Employees Are People Too

As a leader, how do you see your employees? What do they represent? Are they your most important asset? Are they a never ending source of problems? Do they represent a bigger budget and more responsibilities? Or are they something else completely? It's a simple question, really, when you think about it. Fortunately, it also has a simple answer: Employees are people. That's it. They're people.

 

Now, they may be people that have been hired to do a certain task; they may be people who help achieve goals; they may be people who represent assets-and expenditures-on the balance sheet, but first and foremost, they are people. Why is this important? Because sometimes leaders get so caught up in the tasks, the goals, the budgets and the other "stuff" that is important to get their job done, that they forget that the only way do succeed at these things is to deal with people first. Not numbers, not the top line and the bottom line, but individuals. These individuals are not just a means to an end: They are the only means to your end. Without them, there are no results, there is no top line, and the bottom falls out.   

 

If leaders forget that they are dealing with individuals first, it can cause all sorts of problems, sometimes in the short term, sometimes over the long term. But the results are the same: more effort is needed to get the work done, there are more problems to manage, and the atmosphere in the workplace becomes more noxious. Eventually, it catches up to the leader: missed deadlines, cost overruns, and of course, more stress which can lead to health issues.   

 

Over the next few weeks, I will be covering various aspects of this human side of leadership. As always, I welcome comments, questions, and suggestions.  

 

No matter what the title on the business card, leaders cannot exist unless people accept to follow their lead. Nobody is anointed a leader, people decide to grant them that distinction. They can be bosses or supervisors by decree, but they are leaders by consensus. By underestimating this human aspect of leadership, leaders seriously undermine their effectiveness.

Employee Disengagement: Why It Matters

A Case Study in Driving Employee Engagement looks at the impact of employee disengagement in the workplace. It looks at the costs, what to do with a disengaged employee, and how to keep engaged employees from losing their enthusiasm.

I wish I had thought of this...

... but Alan Weiss did it before me. Score:

Alan: lots
Me: Not so much

My Report to the President

Five Mistakes To Avoid During a Technical Presentation

... focusing solely on content is not sufficient to keep the audience engaged. You can distinguish yourself from the majority of other speakers by avoiding the same common mistakes.

You can read the rest on CIOUpdate.com:
Five Mistakes To Avoid During a Technical Presentation

Because We Can

As I was returning from Rhode Island to Canada on a Friday evening, things were quite different at the border. Normally, you go directly to the Canadian border, answer a couple of questions and on you go. But this time, I saw flashers on the US side, and part of the road was blocked.

I patiently waited in line, wondering what the problem was. When it was finally my turn, a young man asked me for my passport, with authority. He asked me a barrage of questions, barely leaving me enough time to answer one before he blurted the other. I answered diligently and he hand me my passport.

Before leaving, I asked: "I come here often and I've never been stopped like this before. Is it because of the swine flu?"

The young man replied: "No, it's because we can."

I stared.

An older man, who clearly was not as enamoured with his newfound power, explained that it's something they do once in a while, that it was part of their normal field operations.

This morning, I was reading an article in the Globe and Mail about changes in the stores. In the comments section, many people complained that some stores had abysmal service, with clerks who are barely willing to help. Why? Probably because they can, since their employers can't, or won't, do anything about it.

How to nail your second interview

Entry Level Careers Examiner: Nailing the second interview

Bridging the gap between business and IT

This post was inspired by a recent blog entry.

Many executives feel that IT has no clue about the business. Conversely, many IT professionals feel executives and management don't understand, or care about IT. Unless the systems don't perform as expected.

There is misconception on both sides, which causes frustration, delays, and eventually affects the bottom line. IT objectives and the business objectives need to be aligned in order to narrow that gap, increase productivity, satisfaction, and ultimately, the financials.

Some things to consider:

• IT does not function in a vacuum: A clear understanding of IT's impact on the client and on the company's bottom line is key. It is management's job to clearly articulate and deliver this message to IT.
• Clear up communication issues: it takes time and requires openness on the side of IT and management. In particular, being able to formulate dissent or incomprehension (sometimes more than once) without being castigated is key.
• Eliminate personal agendas: Managers can build such a culture by effectively and regularly conveying the vision of the business to the employees, and showing them how they contribute to that vision.
• Focus on client satisfaction: the systems, the network, and the processes are not the clients. Is everyone clear on who the clients are, and what it takes to satisfy them?
• From CYA to teamwork: is the corporate culture one that encourages each person to cover his/her behind, for fear of reprisals? Or is it one which accepts that errors occur, and focuses on providing solutions that prevent such errors from repeating?

