Month: December 2012

Big Ideas aren’t for commoners, right? Facebook. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Pennies for Peace. Apple. All Big Ideas. So, big, in fact, that they seem like the kinds of things other people do, not the things us common-folk do.

Hmmmm… you know I’m not going to buy that one, right? I proudly own the moniker ‘Big Idea Success Strategist’ — if I bought the “big thinking is for everyone else” excuse, I wouldn’t have much of a practice… or a Big Idea of my own. The focus of my work with clients is in tapping hidden potential, transforming mindsets to inspire Big Thinking, and implementing the systems and structure to turn Big Thinking into successful action. Fact is, I’m a sucker for a Big Idea, I can smell one from a mile away, and I know you have one… we all do. You may just not have called it that yet.

What IS a Big Idea?

Big Ideas don’t always look like international phenomena. They’re not always translated into billions of dollars, or impact millions of people. And, in fact, sometimes Big Ideas aren’t even what you do, but how you do it.

Do these sound like Big Ideas to you?

• The choice to stop competing as if your unique leadership is a commodity.
• Refusing to live a divided life and inviting who you are into what you do.
• Heeding the ache to restructure your business to fit your evolving life.
• Leading a business or a team that is grounded in purpose, passion, and profit.

All Big Ideas. All necessitate that you to be authentic and courageous. All invite you to be an innovator, a thought-leader, and a role-model. All require that you care enough to take action.

Big Ideas don’t always start out looking big. In fact, most of the time, they just start out looking like you doing what you do best and care about the most. And they always start with small steps.

In the words of Facebook founder, Mark Zuckerberg, when talking about Facebook:

“The craziest thing to me in all of this, is that I remember having these conversations with my friends when I was in college. We would just sort of take it as an assumption that the world would get to the state where it is now. But, we figured, we’re just college kids. Why were we the people who were most qualified to do that? I mean, that’s crazy…. I guess what it probably turns out is, other people didn’t care as much as we did.”

And we all know how that story turned out. What’s the first small step to your Big Idea?

We recently did a survey and were surprised that our employees had negative feelings about their work. They felt frustrated and unappreciated. What should we do?

Congratulations first on taking the time to survey and listen to your employees; second on paying attention to the results, even if they were not what you expected. Without strong positive ties to work or the work experience, employees have little incentive to go the distance or deliver consistently top performance.

So the next step is to understand the reasons for employee negativity. Don’t skip this step or you may be wasting your money, time and credibility by investing in the wrong solutions.

Let’s say that you find out that people don’t feel appreciated because your company tends to reward everyone in the same way. Rewards are most appreciated when they are individualized. Not one size fits all. What delights one person may mean little to another. In addition, people change over time, so that what is rewarding today may not be in the future. To make sure that rewards are genuinely effective in encouraging people, it is worth investing a bit of time in an “armchair analysis” to identify potential rewards for individuals.

Here’s a suggested process:

• Make a list of feasible rewards you could possibly offer your staff members.
• Sit back in your armchair with the list and with a particular individual in mind.
• Review what you know about that individual: the way she likes to work, the kind of work she likes, hobbies, interests, etc.
• Decide which of the possible rewards would be most appreciated by that individual.
• Offer one of these rewards the next time you observe good performance and then check the individual reaction

Management Success Tip

Think of this as an opportunity to determine what is most effective for each individual in the team. You may also find that the exercise causes you to become aware of things about the people you work with, that you hadn’t really paid attention to before. Also see How to Encourage Everyone to Do Their Best Work, Five Ways to Motivate Your Best People and Not Break the Bank and Recognize the Importance of Recognition.

Do you want to develop your Management Smarts?

• Build your skills with The Effective Manager
• Sign up for Quick Wins: 101 Management Tips.
• Find performance boosters in the Smart Moves Blog.
• Need a speaker? Get the Edge keynotes-webinars-workshops.
• Copyright © 2012 Marcia Zidle business and leadership coach.

In today ’s business world many meetings take place virtually using a variety of media, including the Internet, videoconferencing, the telephone, and other technology vehicles that allow participants to be in different geographical areas. Although these virtual media can reduce the cost of meetings, they can also present significant challenges to the facilitator. For despite the geographical dispersion, the facilitator must still find a way to get the participants excited from the very beginning, keep everyone engaged and focused on the objective, gather and document the critical information, build consensus, manage dysfunction, keep the energy high, and close with a clear understanding of what was accomplished, the value of the accomplishment, and the steps to be taken once the meeting ends.

In my new book, The Secrets of Facilitation, 2^nd Edition, I included an entire chapter on The Secrets to Facilitating Virtual Meetings. Here is one of the secrets from the book on preparing for the meeting.

Secret #63- The Secret to Preparing for a Virtual Meeting

In your preparation, select the appropriate technology and plan and prepare your facilitation methods so that everyone will be able to “see.”

