Category: Leadership Skills

“When I gave them their marching orders and they were nodding their heads, I figured they knew what to do and were going to do it.”

I recently heard this from a health care manager who was not too happy when the project got behind schedule and the blame game took over. Managers can’t mandate accountability, they need to encourage it. Here are three tips to generate employee commitment.

1. First, get real buy in.
You may think that when you present the reasons for change and the plan is solid, the majority of people will buy in automatically. But that doesn’t match up to reality. People will be leery until you deal with their questions, anxieties and concerns. Read “I’m committed, why isn’t everyone else?”
2. Set a crystal clear direction.
It must be like a lighthouse, a bright and focused beacon that guides everyone’s work. If people don’t understand precisely where they are headed and how they specifically contribute to the overall results, then it’s only sheer luck that they will succeed.
3. Make sure everyone stays the course.
It’s usually in the middle of a change effort that work starts falling through the cracks, milestones aren’t met and stress is affecting everyone’s morale. This is when management is needed to keep the right hands and the left hands working well together. One organization I worked with had weekly cross departmental meetings for communication updates, coordination issues and problem solving.

Management Success Tip:

Realize you can’t mandate accountability, you must demonstrate it. Instead of pointing fingers when trouble arises, look to yourself first. Ask these four specific questions:

• What is the real problem not just what surfaces?
• What am I doing or not doing to contribute to the problem?
• What will I do differently to help solve the problem?
• How will I be accountable for results?

As one leader said, “It’s in my bones now. I work to demonstrate accountability everyday to myself, the leadership team and our organization’s talent.”

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.
• Fast track your leadership. Be part of a Success Team.
• Need a speaker? Get the Edge keynotes-webinars-workshops.
• Copyright © 2012 Marcia Zidle business and leadership coach.

A major difference between leading and facilitating is that a leader often tells; a facilitator always asks. In my book, The Secrets of Facilitation, I described how I learned what I call the fundamental secret of facilitation.

I began understanding the secret during my career with the management consulting division of what was then one of the Big-8 accounting and consulting firms. In the eight years I spent in that consulting practice, we had a standard way of addressing a client problem. We might be called in to review a particular department or activity. We would arrive with our army of bright people, interview those whom we believed were the key stakeholders, develop a set of recommendations based on our interviews and experience, and create what might be called the “100% Solution.” We would go away and come back a year later and perhaps, if we were lucky, 15% of the recommendations would be implemented.

In my final years with that organization, the practice in which I worked began taking a different approach. We would come in with a smaller group of consultants and work shoulder to shoulder with client personnel. Together we would convene group interviews (facilitated sessions) which typically included 8-20 people. In the facilitated sessions, the participants would create the recommendations, not the consultants. In most cases, they would only come up with what we might consider the 60% or 70% solution. So we would float ideas based on our experience. Some they would accept, others they would reject as “not beneficial” or “not implementable” in their environment. When all was done, they might have created what we would consider “the 85% solution.” Yet a year later, when we came back, amazingly 80-90% of the solution would be implemented!

Why wasn’t more of the “100% solution” implemented? Why would the “85% solution” gained through facilitation achieve far greater success? Therein lies the secret and the power behind it.

Secret #1
If they create it, they understand it and they accept it.

As an expert consultant, we were “telling” our clients what they needed to do. As a result, there was very little buy-in by our clients and their people. When we began “asking” the questions that resulted in them creating their own answers, the difference was staggering.

Dr. Robert Zawacki from the University of Colorado in his book “Transforming the Mature Information Technology Organization” put the secret this way:

ED = RD x CD
Effective Decisions = The Right Decision times Commitment to the Decision

Dr. Zawacki’s point is that the multiplication sign in the formula means that even the best decision can be rendered completely ineffective if commitment to the decision is lacking.

You can achieve more effective results when solutions are created, understood and accepted by the people impacted.

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For more resources, see the Library topic Facilitation.

__________________________

Michael Wilkinson is the CEO and Managing Director of Leadership Strategies, Inc., “The Facilitation Company” and author of Amazon best-seller “The Secrets of Facilitation”, “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.

