Posted by Mark Brousseau
There are people in every organization you know whose titles indicate they are leaders. Often, and unfortunately, their employees beg to differ. Oh, they don’t say it directly, not to the boss’s face, anyway. They say it with their ho-hum performance, their games of avoidance, their dearth of enthusiasm. Leaders—real leaders who have mastered their craft—don’t preside over such lackluster followers. If reading this makes you squirm with recognition, leadership expert John Hamm says you may have a problem lurking.
You’re really just masquerading. You haven’t yet earned the right to lead.
“When times are good, not-so-great leaders can get by,” says Hamm, author of Unusually Excellent: The Necessary Nine Skills Required for the Practice of Great Leadership (Jossey-Bass/A Wiley Imprint, February 2011, ISBN: 978-0-47092843-1, $24.95, www.unusuallyexcellent.com). “They’re cushioned by a surplus of cash, and their missteps are covered up by the thrill of top-line growth, which hides a multitude of sins. But when the cloak of prosperity falls away, their mediocrity is ruthlessly exposed.
“Real leadership equity is only earned, not bestowed,” he adds. “Just because you have been granted authority doesn’t mean you’re getting the full, collaborative engagement of your employees. You may have their bodies and time forty or fifty hours a week, but until you earn the privilege, from their point of view, you’ll never have their hearts and minds.”
Hamm has spent his career studying the practitioners of great leadership via his work as a venture capitalist, board member, high-level consultant, and professor of leadership at the Leavey School of Business at Santa Clara University. In his new book, he shares what he has learned and brings those lessons to life with real-world stories.
“These aren’t radically new ideas,” asserts Hamm. “Human nature hasn’t changed that much over the millennia, so neither have the core laws of leadership. It’s just that in the heat of the day-to-day battle, leaders inevitably lose their grip on the basic principles of leadership. In other cases, they never learned these fundamentals or mastered them earlier in their career. And finally, sad to say, some people just aren’t cut out to lead and need to understand why.”
“Normal” leadership is a complex system of behaviors that can tolerate a lot of little mistakes, explains Hamm. Extraordinary leadership cannot.
Think about it this way: Anyone can snap a photo that looks okay or cook a meal that satiates hunger. However, when an award-winning photographer takes the picture, or a five-star chef prepares dinner, anyone can tell a master has been at work. The same is true of leadership. The small deficiencies in how the novice leads, as opposed to the unusually excellent professional, create a radical difference in the outcome.
So how can you tell whether you really are a great leader in the minds of your employees—or whether, to paraphrase the old television commercial, you’re just playing one on TV? Unfortunately, the depth and breadth of the mistakes you make often tell the true tale.
Below, excerpted from Unusually Excellent, Hamm reveals ten of the most common, deeply destructive mistakes organizational leaders make:
MISTAKE #1: “Role playing” authenticity rather than living it. Authenticity is about owning your failures and shortcomings. It’s about allowing others to really know you, vulnerabilities, warts, and all. It’s about having the guts to seek feedback from others in a sincere and genuine fashion. And it’s about being able to maintain your authentic self in a situation of meaningful consequence—where your decisions affect others, sometimes on a grand scale and sometimes in very personal or dramatic ways.
Knowing who you really are and holding true to yourself in the most difficult moments is the “ground zero” of leadership credibility. It’s the only way to create the trusted connections you need to lead with real influence. Unfortunately, leaders stumble for a variety of reasons: They get scared and veer away at the last moment, or they sacrifice the truth on the altar of protecting other people’s feelings, or they simply seek to avoid the pain of conflict.
“When we make the decision to compromise our authenticity, we end up delivering a message that may feel ‘easier’ but that isn’t truly what we want or need to say,” explains Hamm. “Deception conspires with fear and seduces us down a dark road of believing we can ‘fake it,’ just this one time and it will all be okay.
“But the downstream impact of making such a choice in a moment of stress or carelessness can be devastating,” he adds. “For one thing, it compromises the integrity of that all-important communications channel between leader and follower by changing expectations about the behavior of both. Worse, it sets a precedent for this type of authentic behavior that over time can trap a leader into an expectation or pattern of always behaving that way—and over the course of years this is a soul-destroying situation.”
MISTAKE #2: Underestimating the impact of small acts of dishonesty. In his book, Hamm describes an incident that took place at a famous, fast-growing technology company. A young, inexperienced, but talented associate had what he thought was a plan for a powerful new marketing initiative. So he asked the CMO to broker a meeting with the CEO to make a presentation on the subject. The CMO agreed, and the meeting took place.
During the presentation the CEO was polite, if noncommittal. He gave the presenter a sort of passively accepting feedback—“Nice point,” “Interesting,” and so on—and wrapped up the meeting quickly, thanking the presenter for his initiative. But the CMO could sense a duplicity in the CEO’s behavior and attitude as the parties all headed back to their respective offices. Then, ten minutes after the meeting, the CEO called the CMO into his office and said, in essence, “That presentation was absolutely terrible. That guy’s an idiot. I want you to fire him, today.”
“The story of the firing spread (as it always does) throughout the company, morale slipped, and the CMO never completely trusted his boss again,” writes Hamm. “The CEO’s reputation for trustworthiness had been wounded forever. The wreckage from one seemingly small act of dishonesty was strewn all over the company and could never be completely cleaned up.”
MISTAKE #3: Being two-faced (and assuming others won’t notice). In another scenario from Hamm’s book, a CEO had one executive on his team whom he really trusted and in whom he could confide. One day, a couple of other members of that company’s executive team made a presentation at a board meeting that didn’t go so well. Later, as they were walking down a hallway, the CEO turned to his trusted executive and said, “We need to get rid of those guys. They were a disaster at the board meeting—they embarrassed me.”
But then nothing happened. Life at the company went on as before, and the targeted executives remained in their jobs. In the months that passed, the trusted executive found himself in meetings attended by both the CEO and the targeted executives. And it was as if the whole incident had never happened. The CEO joked with the men, complimented them on their work, and treated them as long-term team members.
As the trusted executive watched this, he asked himself: Did the boss mean what he said? Does he ever mean what he says? Did he change his mind—and when did that happen? Or is he too gutless to follow through with his plans? And if he’s willing to stab those guys in the back and then pretend to be their trusting partner, how do I know he hasn’t been doing the same thing with me? Just how duplicitous is this guy?
“Such are the dangers of shooting from the hip without realizing that a communication such as the one just described does not qualify as a ‘casual’ comment—once said, it must be resolved, and if it is not, there is a lingering odor that in one way or another, will remain smelly until fixed,” writes Hamm.
MISTAKE #4: Squelching the flow of bad news. Do you (or others under you) shoot the messenger when she brings you bad news? If so, you can be certain that the messenger’s priority is not bringing you the information you need: It’s protecting her own hide. That’s why in most organizations good news zooms to the top, while bad news—data that reveals goals missed, problems lurking, or feedback that challenges or defeats our strategy—flows uphill like molasses in January.
Unusually excellent leaders understand this reality, says Hamm. To combat it they work hard to build a primary and insatiable demand for the unvarnished facts, the raw data, the actual measurements, the honest feedback, the real information.
“We must install a confidence and a trust that leaders in the organization value the facts, the truth, and the speed of delivery, not the judgments or interpretations of ‘good’ or ‘bad,’ and that messengers are valued, not shot,” writes Hamm. “If we can do this then the entire behavior pattern of performance information flow will change for the better…Very few efforts will yield the payback associated with improving the speed and accuracy of the information you need most to make difficult or complex decisions.”
MISTAKE #5: Punishing “good failures.” Great organizations encourage risk-taking. Why? Because innovation requires it. There can be no reward without risk. But if your employees take a risk and fail, and you come down on them like a hammer, guess what? They’ll never risk anything again. Unusually excellent leaders deliberately create high-risk, low-cost environments—a.k.a. cultures of trust—where people don’t live in fear of the consequences of failure.
Hamm says a digital camera is the perfect analogy to the kind of culture you want to create.
“There is no expense associated with a flawed digital photograph—financial or otherwise,” he explains. “You just hit the ‘delete’ button, and it disappears. No wasted film, slides, or prints. And we are aware of this relationship between mistakes and consequences when we pick up the camera—so we click away, taking many more photos digitally than we would have in a world of costly film. Because we know failure is free, we take chances, and in that effort we often get that one amazing picture that we wouldn’t have if we were paying for all the mistakes.”
MISTAKE #6: Letting employee enthusiasm fizzle. A big part of a leader’s job is to be compelling. That means you must recruit “A players” through a big vision of the future and a personal commitment to a mission. But it’s not enough to recruit once and then move on. Never assume “once enrolled, always enrolled.” Even the best followers need to be reminded again and again how fun, rewarding, and meaningful their work is.
In other words, when people seem to be losing their spark, they need to become “born again” employees. (Time to put on your evangelist cloak!)
“Enthusiasm is a renewable resource,” says Hamm. “Part of being compelling is reminding yourself that people want and need to be reenrolled all the time. This message doesn’t have to be over the top to be compelling. It may just entail reminding your team, once per quarter, why you come to the office every day, and letting them reflect on the reason they do the same.”
MISTAKE #7: Refusing to deal with your “weakest links.” Chronic underperformers spoil things for everyone else. They create resentment among employees who are giving it their all, and they drag down productivity. Leaders must have a plan for getting these problem children off the playground—and they must act on that plan without procrastination.
“The worst scenario of all is to have a plan for dealing with underperformers, to identify who those individuals are, and then not pull the trigger on the announced consequences, for reasons of sentimentality, weakness, or favoritism—or worst of all, an attempt to preserve leadership popularity,” writes Hamm.
Nothing can be more damaging to the morale and esprit de corps of a team than that kind of leadership. It destroys your authenticity, your trustworthiness, and your ability to compel others to act. It is the end of you as a leader. Indeed, it is better to have no weakest-link plan at all than one with obvious liabilities.
MISTAKE #8: Allowing people to “fail elegantly.” There are two basic operating modes for organizations under high-stakes execution pressure, writes Hamm. One is the mentality of winning, which we know about; the other, less obvious to the untrained eye, the disease of failing elegantly, is a very sophisticated and veiled set of coping behaviors by individuals, the purpose of which is to avoid the oncoming train of embarrassment when the cover comes off the lousy results that we’d prefer no one ever sees.
Essentially, when people stop believing they can win, some then devote their energy to how best to lose. This fancy losing often manifests as excuse-making, blaming, tolerating cut corners, and manipulating and editorializing data. Unusually excellent leaders know how to recognize these symptoms and intervene with urgency and strength of conviction to get everyone on the high road—a.k.a., the winner’s mindset.
“Passive acceptance of failure, and the rationalization that always goes with it, is a cancer that can begin anywhere in the organization, then metastasize to every office, including your own,” says Hamm. “You can prevent it by setting clear and precise standards of behavior for everyone on the team, as well as clear consequences for the violation of those standards. And you can control it through continuous and open communication with every member of your team (some who will spot the problem before you do) and, where necessary, redundant processes and systems.
“Most of all, you can cure the acceptance of failure by setting yourself as an example of zero tolerance (along with a welcome for honest admissions of error), of precision and care in all of your work, a clear-eyed focus on unvarnished results, and most of all, an unyielding and unwavering commitment to your success.”
MISTAKE #9: Delaying decisions until it’s too late. Not making a decision is almost always worse than making a bad decision, says Hamm. As long as they aren’t utterly ill-advised and catastrophic, bad decisions at least keep the organization moving in pace with changing events—and thus can often be rectified by a course correction.
Not making a decision at all, although it may seem the safe choice—because, intellectually, it positions you to make the right move when the reality of the situation is more revealed—actually strips your organization of its momentum, stalling it at the starting line, and makes it highly unlikely that you can ever get up to speed in time to be a serious player.
“Unusually excellent leaders don’t just make decisions; they pursue them,” writes Hamm. “Because the speed of the organization is often its destiny—and because that speed directly correlates with the speed with which its decisions are made or not made—these leaders are haunted by the fear that somewhere in the organization a critical decision is being left orphaned and unmade.”
MISTAKE #10: Underestimating the weight your words—and your moods—carry. Hamm tells the story of John Adler, who, prior to his CEO tenure at Adaptec, was a senior vice president at Amdahl, one of the pioneering computer companies of Silicon Valley. One morning as he was walking down the long hallway to his office, he encountered some maintenance guys who were doing repairs. He greeted them cheerfully and then, just to make conversation, mentioned how difficult it must be to work in such a dark hallway.
The next morning when Adler came to work, he was surprised to find five maintenance men all carefully replacing every light bulb in the hallway. When he questioned the flurry of activity, the men said, “We’re replacing the light bulbs, boss. You said it was too dark in here.” Hamm says this story illustrates why leaders need to think carefully about every word they say—because others certainly will.
“Every conversation with, and every communication from, a leader carries added weight because of the authority of the position behind it,” writes Hamm. “Have a bad day and snap at one of your subordinates, and that person may go back to a cramped cubicle and start updating his résumé, or go out and get drunk, or miss a night’s sleep. Your momentary bad day could be his nightmare—and something he will remember forever. Your mood matters; don’t make it your employees’ problem.”
So if you recognize any of these mistakes in yourself, are you forever doomed as a leader? Of course not, says Hamm. We’re all human, and we can all learn from our errors and redeem ourselves. And yet, he adds, there is no shame in realizing that leadership is not for everyone—or in declining to lead if it’s not for you. (In your heart you probably already know.)
“Leadership is a choice,” he says. “It is a deep, burning desire to engage with people and rally a community to achieve greatness. Leadership can be difficult, thankless, frustrating, maddening work at times. It is only the passion of leading on the field—the thrill of looking other human beings in the eyes and seeing their energy, willingness, trust, and commitment—that makes it all worthwhile, in a very quiet, private way.”
What do you think?
Showing posts with label employee productivity. Show all posts
Showing posts with label employee productivity. Show all posts
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
The lost art of face-to-face communication
Posted by Mark Brousseau
Communicating meaningfully is becoming more difficult than ever before. While technology has created an ever increasing number of ways to communicate rapidly over great distances, many people are now so well insulated and protected by these devices we use that we are losing the skills and abilities to communicating in the most influential way – face to face.
Stacey Hanke, a Chicago-based management consultant and author of the book Yes You Can has serious concerns about the ever-increasing use of technology in business and organizations.
“There’s a real danger to the maintenance and perpetuation of meaningful communications and personal and professional relationships. If you become overly dependent on email or text messages, you focus on the object, but not the person,” Hanke warns.
Hanke says that tweets, text messages, email and Facebook posts, all transmit words over distances so they can be received without presence of the sender. The human element and context is absent.
“It’s a one-sided blast. Take that! Click!” she observes. “You cannot communicate meaningfully with 140 spaces! All you can say is “Wassup!”
These messages are typically short, sequential, controlled and directed. There’s no instantaneous interaction or connection that allows the other person to understand the tone, inflection or emotion that is carried with the words. The sender cannot express or effectively project the elements of trust, confidence, credibility, warmth, empathy, and concern that are crucial to developing and building a personal relationship. The recipient cannot perceive these elements either.
That failure to convey the feelings that accompany the words so people build trust, credibility, and understanding can have a phenomenal impact on business and success.
Meaningful communications that carry these powerful and important characteristics can only be achieved in face-to-face interactions.
Communicating with impact and achieving influence with people is not only about what you say-it’s also how you say it. You have influence on others because you see their face, observe and experience their emotion, and actively listen and engage their interest and support and build relationships.
You know it’s probably time for a face-to-face when:
... You no longer really understand what is important to your listener.
... You think they have become bored or are losing interest in you or your message.
... You feel they are no longer listening and do not understand you.
There are also certain topics of conversation where face-to-face communication will absolutely be the best way to achieve clarity and understanding needed for mutual success and beneficial action.
... Negotiating salaries, vacations, termination;
... Resolving a dispute, a challenge or a conflict between two or more people or organizations;
... Seeking clarification after written communications has failed.
Face-to-face communication is a very crucial skill. It requires you to focus. You have to be able to be comfortable in the presence of other people for more than a few minutes.
Communicating with impact and influence face-to-face also requires discipline, determination, and self-control.
Here are some of her best recommendations:
Make your moments together count. Everyone has the right to speak. Listen before you speak. Earn the right to be heard. Think about what you want to say before you say it. Make every communication moment worth you and your listener’s time. Every word counts. Think before you speak. Tailor what you say to meet your listener’s needs.
Pay attention by listening for the unspoken emotions. Concentrate on the speaker closely. Focus intently on their face. Do not let your eyes dart away and drift off, since that signals you are no longer paying attention. Do not interrupt. Wait to speak only when the person has finished what they want to say. Hear their words and read their face so that you gain maximum understanding of the why behind their words.
Honor the other person’s space and time. Prepare ahead of time. Match the message to the opportunity. Get to the point quickly. Don’t frustrate your listener by taking too long to get the key message across. Don’t ramble and clutter your message with unnecessary points. Ask for the right action. Be clear and be specific. Watch the time. Don’t take 20 minutes when you only asked for ten. Show you know how to respect the other person.
Prepare for your face-to-face meeting ahead of time. Know your listener.
Tailor your agenda and message to achieve the understanding you need and to influence your listener to act on what you have to say.
Watch Your Body Language. Avoid non-verbal abuse. Every movement you make counts. Control your facial expressions. Don’t smile, snicker, whistle, roll your eyes, or grimace, look sideways, wink, or send the evil eye. Your behavior and non-verbal cues are as important as the words you say. Don’t fidget, act nervous, express fear, or allow your posture to convey uncertainty, insincerity, lack of caring, arrogance, overconfidence, dismay or criticism.
Be Sincere and Authentic. Speak in your authentic voice. Be sincere, be genuine and allow others to see the real you.
Maintain the Power of the Floor. Be interesting. If you see the signs that you are no longer the center of attention:
Stop. Break the flow. Earn their attention. Get back on track.
