Are You Creating Disgruntled Employees?

Joseph Folkman | 6:00 AM July 23, 2012 blogs.hbr.org

You can't make every worker happy, surely, and should a business even try? Evidence from our recent research suggests, actually, that the answer is yes. Or rather, our evidence shows that managers are giving up far too soon on their disgruntled employees, making them less productive than they could be, exposing their companies to unnecessary risks from thefts and leaks in the process, and inflating turnover costs.
What causes employees to become disgruntled and what can be done to prevent it? To find out we zeroed in on the most unhappy people in our data. These were 6% in our database of 160,576 employees who displayed the lowest levels of job satisfaction and commitment on their 360 evaluations of their bosses. We were looking for those among them whose managers also oversaw the most satisfied employees. In this way we identified that group of leaders who were managing both the very unhappy and the very happy at the same time.
The results of the data were clear: There is most definitely such a thing as "the boss's favorites." And while, in any disagreement we inevitably find both parties bear part of the fault — that is, the disgruntled employees do certainly play some role in their own unhappiness — we consistently found in the analysis that their complaints were justified. Their managers were in fact treating the disgruntled employee differently than they treated their very satisfied employees. What's more, when the managers in question started to treat their disgruntled employees like everyone else, the employees' behavior quickly improved.
Our results suggest a clear path forward for bringing disgruntled employees back into the fold. In particular, the unhappy group in our survey strongly agreed on six major areas in which they felt (and we agree) that their leaders needed to improve:

• Encourage me more. When we asked the unhappy 6% to name the skill they thought was most important for their boss to demonstrate, the top response was "Inspire and motivate others." Too often, managers take a negative tone with disgruntled employees. Expecting that efforts to motivate will be ignored, none are proffered, and the expectations become self-fulfilling. But our data suggest managers should take the opposite view: Work harder to inspire this group. Keep the conversation positive. Expect the best, not the worst.
• Trust me more. It's probably not surprising that both parties — unhappy employee and boss alike — distrust each other. The key to restoring trust is to operate with the belief that the other party can change. Here we'd suggest the manager make the first move by making the effort to understand the employee's problems. Then, as both parties work on their relationship, they must strive for consistency —that is, the manager must strive to treat all employees equitably, and both parties must strive to reliably do what they say they will do. Over time, trust will grow.
• Take an interest in my development. If a person works hard and gets a pay check he has a job. But if a person works hard, gets a pay check, and learns a new skill, she has a career. Career development should not be focused only on the high-potentials. As counterintuitive as it may seem, don't leave the underachievers out when distributing stretch assignments.
• Keep me in the loop. Communication is fundamentally a management function, so this responsibility rests squarely with the managers. Great communicators do three things well. First, they share information and keep everyone well informed. Second, they ask good questions, inviting the opinions and views from others — all others. Third, they listen. And not just to the people they like.
• Be more honest with me. People want to know how they're really doing on the job — and the one's not in favor perhaps even more than the one's feeling the warm glow of approval. They want to know why they're falling short. They want a chance to improve. Too often, though, the bottom 6% felt their bosses were not giving honest feedback, glossing over problems with comments like "You're coming along fine," when clearly they were not. What's more, many reported promises being made ("if you finish this project on time then...") that were not kept. Honesty is the bedrock of good relationships.
• Connect with me more. Anything managers can to do improve their relationship with the disgruntled employees will have a significant positive influence. Here's where favoritism takes on its most concrete form: managers go to lunch more with people they like, our data show; they talk with them more socially (about children, sports, etc); they know them more personally. This is natural, surely, but so are the feelings of exclusion it creates among the less favored. A small effort by managers to spread their attention around more broadly can go a long way here.

As leaders, our knee-jerk reaction to unfavored (and disgruntled) employees is often — "It's their own fault!" Our research shows this is not always (and often not wholly) the case. Before you settle for letting your dissatisfied people go and cost your organization thousands of dollars in employee turnover, take a moment to consider how these performers need to be treated.
If not for their sake, then for everyone else's sake. Research by the University of British Columbia recently published in the Journal of Human Resources has shown that those who witness workplace bullying become equally disgruntled as the victims and just as likely to quit. All employees need leaders who know how to inspire and motivate them, give them opportunities for development, and treat them with the respect and dignity they each deserve.
A third of a person's life is spent in the workplace, sometimes more. When the environment is created by an extraordinary leader who cares about everyone's development, it leaves employees with little room to complain.

5 accountability pitfalls that kill companies

Steve Tobak 7/23/2012 www.cbsnews.com

President Obama's "If you've got a business, you didn't build that" speech hasn't just created a firestorm of political debate. It's got a lot of business people shaking their heads, as well. And that includes me.

While I understand what the president was trying to get at, the fundamental problem with his logic is that it flies in the face of one of the most important management concepts: accountability. When people are held accountable -- to themselves and their stakeholders -- things get done. Good things.

Actually, the speech does a pretty good job of explaining how accountability works, if you just reverse the cause and effect. You see, when people take risks and hold themselves accountable for the outcome, as our founding fathers did, that's what built "this unbelievable American system," to use the president's words.
Granted, that system does now exist, but only through the continuous replication of the concept of personal initiative and accountability. It's not the other way around. The founding fathers were entrepreneurs and innovators in every sense of the way we think of those words today. Had they not been, we wouldn't have this great system.

President Obama was certainly right about one thing. There are a lot of smart and hardworking people out there. And one of the best ways I know of to differentiate and ensure successful outcomes in business is to create solid accountability mechanisms.

Here are the top five "accountability" pitfalls that business leaders and executives typically fall into, in my experience. Some of them don't even appear to be accountability-related on the surface, which is why they're so insidious. If you want a high-performance management team, make sure you avoid them:
Unclear responsibility. This is probably the most common pitfall. Show me an organization and I'll show you managers with misaligned goals and vague responsibility. Two people shouldn't have the same functional responsibility or own the same goal. If you do that, you're asking for things to fall in the crack. That doesn't preclude "matrix" management; the trick is to ensure goals and responsibilities are properly aligned. It can be done.

No follow up. This is practically an epidemic in organizations. Executives are great at coming up with goals, strategies, even metrics. Unfortunately, they're also notoriously bad at following up. I don't care how driven and entrepreneurial executives are; without follow up, nothing good happens. Companies must have a relatively objective and, sorry to say this, strict process for both setting and scoring management performance metrics.

Compensation plans that reward poor performance. Closely related to the "no follow up" problem, most companies have terrible executive compensation plans. Maybe 1 in 10 actually rewards the right behavior and has enough teeth to foster accountability. The problem? The bar for making gobs of money is set too low, and there's not enough difference between success and failure, plain and simple.

Management behavior. When it comes to management behavior, most executives and boards just look the other way. That lack of accountability plays a key role in business failures because dysfunctional leadership results in bad strategic decision-making and poor employee performance and execution. Granted, coming up with metrics for this sort of thing is challenging, but I think "360s" are pretty effective.

Flawed corporate strategy. This is rarely seen as an accountability problem, but it is. When company executives push a flawed strategy, two things inevitably happen. First, smart people in the organization call them on it -- publicly or privately -- word gets around, and management credibility suffers, big-time. Second, folks will start covering their behinds, pointing fingers, acting passive aggressively -- all sorts of dysfunctional behavior that wreaks havoc with organizational performance.

Not surprisingly, I find that executive management teams at consistently successful companies make accountability a priority and, therefore, avoid these pitfalls. It take a real commitment of precious management time and resources. But not only is the payoff worth it, it's a necessity in our hypercompetitive business world.

