Archive for January, 2009

2009 is expected to be one of the most challenging years for organisations.  In this teleseminar recording you will discover:

• Some of the barriers that might be getting in the way of you successfully managing and leading
• Why sustainability matters when it comes to taking decisions
• The top 5 areas you need to master when leading in turbulent times

I would love to hear your thoughts and tips on leading and managing in turbulent times so take a moment to leave a comment.

Highly effective teams can achieve extraordinary results for the organisations that they serve.  Achieving success for the organisation leads to greater personal success, and achievement.  Yet in truth, team success is not guaranteed.  So what are 5 common barriers to team success and what can you do to avoid them?

Barrier 1: Fuzzy outcomes

If a team is to prosper and deliver results, it needs to be crystal clear about the results or outcomes that are expected to be delivered by the team.  Too often teams are set outcomes that are fuzzy and vague which unsurprisingly leads to little in terms of results.  Make the outcomes specific and measurable.  For example, reduce waste from product X by 10% by 31 December 2008 is both specific and measurable.

Barrier 2: Unproductive conflict

All successful teams need to have challenge and conflict otherwise it all becomes too cosy.  On the other hand, it is important to ensure that conflict is productive rather than destructive or unproductive.  Lively and heated debate that actually results in a better outcome or solution is an example of productive conflict.  Challenge that focuses on all of the negatives without offering any alternatives is unproductive.

Barrier 3: Playing it safe

Making a step change in performance or turning things round requires teams and team members to take some risk and step out of their comfort zone.  This will only happen if the culture within the organisation supports and rewards this type of innovative and balanced risk taking approach.  For example, if the culture is to look for scapegoats when things go wrong, people will keep within the safety boundaries rather than taking a chance.

Barrier 4: Individual agendas

If a team is to prosper, all members need to sign up to and be committed to the team goals first foremost.  For many this is particularly challenging as in business, we are used to being concerned about our own individual situation.  Creating a reward system that relies on the group can be a useful stepping stone to encouraging teams to focus on the team agenda.

Barrier 5: Leadership

In teams someone has to take on the role of the leader.  A team without a leader is like a ship without a captain.  The team might select a leader or as the team develops someone may emerge who is the natural leader.  However, any successful team needs a leader.

Bottom Line – Teams can achieve great results but it is essential that the barriers to team success are identified and addressed.  So what barriers are getting in the way of your teams success?

Ask any manager or leader about some of their key challenges and chances are that motivating staff will be on the list.  We all know that better motivated staff produce better results and are more productive.  So what are my 8 top tips?

Tip 1: Give effective feedback

We all like to know how we are doing.  What we are doing well and what we need to work on.  Without feedback we are in the dark.  Effective feedback will not only praise the results but also highlight the traits or behaviours that are making them happen.  On the flip side, it will let people know what attributes or behaviours are not getting results.

Tip 2: Supportive leadership

Teams follow leaders that they know they can rely on.  Supportive leadership is about being there for people when things are tough and helping them to move forward.  It is about standing up for the team when they are coming under attack.  Like any form of leadership, you need to “walk the talk” or put more simply make sure your actions and words tie up.

Tip 3: Delegate

Yes it is great to hold on to things that we like doing but should not be doing.  It gives a message to staff that you don’t trust them.  Delegating is probably one area that leaders at all levels struggle with.  Yet if you are going to exploit your full potential you need to be ready to delegate both task and responsibility.

Tip 4: Allow risk taking

Let’s be clear, I am not talking about recklessness, but allowing staff to take some risk.  The benefits you get include:

• Staff feel more creative

• They find new ways of overcoming barriers

• It spurs them on when things go well

• They learn a lot when things do not go as expected

Tip 5: Train and develop

Yes there will always be people who are quite happy doing what they are doing and have no aspirations.  The vast majority of staff however, want to learn new skills, gain new experience, build their personal attributes and take on new challenges.  Make sure this opportunity is not lost.