Ask for Feedback. Face-to-face communications is a two way street. Balanced feedback allows people to be relaxed and comfortable. However, when people start feeling comfortable they also may become lazy and lose their professionalism. Don’t forget who you are and what you are doing. Maintain your self-control. Ask for specific feedback…about the points you raised, the manner in which you presented, the way you responded. Ask for balanced feedback about how to improve and immediately begin applying this feedback.
What do you think?
Communicating meaningfully is becoming more difficult than ever before. While technology has created an ever increasing number of ways to communicate rapidly over great distances, many people are now so well insulated and protected by these devices we use that we are losing the skills and abilities to communicating in the most influential way – face to face.
Stacey Hanke, a Chicago-based management consultant and author of the book Yes You Can has serious concerns about the ever-increasing use of technology in business and organizations.
“There’s a real danger to the maintenance and perpetuation of meaningful communications and personal and professional relationships. If you become overly dependent on email or text messages, you focus on the object, but not the person,” Hanke warns.
Hanke says that tweets, text messages, email and Facebook posts, all transmit words over distances so they can be received without presence of the sender. The human element and context is absent.
“It’s a one-sided blast. Take that! Click!” she observes. “You cannot communicate meaningfully with 140 spaces! All you can say is “Wassup!”
These messages are typically short, sequential, controlled and directed. There’s no instantaneous interaction or connection that allows the other person to understand the tone, inflection or emotion that is carried with the words. The sender cannot express or effectively project the elements of trust, confidence, credibility, warmth, empathy, and concern that are crucial to developing and building a personal relationship. The recipient cannot perceive these elements either.
That failure to convey the feelings that accompany the words so people build trust, credibility, and understanding can have a phenomenal impact on business and success.
Meaningful communications that carry these powerful and important characteristics can only be achieved in face-to-face interactions.
Communicating with impact and achieving influence with people is not only about what you say-it’s also how you say it. You have influence on others because you see their face, observe and experience their emotion, and actively listen and engage their interest and support and build relationships.
You know it’s probably time for a face-to-face when:
... You no longer really understand what is important to your listener.
... You think they have become bored or are losing interest in you or your message.
... You feel they are no longer listening and do not understand you.
There are also certain topics of conversation where face-to-face communication will absolutely be the best way to achieve clarity and understanding needed for mutual success and beneficial action.
... Negotiating salaries, vacations, termination;
... Resolving a dispute, a challenge or a conflict between two or more people or organizations;
... Seeking clarification after written communications has failed.
Face-to-face communication is a very crucial skill. It requires you to focus. You have to be able to be comfortable in the presence of other people for more than a few minutes.
Communicating with impact and influence face-to-face also requires discipline, determination, and self-control.
Here are some of her best recommendations:
Make your moments together count. Everyone has the right to speak. Listen before you speak. Earn the right to be heard. Think about what you want to say before you say it. Make every communication moment worth you and your listener’s time. Every word counts. Think before you speak. Tailor what you say to meet your listener’s needs.
Pay attention by listening for the unspoken emotions. Concentrate on the speaker closely. Focus intently on their face. Do not let your eyes dart away and drift off, since that signals you are no longer paying attention. Do not interrupt. Wait to speak only when the person has finished what they want to say. Hear their words and read their face so that you gain maximum understanding of the why behind their words.
Honor the other person’s space and time. Prepare ahead of time. Match the message to the opportunity. Get to the point quickly. Don’t frustrate your listener by taking too long to get the key message across. Don’t ramble and clutter your message with unnecessary points. Ask for the right action. Be clear and be specific. Watch the time. Don’t take 20 minutes when you only asked for ten. Show you know how to respect the other person.
Prepare for your face-to-face meeting ahead of time. Know your listener.
Tailor your agenda and message to achieve the understanding you need and to influence your listener to act on what you have to say.
Watch Your Body Language. Avoid non-verbal abuse. Every movement you make counts. Control your facial expressions. Don’t smile, snicker, whistle, roll your eyes, or grimace, look sideways, wink, or send the evil eye. Your behavior and non-verbal cues are as important as the words you say. Don’t fidget, act nervous, express fear, or allow your posture to convey uncertainty, insincerity, lack of caring, arrogance, overconfidence, dismay or criticism.
Be Sincere and Authentic. Speak in your authentic voice. Be sincere, be genuine and allow others to see the real you.
Maintain the Power of the Floor. Be interesting. If you see the signs that you are no longer the center of attention:
Stop. Break the flow. Earn their attention. Get back on track.
Ask for Feedback. Face-to-face communications is a two way street. Balanced feedback allows people to be relaxed and comfortable. However, when people start feeling comfortable they also may become lazy and lose their professionalism. Don’t forget who you are and what you are doing. Maintain your self-control. Ask for specific feedback…about the points you raised, the manner in which you presented, the way you responded. Ask for balanced feedback about how to improve and immediately begin applying this feedback.
What do you think?
Monday, February 14, 2011
Lessons in leadership
Posted by Mark Brousseau
If strong leadership was important during the recession, it will be especially important as organizations try to distinguish themselves from their competitors during better economic times.
The good news is that anyone can make a difference and anyone can lead. But not everyone chooses to do so. That’s according to Steve Boehlke, author of a new book titled, “50 Lessons on Leading for those with Little Time for Reading.” The book, published by Lilja Press (www.liljapress.com), is a compilation of actionable leadership lessons from people of diverse and varied backgrounds who have helped Boehlke learn about leadership. Among some of the leadership lessons Boehlke shares:
… Leadership is more about value than success.
… Leadership is passing the ball when you want to take the shot.
… Leadership is having vision – even in the dark.
… Leadership is calling forth the best in others.
… Leadership is letting go but not giving up.
… Leadership is setting a good example.
… Leadership is acknowledging your limits in order to go beyond them.
Any leadership lessons you can share?
If strong leadership was important during the recession, it will be especially important as organizations try to distinguish themselves from their competitors during better economic times.
The good news is that anyone can make a difference and anyone can lead. But not everyone chooses to do so. That’s according to Steve Boehlke, author of a new book titled, “50 Lessons on Leading for those with Little Time for Reading.” The book, published by Lilja Press (www.liljapress.com), is a compilation of actionable leadership lessons from people of diverse and varied backgrounds who have helped Boehlke learn about leadership. Among some of the leadership lessons Boehlke shares:
… Leadership is more about value than success.
… Leadership is passing the ball when you want to take the shot.
… Leadership is having vision – even in the dark.
… Leadership is calling forth the best in others.
… Leadership is letting go but not giving up.
… Leadership is setting a good example.
… Leadership is acknowledging your limits in order to go beyond them.
Any leadership lessons you can share?
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
Workplace Behaviors that Drain Everyone's Energy
Posted by Mark Brousseau
If you’re like most people, 2010 was a long, exhausting year at your workplace. You’re tired, depleted, and quite frankly just done with “business as usual.” You’re laying the blame for your fatigue squarely at the feet of the increased responsibilities and long hours you faced. But according to Jon Gordon, you might be wrong. He insists that working hard—when done with a good attitude in the right environment—can actually be quite invigorating.
In other words, what’s wearing you out at work might not be the work.
“Most people wrongly assume that their tasks and responsibilities are what’s grinding them down,” explains Gordon, author of the newly released Soup: A Recipe to Nourish Your Team and Culture. “However, while ‘work’ is a convenient scapegoat, the real culprit is often the negativity of the people you work with and for, their constant complaining, and the pessimistic culture that is now the norm in a lot of workplaces.”
The fact is, many of us work in a world of drainers. And what, exactly, is a drainer? Gordon says the term can describe anyone in the workplace—a boss, coworker, employee, or client—who sucks the life and energy right out of you.
No one sets out to be a drainer, of course. It’s just that some people regularly (and inadvertently) exhibit energy-draining behaviors. What’s worse, many bosses allow them to continue—or are themselves guilty of practicing these behaviors. And over time, the entire culture becomes poisoned.
Don’t fret, though: Gordon promises that if managers are able to identify the offending behaviors and fix them, they’ll be able to spend more time nourishing their companies’ cultures—which will, in turn, make employees happier and more productive, thus increasing the bottom line.
Read on for Gordon’s top twelve draining behaviors (presented in a what-not-to-do format), as well as tips for how you can make a change for the better in each of these situations this New Year:
1. The Energy Vampire Attack
DON’T: Let negativity become your go-to response. There’s nothing more draining than a boss or coworker who is constantly negative. Gordon calls these folks “energy vampires.” They are never happy, rarely supportive, and constantly nay-saying any and all ideas and suggestions that aren’t their own. According to them, you might as well give up before you start.
DO: Respond constructively when someone offers up an idea. Even if you know more about a particular project, have more experience than the rest of your team, or are positive that the suggestions others are making are off the mark, hear them out. Let employees and coworkers know that when they come to you with their ideas, they’ll be heard with an open mind and received with respect. Insist that everyone else practice positivity as well. While negativity squelches creativity and initiative, an encouraging attitude will keep creative juices flowing and encourage constructive dialogue.
“As pessimism rises, performance decreases,” Gordon explains. “You have to encourage optimism and guard against pessimism, or your team will suffer.”
2. The Out-of-Control Complain Train
DON’T: Give in to the temptation to whine. It’s a well-known phenomenon that can have catastrophic consequences: One person’s complaint resonates with someone else, who then proceeds to add grievances to the pile, which prompts yet another individual to throw in her two (negative) cents…and so on. Before you know it, everyone is complaining, and any work that gets done thereafter is marred by a bad attitude.
DO: Push for solutions. The next time a water-cooler conversation threatens to barrel out of control into Complaint Central, step in and ask the complainees how they would make things better. Better yet, take a cue from Gordon’s bestselling book The No Complaining Rule and ban complaints altogether. It’s tough love for sure—but it will also create and sustain a positive culture.
“When you boil things down, complaints are just noise and nothing more—but each one does represent an opportunity to turn something negative into something positive,” Gordon points out. “Turn your employees from problem-sharers to problem-solvers—it’ll make an unbelievable difference in your office’s atmosphere!”
3. The Vicious Voicemail (or Email)
DON’T: Leave critical or harsh messages on voicemail or send them to an email inbox. Nine times out of ten, these critiques seem much more vehement and condemnatory than they actually are. Plus, any communication you send via electronic methods can potentially last forever. Not only could your words come back to haunt you, they’ll also be a constant reminder to your coworker or employee of his or her supposed shortcomings.
DO: Suck it up and conduct the tough talks in person. If you need to have a stern talk with someone, or if you need to talk through a conflict or problem, do it in person if at all possible. You’ll be able to ensure that your words and tone aren’t misinterpreted, and you’ll be able to immediately have a constructive dialogue with the other person. By talking about ways to improve, you can end the conversation on a positive and encouraging note.
4. The Loaded Monday Morning Inbox
DON’T: Overwhelm your team with a mountain of emails before the week is underway. If you’re finishing up your own to-do list late on a Friday night, or if you’re simply trying to get a jumpstart on the week ahead, it can be tempting to dish out the details and to-dos as you think of them. After all, if you wait ’til Monday morning, you might forget to tell those who need to know! However, coming in to an inbox of fifty-seven new messages is draining and makes folks feel like they’re fighting an uphill battle from the start.
DO: Boil down and bundle your communication as considerately as possible. Inevitably, people are going to be working late and sending emails over the weekend—in today’s business culture, it’s unavoidable! However, there are a few things you can do to make “You’ve Got Mail!” less stressful and more efficient for the recipient. Be sure to flag any urgent emails so that your teammates know which tasks to tackle first—and include as many details as possible so that 1) you won’t forget them, and 2) the recipient can get started as quickly as possible. If you can, combine as many of the tasks and questions as you can into one document.
“One email as opposed to ten separate ones is a lot less intimidating,” reminds Gordon. “And if you do fire off a multitude of messages in a moment of panic, a quick note acknowledging the unusual volume can change everything!”
5. The Busy Bee Bamboozle
DON’T: Confuse activity with progress. You know the person. She’s always soooo busy but doesn’t ever seem to meet deadlines or get anything done. When teams are being formed, people secretly hope she isn’t assigned to theirs. She’s living proof of the fact that just because your day is full of things to do doesn’t necessarily mean that you’re getting them done.
DO: Set goals and hold yourself and your employees accountable for results. These results should be ones that matter and that are visible and valuable to your team. It can be helpful to transition over to a day-to-day plan that will help everyone stay on the right track. Most importantly, don’t put your team in situations where the lines are blurred. If the goals are crystal clear, they’ll be easier to accomplish.
6. The Low Performer Look-Away
DON’T: Let sub-par work slide. Simply put, low performers drag the rest of the team down. They are like a cancer inside your organization, creating resentment and generating more work for everyone else. And if you allow them to linger and thrive for too long, your best employees will move on to a more productive environment.
DO: Institute a zero-tolerance policy for low performers. Hold your entire team accountable for meeting their goals and adhering to the same performance standards. If one person consistently misses the bar, then you need to take swift action. Let your employees know that you value their hard work and that you will not allow others to do less and get away with it.
“In support of this initiative, strive for complete transparency,” Gordon advises. “When your team knows exactly what’s expected, they’ll know where they stand—and you’ll be able to make sure that their fears, uncertainties, and questions aren’t holding them back.”
7. The Unclear Communiqué
DON’T: Assume others have all the information they need, or that something you know isn’t really all that important. These hastily drawn conclusions that result from chronic poor communication can lead to serious mistakes and major missed opportunities. Plus, lack of clarity is incredibly frustrating to those who must work with you. When employees, coworkers, or supervisors have to spend their time tracking you down for clarification, rather than getting the communication from you that they need, productivity falls and creativity is stifled.
DO: Make a concerted and proactive effort to make sure that the right people are in the know. Whether it’s letting your boss know that a client’s daughter is getting married (so he can call in congratulations) or telling a coworker that a vendor prefers to be contacted only via email, be sure to tell the appropriate people. You’ll set your entire team up for success and ensure that your clients get the service they deserve. Also, make sure you copy the right people on emails, promptly return voicemails, and are clear about directions and expectations. And if you say you are going to do something, mean it.
“A big part of a successful culture is having a relationship between employees and managers that is built on trust and collaboration,” says Gordon. “And that can happen only if a clear line of communication is established so that inspiration, encouragement, empowerment, and coaching can take place.”
8. The Disorganization Drag-Down
DON’T: Allow disorganization to impede productivity. If you’re managing or leading a company, heading up a big project, or traveling non-stop, it’s likely you’ve lost an email, important paper, phone number, or pie chart or two (or three or four) in your day. You’re busy, and that’s understandable. But constant disorganization can drain your employees and coworkers if they always have to cover your tracks. It may not always be possible, and accidents do happen—but not being able to find the quarterly report for the third meeting in a row sets a bad example, and it depletes others of the energy they could be putting towards other, more productive work.
DO: Make a concerted effort to keep up with your tasks and responsibilities. And if you can’t immediately put your hands on something you need, don’t automatically ask others for help. Take a few minutes to try and find what you need on your own. Better yet, try to think of better systems and processes than the ones you’re using (or not using) now. If you see that someone in your office has a particular knack for organization, ask her for some tips to help you out.
“Remember that there’s no substitute for communication when you do drop the ball,” Gordon instructs. “Tell your employees that between travel, a jam-packed schedule, and working between two computers and a smartphone, you’ve lost something you shouldn’t have. If you are humble and honest about it, they’ll be more sympathetic to your plight and more likely to jump in and help you keep things organized!”
9. The Hasty Plate Clear-Off
DON’T: Sacrifice quality on the altar of expediency. There’s a lot of work to do, and you (understandably) want to get your own tasks done so you don’t hold up others. However, moving through assignments quickly in order to get them off your own plate can also mean that you’re piling the work on someone else. If you’ve rushed, you’re more likely to have made mistakes and been sloppy, which isn’t fair to the person who gets the assignment after you.
DO: Take the time you need to do the job right. Rather than rushing through a report or clicking “send” just because it’s 5:00 p.m., get focused and make sure you do your best work the first time. Pay attention to details, check over your work, and make sure you’ve followed the proper guidelines. Your coworkers and employees would rather have a project that’s done right than one that’s ahead of schedule. (And if you have to turn in a project a day late on occasion, it’s not the end of the world.)
“Doing your best work sets the rest of your team up for success,” notes Gordon. “When people realize that you’re this kind of teammate, they’ll take on your projects with confidence and energy.”
10. The Chronic Deadline Dodge
DON’T: Allow unmet deadlines to throw everything and everyone off-track. With all the unexpected obstacles you face in a workday, it’s not always easy to meet deadlines. And yes, sometimes it’s impossible—but those times should be few and far between. When people chronically miss deadlines, it’s a sure sign of a cultural issue. Either people aren’t giving it their all—or they’re truly overburdened. Either way, your company’s productivity will suffer.
DO: Set reasonable, clear deadlines for everyone involved (and hold hem accountable). Once something gets off-track, nobody is willing to own it. Make sure you set reasonable deadlines that you and your teammates can meet in order to avoid setting folks up for failure. And even if it takes some extra elbow grease from time to time, make a conscious effort to meet every deadline every time (and hold your team accountable for meeting them, too!).
11. The Unattainable Atta-Boy (or Atta-Girl!)
DON’T: Get so caught up in what’s coming down the pike that you forget to acknowledge what’s happening now. Most managers and business leaders would agree that they feel a lot of pressure. And it can be hard for them to constantly be the ones catching the heat from the higher-ups while the rest of the employees have only their own goals to meet and worry about. However, when responsibilities give you to-do tunnel vision and cause you to skimp on the “job well dones,” employees can get discouraged in a hurry—especially if you immediately ask about another goal that’s gone unmet or push more work at them to try and make up for losses in other areas.
DO: Express appreciation and admiration when appropriate. Employees don’t need a pat on the back and a round of applause at every turn. What they do need is to know that you can be satisfied. If, like a hamster running in a wheel, an employee feels as though no amount of hard work or hours spent will ever garner the boss’s approval or satisfaction, his energy and self-motivation will be zapped.
“Leadership is not so much about what you do,” asserts Gordon. “It’s about what you can inspire, encourage, empower, and coach others to do. If employees know you can be pleased and that goals can be reached, then they will happily work toward those things.”
