Category: Management

Hidden Costs

One thing that drove me crazy when I was paying for my sins in corporate America was all of the hidden costs inside the organization.  As a corporate manager I was always asked to cut expenses.  However, I was rarely asked to look at those hidden costs.  The costs that were silent killers.  For example:

  • Meetings.  Need I say more?
  • Training events that were the equivalent of a U2 concert.  Entertainment versus learning here.  Feels good in the moment, but forgotten when it counts.
  • Employees and their organizations who don't fully understand the difference between time and results.
  • Outdated policies and procedures written 20 years ago that are as relevant as a powder blue tuxedo.
  • Hiring practices that are driven by HR.  The hiring of talent is not a legal process.

If your organization really wants to be efficient and lean, then take a look at the hidden costs. It could lead to a new curve.  Failure to look always leads to atrophy.  And as we know atrophy lives next door to extinction.

How Social Media Can Save Customer Service Training

Was doing some research for a friend/client on customer service training materials this week.  I decided to use Twitter (my top choice for social media portals) as a tool to do some research on the matter.  A simple search on the term "customer service training" is all it took to create a hmmm moment.  And though my research was not very scientific, it did reveal some things I knew instinctively.

First, customer service is a very popular discipline for a number of companies/consultants.  Must mean that bad customer service is more the norm than the exception.  I agree with that on its face.

Second, I don't think the customers (organizations) of the customer service training product are fully aware of what's going on inside their own walls. 

Here's what brought me to the above conclusions:

  1. My typed search "customer service training" revealed that for every two consultants offering training, there were an equal number of employees who were referring to customer service training as a boring event, a cure for insomnia, or a pain in the rear.  Again, this wasn't a scientific result, but it seems that many employees are nodding yes, but thinking and feeling no.
  2. Employees, especially those in larger entities, feel like their targets for cost cutting and lay-offs.  Creates a jaded, if not callused view of things.  Wonder how these folks treat customers who have legitimate needs/issues?
  3. Why the disconnect?  Leadership.  Some managers may think they're leading well, but have yet to look behind them to find no one following.
  4. Fixing conclusion #3 creates a bridge for change.
  5. Employers are missing out on the power of social media.  See this article for more on that.  But I'm speaking of finding out what's REALLY going on with the employee base.  Might save them some money and go a long way in reinventing how they serve-employees and customers.

The Lens Of Style Points

You may be involved in leadership team development or a new staff member just trying to navigate the "matrix" that sometimes is career.  Regardless of what your role is, you need to be very careful with "style points."  In this post I'll confine that to the following definition:

    "Evaluating an individual's approach and/or presentation in order to judge that person's worth."

My friend Marc told me once that leaders need to develop a strategy to bring clarity to their intention.  In other words, don't let your intention be run over by your "style."  I see this as important.  I'm a visionary thinker, so consequently, if I were in a meeting on budgets I could appear bored.  It's not that I see no importance in the "numbers," I just have a limited attention span for that kind of information.  Over the years I've implemented specific strategies to combat my bored demeanor.  Coffee would be a great example here.

So what do you do with the idea of judging people based on their style?

Even if I master my delivery and presentation, I can't always walk away clean.  I can continue to work on getting better, but as many thought leaders know, your weaknesses can only move up a notch or two when it comes to growth.

Our best opportunity is in not weighting our decision too heavily on style.  This is especially important in team (a group of peope who see the goal as more important than their own individual agendas) environments and loving relationships at home.  If you're not careful, you can begin to see people through a very critical lens.  I know that Malcolm Gladwell and others embrace an idea that the first impression is everything.  It has a place, but to use it as the sole criteria would be naive.  Besides, if first impressions were truly everything, I never would have married my wife.  She laughed at me when I introduced myself to her over twenty years ago.

Just remember that the shy team member or over-confident sales rep. may have an intention worth looking for beyond the veneer.

