Tag Archive for: Self-Awareness

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Leadership @Customer Experience Management Conference

IQPC: Customer Experience Conference and Leadership

This week I attended the IQPC Customer Experience Management Conference in Sydney. I was fortunate enough to be invited to be a guest speaker during the Focus Day on Monday and many other speakers have shared their thoughts and presentations over the three days.

Although the conference theme was based around Customer Experience, there have been many great quotes and comments regarding leadership, business and culture that are worth sharing. This blog highlights a few of the key points that I felt were most relevant and resonated with my own values and passions.
Thank you to all the speakers for sharing!

  • How are you choosing to challenge what has been done previously? Don’t accept the reasonable reasons from the past.
  • Our employees want to know their leaders and what they care about.

Gordon Ballantyne, Telstra
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  • Leadership cannot be outsourced to HR.
  • Be disciplined: celebrate short-term but don’t forget your ultimate goal.

Dirk Hofman, Nokia
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  • The empowered customer is now in control of the business relationship.
  • 90% of effort is used collecting and collating data and 10% actually using it – it should be the other way around.

Peter Harris, Vision Critical
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  • Question the initial question to truly understand the business problem.
  • Team composition is most important. A lack of a balanced mix is one of the core reasons projects fail.

Mark Nealy, ThoughtWorks
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  • Most organisations and leaders only spend around 20% of their time adding value to the customer.
  • The fundamental mission of business should not be about profit, but rather value creation.

Dr Shayne Silcox, Melville Council
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  • Businesses have to deliver good service to earn the right to sell to customers.

Andrew Pearce, National Australia Bank

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11 Key Leadership and Customer Experience Mantras

CoachStation: Leadership & Customer Experience

This week I am attending the IQPC Customer Experience Management Conference in Sydney. I was fortunate enough to be invited to be a guest speaker during the Focus Day on Monday and presented on the subject of ‘Building Customer Experience Frameworks From The Inside Out’.
The comments and quotes highlight some of my key themes and concepts that I feel are most important when developing a Customer Experience philosophy and strategy:

  1. Unless your business sees Customer Experience as a culture, not a tool, then your customers will feel the pain of what is not being provided by your customer-facing employees.
  2. Leaders should create a culture of employee engagement, empowerment and buy-in that ensures your customers benefit. When we get our leadership mantra right…our employees care about their roles and our customers ‘feel’ the difference.
  3. The so-called soft-skills that differentiate management from leadership are most commonly the key to driving the change in our employees that we are looking for. Leadership is not a tick-the-box exercise. Effective leadership, relationship-building, coaching, connecting, understanding employee motivations, empowerment are all possible – but they take considerable strategy, effort and application.
  4. Foundation values such as empowerment and employee satisfaction cannot be given to an individual but creating an environment that has a higher likelihood towards meeting these needs is possible.
  5. Assumptions are regularly made regarding leaders capability to enact change and employees willingness to make it stick. It is a mistake to assume that employees can and will automatically apply change just because they are asked to.
  6. Businesses exist primarily to provide a product or service that ultimately maximises profit. We, as leaders and business owners have an obligation to our employees greater than simply using them as tools to increase profit.
  7. Employee engagement, buy-in, effective leadership and an ability to coach can be the difference between a transactional, short-term outcome and real, sustained transformational change.
  8. There is a gap between intent and behaviour when it comes to leadership, development, employee engagement, empowerment and related activities in many organisations.
  9. In my experience too often a business runs a workshop, sends an employee to a training session or takes some other well-intentioned step to rectify a perceived or real gap. In itself, attendance at a session such as this will make little difference in behaviour or output for most people. People generally do not have the ability to interpret all of this information and make meaningful change. An employee may also not be working in a culture that reinforces or drives change as a result of this ‘new knowledge’. Post-training follow up and reinforcement through coaching are key.
  10. A bottom-up approach for providing a great customer experience only takes you so far. A genuinely effective customer experience approach requires a top-down strategy based on broad and extensive cultural change.
  11. Leaders often focus on the tangible process, systems and technology aspects of business. The challenge is to ensure we provide more than a cursory input into our employees and the link between engagement and customer service.

…and the presentation was sealed by elements from Ken Blanchard’s recent blog, worth repeating:
It all starts with the leaders of the organization creating a motivating environment for their people to work in. When that happens, it’s no surprise when the workers go out of their way to serve their customers…and the good word gets around. The organization’s best salespeople are the customers they’re already serving. The end result of all of this good news is that the organization becomes sound financially.
So often we think business is all about making money and that customers are the most important thing. But if you don’t treat your employees well and give them a reason to come to work, they aren’t going to be motivated to give excellent service to your customers, and customers who aren’t treated well have lots of other places they can go.
Think of your organization as a stagecoach. Upper management might be the drivers of the stagecoach, but your people are the horses—the ones who create the forward movement. If the leaders get knocked out of the stagecoach, it keeps moving. But if something happens to the horses, everything comes to a screeching halt. So serve and help each other, and then reach out to your customers with the enthusiasm and desire and fabulous service that will make them raving fans…

Don’t forget that without your people, you’re nothing.

