Mind-Sets Can Take Many Forms—Depending On Culture

An employee purposely slows down their productivity or begins to under perform relative to their colleagues.  That seems inconsistent with mind-set #1 (having a bias for results) and mind-set #2 (being a part of something bigger than oneself), right?

Well, no.  At least if you’re in China!

In China the group trumps the individual.  Anyone who attempts to elevate themselves over the collective interests of the group will likely be ostracized by the group.  In other words, the Western model of the rugged individual (and the gold stars that are earned through the accomplishment of outlandish performance standards) doesn’t translate well in some Eastern cultures. In other words, in China it doesn’t pay to try to stand out.

Thus in China the individual who has unintentionally ‘one-upped’ the group will naturally be inclined to conform to the performance norm of the group.  And–to be clear–the norm of that group may reflect a very high level of performance.  That’s why someone in China who throttles back their production for the reasons we’ve illustrated may very well hold dear both mind-sets #1 and #2.

The point is perhaps obvious.  The two mind-sets we’ve illustrated here are just as valid in China as they are in the U.S.  Yet, because of the difference in cultures, they take different forms. One isn’t right, the other wrong–they’re just different. The difference in cultures can be as dramatic as two differing nationalities or as subtle as two corporate subsidiaries that have the same corporate parent.

That’s important for all of us to remember–whether one works in China or just down the street.

Note: This post was inspired by a terrific article by Sylvia Vorhauser-Smith in the May 2012 edition of Talent Management magazine.

 

 

Seven Myths About Blue-Collar Workers

My colleague-friend Bill Tomei provided me with great insight and perspective that has helped shape this post.  Thanks Bill.

Myth #1—Blue-collar workers are ‘less than’ than their management brethren.

‘Less-sophisticated’…’less-responsible’…’less-committed’ …these are three of many inaccurate perceptions held about blue-collar workers.  These perceptions are unfortunate—because they’re typically turn out to be self-fulfilling prophesies.  The vast majority of blue-collar workers are intelligent, capable, and responsible.

Myth #2—The core values of blue-collar workers are vastly different than those in management.

People are people. Blue-collar workers want many of the same types of things everyone else wants in their work-life—-competence in a field that they can continue to excel in, work that holds meaning, respect, etc.  There are few major differences in values between blue-collar workers and ‘management types’.

Myth #3—Blue-collar workers are either unable or are unwilling to understand (let alone accept) the truth about the business.

This perception is particularly troublesome—largely because it suggests that blue-collar workers are somehow incapable of understanding the (so- called) complexities of the business.  That’s disrespectful on any number of levels. Through various applications of self-management ,any number of companies have shown the fallacy of this perception.

Myth #4—Blue-collar workers’ self- interests will always take precedent over the interest of the business.

The implication is that blue-collar workers are just in it for the pay check.  This hasn’t been my experience nor the experience of my colleagues.  There endless numbers of examples that put a stake in the heart of this myth.

Myth #5—Blue-collar workers will lose respect for management if managers don’t have all the answers.

This is a common misconception. A manager being unaware of something is OK (assuming ‘being unaware’ hasn’t become a pattern) as long as the situation is looked into and communicated back to the troops.

A manager who, when faced with a serious issue ,says to the troops “I don’t have all the answers” will not be disrespected by the troops as long as that same manager also commits to finding a solution to the issue.  Blue-collar workers (at least reasonable ones) aren’t expecting their manager to be Superman.

Myth #6—The risks associated with blue-collar workers too-frequently out-weigh the benefits.

In many ways, the United States was built by working people—what we might refer to today as blue-collar employees. It’s a disservice to hold the mind-set that the glass is half-empty when it comes to blue-collar folks.

Myth #7—Blue-collar workers aren’t really professionals.

Sorry, I don’t buy it.  Being a professional is an equal opportunity aspiration.  This myth is de-bunked in chapter two of The Power of Professionalism.   As I mention in the book, “being a professional has little to do with the color of one’s collar”.

