Friday, January 22, 2010
What Motivates Staff?
What Does a Positive Leader Look Like?
Positive Leaders:
• aspire to leadership yet maintain humility;
• find mastery in a few areas but value many;
• have a core set of beliefs but embrace the many beliefs of others;
• have clear views and yet are open to the views of others;
• can set a specific direction but have the ability to adapt and adopt;
• have a deep moral structure but hesitate to judge others (as bad or good) too quickly;
• have a wide repertoire of behaviours all of which are authentic;
• speak with their own voice even if representing the position of others;
• embrace paradox with certainty of purpose.
By contrast, failing leaders assume they are the means of success rather than being part of it. The failure results from:
• not using talent and abilities around them;
• directly or indirectly discouraging bad news;
• behaving inconsistently with what they say and with espoused values.
Natural leadership shows up throughout life. People can and do develop into leaders that others will choose to follow. Leadership “competencies” - things that effective leaders do - can be learned. So, true development work must parallel skill or competence acquisition. The result of addressing both is integrity and authenticity.
How do you identify people who are going to make a success of the job?
Looking for the best and the brightest is a good predictor of management, not of leadership success. We should be identifying people who seek development opportunities and grow from them: people who have the ability and desire to learn about self, values and our mental models of the world. Coaching and mentoring have an important role in helping leaders find authenticity.
Never Waste a Good Crisis
In the good times, organisations grow flabby, comfortable and perhaps a little complacent. But recessions provide an opportunity to get back into shape. No matter how big or small your business, it is a time to put right all the profligacy and excess from the boom.
By excess, we mean the likes of exorbitant hires that go wrong; the launching of products that wouldn’t be touched in the lean times; fuelling advertising and marketing campaigns with little regard for return on investment; expanding into territories that haven’t been researched or experienced; or moving into unnecessary and expensive new buildings.
With a recovery ahead, we stand in a transition phase in which few people will resist changes, be they regulators, consumers or your staff. After all, in the teeth of a recession, tough decisions must be made and everyone knows that. With this in mind, never waste a good crisis. Don’t let the opportunity slip to make all the positive changes you have been thinking about but have not been brave enough to implement.
Far too many businesses have become obsessed with tactical cost-cutting, which is often unsustainable and has the corrosive effect of breathing low morale into the workforce. Whether savings are made by doing away with training and development or slashing marketing budgets, it is clear that these measures can only work in the short term.
The answer is to reinvent your business. Start listening to your customers and frontline operators and you will immediately know what the real problems are and how they should be fixed. And if listening to customers is step one on the road to recovery, step two is acting on that information. Businesses can do so much more for their customers and people in a recession than they can in the good times, yet few do.
One of the oldest of adages about corporate culture – that the way staff are treated is the way they will treat customers – has not been lost on the smartest organisations.
Asda has two principles. The first is to offer everyday low prices to everyone. The second is to ask everybody that applies to join the Asda team, “do you love people?” If the answer is no, applicants progress no further.
To sum it up, companies that create positive experiences will reap rewards in the upturn. On the road to recovery, optimism must be a force multiplier. The most lethal combination is a pessimist and a recession. Those that will come out of recession first will be those who act like they can. They will gravitate towards an opportunity, praise their people and continue marketing aggressively. After all, businesses get the recovery that they deserve.
Thursday, January 21, 2010
Determination
Here is the story of Jim Abbott, a man who has battled the odds his entire life. Despite being born with only one hand he was the 15th baseball player to ever make a professional debut in the Major Leagues. His baseball achievements include the Sullivan Award (best amateur athlete in the United States), male athlete of the year for the 1988 Olympic Games and many awards at the University of Michigan, including the Jesse Owens Athlete of the year.
He is an inspiration to all that meet him or have followed his career. More than his no-hitter, his 13 strike out game, a seven game winning streak, overcoming an eleven game losing streak, Jim Abbott became a great baseball player and a great person. He learned to overcome adversity and be an inspiration to those around him.
Helping Leaders Excel Under Pressure
We work with high perfomers to help them understand their character, their thinking preferences, and their learning styles - we do this in order to help them Learn to Practice and identify when their Learning Cycle might "stall". Once high performers are aware of how their preferences and natural strengths can serve and inhibit them, we then work on Practicing to Compete - at this stage we might explore "Building Pressure in Practice", "Building Resilient Self Confidence" or "Decision Making Under Stress". Once we've improved the quality and effectiveness of practice and the tranference of skills into the decision making environment, we work on Competing to Win - here, we "Find Your Performance Edges" and "Establish Your Performance Routine".
