The most important ingredient for a high performing team is trust. It is at the centre of everything. Without it, there is no psychological safety, collaboration is at subsistence levels and people are rarely enjoying their work. Leaders who aren’t trusted are probably managing through fear and are never going to be fully effective. With it, teams challenge each other, they work towards common goals, and they are more likely to have great ideas. A great way to think about this subjective concept is using the four slightly more objective variables of Charles H Green’s Trust Equation. The Case StudyWhilst what is happening in the UK sucks at every level, it does provide a great illustration of this equation. Let’s consider the last 45 days of UK political turmoil.
Credibility. On a scale of 1 – 10, how would you rate Liz Truss as leaders of the Conservative party and the government? Markets crashed, mortgages went up and the Conservative party imploded. It's tough to go too high. Reliability. Perhaps this one is a little higher as there was a determination to deliver on her leadership campaign promises, no matter what the evidence was that the course of action was totally hat-stand. Intimacy. Is there any evidence that colleagues, outside her faction, felt close to the leader? Will the people who now have higher mortgages feel that their situation was understood? At the very least, her team man-handling Conservative MPs to get them to vote with the government doesn’t suggest a 10 out of 10, does it? Self-orientation. Was throwing a chancellor under a bus and arguably waiting to be pushed rather than jumping showing that she put the parties or nations interests before all else? By your calculations, how does she do? The good news in a political party is when a leader gets it so wrong, the party can act quickly to remove a leader. This is not the same in businesses and organisations. A leader who performs poorly against this criterion can limp along for years, driving the team to achieve just enough without ever letting them reach their potential or feel fulfilled. Everyday is about survival. The really great news is that once aware of them we can all take practical action to improve any of the criteria. The use of an analytical tool and some focused coaching can deliver significant results. Have you been in a team that lacks this ingredient? How did it feel? Have you had a leader that would score badly? How do you score? Need help? As a side note, the past few months has also been a great, condensed study of populism. One Conservative Party leader candidate talked about hard decisions and measured approaches. He was dull too. The other said exactly what those voting wanted to hear, no matter how ill-judged. She won, and the rest is history…….. already. Except if you have a mortgage.
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Last week I posted an article titled ‘The great idea is the easy bit, part 1. My boss in an ass’. Its’ premise was that if you want to get your good idea accepted as just that, you need to do the hard yards to convince your boss and other stakeholders of your genius. If they don’t get it, you need to accept some responsibility for that.
Part 2 looks from the other perspective. If the business wants to have great ideas generated by the team, no matter how junior, what does it need to do to enable that? Not every good idea will come from people with the skills to address the requirements of all stakeholders, and if that’s the expectation, you may not get the engagement you’d hoped for. So here are three things to consider when trying to enable your team to contribute to the next big, game changing idea. Make it easy. Put together a simple template that contains the information you need to help the interested parties decide. Think about the perspectives of each stakeholder; have room for the figures for the finance lead, the big idea for the GM, the value proposition for the marketing lead etc. It needs to strike the balance between having enough ensure to deliver a reasonable understanding, but not so much that it becomes a barrier to ideas being presented. Think about using an A3 template or a short PowerPoint presentation. Maintain enthusiasm. Not every idea is a great idea, and not every good idea is the right one for here and now. So how do you say ‘pass’ on an idea and keep the originator enthusiastic about submitting another?
Create the environment where the sales lead, the finance manager or the chief engineer want to engage with other members of the team, no matter how junior, to develop their great ideas. Depending on the business, this may be done through specific objectives, or providing a regular forum where the skills of the business can be tapped in to. In summary, turning great ideas in to outcomes that benefit the business is vital if you want to keep ahead of the pack, but doing so is not straight forward. That said, if a business creates the right environment to encourage new ideas to come forward and individuals understand their role in convincing others the idea is great, then the chances of generating that business changing opportunity improve considerably. How many times have we said or heard “I’ve had a great idea, but my manager is too dumb/lazy/busy to make it happen”? Heaps?