12. The Blame Game
DON’T: Point fingers at others in order to take the heat off of yourself. A mistake is made, the boss is mad, a deadline is missed. If all eyes are on your team and you start pointing fingers, you could be making a huge mistake. If your employees or your coworkers don’t think you shoulder your share of the blame or are unapproachable when it comes to constructive criticism, they’ll start to shut down toward you.
DO: Accept responsibility for your actions gracefully and humbly. Nobody likes to be the one at fault. But owning up to your mistakes and learning from them are big parts of working together and being successful. If you make a mistake, be the first to own up to it and try to do things differently in the future. Also, be open to suggestions and criticisms—they may make the going much smoother!
If some of these behaviors sound all too familiar, don’t despair. The cusp between the year that’s just passed and the one that’s to come is the perfect time to take stock of what’s making your culture less than nourishing—and resolve to make it better.
“It’s important for managers to acknowledge that it’s been a tough twelve months and that you understand why folks are feeling drained and depleted,” concludes Gordon. “Above all, tell them that you are willing and eager to help alleviate some of that stress! A little acknowledgment can go a long way toward a brighter, more productive, and much more energized 2011.”
If you’re like most people, 2010 was a long, exhausting year at your workplace. You’re tired, depleted, and quite frankly just done with “business as usual.” You’re laying the blame for your fatigue squarely at the feet of the increased responsibilities and long hours you faced. But according to Jon Gordon, you might be wrong. He insists that working hard—when done with a good attitude in the right environment—can actually be quite invigorating.
In other words, what’s wearing you out at work might not be the work.
“Most people wrongly assume that their tasks and responsibilities are what’s grinding them down,” explains Gordon, author of the newly released Soup: A Recipe to Nourish Your Team and Culture. “However, while ‘work’ is a convenient scapegoat, the real culprit is often the negativity of the people you work with and for, their constant complaining, and the pessimistic culture that is now the norm in a lot of workplaces.”
The fact is, many of us work in a world of drainers. And what, exactly, is a drainer? Gordon says the term can describe anyone in the workplace—a boss, coworker, employee, or client—who sucks the life and energy right out of you.
No one sets out to be a drainer, of course. It’s just that some people regularly (and inadvertently) exhibit energy-draining behaviors. What’s worse, many bosses allow them to continue—or are themselves guilty of practicing these behaviors. And over time, the entire culture becomes poisoned.
Don’t fret, though: Gordon promises that if managers are able to identify the offending behaviors and fix them, they’ll be able to spend more time nourishing their companies’ cultures—which will, in turn, make employees happier and more productive, thus increasing the bottom line.
Read on for Gordon’s top twelve draining behaviors (presented in a what-not-to-do format), as well as tips for how you can make a change for the better in each of these situations this New Year:
1. The Energy Vampire Attack
DON’T: Let negativity become your go-to response. There’s nothing more draining than a boss or coworker who is constantly negative. Gordon calls these folks “energy vampires.” They are never happy, rarely supportive, and constantly nay-saying any and all ideas and suggestions that aren’t their own. According to them, you might as well give up before you start.
DO: Respond constructively when someone offers up an idea. Even if you know more about a particular project, have more experience than the rest of your team, or are positive that the suggestions others are making are off the mark, hear them out. Let employees and coworkers know that when they come to you with their ideas, they’ll be heard with an open mind and received with respect. Insist that everyone else practice positivity as well. While negativity squelches creativity and initiative, an encouraging attitude will keep creative juices flowing and encourage constructive dialogue.
“As pessimism rises, performance decreases,” Gordon explains. “You have to encourage optimism and guard against pessimism, or your team will suffer.”
2. The Out-of-Control Complain Train
DON’T: Give in to the temptation to whine. It’s a well-known phenomenon that can have catastrophic consequences: One person’s complaint resonates with someone else, who then proceeds to add grievances to the pile, which prompts yet another individual to throw in her two (negative) cents…and so on. Before you know it, everyone is complaining, and any work that gets done thereafter is marred by a bad attitude.
DO: Push for solutions. The next time a water-cooler conversation threatens to barrel out of control into Complaint Central, step in and ask the complainees how they would make things better. Better yet, take a cue from Gordon’s bestselling book The No Complaining Rule and ban complaints altogether. It’s tough love for sure—but it will also create and sustain a positive culture.
“When you boil things down, complaints are just noise and nothing more—but each one does represent an opportunity to turn something negative into something positive,” Gordon points out. “Turn your employees from problem-sharers to problem-solvers—it’ll make an unbelievable difference in your office’s atmosphere!”
3. The Vicious Voicemail (or Email)
DON’T: Leave critical or harsh messages on voicemail or send them to an email inbox. Nine times out of ten, these critiques seem much more vehement and condemnatory than they actually are. Plus, any communication you send via electronic methods can potentially last forever. Not only could your words come back to haunt you, they’ll also be a constant reminder to your coworker or employee of his or her supposed shortcomings.
DO: Suck it up and conduct the tough talks in person. If you need to have a stern talk with someone, or if you need to talk through a conflict or problem, do it in person if at all possible. You’ll be able to ensure that your words and tone aren’t misinterpreted, and you’ll be able to immediately have a constructive dialogue with the other person. By talking about ways to improve, you can end the conversation on a positive and encouraging note.
4. The Loaded Monday Morning Inbox
DON’T: Overwhelm your team with a mountain of emails before the week is underway. If you’re finishing up your own to-do list late on a Friday night, or if you’re simply trying to get a jumpstart on the week ahead, it can be tempting to dish out the details and to-dos as you think of them. After all, if you wait ’til Monday morning, you might forget to tell those who need to know! However, coming in to an inbox of fifty-seven new messages is draining and makes folks feel like they’re fighting an uphill battle from the start.
DO: Boil down and bundle your communication as considerately as possible. Inevitably, people are going to be working late and sending emails over the weekend—in today’s business culture, it’s unavoidable! However, there are a few things you can do to make “You’ve Got Mail!” less stressful and more efficient for the recipient. Be sure to flag any urgent emails so that your teammates know which tasks to tackle first—and include as many details as possible so that 1) you won’t forget them, and 2) the recipient can get started as quickly as possible. If you can, combine as many of the tasks and questions as you can into one document.
“One email as opposed to ten separate ones is a lot less intimidating,” reminds Gordon. “And if you do fire off a multitude of messages in a moment of panic, a quick note acknowledging the unusual volume can change everything!”
5. The Busy Bee Bamboozle
DON’T: Confuse activity with progress. You know the person. She’s always soooo busy but doesn’t ever seem to meet deadlines or get anything done. When teams are being formed, people secretly hope she isn’t assigned to theirs. She’s living proof of the fact that just because your day is full of things to do doesn’t necessarily mean that you’re getting them done.
DO: Set goals and hold yourself and your employees accountable for results. These results should be ones that matter and that are visible and valuable to your team. It can be helpful to transition over to a day-to-day plan that will help everyone stay on the right track. Most importantly, don’t put your team in situations where the lines are blurred. If the goals are crystal clear, they’ll be easier to accomplish.
6. The Low Performer Look-Away
DON’T: Let sub-par work slide. Simply put, low performers drag the rest of the team down. They are like a cancer inside your organization, creating resentment and generating more work for everyone else. And if you allow them to linger and thrive for too long, your best employees will move on to a more productive environment.
DO: Institute a zero-tolerance policy for low performers. Hold your entire team accountable for meeting their goals and adhering to the same performance standards. If one person consistently misses the bar, then you need to take swift action. Let your employees know that you value their hard work and that you will not allow others to do less and get away with it.
“In support of this initiative, strive for complete transparency,” Gordon advises. “When your team knows exactly what’s expected, they’ll know where they stand—and you’ll be able to make sure that their fears, uncertainties, and questions aren’t holding them back.”
7. The Unclear Communiqué
DON’T: Assume others have all the information they need, or that something you know isn’t really all that important. These hastily drawn conclusions that result from chronic poor communication can lead to serious mistakes and major missed opportunities. Plus, lack of clarity is incredibly frustrating to those who must work with you. When employees, coworkers, or supervisors have to spend their time tracking you down for clarification, rather than getting the communication from you that they need, productivity falls and creativity is stifled.
DO: Make a concerted and proactive effort to make sure that the right people are in the know. Whether it’s letting your boss know that a client’s daughter is getting married (so he can call in congratulations) or telling a coworker that a vendor prefers to be contacted only via email, be sure to tell the appropriate people. You’ll set your entire team up for success and ensure that your clients get the service they deserve. Also, make sure you copy the right people on emails, promptly return voicemails, and are clear about directions and expectations. And if you say you are going to do something, mean it.
“A big part of a successful culture is having a relationship between employees and managers that is built on trust and collaboration,” says Gordon. “And that can happen only if a clear line of communication is established so that inspiration, encouragement, empowerment, and coaching can take place.”
8. The Disorganization Drag-Down
DON’T: Allow disorganization to impede productivity. If you’re managing or leading a company, heading up a big project, or traveling non-stop, it’s likely you’ve lost an email, important paper, phone number, or pie chart or two (or three or four) in your day. You’re busy, and that’s understandable. But constant disorganization can drain your employees and coworkers if they always have to cover your tracks. It may not always be possible, and accidents do happen—but not being able to find the quarterly report for the third meeting in a row sets a bad example, and it depletes others of the energy they could be putting towards other, more productive work.
DO: Make a concerted effort to keep up with your tasks and responsibilities. And if you can’t immediately put your hands on something you need, don’t automatically ask others for help. Take a few minutes to try and find what you need on your own. Better yet, try to think of better systems and processes than the ones you’re using (or not using) now. If you see that someone in your office has a particular knack for organization, ask her for some tips to help you out.
“Remember that there’s no substitute for communication when you do drop the ball,” Gordon instructs. “Tell your employees that between travel, a jam-packed schedule, and working between two computers and a smartphone, you’ve lost something you shouldn’t have. If you are humble and honest about it, they’ll be more sympathetic to your plight and more likely to jump in and help you keep things organized!”
9. The Hasty Plate Clear-Off
DON’T: Sacrifice quality on the altar of expediency. There’s a lot of work to do, and you (understandably) want to get your own tasks done so you don’t hold up others. However, moving through assignments quickly in order to get them off your own plate can also mean that you’re piling the work on someone else. If you’ve rushed, you’re more likely to have made mistakes and been sloppy, which isn’t fair to the person who gets the assignment after you.
DO: Take the time you need to do the job right. Rather than rushing through a report or clicking “send” just because it’s 5:00 p.m., get focused and make sure you do your best work the first time. Pay attention to details, check over your work, and make sure you’ve followed the proper guidelines. Your coworkers and employees would rather have a project that’s done right than one that’s ahead of schedule. (And if you have to turn in a project a day late on occasion, it’s not the end of the world.)
“Doing your best work sets the rest of your team up for success,” notes Gordon. “When people realize that you’re this kind of teammate, they’ll take on your projects with confidence and energy.”
10. The Chronic Deadline Dodge
DON’T: Allow unmet deadlines to throw everything and everyone off-track. With all the unexpected obstacles you face in a workday, it’s not always easy to meet deadlines. And yes, sometimes it’s impossible—but those times should be few and far between. When people chronically miss deadlines, it’s a sure sign of a cultural issue. Either people aren’t giving it their all—or they’re truly overburdened. Either way, your company’s productivity will suffer.
DO: Set reasonable, clear deadlines for everyone involved (and hold hem accountable). Once something gets off-track, nobody is willing to own it. Make sure you set reasonable deadlines that you and your teammates can meet in order to avoid setting folks up for failure. And even if it takes some extra elbow grease from time to time, make a conscious effort to meet every deadline every time (and hold your team accountable for meeting them, too!).
11. The Unattainable Atta-Boy (or Atta-Girl!)
DON’T: Get so caught up in what’s coming down the pike that you forget to acknowledge what’s happening now. Most managers and business leaders would agree that they feel a lot of pressure. And it can be hard for them to constantly be the ones catching the heat from the higher-ups while the rest of the employees have only their own goals to meet and worry about. However, when responsibilities give you to-do tunnel vision and cause you to skimp on the “job well dones,” employees can get discouraged in a hurry—especially if you immediately ask about another goal that’s gone unmet or push more work at them to try and make up for losses in other areas.
DO: Express appreciation and admiration when appropriate. Employees don’t need a pat on the back and a round of applause at every turn. What they do need is to know that you can be satisfied. If, like a hamster running in a wheel, an employee feels as though no amount of hard work or hours spent will ever garner the boss’s approval or satisfaction, his energy and self-motivation will be zapped.
“Leadership is not so much about what you do,” asserts Gordon. “It’s about what you can inspire, encourage, empower, and coach others to do. If employees know you can be pleased and that goals can be reached, then they will happily work toward those things.”
12. The Blame Game
DON’T: Point fingers at others in order to take the heat off of yourself. A mistake is made, the boss is mad, a deadline is missed. If all eyes are on your team and you start pointing fingers, you could be making a huge mistake. If your employees or your coworkers don’t think you shoulder your share of the blame or are unapproachable when it comes to constructive criticism, they’ll start to shut down toward you.
DO: Accept responsibility for your actions gracefully and humbly. Nobody likes to be the one at fault. But owning up to your mistakes and learning from them are big parts of working together and being successful. If you make a mistake, be the first to own up to it and try to do things differently in the future. Also, be open to suggestions and criticisms—they may make the going much smoother!
If some of these behaviors sound all too familiar, don’t despair. The cusp between the year that’s just passed and the one that’s to come is the perfect time to take stock of what’s making your culture less than nourishing—and resolve to make it better.
“It’s important for managers to acknowledge that it’s been a tough twelve months and that you understand why folks are feeling drained and depleted,” concludes Gordon. “Above all, tell them that you are willing and eager to help alleviate some of that stress! A little acknowledgment can go a long way toward a brighter, more productive, and much more energized 2011.”
Tuesday, January 11, 2011
Debunking the Myth that "There Are No Jobs Out There"
Posted by Mark Brousseau
Today’s job market is not for the faint of heart. Unemployment seems stuck at just over 9 percent, so whether you’re laid off and looking or simply desperate to get out of a dead end job, you’ve got a lot of competition. And if you’ve just emailed your résumé in response to yet another Craigslist or Monster.com job posting, take a deep breath and back away from the keyboard. The Five O’Clock Club’s Kate Wendleton has some good news and some bad news.
First the bad news: You’re doing it wrong. When you answer a posted ad, you’re competing with hundreds, even thousands, of other job applicants. (Not good odds!)
Now for the good (no, GREAT!) news: People are getting hired, even in this dismal job market. In fact, Five O’Clock Club members who command a $200,000+ pay rate are getting jobs in less than six months. Across the board, Club members are getting multiple offers, and professionals are typically landing a job in only twelve weeks.
“If you’re using the right techniques, you will almost certainly find a job,” says Wendleton, president of The Five O’Clock Club, a career coaching and outplacement network. “But online searches and job posts are a very, very small part of the equation.”
“There are so many directions to go in when you start a job search that it often overwhelms people into inaction,” says Wendleton. “Our methodology helps job hunters bring structure to a process that seems random. It’s very comforting—and it works.”
If you’re looking to take that next step, read on for a few suggestions pulled from Five O’Clock Club methodology:
Don’t jump in without a plan. Most job hunters feel like they have to find a new job…yesterday. And while, admittedly, sooner is better than later, Five O’Clock methodology stresses the importance of first taking the time to do the necessary planning. Its job hunters must go through an assessment in which they answer important questions like: What kind of job do you want? Where do you want to work? Where do you see yourself in five, ten, fifteen years? They help people realize exactly what they want and ultimately lead to quicker searches.
“All of our job hunters have to go through the assessment,” says Wendleton. “We don’t accept, ‘I don’t have time for that’ as an excuse. Think of it this way: If you have an important project to complete for work, the project will go more smoothly and have a better result if you do the proper planning ahead of time. The same is true of job hunting.
“Don’t just say, ‘I’ll do anything and everything. Whatever job I can get, I’ll take it,’” she adds. “First of all, nobody wants to hire anyone who is willing to do anything. You won’t be valuable to that employer, and they won’t think you will be truly committed to them. You have to set targets for what you want to do and where you want to work. You set those targets through your assessment. It is a critical step in every job search.”
It’s not about what you can do. It’s about what you really, truly want to do. Many traditional outplacement services analyze the personalities of their job hunters, they analyze their skills, and then they let them start searching. Wendleton says these services are doing their clients a great, well, disservice.
“If you are analyzing only a job hunter’s personality and job skills, then he’ll be stuck in the same accounting job he had before he was fired or before he decided to leave his employer—it will just be at a different company,” explains Wendleton. “People need to envision what they would like to be doing fifteen years from now. They need to think about how their job decisions will affect their spouses and families.
“That’s why we take a whole-person approach at The Five O’Clock Club and make envisioning one’s future a key part of the assessment process,” she adds. “In fact, this step is so useful that 58 percent of the Club members who go through it decide to change careers and target a completely new field or industry than the one they were in before.”
Set targets—and keep them in your sights. You have to set targets for what you want to do and where you want to work. Basically, this means narrowing down the industries you want to work in, the positions you want to hold, the geographic areas you’re willing to move to, and so forth. Five O’Clock Club members set targets as part of their assessments. From then on, they frequently hear the statement, “If your targets are wrong, your search is wrong.”
“Targets are essential because they help drive your search,” says Wendleton. “They take a process that can be overwhelming and give you a course to follow. If you find out that a certain target is not working for you, then you can simply go after the next one. Once you have identified your targets, The Five O’Clock Club urges you to go many places, meet many people, and ask many questions.”
Remember, there’s no DIY in “job search.” The big fad for many outplacement services these days is to do everything online. They use webinars and other e-learning opportunities. They can offer long packages to their clients because they don’t require space or labor. Unfortunately, they leave job hunters without the one-on-one coaching that is necessary to keep them positive and on track.
The Five O’Clock Club, on the other hand, offers its clients both private coaching and small group coaching. In fact, it’s the only career program in which members meet with professional coaches and peers on a weekly basis in a friendly, club-type format.
