http://www.sandiego6.com/story/what-are-the-real-rules-of-the-workplace--20130528 |
Book Review of Cy Wakeman’s Reality Based Leadership
“I play favorites and that’s OK”
“Every business wants aggressive agenda’s with limited resources. This is called capitalism. Every year when the aggressive agenda comes down we act shocked. Why?”
The above are two quotes from the keynote speech that CY Wakeman gave last year at the Minnesota State SHRM Conference. Although speaking to an HR audience, her book and key note titled “Reality -Based Leadership” is very much applicable to the average HR pro.
Any of us have the opportunity to demonstrate leadership by pushing accountability and results. An important theme in Cy’s book is that many of our problems are self-created because we don’t confront reality, instead we sit there and complain about why something can’t work. Cy suggests we can make ourselves and our teams happier by confronting reality: stop thinking about why it won’t work and figure out how it can work.
That sounds like a pretty universal message and is one of the top reasons I loved this book: there is a lesson here for everyone: leaders, HR pros and employees.
Cy walks us through finding peace at work (that is the facing reality part), restoring sanity to the workplace, and leading your team to results in an engaging and easy-to-read style.
Many books advise leaders to “value all opinions,” and “treat everyone equally” Cy eloquently and succinctly argues against those premises. When she advocates playing favorites she isn’t suggesting discrimination or favoring your friends. Instead, she encourages you to reward the truly valuable employees on your team. Only by having the courage to differentiate can we see great results.
Maybe you’ve heard that before? Or maybe you think that is “pie in the sky” and can’t be accomplished by mere mortals? Cy would disagree with that and arms you with a number of tools, access to extras such as podcasts on her website and some very practical advice for dealing with different situations.
In one example Cy walks the reader through setting expectations with a resistant employee. She starts out with setting the agenda, keeping the conversation on task, questions to ask, and setting up a follow up plan. Keep in mind the only work you do in this example is meeting with your resistant employee, setting expectations, explaining the shortcomings you see and having the employee draw up a plan to address those issues.
Overall, this is a great book for anyone to read, but will be especially helpful for leaders and HR. The rest of the book is full of good information, examples from work and research and practical advice. I would recommend this book to anyone who is looking for guidance on leadership and team building. |
In a roundabout way, this post is a book review. It started with my wife gifting me a book – Reality-Based Leadership – that she purchased for me after hearing the author, Cy Wakeman, speak at a CORENET Women’s Conference in Dallas two weeks ago. As is said, it was a wonderful read.
After reading Cy’s book, the last few evenings have found me slowly sorting through my small library of business books. In the beginning my objective was twofold – first to compile ideas and best practices associated with a client’s new marketing initiative, and secondly, and more subconsciously, to compare and contrast the values offered in these books to the one I had just finished. While the first objective was accomplished quickly, I continued to page through the volumes to rekindle my memory of the core messages in each and to decide where to “park” Reality-Based Leadership.
Over the years I have amassed quite a collection of “business how to” books. All offered the author’s unique spin of some aspect of business leadership, strategy, culture, sales, marketing or communications – my professional passions. All made valid points and added clarity and insights to a business issue. The usual suspects are prominently featured on my shelves – and I am sure on your shelves as well – including Peters, Drucker, Collins, Stack, Mandino and many dozens of authors whose last names are less well known.
I don’t use the Dewey Decimal System in my library. I assign books into one of three sections:
The Best of the Best
Issue- or Technical Specific Resources
All the Rest
Let me cut to the chase. I am placing Cy Wakeman’s book in The Best of the Best section, and here is why. I applaud her take on leadership. As the name on her book states, it is reality-based. Cy makes a compelling case about “ditching” the drama in the workplace, about focusing on the business of business and on performance. Her book is filled with real-life anecdotes and a wonderful sense of pragmatism that resonates with me. To Cy, reality is about minimizing the negative emotional components – not tolerating the ego, the drama. The marketplace is dynamic and business must be as well to effectively compete. People (employees) are emotional, and it is easy to react to dynamic changes defensively, in a negative emotional manner. But we can choose not to.
We can lead and craft a positive, fun-filled corporate culture that embraces best practices, accountability, performance and actions that drive value to the customer.
I encourage you to read her book. I think you might park it in your library where I did – in The Best of the Best. |
Cy Wakeman:
“Change is not an event to be managed but a psychological transition to be led. To be successful in making an impact, a leader needs to establish a willing group of supporters by creating a compelling vision and capturing the hearts and minds of a core group of people. A leader fails when he or she tries to implement a great plan with an average team of uninspired and unwilling participants. Great leaders tend to the talent first, sorting out the team going forward not by their skills but by their willingness to buy into the overall plan for change. Griffin over-managed and under-led his team, focusing on redesigning organizational structures, cost-cutting measures, and the details of the business rather than on the people. More than anything else, even pleasing people, a leader needs to bring together a group of talented and willing participants.” |
Title: Reality-Based Leadership: Ditch the Drama, Restore Sanity to the Workplace, & Turn Excuses Into Results
Author: Cy Wakeman
Publisher: Jossey-Bass, 2010
ISBN-13: 978-0470613504, 168 pages
Drama is emotionally expensive. Making up stories based on judgments about your circumstances is human nature, but those stories chew up time and energy and warp your decisions. Leadership consultant Cy Wakeman presents a simple but powerful process for clearing away blame, excuses and unenthusiastic performance. Much of Wakeman’s advice is common sense, in keeping with her “reality-based” outlook. She challenges commonly held beliefs about employee management, most notably the idea that the workplace is a democracy. getAbstractrecommends her hard-nosed insights to leaders who are ready to conquer the drama.
Maybe it’s all in your head
Imagine yourself as an employee whose managers just promoted a co-worker who flattered the boss. You work harder, so you feel snubbed. In your mind, your workplace rewards political connections and ignores the people, like you, who contribute the most. But your conclusion is not “reality-based.” You live inside a story that you have created, and – like most other people – you act according to your beliefs, not the facts. Your emotional reactions to your workplace circumstances provide the raw material for your story about them.
“Nothing would get done around here if it weren’t for me,” “I’m underpaid for what I do” and “My co-workers don’t appreciate me” are all typical self-constructed narratives. But work’s not making you crazy, you are. Seeing things as they are is one thing and imbuing reality with meaning is another. When you judge other people’s motives and make assumptions about the causes and effects of their actions, you create an expensive productivity drain.
The most common stories that people make up star themselves in the role of victim. This “learned helplessness” limits their potential more than any external obstacle. People’s stories are familiar and make them feel safe, even if their tales also make them miserable. Blaming others for negative circumstances is an excuse for doing nothing about them. Modern workplace wisdom says that listening to employee complaints is important. But too much listening only magnifies and reinforces employees’ belief in learned helplessness. The antidote to the victim mind-set is “personal accountability.” Psychologists have found that perfection doesn’t lead to happiness; happiness derives from taking responsibility for what happens in your life.
Fact from fiction
Quit “arguing with reality.” Often the stories you believe are worse than the facts. Perhaps the sales office sent in a new order but neglected to include necessary information, so the order is incomplete. Missing data doesn’t have a hidden meaning; information is just facts. But you start thinking that the salespeople are too lazy to do their jobs and that you have to pick up their slack, and then your mood and mind-set sour. Motivated by anger, you’re likely to be unhelpful, unproductive and rude.
To determine what you believe, begin by listing the facts you know about the situation. Are the salespeople really lazy? They sold something, so somebody’s working. Who do you – as a manager or an employee – become in your story if you choose to believe it? If there is no story, how can you remedy the problem of the missing data? If you are convinced your story is right, you might send the order back to sales, delaying it. That means the customer will suffer for the sake of your self-satisfaction. Or you could deal with the facts, and not the story, by just calling the sales department to request the missing information. That’s a win-win outcome. Take your story out of the mix and what remains are the facts plus two questions: “How can I help?” and “What is the very next thing I can do to add value right now?”...
