When discussing leadership, you just can't go wrong with John Wooden, legendary former coach of the UCLA Bruins basketball team.
In the past four years, I've learned two tools that changed my perspective on management - DISC Profiling and Ken Blanchard's Situational Leadership II (SLII).
Are you stressing over your resume?
Donnie Walsh, General Manager of the New York Knicks (of the National Basketball Association, for those of you who don't follow sports) apparently agrees with Jim Collins.
Collins wrote the bestselling business book "Good to Great" and opens it by saying that "good is the enemy of great".
It's easy to see what he means. A good team or company doesn't want to take the risks necessary to become great.
Sports is a great laboratory for studying management and leadership, because the results are so easily measured and the stakes are so high. Unlike a typical business, in sports the only real success is a championship. Coaches have been dismissed for 'just' getting their teams to the playoffs year after year. Ask Joe Torre, Grady Little, Marty Schottenheimer, or Mike D'Antoni.
A case in point is the New York Knicks. Donnie Walsh is the new GM. Mike D'Antoni is the new coach. Everyone knew that this 08-09 team would be terrible, and would needd to be rebuilt from the foundation.
But a funny thing happened on the way to disaster. Coach Mike got the team playing well. They were 6-3 after 9 games. Fans were excited about the style of play and the playoffs looked within reach... until last Friday.
On Friday, Walsh traded the teams two best players, basically killing the season.
Why?
Because good is the enemy of great. This team was never going to be great. It's too flawed.
If Walsh let the team become good, then it's harder to break it up. The fans would scream.
By breaking it up early, Walsh can maintain the focus on long-term health (in this case, being ready to bid on LeBron James when he becomes a free agent), rather than short-term wins.
Pretty smart, huh?
But also pretty ballsy. Walsh is aiming for great (a shot at a championship), not good (playoff contention)
What about in your workplace?
I'm often surprised by managers who won't release 'so-so' performers to make room for new talent.
"Things aren't so bad," they reason, "We're hitting our targets".
Yeah, and you're setting a ceiling that you'll never break through.
Think about it: where is 'good enough' stopping you from being great?
One of my first managers, Merc Martinelli, taught me a lot about management.
"Yes, I know he has one of the best teams, but what has impressed me about the job Tom is doing is his ability to handle Plaxico Burress and not let it affect the team. He is using a very simple leadership strategy called the “Law of Threes”. On each team there are three types of players. The first are the ones that will do anything that is asked, willing to help the program. The second group are the undecided players, the players that are not sure what to do. And the third are the malcontents. These are the players that want to buck the system all the time, and try to breakdown the team. As a leader, there is a tendency to try and win over the players in group three, by trying to make them happy. But all that does is move the players from group two into group three, and cause you to start to lose the players in group one. What Coughlin has done is focus on group one. He pays no attention to group three and what has resulted is that Plaxico is on an island and no one wants to join him. The team is bigger than Plaxico."
I get nothing for this...
In the midst of some fall cleaning this weekend, I dropped off two big boxes of cd's and dvd's at Rasputin Music.
"Learning about food means eating it, thinking about what you ate, eating things like what you have already eaten in order to contrast one experience with another, and asking questions to determine other information that may help you make sense of your experiences.
This is how learning works. "
"Learning about management means managing people, thinking about the results of managing people, managing people using other tools (or other people) like what you have already used in order to contrast one experience with another, and asking questions to determine other information that may help you make sense of your experiences.
This is how learning works. "
I’m on record as hating, wait, no… make that HATING management books that are written as ‘fables’, ‘parables’, ‘novelettes’, or that look remotely like children’s books.
My skeptic-meter goes straight to red when I see books like “Whale Done”, “Who Moved My Cheese”, “The Offsite ”, “Our Iceberg is Melting”, or any of Patrick Lencioni’s ‘Leadership Fables’ in the business section of my favorite bookstore.
Obviously, that’s my problem, as many love the story format. By not reading these books there’s a risk that I’ll miss out on some good ideas.
