Irial O'Farrell's Blog

Every time I’ve checked in the UK’s state-of-affairs over the last couple of weeks, it just seems like one endless capitulation after another. First, it was the rejection of the Sunday evening “televised event” that turned into the dampest squib ever, preceded by the Scottish, Northern Ireland and Welsh governments having already rejected any suggestions of re-opening schools on June 1st, and let’s not even mention the “stay alert” slogan change.

As if that wasn’t enough, it was followed up this week with the about-face on whether non-UK cleaners and porters were to be included in the bereavement scheme and whether non-UK NHS staff did or didn’t have to pay the NHS surcharge. As I was checking in to see what was happening, each about-face was leaving a stronger and stronger impression on me that nobody was following Boris. Not only was nobody following him anymore, but it seemed to me that they were actually telling him what to do and he was obliging.

Emotional Intelligence – Independence

It’s rare to publicly see such a constant rejection of direction from the leader of a country, so the fact that it was happening with such regularity got me thinking about emotional intelligence and its role in leadership. One element of emotional intelligence is the concept of Independence. Someone with high Independence is someone who is able to think for themselves, while low Independence indicates someone who tends to take on the thoughts, ideas and emotions of others. Independence also includes the ability to remain emotionally independent of other people’s emotions. This doesn’t mean someone with high Independence doesn’t have emotions. They have plenty of their own emotions. It means that if someone else has issues with another person, a person with high independence won’t take on that person’s emotions as their own. It’s very subtle but many of us can be swayed by someone else’s emotions towards another.

Emotional Intelligence – Flexibility

So, someone with low Independence is likely to take on other people’s views, thoughts, ideas and yes, even emotions. Couple that with high flexibility and we get a very interesting dynamic. In emotional intelligence terms, Flexibility is the ability to adjust feelings, thoughts and actions to changing conditions. It’s not just around the ability to adjust, it’s how quickly we can adjust. Some people adjust but it might take them a few weeks or month. Someone with high Flexibility is able to quickly adjust to the changing conditions. So, the noticeable behaviour of someone who has low Independence and high Flexibility would be that of taking onboard other people’s ideas and thoughts while doing so, very quickly, depending on the last person you spoke to. I describe this as someone who’s “blowing in the wind” – whatever way the wind blows, they blow that way too.

Emotional Intelligence – Optimism & Reality Testing

Another interesting interplay of elements of emotional intelligence is that of Optimism and Reality Testing. Reality Testing is the ability to see things how they are and not how we would like things to be or how we fear them to be. Optimism is the ability to maintain a realistically positive attitude, particularly in the face of adversity. How I like to describe the combination of low Reality Testing with high Optimism is Walter-Mittyland. Seeing things how we want them to be combined with a high dose of optimism results in expecting everything to turn out tickityboo, regardless of the evidence.

Behavioural Dynamics of Emotional Intelligence

Pull these particular 4 elements of emotional intelligence together and we get someone who is convinced everything will turn out just the way they want it to while constantly changing their story, depending on the last person they spoke too. This might be fine for Walter Mitty but its not a great look for a leader. Obviously, I don’t know Boris or what his emotional intelligence levels actually are. Watching the various about-turns just got me thinking of the dynamics of certain combinations of emotional intelligence. Not sure how things are going to work out for the latest chapter in about-facing. I’m all agog, to see if Dom does or doesn’t survive the current lockdown furore…will Boris follow the way the wind is blowing or does he keep Dom around for his ideas? Choices, choices, how will the Reality Testing see things?

On the bright side, emotional intelligence isn’t fixed. With a bit of effort, we can actively change our behavioural dynamics and enhance our emotional intelligence. Contact me today, if you’re interested in assessing your own level of emotional intelligence and understanding your own behavioural pattern dynamics.

If you enjoyed this, please feel free to like or share it with people you think would also enjoy it. If you’ve any questions on emotional intelligence, please share them with me in Comments and I’ll get back to you.

“Values are like fingerprints. Nobody’s are the same, but you leave ’em all over everything you do” is a quote attributed to Elvis Presley and never a truer word was spoken about values. Nobody is born with values but, through how we were parented, specific incidents and the societal culture we were raised in, we acquire personal values, whether we know it or not. In his quote, Elvis nicely highlights three points about values:

We all have values, whether we are aware of them or not.We all define our values differently. We act on our values.