Click here to read on and receive a free summary of this book courtesy of getAbstract, the world's largest online library of business book summaries. (Available through January 19, 2011.)
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11 Warning Signs Your Career Has Stalled
By Charles Purdy, Monster Senior Editor
Your career can lose power for many reasons: a lack of opportunities, industry changes and plain old boredom are just a few of them.
Are you wondering whether your career has stalled? Here are some of the top warning signs, according to experts:
1. Your role and responsibilities haven't changed in a few years or more.
2. You've bounced from employer to employer without much change in job title or salary.
3. You can't remember the last time you learned something new about your industry or field.
4. People hired after you have been promoted faster than you.
5. You're not invited to important discussions or meetings of the kind you used to attend.
6. You have fewer job duties than you used to.
7. Your performance reviews contain terms like "consistently meets expectations" or "adequate performance."
8. No one at work asks for your help -- or no one in your professional network asks for advice.
9. You dread going to work in the morning.
10. Your manager and coworkers stop communicating with you -- in general, your phone rings less and you get fewer emails.
11. You spend a lot of time complaining about work, or and when you tell stories about work, you are the story's "victim," not its hero. Sound familiar? Never fear -- there are plenty of ways to get your career back in the fast lane. Here are some ideas:
Talk to Your Boss
A first step is to address problems head-on. For instance, if you've been stalled in the same position at the same employer, request a copy of the title hierarchy and job descriptions in your organization, says Debra Yergen, author of the Creating Job Security Resource Guide. “Work with human resources and your boss to find out what steps you need to take to move from where you are to the next step up,” she says.
Alternatively, tell your boss you're ready for new challenges and new assignments. If you've been quietly doing your job and keeping your head down, he may not realize that you're feeling unfulfilled.
Ask for What You Need
Alan G. Bauer, president of recruiter Bauer Consulting Group, says you can ask your manager for tips on what you need to improve. Also, he says you can ask your HR department what's going on with an overdue raise. "If your merit increases are lower than your coworkers', there may be an issue,” he says. “The company budgeted a certain amount for salary increases -- if you aren't getting your share, you need to find out why."
Brad Karsh, founder and president of the career-services firm JobBound, says to look for ways to be more effective, efficient and strategic. “Ask your manager about the possibility of a rotational program to see the inner workings of the company and gain fresh perspective and new ideas," he says.
Take Initiative
Karsh also suggests figuring out what keeps your boss up at night. “Find a way to solve that problem,” he says. “You need to be a key player."
You can also take some classes or work toward a degree, suggests Mary Greenwood, author of How to Interview Like a Pro.
Or consider on-the-job training. "If you value continuous learning, you can volunteer for a project that will require new skills,” says executive coach Elene Cafasso. “Perhaps you can transfer to another area of thebusiness or learn what's needed to back up a coworker."
Rick Dacri, author of Uncomplicating Management, suggests getting actively involved in a professional association. “Get a leadership role, speak before the group or write an article for the newsletter, for instance," he says.
Adjust Your Attitude
Negativity is one of the worst career killers. "If you are spending a great deal of your energy moaning and whining about your circumstances, it's time to try and make a new start before you become so emotionally expensive that the organization feels the need to cut you," says Cy Wakeman, author of Reality-Based Leadership.
Identifying your dissatisfaction and taking steps to resolve it is the first step. The next step may be toupdate your resume and start looking for a new job. "It may be that hanging on to an unhealthy or unproductive employment relationship is what's holding you back,” Yergen says. “I've witnessed a handful of people this year who have identified their dissatisfaction and set a date to quit -- even without a job waiting -- and found something just before or just after the date of their resignation. Sometimes you just have to take that step."
If your career is stalled, perhaps a new career is the right answer. Start exploring options by reaching out to your professional network, job shadowing or talking to your HR department about an internal transfer. |
Every workplace has them, but it’s hard to deal with bullies at work because more often than not, they are in positions of power.
It may be the boss, or someone who has been there for a long time and is just part of the system.
My mate, consultant Rowan Manahan says bullying has become worse in a tough economy because everyone is under more pressure.
What makes it even more complicated is that the issue of bullying is a rather murky area. What might be considered normal behaviour for some is considered bullying by others.
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If you are any doubt over what constitutes bullying behaviour, the CareerBuilder site identifies some common examples: your comments are dismissed or not acknowledged, you are falsely accused of mistakes you didn’t make, you are forced to do work that isn’t your job, there are double standards for you and other workers, you are given looks that should be in a scabbard, people gossip about you, your boss runs you down in front of other workers, belittling comments are made about you at meetings and people steal credit for your work.
According to a Career Builder survey, women reported a higher incidence of being treated unfairly at the office - 34 per cent of women said they had felt bullied in the workplace compared to 22 percent of men. And age also plays a part with 29 percent of workers aged 55 or older and 29 percent of workers aged 24 or younger, reporting they had been bullied on the job.
For most, telling people in HR is no solution. They are unlikely to help because HR units are usually pretty political and won't rock the boat. Besides, HR tends not to be that high up the chain of command in many organisations.
According to the Workplace Bullying Institute, HR hardly ever fixes the problem, and only manages it correctly about 3 per cent of the time. I haven’t heard of any case where HR actually resolved the problem.
Laurie Tarkan at BNet recommends you take things into your own hands, first by identifying what you’re experiencing and giving it a name. Emotional bullying, harassment, abuse - it’s all important because that tells you it’s not your fault. She also recommends getting some help. It could include everything from talking to a counsellor to seeking advice from a doctor to make sure you are not suffering symptoms of stress like hypertension.
Research your legal options. That includes reading the company’s internal policies, particularly on areas like harassment, just to see if there are any violations you can report. She recommends documenting what economic impact the bully has had on the company, citing what it has cost the company in terms of lost productivity and absenteeism. If you report the bully, report the person to the highest level in the company, which immediately eliminates HR.
Start a job search and be prepared to leave if management sides with the bully.
Psychologist Michelle Callahan has a number of suggestions that include: not getting emotional about the situation, building a support network, seeking some help, and most importantly, not expecting you’ll be able to change the bully. In most cases they simply won’t accept that they have a problem.
The Human Resources Degree blog has several good ideas. One includes confronting the bully based on the assumption that most bullies deep down are cowards and can’t handle confrontation. The other thing it suggests is to ignore them because when they see they’re not getting under your skin, they won’t derive as much pleasure from the bullying.
Cy Wakeman in Fast Company has a completely left of field approach. He recommends getting inside the bully’s head instead of wasting time and energy resisting them. This involves making some connection but not too much - just enough to neutralise them.
“To remain in a peaceful place and not be rattled by another co-worker, regardless of their assumed motive, is to assure them that you care about them, but you are unable to participate in the conversation or grant their request,’’ Wakeman says.
“Repeat yourself often and diffuse the manipulative co-worker. So stop wasting time hovering in the corner and stand up for yourself. You’ll feel better, and the office bully may turn into a co-worker you'll want on your team.”
Have you had to deal with a bully and if so, how did you fare?
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By John Rossheim, Monster Senior Contributing Writer
It’s a nightmare scenario for all too many Americans.
You fall ill, say, with cancer. You undergo months or even years of debilitating treatments and finally emerge with a good prognosis. Or maybe a family member becomes catastrophically ill, and you take an extended leave from your career to be the caregiver.
Meanwhile, you exhaust your Family and Medical Leave Act benefit, quit your job and find yourself in a deep financial hole. Now that you’re able to work, you need to land a well-paying job pronto.
Your dilemma: How do you explain this employment gap to hiring managers, without compromising your privacy, exaggerating your return to health or leaving lingering doubts that could taint your candidacy?
“You’re walking a fine line of integrity,” says Shawn Desgrosellier, CEO of recruiting firm Vitality Group. “What do you say and not say? What can help you and what can hurt you?”
However you choose to deal with this difficult job-hunting circumstance, you must face it head-on. “It’s bad if you come in unprepared to talk about the medical issue,” says Cy Wakeman, an independent human resources consultant.