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Developing and Empowering Leaders – Richard Branson (Part 2)

Richard Branson in South Africa, 2004 - Leadership, Coaching and EmpowermentRichard Branson recently stated that coaching senior managers can be difficult for various reasons, not the least of which is the difficulty in finding an uninterrupted period of time to conduct and review.
In Part 1 I noted the first three guidelines Richard Branson highlighted in a recent article in the Business Review Weekly magazine titled, 7 Rules For Managers, focusing on effective leadership, coaching and empowering leaders.This post concludes the guidelines, consisting of the final four points.

Who’s In Charge? It’s Up To You?
A good manager provides clear roles for members of his team, which enables everyone to get on with the job of running the business. Once you’ve made these choices, do not micromanage. If you make a habit of diving in and changing a major project’s direction or otherwise intervening, your employees will learn to be dependent on you, and they will not reach their full potential.

CoachStation Thoughts:

Setting key objectives for yourself, your team and business is important to ensure a focus on the aims and strategy is maintained. Providing context and standards allows your team member to understand where they fit in and ensure they work within the ‘rules’ and expectations. However, flexing between providing enough context and suitable parameters without constricting performance and innovation is a balance that must be established. Responsibility, accountability and empowerment are only ‘buzz-words’ when they are not applied or unfamiliar – there is power in their application. I wrote more about expectations in an earlier post: Expectation Setting – Who Cares?

Champion Your Employees’ Ideas
When your team makes a judgment call, you need to follow through with conviction. If you cast doubt and let their project languish, your team will not have the impetus or confidence to take the next steps. If you insist on making every big decision yourself, you will create a terrible log jam. Do not fall into the trap of asking for further reports in order to justify moving forward. It is always better to act; it is debilitating to dither.

CoachStation Thoughts:

Employ the right people, support and develop them and give them the freedom to make their own mistakes and revel in successes.

Learn From Your Mistakes and Move On
It is impossible to get every decision right. When things go wrong, review with your team what happened and learn from it together. But don’t linger – dust yourself off and tackle the next challenge.
It is important not to keep tinkering with a project in hopes of delaying its end. At Virgin, we have not always got this right – for instance, we hung onto our Megastores longer than we should have.

CoachStation Thoughts:

We all make decisions every day – none of us get it right all the time. Holding people accountable is key to development and building trust. Looking for or portraying perfectionism, for example, has little benefit, however the ability to provide and receive feedback reflects well on you as a leader and the rapport you have with your team. Learn from mistakes because they are not insurmountable – ignore them and they will continue.

Celebrate Successes Every Day
When someone on your team has a big success, celebrate it and tell others. This is something that should be part of your everyday work – you should try to catch your team doing something right.

CoachStation Thoughts:

Developing a team and employee brand can be enhanced through supporting and advocating, when earned. Catching your team doing something right is not always a natural or easily applied trait for many leaders. It is a very powerful relationship-builder when applied well.

As stated, Richard Branson claimed that these guidelines hold true in almost any situation. Do you agree?
I would love to hear your thoughts and comments, whilst possibly providing your own guidelines you believe are key in leadership.

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Developing and Empowering Leaders – Richard Branson (Part 1)

Sir Richard Branson at the eTalk Festival Part...

Sir Richard Branson at the eTalk Festival Party, during the Toronto International Film Festival. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Richard Branson recently stated that coaching senior managers can be difficult for various reasons, not the least of which is the difficulty in finding an uninterrupted period of time to conduct and review. Branson and his senior leaders spend time together each year at his home on Necker Island to discuss the opportunities and challenges the Virgin business group and leaders currently face.

I am certain this is a great opportunity to solve the business issues, share and learn from each other, however equally sure this is only part of the development story for individuals and future of the Virgin group and other companies in general.
Sharing and learning from others is one aspect of coaching and leadership development, however knowing something or having additional information about a situation or about oneself does not equate to a change in behaviour or enhanced skill in application.
The purpose of this blog is to draw upon and respond to a set of guidelines Richard Branson highlighted in a recent article in the Business Review Weekly magazine titled, 7 Rules For Managers, focusing on effective leadership, coaching and empowering leaders.

Keep Your Team Informed
It is crucial to set objectives for each period according to your business’s strategy – and then make sure all employees know about them.
Sally told us that when she was working for the British government, every summer, ministers appointed to cabinet received a note from Blair that outlined his strategic approach for the year and set clear objectives for each department. Cabinet met for a week to discuss these before members of parliament returned from holidays and had the chance to analyse and challenge the approach. Thereafter, the team received a note from Blair every Sunday, which was discussed at a meeting next morning to agree on key actions.
Communicating your objectives regularly will help ensure your team has a framework for making decisions. It is important all feel welcome to discuss the group’s objectives – that open debate is encouraged – because everyone will have a responsibility to follow through.