There are a lot of misconceptions about blue-collar workers.  That’s really  unfortunate—especially since companies like Morning Star, the Contra Costa Times, and (at one time) Saturn have demonstrated first-hand (through various self-managed practices) just what a fallacy these myths are.

It’s been said that, “how we see the problem, is the problem.”   For those holding any of these myths, that couldn’t be more true.

 

This Is The Way We Do It…Part Three

This is the third (and final) installment on “This is the way we do it.”

Two mind-sets, #1 (having a bias for results) and #2 (being a part of something bigger), have the biggest impact on people or organizations in terms of managing change (think:improving things).

Organizations whose cultures have managed to create a strong commitment to results naturally embrace improvements—whether they be central to the enterprise’s core strategy or merely a tactical process change.  The client I mentioned in the last post—the one whose management practices are bench-marked across the world—is a good example.  In that organization, people are maniacal about delivering results.  They know constant improvement is integral to sustaining the superior level of results the organization has become accustomed to.

When there’s a track record of successfully managing change well—which includes committed sponsorship—future change has a much greater degree of taking hold. Unfortunately, most organizations aren’t that good at managing change. Thus, the status-quo lives on to fight another day.

Take the senior executive who is nearing the end of their career.  Many are reluctant to take on major change initiatives. Why? There can be many reasons, but mainly they just don’t want to be bothered.  They may even believe (intellectually at least) in the change effort!  But still, it doesn’t always translate into action.

Before any of us get too self-righteous in judging the senior executive, it’s been my experience that most change efforts are stymied (in whatever aspect) for all-to-human reasons—not for the lack of rational business justifications.  Said another way, sometimes it’s us that doesn’t want to be bothered!  Seeing oneself as a professional can help get us out of that funk.

There’s nothing quite so personal as a job change.  Years ago I interviewed a gentleman for a position in an organization I had stewardship for.  At the time I happened to know this gentleman was 2 years away from retirement.   He was old enough to be my father.  I had seen too many people merely coast to retirement’s finish line.  Often, the outcome wasn’t pretty.  ‘Retired in place’ would aptly describe it.

“Howard, I asked, how do you want to feel about your last 2 years here? You know, as a professional, how do you want to go out?”  Howard didn’t hesitate, “Bill, I want to go out with a bang.  Six months into my retirement I want to look back and feel proud about my contributions here.”

To many people’s surprise, I hired him. Howard indeed went out with a bang.  I couldn’t have been more pleased.  Howard was responsible for the development and execution of two brand new programs—the outcome of which enabled our department to post results that ranked within the top 5% of the company.  Howard probably could have coasted to retirement’s finish-line from his former position.  But that wasn’t Howard.  He wanted ‘in’ on some the promising action we were in the process of cooking up.

Howard was a professional. He held the mind-sets I would later memorialize in The Power of Professionalism. It was never about him.  Rather, it was about what he could contribute.  He wanted to improve things—leaving them better than when he found them.           

Let’s not be pollyannish. Change is tough.  And there are a lot of mandatory ‘head-level’ aspects of the change process that must be accomplished to make the change both compelling and appealing.  Yet successful change is far more about one’s identity as a professional (along with the accompanying mind-sets) that any list of costs and benefits.

This Is The Way We Do It, But…

As we were reminded in a recent post a little over a week ago, being open to new possibilities can be rewarding.  It certainly was for my daughter’s friend who came to realize that by implementing a different approach to food management she would change her overall backpacking experience for the better.  In other words, a seemingly small change can really be a big one in disguise.

Of course, getting to the point where people will consider ‘change’ is key.  Sometimes that’s a tough nut to crack. There are a million reasons why people resist change.  My experience tells me that ‘comfort with the status-quo’ is near or at the top of most people’s list.  That’s why ‘this is the way we do it’ seems like a mantra in some organizations.