With that in mind, we share some experts’ opinions on what to say to employers and how to shift the emphasis to your qualifications for the job at hand.
What to Say About Your Medical Leave
First, keep it simple, advises Desgrosellier. “Say, ‘I had a medical issue and took care of it, and now I’m ready to get back to work,’” he says. “You need to think about the issue in advance and almost script it out for the interview.”
You can boost your appeal as a candidate by bringing forth relevant facts about your leave that aren’t too personal. “Do get detailed about details like the dates of your time off work,” Wakeman says. “But don’t get specific with the medical issue. Instead say, ‘I made the very difficult decision to leave my job; now I’m eager to get back to work.’”
You have the right to draw a line on revealing personal medical information that is not critical to the specific job you’re applying for. “The Americans with Disabilities Act certainly protects the prospective employee from having to divulge sensitive information,” says Michael Hoffman, director of the Center for Business Ethics at Bentley College.
But be aware that prospective employers may weigh the bottom-line consequences of hiring someone who’s had a serious illness. It may be unethical or even illegal, but some employers, especially smaller ones, could consider how adding you to their health insurance rolls might drive up the group premium.
Which brings us to this hard truth: “Being forthright may backfire,” says Desgrosellier. So be honest, but try not to say more than you need to.
Be Bold About Highlighting Your Strengths
With skill and luck, you’ve been able to swiftly put the issue of your medical leave to rest with the prospective employer. Now it’s time to switch gears and promote your superior qualifications for the job. “Your candidacy has everything to do with your work history, whether you’ve worked for the right companies and had the right responsibilities and success,” Desgrosellier says.
Do beware of overpromising what you can deliver given your physical and mental condition. “The prospective employee does have a responsibility to respond truthfully when asked whether he can do the job and the tasks that go with it,” Hoffman says.
Answering Objections, Dispelling Doubts
Do you worry that your prospective employer still harbors concerns about your health? “Ask the employer, ‘What have I left you to wonder about?’” advises Wakeman. “Don’t defend against the employer’s concerns; acknowledge and respond to them.”
And accept this reassurance: Even leading candidates rarely come to a job opportunity entirely unencumbered. “Human resources isn’t looking for a risk-free bet; it’s looking to know and mitigate the risk,” Wakeman says.
Finally, be mindful of the employer’s point of view. “The employer is in a difficult position,” Hoffman says. “The company has responsibilities to stockholders, and is responsible for the safety of other employees and even customers.” These responsibilities may come into play if the employee falls ill again at work, for example.
Leave to Care for a Family Member
When your leave is for the sake of a sick relative, the job-hunting issue is perhaps less difficult.
In the case of a family member’s illness, be specific about your plan, Wakeman says. “[The employer will] want to know what you’ll do if you need to be out of work again [to provide care],” he says.
What if a family member has succumbed to a long illness? Wakeman advises: “If a relative passed away, it’s OK to say, ‘I did what I had to do, and now I’m clear. I didn’t want to cheat my employer.’”
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Cy Wakeman, President of Cy Wakeman, Inc. has a unique background combining four successful business start ups with 18 years of management/management consulting in a variety of arenas, including manufacturing, government, technology, and healthcare. She is a well-known thought leader, a featured blogger for FastCompany.com, and a contributing author for newspapers and online publications, including New York Post, Women's Health, and Entrepreneur.com. Cy has led strategic planning efforts, culture-change initiatives, talent-assessment/succession planning projects, provided executive coaching, and conducted business process re-engineering efforts, to name just a few of her accomplishments. She brings her hard-hitting philosophy "Reality-Based Leadership" to organizations that want to break through their reasons, stories, and excuses to develop innovative solutions to long-standing issues.
MY day started as a CY day (pronounced "sigh") ..... a sledgehammer "Tough Love" message from Cy Wakeman: I am at fault for the unsuccessful history of technology/business application Strategic Partnerships. I am the reason why I have no chair at the Executive Planning table. Everytime I think of my 'partners' as Jerks or Idiots, I contribute to the problem. And while I make this message sound harsh, Cy delivered it with her engaging "c'mon... I've been there too.... you know I'm right" manner. Rueful chuckles around the room.... yeah, ok. Not always, but maybe (gulp) I AM guilty as charged. (just a guess, but I think the guy ahead of me is too)
Cy acknowledges that she assigns appropriate Tough Love accountability to every level and role within organizations. Because we - the collective "we" - of dysfunctional/ stagnant/ pedantic / insert.adjective.here Strategic Partnerships that do not work are accountable to do better.
In most cases, the "we" of technology management have not made the paradigm shift from Decision Makers for business application solutions to Consultants. Only through De-personalizing (i.e. eliminate "we/they" thinking) is conflict resolution handled by Professionals. Roles and responsibilities throughout the strategic planning process of "Current State > Desired State > Strategy > Action > Review" must have Clarity. Additional Elements of Alignment for all involved include participation, vulnerability, commitment, and honesty.
Here's a thought: always ask yourself "Does My Opinion Count?". Well, that depends upon your role. Pre-Decision stage, are you the Decision Maker? Then - absolutely! Consultant? Most likely yes. Involved to Be Informed? Maybe, maybe not. Engage with caution.
Post-Decision everyone has the same role: Do whatever it takes to make it work.
Cy uses real-life situations to make her points. When asked about how to deal with ‘difficult partners', she reminds us that the only change "I" am guaranteed to have the authority to make is how "I" handle it.
Want to influence Decision Makers? Be a Consultant. Provide multiple solutions from which to choose, along with the cost/benefit of each. Someone delaying a decision? Translate the delay into dollars. Make sure he/she knows how many $$ per minute/hour/day are wasted by their indecision. And oh, by the way, how will that affect the ROI allowing this project to proceed in the first place?
Got contrarians in your midst? Those "Been there before...", "Won't work because...", and my personal favorite, "At my LAST company....." folks. Launch a Negative Brainstorming session. Past History? Bring it on. Roadblocks? Let's have ‘em. Read something on the Internet? Must be true. Then discuss each worst-case scenario - the probability of it happening - the impact on the project - AND how those risks can be mitigated. Avoided. Eliminated.
Cy is one of those speakers who has to say "Time to wrap it up". No one watches the clock when she's talking. Because of her experience, her presence, her reality-based examples... you envision yourself evolving, choosing to change how things will be going forward. Yes, I can. |
When did the inability to adapt to change become a protected disability?
Why is it so difficult to roll out an idea, a decision, a direction, a company need and be met with a simple and strong "yes" from employees, teammates and colleagues? When did this become optional and subject to analysis? When were all employees granted veto powers?
This is what's draining value from our organizations. The constant revisiting of decisions by every level, not based upon what will best serve the organization, but based upon whether one "likes" it, is comfortable with it, or thinks it is the best way in their opinion. Resistance is expensive and exhausting. As leaders, we also need to get employees to understand that it is futile - and move toward results. It's time to up the ante and expect more from our employees.
And leaders, you are not innocent victims here. You are the very ones rewarding the naysayers stopping all the action and catering to the requests of the unwilling. Too many leaders are forgoing opportunities to capitalize on change in order to slow down and pick up the resistant stragglers as if consensus had any relationship in successful implementation of change.
Let's get clear: an employee saying "no" is not one trying to point out true danger or trying to ensure success for the organization by keeping us safe from ourselves. Saying "no" is simply a code for actually saying I am unwilling, I would rather not change. Employees need to get clear about how they can truly add value to organizations - by saying "yes."
Leaders need to highlight the horrendous cost of resistance and all the ways in which employees are saying "no." The most valuable employee in any organization is the employee who says "yes" and says it often. Let's get that clear and stop pretending that saying "no" adds any value. Great leaders are those willing to step up and help employees understand that they add the most value by saying "yes!"