Bridging the gap has to focus on individuals as much as procedures and processes. You can put as many processes in place as you want, but if the people who are supposed to use them decide not to, you've invested your time and energy in the wrong place.

Finding fault or getting the best out?

The school system is based on a fault-finding approach, and that typically finds its way in our dealings with other people in business situations. The problem with fault-finding is that it is inherently disheartening.

Nobody's perfect and most people seek to improve their results by improving what they currently do. Fault-finding is focused on the past, and rarely looks to the future. But you can't fix the past, so sticking to fault-finding does not help anything.

Many managers, unfortunately, know how to criticize but aren't necessarily sure how to follow that criticism with steps toward an improved situation. To reach that improved situation, well, you need to know what that situation is!

I remember hearing a speaker ask a crowd of sales people: "Are you ready to bring your business to the next level?" and the crowd roared its approval. He followed that question with this one: "How many of you know what the next level looks like?" Not many hands went up. This is typical of fault-finding; we know what we don't want, but not necessarily what we DO want.

Instead of finding fault and criticizing, it's better to provide feedback. How is feedback different? Feedback is a loop. It's not a monologue but a dialogue. It gives the other person a chance to reply, to push back, to provide his or her opinion when needed. Doing so brings up another issue: ego.

People in leadership positions, but with fragile egos, will not accept pushback. They have difficulty accepting another person's opinion or objections. They won't accept that they could be wrong, so instead of giving someone else the opportunity to debate, they simply close the door to that option. This is the typical attitude of "I'm the boss, just do as I say."

Changing one's away of dealing with subordinates and moving from a coercive model to a cooperative model requires much work on oneself. In order to succeed, you need to have healthy self-esteem, you need to learn not to take things personally, and you need to learn to listen.

Furthermore, you need to focus more on the employee's needs and wants, and finding a way of aligning them with your objectives, instead of forcing the employee to adopt your point of view. You need to demonstrate more empathy. In short, you need to care more about the employee as a person, and not just as another body helping you to attain your goals.

That change is much more difficult to achieve than it seems. So rather than going through the challenges required to change ourselves, we prefer to try and change others... using the same old, ineffective methods.

Comics and visual design

I have been reading a lot about visual design, lately, and its impact on communication. While listening to a some TED talks, the following comic strip was mentioned. It is a very(!) large strip. To read it, follow the light blue line:

Pup Ponders the Heat Death of the Universe

Simple, visually pleasing explanations

I discovered a company called Common Craft today. They use a mix of paper, drawings, and video to explain concepts "in plain English." The idea seems simple, but in fact, is rather difficult to do. As I explained elsewhere, distilling your expertise into a language that even a layman can understand is a daunting task, at best. However, the people at Common Craft do it exceptionally well. Here is an example which explains what Twitter is all about:

Simple explanations, visual support that enhances the information and captivates the audience, bite-sized and digestible quickly. That's what great information does. And you don't need PowerPoint!

If you're interested, I also have a Twitter account: http://twitter.com/lduperval.

Obama's speech: lessons for all speakers

Many preparation and delivery lessons can be gleaned from studying Obama's inaugural speech. Here are just a few:

• It's OK to be nervous. When Obama first appeared on screen, you could tell from his pursed lips that this wasn't a walk in the park for him. As others before him spoke, he clenched his jaw and often closed his eyes. These are typical behaviours of someone who is a bit nervous before speaking. It took him a while to shake those jitters but they seemed to have disappeared by the time he delivered his speech.
  
• Writing is important. You cannot come up with phrases like “To those who cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history; but that we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist.” You can't. This has to be written, rehearsed, and re-written. If you are aiming to deliver a powerful speech, think of writing it out.
• You can make mistakes. On a couple of occasions, Obama had a slight hesitation in the speech. Notice that he did not apologize, he did not become flustered, he did not lose his composure. He just kept on going. His biggest blunder, though, occurred before the speech when he messed up the words during his swearing in (to his defence, the chief judge messed up first). What did he do? He smiled and kept on going. He will be picked on a bit by the comedians, but that's it.
• Converse with the audience. There was not a lot of fanfare during his delivery. He did not jump up and down to make a point. He remained poised and calm throughout, as if speaking to more than one million people in his backyard. That helped make it more effective.
• Don't lie. Obama pulled no punches. To summarize his speech: times are hard, we made errors in the past and everyone is paying for it today. Everyone has some responsibility for the current mess and everyone is going to work together to fix it. This was not your typical rosy, rar-rah-rah, "You can do it!" speech. It was somber and set the tone for what's to come. It won't be fun, but it's got to be done. A great speech will set the tone for the changes to come, but if you lie to the audience it will come back to bite you.

