From “What do you do?” to “What are you working on now?”
Published January 21, 2012 | 
When we meet new people, one of the first questions we typically ask is “What do you do?” This seems to be mostly an American thing (I don’t recall ever getting that question in Europe or Asia). Is it because we as Americans are so involved with what we do. In fact, we are what we do. I am an engineer. I am a manager. I am an entrepreneur, a store owner, a writer, an artist.
I have spent much of my career trying to get people to think differently about work and organizations, to move past the hierarchy and the notion of static jobs with rigidly defined roles that bear little resemblance to what people actually do on a day-to-day basis. I haven’t been all that successful and I’m thinking maybe it’s because our identity is so intertwined with our work that it’s like asking someone to give up who they are.
Or is it? What if we start by simply changing the question? Instead of what do you do? how about “what are you working on now?” Not only does the answer to that question make for a more interesting conversation, it also helps move us forward toward a project or work orientation, rather than a job or role orientation.
Why is this important? Because that’s the way things work today. Smart organizations know how to pull the right group of people together to complete a project, disassemble the team and reassemble another one to do the next project.
It’s much like the motion picture industry puts together a crew to make a film. It’s cost effective for the company, is more likely to lead to high performance work and offers a bigger payoff for those involved. You become part of a team, able to benefit from being a part of something bigger than you could accomplish on your own. You are able to see how and where you and what you do fits in and contributes to the end result. What’s more you have a tangible end result you can point to, learn from, put on your resume and talk about a cocktail party.
What do you say? Are you ready to redefine yourself and expand the definition of what you do into something a little more meaningful?
Roll credits!
The Problem With Procedures
Published January 20, 2012 | It’s not that I’m against procedures. No, in fact, I’m a big fan. I started my professional career in 1980 as a technical writer, so in some ways procedures have helped make me what I am today. :-) The problem is that we often expect them to do too much. We expect procedures to be “enough”. We mistakenly believe we can break down the elements of our complex world into parts and pieces and neatly assemble them into step-by-step instructions.
And we can’t. Although there are places where procedures and checklists make sense (Recent studies speak to how checklists help hospital personnel, pilots and others in critical roles reduce errors and perform more effectively), we must also be aware of the limitations of procedures. The reality is that much of what those pilots, doctors, and nurses deal with on a day-to-day basis cannot be proceduralized.
One of the primary problems with procedures is they assume you can know and realistically cover every eventuality. In the late 1980s I worked with expert systems and decision support teams. My job was to work with the SMEs and capture the rolodex of if/then configurations. “If this happens under these conditions, do this…”
Although I loved the work, I could see the flaw back then – that we could never really cover all the bases, that we would constantly be “chasing our tails” so to speak. Which I think explains in part why those technologies were never very successful.
Procedures often lack context. They assume that things can be done the same way in every situation. For those of us who recognized the importance of context and attempted to include it, we ran into two problems – an unwieldy confusing mess of a document, and continually needing to add new contextual elements.
Another major problem with procedures is they quickly get out-of-date. And once they are out-of-date they are beyond worthless and into the realm of dangerous. Greg Jamieson and Chris Miller (Exploring the Culture of Procedures,2000) studied four petrochemical refineries in the US and Canada to see how they managed their procedures. In none of the four cases did the workers ever completely trust the procedural guides and checklists because they never knew how updated the guides were.
What did they do instead? The learned workarounds. They used their experience to adapt, just as we would expect in complex domains. And it is exactly here, in this state of adaptation that we should focus our energy (but I’ll save that for another post).
Staying with the problems of procedures for now, perhaps the biggest problem with procedures is that they can lull people into a passive mindset of just following the steps and not really thinking about what they’re doing. They stop trying to understand the situation or look for different ways to solve the problem. In a complex environment, this mindlessness is exactly the opposite of what you want. You want people to be continually mindful and aware, proactively anticipatory. You want them to look for clues and signals, and continually develop richer mental models.