Here's how:
First of all, stop rewarding the naysayers! When someone says "no" to a decision, direction or idea, simply ask them for their plan on how they are going to get themselves signed up for the idea. If they aren't able to produce a plan to sign up, ask them for their plan to transition outside of the organization. If they have no intention of leaving, re-ask them for their plan to sign up for and support the new direction. If they don't have a plan for either, stress that there is no third option (staying and resisting). I am amazed at how sticking to these two options and continuing to drive the conversation leads to employees joining up or leaving the organization, either option a great solution. Not cruel, just honest. Make their choices conscious and visible to them and to you.
If employees are cautious rather than unwilling, engage them in negative brainstorming. Have them identify all of their concerns, creating a list labeled "risks." Next, have the team realistically rate the probability and impact of each concern. As a team, work on ways to mitigate and manage the most probable, most impactful risks. By doing so, you are helping your employees learn to add value not by saying "no" and shying away from challenging assignments, but by saying "yes" first and then using their expertise to manage the risks of any decision - which is the highest value they can add in any situation.
Quiz your people daily. Ask each employee, "What did you say ‘yes' to today? What did you deliver today?" Hold each one accountable to answer.
Work with the willing. Focus on the group that says "yes" - give them your time and attention and support. Remember, the average manager spends about 80 hours extra per year on employees that are in a mode of resistance and who have very low odds of moving out of resistance any time soon. Why waste your time and resources? You don't need everyone on board to move forward - only about 46%. So find them and reward them.
Step up and coach your employees to know that in today's new world, the best way to add value when asked to do something, is to simply say "yes."
Cy Wakeman is a dynamic keynote speaker advocating a revolutionary new approach to leadership. Her groundbreaking ideas are featured in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times and SHRM.org. Her book, Reality-Based Leadership: Ditch the Drama, Restore Sanity to the Workplace, & Turn Excuses Into Results (Jossey-Bass, 2010) is available for order at all major online book retailers. For more information, visit www.cywakeman.com.
Forbes.com Article Link |
As I work with leaders to ditch the drama and turn excuses into results, I am shocked to see the number of leaders who still tout an open door policy! I feel the urge to apologize on behalf of all of us who have ever suggested that an open door policy would lead to results--we lied, we had no research to support this notion, it just sounded good, and we are so sorry! Now please close your doors and start coaching rather than hosting a complaint desk.
Rather than helping, the practice of the open door has proven to be disastrous. The practice produces few if any real changes in the organization and often hijacks resources that could be focused on real issues. The practice actually limits the growth potential of employees who utilize the option and exhausts the leaders who practice it.
Just think about it ... those of you have proudly publicized that you have an open door ... has anyone ever come to you and asked for a moment of your time because they are concerned about THEIR OWN attitude, work ethic, recent performance, less-than-stellar results, or treatment of their co-workers?
Most always, employees come through the open door to report concerns about others, to tattle, to report their analysis and judgment of co-workers, to provide leaders with a list of things they'd like to see changed in their reality or even to provide leaders with an evaluation of the leaders' strengths, weaknesses and development needs. Rarely can a leader cite examples where an employee used the open door for self-improvement, self-reflection or self-motivated growth.
What then is the benefit of an open door? To spend hours talking about the performance of others? To focus on all the ways in which the organization is a disappointment? To spend time together "hoping" for a change? All of these activities are a colossal waste of resources, provide little if any ROI and may actually negate the work you are doing to get your employees to be personally accountable and able to succeed in their new realities.
So how do you break the feel-good habit of "my door is always open"?
Close the door and start developing your people. Rather than waiting for informants to come through your door with their complaints or concerns, consistently schedule time with each employee and use the time to talk about the situations that present the greatest challenges to them. Work on bulletproofing your people and increasing their immunity to their circumstances. Coach them to quit wishing their circumstances were better and instead to be better themselves. Be diligent about challenging their current mindsets so that they can impact their own realities, with or without you.
Or, if you must ... Keep your door open and teach the person in front of you. Use the moment to develop the employee present--focus on them solely. Make judging politically incorrect; insist that the employee stops judging and starts helping. Ask questions that refocus the employee on their part in the current outcome such as:
What did you do to help?
What are the facts of the situation?
What can you do to add value?
It is not about the door being open, but about you as a leader opening up employees' mindsets and willingness to change the way they see their circumstances rather than wishing that their circumstances were different.
Quit confusing approachability and open doors with leadership--leadership is the consistent and constant effort to conserve resources normally spent on drama and using them instead on activities that will produce results. So conserve resources and close the dang door!
Cy Wakeman is a dynamic keynote speaker advocating a revolutionary new approach to leadership. Her groundbreaking ideas are featured in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times and SHRM.org. She is a significant thought leader with entertaining podcasts on thegurunation.com and is a favorite expert blogger on FastCompany.com. Her book, Reality-Based Leadership: Ditch the Drama, Restore Sanity to the Workplace, & Turn Excuses Into Results (Jossey-Bass, 2010) is now available for order at all major online book retailers. For more information, visitwww.cywakeman.com. |
Are you beginning to wonder why so many organizations are slow to recover from the challenges of the past few years or why they can't adapt to the new realities, anticipate changes and quickly capitalize on the opportunities at hand?
I'm convinced that the issue has nothing to do with the economy, world events or our government. The lack of recovery is on the shoulders of ineffective leaders who lack an understanding of how to measure the true value of their employees and leverage that talent for top productivity.
Even more concerning is the level of denial in the ranks of leadership. When asked for an overview of their employees' performance scores, the scores are inflated, rating the majority of employees meeting or exceeding expectations, and yet when reviewing the financial results of the company, the numbers are dismal in comparison. How can a group of employees who are exceeding expectations in their performance reviews actually be producing substandard results?
It is obvious that our current approach to performance ratings are a poor indicator of organizational results. Leaders need information to make decisions, especially about their most expensive budget line item - employees. It is high time for a new formula that will truly reveal the value of employees so that they can either be coached up or helped out of organizations. With a new way for leaders to measure the true ROI of an employee, we can completely change how leaders look at recruitment, retention, compensation and succession planning.
The true value of an employee can be quantified with a simple formula:
Current Performance + Future Potential - Emotional Expensiveness = Employee Value
Current Performance - Is this employee truly meeting expectations? Are they consistently delivering results? Do they provide value each and every day? Are you still giving them credit for what they did last year or in the past decade?
Future Potential - What are the odds that this employee will be a great player in the future? Do they seek out new challenges? Do they keep up with trends in their profession and the industry? Will they be relevant to your company in five years?
Emotional Expense - Finally, you must offset any value derived from the employee with the "emotional cost" of the relationship to the organization. Ask yourself, after time together, is my energy heightened or drained? Am I working harder on this employee's success than they are? Does this employee relationship take energy, that if conserved, would create something far greater for the team or company? Does this employee say "yes" to ideas and requests? Do they handle change with excitement or resistance? Are they personally accountable?
The key to great leadership is to regularly review where you have invested your assets to ensure that you are getting the best return. When an asset is not producing results, most of us are quick to search for a better use of our resources. And yet, when it comes to employees, we use a different investment philosophy - all employees deserve the same time, attention and involvement, the same development, opportunities and assistance, no matter what the return on that investment.
The clearest way to improve results is to understand the value proposition of your employees. By doing this, leaders can make clear and unemotional decisions about who their top talent is and where to direct coaching efforts.
Cy Wakeman is a dynamic keynote speaker advocating a revolutionary new approach to leadership. Her groundbreaking ideas are featured in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times and SHRM.org. She is a significant thought leader with entertaining podcasts on thegurunation.com and is a favorite expert blogger on FastCompany.com. Her book, Reality-Based Leadership: Ditch the Drama, Restore Sanity to the Workplace, & Turn Excuses Into Results(Jossey-Bass, 2010) is now available for order at all major online book retailers. For more information, visit www.cywakeman.com.
Forbes.com Article Link |
Leaders today are being called to deliver an even higher level of results with fewer resources in less time than ever before. Most leaders are not only failing to deliver, but they are ensuring that their teams will undoubtedly be incapable of delivering far into the future! Through their leadership, they are proliferating a mindset of "Learned Helplessness" - a near fatal condition for the organization's culture and future results. In our research, finding the condition in just 30% of the workforce is a key indicator of the future financial success of the company.