1. We All Have Values

Aside from sociopaths, we all have values, whether we’re aware of them or not. I define Values as “a set of standards that we expect ourselves, and others, to live up to.” Some people are very aware of their personal values. That could be through having a strong sense of self or through observational feedback from others or through exploring them with a life or executive coach.

Others don’t have a clear awareness of their personal values but, like our fingerprints and Covid9, just because we don’t know, or we forget that they exist, doesn’t mean they don’t exist.

2. We Define Our Values Differently

There are lots of different values, such as Respect, Integrity, Humility, Efficiency, Inclusiveness, Curiosity. We typically each have about 3-5 core values that we seek to uphold fairly regularly. Some values, such as Respect, Integrity, Honesty, are fairly common values . When working with coaching clients, many identify Respect or Fairness as one of their values. So, for a group of people. their headline value of, let’s say, Respect might be the same but, does that automatically mean each person’s definition of Respect is the same? Elvis’ point is that people’s combination of values and their definitions of those values are all slightly different and, in my experience, I agree with him.

For example, one person might define Respect as “manners”, such as opening and closing doors, following up with Thank You cards, etc. Another person might define Respect as “listening to others’ perspectives” while a third might define Respect as ” respecting others’ needs over own needs i.e, self-respect is less important than respecting others”. The headline value indicates that these 3 individuals all have a value of Respect but their definitions of what that means is very different. Which leads us nicely to…

3. We Act on Our Values

We act off our thoughts and our thoughts bubble up from a combination of our conscience and sub-conscience. If we’re aware of our values and beliefs, our thoughts are more likely to come from our conscience. A lack of awareness results in our thoughts more likely to bubble up from our sub-conscience. Regardless, the important point is that we act off our thoughts, which is what Elvis is referring to when he says “you leave ’em over everything you do.”

We think in terms of what is coherent with our values and beliefs. So, we behave in terms of what is coherent with our values and beliefs. We make decisions in terms of our values and beliefs. We talk in terms of our values and beliefs. We do this whether we are aware of our values or not. Most importantly to our mental health, when we don’t behave consistent with our values, we end up in a state of internal conflict, or intra-personal conflict, as I call it.

Personal Values Summary

To summarise, we all have values, whether we are aware of them or not. We act off our values and, when we don’t, we end up in a state of conflict. We don’t all have the same values and, when we have similar values, we might not define them in the same way. However, we expect ourselves and others to live up to our values. So, if others don’t live up to our values, we may come into conflict with others.

Share your own personal values and how you define them in the comments below. Or share what you think what values might drive the following comments:

He asked the others did they want to get involved and it’s so unfair, as I’ve been working on the project for weeks. And then he just slammed the file on my desk. Well, she asked me what I thought of the idea, so I told her and then she got all narky with me.

I know, I know, I’m extremely late to Breaking Bad but Covid19 is good for some things. Having worked through Luther, we’ve moved on to the Breaking Bad boxset, courtesy of Netflix. While I’ve been on the edge of my seat, loved then hated then loved the main characters more times that I can remember (you know, the usual roll-coaster of workplace relations), watching the 5th season, this post came to me – what Breaking Bad teaches us about business. Here’s my top 3 lessons:

What business are you in? What are your business’ limiting factors? How do you keep it authentic?



1. What Business Are You In?

The episode when Jessie asks Walt if he’s in the money business or the meth business was the episode that prompted this blog (blame Jessie, I say) . Walt’s answer, for those of you who forget or haven’t seen it, was “neither, I’m in the empire building business”. It sounded very profound and well-thought-out (kudos to the writers) but what struck me was that Walt wasn’t in the money, meth or empire business, he was in the regret business.

Moving on from Walt and onto you and your business, can you answer the following questions:

Are you clear what business you’re in? What value do you bring to your clients? How do you deliver that value?

The Value your business delivers and what you do are two totally different things. Products and services are outputs, building blocks, tools that enable your business to bring value. Value is the difference your business makes to your customers and clients. It is an outcome. Walt’s outcome was the business assuaged his regret (and, literally, sod everyone else!). So, in 5 words, what business are you in?