Obama's speech may have longer-lasting impacts on oratory style, but that's for another discussion.

RCMP leadership

An interesting article this morning about the leadership at the RCMP in Quebec. While I have yet to see the full report, some interesting information emanates from this article:

• All of the information emanates from the employees. It seems like the researchers did a form of 360-degree evaluation, where they asked all sorts of questions to the employees, in order to get a real portrait of their life at work.
• Competition for promotion gets in the way of real work. I was asked recently if competition in the workplace was a good idea or not. I think most of the time it is, but there are instances where it is not. For example, if it gets in the way of corporate objectives. Another is if there are limited resources available and too many people are competing for the same resource. With the RCMP, it seems to be the case on both these counts.

  Without knowing how things work internally, it looks like the criteria for success are incorrect. They seem to be pointing to personal victories instead of victories that benefit the whole of the organization. Hence the complaints that "careerism" is favoured.

• Lack of training for senior officials. This one, unfortunately, is rampant. It isn't something that is specific to the RCMP. Too many senior executives do not have, nor take, the time to properly develop and update their people skills. They often lift their nose at the concept, thinking that the bottom line is the most important part of the business, and that people should just understand this and follow along. Men, especially, are guilty of this.

  What they often fail to realize is that the human aspect of a business is often its most important and costly. Just take a look at what is happening at the Detroit Big Three. Our skills with people are constantly put to the test and what used to work, may not work as well today. In the case of the RCMP, it seems that conflict management does not work properly at all, since there is no crackdown on dubious behaviours.
  

• Image polishing at all costs. According to its employees, the RCMP seems more interested in the image it projects than what is really affecting its operations. Managing one's image is fine, but at some point in time, you can no longer tame such a beast. Madoff tried it and failed. Satyam tried and failed. Now the RCMP seems to be failing also. At some point, to re-establish an image, you have to eliminate the previous one. Trying to hide issues at all costs, especially in a government agency, can only bring about charges of lack of transparency.

  I don't advocate full disclosure at all levels. However, given the choice between addressing a serious issue that can portray an unflattering image in the media, and sweeping an issue under the rug in the hope that it will disappear, I recommend the former.

• Management doesn't listen and doesn't have a clue. Once again, that is not limited to the RCMP. It is amazing how often I will speak to the employees of a client who tell me of all sorts of issues that they see in the company, yet when I speak to the senior executives, they tend to dismiss it as "employees who are never happy." While there is some of that, when the same issues get reported over and over again, by multiple employees of varying responsibility levels, it's time to listen and act.

In another article, the RCMP made a list of resolutions for 2009. Many of them had to do with operations and infrastructure. But if they want to keep on "getting their man", let's they don't forget the human side.

Confronting issues

A quote from Alan Weiss:

Confront EVERY issue. Life is too short to be worried about what people think of you.

Too many communication issues are a result of our fear of confrontation, simply because we are afraid of what others will say about us. I count myself within that group, at times and with certain people. Identifying the times and the people who cause that reaction, is a good step toward overcoming that fear.

You gain respect when you confront people who are more successful, more powerful, or more confident than you are. Doing so, and doing it well, raises your profile in everyone's eyes, including your own. But that only happens when you are willing to step forward, and take a risk.

Recent quotes on other sites

I was quoted in Infoworld on angry IT workers:

Staff reductions following the dot-com crash have stripped many IT staffs to the bone, forcing those that remain to double or triple their workloads. The piling on of work can demoralize the people charged with keeping the business going, says Laurent Duperval.

Read more here:Angry IT workers: A ticking time bomb?

I also was quoted on CareerBuilder.com on being the bad guy at work, and the effects:

"Employees want to be treated with respect and they want to feel valuable," Duperval cautions. If your type of bad guy is disrespectful and humiliating, then don't expect to receive much appreciation in return.

Read more here: Does It Pay To Be the Bad Guy at Work?

And if you are considering using an OS in a consumer device, think Linux:

Technology News: Mobile Tech: Linux Where You'd Least Expect It

Honesty in sales

Yesterday my wife stopped to gas up the car at a local hardware chain. As she was waiting for the tank to fill, watching the numbers go by faster than the price of a barrel dictates, she was accosted by a woman flashing a large smile, and the conversation sounded like this:

"Madam, today is your lucky day. We are going to give you a $10 coupon which you may apply to your next gas purchase. Isn't that great?"

