Managing starts with clarity. The time a manager spends getting clear about what needs to be done will pay off in focused effort from increased understanding. When things aren’t clear, the day doesn’t go well. Minds and bodies gravitate toward something that does seem clear. The world dislikes a vacuum. When one is created, people will fill in the blanks with their own content. That content seldom matches your intent.
The Manager is the Mediator of Meaning. Clarity is the first part of the issue. The other part is taking the time to show exactly how “what” you are proposing to do is directly connected to the success of over-arching goals. Your kids will tell you to “make it realistic.” Your employees are thinking it.
Managers Understand How People Learn and Work. Intellectually, we all acknowledge that people learn differently and work differently. Really successful managers take time to pinpoint what those styles are and genuinely acknowledge their inherent value. Hands-on ‘Doers,’ Readers, Questioners, Ponderers. . .
Managing Means Knowing How to Orchestrate the Experience. When to have a meeting or not have a meeting; who needs one-on-one attention? What isn’t negotiable and what will work best with a full discussion? Is the objective really achievable–at the level of quality desired–in the originally designated timetable? Managers, go ahead and add your favorites to this list.
Managers Lead from Every Proximity. You’ll spot a good manager out in front of the group; alongside of a direct report who is struggling; or standing in the back of the room listening to a discussion and only joining in when re-direction or a fact is needed. And everyone knows how they’re doing in relation to what’s expected.
Consistently add these five to your repertoire and you’ll bump up your game exponentially.
As leaders, we are often in a position where our opinions and criticism carry great weight and those perspectives can positively and negatively affect the lives of those around us. Unfortunately we’re not always careful with our criticism nor are we mindful of the corresponding responsibilities that go along with our words.
In an age where we can all be critics, whether it’s in blog post comments, on our own websites, on twitter, Facebook, or anywhere else we can share our ideas and opinions, the importance of understanding our responsibility as a critic is great. Yet we often ignore this responsibility and blast away at the object of our derision with little thought for the implications of our actions. Well allow me to offer a challenge for all of us to aspire to be something more than a simple critic
As a leader, it’s easy for you to rain down criticism upon the work of others. You don’t do the work – you simply set the direction for the work to be done, define the performance standards, and judge the quality of the work after it is completed. Like it or not, you’re a professional critic.
What you must understand is your criticism carries weight. It impacts the performance reviews of your people. It determines whether a supplier wins a contract or gets booted. It shapes the perspective on whether someone gets promoted or not. You get the picture – your words change lives.
I invite you to go a step beyond simple criticism. Help build something beyond your words. Instead of simply designating something as inadequate, offer constructive thoughts on how to improve it. Give people the coaching, feedback, and resources to improve their product, service, performance. Identify opportunities to connect ideas and people so they can build something greater. Be part of the solution rather than simply pointing out the problem.
Better yet, change your mindset from one of critic to one of architect. Instead of looking at your job responsibilities as only setting direction and judging the work of others, spend time with your team creating new ideas. Roll up your sleeves, make your own contributions to that idea, and be open to your work being judged by others. It’s risky. Our insecurities hold us back and relegate us to the safe world of the critic rather than allowing us to take the chance of creating “oh my! Something let’s say Average”.
If you’re not up for being an architect, at least be willing to put yourself out there to support and defend new ideas. Don’t simply follow the crowd and their opinion of something. Form your own independent thoughts and stand behind those beliefs. Don’t bow to the criticism of other critics who might criticize you (wow… stop and think that one through). It’s hard enough to create something new for those poor souls who subject themselves to the criticism of the world. I’m sure they would welcome your support, encouragement, and suggestions. Another issue with being critical of the efforts of others without being having input on a solution is that you risk becoming irrelevant to the people you lead. It is very important to take a step back and think about what you are doing and how things might be improved before opening your mouth in judgment.
For an example, consider the following: a few years ago, an executive in a company I work for visited a customer site where things had gone very poorly during a recent project. This person scheduled an urgent conference call in which he spent 15 minutes lambasting the entire field team based on what he heard from one customer, then ended the call. No suggestions for improvement, no consideration of all of the customers who were extremely satisfied with the work – nothing about correcting the situation at all. I can certainly believe he was very upset at the time and demonstrated poor judgment in doing what he did, but there was no apology and no real change of behavior in subsequent calls. The unintended consequence of such behavior is that many of the staff formed their own judgment – that the opinion of that person was not useful in the mission of having excellent customer relationships, so why waste time paying attention to them?
