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Changing the Game

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I love it when I hear of a manager who does something simple and easy that shifts organisational culture immediately.

A recent example of this is the CEO of ING Direct in the USA.  He has recently moved his office to the floor of their telephone banking call centre.

He is now much closer to his staff and to his customers both physically and psychologically.

He is able to experience the company and its work with customers directly, as opposed to through a balanced scorecard or some other set of metrics. He is able to listen to the conversations and make a real difference in appreciating the good stuff and providing a touch on the tiller when it is needed. This first hand experience of how things are working ensures a tightness in execution that is bound to pay off.

My guess is that this one game-changing move will have more impact more quickly than most ‘strategic change efforts’.

  • What simple game-changing moves have you seen work?
  • What simple game-changing moves have you made?

Going from Good Manager to Great: Part 1

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This is the first of a series of posts looking at what most managers need to work on if they are to go from being an OK manager to being a great one.

Understand the Maps

Part 1 – Learn to Read (and Shape) the Maps

Most managers have a pretty good idea of what they need to get done. They have their own map of ‘organisational’ priorities. Their management consists of allocating tasks and shaping work according to this map. It is the only map that matters!

Great managers understand that every employee carries around in his or her head their own ‘map’ of their priorities. Every one of those maps is different. And they all differ from the manager’s organisational map. Great managers know that it is these personal maps that really decide what gets done. It is these that hold the key to performance. Understanding personal ‘maps’ is crucial as they drive decision making and motivation. They provide the directions in which their owners channel their energy, skill and drive.

Each person’s map differs because of the beliefs that each person holds. For people who are confident and self-assured the maps are full of shallow gradients and interesting looking paths. For those who are less confident they are full of rocky precipices and ‘dead end’ canyons. Each persons map is dynamic an dis being continually shaped. Great managers play a full part in the shaping process.
For some people work is a place of stability and security where they want routine and fixed hours. These are the loyal soldiers who get things done. Others are innovators, mavericks and change-makers who are always looking for ways to change the world. For ‘loyal soldiers’ the maps are relatively gentle and serene – for the change monkeys they are a series of first ascents, usually with frequent falls and patches of white water. For most of us the maps cover mixed ground.

Great managers know that it is not enough to simply publish the organisational map – and hope for the best. They spend time in conversation with each employee helping them to explore the organisational map and to shape their own personal map appropriately.

The best way to improve your map-reading skill is simply to do it. Spend more time 121 with your people – looking for clues to their own peronal maps. Are they looking for a serene stroll or a wild adventure? Are they fired up by the thought or increasing margins or fearful of the consequences?

Spending just 30 minutes a week 121 with each person will be enough understand their maps and enable them to give their very best to work.

Improve your management map-reading skills here!

Set the Foundations

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The Mavericks at Work blog reminds us that all the:

co-creation

empowerment

mass collaboration

blogging

YouTubing

MySpace-ing and

Facebooking

 

in the world isn’t going to help if you don’t already have some very persuasive answers to some very basic questions:

 

  • What ideas are we fighting for?

  • What do we see that the competition doesn’t?

  • How are we rethinking our business every day?

Why Do More Women Resign than Men?

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Gender Gap

In the UK, now,

  • More women resign than men. More women are resigning now than ever.
  • Women get promoted younger than men.
  • Women are paid significantly less than men – and last year the gap widened.

These findings are from the Chartered Management Institute and Remuneration Economics.

What explains the high rate of resignations?

Is it the sense of injustice at the widening pay differentials as women take on more responsibility – younger – for less money than men?

Do women have more choices that they can exercise? They are more likely to take up self-employment than men. They may also be more ‘in-demand’ than men as their skill sets leave them better equipped to work in a modern economy. The ‘skill sets’ in which women generally outperform men include

  • better improvisational skills,
  • more relationship-focussed,
  • less rank-conscious,
  • more trust sensitive,
  • more intuitive,
  • more collaborative,
  • more comfortable with ambiguity,
  • better sharers of information
  • more able to balance rational thought with intuition and belief,
  • more articulate,
  • better at reading non-verbal clues,
  • better at multi-tasking, networking and negotiating to win/wins,
  • a preference to take the long view,
  • an ability to promote egalitarian team working and a
  • more naturally empowering management style

Or is it because many management hierarchies are still male dominated cultures in which more feminine values linked to the enhanced skill-sets listed above are under valued?

One trend is very clear. Women’s power in a modern economy is increasing. This is driven by their generally superior leadership skills and their influence over just about every major purchasing decision.

This means that organisations that cannot recruit and retain women will be at a significant disadvantage in the marketplace.

“When land was the productive asset, nations battled over it. The same is happening now for talented people.”

Stan Davis & Christopher Meyer, futureWEALTH

Just Imagine…part 2

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Stairway to Organisational Heaven?

Just imagine…

1. You work in an organisation where everyone gets 30 minutes every week 121 time with their manager to look at how the right work can be done more effectively and to work on communication, trust and respect;
2. Everyone is coached – every week – by their manager. They learn things on a weekly basis and use what they learn to create value;
3. Everyone gets feedback – several times a day. The feedback recognises, appreciates and encourages the good stuff. It also raises awareness around behaviours that people might want to re-think. Everyone knows that feedback is not an emotional big deal. It is just information that is designed to help;
4. Everyone delegates effectively. They expect to be delegated to at least every other month as part of their professional development. Managers ‘delegate and develop’ routinely so that they can consistently do the important (but never urgent) stuff well (stuff like strategy, RnD, customer contact, stakeholder management etc).
5. People who struggle to deliver on their role in the time that the organisation pays them are helped – through feedback and coaching – to find ways to get what they need to get done in the work hours available to them.

What difference would developing these 5 management processes make in your team?