CoachStation Thoughts:

The ability to strike the balance between providing objectives, context, setting standards, parameters and keeping your team members informed as progression occurs is a fine line. I believe that the best outcomes derive through providing more detail rather than less, always balanced between keeping confidential information confidential, but sharing what is appropriate providing context and clarity.

  1. People respond more openly to feedback, accept change and are generally more willing to contribute when they have the necessary detail and information to feel connected to the business, engaged and empowered.
  2. Alignment to/with direction and goals is critical, although too often a company vision, mission statements and goals are seen as just words written on a page. Appropriate detail and context can help to make the vision a reality.

Define The Rules Of The Road
It is important to define core values for your business, which you and your employees can refer to when making decisions. In assessing investments and new directions at Virgin, we have always considered whether the proposed business meets our core values, which helps us manage our diverse portfolio and maintain consistency. We look at whether it will do something different to most or all companies in the industry or sector; whether it will provide real value, great customer service and retain the sense of fun and pride that distinguishes a good from a great business. Recently we added a new core value: we test whether a new business will have the legs to go overseas and can be scaled up within about three years.

CoachStation Thoughts:

Values are critical for both individuals and businesses. Values provide a base for alignment between yourself and the business that employs you. They allow an individual to feel connected and maintain a clear view of the reasons for doing what they do. Understanding what is important to you personally and at work also assists to motivate or re-clarify, providing direction. For an organisation it is important to be nimble, efficient and flexible in structure and design however it should also be clear in its identification and delivery of its core values. This clarity provides a clear view of what employees, customers and other stakeholders can expect when working with the organisation.

  1. Core values are most often ‘non-negotiables’, meaning that you are most likely to walk away from a relationship, workplace or situation when there is a disjoint in alignment.
  2. Shared values encourage a high level of trust within a team and organisation, strengthening commitment and the likelihood for higher levels of equity, honesty, fairness, sharing, respect and other positive aspects.
  3. Values are core to a brand – that of individual’s and businesses. Most importantly, to be effective and meaningful, values must be more than words!

Focus, Focus, Focus
It is tempting to try to do too much; for ambitious managers and their teams, there are always too many projects and too little time. But successful organizations know what their priorities are: They tackle the really important projects and the rest falls into place.

CoachStation Thoughts:

One of the most important skills for a manager or leader, particularly when starting out is to know where to spend your time. Often time management skills are emphasised or provided as a necessary development area during feedback sessions, however few people actually find the optimum balance. The ability to prioritise is even more crucial. In most roles an individual could work 24/7 and still not achieve all that is possible (or sometimes expected!), so identifying what are the most important tasks and strategies that will provide the ‘biggest bang for your buck’ has to be one of the first steps.

  1. One tip is to consider the Pareto Principle or what is more commonly known as the 80 / 20 rule to assist in determining the ‘right’ things to focus on.
  2. The ideal situation occurs when you think ahead and have a strategic mindset, tackling issues before they become urgent. The ultimate control occurs when your time is being spent on tasks and actions that are high impact but low urgency.
  3. Many people will make demands on your time – it is important that you control where you spend this time, not have it dictated to you by others.

Next week I will conclude this blog with the final four guidelines highlighted by Sir Richard.

Let me know what you think of the points made in part 1 of this blog and whether you believe they have relevance in modern business and leadership development.

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The Positive Impact Of Connecting

I recently read an outstanding article titled ‘The Why (and How) of Employee Engagement‘. It incorporates an interview with Kevin Kruse, entrepreneur and CEO of Kru Research and co-author, along with Rudy Karsan, of We: How to Increase Performance and Profits Through Full Engagement.

I am particularly interested in this topic as it is often one of the key differences between those in charge who are managing and those who are leading. Employee engagement is a large topic with many inputs. On a one-to-one level or team level the connections made form part of the engagement story.

There are many interesting points made in the article, notably the need to apply the same rigor and analysis to engagement as we would any other area of management by measuring its success, holding leaders accountable and examining employees’ motivation at work. (1) The leader who is effective in their role recognises that connection between people occurs through more than just the words used. A bond is formed that can be difficult to explain, but has many benefits, both for the people involved and the employer. I believe that we have an obligation as leaders to provide the best opportunity to develop others and the ability to align with depth in your team is a platform to work from in this process.

I found the end statement in the article most compelling: The real why of engagement is not just about company profits. It’s about what you do on a day-to-day basis to impact the health of those who report to you. It’s impacting the relationships and the families of those who report to you. I never hear this in the talk about engagement. People talk about getting a five-times-higher stock price, [and] you want to engage your people so they don’t go to the competition. Those are good reasons, but I forget those reasons when I show up at work and I have a full calendar and 100 emails and reports to do.