Leadership is about being out in front and taking others to new places. You can’t lead if you simply follow the conventional wisdom because it’s safe. So the next time you consider dropping a criticism bomb on the work of another, I invite you to consider the feelings of that individual, the effort they put into creating that work, the risk they’re taking in subjecting it to judgment, and the hopes and dreams they have tied up in the idea. After you’ve considered those things, then render your criticism appropriately and try to go beyond just the judgment.
While people drive the culture, the culture drives the brand…or is it that brand drives the culture? The truth is they are too intimately tied together to discern which comes first. Great companies leverage their culture to promote their brand. Companies such as Zappo’s, Dream Works and Google take pride in their culture and use it to promote who they are as an organization. Every interaction with an employee, a client, or a stakeholder is an opportunity to brand the organization. These very interactions are the ones that over time define and reinforce the organization and the culture that permeates it.
Culture has a tangible impact on employee engagement. Employee engagement is a measure of an employee’s commitment to his or her job, team, manager and organization, which results in increased discretionary effort or willingness to go “above and beyond” normal job responsibilities. This level of commitment is critical in the success of early stage companies and also results in the employee’s intent to stay with the organization. The primary factor that seems to separate an engaged employee from just a satisfied employee is that the engaged worker consciously puts forth additional effort in a manner that promotes the organization’s best interests. Not only does engagement have the potential to significantly affect employee retention, productivity and loyalty, it is also a key link to customer satisfaction, company reputation and overall stakeholder value. Employee engagement drives workforce productivity. Multiple studies demonstrate how a strong and thriving culture with high employee engagement leads to greater employee productivity. Innovation and creativity are often key to the growth of early stage companies. In a great culture where new ideas are respected, and mistakes are viewed as opportunities for learning, employees can actually enjoy their work and be energized by the environment around them. They are naturally more productive because they are eager to be part of a company where they feel valued and their contribution matters. It is a simple concept, but happy employees make for happy, successful companies.
Company culture is unique and provides arguably the most sustainable competitive advantage an organization can have in the marketplace for distinguishing itself against the competition. Competitors may attempt to poach employees, steal customers and duplicate the product or service an organization has worked hard to develop. Culture, like the brand, becomes the fabric of an organization. The stronger the culture and the brand, the more difficult it is for competitors to pose a threat to the organization.
Most company founders embark on a start-up journey with aspirations to see the company through to greatness while maintaining the role of the CEO. However, the role of startup CEO and expansion-stage CEO differ greatly. They require completely different skill sets, and it’s extremely rare for a founder to have both start-up and growth-stage skills. A majority of founders end up recruiting replacements to take over the companies they created. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that. It is a common reality that accompanies the shift from searching for a business model to executing and scaling it effectively.
A founding CEO must be tactical, hands-on, gets stuff done, where a professional manager CEO focuses on the vision/strategy, building a senior team, and guiding the senior team to execution.
Navigating a company through the expansion stage takes operational expertise. You have to know how to recruit senior managers who have specific functional expertise, and you must be able to establish an operating rhythm that gets your growing team working toward the right goals. As your company transitions to the next stage, you must transition with it, and as you do you are faced with three paths.
1) Adapt to the New Reality
If you are dead set on remaining CEO, then you need to pick up the new skills needed to address the blind spots and manage your company’s expansion. That means you have to augment those skills that got you where you are now: your audacity to do something new, your passion to inspire others to take risks, and the tenacity to create and disrupt markets. In addition, you need to focus on managing through others (this one can be the biggest challenge) and developing a rhythm for your team.
It’s extremely rare for a founder to have both start-up and growth-stage skills, and it’s even less likely that you can pick them up as you go. So, consider whether you’d hire yourself to run your company now that you are expanding — chances are, the honest answer is no.
2) Assemble a Skilled Team
Another option is to surround yourself with an executive team that brings the growth-stage experience and expertise your company needs. For most companies entering the expansion stage, a sales and marketing-focused COO is the right choice. However, if you need more cover on overall operations, financial forecasting, and legal matters, then a CFO makes sense.
When it comes down to it, companies aren’t run by highly effective individuals; they’re run by highly effective teams. Most successful CEO’s will tell you to surround yourself with the best people possible who are experts in the areas you are weak in. This will allow you to focus on your strengths.