2. What Are Your Business’ Limiting Factors?

Breaking Bad is a brilliant study of Limiting Factors and how they constantly change, depending on circumstances. Walt and Jessie’s limiting factors ranged from:

Premises: ranged from a camper van to a lab Inputs: key ingredients were a recurring theme Key skills: being a talented cook provided a lot of power, and protectionDistribution to market: the whole series tracks Walt and Jessie’s increasing control on the distribution chain

Stepping back from the day-to-day of your business, are you clear on your answer for following questions:

The key drivers of my current business model are…? We track changing access levels to them by…? Our continuity contingency plans for each limiting factor, if access changes, is…?

If your’re pivoting your strategy and business model, due to Covid19 or because you were doing it anyway, how are you answering the following questions:

The key drivers of our future business model are…?

The new skills and knowledge we need to access to are…?

For example, if you’re pivoting to an online solution, do you have the knowledge and skills needed to design, implement and support your new ecommerce website? In this case, it could be technical IT knowledge but it could also be Innovation and Strategic Thinking, to be able to see the potential in the pivot.

3. How Do You Keep It Authentic?

I loved the way Skylar thinks through the authenticity of their money laundering racket. The story needs to make sense to people. If it doesn’t, people move onto the next provider, product, option. We’ve over 400,000 years experience of reading non-verbals and we excel at it, whether we realise it or not and we’ve often reacted and made our decisions before we’ve even had time to register the non-verbals.

Skylar knows this and has the awareness to take time to step back and asks what would make sense to others. This authenticity is also alluded to in Jim Collins’ Good to Great. with the concept of having a Culture of Discipline. It’s very easy to run after the next shiny, new thing but does it make sense with the business you’re in? Gus is another great example of the Culture of Discipline. As he said so himself, he hid in plain sight, he was so disciplined.

Jessie’s “what business” question was an attempt to highlight, to Walt, the Culture of Discipline point. If he was in the meth business, it would have made sense to stay cooking. If he was in the money business, selling up and realising the money would have been the right decision.

Sometimes, its hard to figure out what’s driving Walt. You’d think $5 million would be enough but it isn’t because it doesn’t erase his regret. However, when we view his actions and ambitions through the lens of regret, we can see he is behaving authentically, if a little recklessly, much to Jessie’s despair.

Getting back to your business, following on from clarifying what business you’re in, do your current services and products support that business or are you selling products and services that make no sense? Do you need to cull some of them? Do you need to introduce others?

Conclusion

A combination of having a clear vision about what business you’re in and the value you bring to your clients, an understanding of your business model, drivers and potential limiting factors, and being authentic in your decisions, delivers a very powerful business strategy, inspiring your employees and clients alike.

These are the top 3 leadership lessons I took from Breaking Bad. Having had a seek peep at similar blogs, though, other people took different lessons, that you might enjoy.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/briansolomon/2012/07/13/7-career-lessons-from-breaking-bads-walter-white/#25aa86fb54a0

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/breaking-good-10-business_b_5909086?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS8&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAC_QzbYfEGWxLHiMcUTC8WVhaFjYqUGs1hMRbm7RXI8ckVXTxrpEtO8UV9C6SjKy2fbvMIntFhjYqtis2uUkvWO5L2YFyIHzcpO64PqGPczDs6JoR-6KdUWHYQc9jRWeOM8qCGOBFkJjXzDTlbUmWIIzdhRmn7-HOuDx_5hW5Eku

https://medium.com/popmarket/12-business-lessons-from-breaking-bad-4b00fb4f676e

While taking a cycle yesterday, I was reflecting on the content of a new ebook I’m writing, on how to design SMART performance goals for managers. When working with managers on performance management, I often find myself having to step out of the nuts and bolts of setting objectives and giving feedback, and into the conversation about how the performance management process is a tool of management.

As I was cycling, I was thinking through the content I had written earlier, reflecting on this common disconnect, and it got me thinking about what are the tools of the management trade? Managers are constantly being thrown theory after theory about how they need to excel at this, that and the other, to be a good manager, but what are the top 3 tools of management? Here’s my answer:

Recruitment Capability Development Process Management

Recruitment

The number one tool of management is the ability to recruit the right people. I’ve spent a lot of time discussing, examining and reflecting on what takes up most management time. The answer, as we all know, is poor performance. How best to tackle poor performance? Hire the right people, to prevent poor performance becoming an issue.

Putting upfront time and effort into hiring the right people prevents performance issues from arising, thus reducing the black hole of managing poor performance. If there was only one skill I could develop in my managers, it would be to become excellent interviewers.