I’ve found that there are generally two types of people when it comes to change—those that tend to be open to it and those who aren’t. Here are some characteristics of:

Those who tend to be open to change:  they’re curious, they’ll mess with the status-quo if a new approach holds promise, they don’t mind rocking the boat, they tend to equate change with opportunity, or they see ‘change’ as part of their legacy (a driver for some senior executives).

Those who tend to avoid change:  they’re not terribly curious, they’re confident that the status-quo is sufficient for their needs,  they aren’t ‘boat rockers’, they tend to equate change with risk, or (frankly) they just don’t want to be bothered.

Let’s be fair here.  Life’s experience and personal temperament has influenced many to be risk-avoiders.  Many have gotten burnt after having stuck their neck out.  Others just don’t have the stomach for it.  And sometimes the proposed change doesn’t make sense—the timing is wrong, there are bigger fish to fry, the proposed change is ill-conceived, or a myriad of other perfectly good reasons.

Let’s face it, leaders and managers (especially in organizations steeped in hierarchy) who are risk-adverse will throw cold water on most change efforts.  That’s unfortunate, but it happens.  If you’re in one of those organizations, it makes your efforts to improve things that much harder. (Note: Chip and Dan Heath’s book Switch is a thought-provoking treatise on change—personal, organizational and everything in between. Chip and Dan share several experiences of those who faced great odds—including resistive bosses or cultures—and made a difference.)

I’m currently working with an organization that is world-class in their management practices. Their approaches are reflected in a myriad of best-practices lists around the world.  Yet, they strive for perfection.  In learning about how they approach things, their people will explain (in effect) “this is the way we do things, but….”   Virtually everyone in their organization thinks about it this way.

This organization has ‘proved’ many of their approaches.  In other words, their approaches work.  They get great results.  If ever a company would be a candidate for complacency it would be them.  Yet, they realize they’ve got a ways to go.  They aren’t about to rest on their laurels.  That’s why you hear the word ‘but’ as a qualifier when they explain how they do things. They want to learn from others.  They want to recognize their blind-spots—to the extent they exist.   In short, they want to get better.

What a different approach from those who hold a bias for the status-quo!  Being open to new possibilities is important—especially in today’s current business climate. Great companies think differently.  This is one such example.  In my next post I’ll explain how the mind-sets play into all this. As you’ll see, they do—prominently!

 

Professionalize Teaching ?—A Duke University Senior Speaks Out

‘We must become more professional’ is a mantra I regularly hear amongst both the for-profit and non-profit sectors. For instance, many have argued that management should have the same types of standardized professional requirements that law does.  Whether you agree or not isn’t the point.  Rather, it’s symptomatic of some level of dissatisfaction of the profession itself.

Recently in the Contra Costa Times another such article “Educating Under Oath”, surfaced. It’s about teachers–written by Matthew Straus, a Duke University senior. Check it out.  And notice the thinking that is foundational to the oath Straus proposes teachers take.  To me, it’s clear that Straus holds several of the mind-sets we write about in The Power of Professionalism.  Am I surprised?  Not at all!

Can We Tolerate Working With You?

In 1999 Whirlpool began a quest to go from one-product, one-customer manufacturer of washing machines to being the global leader of marketing and manufacturing major household appliances, with revenues over $10 billion. Today the Whirlpool brand is the top-selling appliance brand in the world.

Many contributed to Whirlpool’s remarkable success story—but arguably none more than Chief Innovative Officer—Nancy Snyder.   Nancy was the chief architect of this remarkable transformation.  She tells the complete story in her 2009 book Unleashing Innovation.

Nancy would be the first to tell you that there was an endless array of people who deserve credit for this remarkable transformation.  That said, amongst those that were closest to the work itself, there’s an especially important group.  Nancy calls them iHeros.   Without the efforts of the iHeros many of the remarkable commercial innovation successes would have never come to fruition.  In addition, these people were the catalysts that enabled the organization to institutionalize (culturally) innovation at Whirlpool.