The challenge is that having the great idea is always the easy bit; convincing others of your genius is rather more difficult. So here are 3 things to consider when selling your big idea. It’s a matter of perspective. Success will be viewed differently by different stakeholders. The Sales Manager wants something they are excited about selling, the Finance Manager wants good cash-flow, the GM wants to hit budgets and show their initiative. If you are going to pitch a great idea, consider who will influence the decision to pursue it, what their perspectives are and you can then make sure you hit their hot buttons. But it’s style too. What makes a pitch interesting will different for different people. Detail and figures will bore many sales leads who may find diagrams and pictures more engaging, though a lack of them will frustrate finance managers and engineers. The GM or VP may need to understand the vision and the practical steps needed to execute the great idea. So, it’s not just identifying the perspectives of different stakeholders, it’s deciding how to communicate with them to engage and excite each person. Timing is key. If your idea needs funding or has an impact on sales or any other part of the budget, the chance of it being adopted shortly after budgets have been set is diminished. In many large organisations, reallocating funds and resources mid-year can be complex and a distraction. Influence the right people in the right way as the budgets and resources are being allocated makes it easier for everyone to say yes. So remember, the boss is unlikely to be an ass, but they and their leadership team will have a bunch of styles and perspectives that must be considered. If you understand the audience and get the timing right, your great idea is far more likely to be the businesses next great idea ere to edit. A couple of weeks ago I heard an interview with the Godfather of the footballers’ dodgy haircut, the great Kevin Keegan. He talked about the incredible improvement he made in scoring goals after he left Scunthorpe United in the relatively smaller talent pool of Division 3 and joined Liverpool in the extremely competitive Division 1.
His view was that his ability had not changed significantly in the month or so between leaving one team and getting on the field with the next, instead he attributed this marked improvement to the ability of those around him. At Scunthorpe he was surrounded by reasonably talented people who could place the ball roughly where it needed to be. At Liverpool he was surrounded by people who could place the ball exactly where it needed to be. No more having to sprint a bit further to get to the ball, having to manoeuvre the ball away from the side line, or having to recover the ball from the opposition. All Keegan had to do was be in the right place and concentrate on his primary role; to strike at goal. He was remarkably effective at his job. When I heard this, it struck a chord with me. How much energy do people in business expend metaphorically chasing balls that others haven’t quite put in the right place? How much better would we collectively be if the ball landed perfectly at our feet every time? Not every business can attract or afford ‘Premier League’ team members, but can this metaphor help us think differently about how we manage our people? Notwithstanding the challenges of creating business resilience and helping the team to grow, should more time be spent training the team to excel in their primary role and to understand the importance of getting their ball in the right spot every time? What are your thoughts? Is Kevin Keegan sharing an insight that can help us in business, or does this only have relevance on the football field. In a military context, the fog of war and the confusion of the battlefield has necessitated a ‘Mission Command’ approach; leaders and managers agree a required outcome and a rough plan to achieve it, allocate resources and confirm boundaries, then broadly leave their direct reports alone to execute the plan, allowing teams to adapt as risks and opportunities are realised, applying initiative and pushing limits. Trust, flexibility and good communication underpin this way of operating, which can achieve remarkable results. In this dynamic and dislocated scenario, the opposite end of the management spectrum – directed or micro-management – would stifle initiative, decrease agility and undermine all-important trust.
In the current Covid-19 effected business environment, with many working from home and businesses dealing with uncertainty and disruption, it may feel like we are on the metaphoric battlefield and we need to adapt our style. So which managers are thriving which are merely surviving? Those that normally do ok but are struggling with the new normal may need help: Perhaps they find it hard to trust their team once out of sight? Perhaps the team are used to being told exactly how to do something and are not enabled to use their initiative. Perhaps they are conditioned to associate the presence of the boss with full engagement on a task? All these behaviours are barriers to real employee engagement and commitment under normal circumstances and may make the difference between success and failure in these exceptional times. This a great opportunity for businesses and organisations to identify the managers that need more help and set standards of leadership and management that encourages individual initiative, improves engagement and increases agility. Removing the stifling, driving micromanagement style will set bare long-term fruit and allow organisations to emerge from this trying period stronger than ever. How are your managers doing? Do you need to adapt? What have you found effective? Thank you to all those who joined me for my webinar last week. I hope that you found it useful. Please drop me a line if you would like any more information. We may be in this for the long-haul. Three months may be best case, six months likely, and let’s not speculate about worst case. For most business, the COVID-19 pandemic and restrictions related to it represents the biggest challenge they may ever face. How they cope is likely to be a defining moment. So what can a business do to maximise their chances of survival? Well here, utilising the Vexamen Four Pillars of Business Optimisation, are a few considerations to think about. Pillar 1: Strategy and Execution. A good 3-5 year strategy is likely to remain relevant in the long term, but how it is being executed in the current year and what the environment means to the 1-3 year finances needs consideration. Ask:
Giving people a focus that is more relevant to these circumstances will help motivate the team and keep business momentum going. Pillar 2: Tools and Skills. If most of your employees are working from home, then how do you make this work best? Ask:
Some of this involves cost at a time when cash-flow may be weak but as we strive to be more flexible in working practices even without this terrible virus, perhaps this is an opportunity to make that investment in modernising your working practices that will bear fruit long after this current crisis has passed. I am sure the need to provide appropriate personal protective equipment goes without saying. Pillar 3: Organisation and Roles. Some hard questions need to be answered about the size and shape of your organisation. Consider:
Pillar 4: Culture and Behaviour. Now is the time for clear leadership, compassion, empathy, teamwork and great communication.
