J.D. Meier's Blog : Leadership

Influencer - The Power to Change Anything

J.D. Meier — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 08:56:41 GMT

Whether you need to change something in your life or make changes at work, influence is your friend. I just finished a 2 day course on influence. It exceeded my expectations. It was jam packed with insight and action I can use on the job. I walked away with an effective framework for diagnosing problems of all shapes and sizes. I think of it as "skilled change management." Rather than push on a problem from one angle or throw one solution at it, I can inspect the problem from multiple dimensions and find the best leverage points. The heart of the approach is thinking in terms of motivation and ability, and then analyzing from a personal, social, and structural perspective. Another key is finding and focusing on vital behaviors that exponentially improve your results.

I wrote up my notes from my training, put them on my other blog, Sources of Insight. The post is Influencer - The Power to Change Anything. So far, I've shared my notes from day 1, but I still need to write up and share notes from day 2.

Enjoy.

Ken Sylvester on Top 5 Characteristics of Leaders

J.D. Meier — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 18:50:52 GMT

I'm honored to have a guest post at Sources of Insight from Dr. Ken Sylvester on The Top 5 Characteristics of Leaders. Dr. Sylvester has taught Negotiation Strategies at Microsoft for many years. He's president of Organization Strategy Institute (OSI) and has more than 35 years of experience as a leadership and management consultant and professional negotiator.

Here's a summary of Dr. Sylvester's top five characteristics of leaders:

Characteristic 1. Depersonalization: Neutralize Ego-Centric Thinking
Characteristic 2. Self-Control and Emotional Maturity:
Characteristic 3. Emotional Maturity: Avoid “Dancing” To Others’ Psychological Music
Characteristic 4. Manage Failure: Expect Setbacks
Characteristic 5. Cope with Imperfection: Guard Your Expectations

Questions and Answers on The Top 10 Leadership Lessons

J.D. Meier — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 19:36:23 GMT

Jim Kouzes, author of The Leadership Challenge, 4th Edition , wrote a guest post for me at Sources of Insight on The Top 10 Leadership Lessons. Jim's post generated a lot of feedback and some great questions. As a follow up to some of the questions, Jim has written another guest post, Questions and Answers on the Top 10 Leadership Lessons, where he explores some of these questions in depth.

The Enterprise of the Future

J.D. Meier — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 08:29:54 GMT

While researching the future, I came across IBM's Global CEO Study: The Enterprise of the Future. It's a compilation and distillation of insights from more than 1,130 CEOs, general managers, and senior public sector and business leaders from around the world. I think of it as a set of "hot spots" for today's CEOs and a set of success patterns for the Enterprise of the future.

Vision for the Enterprise of the Future
IBM writes the following:

"Grounded in the collective insights and wisdom of more than 1,000 CEOs, we offer the Enterprise of the Future as a benchmark and blueprint for CEO s, corporate officers and boards of directors around the world. It is an aspirational goal: some companies already exhibit particular traits, but few, if any, embody them all. Based on our conversations and analyses, we believe that significant financial opportunity awaits those that become Enterprises of the Future."

Executive Summary
IBM identified the following key points:

Organizations are bombarded by change, and many are struggling to keep up.
CEO's view more demanding customers not as a threat, but as an opportunity to differentiate.
Nearly all CEO's are adapting their business models — two-thirds are implementing extensive innovations.
CEO's are moving aggressively toward global business designs, deeply changing capabilities and partnering more extensively.
Financial outperformers are making bolder plays.

5 Attributes for the Enterprise of the Future
IBM outlined the following five key attributes:

Hungry for Change
Innovative Beyond Customer Imagination
Globally Integrated
Disruptive by Nature
Genuine, Not Just Generous

5 Attributes for The Enterprise of the Future Explained
I quoted IBM's key summary for each of the attributes to characterize what they mean:

Hungry for Change. "The Enterprise of the Future is capable of changing quickly and
successfully. Instead of merely responding to trends, it shapes and leads them. Market and industry shifts are a chance to move ahead of the competition."
Innovative Beyond Customer Imagination. "The Enterprise of the Future surpasses the expectations of increasingly demanding customers. Deep collaborative relationships allow it to surprise customers with innovations that make both its customers and its own business more successful."
Globally Integrated. "The Enterprise of the Future is integrating to take advantage of today’s global economy. Its business is strategically designed to access the best capabilities, knowledge and assets from wherever they reside in the world and apply them wherever required in the world."
Disruptive by Nature. "The Enterprise of the Future radically challenges its business model, disrupting the basis of competition. It shifts the value proposition, overturns traditional delivery approaches and, as soon as opportunities arise, reinvents itself and its entire industry."
Genuine, Not Just Generous. "The Enterprise of the Future goes beyond philanthropy and compliance and reflects genuine concern for society in all actions and decisions."

