This blog is about the relationship between organizations and the people who work for them. And, it’s dedicated to the millions of people around the world who go to work every day wanting to do a great job.
Behaviour change
Grey zones are costing your organization big time
There’s a lot of focus in organizations on moving fast to meet customer needs and shifting market conditions. We’re encouraging employees to be more involved in defining and delivering organizational success. People from all levels and all functions of the organization are getting together to ‘hack’ solutions to important business problems. Collaboration is our mantra. Innovation our goal.
When the formal structures and systems of the organization aren’t supporting what we’re trying to do we’re finding ways around them. And this is a good thing. But, in our rush to collaborate and democratize our organizations we’re losing clarity. While we’re busy crowd sourcing hacks: Who’s got the responsibility? Who’s got the authority? And, how do we know? Will we only find out once whoever it is pops out of the wood work to disagree with what we’ve been working on/towards?
This lesson came crashing home last summer when I discovered that, on a not-for-profit project I’d been working on for several years, I had all the responsibility and no authority. Since, I’m in the business of clarifying, helping make the grey zones black and white, this was a shocking revelation. But it was an informal volunteer thing, so… “These thing happen”.
Now I’m noticing grey zones places where I would never have expected. In a high growth, high success organization that completed a major restructuring and failed to make accountabilities clear for over a year. In a 500 year old institution where lack of clarity on roles and relationships and responsibility and authority is somehow seen as a good thing. And, in a global company where decentralization of decision taking was taken to such an extreme that their shareholders are now threatening to sue them due to lack of oversight.
The grey zones we create, intentionally or not, are costing organizations time, energy, and money. They are increasing politics. It’s more and more about who you know rather than what you know or how well you do it.
Grey zones are decreasing transparency to the point where it’s virtually impossible for anyone to figure out who’s doing what, why, when and how decisions are being taken.
And, they are decreasing trust in the offering, the leadership, the institutions and, if you’re on the inside, in each other.
At high speeds, when we’re all moving fast to meet customer needs and shifting market conditions, new ways of working are imperative but grey zones may be costing us big time. Are they worth the risk?
Random Posts:
Saying goodbye to jargon
Saying goodbye to our favourite jargon isn’t that easy. A recent chat on the IABC linked in page asked for jargon no one wanted to hear ever again. Here are just a few examples:
Incentivize, c-suite, granular, customer-centric, innovation, collaboration, creative, low hanging fruit, breaking silos, verticals, blueprint for change, under the tent, run of play, strategic architects, rolldown, scaling, flight risk, thinking outside the box, pick my brain, value-added, leverage, make an ask, reach out, bandwidth, deep dive, drill down, ramp up, onboard[ing], quick wins, tactical execution, think laterally, going forward, socialize, run it up the flagpole, circle back, face time, strategic decision…
And more. Many, many, more.
I think we all agree. Jargon is a bad thing. And yet, most of us have been guilty at one time or another of contributing to our jargon-filled world. Jargon just sticks.
So, now what? I’m thinking we may need a good exorcism.
Random Posts:
On becoming a zero email company
One year ago today, Atos Origin‘s CEO and Chairman, Thierry Breton, announced Atos Origin would [like to] become a zero email company within three years.
At the time, Mr Breton said:
“We are producing data on a massive scale that is fast polluting our working environments and also encroaching into our personal lives. At Atos Origin we are taking action now to reverse this trend, just as organizations took measures to reduce environmental pollution after the industrial revolution.”
“The volume of emails we send and receive is unsustainable for business. Managers spend between 5 and 20 hours a week reading and writing emails. They are already using social media networking more than search, and spend 25 per cent of their time searching for information. At Atos Origin, for example, we have set up collaboration tools and social community platforms, to share and keep track of ideas on subjects from innovation and Lean Management through to sales. Businesses need to do more of this – email is on the way out as the best way to run a company and do business.”