The truth about liars

Here's a riddle: What are the three times in life it is acceptable to lie? When you are an actor in a play, when you are bluffing in poker and when you are giving objections to a sales person.

Overcoming objections is especially difficult because prospects think it is perfectly okay to play it fast and loose with the truth. Let's look at the liars, half-truth-tellers, "concealers," and the delusional hopeful, whose greatest sin is that they lie to themselves first and then repeat it to us.
I don't have science behind me and I am not a poker expert that can read tells. I do, however, tend to think there are some indicators when the conversation is not completely truthful and those hints are worth watching for.

Over claims. Promises are too big for the person's position in the company or role in the project. Beware the overzealous prospect. They make claims that they can approve the deal because they are afraid you'll move past them and leave them out of the discussions.
Wait-and-see. When someone is delaying the timeline in a buying process he or she defined, it's not a great indicator of honesty. I have found that in these circumstances the person is often checking pricing with the incumbent vendor or negotiating with my biggest competitor while keeping me on the hook.
Too-good-to-be-true. "Price is not a major factor in this decision." "We're not considering any other providers." "We're going to bypass the normal testing phases and put this into full production." I've heard all of these and later in the process not one of them turned out to be true. Was the person lying? Let's say no. But I think she had convinced herself of something that in the end she should have known was not going to be true.
If, then. As in, "...if you just lower your price 11 percent, then we will make the decision right away..." only to find out this was a gambit in a list of demands. This liar is seductive because he preys upon our sense of urgency, and causes us to act as his agent in negotiations within our own firm. The "if, then" liars proceed to blame other forces within their firm, for further delays and heretofore unmentioned requirements, as a means to repeat the "if then" game to win even more concessions.

When I see these types of red-flags, I push. I think a mixture of self-confidence, raw curiosity, and authenticity can get you closer to truth, regardless if the person will tell you the truth or not. The biggest push is raw curiosity -- ask the questions that are uncomfortable. It always surprises me how often we don't ask the questions we know we should because we are afraid of the answer. As if by not asking the question, the answer doesn't exist.

Some of those tough questions can include:

• Why are you considering making a change at this time?
• What is the exact threshold of performance improvement that has to be achieved for us to win this business?
• Who has the greatest amount to lose in your company if you agree to do business with us?

Since you are delaying the decision for 30 days, what specifically will change during that period to enable you to make a better decision in 30 days?

If you made the decision today and went with our firm, what is the biggest thing that could go wrong? Who would be the first to point it out?

This is not the climatic scene of this week's episode of "Law and Order" ("ripped from today's headlines!"), but rather a hunt for information that will help you overcome the real objections. And that's the truth.

Gaining commitment

Tom Searcy July 5th, 2012 www.cbsnews.com

Prospects have a hard time with the C word: Commitment. Sure they have signed on the dotted line. But fear, uncertainty and doubt enter the picture. One of the biggest fears prospects usually have is a quite simple question: "How do we get started?"

They're now poised at the end of a cliff and a deep chasm. They can see the other side and implementation of your solution. But between now and then is a huge chasm they cannot cross in their imagination. This, of course, makes them very afraid.

Building a bridge for them will eliminate that gigantic fear and show them your competence, your ability to anticipate and strategize, and your willingness to share a little of the load of transition.

What the prospects want to know is, "What happens between now and then?" And you have to be prepared to answer completely and with confidence.

"Trust us. It'll be done," won't eliminate any fear.

Let's look at how we develop your transition map.

- Start with the question: What will we do today or tomorrow to move this forward? And you take it from there.

- Name and define clearly each step you will take between now and full implementation. Think of everything. Nothing is too trivial to be included: Actions to be taken, people to be involved from both companies, training that will be needed, person(s) from your company responsible for each step, timelines for each step, and individuals to contact in case the prospect has questions.

- Set a regular communication schedule with the prospects to keep them fully informed.

- Establish milestones with key performance indicators where you and the prospects can discuss how everything is going. Define your results threshold for rollout upfront. At each step, what results do you need and what results do your prospects need to make, so that you can move seamlessly through the steps?

- Establish the 30 percent completion point, the 50 percent completion point, and so on.

- Establish an ROI schedule.

This transition map is essential when you're hunting a big deal. Since this is such a large deal and since prospects are fearful, sometimes they will say, "Let's try a little and see how that works." Don't fall into that trap.

I was with a company recently in the far Northwest. They would sell an initial implementation -- fairly complex engineering sales -- and they'd sell almost any volume they could get.

The volume that would allow them to work out the kinks, really engineer the product, and work through the implementation was 10,000 units. But the salespeople were allowed to go out and sell 5,000 units.

Well, you want to know what the first 5,000 units look like? A mess.

During the first 5,000 they're just getting their supply chain management right. They're working through the orientation of parts in the inline manufacturing process. The first 5,000 units is where all the hard, bumpy work gets done. And if the prospects really wanted to know what the future would look like working with that company, the best vantage point would result from viewing it during the implementation of the second 5,000 units.

If you let yourself get caught in the "try it and see how it goes" trap, you won't have made the big sale you want to make, and your prospects will be disappointed with the results. Chances are you'll lose the deal entirely.

Selling 5,000 when you know the only way for prospects to really understand your value proposition is at 10,000 will not get you your big sale. If the prospect isn't interested in buying your entire deal, you need to find other prospects that will. Don't sell yourself short and settle for anything less than commitment.

A cure for toxic salesperson syndrome

 Tom Searcy July 18, 2012 www.cbsnews.com

Does your company have a salesperson that is too valuable to let go but too painful to keep?  Toxic sales people are easy to spot in the workplace. Co-workers call them tyrants, jerks, and worse. Most are emotional bullies who treat employees coldly, even cruelly. They are quick to assign blame and even quicker to hog credit for themselves.

But what is the impact of such bosses on company performance? Heavy, according to researchers who polled several thousand managers and employees from a diverse range of U.S. companies. Here's how employees respond to toxic co-workers:

• 80 percent lost work time worrying about the offending employees' rudeness
• 78 percent said their commitment to the organization declined
• 66 percent said their performance declined
• 63 percent lost time avoiding the offender
• 48 percent decreased their work effort

Add to that the legal penalties levied against companies in connection with workplace bullying or the hidden cost of long-term disability if a bully makes his or her targets psychologically incapable of working again. And if word gets around that a company tolerates this sort behavior, the employer may have trouble hiring or retaining good employees.

Despite their adverse impact, toxic managers can be rehabilitated, says workplace psychologist Dr. Bruce Heller, author of the book "The Prodigal Executive." That is good news for any company with the kind of salespeople you can't live with -- and without.

"Toxic sales people can be saved because these are individuals who are extremely successful," Heller says. "Many of these executives could be compared to an elite athlete. They are highly skilled, talented, and energetic. They have passion for what they do and love the companies they're working for. They feel a sense pride in their work, have an insatiable curiosity, and want to learn more."

Unfortunately, many of them have never had coaching or leadership development. They were put into a sales leadership role because they were good at selling and often are eager for a mentor. As a result, many are ripe to learn some of these skills.

Heller has repeatedly found that toxic salespeople can change their personality, even if they have been that way for a long time. "Personality is malleable if there is a reward for doing so," he says, citing the example of one president of a Fortune 500 subsidiary named Peter. "His level of intuition and ability to analyze problems were superb. He was also one of the best negotiators I have ever seen. Peter picked up subtle nuances and would instantaneously have the perfect retort ready."