For more information on how we help leaders excel under pressure please contact: gavin.hastings@positiveleadership.co.uk
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
Influence
Team Spirit
Determination
Mental Toughness
One of the values of Positive Leadership is Mental Toughness.
There are seven characteristics of mental toughness in the Positive Leadership model. They are a set of behaviours and beliefs about yourself, your work, how you interact. A person who is mentally tough looks at competition as a challenge to rise up to rather than a threat to back down from. Like physical skills, mental toughness can be learned through quality instruction and practice.
The seven characteristics are:
- Competitive
- Confident
- Control
- Committed
- Composure
- Courage
- Consistency
Seize Your Leadership Day: Ann Mulcahy, John Chambers And Jacqueline Novogratz
Here are three great interviews with much to learn.
First up is Anne Mulcahy (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/22/business/22corner.html?_r=2&th=&emc=th&pagewanted=all), chairwoman and chief executive of Xerox Corporation, a company that she took over on the brink of extinction and turned around. “In 2002 this company lost almost $300 million, and by 2006 we were making over $1 billion.” Now that’s a turn around!
When asked what the secret was, Mulcahy said, “It isn’t a secret sauce. It’s actually fundamental communications, in terms of your ability to really get out there and be with your people, tell a story. People really have to begin to believe in a story to get passionate about the direction the company is going in, which hopefully you’ve been able to do through the way you articulate it, simplifying the complex so that people can get their arms around it and see how they can make a difference. There’s nothing quite as powerful as people feeling they can have impact and make a difference. When you’ve got that going for you, I think it’s a very powerful way to implement change.”
Next is a video interview with John Chambers of Cisco Systems (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/video/2009/03/25/VI2009032500990.html?hpid=topnews). The dot com bomb blasted Cisco and Chambers brought it back. In the interview Chambers talks about managing in this downturn, how collaboration is the next phase of management style, change, and identifying market transitions. He also discusses how business leaders need to “earn back” public trust, how he is adapting the company and why he’s “far from a perfect leader.”
Finally is a great McKinsey print and video interview with venture philanthropist Jacqueline Novogratz (http://www.mckinseyquarterly.com/Women_and_leadership_Learning_from_the_social_sector_2336)
“As a venture philanthropist, Acumen Fund’s Jacqueline Novogratz leads entrepreneurial projects across the globe—many of which put women at the helm of emerging local businesses. In this video interview, she discusses her experience developing other women leaders, the way they have shaped her own approach to leadership, and the different leadership cultures she sees at play in the public and private sectors.”
Tuesday, January 19, 2010
Failure
Confidence
Mental Toughness
Hard Work
The Best of Us
Passion
Resilience
Aligning Tasks and Talents
Top-tier leaders take this opportunity to realign talents and tasks in their workgroup. Your team members have specific skills, talents and preferences that you will use to reach your team’s goals. The key to success as a leader of such a workgroup is to help your team members understand these talents and preferences, align their work roles with them, and be sure that the team’s overall skills and talents complement each other.
That sounds like a lot of work. It is a lot of work. Yet one of the best indicators for motivated and engaged employees and high-performance teams is the degree to which team members are able to use their best capabilities on a regular basis.
Fortunately, there are some simple ways to think about talents and preferences that will help you get this initial teamwork set-up done well. William Daniels, a noted author on organisational performance provides a schema you can use to align tasks and talents.
Daniels tells us there are four types of tasks that team members may perform: routine tasks, troubleshooting tasks, project tasks and negotiable tasks. Each type of task is rated as to whether it is of high or low predictability, and of high or low timeliness.
Routine tasks are high in predictability and high in timeliness. Project tasks are high in predictability and low in timeliness - they can be completed in delayed intervals.
Troubleshooting tasks are low in predictability but high in timeliness, and negotiable tasks are low in predictability and low in timeliness.
Let’s take an example. An organisational leader, Susan, recently took an assessment designed to determine these preferences and skills. She found that her ideal work distribution would involve 10 percent routine tasks, 30 percent troubleshooting tasks and 60 percent project tasks.
These results turned out to confirm Susan's own thinking. She is the CEO of an independent organisation, who is exceptionally good at planning and executing project-based work - and she was brought in specifically to help develop and deliver a new strategic plan for her company.
Her role in this mid-sized organisation requires her to periodically "put out a fire" where she can use her troubleshooting skills. She does have responsibility for crafting budgets, financial reports and the like, but has staff to help with other routine task.