“I hate meetings…they are a waste of time. We just talk, talk, talk…nothings gets done!”

Are you in charge of leading meetings? If so, what are your meetings like? Does real work gets done or is it just talk, talk, talk?

Here are the top three questions that I’m frequently asked by team and project leaders. They involve running productive meetings, keeping them on track and getting work done.

1. “Do you have any tips on encouraging people to be on time to meetings?”
The general rule is to start the meeting on time. This gives the message to people that you are serious about time and meeting management. If you start late, it penalizes the people who make an effort to be there at the designated time. Also, if someone only needs to attend for one particular segment of the meeting, let that person know when that agenda item will be dealt with. Then he doesn’t have to attend the entire meeting, just the part for his input.

Also, research suggests that setting a meeting time that is NOT on the hour or half hour is more likely to result in people arriving on time. For example, consider starting your meeting at 2:10 P.M. rather than 2:00 P.M. It certainly should get the attention of the participants.

2. “We hold regular staff meetings but often we spend a great deal of time on nothing at all. What can we do to be more productive?”
Meetings that occur every week, or on some other regular basis, can be useful provided that there is a clear, important purpose for the meetings. However, this is often not the case. Weekly staff meetings tend to occur simply because that’s the way it’s always been. So if you want to change that here are some things you can do.

Make sure first they are really necessary. Examine the agenda and ask: “Are each of these items essential or can it be handled outside the meeting? Have variety in your staff meetings. Occasionally bring in a speaker, have the meeting off-site, have a celebration, use a film clip or article to generate discussion. Put your creativity hat on and make the meetings interesting.

3. “No matter what we do, our meetings go on and on and on. What can we do to shorten our meeting?”
First, always have an agenda and stick to it. Each agenda item should have a time limit. If you are going over the set time for that item, the group has several choices:

• The item can be tabled to the next meeting
• If an agenda item is multi-faceted, then an option is to focus on one or two key aspects and table the remaining parts until the next meeting.
• The group can decide that this item needs to be dealt with now and extends the time knowing that other items on the agenda may get short-changed or postponed.

Second, it’s important to have ground rules for discussion. For example, some one can “hold the floor” on a single topic or item for a certain time limit that makes sense…two minutes, five minutes and enforce it with a timer. Or someone can speak on any given topic or item two times and that’s it. This prevents talking the topic to death.

Management Success Tip:

As a meeting leader, you wear different hats. You’re the traffic cop making sure everyone gets a turn to speak and controlling the talkers; the director managing the agenda and time so that things get done; the diplomat dealing with inevitable differences of opinion; and the host providing treats, a good atmosphere and occassional fun.

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.
• Fast track your leadership. Be part of a Success Team.
• Need a speaker? Get the Edge keynotes-webinars-workshops.
• Copyright © 2012 Marcia Zidle business and leadership coach.

Conflict is an inevitable part of life. Conflict is inherent in our differences—in people’s differing backgrounds, perspectives, values, needs, goals, expectations, etc. Here are some common, yet erroneous, beliefs about conflict.

Myth #1:
We tend to think that disagreements and conflicts must always be win / lose situations. “If I don’t win, I lose and YOU win.” Our self-esteem is thus involved and we fight for an issue which may not be that important to us. We need to feel “proven right.”
Myth #2:
If people don’t agree with us, they are against us. And we tend to feel that if someone differs with us on one important issue, we will probably disagree on most issues.
Myth #3:
It is better to avoid and not talk with a person with whom we have had a conflict. It will only make the other person uncomfortable.
Myth #4:
If we disagree or do not understand what someone had said, it is best to ignore the issue, rather than ask for clarification. The problem will probably “go away” if we do not bring it up. Or we may think that everyone else understands what was said, and we do not wish to appear “stupid”.
Myth #5:
We think others can read our minds and know what we are thinking and feeling. We think people understand our suggestions when in fact, they do not. And, we may feel sure we know what the other person is saying when we do not. Consequently, we may be talking at cross purposes and not recognize areas of common interest or agreement.