These are people who took out-of-the-ordinary personal risks, made personal sacrifices, and constantly ‘took one for the team’.  In the end, their ‘reputational capital’ was off-the-charts. It goes without saying that they were respected—but people also liked them.  They were iHeros because their peers recognized them as such—not because the organization issued them an award.

There were those within Whirlpool that were almost singularly responsible for some remarkable commercial innovation successes at Whirlpool.  Yet, they weren’t recognized as iHeros by their peers. Why?  Because they were perceived to be more about ‘me’ than ‘we’.

Whereas iHeros weren’t self-glorifying, these individuals tended to be. General Richard Myers once told me that self-aggrandizement was just about the worst character trait one could have in the military.  Turns out, it’s one of the worst at Whirlpool too—although fortunately they don’t seem to have much of it!

Recall in The Power of Professionalism I advocated that professionals are defined by how, not by what they do.  Here’s yet another example of that at Whirlpool.    

‘Can we tolerate working with you?” This is one of only three key questions that several respected executive recruiters tell us need be asked in hiring interviews.  (The other two are:  ‘can you do the job?’ and ‘will you love the job?’)  While it’s more important to be respected than liked, the Whirlpool experience reinforces how important it is to be liked as well.  Ask yourself, everything else being equal, who would I rather work with—someone I like or someone I just tolerate?   Kind of a no-brainer, huh?

Applying The Mind-Sets To Tough Meetings

Got a tough meeting coming up—one in which involves critical problem-solving, or one in which emotions may run high?  If you’re like me, you’ll need all the help you can get.  Here’s a tip.

Assuming you’re dealing with a group that’s familiar with the seven mind-sets, at the beginning of the meeting ask the group two questions:

*** “Which mind-set is most critical in ensuring we achieve our desired outcome?”

*** “Which mind-set (or its absence) is most likely to trip us up?”

If the two questions are properly facilitated, a lively discussion will ensue.  Ultimately the group will settle on a mind-set that pretty much fits the bill for each question.  Post the questions and answers on a white board or on a flip chart where they can be seen over the course of the meeting.  Don’t assume everyone will agree with the mind-set that ultimately gets chosen for the two questions.  In the end, it doesn’t matter.

This brief exercise (which should probably take less than five minutes) will have accomplished three important things:

1)      By default, it provides an invaluable review of each of the seven mind-sets…so in the meeting the mind-sets become top-of-mind.  It informally nudges people to be their ‘best-self’ in an atmosphere that may well prove to be highly-charged.

2)      It provides a great prevention that materially aids in keeping the meeting on-track.  The group will naturally circle back to the two questions (and corresponding answers) should the meeting tend to get off-track.

3)       It reinforces a laser-like focus on the desired outcome.  Of course the meeting’s desired outcome is—by definition—a first-cousin to mind-set #1 (having a bias for results).  Mind-set #1 was chosen to be number one amongst all the mind-sets for a reason…namely, that when people hold this mind-set, a lot of good things naturally follow.

I’m confident that this approach, if well executed, can help you.  The point isn’t what mind-set gets chosen in conjunction with the two questions.  The point is that this process appeals to people’s ‘best-self’ —largely because of their desire to ‘show up’ as a professional would.

Status Quo–Part Three

Recently I mentioned that if there’s ever any confusion as to who the leaders are and who the managers are in your organization—just watch how they treat the status quo.  Managers tend to make the status quo more efficient while leaders tend to make a new status quo.

Here’s a few closing thoughts on status quo…lest there’s any confusion from my first two posts on the subject last week:

***the status quo, per se, may not always be a bad thing—especially for a successful company who is dominating their niche.  Growth (an allure for most leaders) for growth’s sake may not prove to be a smart move.  Be aware of what Jim Collins refers to as the undisciplined pursuit of more.  What’s undisciplined?  1) Taking action inconsistent with your core values. 2) Discontinuous leaps into arenas for which you have no burning passion. 3) Launching into activities that do not fit with your economic or resource engine. 4) Investing heavily in new arenas where you cannot attain distinctive capability.  The complete list is contained on page 55 of Collin’s 2009 book How The Mighty Fall.