In their press release they also reported that:
- By 2013, more than half of all new digital content will be the result of updates to, and editing of existing information
- Online social networking is now more popular than email and search
- Middle managers spend more than 25% of their time searching for information
- 2010 : Corporate users receive 200 mails per day, 18% of which is spam.”
Atos Origin has created a page on their site that expands on their position and approach - here.
I’m curious about how they are doing on their mission to become a zero email company. Good, bad or indifferent there will be lessons here. So, I’ve asked them – by email [oh dear!].
As for the rest of us, over the past year I think we’ve all been feeling the pressure. Virtually all “organizational” men and women are increasingly tethered to email through their mobile devises 24/7. We’re initiating, receiving and responding more.
When you add email to all of the other ways we are sending and receiving information it can all be a bit overwhelming.
Let’s hope Atos has some good news and a few insights about their journey so far that they are willing to share! Standby.
Random Posts:
If the US Army is embracing social media, you can too!
Imagine this paragraph from the opening letter to the US Army’s social media policy - Army social media – Optimizing online engagement - written for your organization:
The US Army isn’t embracing social media as a nice to have. It’s a critical element of their operational strategy.
If the US Army is embracing social media, isn’t it time you did too! And not as a nice to have but as key to your operational strategy.
Random Posts:
From campaign to composition
Let’s face it, we live in an event, event, event world. One event after another. Big events and small events. A new brand. A new executive. A new policy. The latest quarterly results. A new acquisition. A divestiture. A new product. A flood of separate moments. From an employee point of view it can all look pretty disconnected and confusing.
The challenge we have as leaders is to have these discrete events build momentum toward the business results we’re after.
But in an event, event, event world here’s what usually happens. A big shiny new brand launch. A month or two of hints about what’s coming. Lots of energy and hoopla focused on the day of launch. A campaign. Internally all goes incredibly well. Better than expected in fact. Then nothing. Or maybe a little something. And then nothing.
Communications based on discrete events will only ever be just that. What’s missing? The composition, “the plan, placement or arrangement of the elements” in relationship to each other. The same events communicated in the context of the whole will build momentum and action toward the business results we’re after.
To move from a series of campaigns to composition takes a change in perspective. It means looking at the events in context and understanding how each event impacts the other as well as how separately and together they support the overall business objectives over time.
It means understanding what these events separately and together look like from an employee [insert any other important stakeholder here] point of view. What does success look like? If the new brand [insert any important business event/announcement here] is a success, what will we see? Specifically how will it advance the business? What are the proof points? How and when will we know? How will we tell that story over time?
As business leaders isn’t it time to insist on integrated communications strategies that will help build business momentum. Isn’t it time to move from communications campaigns to composition?
Random Posts:
Bursting our bubbles
When I’m at my clients, here in the blogosphere, volunteering, or with my family and friends I tend to find myself in groups that are mostly white, mostly of a certain age and economic level. I’m in a bubble.
And, it struck me over the head again a few weeks ago. I was attending the Living Art, a week-long workshop on creating. I looked up early in the training and realized it was one of the most diverse group of people I might ever have been in [not counting the Apple store on St Catherine's Street here in Montreal - for another post].
There we were 24 of us. A few more women than men, but not by much. Ages ranged from 21 to 75. The youngest was an African American who’d served in the military and was now studying writing at Columbia Univerity. The 75 year old was a contemporary art expert and the daughter of holicaust survivors. There were two married couples. Two french Canadians, an Aussie, a Kiwi [affectionate term for someone from New Zealand] and a German. There were three East Indian Americans. There were about 4 students and one full-time mom. There was a chiropractor and a financier.
There were so many points of view. A rich and wide range of ideas. Over the 7 days, we worked together on a number of projects all designed to help us build our capacity to create. It was an amazing experience.
Back to reality. According to an article earlier this month, it will take women in Canada 151 years at the rate we’re going “before the share of men and women at the management level” will be equal.
That’s not just shocking because we know that women make up almost half of the work force in Canada, or that women make most of the buying decisions, but because we know lack of diversity hurts “employee retention, productivity and innovation.”