Capability Development

Once someone is in the door, the ability to develop their capability to do both today’s job and, over time, tomorrow’s job is the second most important tool of management. Rather than selecting Performance Management as the tool, I’ve broadened it out to Capability Development, which pulls in a wide range of equipment, one of which is the Performance Management and Development system (PMDS). In my experience of working with nearly 1,000 managers, most managers don’t make this link.

A manager that can develop their team’s capability builds a very capable and highly effective power house. This is the basis of all high performing teams. It is also the basis of career-enhancing opportunities for all members of the team, as well as the manager.

Process Design

The third tool of management is the ability to design and evaluate processes. For many people, particularly those working in medium-to-large organisations, the processes are often well-established and often invisible to us. People often see the tasks but not the process behind the tasks.

The third tool of management enables managers to see the processes behind the tasks of the team and evaluate if they are working effectively or not. Where a process is causing issues, either within the team’s own function or as the work of the process is flowing across functions, a manager who excels at process design can identify the issue and figure out effective solutions, both short and long-term.

Collective Impact of Top 3 Tools of Management

The collective impact of using these 3 tools of management is a well designed and smooth running workflow executed by a high performing team. This, in turn, allows the manager to focus on how the team can further increase its value to the organisation, ensuring career development opportunities for both the manager and their team members.

Developing the Top 3 Tools of Management

Each of these tools comprise a range of skills, knowledge and mindset that, with active practice, combine to becoming competent in that tool. For example, to master the tool of recruitment, a manager needs to be clear on the combination of skills, knowledge, outlook, values etc that are critical to success in the role while also being skilled at interviewing to succeed in selecting the right candidate for the role.

Look out for my future blogs on deeper dives into how to develop each of these tools.

Impact of Covid19 on Business

It’s funny how something as tiny as a virus can stop us in our tracks, in a way “known disruption” in the marketplace hasn’t. Known disruption falls into the “coulda, woulda, shoulda” category while pandemics move us straight into the “o-ho, what do we do now?” category. There is no “we’ll get around to it later” in a pandemic-induced lock down. Our future is today. We kinda need to prioritise it now. As we’ve collectively worked through the world’s initial response to containing Covid19, we’re now moving into the “processing the implications of Covid19 being with us for a while” stage and thinking about what that means for business.

Impact on Business Models

How companies rise to this challenge will depend where they are starting from. Some industries have been so thoroughly disrupted, that impacted companies have actively had to re-answer what problem they’re solving and re-imagine their business models, supply chains, capabilities. For them, they have already built up the knowledge, understanding and experience of re-designing their business model and delivery mechanisms. While they may need to be tweaked, these leadership teams have the confidence that they’ve done it before.

For companies and industries that have been largely ignoring innovation and disruption, they are starting from a steeper disadvantage. Leadership teams at these companies need to ask themselves questions such as:

Are we all on the same page as to what our business model is and what problem we’re solving? Do we sufficiently understand our business model, such that we can deconstruct and re-imagine it?Do we have the discipline of innovation needed to re-imagine our Living-with-Covid19 business model ?Can we agree a Living-with-Covid19 business model and organisation design that will support us through this period? Can we implement our Living-with-Covid19 business model?



Re-imagining Business Models for covid19

Its becoming clearer and clearer that this is going to be a u-curve, rather than a V-curve, recovery. Leadership teams that start innovating and re-imaging their business model sooner will gain competitive advantage and rebound quicker. If you recognise this and know that your leadership team needs support to re-imagine your business model, Evolution Consulting can deliver virtual workshops and support to assist you. Contact us today, to discuss how we can help you.

We all know that the 4th revolution has upended the world and companies that dominated the 3.0 business world have been heavily impacted. Banking, newspapers and physical retail are just some of the businesses that have been turned on their heads, as their lunch is being eaten by innovative competitors, companies that might not initially have even seemed like competitors. Online payment companies being a banking case-in-point.

Not surprising, 3.0 companies are struggling to get their heads around the constantly changing playing field. They’ve rightly identified Innovation as a key driver of sourcing new strategies and opportunities. Many of these 3.0 companies have promoted Innovation, naming it as a Company Value, and elevating it as a capability to be developed, possibly even invested in some Innovation training or brought in some key hires with proven Innovation credentials. All solid actions towards developing an organisational capability.

