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?