The bottom line is that those lucky enough to have a valid business model at this time can either just ‘get through it’ or adapt to survive. Those that do the latter will be the ones that thrive once this difficult period is over. Want help prioritising what to do? The Vexamen team is experienced in change and crisis management. Drop me a line at [email protected] and we can see what we can do to help you adapt and overcome. Vexamen is a Southern Highlands and Sydney based businesses consultancy. Setting up a new small business is never going to easy, and to try to do so in a slow economy, just before Christmas, in a very uncertain world adds another dimension.
It has become clear that two key elements keep things moving in such a situation: coffee and great support from wonderful people. It is terrific that so many are willing to take time for a coffee and to offer advice and experience. It’s great to know that I am not alone. This photo brings it all together: The beautifully crafted keep cup, full to the brim with great coffee prepared by the talented Adam Faulkner, Director and Designer at blueegg User Experience Agency, who gave me some great (and frank) advice about how to improve the Vexamen website. #hugelygrateful The correlation between business with a highly engaged workforce and those with superior financial performance is well document and the case reasonably solid but is it the foundation of a successful business or a dangerous distraction?
Employee engagement is both a lag and a lead indicator. If engagement scores are low, it’s a lead indicator that future business performance will be poor but as a lag indicator, the business probably has a whole bunch of performance challenges already. So, what’s the answer? Well there are other indicators that fall into two groups: those that measure the symptoms of poor engagement; high employee turnover, high absenteeism, low productivity etc, and there are those may shine light on the causes but are harder to measure and provide the foundations for success: employees understanding of the strategy and how they contribute to it, appropriate skills in the workforce, the right IT tools etc. Whilst the first group are also lag indicators, they are easy to measure and should give useful early insights into how engaged the workforce is. Initiatives to improve these important challenges will be the ones that are likely to target the causes of the poor engagement and may well involve the foundations in the second list. So, engagement is important and should be kept in the mind, but it is an outcome that is both an indicator of future performance and a lag indicator of business challenges. Business leaders should focus on the lag indicators that are the symptoms of poor engagement, address those through initiative that ensure the real foundations are in place and employee engagement will be on the up. The overwhelming majority of people want to do a good job. They want to be successful; they want to support their colleagues, they want to feel that they have achieved something during their working day, they want to be recognised and rewarded as a good employee. It doesn’t always feel that way and managers get frustrated with people in their teams who appear to have an approach that is at odds with this statement, but how many of the people you know well really think differently? I certainly don’t know anyone who is happy with not being successful at work.
So, where does the desire to do well and actual performance diverge? This is a key question for managers and leaders to ask when considering peoples performance and if they come at it from a perspective of ‘This person wants to be successful: what is stopping them?’, the way they approach conversations may be very different. What are the obstacles to success today? Is it skills, lack of understanding of what is required or organisational issues? Are there things happening at home that are causing problems? These are just a few of the things that interfere with good performance. Conversations that enable honest and open discussion about these challenges and how they can be overcome are the important ones to have. They are the conversations that will lead individuals and through them, the business, to be successful. So leaders, start with believing that your team wants to be successful, then all you have to do is work out how to enable that success. |
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