“Job hunters need feedback,” says Wendleton. “They need to work with people who can get to know them, give them advice on how to improve their résumés and cover letters, set them straight when they’re off track, and hold them accountable. Let’s face it: If you know you’re going to have to report on what you’ve done—and what you haven’t done—you’re much more likely to stay on the straight and narrow.
“People who attend our small groups get jobs faster, at higher rates of pay, and that are more satisfying than those who see only a private coach,” she adds.
Seek out coaching groups that consist of both unemployed and employed job hunters. That’s how Five O’Clock groups operate, says Wendleton. She says the reason is two-fold.
“One, it is depressing for unemployed job hunters to hear only from other unemployed job hunters,” she explains. “They end up sitting around talking about how they were fired, and no one benefits from that. The people who are unemployed get hope from the employed people. They see that Frank or Susan has a job, and know that they will have a job soon too.
“Reason two, the employed members are crunched for time,” adds Wendleton. “They want to come to the group, say, ‘Here’s what I’m doing,’ and get feedback from the group. They keep things moving forward and help everyone get the advice they need efficiently and effectively.”
Don’t fall prey to the “a coach is a coach is a coach” mentality. All career coaches are not created equal, says Wendleton. A coach may have ten or twenty years of career coaching experience, but if he or she is not using a proven methodology, all those years of experience might be a detriment, not an asset. If someone wants to coach for The Five O’Clock Club, he must go through a grueling, four-month certification program to un-learn what he thinks he knows based on his own experience.
“Our coaches can analyze any person’s search in five minutes,” says Wendleton. “First, they want to know how much time a job hunter is spending on her search. Then, they want to know what her targets are. If the person doesn’t have targets that add up to 200 positions—not job openings, but possible positions in her area—then the person hasn’t really started her search.
“They can analyze and improve job hunter résumés and cover letters. They help job hunters identify six to ten search tactics that work for them at any one time. Bottom line, they help job hunters be productive and keep them moving forward in a process that can be extremely tedious and disheartening at times.”
“Card” yourself. Every Five O’Clock Clubber has a special 3x5 index card that holds the personalized keys to their job hunting success. It helps them narrow down and stay focused on their most important “talking points.” You can create one for yourself, too, says Wendleton. First, your card will include the short pitch about yourself to use when you meet a new contact, in interviews, or at other events or meetings.
Here’s an example: I am a marketing manager with twelve years of international experience. In my recent job, I was able to grow revenue by 20 percent in a very bad market. The reason I am looking for a job right now is that the company I work for has decided it doesn’t want to be international anymore. I am talking to you because I can see that you are very interested in growing internationally.
Your card should also include three or four of your personal accomplishments. You want to know these like the back of your hand in case you are ever asked an off-the-wall question in an interview or meeting. Let’s say an interviewer asks you how good your tennis game is. Drawing from your card, you might say: “I don’t know about my tennis game, but at my last job I felt like I was really hitting the ball around. One thing I did was help our sales department increase sales by X percent.”
And finally, your card should include the one question you are most afraid they are going to ask you along with your answer. Let’s say your most dreaded question is Why are you looking? You might say, “I’m looking for a new job because I was caught in a downsizing like so many others in this market.” Or let’s say the question is Why didn’t you finish college? Whatever you do, don’t say, “My mother died and I had to help out,” or, “I couldn’t decide on a major.” The interviewer is not interested in you and your mother. Instead say, “I was eager to work and contribute and that’s the kind of person you would get if you hired me: someone who is eager to work and contribute!”
Shape your own interview. The unfortunate reality is that managers who are hiring don’t always ask the right questions. When this is the case, as the job hunter, you have to figure out a way to get your strengths and accomplishments into the interview. (Remember the tennis game example?) This is when it is a great time to recall all of the great accomplishments you have on your index card and use them to keep the interview moving forward.
“You might expect the person interviewing you to prepare just as much as you did for the interview,” says Wendleton. “But that rarely happens. When this is the case, you don’t have to surrender to her poor preparation. You can revive the situation by creating your own interview. Use the information on your index card to keep the conversation flowing, and keep it flowing in a direction that works to your advantage.”
Network with the big dogs. One of the problems with the way people network is that they just talk to everyone they know. Unfortunately, everyone they know is in the same field or the same age group as them. More often than not, they are peers. They might know about jobs at their companies, but they might not have the authority to recommend you to the hiring manager. Or they might be able to put you only in positions that represent a lateral move and won’t help you advance your career.
“We talk to people all the time who say they’ve been networking for a year and have met a hundred people,” says Wendleton. “Well, unfortunately, they were the wrong hundred people. Networking that counts happens when you are contacting people who are one or two levels higher than you are. You’re not going to get a job until you talk to the right people who are more senior than you and who will think of you when there is an opening at their company.”
If an interviewer doesn’t “bite,” don’t toss him back in the water. In other words, don’t just discard someone who tells you his company has no openings. If a person is at the right level and at the right company, he is just as valuable to you as someone with an opening. That’s because you can ask him this important question: If you were hiring right now, would you hire someone like me?
“Because there is no opening, the contact is more likely to be honest with you,” explains Wendleton. “He might say, ‘Well, no, because you don’t have experience in the X or Y segment of what we do here.’ If you are getting similar feedback from other senior-level contacts, then you will know that you need to adjust your targets or that you aren’t positioning yourself correctly.”
Don’t be afraid to be a “pest.” Follow up, follow up, and follow up again. After you interview with a company or meet with a senior-level contact, that isn’t the end of the road. You need to spend just as much time developing that relationship after you’ve met with her as you did prior to the meeting. You have to follow up…repeatedly.
Think about it this way, says Wendleton. Say there’s a kid who wants to get his first job and he goes to his local grocery store. The first week they tell him they aren’t hiring. So he goes back the next week and then the next. Finally, the manager agrees to hire him. The same general idea holds true for senior-level people and big companies.
“Not only does the follow-up phase keep you in front of them, it also helps you find out where you stand,” explains Wendleton. “You can find out what your competition looks like, how many other people they are talking to, etc. This information will help in the salary negotiation phase if they do decide to hire you. For example, if you know you had a lot of competition for the job, then you will know you can be easily replaced, and you will have little room for salary negotiations. But if they tell you, ‘We want you and no one else’—and yes, this does happen!—that gives you a lot of wiggle room.”
If you get an offer, don’t assume you’re home free. Aim to have three concurrent offers in the works at any one time. These offers don’t have to be jobs that you actually want to take, but having them in the works prevents you from slowing your search when you think you are about to get hired. It also gives you a psychological edge—the fact is, if you have only one thing in the works, the interviewer can tell.
“What usually happens for a job hunter with only one opportunity in the works is he keeps asking the hiring company about progress, and they tell him they haven’t come to a decision,” says Wendleton. “Well, if you have other offers, even if they are offers you know you won’t take, you can tell them that you have three offers on the table, but theirs is the job you really want. If they want you, you can push them to make a decision. Having multiple offers also helps keep you positive. It helps you keep your momentum going.
“By the way: If you don’t have multiple things in the works, don’t lie and say that you do,” she adds. “Nine times out of ten you will not be able to keep up with what you told to whom. You’ll be found out, and it won’t do anything but hurt you in the long run.”
If there’s one overarching piece of advice to remember, says Wendleton, it’s simply this: Don’t sell yourself short.
“You’re not just looking for ‘a job,’” she says. “You’re taking the next step in developing and shaping your career. Your skills are valuable. You do have something to offer. And somewhere out there is a company that wants and needs that something. You owe it to yourself to do what it takes to find them.”
Today’s job market is not for the faint of heart. Unemployment seems stuck at just over 9 percent, so whether you’re laid off and looking or simply desperate to get out of a dead end job, you’ve got a lot of competition. And if you’ve just emailed your résumé in response to yet another Craigslist or Monster.com job posting, take a deep breath and back away from the keyboard. The Five O’Clock Club’s Kate Wendleton has some good news and some bad news.
First the bad news: You’re doing it wrong. When you answer a posted ad, you’re competing with hundreds, even thousands, of other job applicants. (Not good odds!)
Now for the good (no, GREAT!) news: People are getting hired, even in this dismal job market. In fact, Five O’Clock Club members who command a $200,000+ pay rate are getting jobs in less than six months. Across the board, Club members are getting multiple offers, and professionals are typically landing a job in only twelve weeks.
“If you’re using the right techniques, you will almost certainly find a job,” says Wendleton, president of The Five O’Clock Club, a career coaching and outplacement network. “But online searches and job posts are a very, very small part of the equation.”
“There are so many directions to go in when you start a job search that it often overwhelms people into inaction,” says Wendleton. “Our methodology helps job hunters bring structure to a process that seems random. It’s very comforting—and it works.”
If you’re looking to take that next step, read on for a few suggestions pulled from Five O’Clock Club methodology:
Don’t jump in without a plan. Most job hunters feel like they have to find a new job…yesterday. And while, admittedly, sooner is better than later, Five O’Clock methodology stresses the importance of first taking the time to do the necessary planning. Its job hunters must go through an assessment in which they answer important questions like: What kind of job do you want? Where do you want to work? Where do you see yourself in five, ten, fifteen years? They help people realize exactly what they want and ultimately lead to quicker searches.
“All of our job hunters have to go through the assessment,” says Wendleton. “We don’t accept, ‘I don’t have time for that’ as an excuse. Think of it this way: If you have an important project to complete for work, the project will go more smoothly and have a better result if you do the proper planning ahead of time. The same is true of job hunting.
“Don’t just say, ‘I’ll do anything and everything. Whatever job I can get, I’ll take it,’” she adds. “First of all, nobody wants to hire anyone who is willing to do anything. You won’t be valuable to that employer, and they won’t think you will be truly committed to them. You have to set targets for what you want to do and where you want to work. You set those targets through your assessment. It is a critical step in every job search.”
It’s not about what you can do. It’s about what you really, truly want to do. Many traditional outplacement services analyze the personalities of their job hunters, they analyze their skills, and then they let them start searching. Wendleton says these services are doing their clients a great, well, disservice.
“If you are analyzing only a job hunter’s personality and job skills, then he’ll be stuck in the same accounting job he had before he was fired or before he decided to leave his employer—it will just be at a different company,” explains Wendleton. “People need to envision what they would like to be doing fifteen years from now. They need to think about how their job decisions will affect their spouses and families.
“That’s why we take a whole-person approach at The Five O’Clock Club and make envisioning one’s future a key part of the assessment process,” she adds. “In fact, this step is so useful that 58 percent of the Club members who go through it decide to change careers and target a completely new field or industry than the one they were in before.”
Set targets—and keep them in your sights. You have to set targets for what you want to do and where you want to work. Basically, this means narrowing down the industries you want to work in, the positions you want to hold, the geographic areas you’re willing to move to, and so forth. Five O’Clock Club members set targets as part of their assessments. From then on, they frequently hear the statement, “If your targets are wrong, your search is wrong.”
“Targets are essential because they help drive your search,” says Wendleton. “They take a process that can be overwhelming and give you a course to follow. If you find out that a certain target is not working for you, then you can simply go after the next one. Once you have identified your targets, The Five O’Clock Club urges you to go many places, meet many people, and ask many questions.”
Remember, there’s no DIY in “job search.” The big fad for many outplacement services these days is to do everything online. They use webinars and other e-learning opportunities. They can offer long packages to their clients because they don’t require space or labor. Unfortunately, they leave job hunters without the one-on-one coaching that is necessary to keep them positive and on track.
The Five O’Clock Club, on the other hand, offers its clients both private coaching and small group coaching. In fact, it’s the only career program in which members meet with professional coaches and peers on a weekly basis in a friendly, club-type format.
“Job hunters need feedback,” says Wendleton. “They need to work with people who can get to know them, give them advice on how to improve their résumés and cover letters, set them straight when they’re off track, and hold them accountable. Let’s face it: If you know you’re going to have to report on what you’ve done—and what you haven’t done—you’re much more likely to stay on the straight and narrow.
“People who attend our small groups get jobs faster, at higher rates of pay, and that are more satisfying than those who see only a private coach,” she adds.
Seek out coaching groups that consist of both unemployed and employed job hunters. That’s how Five O’Clock groups operate, says Wendleton. She says the reason is two-fold.
“One, it is depressing for unemployed job hunters to hear only from other unemployed job hunters,” she explains. “They end up sitting around talking about how they were fired, and no one benefits from that. The people who are unemployed get hope from the employed people. They see that Frank or Susan has a job, and know that they will have a job soon too.
“Reason two, the employed members are crunched for time,” adds Wendleton. “They want to come to the group, say, ‘Here’s what I’m doing,’ and get feedback from the group. They keep things moving forward and help everyone get the advice they need efficiently and effectively.”
Don’t fall prey to the “a coach is a coach is a coach” mentality. All career coaches are not created equal, says Wendleton. A coach may have ten or twenty years of career coaching experience, but if he or she is not using a proven methodology, all those years of experience might be a detriment, not an asset. If someone wants to coach for The Five O’Clock Club, he must go through a grueling, four-month certification program to un-learn what he thinks he knows based on his own experience.
“Our coaches can analyze any person’s search in five minutes,” says Wendleton. “First, they want to know how much time a job hunter is spending on her search. Then, they want to know what her targets are. If the person doesn’t have targets that add up to 200 positions—not job openings, but possible positions in her area—then the person hasn’t really started her search.
“They can analyze and improve job hunter résumés and cover letters. They help job hunters identify six to ten search tactics that work for them at any one time. Bottom line, they help job hunters be productive and keep them moving forward in a process that can be extremely tedious and disheartening at times.”
“Card” yourself. Every Five O’Clock Clubber has a special 3x5 index card that holds the personalized keys to their job hunting success. It helps them narrow down and stay focused on their most important “talking points.” You can create one for yourself, too, says Wendleton. First, your card will include the short pitch about yourself to use when you meet a new contact, in interviews, or at other events or meetings.
Here’s an example: I am a marketing manager with twelve years of international experience. In my recent job, I was able to grow revenue by 20 percent in a very bad market. The reason I am looking for a job right now is that the company I work for has decided it doesn’t want to be international anymore. I am talking to you because I can see that you are very interested in growing internationally.
Your card should also include three or four of your personal accomplishments. You want to know these like the back of your hand in case you are ever asked an off-the-wall question in an interview or meeting. Let’s say an interviewer asks you how good your tennis game is. Drawing from your card, you might say: “I don’t know about my tennis game, but at my last job I felt like I was really hitting the ball around. One thing I did was help our sales department increase sales by X percent.”
And finally, your card should include the one question you are most afraid they are going to ask you along with your answer. Let’s say your most dreaded question is Why are you looking? You might say, “I’m looking for a new job because I was caught in a downsizing like so many others in this market.” Or let’s say the question is Why didn’t you finish college? Whatever you do, don’t say, “My mother died and I had to help out,” or, “I couldn’t decide on a major.” The interviewer is not interested in you and your mother. Instead say, “I was eager to work and contribute and that’s the kind of person you would get if you hired me: someone who is eager to work and contribute!”
Shape your own interview. The unfortunate reality is that managers who are hiring don’t always ask the right questions. When this is the case, as the job hunter, you have to figure out a way to get your strengths and accomplishments into the interview. (Remember the tennis game example?) This is when it is a great time to recall all of the great accomplishments you have on your index card and use them to keep the interview moving forward.
“You might expect the person interviewing you to prepare just as much as you did for the interview,” says Wendleton. “But that rarely happens. When this is the case, you don’t have to surrender to her poor preparation. You can revive the situation by creating your own interview. Use the information on your index card to keep the conversation flowing, and keep it flowing in a direction that works to your advantage.”
Network with the big dogs. One of the problems with the way people network is that they just talk to everyone they know. Unfortunately, everyone they know is in the same field or the same age group as them. More often than not, they are peers. They might know about jobs at their companies, but they might not have the authority to recommend you to the hiring manager. Or they might be able to put you only in positions that represent a lateral move and won’t help you advance your career.
“We talk to people all the time who say they’ve been networking for a year and have met a hundred people,” says Wendleton. “Well, unfortunately, they were the wrong hundred people. Networking that counts happens when you are contacting people who are one or two levels higher than you are. You’re not going to get a job until you talk to the right people who are more senior than you and who will think of you when there is an opening at their company.”
If an interviewer doesn’t “bite,” don’t toss him back in the water. In other words, don’t just discard someone who tells you his company has no openings. If a person is at the right level and at the right company, he is just as valuable to you as someone with an opening. That’s because you can ask him this important question: If you were hiring right now, would you hire someone like me?
“Because there is no opening, the contact is more likely to be honest with you,” explains Wendleton. “He might say, ‘Well, no, because you don’t have experience in the X or Y segment of what we do here.’ If you are getting similar feedback from other senior-level contacts, then you will know that you need to adjust your targets or that you aren’t positioning yourself correctly.”
Don’t be afraid to be a “pest.” Follow up, follow up, and follow up again. After you interview with a company or meet with a senior-level contact, that isn’t the end of the road. You need to spend just as much time developing that relationship after you’ve met with her as you did prior to the meeting. You have to follow up…repeatedly.
Think about it this way, says Wendleton. Say there’s a kid who wants to get his first job and he goes to his local grocery store. The first week they tell him they aren’t hiring. So he goes back the next week and then the next. Finally, the manager agrees to hire him. The same general idea holds true for senior-level people and big companies.
“Not only does the follow-up phase keep you in front of them, it also helps you find out where you stand,” explains Wendleton. “You can find out what your competition looks like, how many other people they are talking to, etc. This information will help in the salary negotiation phase if they do decide to hire you. For example, if you know you had a lot of competition for the job, then you will know you can be easily replaced, and you will have little room for salary negotiations. But if they tell you, ‘We want you and no one else’—and yes, this does happen!—that gives you a lot of wiggle room.”
If you get an offer, don’t assume you’re home free. Aim to have three concurrent offers in the works at any one time. These offers don’t have to be jobs that you actually want to take, but having them in the works prevents you from slowing your search when you think you are about to get hired. It also gives you a psychological edge—the fact is, if you have only one thing in the works, the interviewer can tell.