***consistent with the previous item—sometimes the best decisions turn out to be those so-called opportunities you elect not to pursue.  Instead you chose to focus on those things you believe you can do exceptionally well.  For instance when Steve Jobs returned to Apple as CEO he killed any project that did not fit into one of four categories he decreed as company priorities. The categories were those that Jobs believed Apple could become a leader in. He created a new status quo—in that Apple would no longer chase growth in areas where they had little chance of differentiating themselves.    

***a new status quos (one with BIG impact) isn’t a one-and –done type of thing.  The new status quo of  ‘everyone an innovator’  that was introduced at Whirlpool in 1999 for example, took time before it was fully integrated and bore fruit.  Introducing another major initiative during that time would have created havoc.  It was only after the ‘innovator’ status quo was mature could Whirlpool consider introducing the next one.

***a good manager and a good leader can both introduce change—the difference being in the degree of impact.  Change for the manager is typically more incremental in nature, for the leader it’s more analogous to a breakthrough (because it creates a new status quo…which typically requires a higher level of thinking).  Remember when we say manager or leader, we’re not referring to someone’s title.  Rather, we’re looking at their impact. There are a lot of wonderful leaders out there who have ‘manager’ embedded in their title.

***making the status quo more efficient (what managers do) is analogous to “doing your job really well”.  Creating a new status quo (what leaders do) speaks to a higher purpose, looking at the bigger picture, and creating even more “greater good”. The level of thinking between the two is vastly different.

***we don’t mean to suggest that all change associated with the status quo is good.  Sometimes the proposed change backfires (because it’s fundamentally a bad idea) or muddies the water (because of bad timing—i.e. there’s already too much churn in the organization) or becomes a distraction (a good idea that provides short-term benefit but drains focus, energy, and resources away from an initiative      that’s expected to provide a bigger long-term benefit).

Hope these thoughts help.

 

Status Quo—Part Two

In yesterday’s post we noted that managers tend to focus on making the status quo more efficient.  In other words, whatever changes they make typically are more tactical in nature. These types of folks tend to act as custodians.  The expectations of a ‘caretaker executive’, for example, is to keep things running, minimize risk, and basically not screw things up.

This doesn’t suggest that these types of individuals don’t demonstrate leadership—because they do.  For instance, a manager who defends a company value (rarely a fun experience) is performing an especially important aspect of their responsibilities.  However, an isolated act of leadership doesn’t make one ‘Lincoln-esque’. Regardless of whatever lofty title the ‘caretaker executive’ was given, their basic role is managerial in nature.

Likewise, even the most transformative leader typically has traditional ‘management’ responsibilities. For example, bringing in the operating budget five percent below target is a short term imperative for the director who is accustomed to shaking things up.  Yet even though leaders have responsibility for comparatively pedestrian tasks such as managing budgets, their larger contribution is changing the unproductive aspects of the status quo.  That means forging new policies, breeding expectations for  better processes, revitalizing the culture—all in the name of improving results.

In other words, leaders manage, and managers lead.  What makes them one or the other is determined by the per ponderous of what they do—not by an envious title or by the power they hold.  How they impact the status quo becomes the acid test in determining whether they’re a manager or a leader.

There is nothing so obvious as the manager (labeled as such through their decreed title) who leads effectively by thoughtfully and stridently advancing an agenda that keeps the organization ahead of the curve in a time of dynamic change.  Likewise, there’s nothing more maddening than the leader (that adjective being implicit with a lofty title) who fiddles (i.e. manages) while Rome burns.

If there’s ever any confusion as to who the leaders are and who the managers are —just watch how they treat the status quo.