Don’t bother trying to plan when…
June 9, 2009
Every now and then, a client comes to us asking for a strategic alignment process and we know within a few minutes that it’s the wrong thing to do. Many factors can lead us to that conclusion. Here’s a dead ringer: sometimes the leadership team can’t have a productive conversation, much less a strategic conversation. Sometimes they don’t know each other well enough yet. Often, they know each other too well - and they just plain don’t like each other.
Leaders often chalk this whispered fact up to all sorts of things - “chemistry,” personality, whatever - but a little more digging usually leads to deeper causes. On the path from being a group of individuals to becoming a peak performing team, leadership teams may hit one or more of these predictable landmines:
- Interpersonal landmines: Let’s face it, sometimes there’s good reason not to like each other. Leader A may just prefer to interact differently from Leader B and that may rub both of them the wrong way. Add to that the amazing capacity we humans have for being thoughtless - for saying and doing things that are (sometimes) unintentionally crazy-making for our colleagues. Cap it off with the typically poor ways we handle conflict and (gasp!) hurt feelings at work, and it’s a wonder we get along with anyone.
- Systemic landmines: I worked a while ago with a team who believed that they were all to be stack-ranked at the end of the year and assigned bonuses, raises, and promotion opportunities based on their rankings. Then people wondered why they didn’t trust each other. Hmm… Another classic systemic landmine, especially for technical/staff groups: competing and misaligned stakeholders. Executive 1 tells them to pursue one course of action while Executive 2 advocates another. That can make any team look fouled up.
- Cultural landmines: And here are the sneakiest ones of all - those unwritten rules of behavior some call culture. Just try to create a collaborative plan when the unwritten rules say that you should “salute up” or “compete with peers at all cost.” You could spend days, weeks, or months on the plan, but the back-end execution will be seriously hampered.
Of course, the presence of landmines doesn’t absolve leadership teams from responsibility. Their job is to see the landmines, call them what they are, and de-fuse them. Then they can get on with the productive work of planning the future and bringing it to life.
Success Personified
June 4, 2009
I met up with a former client a few days ago. He has recently taken over operational leadership of a company that until recently had struggled to make a profit. In the last year, it has turned around - despite sailing into the teeth of a lousy economy.
Naturally, I was curious how he did it. Maybe you are too.
Here are a few summary bullet points from our lunchtime conversation. They are simple, but consistent with our experience.
- Get the right people aligned: This leader said something important about his leadership team: they’re all smart people. But just as importantly, they’re all good people. There are few interpersonal turf wars distracting the team. They work hard, debate well, and get on with decisions. He notes that he had to move a few people out when he took over.
- Get focused: My friend’s company is not small, but they aren’t gorillas either. They only have so much time and energy. So after charting a direction, they figured out the few things that would move them along the path and they put real resources behind them.
- Assign nagging rights: This leader assigned a competent leader to keep the overall strategic system moving forward. The group gave that person nagging rights - and he made sure that initiatives got reviewed, timelines got met, and results were achieved.
- Create a winning culture: This one seems soft, but my client talked about it passionately. He insists that one key to their success was a culture that works hard and is supportive at the same time. The company neither grinds its people down, nor does it coddle them. Like most such things, the soft stuff is the hard stuff.
I couldn’t resist a follow-up question as we finished lunch: What was challenging about creating that momentum? I wasn’t surprised by his response: “Just keeping the focus on these few things in the middle of everyday work is a big challenge. It’s easy to get distracted.”
How would you answer that question for your organization?
Sharpening Perception - Some helpful questions
May 14, 2009
As action-oriented people, most leadership teams want to sprint toward getting a plan in place. As one of my retired-executive friends says, “I’m an engineer by training. I want to pour concrete not sit in a room and think…”
It’s understandable, but I’ve come to believe that it’s absolutely imperative for leadership teams acquire perspective before pouring concrete. Otherwise, we might be pouring concrete in the wrong place - or pouring concrete when we should be planting flowers.
