This is the sad picture we can see in many companies with many boss.
As a leader, my best advice would be to apply the principles of Situational Leadership.
The principle is that leaders must use different leadership styles depending on the situation.
The model allows you to analyze the needs of the situation you’re in, and then use the most appropriate leadership style.
If you want to read more about this, go HERE
Interesting reading from HBR
Here-below, you will find a few communications approaches that will help you effectively reach your employees and encourage behaviors that advance your strategy and improve your results.
Here-below, the detail.
1. Keep the message simple, but deep in meaning.
Most organizations have a deeper meaning as to why they exist. This tends to influence strategy, decision-making and behaviors at executive levels, but often isn’t well articulated for employees. What you call it doesn’t matter, your purpose, your why, your core belief, your center. What does matter is that you establish its relevance with employees in a way that makes them care more about the company and about the job they do. It should be at the core of all of your communications, a simple and inspiring message that is easy to relate to and understand. Strategy-specific messages linked to your purpose become tools to help employees connect their day-to-day efforts with the aspiration of the company.
2. Build behavior based on market and customer insights
For employees to fully understand how your strategy is different and better than the competition they need to be in touch with market realities. The challenge is in how to effectively convey those realities so that your people can act on them. By building internal campaigns based on market and customer insights, you bring your strategy to life for your employees through this important lens. Package your content so that it can be shared broadly with all departments in your organization, but in a hands-on way. Expose managers first then provide them with easy-to-implement formats for bringing their teams together, with toolkits that include all the materials they’ll need. The purpose is to encourage their teams to develop department-specific responses, and to generate new ideas and new behaviors based on what they’ve learned.
3. Use the discipline of a framework.
Not all messages are created equal. They need to be prioritized and sequenced based on their purpose. I suggest using an Inspire/Educate/Reinforce framework to map and deliver messages on an annual basis.
4. Think broader than the typical CEO-delivered message. And don’t disappear.
Often corporate communications has a strictly top-down approach. I’ve found that dialogue at the grassroots is just as important, if not more so. Employees are more likely to believe what leaders say when they hear similar arguments from their peers, and conversations can be more persuasive and engaging than one-way presentations. Designate a team of employees to serve as ambassadors responsible for delivering important messages at all levels. Rotate this group annually to get more people involved in being able to represent the strategy inside the company. And when the message comes from leadership, make sure it’s from your most visible, well-regarded leaders. Another mistake is the “big launch event and disappear” approach. Instead, integrate regular communications into employee’s daily routines through detailed planning against the messages mapped in your Inspire/Educate/Reinforce framework.
5. Put on your “real person” hat.
And take off your “corporate person/executive” hat. The fact is, not many people are deeply inspired by the pieces of communication that their companies put out. Much of it ignores one of the most important truths of communication — and especially communication in the early 21st century: be real. “Corporate speak” comes off hollow and lacking in meaning. Authentic messages from you will help employees see the challenges and opportunities as you see them and understand and care about the direction in which you’re trying to take the company.
6. Tell a story.
Facts and figures won’t be remembered. Stories and experiences will. Use storytelling as much as possible to bring humanity to the company and to help employees understand the relevance of your strategy and real-life examples of progress and shortfalls against it. Ask employees to share stories as well, and use these as the foundation for dialogues that foster greater understanding of the behaviors that you want to encourage and enhance versus those that pose risks. Collectively these stories and conversations will be a strong influence on positive culture-building behavior that relates to your core purpose and strategic goals.
7. Use 21st-century media and be unexpected.
The delivery mechanism is as important and makes as much of a statement as the content itself. Most corporate communications have not been seriously dusted off in a while, and the fact is, the way people communicate has changed tremendously in the past five years. Consider the roles of social media, networking, blogs, and games to get the word out in ways that your employees are used to engaging in. Where your message shows up also says a lot. Aim to catch people somewhere that they would least expect it. Is it in the restroom? The stairwell? On their mobile phone?