Yes, conflict can be destructive when it diverts energy from more important activities and issues; when it polarizes people and groups and reduces cooperation .and when it produces irresponsible and regrettable behavior. However, conflict can be constructive when it opens up and improves communication; when it strengthens working relationships and teamwork; and when it leads to better quality decisions and problem solutions.

Mangement Success Tip:

Conflict by itself is neither good nor bad. It’s the way you manage conflict that produces constructive or destructive results. To deal effective with conflict depends on you and your ability to:

• Stop and understand the situation;
• Select appropriate / constructive conflict resolution techniques;
• Start acting in a manner that solves the problem and honors the relationship.

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.
• Fast track your leadership. Be part of a Success Team.
• Need a speaker? Get the Edge keynotes-webinars-workshops.
• Copyright © 2012 Marcia Zidle business and leadership coach.

Winning teams aren’t created by accident. Rather, the team leaders or manager functions like a coach who recognizes special talents in people and gets them to work together toward a common goal.

The following three steps will help you build a winning team and set it in the right direction.

1. Select the right team members.
You may be called upon to assemble a team of players from different departments to take on a special assignment. Or, you have to pick from your own staff those who should work together on a particular project. Too often, leaders merely assess a project’s demands and select people on technical qualifications. But that approach can fail if the personalities and specific talents don’t mesh.

For example, some people can take a project and run it with little guidance. Others need every detail spelled out. Make sure you have a mixture of necessary skill sets to get the job done. Teams succeed when leaders give as much thought to team relationships as to the tasks that need to be performed.

2. Get the team off to a good start.
The first thing you do is to clarify the big picture and goals. Explain the team’s purpose and how it fits in with the company’s or department’s goals. Team members will then become more motivated and empowered to get involved.

Then explain the “who does what when.” When a team is formed, people often are confused about their particular roles and responsibilities. Get the team immediately involved in setting specific short-term goals. This helps members quickly move from the ‘me’ to the ‘we’ stage of effective teamwork.

3. Maintain involvement and productivity.
The next step is to determine a set of ground rules of how they will operate together. Team members need to define effective team behaviors. For example, they need to discuss how they will handle conflict, how they will make decisions, how they will deal with certain kinds of problems, like lateness, absenteeism, etc.

Management Success Tip

Look out for these danger signs: Team members don’t take responsibility for their actions or they break into subgroups instead of sharing work or they miss deadlines and lose interest in the work. Have regular scheduled “let’s see how we’re doing” meetings to address issues, conflicts, and uncertainties. Also provide team building and team work skills training.

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.
• Fast track your leadership. Be part of a Success Team.
• Need a speaker? Get the Edge keynotes-webinars-workshops.
• Copyright © 2012 Marcia Zidle business and leadership coach.

For many, meetings are viewed as a dreaded evil to be avoided at all costs: far too little gets accomplished, much of the discussion is unfocused and unproductive, and a lot of time is wasted.

If you lead important group meetings, you know how difficult it can be to get a group engaged right from the beginning, to keep them focused and on track, to deal with difficult personalities and dysfunctional behavior, to build consensus when people disagree, and to ensure that full commitment is gained for follow through. Facilitators use facilitated sessions as a tool for addressing these issues.

A facilitated session is…

• a highly structure meeting in which the facilitator guides the participants through
• a series of predefined steps to arrive at a result that is created, understood and accepted by all participants.

The role of the facilitator is to…

• use interactions and techniques that engage the hearts, minds and souls of the participants in the work.

At their best, facilitators are able to help participants excel as a team in focusing on the issues, building a common vision and committing to the actions that will bring that vision into reality!

When SHOULD You Use A Facilitator?

1. Critical Results. If the results of the meeting are critical to the success of the enterprise, and there will be a variety of views in the room, consider using a facilitator.
2. Strong Opinions. If there are many strong opinions in the room and consensus is required, consider using a facilitator.
3. No Good Answers. If the situation is such that there are no apparent good answers and new, creative solutions are called for, consider using a facilitator.
4. You are Vested. If you, the meeting leader, are strongly vested in a particular position, but want to be open to other possible alternatives, consider using a facilitator.
5. Team Ownership Required. If the team – not just one or two people – needs to feel ownership of the solution, consider using a facilitator.
6. Neutral Party Needed. If the discussion is best guided by a neutral party to engender trust or participation, consider using a facilitator.
7. Lack of Expertise. If there is a lack of experience or expertise in managing a group through the work process (e.g., strategic planning), consider using a facilitator.
8. Undefined Approach. If the product of the meeting or the work process needed to create the product is unclear or ill-defined, consider using a facilitator.