Learned Helplessness afflicts the mindsets of employees who have come to believe that they are truly at the mercy of external circumstances. These employees begin to believe that there is little they can do to impact the outcomes of their actions, company processes, or succeed in the face of decisions into which they didn't get to provide input. They become convinced that the odds are stacked against them, that they are the victims in most circumstances, and that they actually deserve special consideration of their "circumstances" when they don't hit their goal.
How does Learned Helplessness take hold in the minds of employees and leaders? Employee "stories" not based on facts and left unchecked by leaders is the key cause. In fact, this is a key leadership function not being performed by more than 80% of leaders surveyed. When a team delivers less than spectacular results, either no effort is made by the leader to facilitate the team to account for the efforts that led to the undesired outcomes or the leader conspires with the employees to re-write their own stories.
As the results are tallied and the team and individuals who did not deliver as expected account for what led to their less-than-stellar results, they conveniently re-write history in their favor. Instead of attributing their results to the half-hearted actions taken, they alter their version of the story to focus on the challenging circumstances.
It is vital that leaders do not leave stories justifying poor results unchecked. Instead, they must lead their teams to honestly account for the actions that led to the results and call them to respond differently in the future to ensure better results.
What can leaders do to eradicate Learned Helplessness from the workplace?
1) Leaders must be very clear about the results that are required from teams. Team projects are approved and budgeted based upon a business case that outlines which results are necessary to justify the investment. Do not allow the team to re-write the business case mid-project.
2) Leaders need to be incredibly honest about a team's results. If the team nailed it - great! Celebrate and reward. But if the team did not reach the mark, stop giving them credit for effort or allowing them to applaud lackluster results. There will always be circumstances and teams need to learn to succeed in spite of circumstances - that is the value they add, mitigating the risks of the circumstances while implementing and executing.
3) Lead the team through a thorough account of their contributions to the results. If the team had great results, ask each member of the team to account for the decisions, choices, approaches and behaviors that led to the success so that they can intentionally duplicate it in the future. If lackluster results were delivered, ask each member to identify ways in which they contributed to the end result. Their responses need to begin with, "I chose," "I denied," "I assumed," "I did," "I didn't," (This is where the "I" in TEAM comes in and the magic starts to happen!). Once each individual can identify how they specifically contributed, they can then commit to what they will do differently in the future to achieve better results.
Cy Wakeman is a dynamic keynote speaker advocating a revolutionary new approach to leadership. Her groundbreaking ideas are featured in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times and SHRM.com. She is a significant thought leader with entertaining podcasts on thegurunation.com and is a favorite expert blogger on FastCompany.com. Her book, Reality Based Leadership - Ditch the Drama, Restore Sanity to the Workplace & Turn Excuses Into Results (Jossey-Bass, 2010) is now available for order at all major online book retailers. For more information, visit www.cywakeman.com
Forbes.com Article Link
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He failed to answer the essential questions every crisis raises. 
In my coaching sessions with CEOs recently, our discussions keep turning to the inability of so many leaders to connect with people following their failures. We've talked about everything from Tiger Woods' apology saga to BP Chief Executive Tony Hayward's disastrous handling of the Gulf oil spill crisis.
When these incidents occur, leaders and their public relations gurus are quick to provide public apologies. They expect those apologies to move people out of their anger, but they often lead to even more criticism and outrage. When you're the leader of an organization that has failed a constituency in some way, people will automatically assume you're sorry, but they'll quickly conclude that you're sorry mainly for yourself, for having been caught in the situation.
Many leaders make matters worse by actually describing, as they apologize, how they themselves have been affected, as if that should somehow connect them with those suffering and create a bond. Instead it usually comes across as self-indulgent, self-serving and lacking in honesty about having been the cause of the situation.
Hayward apologized for having been oblivious to the safety risks of his organization's underwater drilling operations, but his apology was ineffective--not because it wasn't heartfelt but because he was oblivious to what people truly need from a leader, especially in times of crisis.
Why was the nation repeatedly outraged when Hayward went before cameras and then before Congress to utter his famous flat apologies? He and his media experts seemed surprised that his appearances backfired. Yet it was utterly predictable that the approach was doomed from the start. It clearly failed to do what was necessary to repair the relationship between the nation and BP ( BP - news - people ).
What do people truly need from their leaders in times of crisis? They need them to step up and answer three simple questions. They must answer these questions consistently, repeatedly and in multiple ways to truly repair the situation. They must answer them in words, actions, plans and follow-through, with that follow-through coming from all the leaders of the organization. I first learned these three key questions from Lou Holtz, the legendary Notre Dame football coach. He explained to me that what people demand from a leader is simple:
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1. Do you care about me?No, really. Do you see how this has affected me, my family and my community? Can you put it into words, into specific examples? Have you taken the time to personally witness it from my perspective? As a leader, even if you can't fix it, can you give words to it and be willing to listen while others vent, without explaining, justifying or making false promises? People want to feel heard. They want to be recognized for their suffering. They want to know that you, the leader, see them as individuals and real people.
2. Can I trust you? Sugarcoating the current reality or painting an idyllic path to a better future does not build trust. People want to know that you are telling them the truth. Will you honestly outline what you know and what you don't know? Speak from a place of pure accountability, and sort out the blame behind closed doors at a later time. A leader needs to fully account for where the situation is at present, how it got there and what the possibilities are for the future. Do not just give the most optimistic options; outline the complete range of potential developments and the plans you have to create results. Be up front about the risks involved, their likelihood and full potential effects and the contingency plans you have in case the worst does happen, as well as in case it doesn't.
3. Are you committed to excellence? Do you have the same standards of excellence as the people you are leading or attempting to serve? Will you be there for as long as it takes? What does success look like to you? Do you insist on excellence in your business practices? Do you use the best technology and top experts? And are you transparent, allowing access to the media, documenting both your progress and your setbacks? Excellence is not about perfection, it's about commitment to the best possible processes. Just think how different the nation's response might have been if Tony Hayward had turned to a great leadership coach rather than his attorneys and media experts. With your own leadership realm, start early, before a crisis, and ensure that you answer these three key questions on a daily basis with those in your circle of influence. That way you will have a solid foundation already established and a firm basis for success, should a crisis come your way.
Cy Wakeman is an author, speaker, workshop facilitator and trainer. Her new book, Reality-Based Leadership: Ditch the Drama, Restore Sanity to the Workplace, and Turn Excuses into Results, will be available this fall. For more information on her, visit http://www.cywakeman.com.
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In 2005, I stood on stage under the bright lights, delivering a keynote to a large audience who responded with a standing ovation, all while wearing a bra that didn’t belong to me or fit. Upon my arrival for the engagement, I realized hadn’t packed a bra and was due on stage within minutes in a thin, white blouse. With a total sense of calm, I searched my car and found one of my mother’s bras from the suitcase I was to bring home for her from the hospital, as she probably would not be coming home.
You see, my mother was dying of breast cancer in a hospital three hours away. I had stayed the night with heras I had for weeks – leaving in the early hours to deliver motivational keynotes around the nation, while
tending to all the daily needs of my four sons and running a successful business.
As I took the stage, I had a moment of concern for myself that perhaps I was completely overloaded from the temporary craziness that had become my life. I made a mental note that when this was all over, I just had to get my life back in balance, gain some control and make it more manageable.
I had set this goal many times before and failed over and over again to achieve that blissful state of balance. As the year progressed, I failed again as I lost my brother, tended to a father who underwent major surgery, and found my life dramatically changed as my husband broke his neck.
But as I spoke that day to the audience, an epiphany slowly took hold of me. I realized that balance was not a desired future state, but an act of constant adjusting to the changing circumstances in our lives. Balance is about managing one’s energy, facing reality and adjusting accordingly.
When my balance was disturbed, my internal responses were not responding to my external circumstances. The key to balance is really about having the ability to be in this world, but to not be affected by this world.