What’s going to touch me, what’s going to motivate me, is when I look at that direct report. I see Jane there and I see her husband and I see her kids. What I do and say on a day-to-day basis is impacting Jane and her family. That’s going to help me be engagement-oriented on a day-to-day basis. (1)

The ability to connect with others, both in and out of work is so important. This is about understanding the person as a person, not an employee. In the workplace these are often seen as the soft-skills or ‘nice to have’ attributes, but are underestimated in terms of the benefits. The process of ticking boxes so that it appears the manager is doing their job by pretending to build strong and meaningful relationships offers little value. Most people, even those who cannot define or articulate the reasons why, will usually know when a manager is genuinely connecting or is doing it to play a part.

Connecting with people provides a platform for influence, delegation, trust-building and other positive outcomes. An effective leader knows this intuitively and works hard to make sure relationships exist with meaning, even when there may not be an initial strong affiliation. A few key thoughts:

  • The connection will be different with different employees or relationships. Like any relationship, it requires work to make it effective, but a natural connection will occur between people and more readily with some more than others. This is OK – don’t overwork it – this is a natural part of being human.
  • Forcing a connection is not recommended however working through the early stages of a relationship to make sure both parties are giving it their best shot may bear fruit.
  • Work beyond first impressions – they are not always as accurate as we would like to think.
  • Learn the skill. Work from your strengths and understand the power of connecting because you have felt it. It can be quite intoxicating and like other areas of leadership, when discovered, it is something that many of us actively seek in our roles in and out of work.

Let me know what you think.

(1) The Why and How Of Employee Engagement (talentmgmt.com)

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Leadership Starts Early…Real Early

I love my family. I am very proud of my three daughters. I am also pleased that my wife, Julie, and I (almost always!!!) share a similar view on raising our girls. Like any parents, we want our girls to be healthy, happy and able to cope with the many challenges life offers, whilst maximise the joy in their lives, now and in the future. Julie and I set high standards. We are consistent. We love our girls. We lead…and we are developing our daughter’s accordingly.

Leadership is not a title…it is a series of attitudes, developed skills and related actions. Julie and I discuss values with our daughter’s, particularly as our eldest, Maddy, is about to turn 10 – I do wonder where that decade has gone? We do not take this all for granted, regularly assessing and re-assessing where we are at in our relationships and development of our girls.

But we cannot do it ourselves. We are so very fortunate to have a great family support network who are always there for us and share our pains and joys. We are also grateful for the school that Maddy and our middle daughter, Charlotte (and as of next year, Brianna) attend. I am particularly excited to see the emphasis on broader development of each child, including spirituality, respect, resilience, and other values.

Tonight I read the St. Andrews school newsletter and I felt compelled to share a segment with you, as it is so enlightening to see the focus on leadership and related elements at a learning institution dedicated to primary school aged children.

Each year the school focuses on a theme, which for 2012 is ‘Step Up and Shine’. The opening few paragraphs from this week’s newsletter summarise the objective and context nicely:

At the parent teacher night we again touched on the fact that our theme for this year is “Step up and Shine” and framed that theme under the banner of our leadership for the good of our children leadership. We also established that good leaders are very good story tellers. The challenge for us all is to step up and lead for good and be a good example for our children. In order to be a good leader you need to be aware of and be able to show witness via an understanding of three key points. These key points are as follows:

  1. Know who you are and what you believe in.
  2. Know who the organisation (school) is and what that organisation (school) stands for.
  3. Know that actions speak louder than words when you are witnessing to your own values and the organisation’s (school) charter/values/goals.

Stepping up and shining can be easy when you take these into account as you develop and strengthen the right relationships in your own family, your school family and the wider community.

John – School Principal

 

steve riddle familyWhat a wonderful message! The consistency in how we wish to raise our girls and that supported by our school gives me a lot of faith that we will all see the benefit of preparing tomorrow’s adults today, with a well-rounded attitude and set of values. Wanting the best for our children is one thing. Providing it is another point completely. It is a joint effort – the community, family, school and us as parents all have a part to play.

There are parallels in this message for us as adults, employees and certainly as leaders. When was the last time you revisited your core values, relationships and beliefs? Do we take the time to focus on what is important to us? How aligned are you to those things you once considered most important?

Maybe it is time to take stock. Maybe it is time to Step Up and Shine!

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Strategic Thinking and Leadership

Do you truly understand the difference between strategic and tactical thinking and application?

If so, do you understand enough about the similarities and differences to create aligned goals, apply meaningful actions and ensure that one leads effortlessly to the other?

Many a plan or process has failed due to a lack of clear direction and early identification of the problem to be solved, leading to a poor concept of the strategies required.