But the executive never listened to staffers. He felt that because he was the smartest person in the room, listening to others was a waste of time because he already knew what was best. Not surprisingly, there was a mass exodus of top talent from the company.

"I coached Peter to listen using small steps," Heller says. "First, I just had him practice not talking for awhile while his subordinates spoke. Next we had him practice nodding while others spoke. Then, while going through the motions, something amazing happened. He actually heard what they were saying. 'I sure learned a lot more listening than when I was talking.' "
Remember the old joke about how many psychologists it takes to change a light bulb? Only one, but the lightbulb has to want to change.

How To Reverse Your Hard Wiring For Distraction

BY Expert Blogger Olivia Fox Cabane | 04-11-2012 www.fastcompany.com

If you want to be charismatic, your mind can't wander while you're one-on-one with a customer or colleague.

Here's a simple one-minute exercise to help you focus.     

Charismatic behavior can be broken down into three core elements: presence, power, and warmth.

These elements depend both on our conscious behaviors and on factors we don’t consciously control. People pick up on messages we often don’t even realize we’re sending through small changes in our body language.

In order to be charismatic, we need to choose mental states that make our body language, words, and behaviors flow together and express the three core elements of charisma. And presence is the foundation for everything else.

Have you ever felt, in the middle of a conversation, as if only half of your mind were present while the other half was busy doing something else? Do you think the other person noticed? If you’re not fully present in an interaction, there’s a good chance that your eyes will glaze over or that your facial reactions will be a split-second delayed. Since the mind can read facial expressions in as little as 17 milliseconds, the person you’re speaking with will likely notice even the tiniest delays in your reactions.

We may think that we can fake presence. We may think that we can fake listening. But we’re wrong. When we’re not fully present in an interaction, people will see it. Our body language sends a clear message that other people read and react to, at least on a subconscious level.

Not only can the lack of presence be visible, it can also be perceived as inauthentic, which has even worse consequences. When you’re perceived as disingenuous, it’s virtually impossible to generate trust, rapport, or loyalty. And it’s impossible to be charismatic.

Luckily, presence is a learnable skill that can be improved with practice and patience. Being present means simply having a moment-to-moment awareness of what’s happening. It means paying attention to what’s going on rather than being caught up in your own thoughts.

Now that you know the cost of lacking presence, try this exercise to test yourself and learn three simple techniques to boost your charisma in personal interactions.

First, find a reasonably quiet place where you can close your eyes (whether standing or sitting).
Set a timer for one minute. Close your eyes and focus on one of the following three things: the sounds around you, your breathing, or the sensations in your toes.

1. Scan your environment for sound. As a meditation teacher told me, “Imagine that your ears are satellite dishes, passively and objectively registering sounds.”
2. Focus on your breath and the sensations it creates in your nostrils or stomach. Pay attention to one breath at a time, but try to notice everything about this one breath. Imagine that your breath is someone you want to give your full attention to.
3. Focus your attention on the sensations in your toes. This forces your mind to sweep through your body, helping you to get into the physical sensations of the moment.

Did you find your mind constantly wandering even though you were trying your best to be present? As you’ve noticed, staying fully present isn’t always easy. There are two main reasons for this.

First, our brains are wired to pay attention to novel stimuli, whether they be sights, smells, or sounds. We’re wired to be distracted, to have our attention grabbed by any new stimulus: it could be important! It could eat us! This tendency was key to our ancestors’ survival. Imagine two tribesmen hunting through the plains, searching the horizon for signs of the antelope that could feed their family. Something flickers in the distance. The tribesman whose attention wasn’t immediately caught? He’s not our ancestor.

The second reason is that our society encourages distraction. The constant influx of stimulation we receive worsens our natural tendencies. This can eventually lead us into a state of continuous partial attention, in which we never give our full attention to any single thing. We’re always partially distracted.

So if you often find it hard to be fully present, don’t beat yourself up. Presence is hard for almost all of us. A study coauthored by Harvard psychologist Daniel Gilbert estimated that nearly half of the average person’s time was spent “mind wandering.”

The good news is that even a minor increase in your capacity for presence can have a major effect on those around you. Because so few of us are ever fully present, if you can manage even a few moments of full presence from time to time, you’ll make quite an impact.

The very next time you’re in a conversation, try to regularly check whether your mind is fully engaged or whether it is wandering elsewhere (including preparing your next sentence). Aim to bring yourself back to the present moment as often as you can by focusing on your breath or your toes for just a second, and then get back to focusing on the other person.

One of my clients, after trying this exercise for the first time, reported: “I found myself relaxing, smiling, and others suddenly noticed me and smiled back without my saying a word.”

Don’t be discouraged if you feel that you didn’t fully succeed in the one-minute exercise above. You actually did gain a charisma boost simply by practicing presence. And because you’ve already gained the mindset shift (awareness of the importance of presence and the cost of the lack of it), you’re already ahead of the game.
Excerpted from The Charisma Myth by Olivia Fox Cabane by arrangement with Portfolio Penguin, a member of Penguin Group (USA), Inc., Copyright © 2012 by Olivia Fox Cabane.

Value Employees, Keep Your Talent

Jean Seawright March 14, 2011 www.lawnandlandscape.com

The tough economy has taken its toll on staff. Now, with a rebound on the horizon, stretched employees may get restless.
Here’s how to re-energize workers, build trust and keep turnover low as the turnaround hits.
As a result of the worst economic crisis in recent history, workers across the country have, undoubtedly, been shaken. When layoffs, pay and benefit reductions, salary freezes and restructuring first began to occur, employees everywhere seemed to understand the magnitude of the crisis and were happy to just have a job.
Indeed, the phrase “job security” took on an entirely new meaning for many – both the employed and the unemployed alike.
Unfortunately, these newfound feelings of job appreciation have now given way to feelings of burn-out, recession fatigue and self-preservation. This has led to declining levels of motivation, pride and trust in many workplaces.
For this reason, employees are beginning to take a close, hard look at their work life, and they’re asking themselves if they really want to stay with their current employer.
Although you may be blameless in the economic crisis and you may have made wise moves to maintain the health of your business, your employees may still want to jump ship. Why? Because it’s human nature for people to want to disassociate themselves with bad memories.
Unfortunately, if you found it necessary to deploy traditional belt-tightening labor practices to cope with your business challenges, your company may be that bad memory.

FLIGHT RISK.
Several recent surveys conducted by reputable firms suggest that anywhere between 40 to 60 percent of Americans plan to look for a job once the economy rebounds. The younger generations – the Gen Xers and Yers – are reportedly the most likely to abscond.
How do you know if your employees are among the percentage wanting to bolt? Well, the risk increases if one or more of these actions occurred at your company during the recession:

• Leaders failed to communicate what was going on strategically
• Employees have had to work double-time to make up for a slimmer workforce
• Wages were cut and cannot be or are not restored
• Permanent organizational changes were made, limiting employees’ future growth potential
• Employees perceive that they were treated poorly
• Employees lost trust in the organization as a result of how it handled cost cuts
• Employees are stressed out about money

So what can you do now to re-engage your employees and to minimize the temptation for talented employees to find a new job as conditions improve?
The answer lies in first understanding what factors make work gratifying today. A recent nationwide Society for Human Resource Management job satisfaction survey listed among top factors the following very important aspects of job satisfaction:

• Job security
• Benefits
• Compensation/pay
• Opportunities to use skills and abilities
• Relationship with immediate supervisor
• Management recognition of employee job performance
• Communication between employees and senior management
  

Two things stand out on this list:
First, job security rules. Of course, it’s not surprising that during an economic downturn employees selected job security as a very important aspect of job satisfaction. This is actually good news for small businesses since the perception among workers (and, frankly, the reality) is that mass layoffs occur more readily at large companies.
Secondly, three of the job satisfaction factors are directly related to management. This tells us that in the current climate, leaders play a vital role in the job satisfaction of employees.
Indeed, to your employees, the boss is the company, and the ability of your leadership team to encourage the development of your people through trusting relationships will impact retention. No doubt about it, as the market improves it will become even more important for managers and leaders to hone performance development skills and to enhance trust.