What if that’s not enough, though? What if there’s something else that is constraining such companies from nurturing and embedding innovation? When discussing concepts with leaders, some leaders quickly grasp the concept while many struggle. They want detail, they get engrossed in specifics rather than the broader idea. When facilitating organisation design or strategy workshops, they struggle with what might be, constrained by what they know to currently be. They can see what’s in front of them but find it difficult to imagine how things could be.

What causes this difference in style? The answer lies in Carl Jung’s work and subsequent assessment tools such as Insights Discovery and Myers-Briggs. The findings from Jung’s theory, and related tools, show that people tend towards being introvert or extrovert, feeling or thinking. The third spectrum is how people absorb information. Some people are Intuitive while others are Sensing. Intuitive people tend to see the possibilities of what can be, love concepts and ideas, and focus on meaning rather than words. Sensing people, on the other hand, tend to see the specifics of what is in front of them, take the literal meaning of words and like practical examples.

Not surprisingly, Intuitive people are more likely to embrace innovation, enjoy exploring possibilities and having opportunities in bring ideas to life. Sensing people are more likely to enjoy business-as-usual work or taking concrete ideas that have been mapped out in detail and bring them to fruition. Research has also shown that the population doesn’t break down into a 50:50 split between Intuitives and Sensors. The split is more like 25:75.

Implications for 3.0 Companies and Innovation



3.0 companies, by definition, are very established and haven’t needed much innovation for decades. Given 75% of the population are Sensing and we hire people like ourselves, these companies are likely to be full of leaders with a preference for Sensing. This is not a fertile ground for introducing Innovation. People with a preference for Intuition are more drawn to start-ups, distuptive industries, product design, creative fields. This naturally reduces down the number of available Intuitives for 3.0 companies to attract. Where Intuitives have reached leadership positions in 3.0 companies, they are likely to be heavily outnumbered by Sensors, so innovative initiatives are likely to be thwarted. Over time, Intuitives become frustrated with being able to see how things need to change while not getting any support or momentum to realise it.



How 3.0 Companies Can Access Innovation



Isolate their innovation hub/team from the mainstream company. This gives them the freedom to explore options and develop nascent ideas, before they see the light of the Sensor day. Many large companies have gone this route. Actively recruit Intuitive leaders and alter the ratios. Depending on openings, staff turnover, etc this could take time. Regularly war game and scenario plan what might happen, to help Sensors explore what could happen in a more tangible way. Paul O’Connor@Scenario Serious Games runs some very interesting corporate games. Have monthly Innovation sessions, facilitated by an external facilitator who is Intuitive and experienced in idea generation tools and techniques.Invest in start-up companies that complement business strategy. Many of the pharma companies have adopted this strategy. Partner with an Innovation & Strategy company, that allows regular access without upfront costs. Many of the big consulting houses, such as Accenture and Deloitte, are providing this service. Smaller companies also work in this space.



How Best to Move Forward

The first port of call is determining the current preference make up of the leadership team. That might be just C-suite or could extend 1 -3 levels down. This could be done via an assessment tool such as Insights Discovery (please feel free to contact me, to discuss further). Once the extent of Intuitive preferences within the cohort is understood, and the extent of innovation required and investment budget available is determined, the best strategy to access Innovation can be selected.

As part of preparing an innovation workshop with a group of engineers, I was a bit concerned that we’d never get past the analysis stage, to get to the innovation stage. That might sound a bit weird because logically, analysis should come after brainstorming. However, attempts at innovation regularly fall flat in organisations, because someone throws out an idea and someone else immediately starts critiquing why it won’t work. A couple of rounds of this, analysis has trumped innovation and everyone walks away, frustrated and down 2 hours.

If this sounds familiar, there could be a very simple reason this dynamic is happening and a couple of very simple solutions. One element of my work is to work with in-tact teams and help them become more effective. I regularly use team role theory (free online test available https://www.123test.com/team-roles-test/ ), which suggests that there are 9 different team roles that need to be accessed, to maximise a team’s effectiveness. (That’s not to say the ideal team number is 9. Most of us can comfortably access 2-3 team roles.)

While I’ve seen all sorts of interesting team dynamics arise, in relation to Innovation, a very clear conflict regularly surfaces. One element of a successful team is the ability to generate ideas while another element is the ability to critique those ideas. In my experience, these roles regularly don’t sit in the one person i.e., one team member is comfortable in the role of idea generation while another person prefers critiquing.