"Yes it is, thank you."

"Great, all I need is a bit of information to be able to send you the coupon by mail. What is your name? Address? How many children? How much money do you make? When did you get married?"

At which point my wife, spotting a logo at the bottom of the woman's notepad, interrupted to ask: "Are you registering me for a credit card?"

"Yes, I am. So if you'll give me this information I can..."

"I'm not interested," my wife firmly replied.

"What?" was the incredulous answer, "you don't want $10?"

"Sure, I'll take the $10 but I don't want the credit card. Besides, I don't live around here so this won't be of any use to me."

"Ma'am, I'm sure there is a store close to you. Where do you live?"

My wife was flabbergasted. As the woman walked away, she watched her attitude as she coached a younger salesperson doing a similar job. This woman's approach was highly aggressive and she had a derogatory attitude toward anyone who didn't want to buy her credit card.

There are several things wrong with this scenario. Number one: are these people reading the news at all? We have a phenomenal financial crisis on our hands and a lot of it is due to the high level of indebtedness of the general population. Regardless, they are aggressively pushing people to add more debt to what they already have.

Number two: the woman's approach was deceitful. Under the guise of wanting to give a gift, she was only interested in selling a credit card. If my wife had not asked, I am not sure she would have told her what was happening. This lack of honesty is the main reason people dislike salespeople.

Selling is about relationships. If you don't like a person, you will not buy from him or her. Furthermore, a bad salesperson tarnishes your image and it makes people not want to return and give you their business.

When people have bad experiences, they will talk about it much more than if they have a good experience. I would not have heard about this incident if it had not bothered my wife enough for her to tell me about it. And I suspect she will tell other people around her also.

I won't say the name of the company at fault because I don't know if the problem is a bad salesperson, an unscrupulous third-party credit card company, or if it is the company itself.

All I know is that they left a bitter taste in my wife's mouth, and that's never a good thing in business.

Eliminating spam through education

How often do you receive messages from friends or colleagues warning you of a latest health scare, a child that was recently abducted, or an offer from Microsoft to send you $128,443 if you forward your email to 15932 of your closest friends? Most of these messages (not all of them) are fakes that are easily verifiable with a quick Internet search.

I used to get a few of them per week from people I know, but it has dwindled a lot over time. I figure it's either because people don't like me anymore, or because my approach to dealing with such messages has helped them send fewer of them. Of course, I like to think that it's the latter!

If you get a lot of these messages, I invite you to try and educate the people who send them. Reply to the sender and let him/her know that you have found it to be a hoax. It's a simple three step process:

1. Search for the most meaningful terms in the message. For example "microwave causes cancer". If there is specific information in the message, use that as it will give you a more precise result, for example "John Hopkins Hospital microwave cancer." You can also search on known hoax-debunking sites such as snopes.com or hoaxbuster.com.
   
2. Follow the first few links from the search page to find which ones are interesting.
3. Send the links to the original sender, with an invitation to send them to the people who received the original  message.

Maybe if we can stem the tide of these useless messages, it can help take care of the email clutter we face every day.

Standing in the eye of the storm

Last week, I was discussing the Maple Leaf situation with some of my colleagues. Many of them disagreed with the approach taken by Maple Leaf to handle the current situation. Their perspective was that it was better to send a PR representative instead of the president. The reasoning was as follows: if things get worse, who do you send to the front lines then?

I disagree: Maple Leaf did the right thing and I wish more companies would follow their lead. When your company is facing a critical issue, one that could potentially spell the end, you don't send a mouthpiece to do the dirty work: you do it yourself. And you do it often.

Sending a representative for such important issues gives the following message: This isn't important enough for the president to be involved. For Pete's sake, people are dying here! If there is any time to send your president to face the storm, this is it!

This weekend, Maple Leaf put another full ad in the paper where president McCain (wow, that's a funny thing to say in September 2008) explained what steps are being taken to resolve the problem. Once again, he is reassuring their customers that all precautions are being taken fix the current problem and to prevent something like this from happening again.

Mr. McCain has done a lot of things right during the crisis:

• he apologized and admitted guilt;
• he has not tried to lay blame on anyone but himself and his company. Specifically, he hasn't tried to blame the current inspection process in Canada;
• he has taken precautions beyond the minimal requirements to help resolve the issue;
• he has communicated often to keep people aware of what is going on, and he is explaining and describing the progress and process.
  