3) Transition into a New Role
The majority of start-up CEOs recruit their replacements as the company grows beyond $15 million in revenue. It’s that simple, and it’s usually the right choice. Work with your board to bring on a new CEO and transition into a new role. Don’t let your ego drive an emotional reaction. Put the company first, just as you always have, and you will come to the conclusion that it’s the right decision.
Employees leave their current job for lots of reasons. I’ve seen people leave for fabulous opportunities elsewhere. But often times the reason are more half-hearted. A friend of mine recently switched between very similar companies, in essence, because the second company gave slightly more vacation days than the first.
While congratulating her on her new opportunity, I couldn’t help thinking, what a missed opportunity for her current company. When you add up the lost productivity from her winding down her employment, how long it will take to find her replacement and how long it will take that replacement to achieve something approaching this woman’s expertise, you could have easily granted her an extra week of vacation. Or two. Why didn’t her employer do that?
My guess is that her manager didn’t want to set a precedent. (I use to be that way) If she got three weeks of vacation instead of two, everyone else would want three weeks. It’s understandable, but it’s also a very limited way of thinking. For starters, so what if everyone wanted three weeks? In a small department, turnover is a huge source of stress. Avoiding it is worth trying to treat employees better than the competition does. And second, people and their performance aren’t all the same.
While vacation days were her particular source of unhappiness, other people might have completely different problems that would make them walk out the door. Some examples:
A bad commute. Not your fault, to be sure, but something you could improve with a policy allowing people to work from home once or twice per week.
Inflexible hour. A meeting that starts every day at 8 a.m. might interfere with a parent from dropping his children off at school. Since he can’t do that, he winds up paying for more childcare than he’d need otherwise, and this financial stress leads him to look at other job opportunities. Why not let people call in, move the meeting later or get over the idea that you need a daily meeting to establish that people are still doing their jobs?
A bullying co-worker or worse Boss. Yes, companies are supposed to do something about employees who pick on others, but it’s easier not to — until one of your best people leaves over the situation. Addressing that problem would have let you keep your talent and make life better for everyone else, too.
These are all fairly easy addressed pain points. The problem for managers is that your people often won’t tell you their particular source of stress — until you get a LinkedIn message from a team member and realize that it’s because their updating her LinkedIn account as part of their job hunting.
So how to find out? You can always ask. How are things going? Is there anything that would boost your already great productivity? What would make this a better place to work? What would make your job more sustainable and enjoyable? A smart manager who takes even a little interest in his/her people would have discovered this employees desire for more vacation days and figured out a subtle way to grant her what she wanted. That would have kept the office running smoothly — far more so than letting her leave in the hopes of not setting a precedent.
As a manager, how do you keep your best employees?
The glue that holds all relationships together — including the relationship between the leader and those they lead is trust, and trust is based on integrity.
When employees do not trust managers and leaders, various forms of organizational fallout are likely, including low engagement (people seem like they don’t care), high turnover and reduced innovation (no creative solutions or ideas). Rebuilding trust isn’t easy, just as with customers who lose trust. If employees don’t trust their boss or their boss’ boss, they begin to question how they fit in with the company and will have less pride in the organization overall.
Individuals can enjoy their work and have a strong sense of accomplishment, but Trust has to be present for employees to do go beyond the call of duty, to be innovative. The more groundbreaking the innovation needed, the more trust must be present. Trust is built over time as people get to know each other. Employees must trust that their co-workers and direct supervisors are competent (head trust) and will do the employee no harm (heart trust).
A single triggering event, such as a restructuring or other organizational change, can reduce the level of trust employees have in leaders. As can other single events, such as a manager who takes credit for an employee’s work or lies to them.
Most of the time, trust erodes as a result of small subtle patterns of behavior that employees experience on a daily basis that go unaddressed. For example, working with peers who fail to prepare for a meeting, are slow to respond to e-mail or who gossip regularly. While they don’t get addressed, they don’t go unnoticed. The result of such unaddressed behavior is that employees leave the company or, worse yet, they stay. They become the working wounded – they stay, they complain, they do as little as possible, eventually bringing others down with them.
The Reina Trust and Betrayal Model describes three main types of transactional trust:
Contractual trust—trust of character. Do people do what they say they are going to do? Do managers and employees make clear what they expect of one another?
Communication trust—trust of disclosure. How well people share information and tell the truth.