In today’s world of needing to do more with less, teams innocently and sincerely meet to generate some ideas and move problems, challenges, projects and strategies forward However, without an understanding of the concept of team roles or their own team role preferences, the dynamic that surfaces is as outlined above – suggested ideas quickly and continuously knocked back. If this sounds familiar, two very easy solutions can be implemented very quickly.

Option 1 – Set Ground Rules

The first option is to explain, at the beginning of the session, that:

the purpose of the session is idea generation only critiquing of ideas will happen at a later stagethe meeting chair or facilitator reserves the right to highlight instances of analysis and cut them short



Option 2 – Understand Team Roles

The second option is to have all team members complete a team role preference assessment, identify the ideas generators and the analysts and explain the natural conflict. Together, agree the best way to manage this conflict. It could be that during innovation/brain storming sessions, analysts will attend as observers (for the most part) or won’t attend at all. Vice versa, during evaluation and critiquing of fleshed-out ideas, innovators may agree to attend as observers or not at all.

You may be wondering why I’ve included the point about whether or not innovators should participate in critiquing, but believe me, there is a reason, depending on the degree to which the innovator likes to innovate. Some are happy to suggest a few ideas and then move on. Others are constantly diverging and coming up with ideas upon ideas upon ideas. In most businesses, there comes a time when a decision has to be made and implemented. It can be very off-putting for the rest of the team if someone is constantly suggesting alternatives to the decision made, creating its own unhelpful dynamic of TOO much innovation.

Knowing all this, what did I do with the engineers? I put the above image of No Devil’s Advocates Allowed on the front of the door to the workshop room. During the introduction, I explained that we were in idea generation mode and that anyone caught critiquing would have to pay a one euro fine into the fines jar. They came up with some great potential business ideas and I left with an empty jar!

I’ve a confession to make – I’m a Performance Management Geek. There many not be too many Performance Management Geeks in the world, but I’m one (the only one?) of them. Ever since my first job in Sydney, I’ve been fascinated with how companies match the needs of the business with the performance of individuals. This fascination led me to several opportunities designing Performance Management Systems and having countless conversations about Performance Management Systems, with both staff and managers. Here are my top 3 insights into why the current performance management paradigm doesn’t work.

#1 – Jobs have become more complex

The concept of performance management has been with us since the ’50s, when life was considerably more simple and straight-forward. Jobs have become much more complex. Jobs with routine tasks, tangible outputs and consistent rhythm do still exist but many jobs have become more complex, requiring broader knowledge and skill sets.

The current performance management paradigm assumes relatively quick mastery of a role i.e., it is possible to master a role during a performance management cycle (typically 12 months). This assumption is implicit in rating scales – in the vast majority of rating systems, the rating is the same for someone under-performing and someone who is still (appropriately) learning their role. For example, using an Outstanding, Exceeds Expectations, Meets Expectations, Below Expectations, Unsatisfactory, there is no discernible difference in the Below Expectations rating given to someone who is 6 months into their role and learning quickly and someone who is 3 years in their role and struggling. Yet humans like some sort of bench mark so dropping ratings altogether isn’t necessarily the solution.

#2 – Managers Don’t Have Clear Vision of Roles they Manage

Back in the day when I managed teams, I had both a very clear understanding of what each role was designed to deliver and how to gradually build up the skills, knowledge and competence to succeed in each role. I thought that was a fairly normal thing for managers to know. Turns out I’m the odd-one-out and very few managers actually have a clear understanding of their team’s roles or how to develop people into them. This might not sound particularly important but an implicit assumption of the current performance management paradigm is that managers have a clear understanding of the purpose of the roles within their team and how to develop incumbents. And it gets worse the more senior we get. Senior managers get less clear about their own role, let alone their managers’ roles or how to develop their managers.

#3 – Performance Management Objectives Override Job Purpose

Since the ’80s, when MBO (management by objectives) became all the rage, performance management has focused on setting objectives and rewarding their delivery i.e., the assumption has been that if you deliver your objectives, you are performing. Result? People did what it took to deliver their objectives.

In the nineties, there was a recognition that how a person behaved while delivering their objectives mattered (a bit) too, so the idea of behavioural objectives gained ground. While behavioural objectives were a welcome addition, it still side-stepped the natural outcome of rewarding specific objectives i.e., if my bonus is based only on delivering these specific objectives, then my focus will be on delivering these specific objectives, regardless of what the full extent of my job might actually be.