ASSESS YOUR MANAGERS.
As the economy rebounds, the most important ingredient in retention will be the strength of your leadership team. Now is the time to assess the interpersonal skills of your management team and to make necessary adjusments. Employees want and need leaders who can connect with them emotionally; leaders who are highly visible, who care about the well being of others, who encourage the development of talent in the organization and, most importantly, who are trustworthy.
According to a research study conducted by Linda Stroh, a professor at Loyola University Chicago Graduate School of Business, a trustworthy person:

• Is likely to respond in a healthy way when things don’t go right
• Admits and learns from his or her mistakes
• Is aware of how his or her behavior affects others
• Admits when he or she doesn’t know something
• Tells me when I do something wrong
• Helps me be a better person
• Sticks by others during tough times
• Speaks the same of everyone whether in their presence or not
  

I would add one more trait: Keeps commitments. This includes the small ones. For example, if you promise an employee that you will call him or her back before the end of the day, do it.
Failure to keep even the smallest of commitments can erode trust.
Bottom line: Retaining talent in the future is going to depend in large part on the skills and abilities of your leadership team today.
You must ensure that your management team can build relationships with your people on more than just money.
As the economy rebounds, regardless of your industry or the size of your company, the best formula for successfully retaining talent combines trustworthy leaders with a motivating work environment and a culture that recognizes and engages employees.

Jean Seawright is President of Seawright & Associates, a human resource management consulting firm in Winter Park, Fla. 3 or www.seawright.com.

Do Your People Trust You?

Linda A. Hill & Kent Lineback March 2, 2012 www.blogs.hbr.org

When we talk to managers, we often ask, "Do your people trust you?"
Most are taken aback. It's not something they're often asked or a question they've even asked themselves.
After some thought, most eventually say something like, "Well, I think so. I hope so. No one's said he doesn't." In fact, as they ultimately admit, they don't really know for sure.
It's a question worth asking. Do your people trust you?
Chances are, you don't know for sure, either. If so, that's potentially a problem because your ability to elicit people's best efforts depends on their trust in you — their confidence that they can count on you to do the right thing. Your basic job as a boss is to influence others, to make a difference in what they do and in the thoughts and feelings that drive their actions. Yet, even as the person in charge, the one with authority, you can ultimately influence people only to the extent they are willing to be influenced by you. And that willingness will depend on whether they trust you. Without trust, why should people do what you ask, especially if you're asking something difficult? Why should they accept your judgment? Above all, why would they devote the care and extra effort that quality work requires? As the boss, you can demand compliance but you must earn commitment, and the coin of that realm is trust.
As we explore this topic with managers, we find it's a subject both familiar and unfamiliar.
Most people don't know how to think about it constructively. Why?
First, they often don't realize how context-sensitive trust is. Your people certainly wouldn't trust you, say, to do brain surgery on one of their children, and you would find that lack of trust completely understandable. You're not to be trusted in that context. So, when we ask, "Do your people trust you?" we're not asking about people's confidence in you as a person in general — whether, for example, they think you will repay them promptly if you borrow $10. Instead, we're really asking, "Do your people trust you as a boss?" For them to accept you as a boss, they must trust you in that context. When we delve later into the components of trust, you'll see why context is so important.
The second reason most managers feel a little lost when they think about trust is that most of us resist the idea that trust is something you can actively and consciously encourage. To say it can and should be fostered feels manipulative and self-serving. We instinctively distrust the person who exclaims, "Trust me!" We usually don't consider trust an outcome we can or should try to control directly. Sure, if we outright lie, cheat, steal, and fail to keep our word, others will consider us untrustworthy. But most of us don't consistently or purposely behave that way. We try to tell the truth, abide by the rules, honor others' rights and belongings, and if we cannot keep a promise, we explain why. For most of us, that's how we were brought up. It's who we are and so we think of trust as the outcome of simply being who we are. It's only when we occasionally — usually inadvertently — break someone's trust that we worry about it. Otherwise, trust just happens and we think that's how it should be.
But believing as a boss that trust will somehow take care of itself may not work out the way you want. You do need to think about it. And you may need to take conscious steps that make clear to others that you deserve their trust. None of those steps involves dishonesty or manipulation — on the contrary — but they do involve your being explicit about yourself, about what you know, and about the reasons behind your decisions and actions. In other words, it may require that you be more open as a boss than you might personally be inclined to be.
Indeed, the need for such openness may cut against the grain of many managers, especially new managers, who believe that as the boss they're able to take action without having to explain it to everyone involved.
What this means and how you do it will become more clear in the next two blogs, in which we will explore each of the two components of trust — competence and character. For people to trust you as a boss, they must believe you know what to do as a boss. At one time or another, we've all had bosses of whom people said, "He doesn't know the business" or "She doesn't understand what we do." No one would trust you to do brain surgery because you're incompetent in that context.
Character is equally important. It refers to your intentions — what you're trying to do, your goals and values as a boss. If, for example, people think you're only out for yourself, driven by blind ambition, and don't care about them, the group, or the work, they will distrust your character, no matter how much you know. You need competence and character both to earn your people's trust.
In the next blog, we'll explore competence, what it means to "know" as a boss and what you can legitimately do to demonstrate competence. (No, it doesn't mean you're supposed to be the expert.) And in the blog after that, we'll delve into character, a much more elusive concept that obviously can vary greatly with the context. But we'll try to say some constructive things about it, and how you can foster it, that apply broadly.

Don't take trust for granted, or believe it just happens, because virtually all you do as a boss begins with people's trust in you.

Linda A. Hill is the Wallace Brett Donham Professor Business Administration at Harvard Business School. Kent Lineback spent many years as a manager and an executive in business and government. They are the coauthors of Being the Boss: The 3 Imperatives for Becoming a Great Leader (HBR Press, 2011).