“What usually happens for a job hunter with only one opportunity in the works is he keeps asking the hiring company about progress, and they tell him they haven’t come to a decision,” says Wendleton. “Well, if you have other offers, even if they are offers you know you won’t take, you can tell them that you have three offers on the table, but theirs is the job you really want. If they want you, you can push them to make a decision. Having multiple offers also helps keep you positive. It helps you keep your momentum going.
“By the way: If you don’t have multiple things in the works, don’t lie and say that you do,” she adds. “Nine times out of ten you will not be able to keep up with what you told to whom. You’ll be found out, and it won’t do anything but hurt you in the long run.”
If there’s one overarching piece of advice to remember, says Wendleton, it’s simply this: Don’t sell yourself short.
“You’re not just looking for ‘a job,’” she says. “You’re taking the next step in developing and shaping your career. Your skills are valuable. You do have something to offer. And somewhere out there is a company that wants and needs that something. You owe it to yourself to do what it takes to find them.”
Tuesday, January 4, 2011
10 Habits of Highly Effective Managers
By Wes Friesen, Portland General Electric
“Sow a thought and you reap an act; sow an act and you reap a habit; sow a habit and you reap a character; sow a character and you reap a destiny.”
Right in the middle of the quotation above is the importance of our habits. A habit is “an acquired mode of behavior that has become our common practice.” Our habits mold our character and ultimately determine our destiny in the world. Want to further develop your character and develop in to a highly effective manager? Intentionally pursuing and building worthwhile habits is the key.
Following are ten of the habits of highly effective managers. This is not an exhaustive list – but these will build a strong foundation on your road to increased management effectiveness:
1) Habit #1: “Expanding Self-Awareness.” Having a high level of Emotional Intelligence (EQ) is essential to being an effective Manager – and EQ starts with having accurate self-awareness. Self-awareness can help us gain self-control and be helpful to people around us – not hurtful. Some tools to help expand our self-awareness include: get feedback from others such as using 360 degree surveys; have a mentor to speak into your life; and constantly seek feedback from others on how we are doing.
2) Habit #2: “Pursue Continuous Learning and Continuous Improvement.” Are you a perfect manager and person? Me neither! What we can do is to commit ourselves to be like-long learners and seek to continuously improve ourselves as managers and as human beings. I have been inspired by this quote from Dr. Martin Luther King: “I may not be the man I want to be; I may not be the man I ought to be; I may not be the man I can be; but praise God, I’m not the man I once was.”
3) Habit #3: “Always do the Right Thing.” Too many people have been victimized by the unethical behavior of those in leadership roles. Remember Enron? My co-workers and I at Portland General will never forget – we were owned by Enron at time of their bankruptcy and our retirement savings were decimated. Mark Twain said “Always do what is right. It will gratify half of mankind and astound the other.” My former pastor Loren Fischer said “it’s always right to do right” – and I agree.
4) Habit #4: “Be Results AND Relationship Oriented.” As leaders we are expected to get results – and we should. At the same time, building positive relationships is the right thing to do – and it leads to great results. One tool to help build relationships is to consistently practice the 3 Rs with people. Recognize people for who they are and what they do; Reward people for individual and team achievements; and show people Respect – everybody wants to be respected as the classic Aretha Franklin song emphasizes.
5) Habit #5: “Achieve Big Goals one small step at a time.” I remember a grade school friend telling me the following riddle: “Question: how do you eat an elephant? Answer: one bite at a time”. Get the point? We need to set long-term visions and big goals for ourselves and our teams. And we need to break down the journey towards the vision and goals into manageable steps that inspire others to move forward.
6) Habit #6: “See the glass as half-full.” Are you normally a pessimist or an optimist? Studies have shown that the most effective leaders are strong optimists. Being optimistic does not mean that we ignore the half of the glass that is empty. It does mean we are thankful for the half that is full, and we work together to fill the rest of the glass as best we can.
7) Habit #7: “Look for the win-win.” Effective managers don’t get locked into specific positions, but look for ways to meet interests of themselves and others so everybody gets something (a “win-win” versus a “win-lose”).
8) Habit #8: “Spend much time in Quadrant 2.” Stephen Covey popularized the importance of intentionally spending significant time doing “Important, Not Urgent” items. These include things like building relationships, reading and other learning activities, planning and thinking, exercise, etc. To spend more time in Quadrant 2, we need to spend less time in Quadrants 3 & 4 (i.e. “Urgent, Not Important” and “Not Urgent, Not Important”) activities like watching TV, playing video games and wasting time doing things that add no value to our lives or the lives of others.
9) Habit #9: “Enjoy the journey.” Management (and life!) is a journey – filled with both positive and negative experiences. The journey will be much more pleasant and we will go farther if we learn to laugh and be thankful. A Yiddish proverb says “what soap is to the body, laughter is to the soul.” Studies have shown that laughter makes us physically and emotionally healthier – and more fun to be around too. Find a funny friend; enjoy a funny TV show or movie – and just laugh! Being thankful is also important. The reality is that we all have much to be thankful for, and our lives will be more joyful and productive if we learn to develop an “attitude of gratitude.”
10) Habit #10: “Remember - your health is your wealth.” Gandhi said “It is health that is real wealth and not pieces of gold and silver.” Living a healthy lifestyle will increase your energy, stamina and emotional well-being – and help us be more effective in all that we do. A holistic healthy lifestyle includes developing and using our mental capabilities (read a good book lately or taken a class just for the learning?). We are also spiritual beings, and finding faith and serving others can nourish our spiritual health.
Let me leave you with a challenge to not settle for mediocrity, but to get in the game and go for management excellence. Listen to this President Teddy Roosevelt quote “It is not the critic who counts, nor the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doers of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly … who spends himself in a worthy cause.”
Wes can be contacted at Wes.Friesen@pgn.com.
“Sow a thought and you reap an act; sow an act and you reap a habit; sow a habit and you reap a character; sow a character and you reap a destiny.”
Right in the middle of the quotation above is the importance of our habits. A habit is “an acquired mode of behavior that has become our common practice.” Our habits mold our character and ultimately determine our destiny in the world. Want to further develop your character and develop in to a highly effective manager? Intentionally pursuing and building worthwhile habits is the key.
Following are ten of the habits of highly effective managers. This is not an exhaustive list – but these will build a strong foundation on your road to increased management effectiveness:
1) Habit #1: “Expanding Self-Awareness.” Having a high level of Emotional Intelligence (EQ) is essential to being an effective Manager – and EQ starts with having accurate self-awareness. Self-awareness can help us gain self-control and be helpful to people around us – not hurtful. Some tools to help expand our self-awareness include: get feedback from others such as using 360 degree surveys; have a mentor to speak into your life; and constantly seek feedback from others on how we are doing.
2) Habit #2: “Pursue Continuous Learning and Continuous Improvement.” Are you a perfect manager and person? Me neither! What we can do is to commit ourselves to be like-long learners and seek to continuously improve ourselves as managers and as human beings. I have been inspired by this quote from Dr. Martin Luther King: “I may not be the man I want to be; I may not be the man I ought to be; I may not be the man I can be; but praise God, I’m not the man I once was.”
3) Habit #3: “Always do the Right Thing.” Too many people have been victimized by the unethical behavior of those in leadership roles. Remember Enron? My co-workers and I at Portland General will never forget – we were owned by Enron at time of their bankruptcy and our retirement savings were decimated. Mark Twain said “Always do what is right. It will gratify half of mankind and astound the other.” My former pastor Loren Fischer said “it’s always right to do right” – and I agree.
4) Habit #4: “Be Results AND Relationship Oriented.” As leaders we are expected to get results – and we should. At the same time, building positive relationships is the right thing to do – and it leads to great results. One tool to help build relationships is to consistently practice the 3 Rs with people. Recognize people for who they are and what they do; Reward people for individual and team achievements; and show people Respect – everybody wants to be respected as the classic Aretha Franklin song emphasizes.
5) Habit #5: “Achieve Big Goals one small step at a time.” I remember a grade school friend telling me the following riddle: “Question: how do you eat an elephant? Answer: one bite at a time”. Get the point? We need to set long-term visions and big goals for ourselves and our teams. And we need to break down the journey towards the vision and goals into manageable steps that inspire others to move forward.
6) Habit #6: “See the glass as half-full.” Are you normally a pessimist or an optimist? Studies have shown that the most effective leaders are strong optimists. Being optimistic does not mean that we ignore the half of the glass that is empty. It does mean we are thankful for the half that is full, and we work together to fill the rest of the glass as best we can.
7) Habit #7: “Look for the win-win.” Effective managers don’t get locked into specific positions, but look for ways to meet interests of themselves and others so everybody gets something (a “win-win” versus a “win-lose”).
8) Habit #8: “Spend much time in Quadrant 2.” Stephen Covey popularized the importance of intentionally spending significant time doing “Important, Not Urgent” items. These include things like building relationships, reading and other learning activities, planning and thinking, exercise, etc. To spend more time in Quadrant 2, we need to spend less time in Quadrants 3 & 4 (i.e. “Urgent, Not Important” and “Not Urgent, Not Important”) activities like watching TV, playing video games and wasting time doing things that add no value to our lives or the lives of others.
9) Habit #9: “Enjoy the journey.” Management (and life!) is a journey – filled with both positive and negative experiences. The journey will be much more pleasant and we will go farther if we learn to laugh and be thankful. A Yiddish proverb says “what soap is to the body, laughter is to the soul.” Studies have shown that laughter makes us physically and emotionally healthier – and more fun to be around too. Find a funny friend; enjoy a funny TV show or movie – and just laugh! Being thankful is also important. The reality is that we all have much to be thankful for, and our lives will be more joyful and productive if we learn to develop an “attitude of gratitude.”
10) Habit #10: “Remember - your health is your wealth.” Gandhi said “It is health that is real wealth and not pieces of gold and silver.” Living a healthy lifestyle will increase your energy, stamina and emotional well-being – and help us be more effective in all that we do. A holistic healthy lifestyle includes developing and using our mental capabilities (read a good book lately or taken a class just for the learning?). We are also spiritual beings, and finding faith and serving others can nourish our spiritual health.
Let me leave you with a challenge to not settle for mediocrity, but to get in the game and go for management excellence. Listen to this President Teddy Roosevelt quote “It is not the critic who counts, nor the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doers of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly … who spends himself in a worthy cause.”
Wes can be contacted at Wes.Friesen@pgn.com.
Are you Fred?
By Wes Friesen, Portland General Electric
“There is only one boss – the customer. If we don’t take care of our customers, someone else will.”
Fred Shea was a postal carrier who really took to heart and embodied the following quote from Martin Luther King: “If a man is called to be a street sweeper (or work in A/P or A/R!), he should sweep streets even as Michelangelo painted or Beethoven composed music or Shakespeare wrote poetry. He should sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will pause to say, ‘Here lived a great sweeper who did his job well.’”
Fred provided exceptional service to all his customers, and constantly went the extra mile – he would even drive through the neighborhood to check on people on his days off! One of Fred’s very satisfied customers was motivational speaker and author Mark Sanborn, who wrote a book about exceptional customer service called “The Fred Factor.” I highly recommend getting the book and the video training series and going through it with your team.
Here are four cardinal principles about being a “Fred:”
1) Principle #1: Everyone Makes a Difference - every individual can choose to do his or her job in an extraordinary way, regardless of the circumstances.
2) Principle #2: Success is Built on Relationships - the quality of the relationship determines the quality of the product or service.
3) Principle #3: You Must Continually Create Value for Others, and It Doesn’t Have to Cost a Penny - you can creatively find no-cost ways to exceed expectations of your customers.
4) Principle #4: You Can Reinvent Yourself Regularly - every morning you wake up with a clean slate. We can choose to follow the advice of John Wooden’s father Joshua who taught “make each day your masterpiece.”
One tool to measure how well your team provides customer service, is to conduct a periodic customer survey. By analyzing the results of the survey you can reinforce what is going well, and identify areas that can be improved. Because people are busy these days, I prefer to keep the survey simple and short. Here is a sample survey that you can use as a starting place:
CUSTOMER SURVEY
Timeliness:
Are your jobs completed in a timely manner?
Below Expectations ____
Meets Expectations ____
Exceeds Expectations ____
Quality:
How is the overall quality of the work that our team provides for you? (same scale)
Responsiveness:
Is the staff responsive to your special requests? (same scale)
Helpfulness:
Do you find that our staff are helpful and offer solutions to your needs? (same scale)
Overall Performance: (same scale)
Are there services that you would like to see that are not currently provided?
What do you feel are some areas of strength in how we serve you?
What ideas do you have on how we can serve you better in the future?
Unfortunately Fred-like service is not common – as Roger Staubach says “there are no traffic jams along the extra mile.” Being a Fred is a choice – how will you and your team choose?
Let me close with a final quote to think about that comes from Andrew Carnegie: “There are two types of people who never achieve very much in their lifetimes. One is the person who won’t do what he is told to do, and the other is the person who does no more than what he or she is told to do.” Good luck as you commit you and your team to go the extra mile and be “Fred’s!”
Wes can be contacted at Wes.Friesen@pgn.com.
“There is only one boss – the customer. If we don’t take care of our customers, someone else will.”
Fred Shea was a postal carrier who really took to heart and embodied the following quote from Martin Luther King: “If a man is called to be a street sweeper (or work in A/P or A/R!), he should sweep streets even as Michelangelo painted or Beethoven composed music or Shakespeare wrote poetry. He should sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will pause to say, ‘Here lived a great sweeper who did his job well.’”
Fred provided exceptional service to all his customers, and constantly went the extra mile – he would even drive through the neighborhood to check on people on his days off! One of Fred’s very satisfied customers was motivational speaker and author Mark Sanborn, who wrote a book about exceptional customer service called “The Fred Factor.” I highly recommend getting the book and the video training series and going through it with your team.
Here are four cardinal principles about being a “Fred:”
1) Principle #1: Everyone Makes a Difference - every individual can choose to do his or her job in an extraordinary way, regardless of the circumstances.
2) Principle #2: Success is Built on Relationships - the quality of the relationship determines the quality of the product or service.
3) Principle #3: You Must Continually Create Value for Others, and It Doesn’t Have to Cost a Penny - you can creatively find no-cost ways to exceed expectations of your customers.
4) Principle #4: You Can Reinvent Yourself Regularly - every morning you wake up with a clean slate. We can choose to follow the advice of John Wooden’s father Joshua who taught “make each day your masterpiece.”
One tool to measure how well your team provides customer service, is to conduct a periodic customer survey. By analyzing the results of the survey you can reinforce what is going well, and identify areas that can be improved. Because people are busy these days, I prefer to keep the survey simple and short. Here is a sample survey that you can use as a starting place:
CUSTOMER SURVEY
Timeliness:
Are your jobs completed in a timely manner?
Below Expectations ____
Meets Expectations ____
Exceeds Expectations ____
Quality:
How is the overall quality of the work that our team provides for you? (same scale)
Responsiveness:
Is the staff responsive to your special requests? (same scale)
Helpfulness:
Do you find that our staff are helpful and offer solutions to your needs? (same scale)
Overall Performance: (same scale)
Are there services that you would like to see that are not currently provided?
What do you feel are some areas of strength in how we serve you?
What ideas do you have on how we can serve you better in the future?
Unfortunately Fred-like service is not common – as Roger Staubach says “there are no traffic jams along the extra mile.” Being a Fred is a choice – how will you and your team choose?
Let me close with a final quote to think about that comes from Andrew Carnegie: “There are two types of people who never achieve very much in their lifetimes. One is the person who won’t do what he is told to do, and the other is the person who does no more than what he or she is told to do.” Good luck as you commit you and your team to go the extra mile and be “Fred’s!”
Wes can be contacted at Wes.Friesen@pgn.com.
Want to Improve Performance? Measure It!
By Wes Friesen, Portland General Electric
“Improving performance does not happen by accident. It is the result of a commitment to excellence, intentionality and focused effort.”
Peter Drucker was the considered the Father of professional management. He said “Leadership is lifting a person’s vision to higher sights, the raising of a person’s performance to a higher standard, the building of a personality beyond its normal limitations.” Being in a management role provides us the opportunity to intentionally raise the performance levels of our teams – and the individuals that comprise them.
To improve the performance of our teams, we need relevant performance measures to inspire, provide a common focus and allow us to track progress. Here are some tools to help develop powerful performance measures:
Ask the Right Performance Questions
The Right Questions express the critical few things by which to judge our performance results. Put yourselves in the shoes of your key stakeholders (investors, customers, employees) and ask what is important to them?
Organizational Development expert Brad Fishel points out that when you answer the Right Performance Questions realize that some measures you develop in response will be Quantitative (numeric) in nature (e.g. how many pieces of mail were produced last month), but some will be Qualitative (subjective) in nature (e.g. how satisfied are our customers). Don’t ignore qualitative measures – consider the usage of surveys and other rating instruments. Fishel also says “Better to have subjective judgments about important questions than objective data about unimportant questions”.
Develop “balanced” measures to judge success
Effective teams add value to all important stakeholders and avoid a singular focus (e.g. being low cost) to the detriment of other important outcomes (e.g. high quality). Following are potential types of measures to consider. For each measure that gets used, we should have a target/goal to compare actual results against:
1) Productivity (productivity is simply a measure of Goods/Services produced divided by Resources Used)
2) Quality (e.g. reliability, accuracy, mistake free, meets requirements, etc)
3) Volume (how much is being produced)
4) Timeliness (are work products completed when needed)
5) Service (are customers satisfied with the service they receive)
6) Compliance (are postal regulations, Sarbanes-Oxley, HIPPA, and other regulations being met)
7) Cost (e.g. measure overall costs and/or cost per unit)
Intentionally focus on improving performance
How can we strive to improve productivity and overall performance? Following are some tools to choose from:
1) Lay out a challenge (illustrated by the closing story)
2) Enhanced Training & Development
3) Provide recognition and use incentives
4) Pursue wise use of technology
5) Look for process improvements
6) Be a better servant leader and show more care for your employees
7) Solicit ideas from your team members
8) Learn from other successful teams
Let me close with the following story from the life of Charles Schwab, former head of U.S. Steel. Schwab said:
I had a mill manager who was finely educated, thoroughly capable and master of every detail of the business. But he seemed unable to inspire his men to do their best.