Procedures do a lot of good things. They help ensure consistency, help beginners learn the ropes, help more seasoned professionals remember the essential steps. They are an important and necessary element of our cognitive support toolbox. But they are only one tool in the toolbox. We’ll talk next time about some of the other tools.
I have a voice. You have a voice. Together we have a really big voice.
Published December 30, 2011 | For years we customers didn’t have a voice. We were at the mercy of whatever a company wanted to tell us about their product or service – which was mostly Marketing and the occasional product review. If you were lucky, maybe you knew somebody who knew somebody who had the same car, computer or TV and was willing to talk about it. But even then, the quality of the intel was often suspect.
But then it changed. Starting somewhere around the turn of the century, the customer’s voice became part of the equation. Why? It wasn’t that people were suddenly talking – in fact they had always been talking. What changed was now there were platforms for collecting the voice or voices. Discussion groups, sites like Amazon that encouraged product reviews and did ratings, all sorts of structures for capturing customer opinion. It changed everything. Amazon customer reviews and ratings of this TV versus that TV, dramatically influenced product sales. Trip Advisor hotel reviews influenced thousands of vacation plans and empowered and damaged brands in a way that Fodors or Michelin could only dream of.
Not only did regular folk like you and me have a voice, but together we were able to impact companies and force them to listen. And that voice created options. Now, when a product or service doesn’t live up to its promise, someone is going to talk about it. And if it’s a product or service a lot of someones have purchased, then chances are a lot of people are going to talk about it. And together we have impact.
If it was just me, the lone voice talking about the giant green blob that took over my big screen Sony TV, it wouldn’t have a lot of impact. But now that there are websites and Facebook pages and all sorts of communities sharing information about Sony’s screw-up and more importantly, the options that I, the owner of the big green blob, now have that I wouldn’t have known about had I not linked up with this fabulous community of like-minded folks.
The results….. Sony listens. Sony responds. Some people are offered replacement TVs, others get discounts on new models. And even though the deal might not be what you felt like you deserved, at least you got something. And that’s important. And it’s more than the money. It’s also about feeling good that you had some power, some options. Believing the BS and paying a lot for a product you thought was above and beyond and then realizing you were wrong is painful. No one wants to look or feel stupid and that’s often what ends up happening. “How could I have been so stupid?” you say to yourself. When you join the community and realize that thousands of other smart people made the same mistake, it takes the sting out of it. We all made the same mistake, and together we’re helping each other figure out what to do next.
Talent Gap and Feeder Pool Strategies
Published December 8, 2011 | As if the challenges of finding and attracting qualified talent and dealing with the Boomer retirement tsunami weren’t bad enough, companies are now facing an even bigger and more imminent threat – the problem in the middle.
One of my clients had this not so pleasant discovery recently. They were confident they had covered the front end challenge and were attracting and training new talent pretty well. And they were aware of critical knowledge in the heads of people soon to retire and taking steps to capture and transfer that knowledge. What they weren’t addressing, in fact didn’t know about, was the problem in the middle. When they put pen to paper (or numbers into a spreadsheet) and began to look at the middle tier or feeder pool for critical senior level roles, they were astounded to discover, they had a major gap.
The potential repercussions of this talent gap are enormous. These are the people and jobs that make up the most critical tier of the organization, the people and jobs that are responsible for the organizations growth and ultimately, their survival.
And this is not a gap you can easily fill. You can’t hire it from the outside because so much of the most important knowledge is proprietary. And you can’t grow it quickly. You can’t take a good engineer with a good base of knowledge and put them into a senior role and magically expect them to move from competent to expert. You get to expert by doing, by applying knowledge in different contexts, by making mistakes and learning from them.
In the old days we had time to grow our experts. We had time to provide them with the opportunities they needed to develop. We threw them into learning environments and they learned. But somewhere along the line, perhaps in the challenging economic environment of the last few years, we stopped doing that. At the same time, change sped up, complexity increased and in the blink of an eye, we got further and further behind.
So how do we solve this problem? Admittedly, it’s not an easy one. In fact, solving this problem may be one of the key challenges of modern times.