Whenever possible with virtual meetings, consider using technology that will allow all participants to see the same information. In face-to-face meetings, flip charts serve as a major focusing tool; similarly, virtual meetings are far more productive when participants are seeing the meeting output created as the meeting is progressing. Having the meeting information visible can keep participants engaged, reduce off-topic conversations, minimize misunderstandings caused by people mishearing information, and provide a method for identifying and correcting when the facilitator has misunderstood a point that is made.

The number of tools available to assist facilitators with virtual meetings continues to grow. At the time of this publication, the more popular ones include WebEx, Live Meeting, Adobe Connect, GotoMeeting, Join.Me, Skype, Google Docs, Powernoodle, ThinkTank, TeamViewer, iLinc, and iMeet.

• For basic desktop sharing functions that allow others to see your screen while the meeting is progressing, tools that are free or relatively inexpensive, such as GotoMeeting, Join.Me, Skype, and Goggle Docs, may be more than adequate.
• When you need more robust capabilities, such as the ability to divide into breakout groups or have participants simultaneously record on a whiteboard, more powerful tools, such as WebEx, Live Meeting, or Adobe Connect, may be more appropriate.

Whatever tool you select, consider the following to help ensure that you are fully prepared with the tool. (These suggestions are adapted with permission from Challenges of Virtual and Blended Meetings, by Rachel Smith, director of digital facilitation services at the Grove Consultants International.)

• Spend time practicing with the technology before the meeting. Be sure to load any files you will be showing and to run through all the tools and options you think you might use. Consider practicing using two computers, one showing what you will see and one showing what participants will see, to ensure that you understand what you and the participants will experience.
• Offer to give a brief orientation session to participants in advance of the meeting to increase the comfort of those who are unfamiliar with the technology. The orientation session can also serve to identify potential technology problems early.
• If possible, arrange to have someone on hand during the session that can answer technical questions and help attendees who get stuck. Having a partner working with you to handle technical issues will allow you to keep the meeting running smoothly while your partner assists attendees in trouble.
• Ask attendees who are calling in from their computers to use a headset or earphones. When people don’t use a headset or earphones, their computer microphone can sometimes pick up the output from the speakers and broadcast it back into the conference. Although the offender often can’t hear this, others on the call will likely hear feedback or echoes.
• If some people simply can’t use a headset or earphones, ask them to keep their microphone muted unless they are speaking.

Preparing for a Virtual Meeting

Along with preparing the technology, there are several other preparation steps, starting with identifying your 5 Ps.

• Define the 5 Ps for the session: the purpose, product, participants, probable issues, and process.
• When defining the process, think carefully through O-P-Q-R-S-T for the virtual setting.
• What is the most appropriate Order of the processes?
• What Process technique (for example, listing, brainstorming, or grouping) will you use with each agenda item?
• What will be your type B starting Question for each agenda item?
• How will you Record the responses for the agenda topic? Will you be using a Word document, PowerPoint, or whiteboard?
• What Supplies do you need for the session? Although the session is virtual, consider what other tools you might need, such as pen and paper to diagram who is on the call.
• What’s your estimate of the Timing for each agenda item?
• Distribute a meeting notice in advance of the session, stating the purpose, the product, the agenda, and proposed ground rules, and that include any relevant handouts. The meeting notice should indicate what documents participants need to have for the meeting and any advance preparation required. If participants from multiple time zones are attending the meeting, be sure to specify the time zone when informing participants of the start and end times.
• As with face-to-face meetings, state a gathering time and a start time in the meeting notice. The gathering time should be ten to fifteen minutes before the start time to have everyone logged in and ready to go prior to the official start of the meeting.
• In planning the meeting, limit agenda items so that the entire call can be completed in two hours or less to help participants maintain focus. If necessary, break the meeting into several calls.
• Consider having participants do preliminary brainstorming and submit their ideas prior to the meeting. You can summarize these ideas into “brainstorm lists” and send them in advance to participants along with the agenda and other written materials. This advance preparation allows more time in the meeting to be spent grouping, prioritizing, or evaluating the brainstormed material.
• If there are multiple people at the same location, consider having them assemble for the meeting in a conference room or some other suitable environment. Having as many as possible in the same room promotes teamwork and helps people avoid the temptation to multitask (for example, answer emails) during the meeting. With each “call-in” location, consider appointing a scribe to document key points on flip charts during the meeting.
• Prior to the meeting, create a list that shows the name and location of each person expected in the meeting.

For the next virtual meeting you facilitate, try these techniques. Expect that the preparation will take you about twice as long the first time, as you will be establishing new tools and approaches.

Read more in “The Secrets of Facilitation 2nd Edition.”

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For more resources, see the Library topic Facilitation.

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Michael Wilkinson is the CEO and Managing Director of Leadership Strategies, Inc., “The Facilitation Company” and author of the brand new “The Secrets of Facilitation 2nd Edition”, “The Secrets to Masterful Meetings”, and the brand new “The Executive Guide to Facilitating Strategy.” Leadership Strategies is a global leader in facilitation services, providing companies with dynamic professional facilitators who lead executive teams and task forces in areas like strategic planning, issue resolution, process improvement and others. They are also a leading provider of facilitation training in the United States.