8. Make the necessary investment.
Most executives recognize how important their employee audience is. They are the largest expense to the company. They often communicate directly with your customers. They single-handedly control most perceptions that consumers have about the brand. So if this is a given, why are we so reluctant to fund internal communication campaigns? I suggest asking this question: What am I willing to invest per employee to help them internalize our strategy and based on that understanding, determine what they need to do to create a differentiated market experience for our customers? Do the math and set your hoped-for ROI high whether it is financial performance or positive shifts in behavior and culture. If you choose not to invest be certain of the risk. If you don’t win over employees first, you certainly won’t succeed in winning with customers, as they ultimately hold that relationship in their hands.
Interesting list.
You will find the original article HERE
10 Things Great Managers Do.
Great and motivating presentation and food for thought.
Life is a journey.
Life is too short not to do something that matters.
Therefore, ask yourself these three questions…
I would add following great books that I personally enjoy reading :
Still some books to read …I will put some of them on my shopping list.
The other option is to read The Personal MBA: Master the Art of Business (Josh Kaufman) which is supposed to summarize the the most important concepts in business .
Today, I had a very good meeting with my team.
Here-below, some tips, I’ve discovered in HBR.
Source : http://web.hbr.org/email/archive/managementtip.php?date=050211
Great book from Guy Kawasaki.
To be honest, still on my shopping list but I really like this infographic !
Look also at this interview of Guy Kawasaki by Brian Solis.
Source : http://www.theharteofmarketing.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/enchantment-infographic.jpg
Great & Practical presentation about behavior change.
I like personnaly the #8 : Focusing on abstract goals more than concrete behaviors.
This is in line with what we can read in Switch http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6570502-switch
What Leads to Success ?
Some inspiring reading and Video & Slides, from Richard St.John.
This is Food for Thought
This is based on 500 interviews and 7 years of research.
Here-below, also the Slides
I like this small book with food for though. Very short and inspiring reading.
Source : Phil Dourado
Interesting reading in Harvard Business Review.
12 Things Good Bosses Believe.
I have a flawed and incomplete understanding of what it feels like to work for me.
My success — and that of my people — depends largely on being the master of obvious and mundane things, not on magical, obscure, or breakthrough ideas or methods.
Having ambitious and well-defined goals is important, but it is useless to think about them much. My job is to focus on the small wins that enable my people to make a little progress every day.
One of the most important, and most difficult, parts of my job is to strike the delicate balance between being too assertive and not assertive enough.
My job is to serve as a human shield, to protect my people from external intrusions, distractions, and idiocy of every stripe — and to avoid imposing my own idiocy on them as well.
I strive to be confident enough to convince people that I am in charge, but humble enough to realize that I am often going to be wrong.
I aim to fight as if I am right, and listen as if I am wrong — and to teach my people to do the same thing.
One of the best tests of my leadership — and my organization — is “what happens after people make a mistake?”
Innovation is crucial to every team and organization. So my job is to encourage my people to generate and test all kinds of new ideas. But it is also my job to help them kill off all the bad ideas we generate, and most of the good ideas, too.
Bad is stronger than good. It is more important to eliminate the negative than to accentuate the positive.
How I do things is as important as what I do.
Because I wield power over others, I am at great risk of acting like an insensitive jerk — and not realizing it.
Source : http://blogs.hbr.org/sutton/2010/05/12_things_good_bosses_believe.html
Great reading !
Every time you make a sales presentation… craft a resume… try to persuade anyone about anything… there’s one question you simply must answer: SO WHAT?
That’s what the people you’re talking to care about. That’s what they need to know. Tell them that — quickly, convincingly, powerfully — and watch them respond by saying, “I love it, I want it, and I’ll buy it.” Knowing this is one thing. Doing it — that’s something else altogether. In this book, Mark Magnacca shows you exactly how to do it — every single time.
In this book you will discover how to :
To know more on this book, visit http://sowhatbook.com/#home
Interesting reading in Harvard Business Review.
Here-below, a short summary :
Six Ways to Refuel Your Energy Every Day
Two tips :
With your eyes closed, try breathing in through your nose to a count of three, and out through your mouth slowly to a count of six.
The more fully and frequently you download what’s on your mind, the less energy you’ll squander in fruitless thinking about undone tasks, and the more energy you’ll have to be fully present in whatever you’re doing.
If taking a run or going to a gym is too time consuming, how about taking a brisk 15 to 30 minute walk outside?