First, identify the organization’s most critical skills. What must you do well in order to remain competitive? What are your core competencies? What separates you from the competition? Take a look at this not only in today’s terms, but also in tomorrow’s terms. How are things changing and what new skills and competencies must you have in order to compete tomorrow?
Second, identify gaps and risk areas. What areas are supply and demand challenged? In other words, where are you competing for talent or at risk of losing talent?
Third, prioritize. There is only so much time and money, so it is essential you prioritize opportunities. Identify criteria that will help you determine where you’re most at risk and where you’ll get the biggest payoff. Look for synergies between projects.
Fourth – rethink the job/role. If you have a gap or supply/demand inequity, how might you redefine the role or the ideal candidate to improve the odds of filling the gap.
Fifth, and perhaps the most critical (and also the most difficult), how can you compress the time it takes to move people from novice to competent and competent to expert. Research suggests, that small movements in compressing the competency curve result in big savings and even bigger impact.
We’ve covered a lot in this post and only scratched the surface. These are big challenges with important payoff. Stay tuned for more on this subject and please share your ideas.
Create a Word Cloud
Published September 24, 2011 | Want to create a quick and easy word cloud graphic to make a point? Check out Wordle.net. Here’s my illustration of an organization’s values.
A New Look at Job Descriptions
Published August 13, 2011 | The ancient artifacts we call job descriptions haven’t changed much over the last half century. But the world of work has. Rather than having a single job, most of us perform a variety of roles and activities. What we do changes frequently, and typically bears little resemblance to formal job descriptions.
Isn’t it time for a new approach to defining work? One that’s more in tune with the times and focused on effectiveness rather than efficiency? One that actually provides real guidance and enables “right person right job.” Isn’t it time we put job descriptions to work? We should start this process by revisiting what we want job descriptions to do. For example, job descriptions should:
- Provide guidance to people as to what to do and how to do it.
- Provide information that could be used in staffing the job — not only technical skill requirements, but also information about the “nature” of the person best suited for the work.
- Provide a basis for “Who’s Who” and Expertise directories that enable people in the organization to know who does what and who knows what.
What do we need to change in order to accomplish these objectives?
I suggest three things:
First, expand job descriptions to include multiple roles and areas of expertise.
Second – identify underlying attributes of the work that can be used to better match people to activities. For example, is most of the work hands-on, “in the trenches” or is it more conceptual, planning, and analyzing? Does the work deal mostly with people, data, or things? What’s the level of responsibility, in other words, what are the repercussions of mistake making?
We must stop looking at jobs and people as two separate entities and focus instead on the relationship between the two. We also need to develop a common language for describing work and people, a language that goes beyond technical skills, degrees, and years of experience.
Finally, job descriptions should be written by or with the person in the job. I mean, if you look at the benefits of good job descriptions, a common theme emerges. Who is in the best position to supply job information?
Who knows better what the job is actually all about and what kinds of skills and competencies are most important? The incumbent! I’m an advocate for enabling employees to complete their own work profiles and job descriptions. Some people may need help articulating details about their job, but that doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be the primary supplier of information. Consider using an interview process for gathering key information.
I’m also in favor of “self-assigned” job titles. Encourage employees to choose their own job title, one that actually means something to them, one that motivates them and makes them feel good about what they do. Chief Visionary. Client Caregiver, Director of Talent.
Job descriptions and job titles provide identity and purpose. Perhaps by redefining work, we can help make employees feel better about who they are and what they do.
Turning Organizational Models on Their Head
Published August 9, 2011 | 
What if you could junk your organization as it exists today and start all over? Would you choose the same people? Would you structure things the same?
If you could design the ideal organization, jobs, and work processes, where would you start? I’ve thought about this a lot, and here’s my answer. It’s a simple 3-step process.
1.
First, start with the organization’s goals and objectives. What is the vision of the organization? What are you trying to do or be? What must you do/be in order to succeed/survive/thrive?
2.
What kinds of people do you need to get there? What are the characteristics, qualities, values and skill sets? (notice the order, it’s important)
3.