Hmmm…. Is this the right thing to do right now?
But gaining perspective is devilishly difficult. My friend and colleague, Linda Lindquist-Bishop recently sent me an op-ed piece from David Brooks in the NY Times. In it, Brooks talks about the challenges we face in perceiving things accurately, especially with the huge increase in available information over the past decade. It used to be that we didn’t have enough information. Now we may have enough information to justify any position we’d like to take, regardless of whether it’s true or not.
This got me thinking about a few questions any leadership team might consider adding into its thinking process as it tries to get perspective and shape plans for the future:
- What are our assumptions and prejudices as we look at our situation? What do we want to be true (even if it strains the facts)?
- What recent events may cloud our judgment? If we took a longer view, what might we see?
- What events have we assumed are root causes of our situation? Are they really causes or just correlations?
- What do we congratulate ourselves for that may have just happened as a result of good fortune/dumb luck? In other words, how have we been successful in spite of our actions vs. because of our actions?
As Brooks says, “The human mind is continually trying to perceive things that aren’t true, and not perceiving them takes enormous effort.” But once the concrete is poured, it takes even more effort to tear it out!
Focus Personified
April 24, 2009
Gym or food packing facility?
This past weekend, I got to see focus in action. But it happened in a very unexpected place - an elementary school gym. Here’s what happened.
We all know the impact of the economic crisis on those of us in the developed world. Millions have lost jobs. Many have lost homes. Nearly all of us have lost significant savings. What’s easy to forget is that people in the developing world have actually gotten hammered far worse. As one person put it recently, “Rich people are inconvenienced by sharp recessions. The poor are crushed.” Millions more people are being thrown into extreme poverty (living on less than $1 per day) as a result of the crisis.
Which leads me back to the elementary school gym. Members of our church were invited to come serve for a 2-hour block this past weekend to help alleviate the crisis for people in the developing world. Specifically, we were asked to come pack meals for children and other at-risk populations in Zimbabwe where a decades-long crisis has turned into hyper-inflation, social unrest, and massive outbreaks of disease.
What can 120 suburban volunteers in Chicago accomplish in 2 hours to address this situation? As it turns out, quite a lot - thanks to focus. We were ably led by a non-profit called Feed My Starving Children. Their whole (focused) mission is to pack and distribute nutritious meals for at-risk populations in the developing world. While they buy the food, the packing is done entirely by armies of volunteers. That’s only possible through impressive focus. Here are just a few things they do to turn grade school kids, gramdmas and everyone in between into relief workers:
- They formulated a nutritious, culturally friendly, non-perishable meal formula with nutritionists from leading food companies.
- They designed a simple, idiot-proof process for taking those raw materials and packaging them.
- They worked out the logistics to take the show on the road, turning many different public spaces into effective food packaging facilities.
- They streamlined the training process so that it can be done in 10-15 minutes.
- They both appealed to like-minded organizations and welcomed all comers, multiplying their workforce by literally tens of thousands. Kids can even have food-packing birthday parties at their facilities.
The result? In two hours (start to finish), our group of 120 packed 36,000 meals. That’s enough to feed 99 children for a whole year. (Oh, and we had fun and our kids learned a great lesson!) All because an organization figured out a model of how to contribute and organized all activity around it. Pretty impressive!
Secrets of a Master Planner - Focus
April 22, 2009
What makes the difference between a good idea and great results? Though there are probably many good answers, I’ve come to believe that focus ranks right up there. I’m not alone. David Maister, a leading consultant to professional services firms, succinctly says “strategy means saying ‘no’.” Jim Collins talked years ago about the hedgehog principle.
Tom Paterson, a veteran of 30+ years putting Peter Drucker’s principles to work in organizations, puts it this way:
Success is not unlimited opportunity, but focused possibilities.
In other words, achievement comes from picking the best from all of the good options, and aligning massive amounts of resources behind those few things. When Drucker observed successful leaders, he noted that most of them focused nearly all of their discretionary time and energy on one key initiative for a matter of months (or years).