Leadership and Strategic Thinking
The subject of strategy is vast and complex. This blog highlights that there is power in understanding what strategic thinking is and its necessary alignment to the tactical tasks and practical choices we make every day. In this instance, a useful definition of strategy is, “A word of military origin (which) refers to a plan of action designed to achieve a particular goal. In military usage strategy is distinct from tactics, which are concerned with the conduct of an engagement, while strategy is concerned with how different engagements are linked” (1).

This is a relevant point – although business is obviously different to the military, the context of the definition has significance, particularly the point that strategy refers to the links between leadership, different engagements (military) and actions/tasks (business).

I was working with someone recently who engaged me to assist with his preparation for an interview for a more senior leadership position. The conversation went well and I was able to offer him several suggestions and concepts designed to stretch his thinking, to be better prepared for the interview and importantly, a plan for the role, if successful.

Whilst we were talking however, a concept became much clearer to me. In my colleagues case he was able to talk to many relevant, tactical initiatives and actions that could be applied in his first three months. In contrast, his strategic assessment and context was not as strong and we spent much of the session focusing on this subject. In essence, I was asking whether he had an understanding of the plan of action for what he would be trying to achieve and why these points were of core focus.
Strategic Thinking MindMap in Leadership
After reflecting on this and other similar discussions, the part that I find most intriguing is that although people generally have a solid grasp of the broader concepts of strategy, they are often much more experienced and comfortable talking to the tactical elements. An inability to define strategies is not unusual for many in entry-level management roles who have less experience and exposure to strategic thinking but this skill-gap becomes an issue when promoted to more senior leadership roles, where this is seen as one of the more important, core skill requirements.

Understanding the bigger picture is important: “Setting strategy isn’t the same as leading strategy. Even the best strategist can falter when it comes to implementing and sustaining the right direction for the business. In fact, statistics indicate that only from 4 to 7 percent of leader‟s exhibit strategic skills, a woefully inadequate amount given the demands of organizations in today’s environment… But the pressure to meet short-term targets and solve functional problems is creating a leadership pipeline with limited strategic leadership capacity…Strategic thinking is grounded in a strong understanding of the complex relationship between the organization and its environment. Strategic thinkers take a broad view; ask probing questions; and identify connections, patterns and key issues” (2).

It may seem to be an odd appraisal in this context but it is clear to me that most managers are more comfortable discussing and managing the numbers than they are at leading their people through addressing the more challenging development requirements or what are commonly referred to as ‘soft-skills’.

Regular discussions surrounding results and the relationship to business targets with team members are common-place. Although relating the coaching session to results is important, challenging an individual to improve their results through highlighting the numbers does not, in itself, provide a platform or understanding of how to change the inputs that contribute to the results and outcomes. In my experience, most people will find other ways to simply meet their numbers, taking short-cuts and often demonstrating behaviours that are at loggerheads with business expectations and culture.

Ironically, these discussions often drive the type of behaviour and culture that the manager is trying to avoid by conducting the meeting in the first place. This relates to the anomaly between strategic thinking and tactical ability in that most managers find it easier to apply the day-to-day tactical elements (numbers and outcomes) than analysing the inputs and considering the bigger picture. This ‘safe-zone’ within the tactical-related realm of thinking, can be enhanced through skill gaps, fear or avoidance as the business KPI’s, outcomes and other results mostly stem from our effectiveness at leading and developing the skills, attitudes and attributes of your people. Most managers accept this rationale but their own fears and self-need to remain within their comfort zone means that they avoid addressing (the perceived) more difficult soft-skill essentials of their team.

So, the question remains, what comes first the strategic or tactical component? In terms of a strategic approach, the point is that most people focus their thoughts and energies at the tactical level, trying (or hoping!!) that the strategies will become more evident at a later date as progress occurs. This thinking is in complete contrast to the more effective methodology where development of a strategy must come first and the goals, direction and tactical actions flow from and towards the strategic concepts.

Factors such as identifying and acknowledging obstacles, discovery of potential solutions, developing a common purpose, understanding values, identifying benefits of improvement and ability to track progress, all form part of the broader concept. In each case these elements should all be drawn back to the strategic view. Relevant questions to ask yourself are:

  • Have you clearly stated what the problem is and considered what you are trying to solve in the first place?
  • Have you developed a strategy with enough context and depth for the tactical elements to be developed and aligned to?
  • Alternatively, have you moved into solutions mode too early, seeking possible responses to the issue at hand without understanding the broader issues and impacts?

As stated earlier, goal or process failure is often due to a lack of clear direction and early identification of the problem to be solved. Often this is referred to as a ‘shotgun’ approach where many ideas and solutions are put into place hoping that one or more will hit the mark and solve the problem(s).

Unfortunately this type of approach has many shortcomings, including cost-blowouts, confusion from poorly communicated actions and a lack of buy-in or reduction in discretionary effort from stakeholders and staff, amongst many other adverse outcomes.