Competence trust—trust of capability. How well people carry out responsibilities and acknowledge other people’s skills and abilities.
The key thing about transactional trust is that it is reciprocal in nature; you have to give it to get it. There are specific, concrete behaviors that build trust.
Ability: the manager’s ability to do their job.
Understanding: displaying knowledge and understanding of employees’ roles and responsibilities.
Fairness: behaving fairly and showing concern for the welfare of employees.
Openness: being accessible and receptive to ideas and opinions.
Integrity: striving to be honest and fair in decision-making.
Consistency: behaving in a reliable and predictable manner.
So take a look at your employees, what does their behavior say about their trust in you. If it doesn’t look good, take the steps now to begin the process of rebuilding trust.
For many leaders who are accustomed to being in control in their lives and at work giving up the reigns can be extremely difficult. I compare it to teaching your teenager how to drive. When a new driver is practicing driving, you sit next to them as they take the steering wheel and brakes; they are in control and you are there to offer (hopefully calm) guidance and advice. I know it doesn’t always work that way.
Being a leader has a lot in common with the parent helping their teen to learn driving skills. Leadership is a hands-off activity that allows your team to take control of the daily work while you guide and coach from the passenger seat. It can sometimes be hard to respectfully refrain from trying to grab the steering wheel or putting the brakes on.
Letting go and allowing your team to take the steering wheel is not always comfortable. There will be mistakes made, but if you learn to pay attention without meddling while providing a light touch in guiding them, it can also be one of the most rewarding experiences you’ll have.
As a leader, you’ll be most successful when you don’t try to drive for others. Learning to sit in the passenger seat isn’t easy, but it can be a great ride when you:
Trust them. How do you know if your staff is capable if you don’t trust them to do the things they were hired to do? Trust that they are, and your advantage is that they will trust you back. If the level of work you give them has a mix of things that meet or exceed what they are capable of, chances are that you’ll be glad you allowed them to drive.
Lead with clarity. Be clear about your expectations and outcomes. Go ahead and tell them why you are requesting that they do the work you’re delegating. Make sure these initial conversations are two-way so that you can be assured that they understand what you are asking them to do. They will be most successful when you clearly dialog with them about the work they need to do.
Are available. Especially when your team members are learning new things, make sure that they know when you are available to talk through their dilemmas. Perhaps you might want to set up meetings with them more frequently than you have, or make sure you put time into your schedule to check in with them to ask if they have questions or need assistance without falling into the trap of solving all the problems for them.
Coach them along the way. You still need to be informed of the work your staff is doing, but you should do your best to refrain from telling them how to do it. And unless they ask for instruction or they are getting into trouble, lay off on the advice-giving and problem-solving. Instead, gently guide them with questions that help them to figure out the best way to proceed: “What’s your next step?” “How will you begin?” and “What do you need from me?” are great questions to ask.
Encourage, thank, and celebrate. These are the seemingly small things (to you) that are big things to your staff and the success of your organization. When they are on the right track, encourage them to go further. Thank them for what they do well. Celebrate success so that everyone can see great examples of work well done.
Leading from the passenger side isn’t easy, but when done well, it can be a rewarding experience for a leader to watch employees develop, learn their own ways of getting things done, and become an example for others.
It’s a wonderful thing to go out in the world and make a contribution, to create something, to produce something that matters .
It’s just as important and maybe more so that we help others do the same.
If you think of your work as a contribution—great or small — then you can say you’ve made x amount of difference in making your organization—or maybe even the world—a better place. If you help 5 or 10 people make their contributions, you can say you’ve made perhaps 5x or 10x the amount of difference, And if, in doing so, you teach others to help other people create and produce and make contributions, you’ve just added an exponent to your contribution. Do the math to see the impact potential. X squared, X to the power of 3 or 10 or whatever the number might be. OK, math isn’t my strong suit, but you can see the point: the amount of difference made at work or in the world not only multiplies, but keeps on multiplying beyond you.
Unfortunately, many people seem to have a problem with this concept. Instead, they spend their time tearing people down and intentionally getting in their way. They’re even jealous when someone else achieves an important goal or has any kind of success.
It’s important to break free of petty jealousy and meanness. When you learn to be happy for others—and count their success as an extension of yours if you’ve helped them out along the way—you’ll notice a big change in the culture of your workgroup or maybe even of the entire organization if the exponential factor is in place.