One day I asked him: “How is it that a man as able as you, cannot make this mil turn out what it should?” “I don’t know” he replied. “I have coaxed the men; I have pushed them; I have sworn at them. I have done everything in my power. Yet they will not produce.”
It was near the end of the day; in a few minutes the night force would come on duty. I turned to a workman who was standing beside one of the red-mouthed furnaces and asked him for a piece of chalk. “How many heats has your shift made today?” I queried. “Six” he replied. I chalked a big “6” on the floor, and then passed along without another word.
When the night shift came in they saw the “6” and asked about it. “The big boss was in here today”, said the day men. “He asked us how many heats we had made, and we told him six. He chalked it down.”
The next morning I passed through the same mill. I saw that the “6” had been rubbed out and a big “7” written instead. The night shift had announced itself. That night I went back. The “7” had been erased, and a “10” swaggered in its place. The day force recognized no superiors. Thus a fine competition was started, and it went on until this mill, formerly the poorest producer, was turning out more than any other mill in the company.
Good luck as you partner with your team and intentionally pursue a higher level of performance!
Wes can be contacted at Wes.Friesen@pgn.com.
“Improving performance does not happen by accident. It is the result of a commitment to excellence, intentionality and focused effort.”
Peter Drucker was the considered the Father of professional management. He said “Leadership is lifting a person’s vision to higher sights, the raising of a person’s performance to a higher standard, the building of a personality beyond its normal limitations.” Being in a management role provides us the opportunity to intentionally raise the performance levels of our teams – and the individuals that comprise them.
To improve the performance of our teams, we need relevant performance measures to inspire, provide a common focus and allow us to track progress. Here are some tools to help develop powerful performance measures:
Ask the Right Performance Questions
The Right Questions express the critical few things by which to judge our performance results. Put yourselves in the shoes of your key stakeholders (investors, customers, employees) and ask what is important to them?
Organizational Development expert Brad Fishel points out that when you answer the Right Performance Questions realize that some measures you develop in response will be Quantitative (numeric) in nature (e.g. how many pieces of mail were produced last month), but some will be Qualitative (subjective) in nature (e.g. how satisfied are our customers). Don’t ignore qualitative measures – consider the usage of surveys and other rating instruments. Fishel also says “Better to have subjective judgments about important questions than objective data about unimportant questions”.
Develop “balanced” measures to judge success
Effective teams add value to all important stakeholders and avoid a singular focus (e.g. being low cost) to the detriment of other important outcomes (e.g. high quality). Following are potential types of measures to consider. For each measure that gets used, we should have a target/goal to compare actual results against:
1) Productivity (productivity is simply a measure of Goods/Services produced divided by Resources Used)
2) Quality (e.g. reliability, accuracy, mistake free, meets requirements, etc)
3) Volume (how much is being produced)
4) Timeliness (are work products completed when needed)
5) Service (are customers satisfied with the service they receive)
6) Compliance (are postal regulations, Sarbanes-Oxley, HIPPA, and other regulations being met)
7) Cost (e.g. measure overall costs and/or cost per unit)
Intentionally focus on improving performance
How can we strive to improve productivity and overall performance? Following are some tools to choose from:
1) Lay out a challenge (illustrated by the closing story)
2) Enhanced Training & Development
3) Provide recognition and use incentives
4) Pursue wise use of technology
5) Look for process improvements
6) Be a better servant leader and show more care for your employees
7) Solicit ideas from your team members
8) Learn from other successful teams
Let me close with the following story from the life of Charles Schwab, former head of U.S. Steel. Schwab said:
I had a mill manager who was finely educated, thoroughly capable and master of every detail of the business. But he seemed unable to inspire his men to do their best.
One day I asked him: “How is it that a man as able as you, cannot make this mil turn out what it should?” “I don’t know” he replied. “I have coaxed the men; I have pushed them; I have sworn at them. I have done everything in my power. Yet they will not produce.”
It was near the end of the day; in a few minutes the night force would come on duty. I turned to a workman who was standing beside one of the red-mouthed furnaces and asked him for a piece of chalk. “How many heats has your shift made today?” I queried. “Six” he replied. I chalked a big “6” on the floor, and then passed along without another word.
When the night shift came in they saw the “6” and asked about it. “The big boss was in here today”, said the day men. “He asked us how many heats we had made, and we told him six. He chalked it down.”
The next morning I passed through the same mill. I saw that the “6” had been rubbed out and a big “7” written instead. The night shift had announced itself. That night I went back. The “7” had been erased, and a “10” swaggered in its place. The day force recognized no superiors. Thus a fine competition was started, and it went on until this mill, formerly the poorest producer, was turning out more than any other mill in the company.
Good luck as you partner with your team and intentionally pursue a higher level of performance!
Wes can be contacted at Wes.Friesen@pgn.com.
Connecting with the "Overqualified" Job Candidate
Posted by Mark Brousseau
When a job opens up in today’s economy, it receives a lot of attention. And no wonder: Over 15 million Americans need work. And if you’re a hiring manager, you may have found that the best way to shrink that pile of résumés on your desk is to weed out the seemingly “overqualified” workers first. After all, you reason, those candidates will want too much money and will jump ship the minute they find a better offer. Right?
Not necessarily, says Maribeth Kuzmeski. In fact, she adds, a recent Harvard Business Review article suggests that when you ignore these candidates you’re missing out on the opportunity to add highly qualified talent to your organization.
“The article points out that ‘overqualified’ candidates tend to show a better work ethic, stay, on average, longer than less qualified candidates, and as long as they are empowered are actually happy workers,” says Kuzmeski, author of The Connectors: How the World’s Most Successful Businesspeople Build Relationships and Win Clients for Life and the new book …And the Clients Went Wild! How Savvy Professionals Win All the Business They Want.
To back up these assertions, the HBR article cites studies from folks at the University of Connecticut, the University of South Carolina, St. Ambrose University, and Portland State University, respectively, which show that overqualified workers are high performers, less likely to quit, and value autonomy.
“Saying someone is ‘overqualified’ is basically saying he or she is too skilled or too experienced,” says Kuzmeski. “The truth is, candidates with well-developed skills, a lot of working world experience, and the right attitude are exactly what you should want. When you ignore candidates based on your own assumptions or perceptions about what you see on their résumés, you run the risk of missing out on great employees.
“Instead, take the time to connect with these candidates,” she suggests. “Invite them in and learn what motivates them.”
Below Kuzmeski offers advice on how best to approach the highly qualified hire:
Be open and honest about your concerns. If you have concerns about certain elements of the candidate’s experience, ask about it. If you see that a candidate has an impressive list of achievements, acknowledge them.
“Don’t chuck someone in your ‘no’ pile simply because you might be a little intimidated by his achievements,” stresses Kuzmeski. “Ask the candidate how he plans to use the skills that led him to his past achievements in the position you’re offering, but don’t focus too much on the past. Instead, find out about his current motivations and the goals he has for the position.”
Connect with the candidate’s why. Your worries about a highly qualified candidate can be decreased when you connect with her why. Most candidates are not applying for jobs they seem more than qualified for because they are simply desperate for work—but many hiring managers never find this out because they discard these candidates’ résumés rather than invite them to come for an interview.
“By connecting with the candidate’s why, you can learn her motivations for wanting a position,” notes Kuzmeski. “Even if a person was downsized, maybe she was burned out on what she was doing and wants to jump-start a new career. Or she may want to give up a higher level position in order to get back to something she enjoyed doing earlier in her career. You’ll be able to tell when she is explaining her reasoning and her motivations whether or not she truly has a passion for the job in question or whether she is simply willing to take the first job that is offered to her.”
Recognize that highly qualified people require less training. If a job candidate has been around the block a few times, his adaptability to new situations and responsibilities will be better. That’s good news, because you and your managers will spend less of your own valuable time training him.
“Plus, once you have him on board, it’s likely that you’ll find he is a great help to your other employees,” says Kuzmeski. “Highly qualified candidates bring with them more life experience to pull from when challenging situations arise with clients or other coworkers. You will probably also find that you have added peace of mind knowing that someone who is highly skilled and experienced is hard at work for you.”
Hire based on attitude. This might be the best piece of advice to heed with any hiring decision. As long as a candidate has the basic skills and knowledge required to get the job done, don’t spend time wringing your hands over whether or not she might be too qualified. If the person has a great attitude and is highly motivated, then you might want to give her a chance, especially if the other candidates are less qualified and don’t seem like they will fit in with the company culture.
“Hiring is a tricky business,” notes Kuzmeski. “Sometimes it’s okay to go with the person you like the most. If that person also happens to be highly qualified, then it will only benefit you and your company in the long run.”
Once you have them, empower them. As touched on above, the study from Portland State University found that overqualified employees who are given decision making power tend to be more satisfied with their jobs. The study performed by assistant professors from the University of Connecticut, the University of South Carolina, and St. Ambrose University examined data on more than 5,000 Americans. Those examined, according to the Harvard Business Review article, were high-intelligence workers in jobs such as washing cars and collecting garbage. With those studied, high performance was the norm.
“By giving these employees autonomy, you show them that you have confidence in their abilities and respect the skills and qualifications they bring to the table,” says Kuzmeski. “As a result, they stay with the company and often outperform their fellow employees.”
"The best thing you can do is ignore the myths about ‘overqualified’ job seekers,” says Kuzmeski. “Think about it: These people became highly qualified for a reason—for the most part, they make fantastic employees. You want to hire the right person for the job, not the person you assume, sight unseen, is less likely to leave. By taking the time to connect with candidates and discuss their motivations and goals, you’ll be able to make that judgment for yourself.”
What do you think?
When a job opens up in today’s economy, it receives a lot of attention. And no wonder: Over 15 million Americans need work. And if you’re a hiring manager, you may have found that the best way to shrink that pile of résumés on your desk is to weed out the seemingly “overqualified” workers first. After all, you reason, those candidates will want too much money and will jump ship the minute they find a better offer. Right?
Not necessarily, says Maribeth Kuzmeski. In fact, she adds, a recent Harvard Business Review article suggests that when you ignore these candidates you’re missing out on the opportunity to add highly qualified talent to your organization.
“The article points out that ‘overqualified’ candidates tend to show a better work ethic, stay, on average, longer than less qualified candidates, and as long as they are empowered are actually happy workers,” says Kuzmeski, author of The Connectors: How the World’s Most Successful Businesspeople Build Relationships and Win Clients for Life and the new book …And the Clients Went Wild! How Savvy Professionals Win All the Business They Want.
To back up these assertions, the HBR article cites studies from folks at the University of Connecticut, the University of South Carolina, St. Ambrose University, and Portland State University, respectively, which show that overqualified workers are high performers, less likely to quit, and value autonomy.
“Saying someone is ‘overqualified’ is basically saying he or she is too skilled or too experienced,” says Kuzmeski. “The truth is, candidates with well-developed skills, a lot of working world experience, and the right attitude are exactly what you should want. When you ignore candidates based on your own assumptions or perceptions about what you see on their résumés, you run the risk of missing out on great employees.
“Instead, take the time to connect with these candidates,” she suggests. “Invite them in and learn what motivates them.”
Below Kuzmeski offers advice on how best to approach the highly qualified hire:
Be open and honest about your concerns. If you have concerns about certain elements of the candidate’s experience, ask about it. If you see that a candidate has an impressive list of achievements, acknowledge them.
“Don’t chuck someone in your ‘no’ pile simply because you might be a little intimidated by his achievements,” stresses Kuzmeski. “Ask the candidate how he plans to use the skills that led him to his past achievements in the position you’re offering, but don’t focus too much on the past. Instead, find out about his current motivations and the goals he has for the position.”
Connect with the candidate’s why. Your worries about a highly qualified candidate can be decreased when you connect with her why. Most candidates are not applying for jobs they seem more than qualified for because they are simply desperate for work—but many hiring managers never find this out because they discard these candidates’ résumés rather than invite them to come for an interview.
“By connecting with the candidate’s why, you can learn her motivations for wanting a position,” notes Kuzmeski. “Even if a person was downsized, maybe she was burned out on what she was doing and wants to jump-start a new career. Or she may want to give up a higher level position in order to get back to something she enjoyed doing earlier in her career. You’ll be able to tell when she is explaining her reasoning and her motivations whether or not she truly has a passion for the job in question or whether she is simply willing to take the first job that is offered to her.”
Recognize that highly qualified people require less training. If a job candidate has been around the block a few times, his adaptability to new situations and responsibilities will be better. That’s good news, because you and your managers will spend less of your own valuable time training him.
“Plus, once you have him on board, it’s likely that you’ll find he is a great help to your other employees,” says Kuzmeski. “Highly qualified candidates bring with them more life experience to pull from when challenging situations arise with clients or other coworkers. You will probably also find that you have added peace of mind knowing that someone who is highly skilled and experienced is hard at work for you.”
Hire based on attitude. This might be the best piece of advice to heed with any hiring decision. As long as a candidate has the basic skills and knowledge required to get the job done, don’t spend time wringing your hands over whether or not she might be too qualified. If the person has a great attitude and is highly motivated, then you might want to give her a chance, especially if the other candidates are less qualified and don’t seem like they will fit in with the company culture.
“Hiring is a tricky business,” notes Kuzmeski. “Sometimes it’s okay to go with the person you like the most. If that person also happens to be highly qualified, then it will only benefit you and your company in the long run.”
Once you have them, empower them. As touched on above, the study from Portland State University found that overqualified employees who are given decision making power tend to be more satisfied with their jobs. The study performed by assistant professors from the University of Connecticut, the University of South Carolina, and St. Ambrose University examined data on more than 5,000 Americans. Those examined, according to the Harvard Business Review article, were high-intelligence workers in jobs such as washing cars and collecting garbage. With those studied, high performance was the norm.
“By giving these employees autonomy, you show them that you have confidence in their abilities and respect the skills and qualifications they bring to the table,” says Kuzmeski. “As a result, they stay with the company and often outperform their fellow employees.”
"The best thing you can do is ignore the myths about ‘overqualified’ job seekers,” says Kuzmeski. “Think about it: These people became highly qualified for a reason—for the most part, they make fantastic employees. You want to hire the right person for the job, not the person you assume, sight unseen, is less likely to leave. By taking the time to connect with candidates and discuss their motivations and goals, you’ll be able to make that judgment for yourself.”
What do you think?
Thursday, December 30, 2010
Why It's a Great Time to Look for a Job
Posted by Mark Brousseau
You've been on the job hunt for months—maybe even all year—and you're looking forward to the coming respite from search-related stress and disappointment. The holidays are here, after all. And it's "common knowledge" that nothing happens on the hiring front from Thanksgiving to New Year's. You might as well give the pavement pounding a rest and focus on decking the halls for a while...right?
Wong. In fact, says Kate Wendleton, now is exactly the time to hit your job search the hardest.
"Although most job seekers don't realize it, conditions are ideal for them this time of year," confirms Wendleton, president of The Five O'Clock Club (www.fiveoclockclub.com), a career coaching and outplacement network. "While they won't 'officially' tell you, many organizations are planning to hire in January. That means now is the perfect time to put yourself on their radar."
Wendleton knows all about helping people navigate the complicated job market, regardless of the season. Hers is the only career program in which members meet with professional coaches and peers on a weekly basis in a friendly, club-type format. It offers small group career coaching across the U.S. and Canada. And its website—www.fiveoclockclub.com—provides hundreds of free articles and audio recordings on job searching and career development.
"It may come as a big surprise, but looking for a job this time of year actually increases your chances of getting hired," Wendleton promises. "You have less competition, and many companies are in a hiring mood. It's the perfect storm—in a good way—for job seekers."
Read on for the case as to why you should keep on keepin' on...and some suggestions from The Five O'Clock Club for how you can maximize your momentum amidst the merriment:
Why you shouldn't wait 'til January:
'Tis the season for your competition to take a breather. Nearly everyone believes the "no one gets hired during the holidays" myth, so the majority of your competition is taking a break while you're still filling out applications. The fact is, it's much easier to out-class and out-perform the competition when there's next to none of it!
"It's amazing how many people retire from the job-hunt battle this time of year and leave the field wide open," Wendleton says. "At no other time will it be easier for you to really distinguish yourself from the pack. For one thing, hiring managers will have fewer résumés to distract them; plus, they'll be impressed by your drive and persistence, because most of your peers are taking it easy."
Managers are planning their post-Auld Lang Syne moves now. Here's a valuable tip for job hunters: January is often one of the biggest hiring months of the year. However, no organization will say that it plans to hire in January—right now, all you'll hear is that there are no openings at present (which is technically true). And guess what? Those upcoming positions won't go to folks who kicked back by the fire with a cup of eggnog—they'll be offered to the people who expressed interest and met with hiring managers in December.
"Right now, organizations are doing their budgeting for 2011," Wendleton explains. "For example, one company The Five O'Clock Club spoke with said they will not do any more hiring this year because they want to keep the numbers looking good, but they will fill those positions ASAP in the New Year, and they might even consider making offers now. Who is going to get those jobs? The folks who throw their hats into the ring during the holidays!"
The business world isn't pressing pause just because the halls are decked. The fact that the annual alcohol-laced karaoke party has been scheduled doesn't mean that business as usual stops. Think about it: The stock market is trading. Stores are still open. Deals are still being negotiated. And—shocker!—hiring managers are still reading résumés that land on their desks. (If anything, the seasonal good cheer will put them in a better mood when they do.)
"No hiring manager in his or her right mind would ever say, 'Okay, it's December, so I can't look at any résumés or communicate with any prospective applicants until January,'" Wendleton points out. "Certainly, this time of year comes with a special set of distractions, but underneath the trimmings, it's business as usual. If there's hiring to be done, it will be done."