If Susan was the type of leader with a high troubleshooting preference, who liked to work in a fast-paced and at times chaotic environment where her ability to respond quickly to urgent needs was necessary, the position as a project planning and execution leader would not fit well with her. Worse, her motivation would quickly tire.
As a leader, you enhance your team’s effectiveness if you are able to match individual work preferences and skills with tasks and workflow. It doesn’t always have to be as good a match as Susan’s, but avoiding critical mismatches is important.
As you set up your year and review the plans with your team, help them express where they feel most energised by their work. An important question to ask is when or where they feel drained or de-energised by a work task. This could be an indication of a talent and task mismatch.
As the new year begins, take the opportunity to increase the performance capability of your team or organisation. Align talents and tasks for success in 2010.
Monday, January 18, 2010
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. on Leadership
LEADING BY EXAMPLE
"People are often led to causes and often become committed to great ideas through persons who personify those ideas. They have to find the embodiment of the idea in flesh and blood in order to commit themselves to it."
"The people are looking to me for leadership - and if I stand before them without strength and courage, they too will falter."
COMMITTED/COMPELLED
"If a man hasn't discovered something that he will die for, he isn't fit to live."
CONFIDENCE
"I have a dream my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. I have a dream today!"
COMPOSURE
"The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy."
CHARACTER
"The time is always right to do what is right."
"There comes a time when one must take the position that is neither safe nor political nor popular, but he must do it because his conscience tells him it is right."
VOCAL LEADERSHIP
"I will not be intimidated, I will not be harassed. I will not be silent, and I will be heard."
SERVANT-LEADERSHIP
"A man all wrapped up in himself is a mighty small package."
CONFIDENCE-BUILDER
"We've got some difficult days ahead. But it doesn't matter with me now. Because I've been to the mountaintop... I've seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people will get to the promised land."
REFOCUSER
"The first thing we must do here tonight is to decide we are not going to become panicky. That we are going to be calm, and we are going to continue to stand up for what is right. Fear not, we've come too far to turn back... we are not afraid and we shall overcome."
TEAM-BUILDER
"A genuine leader is not a searcher for consensus but a molder of consensus."
ENFORCER
"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere."
"We are not asking, we are demanding the ballot... "
"When evil men plot, good men must plan. When evil men burn and bomb, good men must build and bind."
RECOMMENDED READING
For more information on Dr. King and his powerful leadership, read the following:
Martin Luther King, Jr., on Leadership: Inspiration and Wisdom for Challenging Times
The Right Decisions Aren't Always Easy
Maybe Andrea Jung's passion for her work was most visible early last year when the company known for women's cosmetics decided to spend huge bucks on a TV ad during the Super Bowl, the game known for sweaty men and Budweiser.
Her workers were skeptical, Jung said in response to a question from Stanford Graduate School of Business student Roanak Desai on Nov. 9 as part of the student-sponsored View from the Top series. "They said, 'So, Andrea, are we going to advertise skin care or lipstick?' And I said, 'Neither. We’re going to create a testimonial ad of people who've joined us since they got laid off, and they're going to tell their story.'"
Amid the global economic brutality, Avon has been a success story, offering opportunities for women who had been laid off, had seen their husbands laid off, or simply needed extra cash.
"It’s been extremely motivating. There's almost no language necessary when you have the mission and purpose," Jung said. "People really said, 'I can’t get laid off. I am running my own business. They're my own hours.'"
Jung's 10 years as CEO of Avon is the denouement of a personal success story — she is one of the world's most influential female business leaders, serving on the boards at Apple and General Electric, as well as leading Avon. It wouldn't have come about without at least four significant decisions:
— After graduating magna cum laude from Princeton, Jung decided to go into retail rather than something like law or medicine, which didn't exactly thrill her parents, both Chinese immigrants. "I think their first reaction was, 'That wasn't really what we had in mind.' But then the family values set in, which were,'‘No matter what it is you do, you'd better go and be your best.'"
— When Jung got bogged down early in her career, stuck with uninspiring work in retail, her mother told her quitting was not an option. Work through the challenge, and get it done. That's what the family does. That's what Jung did.
— In 1997, when Jung was a top candidate for the Avon CEO job, a 52-year-old man was chosen instead. She thought about going to another company. "A mentor of mine said, 'Follow your compass, not your clock,'" Jung recalled. Her compass told her that Avon was still the place that suited her best. "I loved the company — its mission, its purpose."
Jung says she wouldn't have regretted the decision even if she had never obtained the promotion, but fate soon made the circumstances moot. "It didn't work out for him, so I got the job in 21 months, and the rest is history."