This epiphany has dramatically changed the way in which I coach top executives, particularly women. I work to reframe their thinking and help them search for sanity instead. Balance is about control, while sanity is about peaceful surrender, which, in turn, leaves us with an abundance of energy to impact our reality far beyond our wildest dreams. The key is in dropping the impossible, restoring balance, and setting a goal within our reach.
So here are a few tips to help you give up the illusion that balance is in your control – so you can restore sanity to your life.
Rewrite your definition of balance
Balance is not a noun or a state of nirvana to be achieved. Balance is a verb, an act of assessing one’s current state and making choices to add those things into our lives that build our energy while choosing to forgo those activities and people that deplete it. In fact, we don’t balance things, tasks or priorities – we balance energy, ensuring that we engage in activities and choose mindsets that energize, not deplete. Achieving sanity is not about managing time. It’s about managing your energy so you can approach everything with a peaceful mind, a full reserve of energy, and all the creativity necessary.
Drop the “story” that stresses you out
Get very clear: It’s not the events in your life that cause your stress, but the stories you tell yourself about what’s happening that’s the cause of your stress. So drop the story and free up that energy. The reality is that most of us go to bed with an unfinished “to-do” list and dishes in the sink, and life goes on.
Stop playing by old rules and embrace life-changing tools
The old rule was that physical presence was mandatory at home and work, but the new rule is that being connected is really the key. Take advantage of new technologies such as texting, iChat or Skype to connect with family, friends and co-workers. Make sure the rules you’re playing by are yitch the drama in your life: Stop arguing with reality
The average person spend two hours a day arguing with reality ... an argument you will surely lose, but only 100 percent of the time. Learn instead to be a lover of reality, greeting each new piece of information with a welcoming attitude of, "Good to know." Conserve your precious energy used in the past to argue with reality and use it instead to innovate and problem-solve. |
Here are three steps to take to get you started.
Years ago, when I was struggling to produce great results with a new, somewhat resistant team, I had a mentor who asked, "Cy, how many people do you have on your team?" I said 41. She asked how many of them would go to battle for me. How many wanted success as much as I did? My answer? Three. She said, "I have an idea. Start with them."
Work with the willing. It's the best advice I ever got. Working with the willing doesn't mean ignoring everyone else, but you will be amazed at the results you can achieve when you focus your attention on the people you really want to reward. It all starts with a concept you probably haven't thought about since childhood: playing favorites.
We are all conditioned from childhood to think that playing favorites is unfair. But part of growing up is realizing that the world outside the nursery doesn't work that way. We're all treated differently according to our abilities, our aptitudes and our attitudes. Yet too many companies try to treat everyone the same.
Some of today's leaders seem to have surrendered to mediocrity so as to never, ever offend anyone. They hesitate to give honest feedback and act as if all employees deliver equal results and value to their organizations, when the reality is quite different. They fear confronting underperformers, so they depend solely on a few great employees, who are often not rewarded as they should be.
Successful leaders know that playing favorites is not only OK, it's actually optimal for the workplace. Protecting employees from the results of their lackluster performance and unproductive mindsets is patronizing. You owe it to your colleagues to hold everyone to the same standards, to keep those standards high and to reiterate them relentlessly. While it's never wise to favor an employee based on your own vanity and it's never acceptable, or even legal, to discriminate on the basis of race, physical ability, sexual orientation or religion, it is more than appropriate, and completely legal, to reward those who contribute the most to your organization's success. Your best performers deserve a disproportionate share of your time and attention, so put aside any anxiety you may have over playing favorites in the office, and follow these steps:
1. Identify your visionaries. The first step toward working with the willing is to identify them. It shouldn't be difficult. Generally about 20% of all employees in any given office are engaged, creative and present. They are personally accountable, they look for opportunities everywhere, and they are resourceful, connected and optimistic. They look forward to coming to work. They're your best people.
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Unfortunately another 20% of employees live in a permanent state of resistance. Everyone knows who they are. They bring their poor or ambivalent attitudes to every task. At worst, they're bullies; at best, they're inaccessible, impervious to criticism and encouragement alike and too complacent to find another job. They present a real leadership challenge.
The remaining 60% of employees are in survival mode. They're not actively useful or making constant improvements. Rather, they play it safe. They get their work done, but they're always counting down the days to the weekend.
2. Redirect your focus. A typical leader has to spend 80 hours each year thinking about and working with a single person in a chronic state of resistance. The return on this hefty investment is almost nothing. We direct far too much energy at getting those resistant people's help and approval. It's a waste of time.
When you focus your energy and attention on those in resistance, you pay them to bully you, to critique and sabotage your plans--and the other people you lead notice. They want attention, too, and you're showing them exactly how to get it. Before long, some of those 60% who are in maintenance mode are slouching low in their chairs, joining the truly resistant.
Even worse, after a while your visionary 20% start dying on the vine. They get so frustrated with your office culture that they'll look for work elsewhere. It'll be easy for them to leave you. They're friends with all the other visionary people in your industry. If you want them to stay, play favorites. Favor those who use their talents to work with, not against, your organization. Put your time and energy into training and developing your best people.
3. Compensate value, not effort. If you study the research and literature on success in business, along with the best employees in your organization, you'll find real commonalities among the best people. Help your employees to develop similar competencies, and congratulate them when they do. Then, if it's up to you, take the next courageous step: Compensate your best people in direct proportion to the value they deliver, not according to their effort, hours clocked or daily tasks accomplished.
People will notice where your attention goes, and that's what you want to happen. In my work as a leader, I've often had employees complain to me, "You play favorites!" To which I've always replied, "Why, yes I do. Would you like to be one of them?" I then follow up with a list of all of the competencies and behaviors that make some of my team members more beloved than others and better rewarded than others. Those competencies and behaviors include being personally accountable, results-driven, flexible, low-drama, emotionally inexpensive, great with change and supportive of the direction of the organization.
Make it absolutely clear what gets attention from you, and your impressionable people in maintenance will start to go where the love is. When you work with a group of willing people, no matter how small, you'll start to get results that make believers of others.
Cy Wakeman is an author, speaker, workshop facilitator and trainer. Her new book, Reality-Based Leadership: Ditch the Drama, Restore Sanity to the Workplace, and Turn Excuses into Results, will be available this fall. For more information on her, visit http://www.cywakeman.com.
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As I continue on my trek to challenge conventional wisdom and current thinking – mostly because it obviously isn’t leading to success in most businesses – I am going to focus this blog on parenting … or, as I believe, leading future employees before they hit the work scene.
Once again, I am questioning my sanity and my perspective as a human resources guru in my role as a parent. I just left a get-together where the entire dialogue was between 40-year-old parents who were bemoaning the fact that their kids wanted to game all day instead of read books or play tag outside. They even went on to conclude that this constant gaming was going to be the demise of society as we know it. They characterized gaming as impersonal, leading to violence, keeping their kids from developing interpersonal skills and even stunting their learning and growth intellectually – thereby further diminishing their chances of any great future in the business world.
What disturbed me most was that this perspective was shared by all as the truth – obvious conventional wisdom that calls on all of us to severely limit the time we allow our children to game. When, in fact, I believe that’s the absolutely worst thing we could do! I was shocked at how different my perspective is as the HR professional desperately seeking employees who have mastered the exact same competencies being developed and rewarded through gaming. I had no idea that other parents don’t value gaming the same as I do: that it’s the perfect preparation ground for high-performing, low-maintenance, top-results-producing employees of the future.
Here is my take on why gaming is not only beneficial, but will completely revolutionize our current life in HR and leadership:
If you look at playing a game outside, such as tag, what happens? Someone is “it” and that person’s left holding the bag while the rest play defense, resisting to join up on the caught team, all while dragging the game on for hours.
And reading. It’s great as it builds theoretical knowledge but with limited application. It can be gathered incessantly by one person who doesn’t ever need to share it with anyone except on tests and book reports to further prove their superior station in life as a great comprehender of written material.