Development of a strategy and the knowledge that there is a difference between strategic and tactical application is a significant topic, not just in the business world, but also in personal decision-making. I have only scratched the surface, however, hopefully this article has stimulated and challenged you to identify the differences between blindly taking action based on little fore-thought or strategic planning. There are many benefits in understanding the ‘bigger picture’ and identifying what you are working towards.

Without an ability to strategise thought into meaningful action you are most likely guessing; making assumptions; and ‘hoping more than knowing’ your future direction and the reasons why this path is the right one.

The good news is that with a change in thought-process and practice, you can develop skills in strategic thinking and implementation, allowing you to become one of the core drivers of change within your business.

As is always the case, the choice is yours!

 

The quality of leadership, more than any other single factor, determines the success or failure of an organization
Fred Fiedler and Martin Chemers

 

 

(1) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategy: Strategy @Wikipedia
(2) www.ccl.org/leadership/enewsletter/2011/MAYstrategy.aspx?sp_rid=&sp_mid=36650204: Center for Creative Leadership

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Leadership, The Coach and Coaching – Ange Postecoglou

With this evening’s win by Australia in the Asian Cup Football, it is timely to share a blog I wrote a couple of years ago after seeing and hearing Ange Postecoglou speak. He was then and is now a very inspiring leader. So much so that he has turned our national team around in a very short period…leading to tonight’s win.

His thoughts and words regarding team, leadership and culture are just as relevant in business as they are in sport.

I was fortunate to attend an evening hosted by one of my local football clubs on Friday night. The guest speaker was Ange Postecoglou, head coach of our local nationally based football (soccer) side, the Brisbane Roar. Ange has represented Australia playing football and has successfully transitioned into coaching ranks.

Ange was able to offer significant insight into his own style and the great success his club has had in recent seasons. TheBrisbane Roar FC logore were several points about leadership and team culture that particularly resonated for me. A selection of the key points raised by Ange are highlighted below, followed by my own thoughts about how they translate to the business environment.

Point 1: The team exists because of the players and their ability to perform and follow the team plan. All other people in the club, including the coach, CEO and other staff are there because of the players and they should be served accordingly.

This is as true in business as in sport. As conveyed by Ken Blanchard and other thought leaders, the ability and willingness to serve your team as individual’s and a unit is one of the great leadership mindsets. You are there for your team, not the other way around.

Point 2: If you really believe in something, you must be prepared to make decisions and stick by them. Ultimately the buck stops with the head coach, so make sure you are in a position to make decisions and reinforce them through action.

Every leader has their own style. Some are more decisive, democratic, inclusive etc. however the leader should lead. This requires the ability to make decisions, align them to business and team goals and compel others to buy into the concepts because overall accountability still sits with the you as the leader and it is difficult to achieve on your own.

Point 3: Although Ange acknowledged he is ‘not a fan’ of confrontation, he is more than willing to take it on when it comes his way.

Although I have met very few people who enjoy confrontation (there is a difference between ability to manage confrontation and enjoying it), the skill to effectively manage confrontational situations is key to leadership. Emotional intelligence, engagement and empathy are important in my experience – reading the situation clearly by understanding the other person’s perspective and reasons why the situation has escalated help to manage confrontation.

Point 4: Not everyone will fit into your team culture, plan and goals, even if they are very good players and stalwarts of the team. (Note: when Ange took over coaching the Brisbane Roar team in 2009, he chose to release a handful of key players and the captain, which, although unpopular with supporter’s and the media at the time, have proven to be the right moves).

This is an interesting point. Through force of conviction, clear goals and direction, Ange was able to identify those player’s who were willing and flexible enough to transition across to the new team culture. ‘Star’ players and high performance historically does not necessarily translate to continued success within a different culture and/or set of expectations.

Point 5: Performance – it is OK to make mistakes if you are playing the team way. Be prepared to allow player’s to make mistakes, but not if they are playing as individual’s. Be brave and allow the players to express themselves, within the team guidelines.

Within my team and when I am facilitating leadership development sessions, I often discuss the concept of boundaries and expectations. Among other expectations, it is imperative to set clear direction and limits so that all team member’s are aware of guidelines, where they fit in, what they will be measured upon and how they are supported. Without it you are encouraging individualism, creating confusion and an environment of assumptions. I have found it is about finding the balance between expectation-setting and providing enough space to be innovative, creative and proactive.

Point 6: Ange would prefer to see the team play the team way and adhere to the team structure and lose than get a good result by not following the team plan. He was able to offer examples of games where he was happy overall with the effort, organisation and structure of the game but the result did not go the team’s way. Alternatively he has on occasion been unhappy with the team’s response even with a good result. His message was clear, how we get there is just as important, if not more so, than the end result!

I could not agree more with this concept. Too often I see managers rewarding and recognising employees based on the end result, with no regard as to how it was achieved. I interpreted this message as the ‘right’ journey will more often than not provide the ‘right’ result and the team culture, ethic and standard will be reinforced even further as a result. This point focuses on the ‘how’. Ultimately, the long-term culture and level of understanding benefits from this mindset.