Your momentum won't sustain itself through the merriment. Unless your job hunt started last week, you've built up some amount of momentum. You've made contacts. You've gotten your foot in some doors. You've started to prove how wonderful you are. Don't let all of that effort go to waste by slacking off now! If you do, it'll take you weeks to make up the lost ground.
"I can categorically say that the slackening of momentum is one of the greatest job-hunt saboteurs we see in The Five O'Clock Club," Wendleton shares. "When people fail to have lots of things in the works, they concentrate on the one great job that they really want—and they're devastated when they come in second or the company puts a freeze on hiring. Then, it takes them two or three weeks to dig out of the depression...and who knows how many great opportunities have slipped by in the meantime?"
What you can do to improve your job search:
The Five O'Clock Club says that there are three stages to a job search: 1) being in touch with six to ten people in your target market on an ongoing basis, 2) getting those people to actively express interest in having someone like you on board, and 3) inspiring them to discuss real jobs with you. The following strategies will help you get to Stage Two (which means you're approaching the right people and positioning yourself correctly)—and once you're there, Five O'Clockers promise, Stage Three will take care of itself.
Reconnect with the year's contacts. You've sent out cards and good wishes to friends and family...so why not extend that tradition to all of the job-search contacts you've made throughout the year? Send a card or email thanking each person for his or her help, wishing them a Happy New Year and include an update on your situation. You never know when the right memory might be sparked!
"Reconnecting with the year's contacts in a friendly, well-wishing way will remind them of who you are, what you do, and what you're trying to accomplish," Wendleton explains. "One of your main goals should be to stay on the radar of as many people in your network as possible. It takes hard work and discipline, yes, but as was the case recently for one Five O'Clock Club member, a friendly email can prompt a contact to forward your résumé to someone else, which might lead to an interview...and a job."
Expand, define, and redefine your targets. You may have a short—or long—list of companies on which you're focusing, but that list isn't definitive by a long shot. The last thing you want is a skimpy or sloppy group of targets that lacks breadth and depth. Plus, you never know when you might discover a new company you never knew about that's an ideal fit.
"You can expand your list of targets by revisiting what your skills and strengths are (maybe there's something you've overlooked!), brainstorming with friends, and doing more internet research," suggests Wendleton. "Many people are amazed to discover, after months of job hunting, an organization that isn't rich or famous but is nevertheless a great place to work."
Focus on avenues you've neglected. Everyone has a preferred method of getting meetings, whether it's through ads, search firms, networking, or direct contacts. During the next few weeks, focus on the avenues you normally skimp on. You'll probably identify new hiring trends, new contacts, and new positions. And (as we've established) now's the ideal time to get your name out there.
"Many people neglect networking and direct contacts, because they're the most labor-intensive," Wendleton shares. "If you fall into that category, challenge yourself to launch a targeted mail campaign this holiday season. Imagine what the impact might be if you send out ten intelligent cover letters per week, and then make follow-up phone calls a few days later. At the very least, you'll be a familiar name to a bevy of hiring managers."
Don't withdraw from your support network. Five O'Clock Club members attend a weekly meeting in order to receive support, advice, and help in their job searches. If you belong to such a group, don't use the holidays as an excuse to skip meetings. One of your primary goals should always be to make sure your search is moving forward.
"Accountability and outside input are crucial in helping you stay on track, and they also ensure that your job search doesn't lose originality and momentum," Wendleton says. "If you don't have a support network and are worried that you'll slack off despite your best intentions, ask a friend or family member to serve as a sounding board and check in on your progress."
Accept those party invitations! You might be tempted to become a hermit because you don't want to field questions about "what you're doing right now" or "how your job search is going." To some extent, that's understandable, especially if your situation hasn't changed in a long time—but avoidance is the wrong attitude to have. This is a party time of year, so get out there and network! Tell people you're looking for your next situation, and be sure to tell them the kind of job you're looking for.
"Take advantage of as many opportunities to meet new people as possible, and be ready to share your 30-second pitch on what you're looking for," advises Wendleton. "And if it's appropriate, ask for a more formal meeting at a new contact's office in the near future. Also, remember that those who are in a direct position to hire aren't your only allies. If you favorably impress a project manager, for example, she might mention you to her boss...and bingo—you've got an interview."
"Remember, keep adding to your job-search to-do list...and check it twice," concludes Wendleton. "There's absolutely no reason why you can't start out the New Year with one resolution already crossed off your list—a job you're excited to accept."
What do you think?
You've been on the job hunt for months—maybe even all year—and you're looking forward to the coming respite from search-related stress and disappointment. The holidays are here, after all. And it's "common knowledge" that nothing happens on the hiring front from Thanksgiving to New Year's. You might as well give the pavement pounding a rest and focus on decking the halls for a while...right?
Wong. In fact, says Kate Wendleton, now is exactly the time to hit your job search the hardest.
"Although most job seekers don't realize it, conditions are ideal for them this time of year," confirms Wendleton, president of The Five O'Clock Club (www.fiveoclockclub.com), a career coaching and outplacement network. "While they won't 'officially' tell you, many organizations are planning to hire in January. That means now is the perfect time to put yourself on their radar."
Wendleton knows all about helping people navigate the complicated job market, regardless of the season. Hers is the only career program in which members meet with professional coaches and peers on a weekly basis in a friendly, club-type format. It offers small group career coaching across the U.S. and Canada. And its website—www.fiveoclockclub.com—provides hundreds of free articles and audio recordings on job searching and career development.
"It may come as a big surprise, but looking for a job this time of year actually increases your chances of getting hired," Wendleton promises. "You have less competition, and many companies are in a hiring mood. It's the perfect storm—in a good way—for job seekers."
Read on for the case as to why you should keep on keepin' on...and some suggestions from The Five O'Clock Club for how you can maximize your momentum amidst the merriment:
Why you shouldn't wait 'til January:
'Tis the season for your competition to take a breather. Nearly everyone believes the "no one gets hired during the holidays" myth, so the majority of your competition is taking a break while you're still filling out applications. The fact is, it's much easier to out-class and out-perform the competition when there's next to none of it!
"It's amazing how many people retire from the job-hunt battle this time of year and leave the field wide open," Wendleton says. "At no other time will it be easier for you to really distinguish yourself from the pack. For one thing, hiring managers will have fewer résumés to distract them; plus, they'll be impressed by your drive and persistence, because most of your peers are taking it easy."
Managers are planning their post-Auld Lang Syne moves now. Here's a valuable tip for job hunters: January is often one of the biggest hiring months of the year. However, no organization will say that it plans to hire in January—right now, all you'll hear is that there are no openings at present (which is technically true). And guess what? Those upcoming positions won't go to folks who kicked back by the fire with a cup of eggnog—they'll be offered to the people who expressed interest and met with hiring managers in December.
"Right now, organizations are doing their budgeting for 2011," Wendleton explains. "For example, one company The Five O'Clock Club spoke with said they will not do any more hiring this year because they want to keep the numbers looking good, but they will fill those positions ASAP in the New Year, and they might even consider making offers now. Who is going to get those jobs? The folks who throw their hats into the ring during the holidays!"
The business world isn't pressing pause just because the halls are decked. The fact that the annual alcohol-laced karaoke party has been scheduled doesn't mean that business as usual stops. Think about it: The stock market is trading. Stores are still open. Deals are still being negotiated. And—shocker!—hiring managers are still reading résumés that land on their desks. (If anything, the seasonal good cheer will put them in a better mood when they do.)
"No hiring manager in his or her right mind would ever say, 'Okay, it's December, so I can't look at any résumés or communicate with any prospective applicants until January,'" Wendleton points out. "Certainly, this time of year comes with a special set of distractions, but underneath the trimmings, it's business as usual. If there's hiring to be done, it will be done."
Your momentum won't sustain itself through the merriment. Unless your job hunt started last week, you've built up some amount of momentum. You've made contacts. You've gotten your foot in some doors. You've started to prove how wonderful you are. Don't let all of that effort go to waste by slacking off now! If you do, it'll take you weeks to make up the lost ground.
"I can categorically say that the slackening of momentum is one of the greatest job-hunt saboteurs we see in The Five O'Clock Club," Wendleton shares. "When people fail to have lots of things in the works, they concentrate on the one great job that they really want—and they're devastated when they come in second or the company puts a freeze on hiring. Then, it takes them two or three weeks to dig out of the depression...and who knows how many great opportunities have slipped by in the meantime?"
What you can do to improve your job search:
The Five O'Clock Club says that there are three stages to a job search: 1) being in touch with six to ten people in your target market on an ongoing basis, 2) getting those people to actively express interest in having someone like you on board, and 3) inspiring them to discuss real jobs with you. The following strategies will help you get to Stage Two (which means you're approaching the right people and positioning yourself correctly)—and once you're there, Five O'Clockers promise, Stage Three will take care of itself.
Reconnect with the year's contacts. You've sent out cards and good wishes to friends and family...so why not extend that tradition to all of the job-search contacts you've made throughout the year? Send a card or email thanking each person for his or her help, wishing them a Happy New Year and include an update on your situation. You never know when the right memory might be sparked!
"Reconnecting with the year's contacts in a friendly, well-wishing way will remind them of who you are, what you do, and what you're trying to accomplish," Wendleton explains. "One of your main goals should be to stay on the radar of as many people in your network as possible. It takes hard work and discipline, yes, but as was the case recently for one Five O'Clock Club member, a friendly email can prompt a contact to forward your résumé to someone else, which might lead to an interview...and a job."
Expand, define, and redefine your targets. You may have a short—or long—list of companies on which you're focusing, but that list isn't definitive by a long shot. The last thing you want is a skimpy or sloppy group of targets that lacks breadth and depth. Plus, you never know when you might discover a new company you never knew about that's an ideal fit.
"You can expand your list of targets by revisiting what your skills and strengths are (maybe there's something you've overlooked!), brainstorming with friends, and doing more internet research," suggests Wendleton. "Many people are amazed to discover, after months of job hunting, an organization that isn't rich or famous but is nevertheless a great place to work."
Focus on avenues you've neglected. Everyone has a preferred method of getting meetings, whether it's through ads, search firms, networking, or direct contacts. During the next few weeks, focus on the avenues you normally skimp on. You'll probably identify new hiring trends, new contacts, and new positions. And (as we've established) now's the ideal time to get your name out there.
"Many people neglect networking and direct contacts, because they're the most labor-intensive," Wendleton shares. "If you fall into that category, challenge yourself to launch a targeted mail campaign this holiday season. Imagine what the impact might be if you send out ten intelligent cover letters per week, and then make follow-up phone calls a few days later. At the very least, you'll be a familiar name to a bevy of hiring managers."
Don't withdraw from your support network. Five O'Clock Club members attend a weekly meeting in order to receive support, advice, and help in their job searches. If you belong to such a group, don't use the holidays as an excuse to skip meetings. One of your primary goals should always be to make sure your search is moving forward.
"Accountability and outside input are crucial in helping you stay on track, and they also ensure that your job search doesn't lose originality and momentum," Wendleton says. "If you don't have a support network and are worried that you'll slack off despite your best intentions, ask a friend or family member to serve as a sounding board and check in on your progress."
Accept those party invitations! You might be tempted to become a hermit because you don't want to field questions about "what you're doing right now" or "how your job search is going." To some extent, that's understandable, especially if your situation hasn't changed in a long time—but avoidance is the wrong attitude to have. This is a party time of year, so get out there and network! Tell people you're looking for your next situation, and be sure to tell them the kind of job you're looking for.
"Take advantage of as many opportunities to meet new people as possible, and be ready to share your 30-second pitch on what you're looking for," advises Wendleton. "And if it's appropriate, ask for a more formal meeting at a new contact's office in the near future. Also, remember that those who are in a direct position to hire aren't your only allies. If you favorably impress a project manager, for example, she might mention you to her boss...and bingo—you've got an interview."
"Remember, keep adding to your job-search to-do list...and check it twice," concludes Wendleton. "There's absolutely no reason why you can't start out the New Year with one resolution already crossed off your list—a job you're excited to accept."
What do you think?
Tuesday, December 21, 2010
Top 5 Germiest Places in the Workplace
By Peter Sheldon, Coverall Health-Based Cleaning System
According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, American adults spend more of their waking hours between Monday and Friday at the workplace than anywhere else—including home. About one-third of all workers also devote five hours, on average, at the workplace on weekends as well. So it stands to reason that offices, factories, clinics and other work facilities have become places to exchange not only goods and services, but also viruses, bacteria and other sources of infection.
The Centers for Disease Control estimates that between 5 and 20 percent of all Americans contract flu annually. Up to 80 percent of all infections are spread through our environment by hand contact with contaminated surfaces, as well as through direct human contact. Adults put their hands to their faces an average of 18.5 times per hour, presenting hundreds of opportunities each day to transfer illness causing organisms into our bodies. Once an infection takes hold, the next step is usually the doctor’s office followed by the sick bed—providing thousands to millions of dollars in lost productivity due to employee absenteeism. In fact, according to a National Health Interview Survey, influenza alone is responsible for 200 million days of diminished productivity and 75 million days of work absence.
Fortunately, knowing what surfaces provide the greatest risk for disease transmission at work allows us to put a proactive plan in place to implement effective cleaning practices, which can help reduce these risks and minimize infections. Ultimately, employees must be educated on what precautions to take to help avoid the top germiest places in their workplace:
1. Telephones. In many workplaces, telephones are still used by multiple employees. Office phones can harbor more than 25,000 germs per square inch. Users should be instructed to wipe off handsets and keypads with sanitizing wipes after using them and periodically throughout the day.
2. Elevator buttons. Scores, if not hundreds, of people use elevators every day, many times before they have a chance to get to their workstations or wash their hands. Avoid direct contact with elevator surfaces if you can. Consider using your elbow rather than your hand to push the buttons. (Want to guess the number one place in the elevator for harboring bacteria germs? Ironically it’s the “one”, or first-floor, button.)
3. Water fountains. Public drinking fountains can harbor as many as 2.7 million bacteria per square inch on the spigot. As an alternative, bring water from home in a sports bottle or buy bottled water during the worst flu outbreaks.
4. Keyboards. As with telephones, PC keyboards are often used by more than one person, making their use a common way to transfer germs. In fact, keyboards can actually have more than 200 times as many bacteria as a toilet seat.
5. Bathrooms. Tagged as the “epicenter of cross-contamination” and the “bio-hazardous waste transfer station,” facility bathrooms are one of the germiest places of all. E. coli and other fecal toxins are often found on nearly every surface; folks who wash their hands before leaving are nonetheless presented with germy door handles. As a solution, use paper towels—to turn faucets off and on, to close the toilet lid before flushing, and to open the door before exiting.
To effectively clean to kill and remove germs and soil, consider a shift to a nightly health-focused, hygienic cleaning system. Health-focused, hygienic cleaning is proven to reduce health risks through the prudent use of hospital-grade disinfectants to kill harmful organisms and include advanced soil removal techniques to capture and remove dirt and germs. Studies have shown that by employing an effective surface disinfecting and cleaning protocol, absenteeism can be reduced by as much as 50 percent. Combining this method of cleaning with an aggressive hand hygiene program provides a hygienic barrier to help reduce the risk of illness and improve the quality of work life for all building occupants.
The inclusion of EPA-registered, hospital-grade disinfectants in your cleaning compounds help reduce the overall risk of illness by killing harmful organisms on surfaces in your facility. Their prudent use, especially in the germiest areas mentioned above, is a critical component to an effective daily, hygienic cleaning system. Not only should disinfectants be used during nightly cleaning, but employees should be provided with disinfectant disposable wipes to periodically wipe down high-touch points throughout the day.
The introduction of backpack vacuums with HEPA (High Efficiency Particulate Air) filtration is another component of hygienic cleaning that can also help reduce airborne germs and improve overall indoor air quality. The backpack platform provides an increase in productivity of 70 percent when compared to traditional push vacuums, and the HEPA filters the air to .3 microns, ensuring harmful germs are not blown out of the exhaust back into the air.
Another key component to an effective hygienic cleaning system is the use of microfiber textiles in cleaning cloths, instead of cotton or other fabrics or disposable paper. Most cloths and rags don’t effectively remove soil and germs; they actually spread them around and contribute to cross-contamination. Microfiber, by contrast, is a very fine, round synthetic fiber that is chemically treated to split the individual round strands into open, star-shaped channels. These channels have been proven to be 99% more effective at capturing and removing bacteria and soils.
When using microfiber cloths, it’s essential that workers turn and change cloths often to ensure that their germ and soil removal capabilities are not reduced. Also, cloths should be color coded; each color should be devoted to a single, designated area of the workplace to prevent cross-contamination.
Finally, in addition to effective, hygienic cleaning, empower employees with the proper information and tools to protect themselves. Use flyers, emails and meetings to remind employees about the need to help minimize germ transmission through effective hand hygiene. Stress effective hand washing and the use of alcohol-based hand sanitizers, and keep sanitizing stations visible and well stocked. By combining effective hygienic cleaning and worker hand care education, you will reduce health risks and improve your chances of weathering the cold and flu season with a minimal loss of manpower.
According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, American adults spend more of their waking hours between Monday and Friday at the workplace than anywhere else—including home. About one-third of all workers also devote five hours, on average, at the workplace on weekends as well. So it stands to reason that offices, factories, clinics and other work facilities have become places to exchange not only goods and services, but also viruses, bacteria and other sources of infection.
The Centers for Disease Control estimates that between 5 and 20 percent of all Americans contract flu annually. Up to 80 percent of all infections are spread through our environment by hand contact with contaminated surfaces, as well as through direct human contact. Adults put their hands to their faces an average of 18.5 times per hour, presenting hundreds of opportunities each day to transfer illness causing organisms into our bodies. Once an infection takes hold, the next step is usually the doctor’s office followed by the sick bed—providing thousands to millions of dollars in lost productivity due to employee absenteeism. In fact, according to a National Health Interview Survey, influenza alone is responsible for 200 million days of diminished productivity and 75 million days of work absence.