One of the least recognized ways we squander energy is in negative emotions. We’re far quicker to notice what’s wrong in our lives than what’s right.
When we leave the office, many of us carry work with us. The result is that even when we get home, we’re still not truly present. Consider establishing a very specific way to disengage from work so you can leave it behind.
Source : http://blogs.hbr.org/schwartz/2010/12/six-ways-to-refuel-your-energy.html
Simon Vetter has recommended me a great book.
By Scott Eblin, www.eblingroup.com
Much as Good to Great described what separates top companies from the rest, The Next Level: What Insiders Know About Executive Success shows executives what separates leadership success from failure at the next level.
Every day, high performers are tapped to be executives and then left alone to figure out how to succeed in their new role. When this happens, most executives rely on strengths that served them well earlier in their careers.
As executive coach Scott Eblin explains, this is why 40 percent of them fail. Moving successfully to the executive level requires knowing which behaviors and beliefs to let go, as well as which new ones to pick up. Like having a personal executive coach, this confidence-building book outlines a program for success based on frank advice from accomplished senior executives on what to do and to avoid.
Pick Up / What To Do |
Let Go Of / Avoid |
Personal Presence |
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Team Presence |
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Organizational Presence |
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Source: The Next Level: What Insiders Know About Executive Success, by Scott Eblin, page 15.
See below a short video on these concepts.
We’ve implemented the Situational Leadership within my Team at Microsoft.
The principle is that managers must use different leadership styles depending on the situation.
The model allows you to analyze the needs of the situation you’re in, and then use the most appropriate leadership style. Depending on employees’ competences in their task areas and commitment to their tasks, your leadership style should vary from one person to another. You may even lead the same person one way sometimes, and another way at other times
Take a look at the Video of Ken Blanchard (One Minute Manager)
Here-below more details but just read the book of Ken Blanchard
Behavior of the Leader
S1 – Telling / Directing – High task focus, low relationship focus – leaders define the roles and tasks of the ‘follower’, and supervise them closely. Decisions are made by the leader and announced, so communication is largely one-way. For people who lack competence but are enthusiastic and committed. They need direction and supervision to get them started.
S2 – Selling / Coaching</b> – High task focus, high relationship focus – leaders still define roles and tasks, but seeks ideas and suggestions from the follower. Decisions remain the leader’s prerogative, but communication is much more two-way. For people who have some competence but lack commitment. They need direction and supervision because they are still relatively inexperienced. They also need support and praise to build their self-esteem, and involvement in decision-making to restore their commitment.
S3 – Participating / Supporting – Low task focus, high relationship focus – leaders pass day-to-day decisions, such as task allocation and processes, to the follower. The leader facilitates and takes part in decisions, but control is with the follower. For people who have competence, but lack confidence or motivation. They do not need much direction because of their skills, but support is necessary to bolster their confidence and motivation.
S4 – Delegating – Low task focus, low relationship focus – leaders are still involved in decisions and problem-solving, but control is with the follower. The follower decides when and how the leader will be involved. For people who have both competence and commitment. They are able and willing to work on a project by themselves with little supervision or support.
Effective leaders are versatile in being able to move around the matrix according to the situation, so there is no style that is always right. However, we tend to have a preferred style, and in applying Situational Leadership you need to know which one that is for you.
Likewise, the competence and commitment of the follower can also be distinguished in 4 quadrants.
Development Level of the Follower
D4 – High Competence, High Commitment – Experienced at the job, and comfortable with their own ability to do it well. May even be more skilled than the leader.
D3 – High Competence, Variable Commitment – Experienced and capable, but may lack the confidence to go it alone, or the motivation to do it well quickly.
D2 – Some Competence, Low Commitment – May have some relevant skills, but won’t be able to do the job without help. The task or the situation may be new to them.
D1 – Low Competence, High Commitment – Generally lacking the specific skills required for the job in hand, but has the confidence and / or motivation to tackle it.
Similar to the leadership styles, the development levels are also situational.
A person could be skilled, confident and motivated for one part of his/her job, but could be less competent for another part of the job.