— In 2005, after Avon missed earnings projections a couple of times, a colleague pointed to something AT&T had done: Cutting layers of management to streamline bureaucracy. Jung resisted, but later in the week a trusted advisor told her that she was likely to lose her own job within 120 days, despite her popularity, if she couldn't turn Avon around. The advisor said Jung would end up leading another struggling company where she wouldn’t know anyone, and then have to try to turn that company around. That was a jolt, because her first five years as a CEO had seen substantial growth. "We were booming into emerging markets. We had double-digit top-line growth," Jung said. "I had no idea what the word 'turnaround' meant — and we hit the wall."
After talking with the advisor, Jung realised that if she was going to have to be a tough, budget-cutting CEO no matter what, she might as well do it at the company she loved. So she cut layers of management at Avon, painful though it was. "I had to become a definer of my own second chapter and start it fresh."
That second chapter has seen the most people join Avon in the United States at any time since the 1970s. Jung said managing them is different than in most companies because the salespeople are independent representatives, not employees. "Motivation, inspiration, and influence are very different things than leadership requirements and mandates, and so the skill of communicating is the skill of influencing and inspiring. Mission and values and purpose have been the way that we've effectively kept that sales force going this year."
Looking outside the United States is even more crucial. Jung said that in her industry category 88% of the growth from 2008 to 2013 is projected to come from emerging markets.
One huge market is China, where Avon has more than one million workers. "We decided at Avon not to focus on the eastern seaboard cities, the large cities," she said. "We decided to penetrate the small towns and villages and have a supply chain and infrastructure strategy where the women were because we knew that the government would like the fact that we were offering opportunities for people not to have to bus themselves to work into large cities — that we could create work for them right in the towns and villages where they were."
As her career has evolved, Jung has seen through companies such as Avon and Amazon.com that finding the most effective distribution channels is crucial for retailers.
"He or she who can nail and reinvent the distribution game will win," she said. "Branding is critical — that's the cost of entry now. Distribution is the final trump."
For the complete lecture, see:
Sunday, January 17, 2010
Managing Stress and Improving Performance by Getting Into 'The Zone'
Why?
As our brains are fully engaged—analysing the past, understanding why we have problems, and building scenarios for how to solve problems or exploit opportunities in the future—our eyes turn inwards and we miss seeing the flowers in front of us. We wake up and the next thing we know we are having supper and are ready to retire. Where did the day go? Between our ears; we were busy inside our heads and did not notice the smile of the baby, the blooming of the roses, or how the wind was caressing our faces.
We live physically longer but experience life as being very short. Where did it go? Solving problems. Rushing from one agenda item to the next without a break in between.
All the days start looking the same: get up, run run run, and go to sleep…assuming that you succeed in falling asleep. As this experience repeats itself, eventually you won’t even know what day of the week it is. And soon, unless you look for it, you will not know which calendar year it is. It is not inconceivable that the day will come that we will graduate from school, go to work, and the next thing we will be aware of is that we are gasping for air because we are dying.
Where did life go? Between our ears, with our eyes turned inward. We will have no memory of our children crawling, our loved ones crying, or our garden blooming. We saw these things but did not register them. Our eyes were turned in, watching us deal with the past or future and missing the present.
Many well-meaning people tell us to stop the rush of life and smell the flowers. It is a great recommendation, but how do we go about doing it? Is it as simple as literally canceling a meeting and going for a walk in the garden?
No! We can cancel many meetings, walk in many gardens, and even smell the flowers…and still have no memory of it unless….
In order to smell the flowers we need to see them first, to be aware of their existence and beauty, and for that we need to turn our eyes outward. That will happen when we stop the brain from totally monopolising our awareness.
We need to slow our minds. We need to control our minds rather than be controlled by them.
We need to move from the brain to the heart.
This last point needs explaining: The brain has left and right sides to it. The sides argue with each other. The right side is very liberal, creative, risk taking. The left side is detail-oriented, risk-averse, conservative. They can spend days, years, arguing with each other about what to do and leaving you bewildered. You will act because you have to, but you will be acting full of doubts and thus pregnant with anxiety and worry.
When you listen to your heart it is like being in love. There is no answer to the question “why?” When you make a decision “with all your heart,” there is no doubt, no anxiety, no worry. You feel at peace with your decision.
Granted you should start thinking with your brain; do your due diligence on the subject. But end your internal debate with your heart. To make a final decision let your heart speak.
How will that happen?