Don’t Institutionalize Everything

The cause of many of the ills your organization may be facing are rooted in the process of institutionalizing.  This is a process of making rules, creating procedures and locking down the process.  In some cases, institutionalizing is smart business (profit or non-profit).  For example, the idea of no hand guns permitted or firing an employee for falsifying documents would be something to institutionalize.

Unfortunately, it seems we've swung the pendulum way too far.  I would even argue we've done this in our relationships.  Think about your marriage, your business partner(s), your church, the homeless guy you pass on the way to the office. 

Let me unwrap this a little further.  In certain arenas of our culture homelessness and poverty is looked at as inevitable (this idea is part of the institutionalized mindset).  When you view people (magnificent art designed by a wonderful God) as "inevitable" you will easily look the other way.  But what if you looked at people as magnificent artwork?  Kind of hard to look past a Michaelangelo, no?  And yes, some people are bad/evil and will never change.  That's ok (not really), everyone makes their own choices.  My gut tells me that many just want to be seen as valuable and worth a fight.

The above describes how you can take an institutionalized view and change it to a liberated/fluid view.

Here is a list of some things organizations and people should not institutionalize:

  • People (see my thoughts above).
  • Policies and procedures.  Far too often this is a place of insanity in many organizations.  Creating these are often practices in fear management.
  • New ventures.  Don't think that what is new will look like what is old.  Be willing to be fluid.
  • Business relationships.  We've got to stop networking as a part of our business plan (another form of institutionalizing).  Network because you believe in sharing, giving and changing the world.  If the idea is great you won't feel compelled to take.
  • Marriage.  Fall in love and keep falling.

I Want My Leadership Development-Now

In times of crisis (economic or otherwise) organizations begin to think about leadership.  Actually, they think of it often.  What they do about it is another thing.

I feel for those organizations that neglected growing leaders when profits were up.  That would have been the best time to change the world.  But alas, those were the "best laid plans." 

If you run an organization that has never given much thought to leader development, then I would advise you to prepare for a great deal of pain (it is worth it).  The pain process goes like this:

  • The process of announcing an initiative that many will not believe or take seriously.  Shucks, you've rolled out initiatives as frequently as you lose employees.
  • After the above, you've got to lead your people thru the treacherous waters of change (the present state to the desired state).
  • If you make it past change, you've got to now make it a part of the organization's DNA.

This is not an easy endeavor.  I think you can understand why these organizations mostly hang themselves on leadership development as a talking point.  You know what I mean; it feels better when you say leadership development versus living it.

I don't mean to sound Grinchy, but best not to sugar coat.  It's sort of like a 62 year-old worker who started planning for retirement 5 years ago.  Is it too late?  No, but it will hurt.

I may be all wet about where we're at, so find out for yourself.  Ask this tough question:

What are we/you specifically doing to grow your leadership?

The answer to that question will reveal a lot.

Diminishing Return

If you're like me, a type A, then the idea of one more call or sentence is a lure.  But the reality is we reach diminishing return well before we think.  This is not only an issue for type A people.  It really flows through our culture (in America at least) the idea of time versus results.

I know a COO of a new non-profit start up that is instituting a 35 hour work week-mandatory.  He believes efficiency fades after 35 hours.  How innovative! 

I wonder how many of our working hours are made up diminishing returns?  I would say a minimum of 20%, and I think I'm being conservative.  Especially when you line up work hours with the stated mission of many organizations.

In the end, the most important thing is to know the following:

  • What's the most important thing to be accomplished.
  • Figure out how to get the most important things done.
  • Make sure you have the resources needed to get those things done.
  • Measure success.
  • Stop when you know diminishing return has set in.

Making Urgency Real

 

I received an email today from a publicist at Harvard Business Press wanting to connect about John Kott'er's newest book A Sense of Urgency.  It didn't take me very long to respond, with excitement, about reviewing a copy.  After reading, I will post my thoughts on this blog.

John Kotter is brilliant and thoughtful.  He truly has impacted my thinking over many years. 