What kinds of support structures and work processes support these people and enable them to do what they do best on a regular basis? (I’m convinced that if you can do this, you’re 90% there).
The traditional model of organization design starts with structure and fills in the pieces to match the structure. You start with an org chart – CEO at the top, COO, CIO, CFO, CTO, HR, etc. with previously defined and tightly confined jobs and roles underneath each of the CXs.
What I’m suggesting is we turn the model 180 degrees and start with people – the kinds of people we want in the org, THEN build the structure to support those people. Scary way to start? You bet! It’s much easier to re-purpose the old worn out hierarchical org chart and “standard” job descriptions, without thinking about whether they truly serve our needs.
But here’s the reality. Speed, innovation, impact – these are the competencies and success enablers of today. Traditional structures do little to nothing to support these. Hierarchies move too slow. Traditional job descriptions and work design keeps people in boxes, stuck in status quo and not able to respond to challenges and opportunities.
Bottom line: These structures were designed for a different time and place and are no longer effective. You have a choice. Recognize the world has changed and take steps to reinvent your organization to better respond to today’s realities or hold on to the old model and get left behind. It’s just that simple.
Culture: Critical Success Enabler
Published July 25, 2011 | My clients and colleagues are probably sick of me rattling on about the importance of culture, but I can’t help it. Darn near every challenge I’m involved in seems to ultimately come down to culture. Whether it’s attracting and retaining customers, doing more with less, planning for the future, attracting and retaining key talent or reversing the safety trend, culture comes up front and center as a critical enabler of success.
So what is culture? The academic definition is the “psychology, attitudes, experiences, beliefs and values shared by people and groups in an organization that control the way they interact with each other and with stakeholders outside the organization.” In layman’s terms it’s “the way we do things around here.”
Culture provides people with an answer to “What should I do in this situation? Say for example a customer calls unhappy with a recent purchase. The odds of the customer service rep salvaging the relationship and the customer going away a fan, versus the customer service rep making the situation worse and potentially producing an enemy, is directly tied to the culture of the organization.
What do you tell people, either explicitly or implicitly about how to view and treat customers? Better yet, what do you show or demonstrate through your own actions about how to treat customers?
What kind of language or tone do you use when you talk about customers? Do you poke fun at the saying “the customer is always right”, point out that customer A is looking to get something for nothing, encourage staff to look for ways to make it difficult to get out of contracts or return a purchase?
How do you reward people? Do you reward on short term or pennies pinched or do you reward for building and maintaining relationships that yield long term results?
The problem with culture is that almost everyone appreciates the importance of it, but few understand what it is or how to influence it. Beliefs, values, psychology – all big, scary words that most business leaders cringe at. What leaders don’t realize is the impact that subtle things have on the overall culture and performance of the organization.
Culture can’t be made or changed overnight. I could argue that it can’t actually be “made” or “changed” at all. Culture arises out of everyday events and behaviors. It is the result of actions and influences over time.
That said, leaders certainly can purposefully and strategically influence the culture. Decide what you want your organization to do, be or stand for, then identify ways to demonstrate the beliefs and behaviors that build the culture you want. Communicate purposefully and personally and communicate often.
Revisit job descriptions, procedures and unwritten rules for doing business. Make the implicit explicit. Create “room” and support for people to do what is right. Let people know when they’re doing a good job, celebrate small victories and take responsibility for failures and show how you learned from them.
It’s true, culture change is difficult and it doesn’t happen quickly. But the payoff is big, really big!
Want more ideas on how to make positive changes to your culture? Contact me (Pam) at pam@aboutpeople.com.
How managers sabotage performance
Published June 16, 2011 | 
An article called “Managing with Brain in Mind” in the Autumn 2009 edition of Strategy+Business magazine provides interesting insight into the social nature of performance. We researched the threat response for our book Axis of Influence and found that the first stop on the road to credibility and likeability is trust, which means dealing with the automatic “am I in danger?” threat response.
Research available since that time shows us that our friends in the fight or flight department of the brain are alive and well and influenced or triggered by more than just safety. Recent research by UCLA’s Naomi Eisenberger and Matthew Lieberman suggests that the same neural responses that drive us toward food or away from predators are triggered by the way we are treated by other people.