Now let’s move into the workplace. These tag-playing, book-reading types of people are not at all what we are looking for, but definitely the type of employee that we have a ton of. They are smart people who are rarely willing to freely share that knowledge with others except for great reward. They are those who can’t readily apply knowledge in spite of changing circumstances, those who need structured training for further learning, and those who use that knowledge to resist and play defense while a single leader is running their butt off trying to “catch” everyone so they can WIN.
Now, let’s look at gaming. It’s a group of incredibly diverse people of all ages from all over the world who quickly come together, easily adapting to a variety of changing technologies, granting each other instant trust, gaining clarity on a specific deliverable or mission, working in concert toward the goal, readily sharing new techniques for the betterment of the team, self-regulating, and readily accepting new and harder challenges with excitement while owning their own results or scores as reality . . . and thinking about how they can improve next time. Sounds like a dream team to me! Remind me again how reading and tag playing or even playing team sports are better preparation than that for successful business outcomes?
Think about it – the benefits of gaming as preparation for the real world are amazing!
• Diversity isn’t an issue or even a program – it’s a given. Discrimination or favoritism is not about differences in humans but about differences in capabilities and the ability to get results in a team environment.
• Teamwork happens without huge teambuilding retreats, ropes courses or group hugs. Teams are quickly formed without external support and without trust issues, storming periods or even introductions. Someone is randomly assigned or sought out due to their past great performance and if they do well, they’re rewarded by the team.
• The team is self-monitoring. Issues are taken care of within the team. There is no need for an elaborate performance management system. If a team member doesn’t do their share, the team tries to coach them and help them improve. If they act out or insult the team, the team self-regulates and quits playing with them. All that without a leader, manager or HR consultant present!
• Players develop a global perspective where they get a ton of practice at problem-solving at ever more difficult levels. Process improvements or “cheats” are readily sought out and implemented with great pleasure. There is no need for large training departments as any knowledge gained is quickly disseminated via the Internet and school playground for immediate implementation in the very next gaming session.
• The learning agility shown by players is amazing. A new game is brought home, unwrapped and played within minutes with very little preparation, no manual and definitely no costly training departments and programs or orientation sessions. Games are mastered by risk-taking, by attempting and failing over and over again. Remember that old business adage about the business that eventually wins is the one that can fail the fastest?
• Knowledge transfer between experts and beginners is a non-issue. Players eagerly text the latest tips and newest learning to their friends in real time, usually multi-tasking communication with parallel play.
• And lastly, there are clear winners and losers. Players don’t personalize the very real feedback of their score the way employees personalize almost any feedback given to them in today’s workplace. They accept it as their reality and plan on how to improve. There’s no need for a huge employee relations department to mediate that feedback. It’s just taken as a data point and players begin again, striving for improvement.
You know what I love about gaming with my kids after a hard day’s work as a leader? I never hear my kids freaking out because something changes in a game. I don’t hear them frustrated by personality issues and differences while gaming. They are online with others from around the world for a common mission, focused on what value they can add, collaborating, sharing information freely, and can just as quickly disengage without any commitment to play again in the future together. They don’t ask for any guarantees for the future. They actually like being scored. They own their own results rather than blaming the circumstances. They take risks and recover easily to jump back in the game by using what they just learned from failures.
Honestly, this is an HR person’s dream come true. Game on my young friends, we can’t wait to get you in the workplace!
Remember, you rock and Cy rocks!
Lead on my friend!
Cy |
This blog is written by a member of our expert blogging community and expresses that expert's views alone.
Human Resources gospel has always been to make employees feel as if their opinions counted. After all, this is America, and democracy is a good thing, right? Not always.
Your workplace is not a democracy. We know the value of democracy in a representative government, but in reality, what value does an opinion contribute to your organization? Most of the time a single person's opinion adds zero value and actually drains resources that could be used to add value. A non-decision maker offering their opinion usually derails the team into a search for consensus rather than all efforts going toward implementing with excellence! Many people without expertise and without decision-making authority mistakenly attempt to add value by offering their opinions when what is really needed is their actions!
Seriously, if you think you are having a heart attack, and you race to the emergency room, do you care what the receptionist on duty thinks is wrong with you? Or would you rather hear from the cardiologist? And is the receptionist offended when you want admission services from him or her rather than a diagnosis? NO. Then why are so many employees offended when their opinions are not solicited on each and every issue?
These same employees who want to be consulted on each and every decision are creating chaos in the organization. Can you imagine what the morning commute would be like if each person took time out to discuss their opinions of whether or not stop signs were needed at a particular intersection? No, they just stop, not feeling at all offended that they were not consulted and then drive on. We need the same behavior in the workplace so that we can move on to results.
Leaders, quit creating the impression that buy-in is optional and that everyone has the right to their opinions, even when it costs the organization its progress.
When people ask me, "Cy, do you want my opinion?" I say, "That depends. Has a decision has been made?" And if the answer is "yes," then I don't want to hear their opinion! It will be superfluous at best; counterproductive at worst. In reality, Google has replaced opinions. We used to solicit people's opinions a lot more often in the workplace because we needed to gather information about how things were being done in other companies where they may have worked in the past. We lacked the huge library of potential solutions that we have today, when a simple Google search can provide us with a myriad of opinions and best practices to choose from. So it no longer makes sense to use our precious talent and resources to try to generate ideas and opinions. I would rather they use their expertise to make the decision work!
Now, if they're coming to me before a decision has been made, it also depends. Are they the decision makers? Do they have relevant expertise? If not, then their opinion is again of no value to me or to the organization. Does this mean I don't care about them as valuable members of the team? Absolutely not. And that's just one of several good reasons not to encourage them to editorialize about decisions in which they have no say.
For 90% of people in any organization at any given time, their role is simply to be informed - not to make, or comment on, a decision. If you subscribe to the idea that everyone's opinion has to count, in effect you are handing out veto power to the majority while only a minority has the power to say "yes." This sets up a paradigm in which it's very difficult to take positive action. You also create a situation in which people feel buy-in is optional. This leads to resistance that can stall or even sabotage your plans. Reality-Based Leaders are clear that the highest value the talent under their leadership can offer is to implement with excellence. They value action over opinion.
And leaders - you need to model this new behavior and stop colluding with your employees! Sometimes you will be charged with implementing plans that you did not design - plans you might dislike or view as flawed. It will be tempting in those situations to match your effort with your belief, to tell yourself there is no way you can do what is being asked of you, that you wouldn't even know where to start. But to deliver results time after time, leaders need the ability to resist editorializing and instead move toward implementation with excellence.
If you are not in the position of ultimate decision maker, offer expertise - not editorials. If you are asked your opinion about a potential decision, be proactive. Offer up a variety of ideas to the decision makers, outlining the potential benefits of each course of action along with the corresponding risks, complete with your team's plan to mitigate the risks of any chosen option. Resist the urge to favor any option as "right." Cherish your neutrality and aim to deliver on any option chosen.
Criticizing any decision made by another level of the leadership team, especially when times are tough, is a cardinal sin. If I can ask your team member what you think about a decision and they can tell me, you have failed them in one of the worst possible ways. If you don't buy in and offer up your best effort, why should they? They will suffer cognitive dissonance every day as they try to implement a plan you have already told them (whether in so many words or not) isn't worth their effort.
So, get over it - Google has replaced you in the opinion department! Move on and add value in new ways with action that leads to success, regardless of your circumstances or the merit of the plan.
And remember, you rock and Cy rocks!
Lead on my friend!
Cy |
"So," I asked Cindy,* an HR specialist for a Fortune 50, "Do you give your co-workers holiday gifts?"
"They aren't allowed," she explained.
"Not even a secret Santa?"
"If we do anything it's a white elephant gift exchange, but probably not even that."
Next, I asked my friend Ellen* who put in a lifetime in corporate America before becoming a foreign car salesperson.
"Are you going to give your co-workers holiday gifts?"
She shook her head in the negative, "There are too many people to give gifts."