So, when are we going to learn and burst this bubble?
Random Posts:
Back to school. Back to work.
Rene Magritte’s famous painting Golconde. Work as a formalized dreary rainy man’s world.
This image, seems so right and so wrong. Today, after the official end of summer holidays here in North America and in much of the western world, we are returning to our work routines.
The good news. The opportunity for change is perhaps as great as at any time of the year as plans will be submitted for final approval for 2012 [and in some cases beyond].
Time to think about the institution’s real values. Time to think about the culture that will best suit your institutional objectives given those values. Time to make the business case for investing in the capacity to make it happen.
Random Posts:
Smile!
… and the world smiles with you! Or not, according to an article in today’s Globe and Mail. How and when we smile depend on “gender, race, culture, and class”.
It’s interesting to think about the impact this small thing, a smile, has on our boardrooms and workplaces. As an example: ”Impassive facial expressions are the default for men” and “women are more likely to… return a smile and … to smile when the are disappointed.”
So, the people in power aren’t smiling [men hold 86% "of board seats among the 500 largest Canadian companies"] and their women employees are out there smiling even when they are disappointed. See a problem here?
If employee involvement is our goal, then maybe we need to start with a smile!
Have a great weekend!
Random Posts:
Sucky values suck!
It was impossible to disagree with Robert Fritz when he said, at a training I participated in last week, that:
“Organizations are amoral in and of themselves.
It’s human beings in organizations that have values.
It’s leaders that must impose values.”
So, when I read the most recent Maritz poll results (2010, USA), I had to conclude that leaders may be imposing values, but they aren’t the ones that are being communicated by Corporate communications and HR professionals.
The survey found that “despite a slight improvement in business conditions, the American workforce remains less engaged with their employers than they did one year ago. Poor communications, lack of perceived caring, inconsistent behavior, and perceptions of favoritism were cited by respondents as the largest contributors to their lack of trust in senior leaders.” Specifically:
- Only 7% believe senior management’s actions are completely consistent with their words.
- 14 % of employees believe their company’s leaders are ethical and honest.
- Only 12 % believe their employer genuinely listens to and cares about employees.
- Only 10 % of employees trust management to make the right decision in times of uncertainty.
- About 25 % of employees distrust management more than they did the year before.
What is especially disheartening is that these same leaders are reading this report and year over year seeing the same results disappointing results. What are they making of it? Do they see employee involvement in their businesses as a must have or as a nice to have? What’s keeping them up at night if it’s not this?
Sucky values suck!
Thanks to Hacking Work and Communication at work for bringing this poll to my attention.
Random Posts:
Changing your point of view changes everything!
We’re busy. We’re very, very busy. We’re announcing new strategies. We’re launching refreshed brands and new identities. We’re introducing new values. We’re introducing new products and services. We’re up-sizing and downsizing and reorganizing. We’re changing processes and systems. We’re reducing costs and increasing investment. We’re changing our culture to be more innovative, collaborative, flexible, [insert other]. We want our employees to be engaged, loyal, and proud of the organization they work for so we’re “communicating” and “communicating” and “communicating”.
Changing your point of view is an important source of insight and understanding. Today, I’m wondering if this isn’t what it all looks like from an employees point of view.
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Recent Posts
- Decisions based on compromise
- Grey zones are costing your organization big time
- Saying goodbye to jargon
- Don’t leave them laughing
- A master class with Ed Sullivan
- Innovation & collaboration: Strategic priorities or not?
- The truth about the number 1 fear
- Want to know the secret to writing a great speech?
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Recent posts
- Decisions based on compromise
- Grey zones are costing your organization big time
- Saying goodbye to jargon
- Don’t leave them laughing
- A master class with Ed Sullivan
- Innovation & collaboration: Strategic priorities or not?
- The truth about the number 1 fear
- Want to know the secret to writing a great speech?
- Connecting for big business benefits
- Staying in touch with reality
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