This might not sound like a big deal but here’s what happens on the ground – staff focus on their objectives which will only be partially aligned to their actual role. They do the more obvious tasks of their role while mainly focused on delivering their objectives. They don’t bother with some aspects of their role so those bits won’t be done. These aspects of their role fall into 2 categories: (1) there’s no immediate discernible consequence for not doing them so its not noticed (but over time, there’s a cumulative impact); or (2) they have to be picked up elsewhere, often by someone more senior. The multiplier effect, in terms of time, cost and opportunity costs, kicks in and, very quickly, the organisational system is under pressure.

This is a fatal flaw of the current Performance Management paradigm that, ironically, the performance management system rewards. Add in the impact of roles getting more complex and managers not fully understanding the purpose and expectations of their teams’ roles, and it results in a constant reaction to the swirl of the dynamic. On the ground, this translates into managers always chasing their tail, sorting out problems, becoming bottlenecks, as everyone waits on them, staff becoming dis-empowered and disengaged, resources being misused, cost of business delivery inflated and profit margins eroded.

Re-thinking Performance Management

If we step back and take a wider look, an organisation is made up of roles designed to deliver specific outputs/outcomes, The roles combine into an organisational system. If parts of roles aren’t delivered, it puts the organisation’s overall performance under pressure. Having clear sight of all aspects of all roles makes it easier to develop consistent performance expectations and more objectively evaluate performance. This insight has led us to working with clients to design a Role Dimension framework, which has radically altered performance conversations, both for current roles and in the context of career conversations. This has allowed a real understanding of what performance in a role really means and how it really contributes to the company’s performance.

We have re-categorised objectives into developmental objectives and strategic objectives. Developmental objectives focus on building a person’s capability to master all aspects of their role and, depending on their role, may take 2-3 years to master. The typical response has been “that makes sense” because they can see their road-map to mastery, how they are going to develop over the coming years and how it fits into their wider career development. Not only that, but they have the opportunity to accelerate their development in a fruitful way.

We have also used a more nuanced rating scale which actively acknowledges that people are in learning mode and on track. While someone who is still learning their role can’t expect to be rewarded to the same level as someone who is fully competent in their role is, it separates them out from people who are under-performing, resulting in a much more positive and appropriate experience.

As a consultant, I’m very privileged to experience all sorts of organisational cultures and its always fascinating to see how different cultures arise in different organisations, even within the same sector. One cultural dynamic I find particularly interesting is the one where everything is urgent.

When exploring this phenomenon with managers in such organisations, they’re often burnt out, confused, directionless, and yet plough on responding to, and enabling, the urgency. When pressed on where this urgency is coming from, inevitably its from the leadership team, who are often just as frustrated that nothing is getting achieved while everyone seems to be spinning their wheels, being incredibly busy.

Why does this matter?  My mother used to always say “more haste, less speed” and that is eminently true with a culture of urgency. If everything is urgent, nothing is urgent. Just like we can’t all be high performers, everything we do can not be urgent. If everything is urgent, there is something (or several things ) seriously wrong. This results in:

Projects (improvement, strategic, etc) never get finished out and desired outputs/outcomes never get realisedNo value is ever derived from the use of the resources ploughed into those projectsWasted resources, lower profitsQuality is constantly undermined, increasing reputational damage, loss of customers, lower revenue, lower profitsConstant operation in reaction mode leads to managers and staff in a constant fight or flight mode, leading to stress, burn-out, turnover, loss of knowledge & skills, heaping more pressure on the organisational system.

A culture of urgency arises from a combination of impatient leaders and reactive managers. In terms of models, such leaders would draw heavily from Red energy (Extrovert Thinking) on the Insights Model and would likely be Shapers on the Team Role preference model. Their mindset is very likely to be that of Individual Contributor. They tend to want to execute and execute NOW! They don’t want to stop and think about how to go about it, what other initiatives are  happening across the organisation, or the impact on resourcing or capability. Nor do they seem to want anyone else to stop and plan out how to achieve it. They just want it done NOW already.