"What about when you worked at the consulting firm, did you give gifts then?"
"I probably gave gifts to people on my team, especially the support staff," she said. "The thing I learned at my very first job is that you never gift up because if you give the boss a gift and others don't, it could create bad feelings."
In my small sample of the gainfully employed, I didn't find anyone who is giving a co-worker a gift. No one. I found consultants giving gifts to clients. I found bosses planning on hosting a holiday party. But, I didn't find one worker planning on giving one gift to a co-worker. From the BlogHer page on Facebook,
While some may think the dearth of holiday gift giving in the workplace can be blamed on the current economic downtown, experts say the economy is just a partial explanation. The other part is a shift in attitude that began about five years ago. "No one needs another thing on her desk," says Cy Wakeman, an HR expert who blogs at Fast Company.
Wakeman says today's worker, particularly the Gen Yers, want to focus less on consumerism during the holidays, and more on being a good corporate citizen.
Wakeman is not the only one saying gift giving in the workplace is passé. "Anthropologists have told us for years that the norm around gifts is an expectation of reciprocity," says Diane Swanson, a business ethics expert at Kansas State University, and author of Toward Integrative Corporate Citizenship. Swanson says it's the built-in expectation of reciprocity in gift giving that creates an ethical question of fairness and potential conflict of interest.
Cy Wakeman says another reason why holiday gift giving in the workplace is becoming part of our past corporate history is because today's workplace is more global. "Many people don't mark a holiday in December," says Wakeman, who adds there are also some legal reasons that are putting the kibosh on workplace gift giving.
"If someone is thinking of giving co-workers a holiday gift they should check in with HR before they do anything," says Wakeman, "Many corporations don't allow holiday gift giving or limit the amount on gift giving."
Instead of spending money, Wakeman suggests sending coworkers a handwritten compliment card where you acknowledge co-workers for their contributions to the team. In her own office, Wakeman says instead of giving gifts, her team adopts a family through the United Way, and then goes shopping together to buy toys and dinner for the family. "It ends up being a team building experience. It's fun to go out shopping and makes us appreciate that we all have jobs."
What if your work culture is still one of the few that does exchange holiday gifts? Wakeman says her favorite gift is a book because there is no way to insult someone by giving them a book as a gift.
For other ideas check out the suggestions here, here, and here.
What's happening at your office? Has it changed significantly in the past few years?
*Cindy and Ellen are pseudonyms. The conversations were real.
Elana Centor Editor, Business & Career
FunnyBusiness
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HARVEY SCHACHTER
With the business world and business schools grappling with how to get a handle on ethics, Toronto-based consultant Patrick O'Neill highlights five deficits that have to be addressed, in his Extraordinary Conversations e-newsletter:
Deficit of reflective practice
As the pace of work speeds up, a significant imbalance has arisen between reflection and action in many organizations. The value placed on action also far outweighs critical thinking. "Strategic decisions are being made on the fly, divorced from an examination of the issues involved, including ethical considerations. While there have been significant inroads made in governance and risk management, especially in the last decade, much damage has resulted from expediency," he writes.
Deficit of character development
Leadership is an initiation into character and courage because, he says, "it requires people to take on extraordinary responsibilities." Our society currently rewards and develops talent, but less recognition and fewer resources are allocated to character development. Yet, ethical behaviour requires both. To help, he argues that business reporting should include stories of conflicts, dilemmas and issues handled ethically. We could use lessons on groups or leaders who do the right thing with courage and integrity.
Deficit of respect
In more than 200 conflicts that he has been hired to mediate, the core issues that Mr. O'Neill found usually included some form of abusive behaviour - an example of the erosion of respect in the workplace. Bullying in the workplace is common. Corporate leaders treat shareholders with little respect. Ethical treatment, he says, is a fundamental human right, and organizations must ensure it.
Deficit on right use of power
The increasing abuse of power in organizations leads to demoralization, employee absence and attrition, occupational health and safety issues, and litigation. "It costs a lot of money when productivity is impaired in this way," he says. "Providing leaders with a basic understanding of the positive and ill effects of using and abusing power and helping them come to terms with their own relationship to power would be a significant contribution to ethics education."
Deficit of mentoring
Mentoring has not been used to the extent it could for teaching ethical leadership, he says. Instead, the focus has been on coaching technical performance, rather than the overall development of the person. "This gap has contributed to the decline of ethical leadership in business, community and institutional life," he asserts.
POWER POINTS
Scare yourself
Do something at least once a year that scares you. George Torok, motivational speaker, torok.com
Put those FAQs up front
A FAQ - frequently asked questions - page was de rigueur in the early days of the Web. But, consultant Jeff Sexton asks, if those questions are so vital, why aren't they answered directly on the regular pages of your Web site, when the customer is first encountering your company and its products? "Why would you possibly be content with hiding the answers to your prospective customers' questions in an FAQ page? Are you trying to weed out all but the most determined of customers?" grokdotcom.com
A valuable interview question
Here's a favourite interview question from Jeffrey Katzenberg, CEO of DreamWorks Animation: "What's your favourite thing to do on your free time?" It often reveals what the job candidate values. The New York Times
Pause for effect
As you watch U.S. President Barack Obama speak, you'll quickly notice how frequently - and calmly - he pauses during a talk. Speech coach Sims Wyeth urges you to emulate that in your own presentations - a pause lets the audience catch up with you and allows your words to resonate. BNET.com
Social network sites to suit you
Consultant Paul Chaney says the three most popular social network sites for business are: LinkedIn, which is like your business suit, expected and lending you professional credibility; Facebook, which is your business-casual attire, allowing others to see your professional and personal side; and Twitter, which is like a cocktail hour, a place you go to casually and informally interact with potentially thousands of others. MarketingProfs.com
Google your calculations
If you have a quick calculation, instead of using a hand calculator or your computer's calculator, put the numbers into a Google search box and you'll get an answer lickety-split. Use the +, -, *, / symbols and parentheses to do a simple equation. Leo Babauta dumblittleman.com
HANDLING STUPID QUESTIONS
It has become ritualistic for leaders to encourage forthrightness among staff by insisting "there are no stupid questions." But on the Fast Company leadership blog, consultant Cynthia (Cy) Wakeman insists there are stupid questions, and gives these characteristics:
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There is really no answer to the question.
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Even if you could speculate and offer an answer, that answer would add no value to the situation.
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The question implies blame.
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The question flies in the face of personal accountability.
The question is focused on people who are outside the control of the leader fielding the question.
"To spend a single second of thought or action on such questions is a complete waste of resources, period," she writes.
Often, these stupid questions begin with "why," "who," or "when," and are applied to human behaviour rather than seeking information about a process or a logistical detail of a plan.
When you start to slip into asking a stupid question, she suggests a rewording that may seem difficult to assimilate initially but which she illuminates with an example.
First, change every "why," "who," or "when" to either a "how" or "'what." Then follow with the words "can I" and, finally, end the smarter question with some action words such as "do" or "help."
So, "Why do things keep changing?" becomes "How can I drive change?"
ENTREPRENEURSHIP: BEWARE OF FAMILY MONEY
Startups need cash, and usually that money comes from friends and family. But Meg Cadoux Hirshberg, wife of Gary Hirshberg, CEO of Stonyfield Yogurt, warns that accepting such financial assistance can fray or even sever family relationships.
When the business is funded by relatives, you may lose the carefree family holiday gathering or the light-hearted phone chat with Mom and Dad. "Anxious and exhausted, entrepreneurs yearn for the solace and support usually provided by families: a sheltered place to lay their weary heads. But relationships change whenever money enters the picture," she writes in Inc.
Beyond their fears, you also carry the guilt that if the business goes under you'll take your relatives' money with it. Ironically, she notes, that's why venture capitalists often prefer that friends and families invest before they consider a deal.
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COMMENTS (2)
Great advice. Tony Hayward's leadership failed to prevent this crisis occurring and his communication during the on-going incident did more harm than good. I expand on this in the blog posting b