Simple, yes. Easy, no. Every era provides its own temptations for dragging us away from focus. Our era is not quite like Drucker’s hay-day when letters were typed and overnight mail/faxing were the huge communication innovation. On a micro-level, I see leaders constantly interrupted by email alerts dinging, Blackberrys buzzing, cell phones ringing, Twitter tweeting. It’s hard to have a focused hour these days, let alone a focused year.
Add to that our current economic crisis - for many leadership teams I’m working with, the thought of focusing on something is attractive but elusive right now. It’s like someone came in and threw their whole chessboard on the ground. The game pieces are scattered. They’re not even sure what game to play now, let alone where to focus.
But before we dismiss Tom’s pithy statement as irrelevant, perhaps we should ask a couple of questions:
- Is it really true that our time is that different from the days of Drucker, Paterson, Collins, and Maister? If so, how is it different?
- Do the challenges of our time make focus less relevant or more? What is the alternative?
- And practically speaking, what can we do to get the focus that will help us re-gain traction? What can leaders do to spur momentum?
I’m curious about your responses…
Dirty Word #22 - Innocence
April 15, 2009
I’m going to take a break today from writing about strategy, momentum, and performance. That’s because I saw something today that got my attention - and perhaps goes a little deeper than just getting stuff done.
Most of you are familiar with Americon Idol, a show that entertains both through identifying talent and by finding people who are willing to embarrass themselves in front of millions. In fact, the shows where the vastly under-talented sing before a panel of three paid-to-be-cynical judges often score very high in ratings. It’s like watching a train wreck with no blood.
England has its own version of the show, Britain’s Got Talent, and Simon Cowell brings his caustic wit to that panel as well. This past weekend, Susan Boyle, a 47-year-old single woman from northern England got her turn on the show. From the moment she walks on stage, you assume it’s a classic American Idol set-up - that she will embarrass herself and perhaps show herself to be totally deluded about her talent.
Boy, was that panel (and packed house audience) in for a surprise. If you haven’t seen this performance, I dare you not to click here and watch it. Better than that, I dare you not to be moved by her talent.
Even more, perhaps we should be moved by the dynamics behind the interaction. Susan doesn’t fit the American Idol/Britain’s Got Talent stereotype for stardom - young, beautiful hotties. We can laugh at the astonished reactions of the panel. But I admit I’m a little uncomfortable that my own pre-suppositions about Susan were far from complimentary as I watched her stride out onto the stage. I was squirming and thinking to myself, “She can’t be serious…”
She was very serious.
What can we learn from this?
- Don’t judge a book by its cover. This is the obvious point. Beauty comes in many different packages.
- As we lead, we need to restrain our temptation to judge. This is true about our knee-jerk reactions to people, ideas, organizational models. Would a second look lead us to see something better and deeper?
- Is innocence actually strength in disguise? What strikes me about Susan Boyle is that she just loves singing. She was confident but had no chip on her shoulder. She seems very comfortable in her own skin even when others dismissed her. In a world (and TV series) full of schemers, Susan just went out and did what she does every week in the church choir. What would happen if we approached each other with a similar lack of pretense?
What else can we learn from this video? How does it apply to our roles as leaders in organizations?
Ending? Beginning? Or Both?
April 2, 2009
ADP released statistics that we all intuitively expected this week: job loss data shows that layoffs are continuing at a very high pace in the US economy. Most organizations have experienced lay-offs and it’s very likely more will be coming.
What we may never see in the statistics is the loss of productivity surrounding these moves. We can quantify cost savings, but how do you put a number on the hours spent by leaders making difficult staffing decisions or the anxious days spent by employees thinking about, whispering about, and txting about the chances they may be let go. The whole exercise, while often necessary, can paralyze the organization.
I was talking with a leader recently whose company was in the middle of this process. They had identified the people who would leave and the date it would happen. Now everyone was just nervously waiting for the event itself. In a moment of honesty, this leader finally said something like, “I’m just looking forward to it being over.”