Many companies can learn from Maple Leaf's stance: when things go wrong, if you are in a leadership position then you need to maintain that position throughout difficult times. You can't just hide and hope it goes away; you can't stop talking and expect people around you to fill in the blanks. You need to take responsibility, keep communication channels open, and take concrete steps to resolve the issue.

This works in business when dealing with clients or when dealing with employees. And by the way, it also works at home with your loved ones!

Process before results?

To follow up on yesterday's post: I saw an item in today's paper where food inspectors were complaining of the workload and the processes used in monitoring food processing plants.

It seems a new process was put in place to inspect a company's plant, however the system put more work on each inspector's shoulders while giving them less time to actually investigate. According to some inspectors, it gives them a more "hands-off" approach and prevents them from making observations they used to do before the new process was put in place. Some inspectors have even started asking the question: "I don't have time to do both so which is more important: the inspection or the paperwork?"

Processes are important in any well-functioning system but the processes must help reach results better, faster and more cheaply. If those are not the results you are seeing, then the process is flawed.

Process should never have priority over results. Bear in mind that any new process will inevitably bring about a certain slowdown or will change results in the short term. That's a natural phenomenon, until the process becomes second nature.

However, any new process must be closely monitored to see that you get the expected results and that you do not suffer from The aaw of unintended consequences.

Does your strategy serve the client or the business?

This morning an article in the Montreal Gazette mentioned that an Air Canada Jazz affiliate had chosen to ditch life vests from its aircraft as a cost-cutting measure. The gist of the story can be found on CanWest's news site. A spokesperson for Air Canada Jazz put the blame on high fuel costs.

Airline regulations only require airplanes to provide life vests if the plane flies more than 90 kilometers from land. The regional carrier rerouted some of its planes to make sure they met this criterion. In other words, they are complying with their obligations.

Contrast this with Maple Leaf, the meat packing company. This week, there was an outbreak of listeria, a deadly bacteria that has already killed 12 people in Canada.

In today's paper, there was a signed, full-page letter from Maple Leaf president Michael H. McCain apologizing for the problem and expressing his sympathies to the families of the victims. In the letter, he also outlined how his company had decided to go beyond the call of duty: they have recalled all of the products that came from the plant where the problem was found, even if the evidence showed that only part of the meat was tainted. He also decided to close that plant until appropriate measures are implemented.

To put things in perspective, there have been few water landings by commercial aircraft. So in effect, the life vests are probably a luxury. However the perception will linger that Air Canada Jazz, to "save a few bucks" has put the safety of their passengers in jeopardy.

Information is what you say and communication is what the other person understands. Air Canada Jazz needs to step up their communication strategy to make their clients understand that they in no greater danger now that life vests are no longer standard equipment on some of their aircraft.

Law of unintended consequences

This weekend I met someone who made me wonder about the long lasting impact we have on people, often without our realizing it.

I attended a festival in my hometown of Sherbrooke, Québec. As I was watching a dance show, someone tapped me on the shoulder and said, “Hey Whodini, how are you?”

I looked at the young man sporting mirrored shades and replied, "I'm doing fine thanks."

"You don't remember me do you?"

"Can't say that I do, sorry."

"Remember back in the 80s you used to work in a video arcade? Whenever you worked, you always played a lot of rap and hip-hop in the arcade. We loved it and you were the only guy we knew who listened to that kind of music and you made us a tape. Today I have a large collection of rap and hip-hop records, and it keeps on growing. For the past 16 years, my friend and I have been hosting a hip-hop radio show every week."

I was a bit taken aback that someone I had no contact with, other than seeing him once in awhile during a part-time job, would remember me almost 20 years later. I was even more surprised that a little gesture that I had forgotten about had had such an impact for so long.

I never would have known about this, had I not bumped into him quite accidentally. Then it got me to thinking: how many other people have I unwittingly affected, for better or for worse?

If I had to make a complete list of all of the people I have met, and had to evaluate all of the results of those interactions, what would the conclusion be? Would it be overwhelmingly positive? Negative? Somewhat positive? Or would I mostly have left them indifferent?

If you've ever read the book “Freakonomics”, you've heard about the law of unintended consequences. It's the law that says that any action will have some sort of unexpected outcome, such as what happened above.

I've been fortunate enough to know of (now) two unintended consequences of my actions. Someone else once told me that I had showed him what software I used to balance my chequebook. From there, he developed an interest in money management and today he has his own business. Who knew?

A more notable example is Facebook. It was originally developed to help a few college buddies keep in touch after school. Today, Facebook is the darling of the Internet and putting one's profile on site has much more impact than it used to.

How have you been impacted by unintended consequences? Or how have you impacted others in ways you did not expect?