This also relates to the belief from some that ‘the end justifies the means’, which I do not support. I have often seen greater growth and learning occur for someone through the sequences contained within the journey more so than benefits achieved from the outcome. The outcome in itself is a short-lived effect – the path to get there has many opportunities to learn and contribute. Developing a strong team brand, aligned to values and integrity will always create a team dynamic and culture that has long-term benefits, even through the challenge of staff turnover and transition periods.

Point 7: Each morning, the players have to shake the hand and acknowledge every other player, staff member and employee of the club that they come across.

Another interesting concept. Although it feels a little contrived, ‘forcing’ this initially may have felt unnatural to some player’s, however I see the point. Being present and engaging those in your team and beyond creates a dynamic and inclusive environment. Hopefully this becomes a natural part of the culture and ultimately more ‘real’ for those involved, however initially creating a team standard more overtly has obvious benefit. Essentially, show an interest in your people because you are actually interested not because you feel you should!

Point 8: You play for what’s on the front of the jersey (team jumper) not what’s on the back!

I love this point! The front of the jumper has the team logo (Brisbane Roar); national competition logo (A-League); and the sponsors logo. Ange is reinforcing that the player should respect and be proud of the club, the association that provides the opportunity to play and the sponsors who enable the team to succeed through sponsorship and funding. The back of the jumper has the player’s name and player number. The message is clear – in the Roar culture, play for yourself and you won’t fit in to his team. In business, focus on your needs only and you are missing the whole point of leadership!!

Point 9: Taking shortcuts has implications. Ownership for the team’s success must be held by the entire team. Leadership traits are the responsibility of all.

I am a keen advocate of developing leadership skills in people, even if they do not have direct reports. Leadership is more than a role or title – it is first and foremost an attitude, with the skills and traits that effective leaders display being able to be learned by almost anyone. It takes significant effort and time to develop though, with no silver bullet to learning and application of leadership. Of course, how well these skills are portrayed is critical, but the point that leadership within the team is the responsibility for all makes perfect sense. There is the leader and there are those who lead!

Overall, there were many interesting points raised on the night. Although the context between sports coaching, business and leadership has been written about many times, the first-hand examples and theories provided by Ange in his role as a successful coach of a national sporting team, have many parallels to business. How many can you identify with?

I am very interested in your own thoughts and comments relating to sports coaching, leadership and aligned successes.

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Expectation Setting – Who Cares?

Feeling The Pressure Of Long Hours...Are Expectations Clear?!!

Does an employee have the right to clear expectations?

Or, is it the employee’s responsibility to ask if they are unclear about any aspect of their role. As leader’s should we just expect that the clarity and details will come in time – it’s not like there is an expectation of high performance on day 1..or day 10..or day…? Or, is there never an expectation of high performance? There should be!

Earlier this week I read a blog on the Leaders Beacon website (thanks Colleen Sharen) providing insight into expectation setting. It got me thinking. How well do we as leaders really set clear expectations? Do we induct our new employees effectively? Is this even on the radar of leaders or central to business planning and strategy? Do we consider business requirements, measurement and regularly review these aspects for our longer-tenured team member’s? Fair questions for leaders…not so great a reality.

Expectation setting is more than providing a broad brush-stroke of requirements as highlighted in a position description document. It is also not simply a high-level group of role requirements that form part of the probation period, if there is one. It goes well beyond that and has a direct correlation to employee engagement. It is defining a reality for that employee – with depth and meaning – based on the information included within but not exclusively from work documents, policies and position descriptions. Yet, it is more than that.

Every individual has different expectations of themselves, their leader and the employer. Each team member brings different skills, values, biases, desires and other personal traits to their role. It is the leaders job to understand the employee well enough to blend business needs with personal needs. This helps to build strong relationships, opportunity to align values and remove uncertainty that often comes from unexplained or misunderstood diversity between employees.

Clarity in expectations is not only important for each employee but clearly of benefit to the employer/business. The risk is that if expectations are not clearly set and understood, performance will suffer, morale of this employee and possibly others around them may decrease and certainly, the ability to ‘master’ their role is diminished. It is a lose-lose situation and yet not all that rare an occurrence.

Reduced discretionary effort and a limited willingness to engage beyond the bare minimum are also potential risks. Additional pressure is often felt by the employee and can be demonstrated through behaviours such as increased hours in the workplace, withdrawing from the team, irritability, sullen attitudes and other negative outcomes.

Setting each team member up for success starts before their first day. We all make judgments and these start during the recruitment and interview process – for both the employer and the potential employee. Hopefully, you have set a good standard of communication and enhanced the image of your business throughout the recruitment process. This high standard certainly must be consistently delivered from day one of employment, assisting to build employee engagement, which is of value to any leader as noted below.