It’s understandable. We want to believe as leaders that once we get past the necessary, but unpleasant task of lay-offs, we can get back to normal - like somehow “real work” has simply been put on hold and we’ll go back to how things were before with just a few less people.
Unfortunately, that’s not the way I think it works. Yes, there’s a momentary sigh of relief once the layoff event has passed. Leaders can stop feeling awkward around their direct reports. Employees can stop looking over their shoulders (for now). But then reality hits. All of that anticipation often leads to a loss of momentum. The remaining crew is on the boat, but the wind has died down significantly.
Like the situation with our global economy, leaders can make this situation better or worse by their actions. A few things they must do to get the ship moving again:
- Tell the truth - People want to hear good news and we should give all that we can. But one core question the remaining staff is asking is “Do these leaders have credibility? Do I trust them?” Balanced, truthful information (with as much disclosure as is appropriate) goes a long way to re-building trust that may have been bruised during the past few months.
- Re-Focus - A client of mine jokes that he’s been told to “do more with less” so many times that he would like to meet Les. Yes, there was probably some fat in the organization before. But asking people to run the same business with a fraction of the resources eventually destroys a leader’s credibility. Better to be realistic, acknowledge that the organization will simply have to stop doing some things, and focus people on what is vital for the future. This may require getting your leadership team together and making tough strategic decisions. The alternative isn’t pretty.
- Turn up the feedback - John Grau, my first boss, liked to say, “In the absence of data, people make up their own.” This may be even more true in tough times. So go on an intentional hunt to find progress and recognize it. Help people see both the signs of progress and any causes for concern. But by all means don’t retreat to your office. Yes, leaders get tired too - but this is a time where their energy matters more than ever.
Lay-off’s (and other cost measures) are an ending - but in significant ways they also signal a beginning. What other high-gain actions do you think leaders should take in times like these?
Dirty Word Re-visited - Mistakes
March 31, 2009
Unless you live in a very different world than I do, you have probably noticed one of the dominant reactions to our times: fear. If you’re an employee, you may fear the possibility of that unplanned visit by the HR team. If you’re a boss, you may fear the directive to trim yet more cost from your area of responsibility. If you’re a consultant, you may fear that meeting with a client or prospect when they tell you they just don’t have the funding to do your project.
All of those circumstances can lead people to especially fear mistakes, and this can be a real problem for leaders. Instill a deep fear of mistakes in your team and you just might keep an already faltering organization stalled for some time. Here’s a story to illustrate:
I have a friend named Shaun who runs a very unique program at a Chicago-area high school. He is a chef by training, and attended the prestigious Culinary Institute of America (kind of the Harvard of chef schools). The guy can cook. But he’s chosen to put his skills to work teaching high school students how to run a first-class food operation. In fact, they run a full restaurant at their high school and serve top-notch meals to faculty and staff. And you thought extended summer breaks were the best part of teaching!
A graduate of his program was accepted to an elite chef school and sent to Spain to apprentice under one of the top chefs there. On her first night in the kitchen, she was handed an order of chicken and told to put the appropriate sauce on it. Unfortunately, the instructions were given in Spanish and this young lady spoke no Spanish: nada. She looked around, took her best guess as to which sauce to use and finished the dish.
Much to her chagrin, her immediate supervisor looked at the dish in horror: she had finished this chicken dish with chocolate sauce. The supervisor showed the dish to the head chef. He looked at the dish and the young American chef waited for the inevitable Gordon Ramsey-like explosion. She mentally had her bags packed for a return trip in disgrace.
Instead, the chef smiled and said, “You will do well. You took initiative. I would much rather you take initiative and make mistakes sometimes than that you wait to be told what to do.” The dish had to be trashed and started over, but the chef had learned something important about his young student.
