Well after slamming the article in the GMJ about a tribal knowledge article a few weeks back I felt compelled to go back and read some more. I found an article on managing. I have to say I loved it. It started out with a rather biting satire of how senior managers just do not get what good management is about. That caught my attention as I recalled all the suits that parrot the right words, some even vaguely understanding what they are saying few connecting words to actions though.

“People are our greatest asset”

Many managers I have interacted with really do not understand this simple phrase. Oh sure they can recite it even do so with apparent conviction. Heck they may even believe that a middle of the road pay scale constitutes recognizing this asset base. I do not.

People need a decent paycheck yes. They even would like a larger one most of the time. However if you try to connect a paycheck to motivation directly it will rarely work. Motivation comes from the inside. It comes from an alignment of personal values and purpose with the same in the organization. When a person and the organization are aligned, that is power; that is a setting where motivation can really explode.

How can we as leaders or managers create an environment where motivation is possible?

We can understand the culture of our own organization. Discover the norms and assumptions that define your company. Learn about the stories that are told. Magnify the positive aspects of these within your sphere of influence. Become the storyteller.

We can seek to identify the sacred cows and have a barbeque with them. They have to go if they inhibit us or our team’s growth and success. Find the barriers and the frustrations that cause your team to under perform. Take a step further identify the policies and procedures that do the same. Work with other organizational leaders and see about changing the policies that inhibit your team.

Change the culture to one including appreciation. Find ways to recognize excellence. Find ways to encourage the right behavior and redirect the wrong ones. Give feedback often both affirming and corrective. As possible bias feedback toward the positive.

As a final thought study the work of Gallup on employee engagement. Gallup is well known for their research on engagement and how it is created. Their Q12 question set is a fundamental tool for any beginning manager. I believe you should not be promoted into a leadership or management role without having read and assimilated the lessons contained in First Break All the Rules.

Lead well

One of the most difficult things to do as a leader is to ensure that your whole team is moving in the same direction at the same pace at the same time. This is not much of an issue when the team is small and if you are leading just yourself the point is moot. Moving in the other direction into larger groups and enterprises the challenge grows exponentially. This is why leadership development is such a critical need in organizational life. The only way to effectively magnify your influence and hence ensure organizational alignment is to grow other leaders who can share the burden of direction setting and shepparding toward organizational goals and objectives.

Communicate

There are other things that can be done to create greater alignment however. Arguably the most important action a leader can take to ensure alignment is to communicate. I was listening to one of my favorite podcasts today www.manager-tools.com. In this weeks episode Mike and Mark the hosts of manager tools discussed communication. They stated a super critical truth that lies at the heart of all leadership communication. Communication is not the words spoken by the leader; rather it is the understanding of the listener. So speak to be understood not to hear yourself speak not to achieve an action item of fulfill an obligation.

We have talked about listening skills before here at develop a leader.com both in the seven points of leadership effectiveness and in various posts. If you have not yet gotten the seven points you can join the mailing list or buy our new soon to be released e-book which will feature an expanded analysis of the seven points.

Just remember that with communication understanding on the part of the listener is the key. To facilitate this, take a lesson from Martin Luther King who in his I have a dream speech repeated the same vision at least five different ways to make his point come to life in his audiences mind.

Environment

Another action a leader can take to create alignment is through organizational culture and environment. By creating a trust based culture where teams feel comfortable challenging the direction of the organization then willingly fall in line once the decision is made, alignment is strengthened. Not that it is easy to create a trust based culture nor is it easy to ensure people fall in line at the appropriate time. Both are absolutely achievable however and relate to two points made in our seven point series. Trust in part comes from integrity and the ability to stay true to values and commitments. The other is effective decision styles both personally for the leader and organizationally. When people know how the decision will be made and have the opportunity to participate in the decision direction they are far more likely to support the eventual decision.

So keep your commitments and nurture trust. Take the risk of sharing decision making responsibility and grow your team

There are other things that can be done to achieve alignment as well. We will cover them in another post. In the mean time

Lead well

Ron

Is it possible for a nine letter word to mimic a four letter word?

When it comes to this word I believe so. The life of a leader is often filled with meetings. This is not a bad thing provided they have purpose, they have actions, they have outcomes. The thought of a meeting where you accomplish little and talk much makes me cringe. This is my perception of “committees”, they have meetings. They accomplish little other than talk a lot about what needs to happen.

So I checked the definition of what a committee is and was surprised to find that the word actually has a noble purpose…

A group of people officially delegated to perform a function, such as investigating, considering, reporting, or acting on a matter.

Acting, great word! Not very many committees I have been a part of get around to this part of the definition, but there sure is a whole lot of the considering part.

Here is a better definition in the form of a quote by Milton Berle

“a committee is a group that keeps minutes and loses hours”

No thank you I won’t be attending that committee meeting.

Do not get me wrong there is a time to discuss, a time to investigate, a time to learn and a time to negotiate. However there is another important word that leaders need to get, that is consensus.

Tell me the truth do you think that this word means that everyone has the same opinion and the decision is unanimous? Did you?

Here is what I found online:

An opinion or position reached by a group as a whole

The way I read it a group agrees that a decision be taken and that they will support the decision. They may not completely agree this is the best decision, merely that they agreed to support the group decision

Why is this important? As a leader we need to be able to get to a decision even when not everyone is going to agree. We need to be able to listen to others perspectives and balance this need against the ability to move quickly.

I call this balancing consideration with execution. Both are critical and often oppose each other in the life of a leader.

We are going to talk about this theme often in the coming months both here on Developing Leaders and on my blog site www.materialleadership.blogspot.com

I am really looking forward to this and hope you are as well

Lead well

Ron