Tip 6: Generate high expectations

When you set high expectations you inspire people to reach out and meet them.  The challenge is to ensure that your expectations require effort and some discomfort but are not completely out of reach.  Generating high expectations will mean that you will achieve a better result even if it is not the ideal.

Tip 7: Set goals

Goals are outcomes that you and your team want.  Setting goals gives you a clear destination to aim for.  It allows you to plan and set strategies in place to get there.  Think about goals a bit like a car journey.  Where you want to get to is the destination.  The mode of transport, the route and stop off points are the strategies you employ to get there.

Tip 8: Acknowledge achievements

Do you ever find yourself dismissing progress because you have not quite achieved the outcome you wanted?  This is easy to do and a simple technique to use is to remind the team of where you started, the progress that has been made and to celebrate achievements.

Motivating staff is challenging, but by adopting these 8 simple steps, you can start to move forward to greater success.

One of the biggest challenges facing those taking on a management or supervisory role is finding the time to manage.  It can sometimes feel like that you have 100% of your time allocated to doing tasks and the only way to fit in the management part of the job is to do lots of unpaid extra hours.  So how can you start to address this dilemma?

Be clear on what is expected of you

As a new manager you need to get absolute clarity on what is expected of you and how your performance in the job will be measured.  The last thing you want is to get to your appraisal and find out that you have been aiming for the wrong target.

Set aside time for managing

If you do a 40 hour week and you know that management will take up about 40% of your time, block out 16 hours in your calendar each week and set up a schedule of things that you will work on.  It might be appraisals, work planning, recruiting, staff training, customer surveys, management meetings to name a few.

Let go of the jobs you do not need to do

You might love doing that piece of analysis work on excel that you have always done but you know deep down that someone else can do it.  Train them and let go of it.

Be accessible but manage interruptions

Managers love to talk about having an open door policy but make sure that people understand that this does not mean they can interrupt you whenever it suits them.  Have slots when your team can come to you to discuss issues and make sure people know when they are.  With e-mails, set aside times in you day to deal with them.  If it a real emergency someone will call you.  You may also need quiet time to focus on a report or presentation.  Divert your phone to someone else if you can or to voicemail.

Build in some space in your schedule

Things crop up that you did not expect or anticipate, so make provision for these in your schedule so that you can be flexible and responsive.

Ask for help if you are getting overloaded

We all have blind spots.  If you are finding that you are getting overloaded and cannot seem to find a way through, ask for help.  Merely sitting down with someone else and asking them to take a look at the challenges with you and help find solutions can get you back on track and delivering great results.

At the end of the day there is no magic solution but taking control is a powerful first step.

More and more organisations are looking to add coaching to their learning and development offering.  So what are some of the common challenges that can be tackled by coaching in organisations?

Winning the war for talent

In many businesses there is a constant challenge of recruiting and subsequently retaining the best people.  Coaching can help to build relationships in the organisation and also give a strong message to employees and potential hires that people development is taken seriously.

Leadership development

Many employers offer opportunities to employees to gain professional qualifications, masters levels degrees and participate in the in-house development programmes.  All of these will work for employees but for some the opportunity to work one to one with someone else is much more effective.  It allows open dialogue and attention to be focused on those areas of improvement that will deliver greatest impact.

Increasing productivity

The opportunities here are almost endless.  Someone could be work with a coach on work organisation, delegation, time mastery, project planning, process re-design, goal setting, decision making to name just a few.

Communication

Like productivity the opportunities in the area of communication are significant.  It might be presenting a new strategy, getting buy-in to a change programme, asking more effective questions when handling conflict,improving presentation skills, listening more effectively or even how to write in a more compelling way.

So what other areas would you add to the list of challenges that can be tackled by coaching?  Leave a comment with your thoughts.

Stepping into a leadership role is a significant step in just about every profession.  Initially you feel excited and energised and appear to be going along on a crest of a wave.  Sadly, much as we would like this feeling to last for ever, the realities of leading is somewhat different. So what are some of the realities of leading?