Blanchard and Hersey said that the Leadership Style (S1 – S4) of the leader must correspond to the Development level (D1 – D4) of the follower – and it’s the leader who adapts. By adopting the right style to suit the follower’s development level, work gets done, relationships are built up, and most importantly,
the follower’s development level will rise to D4, to everyone’s benefit.
Steps in Situational Leadership. Process
Make an overview per employee of his/her tasks
Assess the employee on each task (D1…D4)
Decide on the leadership (management) style per task (S1…S4)
Discuss the situation with the employee
Make a joint plan.
Follow-up, check and correct.
Strengths of the Situational Leadership model. Benefits
Easy to understand
Easy to use
flag : situational leadership, situational leadership, situational leadership, situational leadership
david merzel, david merzel, david, merzel
I don’t know if you have ever worked with a micro-manager?
This is someone who thinks he or she needs to be involved in everything that happens within the company.
These leaders are closing out the talents of others by not divesting themselves from the day-to-day problem-solving activities of the company.
Great leaders let go of the day-to-day, problem-solving activities of the company.
Rather, they choose to maximize strategic and relationship-building efforts.
The majot risk of micromanagement is disengagement.
Fundamentally, it is a state of distance from one’s work.
A disengaged employee puts in time but little else, and his apathy affects not only his own productivity but that of his colleagues.
Because a consistent pattern of micromanagement tells an employee you don’t trust his work or his judgment, it is a major factor in triggering disengagement.
By contrast, engaged employees are more likely to show up to work, to stay with a firm longer, and to be more productive while they’re on the job.
Interesting to read within Gallup research that highly engaged teams average 18% higher productivity and 12% greater profitability than the least engaged teams.
The good news is that you, as a manager, have enormous influence over your direct reports’ engagement levels.
So what can you do to increase their engagement and hence their productivity? For starters, you can take a page from the Gallup playbook and make a practice of building on employees’ strengths.
My take-out is 4 tips to create more enguagement from your team :
- Say you have a direct report who rarely submits sales reports on time or fills them out correctly. Ask yourself, “At what tasks does this person excel?” Maybe he’s great at troubleshooting customer complaints. Or he’s a consistent source of creative ideas for the next promotional effort. Whatever his strengths, think about ways to build on them so that they can add more value to your organization. At the same time, see if you can minimize or redistribute some of the work at which he’s less successful. This is not always easy to implement but this is key to be flexible !
• Be clear about performance expectations for new hires. As they grow more comfortable in their roles, lessen your direct supervision of their work. I realy like the ONE MINUTE MANAGER approach for this. We’ve implemeted this approach within my TEAM and I think this works. The One Minute Manager reveals three fundamental concepts:
• If you find yourself feeling consistently negative about a particular employee’s performance, check that you’re not falling into the set-up-to-fail syndrome described by Insead-affiliated management scholars Jean-François Manzoni and Jean-Louis Barsoux. This syndrome is marked by a downward performance spiral. The manager, expecting poor performance from the employee, starts noticing only mistakes and overlooking or minimizing successes. To avoid this pattern, regularly challenge your perception about the employee by asking yourself: What are the facts about her work? Is it as bad as I’ve been thinking? Of course, it may be that her performance is so bad that you’ll have to let her go. But in some cases, adjusting your lens might reveal that she’s actually doing some worthwhile work.
• You don’t want to create a culture that says you’re always right, and the employees are usually or always wrong. So invite employees to challenge your opinions. Over time, as they grow more comfortable in this role, they’ll feel freer to discuss any performance concerns they have with you.
Interesting article in Harvard Business Review regarding Leadership.
My take-out is a list of 5 things you can do to achieve self-awareness and personal mastery in leadership.
•Monitor your performance. Note areas in which you excel and need improvement. Communicate these to your team.
•Realize that failures and mistakes are just one step on the road to success.
•Recognize that being aware of the impact that your behavior has on other people is a critical leadership skill.
•Remember that when criticism is difficult to accept, there is probably some truth to it.
•And, finally, learn to give yourself and others credit for improving.
Check out also this Video of Ken Blanchard
I want to share with you, an interesting artcle regarding how to “create a powerful leadership brand”
I just had a very good discussion on this with Simon Vetter (coach and expert in behavioral change and personal brand management) who has done the article here-below with Patricia Wheeler.