This is why coaching is so important. It sets the stage for exponential personal growth, individual performance, and a healthy organizational culture.
You don’t need some kind of “certification” in order to coach. You need the desire to help others and the willingness to invest time and energy to do it.
The results can end up impacting people who you may never meet. But you’ll know who they are because you’ll recognize a part of you in what they do and how they do it.
Who can you coach, even in some small way, in order to begin making a difference?
One of the greatest challenges of leadership is managing time, a limited resource that has to be used with the utmost care and consideration. As the saying goes, there are “only so many hours in a day“, and as a leader you must be able to stay focused on those tasks and activities that truly matter.
That task is complicated by the daily presence of many distractions that a leader must avoid so as not to put themselves (and their company) at risk.
In my role as consultant and business partner, I find the three distractions that are particularly dangerous:
The “Fire Drill” - Your boss calls you and is upset because he spoke with a customer who said they were unhappy with the service they received. When you dig into it, it appears to be an isolated case that could be routinely handled by your customer service staff, since you had set up a protocol for cases exactly like this one. Your boss looks at it differently – it’s a complete breakdown of customer service that needs an extensive review of processes and staff. You then start the fire drill – two days of meetings, phone calls, and e-mails, involving many members of your team, devoted to that single customer complaint who by the way already forgot about it.
The “Black Hole” – The Company has committed a lot of money to a particular project and you are trying to guide it to a successful finish. The trouble is, about 25% of the way in it becomes pretty clear that things aren’t going well (and you are going to be over budget also), and you face the decision – pull the plug now (with all the resulting hand wringing and blame), or, ask for more money and move on. You choose the latter, and enter the black hole – pressing dangerously on in the hope that somehow, someway it will get pulled through in the end.
The “Something New” - It’s a new product, service, client, a new venture, or a new partner that catches your attention. It sounds really exciting and the possibilities are endless. The problem is, it’s not really right for your company, or it’s a long shot for success, or maybe even the timing is off. But it really is exciting! So you devote a lot of time and energy on it, at the expense of other, more viable and profitable things.
These kinds of distractions CAN be avoided. It’s all a matter of leadership perspective – that ability to take a step back, and “see” the bigger picture. It also requires something else that is even more essential – Courage.
The courage to put down a bright shiny object in the face of all that “excitement”.
The courage to stop a black hole project dead in its tracks and take the heat.
And, the courage to tell your boss you will not conduct a fire drill because of a single and isolated incident.
Perspective and courage are your best tools for time management – use them well, and wisely.
If you don’t give your employeesfeedback on their performance—whether on a daily basis or, at least, at performance reviews—they’ll never improve. Then why do so many entrepreneurs do such a horrible job of providing feedback?
Many of us aren’t “people persons” and it simply doesn’t occur to us to tell people how they’re doing. Often, entrepreneurs are take-charge types who, if something isn’t done the way they like it, grab the reins and do it themselves, not giving their employees a chance to improve. Finally, some of us want to give feedback, but fear coming off too harsh with negative criticism.
How can you get over these hurdles to provide feedback that will help your employees learn, grow and improve their job performance? Here are some tips all leaders can use.
Set a goal. Consider what you want the feedback to achieve for your business. Don’t criticize someone simply to vent your frustration; always have a larger goal such as helping the person to improve, preventing customer issues, or increasing sales. By showing the employee that you have a larger goal in mind, feedback will seem less of a personal criticism.
Begin with the good stuff. Try to find something positive about the way an employee handled a task or situation. This will put them in a receptive frame of mind. After they have absorbed the positive praise, bring up any negative criticism. (Keep in mind, not every instance of feedback has to involve negativity. Rewarding employees with positive feedback for a job done well has a strong reinforcement effect.)
Provide detail. Give specifics as to what was done right or wrong and why this was helpful or hurtful. (“You answered the phone on the first ring, which conveys a positive impression to our customers. Great job!”) If you want the employee to change how he or she is doing something, be specific about what they should do and why.
Allow questions. Always make sure the employee feels comfortable asking for clarification on your feedback. You can ask them, “Does that make sense to you?” or “Do you have any questions about that?” to confirm that they’ve understood what you said.
Follow up. If you ask an employee to do something differently, pay attention to see whether they learn from the feedback. If so, comment positively on the progress. If not, continue to provide feedback until they get it right.
You’ll be surprised how much feedback can improve your business when it’s used correctly.