In the case of “The Five Dysfunctions of a Team” that’s exactly what happened. I tried to read the book three times, laughed my ass off by the end of page two (and not in a good way), and put the book down. As a result, I missed out on a very useful model.
Fortunately, this Field Guide was released for folks like me.
Title: "Overcoming the Five Dysfunctions of a Team"
Author: Patrick Lencioni
Genre(s): Business, Teams, Training, Facilitation
Summary: to quote the back of the book - "practical guidance for overcoming the Five Dysfunctions"
Favorite Quotes: I'll give you three:
Strengths: The model is clear and intuitive. It resonates. Lencioni gives concrete examples and actions for overcoming the dysfunctions.
Weaknesses: It’s boring, where's the drama? No, I kid… I kid... Seriously - this book is perfect. Pair It with Lencioni’s hugely entertaining DVD and you’ve got a winning workshop for your team.
Conclusion: The ‘Five Dysfunctions’ is one of my (and my clients) favorite workshop tools. This Field Guide delivers the model effectively, with no fat.
Post-it Flags: 21 flags
* Each time I find an interesting quote, model, image, or idea in a book, I mark it with a Post-it flag. The more flags, the more value I found in the book.
It's performance review time at our company - you can smell the fear and depression in the air.
How have we managed to turn something that should be good - some feedback on your performance, a discussion about next year's goals, and a little extra money - into something that almost no one appreciates?
Do you dread performance reviews? Either giving them or getting them?
Well, you don't need to. Here are five steps to making your performance reviews less painful and more productive.
1. Set Expectations in Advance
If you don't do this... don't even bother with the other four steps. It's critical that you let people know what constitutes performance at a 'meets expectations' or 'exceeds expectations' level.
Two cases in point:
One more key point. Make clear that a 'meets expectations' is good!
Grade inflation has pushed us to a point where no one is happy unless they get an 'exceeds expectations'.
Set expectations. It'll save you a lot of trouble down the road.
It depends on how much value you add.
I'll propose this simple litmus test:
Can your job be drawn on a flow chart?
If the answer is 'yes', then I can tell you now that your job is going to be:
Don't believe me? Look at every job you've seen outsourced or offshored.
I'll bet you can draw the tasks of that job in a flowchart.
Now look at the jobs that are 'safe' - most of them can't be flow charted.... yet.
Can you flowchart phone support? Yep, most of it anyway.
Can you flowchart in-store support? Pretty hard to do.
My solution? Flowchart your job and - as the Red Hot Chili Peppers say - "give it away, give it away, give it away now".
Seriously. Then start doing stuff that isn't on the chart and can't be charted.
Then, as soon as you get it structured, give that away, too.
It's time to sail off the chart. We've got to be explorers now.
click image to enlargeRow two lists resources and activities that I leverage in my exploration of these areas.
A number of them, like books, occur in all areas.
Finally, row three lists my offerings or outputs in these areas.
You'll find more information about these from the offerings tab at the top of this blog.
I'm working with a group of directors who are responsible for an area that is tactically focused.
We've been gathering to determine a long-term vision for the team, and they are feeling some frustration during the process.
Now, most vision exercises are frustrating - if not, then you're probably not challenging yourself enough - but this one seems more painful than usual.
Every time we start to break through to a strategic discussion, it seems we can't stay there for more than 15 minutes before one of the members is compelled to dive back into a specific tactical point.
Last week, we discussed the fact that thinking strategically is like a muscle, if you don't use it, it atrophies. One member then suggested working on this for the next 6-9 weeks and you could see rolled eyes and hear some groans.
This prompted a question from me - how many hours a week should a director spend on strategic thinking? 2 hours a week would mark less than 5% of their time (I don't know any Director level employee who puts in less than 40 hours/week - certainly not these guys).
So, is 5% too much? Not enough?
How much time should a director spend?
A manager?
A VP?
A GM?
Who owns strategic thinking? And why is it so hard for most people?
Tell me what you think...