My take-out of this article and discussion are following :
————————————-
Here-below, the full article.
Create a Powerful Leadership Brand
By Patricia Wheeler and Simon Vetter
What’s your leadership brand?
Think you don’t have one? Guess again! The term leadership brand is based on two important disciplines: branding and leadership.
First, let’s define branding. Simply put, branding is the perception that people have of a product, service, company or person. A brand stands for something; it is associated with an idea, an emotion, a standard of quality or a unique concept. We think of brands as mostly related to products and organizations….for example, Heinz 57; Exxon; Lexus. Think of brands that have powerful positive connotations for you. What characteristics do you perceive? What emotions does the brand evoke?
In business, companies put tremendous efforts into building their brand because strong branding results in premium price, higher credibility, better reputation, and ultimately, higher revenue.
The same concept applies to people. At this point, those most focused on building their brand tend to be service professionals and entrepreneurs who must differentiate themselves in a crowded marketplace.
The crucial question in personal branding is: What are you known for? Leaders inside organizations increasingly recognize the importance of consciously developing their own personal brand, apart from the brand of their company.
Why should corporate executives be aware of and develop their personal brand? The reasons are similar to those involved in corporate or product branding. When individuals have a credible reputation, this equals a strong personal brand, which in turn leads to higher earning power, better chances for promotion, and more interesting opportunities.
In summary, they are more in demand and get more of what they want. Now, let’s consider leadership and its relationship to branding. The essence of leadership is contained in the following question: Do people want to follow you? We’ve all known executives who had “position power” but failed to connect with and inspire those they led. So how do we combine leadership and branding? Ask yourself the following questions: What aspects of leadership do you want to be known for? In other words, what feelings do you evoke in people so they positively talk about you, refer you, promote you, and want to do business with you?
Let’s take the case of Peter, a highly talented executive director of a Fortune 500 company. Although he was an intelligent, ambitious, no-nonsense manager, Peter was twice turned down for promotion to vice president. He was incredulous when others moved up and he didn’t. His boss, sensing Peter’s frustration, recommended he consult with a coach. Peter was originally skeptical when we encouraged him to reflect on his leadership brand and how he is perceived. He really pushed back, asserting that personal branding is insubstantial, that it pertained more to the sizzle than the steak. “Why should I spend my time on soft stuff like politics? What I’m known for is results, and that’s what really matters.” He strongly believed that his performance and numbers should speak for themselves, and that leaders shouldn’t have to “blow their own horn.” When we conducted a 360° feedback survey with Peter’s co-workers, we uncovered some crucial information about how he was perceived by others. He was, indeed, acknowledged for his drive, creative problem solving, critical thinking, financial acumen and industry knowledge. In addition, he was also perceived by bosses and peers as abrupt, disrespectful and dismissive of others people’s ideas. For example, when one of his peers expressed an idea in a meeting, Peter cut her off, quickly telling her why that idea wouldn’t work. By doing so, Peter discredited his colleague – not just her idea – and conveyed the message “I am smarter than you; your ideas don’t matter, mine do.”
Although Peter was efficient, smart and engaging, he sometimes came across as boastful, impolite, dismissive and disrespectful. This, in essence, was his leadership brand. There was a strong discrepancy between Pete’rs intentions and the message his actions carried. Even though he had the best interests of his company in mind, Peter wasn’t aware of the impact he had on others. This is called a blind spot, when others see something in us that we don’t. There are two lessons we can learn from Peter. First, solicit feedback from the people around us; proactively ask for others’ point of view. To gather this information, we can conduct a 360° online survey, or go to our co-workers and ask for their candid input on how they see us and how we impact others. The goal in this exercise is to see through our own blind spots. The second insight from Peter’s story is that we must ensure that our intentions are congruent with our actions. We all have good intentions, but too often our behaviors leave a different impression. Then we wonder why people respond incongruously to us, don’t do the things we ask them to do or, as in Pete’s case, don’t promote us. Having good intentions is not enough; we must display the behaviors that best convey our intentions to others. Remember, we judge ourselves by our intentions and we judge others by their behaviors.
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