Reality 1: It is stressful

If you are leading, chances are you will experience pressure, worries, anxieties and maybe even stress.  As a leader you need to look after yourself if you are to perform at your optimal level.  Part of taking care of yourself is taking regular exercise and eating sensibly.  I know from experience just how difficult it can be but it is up to you to make powerful choices.

Reality 2: People will look to you

As the leader, people will look to you for a whole host of things.  These might include, for example:

• To provide clear direction
• To sort out problems
• To reassure people when they are worried or concerned
• To make things happen
• To communicate with them regularly and effectively

The question you need to be asking yourself is whether you are willing to take on this role.

Reality 3: The buck stops with you

Your job as a leader is to deliver results, consistently.  If you do you will be rewarded well and progress in your career.  If you don’t, chances are that you will find that you come under a lot of pressure to stand down or are may be removed from your post.

Are you happy with this level of risk?  If not, then you need to think about whether leading is for you.

Bottom Line – Leading at any time is challenging.  In the currently tough economic climate it is even tougher.  The big question you need to ask yourself is whether you are ready for the challenges of leading.

It is often said that you have to get the right people on a team with the right blend of skills, experience, knowledge and personal attributes to deliver success>  So how can you get the right people on the team?

 

Determine what you are trying to achieve

 

A big influencer on who you need on the team is determining what it is you are trying to achieve.  For example, if you are trying to achieve something technically complex, you might need people with expert knowledge of the detail sprinkled with a few who can see the bigger picture,  For example people who invent things might not be great in turning it into something commercially viable.

 

Determine the essential skills

 

The essential skills are those that are so vital to the result that you are trying to achieve.  If these are missing from the team, the chances of success are greatly diminished.  Write these down so that you can use as a reference point when it comes to deciding who to get on the team.

 

Determine the desirable skills

 

You may have some skills that are not make or break when it comes to achieving the result but will still be of great value.  So for example, you may need an accountant or your team but you are particularly interested in someone with a strong IT bias.

 

Consider the personal attributes

 

Skills, knowledge, experience are vitally important but success in a team is much more than a pool of brains.  You need people with the right personal qualities like

 

• Good relationship builders

 

• Able to build on ideas of others

 

• Great at listening

 

• Supportive of others

 

• Able to constructively give feedback

 

Don’t underestimate the importance of personal attributes when creating a team.

 

Bottom Line – Success on a team is not guaranteed.  Making sure that you have the right people on the team can however make a huge difference in the results and success achieved.

 

 

 

Duncan Brodie of Goals and Achievements helps accountants and health professionals to become highly effective leaders and managers and improve team working.  Click here to find out more

The new year is a time when most of us make plans for the year ahead.  The vast majority of these plans or goals fizzle out by February or March of each year.

If you want to use goal setting to get results you need to be clear firstly on what a goal is and what a goal is not.   You then need to understand and be ready to address some of the barriers to your success in order to achieve results.

To help you to use goal setting to get results, I am providing a recording from a recent teleseminar that I delivered.  I hope you enjoy it and as always please add your comments or ideas on what you have found most effective when it comes to goal setting.

In all walks of life teams exist to get results.  Getting results depends on teams being both productive and positive.  Teams can be highly productive running at 100 miles an hour but have low levels of morale.  On the flip side they might be highly optimistic but never get anything done.  So what are essential ingredients of highly productive and highly positive teams?

Set clear goals

If teams are to be productive, they need to know where they are heading and what they are going to deliver.  In other word they need to have absolute clarity on their goals.

Common mission

Teams need to be aiming in the same direction, working together towards a common vision or mission.  Without this they are merely a collection of individuals who will pursue what is right for them personally.

Create accountability

When a team needs to account for what it has achieved and what it has not, there is a greater likelihood of achievement rather than below optimal performance.  Accountability is not something that is viewed as negative but a means of staying on track.