This approach, and resultant flurry of activity, might meet the leader’s drive to feel like progress is being made but it’s fool’s gold. Over time, little gets delivered and it all feels very Groundhog’s Day-ish, as new urgencies arise.  Such a leader would be better off challenging themselves to consider whether they want ACTION or SUCCESS? Action, of itself, isn’t success – it is action which may result in desired outcomes or may just keep us busy for a while. If success is the actual desired outcome, then such leaders should consider:

Readjusting their expectations around timelines and successAllowing for proper strategic planning and surface what is really important to deliver – done properly, the OKR process can assist in thisRecognising that planning & preparation are activities required to deliver successManaging own impatience (may need an Executive Coach to explore the expectations, assumptions and beliefs driving this)Actively signalling to managers the change in approach – otherwise you’ll have to wait for them to recognise the change in approach and have the courage to test it out – you could be waiting for quite a while (Re-)reading the story of the Tortoise and the Hare

 

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]

The S-Curve Trajectory




3 Limiting Factors to business Growth

Remember the petri-dish experience in biology? The one where you’re encouraged to introduce the nastiest bacteria you can find and then watch it grow? Next biology class, nada. The following biology class, a speck; and then, one day, you take a look and half the dish is covered in mould. It’s looking furry and you think “this is it, I’ll have a furry little monster by next week”. If you remember, however, the following class, the dish is fully covered and by the following week, it’s practically all gone. The learning? A limiting factor that, if not nurtured, will limit growth and result in decline. The rise and fall of the bacteria’s life cycle is called the S-curve. Adjusting the limiting factor moves it to a new s-curve. Doing nothing results in decline, and eventual death.

I love using this model with clients. Often, they’ve never heard of it applied in a business setting and, if they did the experiment in biology, the learning is well forgotten. The most obvious limiting factor in business is the market – it has become saturated. However, most businesses never get to that point because, in reality, they have internal limiting factors that prevent them from ever growing so big. Here are 3 limiting factors that I’ve observed, while working with clients:

Organisation Design

Very few organisations are intentionally designed from the beginning, they tend to evolve and grow over time. At some point, they solidify and the collective assumption that “this is how our organisation is” takes hold. For a while, that’s good. At some point, stability becomes important for a business, to maximise opportunities and consolidate business, as they rapidly move up the s-curve. However, at some point, the business outgrows it’s organisation design. It may need to increase collaboration, or become more responsive to the market. However, the invisible bonds of the organisation design doesn’t permit such needs. Unless changed, the Organisation Design becomes a limiting factor to further growth.

Innovation

Start-ups are very exciting. The energy, the entrepreneurial go-getting spirit, is very exciting. As we move up the S-curve, the constant weaving, ducking and diving is eventually replaced with increased stability and consistency. Typically, senior managers from more established companies in the industry are brought in, to help the company grow up. There are many very valid reasons to do this but it also comes with risks. One clear risk is the potential loss of innovation. Managers who have developed their careers in well-established organisations tend to not need to worry too much about Innovation and being innovative. After all, don’t we have a department that takes care of that?

As the market matures and new innovations start coming into the market place, such companies often find themselves being limited by their lack of innovation.

Leadership

In working with clients, I regularly come across managers in positions of leadership. What do I mean by that? They see themselves as managers, there to manage the status quo but not to lead. By definition, leadership is about change; management is about the status quo. If the world wasn’t changing, there would be no need for leaders. Given the pace of change that is being imposed on businesses in all sectors, very quickly, this becomes a limiting factor to growth.

If leadership was an individual limiting factor, it’s impact might not be so great. After all, it’s possible to limit the impact of a leader low on innovation. Leadership has a multiplying effect within a business. Leadership dictates the culture and behaviour patterns that can seriously detract from business growth. A limiting factor of leadership can arrest all growth and seriously imperil the company’s future. If you don’t think it’s possible, think of Kodak and it’s demise. Not only had they identified the change and designed the future technology (digital cameras), but they had the time (10 years) to pivot to a new s-curve; but leadership could not overcome the vested interests inertia.

Summary

What does all this mean for your business? These are 3 key high-level limiting factors that provide a starting point to analyse specific limiting factors in your business. Determining what is really happening with a specific company takes reflection, analysis, assessment and action. In one organisation, it might be a specific leader is a limiting factor; in another, a lack of clarity or poor collaboration on a particular process might be a limiting factor. Take the time to identify your business’s top 1-2 limiting factors and determine how  you’re going to kick-start the liming factor to a new s-curve.  

 

[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]