The above video provides some clues to how urgency connects to change.

Good News vs. Bad News

Do managers have a problem with hearing bad news?  I know you're chuckling right now. But they really should welcome bad news with open arms. 

Bad news can do the following if we let it:

  • Sober us up and give us a sense of reality – We crave and worship good news because we see it as the only thing to make us happy.  If you've read my blog before, you know how I feel about happiness-it's based on a choice that only you can make.
  • Help us understand who is really interested in making things better – those who like to kiss ass won't be comfortable here.  People who only deliver good news are not helping.  Leaders who only want followers who deliver good news are drinking a poisonous cocktail.
  • Help us discover our true leadership level – if you want to know how good a leader is, observe and take notes when bad news is delivered.
  • Makes us question silence – a friend of mine gave his employer some bad news about a new customer and was cautioned about it.  Don't know if they didn't like his tone or timing, but his employer didn't want to hear it.  It made me think about all those employees that don't say anything.  What do you think their level of engagement is?
  • Helps us find the next breakthrough – isn't that what all organizations want?

How Do You Hire Talent?

I found this at one of Guy Kawasaki’s Twitter posts.  It’s Malcolm Gladwell speaking at the New
Yorker’s Stories from the Near Future conference back in May.  His speech revolves around our antiquated approach to hiring talent.  You can view the speech here.  Mr. Gladwell makes some great points, but I will allow you to glean that on your own.


Here are my thoughts on the matter:

  • Organizations have spent too much time and money on removing all doubt. 
  • Organizations don’t use leadership to “size” talent up.
  • Organizations don’t know what system they’re built on (thank you Michelle).
  • Organizations need to teach and hold managers accountable for evaluating talent.
  • Organizations need to decide what value they place on people-really.

I know you may be thinking that the above has been said before.  And you would be right.  Nothing new under the sun as once been said.  But here’s something to consider:


A friend once asked me, during a time of great struggle/learning, how I knew if the lessons learned would stick.  I told him that sometimes God has to orchestrate such winds upon our life-tree that our roots go so deep that we never turn back.  I’m living proof of this.  Maybe this applies to organizations too. 


We’re not short on data that tells us to change, but short on character and courage to move forward in change.

What’s DNA Got To Do With It?

I wrote last week about DNAand leadership.  I got some quizzical looks when I discussed this with a few people.  So in the spirit of better explaining myself, the following outlines what DNA has to do with leading people:

  1. Leading people is sacred.  Therefore, that which makes each person unique (their DNA applies here) cannot be disconnected from the leadership process.  I know some managers might roll their eyes at the idea of seeing every follower as unique.  But reality says you have to see people as they really are.  For too long we've asked employees/followers to "check" their voice at the door.  Most of the time this has been done to make the leader's job easier.  Of course that's never verbalized, but true anyway.  Being a good leader was never designed to be easy. 
  2. Leadership = Responsibility.  You can't get around the fact that to lead, is to be responsible for/to others.  Unfortunately, many leaders take leading too lightly…accepting or seeking positions like shopping for a suit at Nordstrom.  Think about the responsibility before accepting a promotion to lead people.
  3. There's a difference between management and leadership.  When a manager is allowed or incented to manage, not lead, followers will be left in the dust.  Managers who don't lead well embrace tasks, not people.
  4. Leadership creates a stress of soul.  It was said of Winston Churchill that he carried a "stress of soul" throughout WWII.  This stress is rooted in a love of, and a vision for, those following you.  It's not romantic, it's not familial, but it is a deep caring for the well-being of those following.  In our age of quarter-by-quarter vision, it is rare to see this.  Tough times reveal whether we carry this trait in our leadership. 
  5. Legacy is defined by our treatment of people.  Whether you know it or not, history will judge your legacy by how you treated people.  This is especially true for those who lead people.  From my own perspective this is a daunting and powerful reality.  I pray that I have lived up to the standard of each person's unique voice I've led.