  • In world-class organizations, the ratio of engaged to actively disengaged employees is 9.57:1.
  • In average organizations, the ratio of engaged to actively disengaged employees is 1.83:1.

Actively disengaged employees erode an organization’s bottom line while breaking the spirits of colleagues in the process…estimates this cost to be more than $300 billion in lost productivity alone. Beyond the significant differences engaged workgroups show in productivity, profitability, safety incidents, and absenteeism versus disengaged workgroups, we have proven that engaged organizations have 3.9 times the earnings per share (EPS) growth rate compared to organizations with lower engagement in their same industry. (1)

In any role, the employee has the right to expect a clear understanding of what is required of them. Every task, function, skillset, policy and other related expectations should be provided early in his or her tenure. This set of expectations should then form part of the regular rhythm of coaching, discussions and review.

It is never fair employment strategy nor smart leadership to expect that an employee will ‘pick up’ all they need to perform their role to a standard if that standard is never clearly established.

This includes the need to also check in and ensure clarity (for both parties), along with a willingness and ability to meet the expectations now or in the future with the proper support, development and training.

If we don’t, then we are breeding and encouraging mediocrity in our leadership standards, within our team cultures and potentially setting the bar low before your business has had a chance to excel.

Expectation setting – who cares? You should!

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Falling Into Leadership

An individual taking on a leadership role is often something that has ‘just happened’.

Being a genuine leader does not come from the role and title designated to you but rather from your decision-making, inclusiveness, delegation skills, ability to communicate and other, well-recognised and documented traits. Many of these traits can be learned and enhanced through proper coaching.

Does this story mean anything to you?

You started in a company at a lower level. Opportunity presented itself in the form of a chance to step-up temporarily or permanently into a role providing more money, esteem, credibility or some other perceived benefit. You jumped at it! Of course, along with all of the benefits the role also came with much higher expectation…that of others and your self.

You worked hard…things went fairly well but you didn’t really feel supported to truly excel. You wanted to be the best operator so didn’t ask many questions  – after all, asking questions shows that you were not ready for the promotion in the first place, doesn’t it? “Better to bite your tongue and work your way through the issues on your own”, is a common thought and action at this stage.

Your boss didn’t spend much time developing you or even working with you day to day. This autonomy had its benefits, but also plenty of downside. You were often stressed, tried to please everyone and in so doing often pleased the few, including yourself.

Longer hours and pressure meant that you regularly wanted something different but didn’t know how to achieve it or even what that difference looks like.

However, after a while further opportunity presented itself. Another step onwards and upwards. You wondered why you were being considered as you don’ t feel like you have been particularly effective in your current role, but people seem to like you and you occasionally receive some good feedback, however insincere it often seems. You know in your heart that you are not ready for more responsibility…more stress…but you wonder can I “fake it ‘til I make it at an even higher level?”

So, you take on the new role because it’s expected of you, or it offers greater prestige, salary or some other perceived benefit – you don’t want to let others down and certainly the benefits outweigh the negatives…don’t they!??

Now, you’re leading people.

You are responsible for a process and regular input into projects and other ad-hoc work requiring your expertise, skill and knowledge. You are also now not only accountable for yourself but leading, developing, coaching and inspiring others. Are you ready to lead? If not, the impact will be felt by many. Effective leadership can have a significant benefit on a team or business culture, personnel satisfaction, attrition, sickness levels and the bottom line. Ineffective leadership has exactly the opposite impact. Now, how does that pressure feel for you???

Does this scenario sound familiar? In my experience and working with many new and experienced leaders, this is a very common journey felt by many. Most of these people felt they had few opportunities to rectify their situation. Progress and genuine development will only succeed if you are willing to take some risks, source someone to assist you (a coach, mentor, role-model or some other trusted person) and challenge your own beliefs, perceptions and perspectives.

The ability to take yourself out of your comfort zone often enough to test yourself and learn, is key. Knowing when to step back into your comfort zone is also a skill linked to self-awareness and emotional intelligence. These are skills and traits that can be learned.

Regularly the difference for individuals who are experiencing these fears, self-limiting beliefs, poor feedback and other negative impacts is their willingness to seek help. There is no doubt that the most effective and respected leaders in any role or organisation are those who recognise that they are not in their role because they have all the answers. Rather they are successful because they understand their own strengths and limitations, possessing the emotional intelligence to surround themselves with a team who have various strengths and skillsets that contribute to the synergy and effectiveness of the team.

Ironically, emphasising delegation as a standard, building strong/ trusting relationships, focusing on self-development and coaching of others, amongst other elements starts to enable development and improvement. This manifests itself through better work-life balance, team members feeling more engaged through contribution and being heard, less of a feeling that the leader has to take on all the work his/herself, prioritisation and many, many other more positive influences.

The first step is the key step. Seek out someone you trust to share your situation with and move forward through understanding your choices and taking relevant action.

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