This was the first trip I've made to Singapore since I saw the Gallup Q12 data that showed Singapore having the least engaged workforce in the world.
Marcus Buckingham makes a pretty big deal out of it in his TLC presentation, roughly saying, "When they offer you that great job in Singapore, don't take it".
The statement, like many of Marcus' statements, draws a big laugh (dry British humor wins the day, again).
Gallup reports that only 4% of the Singaporean workforce would call itself 'engaged' (compared to 29% in the US, or 9% in Japan, at the time).
Since I lived in Singapore for two years, everyone asks me, "Is it true? And why?"
Well, yes. The data has the ring of truth to me. Why? I'll try to answer that.
First, I wanted to know how Singaporean workers would respond to the data.
I showed the data to my friends, including the HR director, and asked, "Is it true?"
After a moment of silence, they nodded. "Yes".
Does that mean you shouldn't take the job in Singapore?
Are you kidding? Take the job, I say!!When the management bar has been set that low, you can't fail.
Want to make a difference? Go to Singapore and engage 5% of your employees (or better)...
But there's still the nagging question - Why would only 4% of Singapore's workforce consider themselves 'engaged'?
In 1997, I was managing a young, new Customer Service group in Singapore.
I'm the kind of manager who tries to catch people 'doing good' and then reinforce that behavior, so I walked around a lot, looking for the type of behavior I wanted to see and complimenting it.
More than once, people commented on how much praise I delivered. They weren't used to it. It scared them.
One Monday morning, at a staff meeting, I called out the extraordinary efforts an engineer made to get a specialized oscilloscope from a vendor. This allowed him to fix a difficult issue that was critical to our customer.
This, I said, is the type of initiative that makes us part of the solution, and not part of the problem.
After the staff meeting, my Singaporean manager called me into his office.
"Glenn," he said, "I want to give you some feedback".
Sure.
"We don't give compliments in Singapore. You'll need to stop."
Ummm... please explain.
"Well, if we compliment our workforce, they will think they are good."
Okay, I'm with you so far.
"If they think they are good, they'll want raises and promotions. And then they'll leave."
I see. Let's assume that's true. Let's agree that complimenting will drive out employees.
How is the 'no compliment' scheme working out for you.
Well, turnover in the group at that time was about 20%.
I decided that I couldn't do much worse than that by giving compliments.
I'm a guy who's unafraid of failure. In fact, I welcome failure if I can learn from it.
One thing I can't stand, however, is making the same old mistakes.
If I'm going to fail, I want to fail in new and interesting ways.
So, my manager and I agreed to disagree, and I went on with my positive ways.
Result - in two years. I lost only one employee, who I actually encouraged out (great guy, wrong place).
Note - this pattern repeated itself over the next 5-7 years.
Chinese Manager - high turnover
Western Manager - low turnover
In other words, it wasn't any magic gift I had..... (damn...)
So, what was it?
Over those two years, I interviewed many engineers who wanted to work for me.
I always asked the standard interview question, "Why do you want to work for KT?"
Some answers -
-"You are an American company"
-"You are Caucasian"
-"You are not Chinese"
-"I want to work for a Western Manager"
These responses always came from Chinese Singaporeans, and came often enough to create a pattern.
My read on this?
I think a combination of status, hierarchy, fear, and freedom created a conflict.
The East/West mix of Singaporeans means that hierarchical structures and relationships are often in place, but the workers are westernized enough to not like it.
But not an 'engaged' workforce.
I'm sure there are 100 other reasons for the 4% result.
But I'm also sure that any manager in Singapore who makes an effort to get positive responses from his team on Gallup's 12 Questions will be, as Marcus Buckingham says, 'an employer of choice'.
Everyone 'knows' that Asians don't like change. It's a given, isn't it?
Well, consider this...
When I lead Change Management classes around the world, we do an exercise where everyone has to change 5 things about themselves, then 10 more, then 10 more.
In the US, some attendees will start rolling their eyes right from the start.
In Asia, the attendees dive straight in and enjoy the process.