Apparently Maslow had it wrong. Maslow in his “hierarchy of needs” suggested that humans satisfy their needs in sequence, starting with physical survival and moving up the ladder toward self-actualization at the top. In this hierarchy, social needs sit in the middle. But many studies now show that the brain equates social needs with survival; for example, being hungry and being ostracized activate similar neural responses.
Being in this threat response state for any length of time is damaging to both individual productivity and organizational performance. It uses up vital oxygen and glucose from the blood making it no longer available to other functions of the brain such as working memory which processes new information and ideas. This impairs analytical thinking, creative insight and problem solving.
The impact of this dynamic is often visible in organizations. For example, an autocratic manager operating in a carrot and stick mentality triggers a threat response in employees and reduces efficiency, creativity and innovation.
So what can managers do to minimize the threat response and enable the reward response? Here are 3 of the 5 things mentioned in the article:
1. Understand “status” stress and look for creative ways to enable status boosts.
As humans, we are constantly assessing how our status compares to others around us. Research by Hidehiko Takahashi in 2009 shows that when people realize that they might compare unfavourably to someone else, the threat response kicks in releasing cortisol and other stress-related hormones.
As a manager, limit stressful comparisons like forced ranking and 360 degree reviews as well as negative “feedback.” Provide praise and opportunities to learn new skills, two critically important status boosters.
2. Be transparent, open and clear about what’s going on.
When a person encounters a familiar situation, his or her brain conserves it’s own energy by shifting into a kind of automatic pilot. The pattern has been established and minimal energy is taken up. The opposite is true when the brain registers ambiguity or confusion. Uncertainty registers as an error, gap or tension and draws energy away from other functions.
Not knowing what will happen next can be debilitating because it requires extra neural energy. This diminishes memory, undermines performance and disengages people from the present. Leaders and managers can help create a perception of certainty by sharing business plans, rationale for changes, and by breaking large projects into smaller more manageable chunks.
3. Stop micro managing and let people make their own decisions
A perception of reduced autonomy – for example of being micromanaged – can easily generate a threat response. Presenting people with options, or allowing them to organize their own work and set their own hours, provokes a much less stressed response.
Full article here -http://www.strategy-business.com/article/09306?gko=5df7f
The Knowledge Funnel
Published June 16, 2011 | 
A helpful way to think about knowledge in an organization is using the metaphor of a funnel. At the highest level, you have a wide variety of disparate ideas, concepts and tacit knowledge that have not yet been made explicit. There is a lot of good intelligence and know-how in this collection, but it isn’t very useful to anyone other than those who hold the knowledge in their heads.
With some expert help (say by someone on the Knowledge CATS team), you draw out this tacit knowledge and make sense of it. You package it into models or heuristics and in so doing you move it from tacit to explicit and now other people can use it. At the Models & Heuristics stage, the knowledge or know-how is in guideline form. In other words it is principles and rules-of-thumb that the expert uses to make decisions quickly and efficiently. Typically cues or signals are also included at this stage, so it’s not just the heuristic or rule-of-thumb, but it’s also knowledge about when to use it.
The bottom of the funnel is Systems and Procedures. This is where knowledge is distilled into uber explicit procedures. Step 1, do this, Step 2 to this. The ultimate path from this point forward is from procedures to systemization or into code.
There is increased usability and cost savings as knowledge moves down the funnel. But there are also risks. Once you capture in depth knowledge and put it into procedures, you now have to keep up those procedures. Models and heursitics don’t require regular updates, but procedures do, because so many of the variables (equipment, people involved, contexts, etc.) change frequently.
Secondly, once proceduralized or systematized, the know-how can be easily copied. As my friend Adrian Davis says – once systemitized, it can be commoditized! Which means it no longer offers you any sort of competitive advantage.
Bottom line – not all knowledge should be pushed down into the Systems & Procedures part of the funnel. We’ll go into how to determine which should and when you should stop at Heuristics in a subsequent post.