Why We Don't Always Tell the Truth

Ron Ashkenas Feb. 21, 2012 www.blogs.hbr.org

When I was growing up, one of the principles in our house was that we had to tell the truth, no matter how painful it might be. Lying, we were taught, wasn't something you could get away with. Like Pinocchio's nose, it would be apparent to others.
Children of course need clear rules to learn the difference between right and wrong. However as we get older, the truth becomes more nuanced — and there are times when a little white lie or the absence of some key facts might be appropriate. The problem is that all of us have different standards for when, why, and how we shade the truth. These divergent 'shades of gray' then cause miscommunication, breakdowns of trust, and other dysfunctional behaviors. That's why, despite the inclusion of "integrity" in almost every value statement, some form of lying is common in most companies.
From my experience, there are three fundamental concerns that cause people to shade the truth, either consciously or not. Being aware of these "lying triggers" can sometimes help to improve communication and reduce the feelings of mistrust.
Impact of the truth on yourself: It's human nature to want people to think well of us, particularly those who have influence over our lives and careers. At the same time we all make mistakes, so we create justifications and excuses — many of which are at best half-truths. I recall a manager whose key project was behind schedule, largely due to his lack of discipline and follow-up. Yet when asked why the project was lagging, he blamed a snowstorm (from six months previously) for slowing down the work.
Impact of the truth on others: One way to gain others' approval is to avoid pointing out things that may damage their self-image. As a result, many people withhold some or all of their true thoughts about others. For example, a senior executive complained to me recently that one of his managers never gave her people negative criticism during performance reviews. To justify that behavior, she said that it was better to reinforce positive behaviors rather than point out weaknesses — a strategy that also happened to make her popular with her team. The senior executive however was convinced that her drive to be well liked was doing the team a disservice, because they didn't know what they could do to improve.
Impact of the truth on business success: To be successful almost every organization needs to sell — be it a product, a service, a story, or a promise. But much of that selling is done without truthful disclosure of what it will take to fulfill the sale. That's why product salespeople will often take an order without revealing to the customer that there may be supply problems, or why a CEO will tout the benefits of an acquisition without mentioning the challenges of integration. Showing customers or partners what's truly behind the curtain could undermine credibility and threaten the deal. The wiser course in many cases is to limit the truth and figure out how to "deliver" later.
It's easy to be judgmental about all these situations and to insist on absolute truth at all times. But people don't work that way, and neither do organizations. As managers, the best we can do is to be more aware of why we avoid or shade the truth — and make sure that it's an appropriate time to do so.

How truthful is your organization? What's your experience with shades of gray?

Ron Ashkenas is a managing partner of Schaffer Consulting and a co-author of The GE Work-Out and The Boundaryless Organization. His latest book is Simply Effective.

Why Appreciation Matters So Much

Tony Schwartz January 23, 2012 www.blogs.hbr.org

I've just returned from an offsite with our team at The Energy Project. As we concluded, I asked each person to take a few moments to say what he or she felt most proud of accomplishing over the past year.
After each of their brief recountings, I added some observations about what I appreciated in that person. Before long, others were chiming in. The positive energy was contagious, but it's not something we can ever take for granted.

Whatever else each of us derives from our work, there may be nothing more precious than the feeling that we truly matter — that we contribute unique value to the whole, and that we're recognized for it.

The single highest driver of engagement, according to a worldwide study conducted by Towers Watson, is whether or not workers feel their managers are genuinely interested in their wellbeing. Less than 40 percent of workers felt so engaged.

Feeling genuinely appreciated lifts people up. At the most basic level, it makes us feel safe, which is what frees us to do our best work. It's also energizing. When our value feels at risk, as it so often does, that worry becomes preoccupying, which drains and diverts our energy from creating value.

So why is it that openly praising or expressing appreciation to other people at work can so easily seem awkward, contrived, mawkish and even disingenuous?
The obvious answer is that we're not fluent in the language of positive emotions in the workplace. We're so unaccustomed to sharing them that we don't feel comfortable doing so. Heartfelt appreciation is a muscle we've not spent much time building, or felt encouraged to build.
Oddly, we're often more experienced at expressing negative emotions — reactively and defensively, and often without recognizing their corrosive impact on others until much later, if we do at all.

That's unfortunate. The impact of negative emotions — and more specifically the feeling of being devalued — is incredibly toxic. As Daniel Goleman has written, "Threats to our standing in the eyes of others are almost as powerful as those to our very survival."
In one well-known study, workers who felt unfairly criticized by a boss or felt they had a boss who didn't listen to their concerns had a 30 percent higher rate of coronary disease than those who felt treated fairly and with care.
In the workplace itself, researcher Marcial Losada has found that among high-performing teams, the expression of positive feedback outweighs that of negative feedback by a ratio of 5.6 to 1. By contrast, low-performing teams have a ratio of .36 to 1.
So what are the practical steps you can take, especially as a manager, to use appreciation in the service of building a higher-performing (and more sustainable) team?

1. As the Hippocratic oath prescribes to physicians, "Above all else, do no harm." Or perhaps more accurately, do less harm, since it's unrealistic to do none. The costs of devaluing others are so great that we need to spend far more time thinking than we do now about how to hold people's value, even in situations where they've fallen short and our goal is get them to change their behavior for the better.

2. Practice appreciation by starting with yourself. If you have difficulty openly appreciating others, it's likely you also find it difficult to appreciate yourself. Take a few moments at the end of the day to ask yourself this simple question: "What can I rightly feel proud of today?" If you are committed to constant self-improvement, you can also ask yourself, "What could I do better tomorrow?" Both questions hold your value.

3. Make it a priority to notice what others are doing right. The more you work at it, the better you'll get at it, and the more natural it will become for you. For example, start by thinking about what positive qualities, behaviors and contributions you currently take for granted among the members of your team. Then ask yourself, what is it that each of them uniquely brings to the table?

4. Be appreciative. The more specific you can be about what you value — and the more you notice what's most meaningful to that person — the more positive your impact on that person is likely to be. A handwritten note makes a bigger impression than an email or a passing comment, but better any one of them than nothing at all.
We're all more vulnerable and needy than we like to imagine. Authentically appreciating others will make you feel better about yourself, and it will also increase the likelihood they'll invest more in their work, and in you. The human instinct for reciprocity runs deep

Why to-do lists set you up for failure

Dave Johnson (MoneyWatch)  www.cbsnews.com January 30, 2012

You've probably seen advice about why it's a great idea to maintain a rolling to-do list of projects -- big and small -- that you need to get done. Some efficiency experts recommend writing a to-do list each morning, in which you meticulously transfer incomplete to-dos from the old list to the new one every day. You might have noticed that this system doesn't work very well, and you probably just assumed that it's your own fault. But according to the Harvard Business Review, it's not you. In a nutshell, the entire system is flawed, and simply sets you up for failure.

Harvard Business Review cites several key problems with rolling to-do lists. Here are some of the most compelling:

The paradox of choice. Psychologist Barry Schwartz has written extensively about the paradox of choice -- when faced with too many options, people feel overwhelmed and respond poorly. A to-do list is a veritable smorgasbord of choices.

Heterogeneous complexity. Moreover, your to-do list invariably contains a mixture of big projects and small ones, hard ones and easy ones. Consequently, you choose the short and easy tasks almost without fail, since there's a much stronger payoff. The other tasks never get done.

Heterogeneous priority. Likewise, your to-do list is filled with tasks of varying priority. There's little doubt that you tend to do the highest priority tasks up front, and push off the rest until circumstances raise their priority as a consequence.

So what's the alternative?

Harvard Business Review recommends "living in your calendar." In other words, don't maintain a to-do list, but rather schedule these tasks right into your Outlook calendar, around your other commitments, while also accounting for the time you'll need to deal with brushfires and other unexpected priorities. This serves, in part, as a sort of commitment device, which is akin to positioning your army with its back to a river so there's no possibility of retreat from the enemy.

Melodramatic? Perhaps. But it's also likely to be more effective than that dog-eared to-do list you always carry around, but never complete.

10 Things Great Managers Do

(MoneyWatch) August 18, 2011Steve Tobak www.cbsnews.com

There's all sorts of rhetoric about what good bosses should and shouldn't do these days. I guess that's a good thing.
Unfortunately, most of it's pretty basic, generic fluff that sort of blends together after a while.
Even worse, a lot of it's, well, utopian. It panders to what employees want to hear instead of giving truly practical and insightful advice on what makes a manager effective in the real world where business is everything and everything's on the line.