If you have to consider two or more of these items, definitely: USE A FACILITATOR!

When Should a Facilitator NOT Be Used?

It’s also important to understand the circumstances when it doesn’t make sense to engage a facilitator. You do not need a facilitator when:

1. the decision has already been made.
2. decision makers are not open to alternatives other than their own.
3. the meeting is information only and requires no engagement of the group.
4. the group is very small.
5. there is a commonality of opinion on how to proceed.

Meetings are expensive. When you have the right facilitator with the corresponding skill set you tremendously enhance the quality of your meeting deliverables and make them much more cost-effective.

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For more resources, see the Library topic Facilitation.

__________________________

Michael Wilkinson is the CEO and Managing Director of Leadership Strategies, Inc., “The Facilitation Company” and author of Amazon best-seller “The Secrets of Facilitation”, “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.

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For more resources, see the Library topic Facilitation.

__________________________

Michael Wilkinson is the CEO and Managing Director of Leadership Strategies, Inc., “The Facilitation Company” and author of Amazon best-seller “The Secrets of Facilitation”, “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.

“I didn’t communicate clearly and often enough the changes that had to be made and why they had to be made.”

This manager was talking about the importance of providing a clear road map to his staff about the rationale, direction and steps of the change. What people want from their leaders are answers to these 5 critical questions:

• Where are we going?
• Why is this important?
• How are we going to get there?
• What is my role and responsibilities?
• What will success look like?

Are you giving your staff a clear roadmap? Are you communicating regularly about what’s going on? My sense is that there may be a lot of “talk” but not enough quality communication. Here are three tips onto make sure your people get on board the change train.

1. Obtain the many facts surrounding the change.
This is not the time to “wing it”. You must be very clear about the big picture and the small details. What’s changing and what isn’t? What’s going to change right now and what later? What’s the time frame? What other important details do I need to reassure my staff?
2. Decide when and how to communicate the news.
The timing of the communication is very important. Consider when you are at your best as a communicator and when your employees are most apt to be receptive. What is the best time to talk with your staff? Will key people be there? What is the most effective way to communicate the news? Is it n a group meeting or one-on-one or in a memo or email or some other way?
3. Anticipate and address their concerns.
When a manager announces a change, a staff person’s first concern is “How is it going to affect me?” Recognize that while the change is beneficial and needed, there may be legitimate problems and downsides to the change. What questions might be asked about the change? How might you answer these questions and their concerns? What can you do to reassure and encourage your staff about the change?

Management Success Tip:

When the change message is not well-defined and well presented, people tend to respond by sitting on the fence, dragging their feet or even worse sabotaging the change effort. Suddenly milestones are not met, customers are upset and your boss is pounding on your door for better results. Avoid these problems by communicating with your staff early, often and well.

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.
• Fast track your leadership. Be part of a Success Team.
• Need a speaker? Get the Edge keynotes-webinars-workshops.
• Copyright © 2012 Marcia Zidle business and leadership coach.

Last week I worked with a group of telecom executives navigating Adaptive Change, change that is complex and unpredictable. During the check-in and check-out the challenge of connecting came up. So, close your door, ignore the phone, and let’s explore connecting.

Connecting with others requires that we first connect with ourselves. This means being present and mindful, fully embodied in the moment. When connected to ourselves we tap into our positive core – our strengths, positivity, and deep trust – which allows us to engage with the world from a stance of curiosity, inquiry, and experimentation. In a mindful state we are open to new ideas and perspectives[1]. Positivity broadens our perceptions so that we see more possibilities and are able to imagine solutions to challenges that arise[2]. Being present and embodied we are in touch with our emotions and intuition as fleeting internal and external signals help us make meaning of the situation[3]. In this way we are poised to embrace the future rather than relive the past.