Only when you tell your brain that enough is enough and it should “shut up” so your heart can get a chance to have its voice heard. To be freed from the brain master that enslaves you, you need to be “above it,” not let it overcome you and thus drive you. The same is true with emotions. It is okay to have them but they must be under control. And the same applies to your body and its urges.
Who is the boss? You, and “you” is neither the mind, nor the body, nor your emotions. It is above them all. It is your spirit, and the spirit dwells in your heart, while your mind is in your brain and your emotions in your liver.
When we finalise decisions based on what our hearts tell us, we will feel complete. And when that happens our lives, instead of being filled with doubts, will be filled with love. It will be less stressful and more enjoyable. It will feel as though we live longer, with more memories and fewer disappointments.
How can we slow our minds and get all of the above benefits?
Researchers with the Institute of HeartMath (http://www.heartmath.org/) have observed in scientifically controlled studies that we can greatly reduce stress levels and improve our health through intentional emotional management and practicing the simple principles and methods of heart-based living. HeartMath has spent many years developing the tools, techniques and technology to help you practice using your mind to sort out your heart’s intuitive feelings and wisdom from the mind’s noise and auto responses to life’s challenges. Heart-based living helps you learn to live in the now, bringing more of your real self into each moment. Becoming more of who you really are releases inner security, allowing you to relate to life with increased hope and confidence. Increased fulfillment is the result of this process.
One of IHM’s key areas of research has been "heart-rhythm coherence," described in simple terms as smooth, balanced heart-rhythm patterns, which can be measured and viewed by various types of monitors.
Stress, anger, fear, compulsive behaviours and other negative states all are signs of incoherent heart-rhythm patterns and are represented on heart-rhythm monitors by jagged, irregular waves. Fatigue is common among people with such symptoms. Sickness and disease, including numerous heart problems, diabetes, overweight and obesity among other ailments are more likely among people with incoherent heart-rhythms.
In contrast, when you have a coherent heart you are at your best. Stress chemical pathways reverse, paving the way for increased synchronisation between the heart and brain, and in this synchronised state, which athletes call being "in the zone," you can achieve optimal mental clarity, cognitive performance and perception. Energy levels, sleeping patterns, relationships and so much more, including your mental, physical and emotional health, all improve.
Managing Golf's Emotions
describes how golfers benefit from the techniques developed by IHM.
Saturday, January 16, 2010
Encouraging a 'Check-Six' Culture in Business
A wingman watches your back. In Never Fly Solo: Lead with Courage, Build Trusting Partnerships, and Reach New Heights in Business
, Waldo threads real world experiences to encourage the development of a check-six culture. Check-six refers to the six o’clock position where the jet is most vulnerable—the pilot’s blind spot. Waldo says, “There is a limit to how much you can learn on your own. A good wingman will give you mission-critical feedback, catch your errors, ask questions, and propose challenging scenarios to push you to grow in your skills and mental discipline.” Encouraging others to look out for our blind spots requires a great deal of mutual trust. “These trusted partners, male or female, are your wingmen.”
Of course, this means first, not being afraid to acknowledge that you need help and then being able to ask for it. This is all the more difficult if you haven’t built trust in yourself and invested the time to build trusting relationships with others. You’ve got to “walk the flight line.” Get out and build relationships with those people you work with—treating each other as people first and coworkers second. “It’s the relationships we build and the people whom we trust that give us the courage to take risks and make ourselves better.”
By being willing to say, “I don’t know,” or “I messed up,” we create a transparency that will attract others to us and “create the type of environment where people won’t be afraid to make mistakes. They will also be more likely to check your six as well.”
Additionally, we have to keep our “radar sweeping for a wingman, coworker, or peer who may be experiencing a challenging time in her life. Don’t let her get isolated.” Be supportive and find her some help if necessary.” It is the worker that keeps to themselves—trying to fly solo—that check out, become unmotivated, complacent and careless. “Never feeling invested in the company’s mission, they do the minimum, and everyone suffers.”
In today’s environment, communication, feedback, and mutual support are critical Waldo says because:
•Human beings make mistakes.
•We each have a limited perspective.
•We operate in stressful environments that lead to tunnel vision and task saturation.
•Most professionals undervalue communication and teamwork.
•Faulty communication can kill a mission as well as a relationship.
•Errors increase when there is no definable set of teamwork standards and skills.
“An effective check-six environment frees up communication and removes barriers to growth, so that all members of the team feel empowered to speak up and ask questions.” It also builds team confidence.
We all need wingmen and the best way to find a wingman is to be one!
Leading Is Not Easy
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