This list is different. It's different because, to derive it, I went back in time to the best characteristics of the best CEOs (primarily) I've worked for and with over the past 30 years. It's based entirely on my own experience with executives who made a real difference at extraordinary companies.

Some were big, some were small, but all were successful in their respective markets, primarily because of the attributes of these CEOs. Each anecdote taught me a critical lesson that advanced my career and helped me to be a better leader. Hope you get as much out of reading it as I did living it.

10 Things Great Managers Do

Maintain your cool and sense of humor, especially during a crisis. When our biggest customer - and I mean big - thought I leaked a front-page story to the press, I offered to resign to save the relationship. My boss, a great CEO, gave me a serious look, like he was thinking about it, and said, "You're not getting off that easy." Then he broke into a big smile.

Tell subordinates when they're shooting themselves in the foot. Sometimes I can be pretty intimidating and I've had CEOs who shied away from giving it to me straight when my emotions got the better of me. Not this one guy. We'd be in a heated meeting and he'd quietly take me aside and read me the riot act. He was so genuine about it that it always opened my eyes and helped me to achieve perspective.

Be the boss, but behave like a peer. I've worked with loads of CEOs who let their egos get the better of them. They act like they're better than everyone else, are distant and emotionally detached, or flaunt their knowledge and power. That kind of behavior diminishes leaders, makes them seem small, and keeps them from really connecting with people. They're not always the most successful, but the most admired CEOs I know are genuinely humble.

Let your guard down and really be yourself outside of work. You know, teambuilding is so overrated. All you really need to do outside of work to build a cohesive team is break some bread, have some drinks, relax, let your guard down, and be a regular human being. When you get to be really confident, you can be that way all the time. That's the mark of a great leader.

Stand behind and make big bets on people you believe in. One CEO would constantly challenge you and your thinking to the point of being abusive. But once he trusted and believed in you, he put his full weight behind you 100 percent to help you succeed. He'd stand up for you even when he wasn't sure what the heck you were up to. And he'd give you new functional responsibilities - something up-and-coming execs need to grow. Okay, he wasn't perfect, but who is?

Complement your subordinate's weaknesses. I often say it's every employee's job to complement her boss's weaknesses. The only reason that's even doable is because we've all only got one boss. But I actually had a CEO who did that with each and every one of his staff. For example, I'm more of a big picture strategy guy and he would really hold my feet to the fire by tracking my commitments. It felt like micromanaging at first, but I eventually realized it helped me to be a more effective and strengthened the entire management team.

Compliment your employee's strengths. It takes a strong, confident leader to go out on a limb and tell an employee what they're great at. Why? I don't know, but I suspect it's hard for alpha males that primarily inhabit executive offices. Anyway, it's important because we can't always see ourselves objectively. Twenty years ago a CEO identified how effectively I cut through a boatload of BS to reach unique solutions to tough problems. Today, that's what I do for a living.

Teach the toughest, most painful lessons you've ever learned. As a young manager at Texas Instruments, I once asked my boss's boss for advice about a promotion I didn't get. He told me a candid story about the hardest lesson he'd ever learned, the reason he was stuck in his job. He made himself indispensible and didn't groom his replacement. It was painful for him to share, but it opened my eyes and made a huge difference in my career.

Do the right thing. Just about everyone says it, but I've only known one CEO who both preached and practiced it to the point where it became a big part of the company culture. You'd walk the halls and hear people say it all the time. He meant two things by it. When he said it to you, it meant he trusted you to do just that. He also meant it regardless of status quo or consequences. He had extraordinary faith in that phrase. Now I do too.

Do what has to be done, no matter what. It's a rare executive who jumps on a plane at a moment's notice to close a deal or gives an impromptu presentation when a potential investor shows up unexpectedly. It's even more rare when he does it without asking questions or hemming and hawing about it. He just does what has to be done. That kind of drive and focus on the business is relatively common with entrepreneurs in high-tech startups. And it's the mark of a great manager who will find success, that's for sure.

"No" is the New "Yes": Four Practices to Reprioritize Your Life

Tony Schwartz blogs.hbr.org January 17, 2012

I was sitting with the CEO and senior team of a well-respected organization. One at a time, they told me they spend their long days either in back-to-back meetings, responding to email, or putting out fires. They also readily acknowledged this way of working wasn't serving them well — personally or professionally.
It's a conundrum they couldn't seem to solve. It's also a theme on which I hear variations every day. Think of it as a madness loop — a vicious cycle. We react to what's in front of us, whether it truly matters or not. More than ever, we're prisoners of the urgent.
Prioritizing requires reflection, reflection takes time, and many of the executives I meet are so busy racing just to keep up they don't believe they have time to stop and think about much of anything.
Too often — and masochistically — they default to "yes." Saying yes to requests feels safer, avoids conflict and takes less time than pausing to decide whether or not the request is truly important.
Truth be told, there's also an adrenaline rush in saying yes. Many of us have become addicted, unwittingly, to the speed of our lives — the adrenalin high of constant busyness. We mistake activity for productivity, more for better, and we ask ourselves "What's next?" far more often than we do "Why this?" But as Gandhi put it, "A 'no' uttered from the deepest conviction is better than a 'yes' merely uttered to please, or worse, to avoid trouble."
Saying no, thoughtfully, may be the most undervalued capacity of our times. In a world of relentless demands and infinite options, it behooves us to prioritize the tasks that add the most value. That also means deciding what to do less of, or to stop doing altogether.
Making these choices requires that we regularly step back from the madding crowd. It's only when we pause — when we say no to the next urgent demand or seductive source of instant gratification — that we give ourselves the space to reflect on, metabolize, assess, and make sense of what we've just experienced.
Taking time also allows us to collect ourselves, refuel and renew, and make conscious course corrections that ultimately save us time when we plunge back into the fray.
What follows are four simple practices that serve a better prioritized and more intentional life:
1. Schedule in your calendar anything that feels important but not urgent — to borrow Steven Covey's phrase. If it feels urgent, you're likely going to get it done. If it's something you can put off, you likely will — especially if it's challenging.
The key to success is building rituals — highly specific practices that you commit to doing at precise times, so that over time they become automatic, and no longer require much conscious intention or energy. One example is scheduling regular time in your calendar for brainstorming, or for more strategic and longer term thinking.
The most recent ritual I added to my life is getting entirely offline after dinner each evening, and on the weekends. I'm only two weeks into the practice, but I know it's already created space in my mind to think and imagine.
2. As your final activity before leaving work in the evening, set aside sufficient time — at least 15 to 20 minutes — to take stock of what's happened that day. and to decide the most important tasks you want to accomplish the next day.
Clarifying and defining your priorities — what the researcher Peter Gollwitzer calls "implementation intentions" — will help you to stay focused on your priorities in the face of all the distractions you'll inevitably face the following day.
3. Do the most important thing on your list first when you get to work in the morning, for up to 90 minutes. If possible, keep your door closed, your email turned off and your phone on silent. The more singularly absorbed your focus, the more you'll get accomplished, and the higher the quality of the work is likely to be. When you finish, take a break to renew and refuel.
Most of us have the highest level of energy and the fewest distractions in the morning. If you can't begin the day that way, schedule the most important activity as early as possible. If you're one of the rare people who feels more energy later in the day, designate that time instead to do your most important activity.
4. Take at least one scheduled break in the morning, one in the afternoon, and leave your desk for lunch. These are each important opportunities to renew yourself so that your energy doesn't run down as the day wears on. They're also opportunities to briefly take stock.
Here are two questions you may want to ask yourself during these breaks:
1. Did I get done what I intended to get done since my last break and if not, why not?
2. What do I want to accomplish between now and my next break, and what do I have to say "no" to, in order to make that possible?