Secure resources

Resources (manpower, money and materials) are another ingredient in productive teams.  The resources (whatever they are) once secured need to be used effectively.

Make effective decisions

Highly productive teams take decisions, avoid procrastinating and get things done.  Effective decision making does not happen by chance.  A decision making process is essential.

Encourage proactiviness

Being proactive is about looking out for opportunities to change, develop and improve and then acting swiftly to exploit those opportunities.  Being proactive is about anticipating and thinking outside of the boundaries.

Effective leadership

Effective leadership is core to any team that gets results whether it is in business, communities or sports. 

Be optimistic

People can generally fall into the glass half full or glass half empty category.  The glass half full are the optimists, the glass half empty are the pessimists.  Which group do you think achieves more?

Build trust

Trust is about creating an environment where people can speak openly and objectively without fear.  Trust comes from knowing that others can be counted on, even when the going gets tough.

Respect each other

Respecting each other is not about agreeing with everyone or liking every one.  It is about being willing to listen, understand different points of view and respecting those differing views.

Effective communication

The best teams communicate clearly, avoid ambiguity and see listening as just as important as speaking.

Welcome conflict

No matter how well a team works together, conflict will arise from time to time.  It is how it is dealt with that really matters.  Utilised effectively it can unleash creativity, open new possibilities and contribute to development and growth.

Create sense of belonging

Camaraderie is extremely powerful, especially when the going gets tough.  The best teams work on creating and maintaining that camaraderie.

Value diversity

We are all different.  We all have different personalities, backgrounds, experiences, ways of looking at things and approaching things.  Valuing that diversity gives teams much greater range and helps that to get better results.

At the end of the day teams exist to get results.  So what will you do to develop your team and get even better results in 2009?

These days getting more from the resources you have available is almost taken for granted.  You have more and more tools to help you yet you still struggle to be as productive as you would like.  Does it really need to be like that?  Here are my top 8 tips for being more productive.

1. Discover when you are your best

Some of us are at our very best early in the morning.  For others it might be late into the evening or even in the middle of the day.  Knowing when you are at your best has huge benefits when it comes to scheduling what you do and when you do it.

2. Set goals

Determine at the start of each day what outcomes you will have achieved.  Don’t worry if you don’t have every detail worked out as to how you will do it.  By setting an intention or outcome you will figure out ways of achieving it.

3. Know what matters

Many people lack clarity on what their key deliverables are.  We all know that about 20% of what we do accounts for about 80% of the results.  What is the 20% that gives the most impact for you?  If you don’t know, set out to find out.

4. Start with the biggest challenge

While it always tempting to start with easy stuff and start scoring things off the list, avoid doing this.  Start with the most challenging task first.  It might be a report, a project plan, a specification or an important customer call.  Whatever it is do it first.

5. Manage interruptions

Open plan offices are all the rage.  While they are great for team and group working, you sometimes need some quiet space.  Make it clear to those around you if you need a slot of time without interruptions.

6. Delegate more

If you have a secretary or PA they can often take a lot of tasks off your hands.  This might be for example routine letters or phone calls or operating a bring forward system for items that you have deferred.  If you are leading a team, delegate things to others that can do it better than you.

7. Book out time slots in the diary

The more senior you get, the more likely you are to get your diary filled with meetings.  With diaries also being open to others, it can mean there is no time to get things done.  Make a point of booking out tasks that you have to do as appointments so that the time is not grabbed by someone else.

8. Be realistic

Remember you are a ‘human being’ and not a ‘human doing’.  It is all too easy to set up lists of things to do that are totally unrealistic.  We all have done it.  We like to helpful.  Get into the habit of setting challenging but realistic targets.

At the end of the day improving your productivity is an ongoing process.  Start by taking some simple steps and watch as you start to achieve more and more with less and less effort.

From your own experience what else contributes to your productivity.  Share your experience and wisdom by leaving a comment.