Fortunately, knowing what surfaces provide the greatest risk for disease transmission at work allows us to put a proactive plan in place to implement effective cleaning practices, which can help reduce these risks and minimize infections. Ultimately, employees must be educated on what precautions to take to help avoid the top germiest places in their workplace:
1. Telephones. In many workplaces, telephones are still used by multiple employees. Office phones can harbor more than 25,000 germs per square inch. Users should be instructed to wipe off handsets and keypads with sanitizing wipes after using them and periodically throughout the day.
2. Elevator buttons. Scores, if not hundreds, of people use elevators every day, many times before they have a chance to get to their workstations or wash their hands. Avoid direct contact with elevator surfaces if you can. Consider using your elbow rather than your hand to push the buttons. (Want to guess the number one place in the elevator for harboring bacteria germs? Ironically it’s the “one”, or first-floor, button.)
3. Water fountains. Public drinking fountains can harbor as many as 2.7 million bacteria per square inch on the spigot. As an alternative, bring water from home in a sports bottle or buy bottled water during the worst flu outbreaks.
4. Keyboards. As with telephones, PC keyboards are often used by more than one person, making their use a common way to transfer germs. In fact, keyboards can actually have more than 200 times as many bacteria as a toilet seat.
5. Bathrooms. Tagged as the “epicenter of cross-contamination” and the “bio-hazardous waste transfer station,” facility bathrooms are one of the germiest places of all. E. coli and other fecal toxins are often found on nearly every surface; folks who wash their hands before leaving are nonetheless presented with germy door handles. As a solution, use paper towels—to turn faucets off and on, to close the toilet lid before flushing, and to open the door before exiting.
To effectively clean to kill and remove germs and soil, consider a shift to a nightly health-focused, hygienic cleaning system. Health-focused, hygienic cleaning is proven to reduce health risks through the prudent use of hospital-grade disinfectants to kill harmful organisms and include advanced soil removal techniques to capture and remove dirt and germs. Studies have shown that by employing an effective surface disinfecting and cleaning protocol, absenteeism can be reduced by as much as 50 percent. Combining this method of cleaning with an aggressive hand hygiene program provides a hygienic barrier to help reduce the risk of illness and improve the quality of work life for all building occupants.
The inclusion of EPA-registered, hospital-grade disinfectants in your cleaning compounds help reduce the overall risk of illness by killing harmful organisms on surfaces in your facility. Their prudent use, especially in the germiest areas mentioned above, is a critical component to an effective daily, hygienic cleaning system. Not only should disinfectants be used during nightly cleaning, but employees should be provided with disinfectant disposable wipes to periodically wipe down high-touch points throughout the day.
The introduction of backpack vacuums with HEPA (High Efficiency Particulate Air) filtration is another component of hygienic cleaning that can also help reduce airborne germs and improve overall indoor air quality. The backpack platform provides an increase in productivity of 70 percent when compared to traditional push vacuums, and the HEPA filters the air to .3 microns, ensuring harmful germs are not blown out of the exhaust back into the air.
Another key component to an effective hygienic cleaning system is the use of microfiber textiles in cleaning cloths, instead of cotton or other fabrics or disposable paper. Most cloths and rags don’t effectively remove soil and germs; they actually spread them around and contribute to cross-contamination. Microfiber, by contrast, is a very fine, round synthetic fiber that is chemically treated to split the individual round strands into open, star-shaped channels. These channels have been proven to be 99% more effective at capturing and removing bacteria and soils.
When using microfiber cloths, it’s essential that workers turn and change cloths often to ensure that their germ and soil removal capabilities are not reduced. Also, cloths should be color coded; each color should be devoted to a single, designated area of the workplace to prevent cross-contamination.
Finally, in addition to effective, hygienic cleaning, empower employees with the proper information and tools to protect themselves. Use flyers, emails and meetings to remind employees about the need to help minimize germ transmission through effective hand hygiene. Stress effective hand washing and the use of alcohol-based hand sanitizers, and keep sanitizing stations visible and well stocked. By combining effective hygienic cleaning and worker hand care education, you will reduce health risks and improve your chances of weathering the cold and flu season with a minimal loss of manpower.
Monday, December 13, 2010
Heading Off "Vacation Guilt"
Posted by Mark Brousseau
Fearing your holiday vacation will be tainted with tiny tantrums from a needy boss?
"Fear is a big driver, and when bosses - and kids- don't have control, such as with matters of a vacation from work, a 'terrible office tyrant' or 'TOT' can emerge," says Lynn Taylor. "The inner child should, but doesn't 'stay there'," says the author of "Tame Your Terrible Office Tyrant."
Taylor, a nationally recognized workplace expert, explains that despite this relatively quiet time of year, many bosses can become needy, like toddlers who have trouble modulating their authority. "Senior management can't afford to take chances in this economic environment, and want to ensure there's a tether to…you."
In Taylor's book, she offers tips on "separation anxiety" in offices that appear to be more of a schoolyard running amok than a professional company. "A needy boss wants constant assurance that you will take care of all needs and deadlines, holiday or not. Some 'TOTs' at the helm may be taking shorter vacations themselves, particularly at smaller companies, which can exacerbate the sense that you're abandoning ship," she adds.
If your boss suffers from holiday separation anxiety, Taylor suggests these tips:
•Remain unapologetic when requesting or taking the allotted time off. Everyone needs a break.
•Reassure the boss that a little break now will translate into a happier, more productive new year.
•Make solid plans in writing for who covers what while you're on vacation. Provide a "to-do list" for your boss, which will reassure and suggest that your "TOT" can go skiing without thinking about you.
•Speaking of which, set clear limits; you don't want to be skiing after getting the 'big freeze' from the boss.
"Neediness may seem benign at first," says Taylor, "but it can quickly cascade into one of 19 other bad boss behaviors."
Do you have a needy boss? If so, how do you manage them?
Fearing your holiday vacation will be tainted with tiny tantrums from a needy boss?
"Fear is a big driver, and when bosses - and kids- don't have control, such as with matters of a vacation from work, a 'terrible office tyrant' or 'TOT' can emerge," says Lynn Taylor. "The inner child should, but doesn't 'stay there'," says the author of "Tame Your Terrible Office Tyrant."
Taylor, a nationally recognized workplace expert, explains that despite this relatively quiet time of year, many bosses can become needy, like toddlers who have trouble modulating their authority. "Senior management can't afford to take chances in this economic environment, and want to ensure there's a tether to…you."
In Taylor's book, she offers tips on "separation anxiety" in offices that appear to be more of a schoolyard running amok than a professional company. "A needy boss wants constant assurance that you will take care of all needs and deadlines, holiday or not. Some 'TOTs' at the helm may be taking shorter vacations themselves, particularly at smaller companies, which can exacerbate the sense that you're abandoning ship," she adds.
If your boss suffers from holiday separation anxiety, Taylor suggests these tips:
•Remain unapologetic when requesting or taking the allotted time off. Everyone needs a break.
•Reassure the boss that a little break now will translate into a happier, more productive new year.
•Make solid plans in writing for who covers what while you're on vacation. Provide a "to-do list" for your boss, which will reassure and suggest that your "TOT" can go skiing without thinking about you.
•Speaking of which, set clear limits; you don't want to be skiing after getting the 'big freeze' from the boss.
"Neediness may seem benign at first," says Taylor, "but it can quickly cascade into one of 19 other bad boss behaviors."
Do you have a needy boss? If so, how do you manage them?
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
World of work is changing fast
Posted by Mark Brousseau
The world of today is dramatically different from 20 years ago and with the lines between work and non-work already badly frayed, Gartner predicts that the nature of work will witness 10 key changes through 2020. Organizations will need to plan for increasingly chaotic environments that are out of their direct control, and adaptation must involve adjusting to all 10 of the trends.
“Work will become less routine, characterized by increased volatility, hyperconnectedness, 'swarming' and more,” said Tom Austin, vice president and Gartner fellow. By 2015, 40 percent or more of an organization’s work will be ‘non-routine’, up from 25 percent in 2010. “People will swarm more often and work solo less. They’ll work with others with whom they have few links, and teams will include people outside the control of the organization,” he added. “In addition, simulation, visualisation and unification technologies, working across yottabytes of data per second, will demand an emphasis on new perceptual skills.”
Organizations will need to determine which of the 10 key changes in the nature of work will affect them, and consider whether radically different technology governance models will be required.
1. De-routinization of Work
The core value that people add is not in the processes that can be automated, but in non-routine processes, uniquely human, analytical or interactive contributions that result in words such as discovery, innovation, teaming, leading, selling and learning. Non-routine skills are those we cannot automate. For example, we cannot automate the process of selling a life insurance policy to a skeptical buyer, but we can use automation tools to augment the selling process.
2. Work Swarms
Swarming is a work style characterized by a flurry of collective activity by anyone and everyone conceivably available and able to add value. Gartner identifies two phenomena within the collective activity; Teaming (instead of solo performances) will be valued and rewarded more and occur more frequently and a new form of teaming, which Gartner calls swarming, to distinguish it from more historical teaming models, is emerging. Teams have historically consisted of people who have worked together before and who know each other reasonably well, often working in the same organization and for the same manager. Swarms form quickly, attacking a problem or opportunity and then quickly dissipating. Swarming is an agile response to an observed increase in ad hoc action requirements, as ad hoc activities continue to displace structured, bureaucratic situations.
3. Weak Links
In swarms, if individuals know each other at all, it may be just barely, via weak links. Weak links are the cues people can pick up from people who know the people they have to work with. They are indirect indicators and rely, in part, on the confidence others have in their knowledge of people. Navigating one's own personal, professional and social networks helps people develop and exploit both strong and weak links and that, in turn, will be crucial to surviving and exploiting swarms for business benefit.
4. Working With the Collective
There are informal groups of people, outside the direct control of the organization, who can impact the success or failure of the organization. These informal groups are bound together by a common interest, a fad or a historical accident, as described by Gartner as “the collective.” Smart business executives discern how to live in a business ecosystem they cannot control; one they can only influence. The influence process requires understanding the collectives that potentially influence their organization, as well as the key people in those external groups. Gathering market intelligence via the collective is crucial. Equally important is figuring out how to use the collective to define segments, markets, products and various business strategies.
5. Work Sketch-Ups
Most non-routine processes will also be highly informal. It is very important that organizations try to capture the criteria used in making decisions but, at least for now, Gartner does not expect most non-routine processes to follow meaningful standard patterns. Over time, we believe that work patterns for more non-routine work will emerge, justifying a light-handed approach to collecting activity information, but it will take years before a real return on investment for this effort is visible. In the meantime, the process models for most non-routine processes will remain simple "sketch-ups," created on the fly.
6. Spontaneous Work
This property is also implied in Gartner’s description of work swarms. Spontaneity implies more than reactive activity, for example, to the emergence of new patterns. It also contains proactive work such as seeking out new opportunities and creating new designs and models.
7. Simulation and Experimentation
Active engagement with simulated environments (virtual environments), which are similar to technologies depicted in the film Minority Report, will come to replace drilling into cells in spreadsheets. This suggests the use of n-dimensional virtual representations of all different sorts of data. The contents of the simulated environment will be assembled by agent technologies that determine what materials go together based on watching people work with this content. People will interact with the data and actively manipulate various parameters reshaping the world they’re looking at.
8. Pattern Sensitivity
Gartner has published a major line of research on Pattern-Based Strategy. The business world is becoming more volatile, affording people working off of linear models based on past performance far less visibility into the future than ever before. Gartner expects to see a significant growth in the number of organizations that create groups specifically charged with detecting divergent emerging patterns, evaluating those patterns, developing various scenarios for how the disruption might play out and proposing to senior executives new ways of exploiting (or protecting the organization from) the changes to which they are now more sensitive.
9. Hyperconnected
Hyperconnectedness is a property of most organizations, existing within networks of networks, unable to completely control any of them. While key supply chain elements, for example, may be "under contract," there is no guarantee it will perform properly, not even if the supply chain is in-house. Hyperconnectedness will lead to a push for more work to occur in both formal and informal relationships across enterprise boundaries, and that has implications for how people work and how IT supports or augments that work.
10. My Place
The workplace is becoming more and more virtual, with meetings occurring across time zones and organizations and with participants who barely know each other, working on swarms attacking rapidly emerging problems. But the employee will still have a "place" where they work. Many will have neither a company-provided physical office nor a desk, and their work will increasingly happen 24 hours a day, seven days a week. In this work environment, the lines between personal, professional, social and family matters, along with organization subjects, will disappear. Individuals, of course, need to manage the complexity created by overlapping demands, whether from the new world of work or from external (non-work-related) phenomena. Those that cannot manage the underlying "expectation and interrupt overloads" will suffer performance deficits as these overloads force individuals to operate in an over-stimulated (information-overload) state.
The world of today is dramatically different from 20 years ago and with the lines between work and non-work already badly frayed, Gartner predicts that the nature of work will witness 10 key changes through 2020. Organizations will need to plan for increasingly chaotic environments that are out of their direct control, and adaptation must involve adjusting to all 10 of the trends.
“Work will become less routine, characterized by increased volatility, hyperconnectedness, 'swarming' and more,” said Tom Austin, vice president and Gartner fellow. By 2015, 40 percent or more of an organization’s work will be ‘non-routine’, up from 25 percent in 2010. “People will swarm more often and work solo less. They’ll work with others with whom they have few links, and teams will include people outside the control of the organization,” he added. “In addition, simulation, visualisation and unification technologies, working across yottabytes of data per second, will demand an emphasis on new perceptual skills.”
Organizations will need to determine which of the 10 key changes in the nature of work will affect them, and consider whether radically different technology governance models will be required.
1. De-routinization of Work
The core value that people add is not in the processes that can be automated, but in non-routine processes, uniquely human, analytical or interactive contributions that result in words such as discovery, innovation, teaming, leading, selling and learning. Non-routine skills are those we cannot automate. For example, we cannot automate the process of selling a life insurance policy to a skeptical buyer, but we can use automation tools to augment the selling process.
2. Work Swarms
Swarming is a work style characterized by a flurry of collective activity by anyone and everyone conceivably available and able to add value. Gartner identifies two phenomena within the collective activity; Teaming (instead of solo performances) will be valued and rewarded more and occur more frequently and a new form of teaming, which Gartner calls swarming, to distinguish it from more historical teaming models, is emerging. Teams have historically consisted of people who have worked together before and who know each other reasonably well, often working in the same organization and for the same manager. Swarms form quickly, attacking a problem or opportunity and then quickly dissipating. Swarming is an agile response to an observed increase in ad hoc action requirements, as ad hoc activities continue to displace structured, bureaucratic situations.
3. Weak Links
In swarms, if individuals know each other at all, it may be just barely, via weak links. Weak links are the cues people can pick up from people who know the people they have to work with. They are indirect indicators and rely, in part, on the confidence others have in their knowledge of people. Navigating one's own personal, professional and social networks helps people develop and exploit both strong and weak links and that, in turn, will be crucial to surviving and exploiting swarms for business benefit.
4. Working With the Collective
There are informal groups of people, outside the direct control of the organization, who can impact the success or failure of the organization. These informal groups are bound together by a common interest, a fad or a historical accident, as described by Gartner as “the collective.” Smart business executives discern how to live in a business ecosystem they cannot control; one they can only influence. The influence process requires understanding the collectives that potentially influence their organization, as well as the key people in those external groups. Gathering market intelligence via the collective is crucial. Equally important is figuring out how to use the collective to define segments, markets, products and various business strategies.
5. Work Sketch-Ups
Most non-routine processes will also be highly informal. It is very important that organizations try to capture the criteria used in making decisions but, at least for now, Gartner does not expect most non-routine processes to follow meaningful standard patterns. Over time, we believe that work patterns for more non-routine work will emerge, justifying a light-handed approach to collecting activity information, but it will take years before a real return on investment for this effort is visible. In the meantime, the process models for most non-routine processes will remain simple "sketch-ups," created on the fly.
6. Spontaneous Work
This property is also implied in Gartner’s description of work swarms. Spontaneity implies more than reactive activity, for example, to the emergence of new patterns. It also contains proactive work such as seeking out new opportunities and creating new designs and models.
7. Simulation and Experimentation
Active engagement with simulated environments (virtual environments), which are similar to technologies depicted in the film Minority Report, will come to replace drilling into cells in spreadsheets. This suggests the use of n-dimensional virtual representations of all different sorts of data. The contents of the simulated environment will be assembled by agent technologies that determine what materials go together based on watching people work with this content. People will interact with the data and actively manipulate various parameters reshaping the world they’re looking at.
8. Pattern Sensitivity
Gartner has published a major line of research on Pattern-Based Strategy. The business world is becoming more volatile, affording people working off of linear models based on past performance far less visibility into the future than ever before. Gartner expects to see a significant growth in the number of organizations that create groups specifically charged with detecting divergent emerging patterns, evaluating those patterns, developing various scenarios for how the disruption might play out and proposing to senior executives new ways of exploiting (or protecting the organization from) the changes to which they are now more sensitive.
9. Hyperconnected
Hyperconnectedness is a property of most organizations, existing within networks of networks, unable to completely control any of them. While key supply chain elements, for example, may be "under contract," there is no guarantee it will perform properly, not even if the supply chain is in-house. Hyperconnectedness will lead to a push for more work to occur in both formal and informal relationships across enterprise boundaries, and that has implications for how people work and how IT supports or augments that work.
10. My Place
The workplace is becoming more and more virtual, with meetings occurring across time zones and organizations and with participants who barely know each other, working on swarms attacking rapidly emerging problems. But the employee will still have a "place" where they work. Many will have neither a company-provided physical office nor a desk, and their work will increasingly happen 24 hours a day, seven days a week. In this work environment, the lines between personal, professional, social and family matters, along with organization subjects, will disappear. Individuals, of course, need to manage the complexity created by overlapping demands, whether from the new world of work or from external (non-work-related) phenomena. Those that cannot manage the underlying "expectation and interrupt overloads" will suffer performance deficits as these overloads force individuals to operate in an over-stimulated (information-overload) state.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