Tony Schwartz is the president and CEO of The Energy Project and the author of Be Excellent at Anything. Become a fan of The Energy Project on Facebook and connect with Tony at Twitter.com/TonySchwartz and Twitter.com/Energy_Project.

8 tips to get your great ideas acted upon

by Tom Searcy,  www.cbsnews.com

Great holiday party themes, starting a recycling program, changes to the compensation system, ways to expand the business globally...regardless of the category of idea or the scale, you've probably had a great idea somewhere along the way that never got heard, despite valiant attempts. That's because you were probably thwarted by the "Idea Vampires," those people who reject your brilliant insights, and for any number of reasons. In order to get heard, you have to learn how to work with these people to move your idea from concept to action.

Vampires are scary. Idea Vampires use fear to suck the excitement, interest and support out of new ideas. They do it in emails, meetings, and conversations after the meeting. By creating doubts, delays and distractions, they can mortally wound your good idea. Here are some ways to move your ideas forward:

1. Make your idea the next evolutionary step. If your idea can be attached to an existing program or initiative and seen as an extension, it is less scary and more likely to be adopted.

2. Break it into bite-size steps. Break your idea into smaller pieces that can be implemented in phases. Less threatening ideas are more possible ideas.

3. Co-opt your idea onto someone else's idea. Making something another person's idea is a great trick you may have used in the past. A twist on this is to add an addendum to that person's idea, which is typically most successful when that person is in a stronger power position.

4. Start smaller for traction and expand the idea for resources. In the brainstorming sessions from which ideas come, really good thoughts get squashed because they start out too big. Start your idea small. Generate interest, then consensus, and grow the idea in the conversation in order to secure resources.

5. Ask, "Under what conditions," to open up the brainstorming. When you get thwarted by a stonewall response, see if you can crack open the door of possibility by asking, "Under what conditions do you think we could move forward?" This maneuver avoids a deadlock and may get creative juices flowing.

6. Anticipate the typical vampire blocking moves and be ready. Here are some of the usual suspects in the vampire vocabulary: "We don't have the resources"; "This will distract from our priorities"; and "Give me an example of where this has worked," are typical. Be ready for them with answers.

7. Seed the audience with supporters. If you have decided to present an idea in a meeting, preview your idea to some supporters in advance to get friendly voices in the discussion.

8. Put your idea forward in terms of "yield." Executives are paid to make the performance needles move. That means a calculation of what is the yield of each idea (ratio of effort to result), in order to be successful.

Remember the old saying, "There's no limit to what you can get done if you don't mind who gets the credit." Make the point of your concept to create progress for the company rather than to claim personal credit, and the chances of getting your ideas implemented will go up tremendously.

Tom Searcy is a nationally recognized author, speaker, and the foremost expert in large account sales.

Tom is the author of RFPs Suck! How to Master the RFP System Once and for All to Win Big Business

and the co-author of Whale Hunting: How to Land Big Sales and Transform Your Company.

To Grow, Leave What You Know Behind

John Coleman  blogs.hbr.org December 6, 2011

Last year, I was fortunate to moderate a fascinating panel discussion with Harvard's Center for Public Leadership on the topic of "Next Generation Leadership." One of the panelists, Rosalinde Torres, encouraged us to ask the following question: "What has made you successful in the past that you need to change to move forward as a leader?"
As we go through different phases in our personal and professional lives, we're called upon to adapt, to marshal skills different than those we've used in the past. And in the modern world — where the pace of technological and social change is as fast as at any time in human history, those demands on our adaptability are greater. An exceptional grocery store cashier, for example, will need a different set of skills to be a store manager as her career evolves. And those in computer repair have had to learn and unlearn a myriad skills over the past 30 years to keep pace with the changes happening around them.
So what skills do you need to modify or leave behind to grow? For me, a few suggestions come to mind.
Stop seeking answers; start asking questions. In our 20+ years of education, we have been trained to get ahead by having the right answers — to tests, to class questions, to business problems. But the most difficult challenges require leaders who can identify and ask the right questions.
The world needs great problem-solvers, but it also needs people who can make sure their organizations focus on the right problems and miss nothing in the process. One of the more intellectually impressive senior executives I've worked with asked questions twice as often as he offered answers. As a result, the people who worked for him always took full responsibility for their work — because they knew they'd have to answer a stream of deep and thoughtful questions as soon as they entered the boardroom. This leader's questions not only showed his thoughtfulness and helped drive deeper solutions, but they created ownership among the people who worked for him.
Focus on people, not problems. Junior businesspeople often work on heavily analytic, stand-alone problems. They're asked to build models and plans — to find the "right" solution. But the most difficult problems can't be solved and implemented by individuals alone. Good leaders can't just get the right answer. They have to involve people — those who will ultimately implement their programs and those teammates who can help them solve the problem faster and better than they could on their own.
When an individual becomes too rigid about his or her "own" solution at the expense of working collaboratively with others, that individual often loses the momentum to generate change and misses the valuable insights of his or her peers in the process. A famous example of collaboration in the face of a difficult problem — no matter your thoughts on the project itself — is the Manhattan Project. The project, which ultimately led to the construction of the first atomic bomb, was led by General Leslie Groves. Knowing he couldn't handle the project by himself (and neither could anyone else), he called upon as many great minds and competing perspectives as possible to come to the right solutions collaboratively and created an environment in which they could implement against that plan.
Stop working as a generalist. Many of us have lived life so far as generalists — "Jacks of all trades," so to speak — focused broadly on a variety of skills, functions, or industries. Sure, we may have picked some topics on which to become knowledgeable, we've chosen professions, and we've completed "majors" or built specific skills. But by-and-large, we've cast our nets wide, learning broadly to gain context about the world around us. At some point, however, most of us will need to generate proficiency in a very specific topic, both because it makes us valuable sources of expert knowledge and teaches us the habits of mind to generate deep insight.
Take, for example, Steve Jobs's early obsession with calligraphy. After dropping out of Reed College in 1972, Steve spent months immersed in calligraphy, which, at Reed, was an incredibly strong program. In his words, "I learned about serif and sans serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can't capture." That experience not only helped Steve build the practical toolkit to create beautiful text and designs, but also improved and sharpened his mind, attention to detail, and his fascination with design.
You may be at a different stage in life — a great "people" manager who needs to work on her problem-solving or a specialist who needs to broaden his experience — but I've found that as my professional career evolves to include more collaboration, management, and implementation, the skills I've depended on, while helpful in their time, need to evolve for successful growth. These adjustments provide new areas of focus that may be common to a number of young leaders who are making the transition from individual contributor to manager as they advance in their careers.
What do you think? In your own work life, what are the traits that have made you successful in the past that you'll need to leave behind to be successful in the future?
John Coleman is a coauthor of the new HBR Press book, Passion & Purpose: Stories from the Best and Brightest Young Business Leaders.

The best way to recognize employees

Jeff Haden December 15, 2011 cbsnews.com

(MoneyWatch)
According to a SHRM survey conducted earlier this year, most organizations have employee recognition programs in place. So why don't many of those programs work?