If connecting with ourselves leaves us aware, resourceful, and resilient connecting with others allows us to do something exceptional with all that energy. Connecting with another person is fundamental to creating WE[4]. Without the inclusiveness of connection we operate as two independent agents, able to coordinate our activities and cooperate but little else. Connection generates interdependence, a sensitivity to bidirectional feedback, and the ability to collaborate (literally, to work with another, especially in joint intellectual effort). So connecting with others creates a space for doing, thinking, and relating that did not previously exist. Without connection interactions collapse into WIIFM- What’s In It For Me.

What happens when teams connect?

The Tuckman model of team development – Forming-Storming-Norming-Performing – has lost its usefulness. The world of work is too fast paced, change is continuous, and performance is the context not the outcome of teams. Two pieces of research on group dynamics and performance fill the vacuum created by this conceptual loss.

Team Dynamics – Synthesizing the research of Kenwyn Smith and David Berg[5] we can replace the Tuckman model with a virtuous cycle of team development that operates in the context of performance: Connect-Engage-Act. Connection creates the relationships that are strong and healthy enough to withstand the strain of opposition and conflict (most often of ideas) within the group. Connectivity reflects how attuned and responsive team members are to one another[6]. Strong, healthy connection with another person(s) promotes openness, empathy/compassion, and the integration of differences, which ultimately leads to trust. Connection allows the diversity within the group to be used to achieve goals, perform different functions, and survive as a coherent system over time.

Team Performance – Connectivity also drives performance. Based on the research of Marcial Losada[7] team performance has three bipolar dimensions – positivity/negativity ratio, self-focus/other-focus, inquiry/advocacy – all driven by a single control parameter, connectivity. High-performing teams (determined by profitability, customer satisfaction ratings, and 360^o evaluations) had higher connectivity (they were more attuned and responsive to each other), focused their attention on the needs of others as well as self, asked questions as often as they defended their personal point of view, and had positive interactions three times more often than negative interactions (positive language included: support, encouragement, or appreciation; negative language included: disapproval, sarcasm, and cynicism). Low and moderately performing teams all had lower connectivity and, as a result, imbalance in the other three dimensions of performance.

Leadership Learning

Everyone has the opportunity to practice connection thousands of times a day. Use these to become Masters of Connectivity. Here’s how:

• Before getting out of bed connect with your body, your feelings, and your intentions for the day. Get out of bed feeling connected and grounded rather than scattered and rushed.
• Quick Connections: At the grocery store, toll booth, gas station, or restaurant connect with the person serving you. Really see them, connect with a comment that lets them know you see them, watch for feedback, that they suddenly see you, and see if they connect back. Feel the link between you spring into being. How did your body respond? How did theirs change? What nonverbal cues did you pick up that indicated the connection? Don’t evaluate your connection, that makes it a performance and not a true connection, just keep doing it and watch what happens over time.
• Deep Connections: Take a moment to reflect on your comfort zone for connectivity. How deep can you go – with yourself and with others? What is your response when someone tries to connect more deeply than this? What would allow you to go deeper? How can you practice this?

[1]Langer, E. J. Mindfulness. Perseus Books, Reading, MA. 1989.

[2]Fredrickson, Barbara. Positivity. Crown Publishers, New York. 2009.

[3]Strozzi-Heckler, R. The Leadership Dojo. Frog Ltd. Berkeley, CA. 2007.

[4]Glaser, J.E. Creating WE. Platinum Press, Avon, MA. 2005

[5]Smith, K.K. and Berg, D.N. Paradoxes of Group Life: Understanding Conflict, Paralysis, and Movement in Group Dynamics. Jossey-Bass, San Francisco, 1987.

[6]Fredrickson, Barbara. Positivity. Crown Publishers, New York. 2009.

[7]Losada, M. and Heaphy, E. (2004) The roles of positivity and connectivity in the performance of business teams: A nonlinear dynamics model. American Behavioral Scientist, 47(6), 740 – 765.