“The initiative is marvelous. The chocolate chicken - not so much…”
So as leaders, now more than ever, we must find ways to encourage initiative and courage even when they cause mistakes. Yes, we should watch to see if team members can learn from and anticipate future problems. But courageous (imperfect) action almost always beats fear. Who needs some recognition for taking initiative despite fear in your world?
Stress Test Revelations
March 16, 2009
Everyone seems to be getting stress tests these days, not just major banks. Practically every organization is facing circumstances that will reveal underlying fundamental health. That health comes in many different facets - financial, strategic, and operational. In the Fast Company article I wrote during our last recession, I wrote about leadership lessons I learned during that time.
Here’s one more that I’m noticing these days as my team works with senior leadership teams facing strategic challenges: These times will reveal the mettle of your leadership team itself.
A recent email from a friend of mine brings this to light. She is a world-class sailor who has competed on a team that has won many of the major prizes in their class. In a recent regatta, they had a complex maneuver that went disastrously wrong in the middle of a race. Unlike many teams (sailing or otherwise), this team didn’t implode or avoid thoughtful review after they limped into the finish line. Instead, they consulted their on-board video footage of the 15-second incident and spent two hours reviewing the maneuver in excruciating detail. Each person got time on the hot seat, examining how his/her actions contributed to the situation and how they could perform better next time.
In most executive teams, this sort of candid review would be flat-out impossible - team members would be incapable of honest, direct review of a mistake without feeling threatened. So too often, leadership teams just walk around the mess or spend a lot of time privately assigning blame. For the leader, this preserves superficial peace. But everyone knows that it erodes the ability to perform over time.
Here’s how my friend describes the difference in this championship team:
Our team debriefs are such a testimony to the power of feedback. There is a school of thought that ‘learning from experience’ is enough. Be diligent in your own reflection and ‘make sure you learned the lesson’ whatever it is.
But there is SO much more to be gained if you are in a trust based - high communication environment where you can generate critical and constructive feedback. Adding the perspective of others - to put the pieces together to create a bigger picture - brings a whole new level of understanding and solution.The challenge is - that you have to have the relational trust and respect among those participating in the ‘feedback’ - or it won’t be productive. (emphasis mine)
Now before anyone thinks, “That’s fine, but it’s just a bunch of mumbo jumbo about trust. We’re dealing with strategic issues here,” let me add my friends conclusion.
The upside of being on our team is we can pull off maneuvers which other boats can’t due to our communication, timing, and crew work.
In other words, they sail faster and win more trophies!
Today’s environment can help us to assess many things about our organizations. The waters are stormy. More than ever, we need to be adept in the hard skill of getting our leadership teams to ruthlessly face the facts while fostering trust and respect.
Leader’s Job 1: Define the Win
March 11, 2009
Hmmm… How do we get to this exit?
Most of the business community is playing defense right now. With seismic shifts in the financial markets, stunning changes in consumer behavior, and layoffs all around, it’s easy to see why. No wonder so many people are looking over their shoulders.
With that trend comes a tendency toward confusion and drift in our organizations. For instance, I was speaking recently with a senior executive who had recently taken on responsibility for a critical strategic function in his company. As he spoke with team members, he realized that they were pretty demoralized but he couldn’t immediately see why. Then it hit him - they had been working hard for over a year on high-profile projects, but they had never really understood what success looked like. As a group of high achievers, they found this extremely frustrating. They didn’t know if or when to celebrate, so the job had just turned into a long slow slog.
As I work with senior leaders and their teams, I’ve come to believe that this is one of the most important (and surprisingly, neglected) roles of a leader - to define the “win.” People desperately want to know what success looks like. Yes, they want to know so that they can see if/when they may receive a bonus or promotion (or in today’s world, keep their position). But even more, the people you really want on your team - the ones who have a self-motivating engine - just get off on achieving success. And most of those high-achievers are very self-critical. If you don’t help them identify and celebrate the achievement of a tangible goal, they will usually feel like they could/should have done more.
In times like these, it’s hard for leaders to step aside long enough to define the win - beyond “survive!!” But it may just be more important now than it ever has been.