Effective employee recognition isn't based on following arbitrary guidelines or creating insincere recognition systems. That's why so many formal recognition programs only pay lip service to praising employees for their efforts.

Your small business doesn't need a formal program in place to recognize and praise employees. Just follow these tips and it's easy to give the recognition your employees deserve:

See every employee as an individual. Every employee responds differently to recognition. Many appreciate public praise. Others shrink from the limelight. Don't pass out praise on your terms; recognize each employee in the way that produces the greatest impact for that person.

Assume too soon is never soon enough. There's an inverse relationship between recognition and performance: The longer you wait, the lower the impact. Praise employees immediately. Don't wait for "the right time," because the only right time is right now.

Provide details that show you know. Generic praise is nice, but specific praise is wonderful. Don't just tell employees they did a good job. Tell them how they did a good job. Not only will they appreciate the recognition, they'll also know you pay attention to what they do.

Be genuine. We've all received recognition that felt forced, like the boss who walks around once a month and says, "Thanks for your efforts." Only recognize hard work and achievement when you mean it.

Skip constructive criticism, at least for now. Say, "You did a great job, but next time..." and all the employee remembers is what they did wrong or could have done better. Follow up at another time with constructive feedback. Let the warm glow of praise be the feeling the employee carries with them.

Actively find employees to praise. We're all trained to spot issues, hunt down problems, and eliminate errors. We're usually not trained to find people doing things well. Spend part of every day looking for positives. (You might be surprised by how skilled your employees really are.)

Leverage the surprise factor. Unexpected recognition is incredibly powerful. Winning the employee of the month award is great, but being recognized in the middle of a meeting for outstanding achievement can feel even better.

Spot opportunities to share the "praise wealth." It's easy to recognize your great employees. They're great because they perform well. Look for ways to praise less stellar performers when they deserve the recognition. Sometimes all an average performer needs is a little attention and encouragement.

And keep in mind providing praise will get easier over time, because when you do a better job of recognizing employees they naturally perform better - and that gives you even more achievements to recognize.

Why Everyone Hates the Boss

David Rock Friday November 11, 2011 blogs.hbr.org

One of the most common complaints about leaders is that they are promoted for their technical skills, and often have poor social skills. A big insight that emerged on day two of the 2011 NeuroLeadership Summit is that this may simply be a function of the leader's role.
UCLA professor Matthew Lieberman, one of the founders of the Social Cognitive Neuroscience field, presented research on our ability to mentalize, or predict other people's emotional or intentional states. It turns out this requires significant effort, attention and resources. People experiencing even a mild cognitive load or "stress" find their ability to think about what others are thinking or needing impaired. The trouble is that our ability to mentalize about other people's thoughts is extremely poor even at the best of times.
In one study, an average of 50% of participants initially predicted that people would be able to work out the tune of a very well known song by listening only to the beats being tapped out. It turns out only 2.5% of people could successfully guess the tune with tapping as the only information. Our ability to the think about the minds of others is surprisingly poor, even when not under pressure.
The other challenge is that the circuitry for thinking analytically, such as thinking about the future or about concepts, switches off the circuitry for thinking about others. People spending a lot of time being analytical, conceptual or goal focused may have diminished circuitry for thinking about the minds of others, simply through lack of use.
Leaders who spend too much time analyzing and strategizing may find it difficult to activate their rarely used social circuits. Put this together with how hard it is to think about the minds of others when under pressure (and leaders are under massive cognitive load), and you begin to see why there is such an emotional divide between cognitively exhausted senior executives and the people they lead.
The big question now is what we can do to improve a leader's capacity to mentalize about others? Lieberman is studying this very question in the lab now. We look forward to seeing the results.

David Rock is a consultant and author of Your Brain at Work.

Top 3 Ways to Get Your Phone Calls Returned

Tom Searcy November 2, 2011 9:40 AM cbsnews.com

Chasing sucks. Prospects, clients, people who owe you information, drawings, money. I hate having to chase. Most of us have to do it--A LOT. Most of the time we go into the bottomless pit of voice mail hell to be tortured by the digital demons therein. Here is how to get your phone call returned more often. There are no perfect strategies that guarantee 100% response; even the IRS auditors don't get 100% return calls. But you can do much better if you follow this approach.

Quick note: This skill focuses on getting a returned call from someone you have already met. Prospecting is a different skill.

Step 1: Tell the person what you want. Calls that say "Call me when you get a chance" are relegated to someone's "B" or "C" priority list. (When was the last time you were working your "B" priority list?). If your voice mail says "Give me a call back, I have a couple of things I want to review with you," then you are never going on that person's radar of must-do priorities.

Tell the person you are calling what you want right at the beginning of the call. Make certain your voice mail is not longer than 40 seconds- they won't listen to it. What do you tell them you want? A document, a phone call, an email, a piece of information- whatever it is that you want, ask for it and ask for it fast. I'll give examples below.

Step 2: Speak in terms of time. Tell them:

• How long the returned call will take. (3 minutes, 11 minutes, "less than a cup of coffee" are all good increments)
• Must-talk-by date and time. Your message needs to say, "This call has to happen by...." And then give the date and time. End of day tomorrow, Friday by noon, this afternoon before 3:45pm. Success goes up if the window is later than 4 hours from now and no later than 24 hours from the point of your voice mail message you are leaving. If, by some miracle, you are actually talking to an administrative support person, the time issue is the same, just ask to book the appointment.

Step 3: Declare consequences.
To create urgency you need to declare consequences. Notice I used the word "consequences" not "threats." Consequences are the natural and understandable outcomes of an action or inaction. You are telling the person you are reaching out too that if he does not call back to you this will happen. Factual and without emotion. Here are some approaches:

• Negative Option - If you do not hear back, you will assume the answer is "no" and you will act accordingly.
• Time expiration - If you do not hear back, time will expire on the offer and what has been offered will be rescinded.
• Delay of Progress - If you do not hear back, then the proposed date for start or end will not be attainable and will be delayed.
• Positive Option - If you do not hear back you will take that as tacit approval and will move forward with the previously agreed upon actions.

Examples:
* "Bill, this is Tom from XYZ. I need the final drawings we discussed by noon tomorrow in my email or I will not be able to honor the delivery date of next Friday. Please give me a 30 second call when you have sent them to confirm. Thanks."

* "Sue, this is Joe from PDQ. I need confirmation of the wire transfer by end of business today or we will not ship. Please give me a call back by 4:00pm to ensure shipment. Thanks."

* "John, this is Deirdre from Pinnacle. I only need 3 minutes to get the details from you I need to give you the proposal you requested. If we connect by noon today, you'll have my proposal before you pack up to go home. Thanks.

* "Frank, this is Alex from Acme. A call no longer than a cup of coffee will sort out the issues you raised about the proposal. We have been out of touch for over a week- that usually means bad things. If I don't hear back from you by end of day tomorrow, I'll take that as a definite "no" and assume you are not interested in the proposal. Thanks."

What you should notice is that
1) This approach takes a forceful and direct tone, rather than a subservient and weak tone.

2) The messages are short. People rarely listen to long, detailed voice mails. They scan, much like we scan our emails. They store the things they intend to listen to later and delete everything else. They rarely get to what they say and eventually it solves itself or they delete it.

3) Action requests, time frames and consequences are clear.

Tom Searcy is a nationally recognized author, speaker, and the foremost expert in large account sales.