The Growing Gap
One of the key themes in the report is how there's a growing gap between companies that succeed and companies that fail. The big factors seem to be the accelerated rate of change and a global market. IBM writes:

"So what’s causing this growing gap? Constant change is certainly not new. But companies are struggling with its accelerating pace. Everything around them seems to be changing faster than they can. As one U.S. CEO told us, “We are successful, but slow.” But in 2008, CEO s are no longer focused on a narrow priority list. People skills are now just as much in focus as market factors, and environmental issues demand twice as much attention as they did in the past. Suddenly everything is important. And change can come from anywhere. CEO s find themselves — as one CEO from Canada put it — in a “white-water world.” CEO s are most concerned about the impact of three external forces: market factors, people skills and technology. Customer expectation shifts, competitive threats and industry consolidation continue to weigh on their minds. CEO s are also searching for industry, technical and particularly management skills to support geographic expansion and replace aging baby boomers who are exiting the workforce."

Prosumers
One of my favorite points in the report is about the rise of the prosumer:

“In the future, we will be talking more and more about the ‘prosumer’— a consumer/producer who is even more extensively integrated into the value chain. As a consequence, production processes will be customized more precisely and individually.”
- Hartmut Jenner, CEO, Alfred Kärcher GmbH

Key Take Aways
Here's my key take aways:

Master change management.
Build to change over built to last.
Make customers partners in the process.
Bake reinvention into the business development model.
Find ways to leverage the producer model.
Find ways to leverage and enhance a global network of knowledge.
Find business models and investments that improve society.

Additional Resources

Global CEO Study: The Enterprise of the Future
Prosumer (Wikipedia)

My Related Posts

Eight Big Trends

J.D. Meier — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 04:43:45 GMT

While researching the future, I came across the free E-Book, What Comes Next? A Trends Perspective for Our Future, by Jim Carroll. I think Jim shined the light on some very key trends that are reshaping and redefining today's business.

The 8 Trends

Analytics is Hot.
Small is the New R&D.
Attitude and Amusement.
Time Disappears.
Resistance to Change Retires.
Careers End.
Knowledge & Skill Banks.
Interactivity Redefines.

The 8 Trends Explained
I quoted my favorite lines from Jim's guide to help characterize the trends:

Analytics is Hot. "The 21st century is all about math: some of the most unique, innovative ideas are emerging with these types of analytic projects. This is where the next billion dollar industries are being born."
Small is the new R&D. "Today, the global R&D process has changed, and small
is big. The global, infinite idea loop allows topic experts to share their latest research and insight with their global peers on a continuous basis. It’s a fundamental
transformation in which most new scientific discoveries now percolate from the bottom up."
Attitude and Amusement. "The fact is, you’ll need them. That’s why workforce
engagement is the big issue — you’ll only be able to get the staff you need if you can keep them active, engaged, interested and amused. A entirely different workplace concept that is radical, yet necessary."
Time Disappears. "The major trend going forward is the collapse of time. There’s no time to plan anymore - there is just a need for action. While we still need budgets to manage and control, they’ll have to be constantly adjusted to deal with new realities. In this context, volatility is the new normal : the concept of risk management, for example, is transitioning quickly to one of risk containment."
Resistance to Change Retires. "The coming generation of senior management aggressively pursues and implements new ideas. While the first is reluctant to embrace new business models, the next steamrollers them. Expect velocity!
Careers End. "Your paycheck will come from: the global, itinerant, part-time, skills-for-hire economy."
Knowledge & Skills Banks. "The capital of the 21st century isn’t financial : it’s experiential knowledge that is extremely scarce and specialized."
Interactivity Redefines. "Every industry will soon be transformed by the forthcoming era of “pervasive connectivity.” Essentially, every device and thing around us is about to become plugged in — leading us to an era of interactivity and connectivity that is mind-boggling in scope."

My Related Posts

Character Trumps Emotion Trumps Logic

J.D. Meier — Wed, 24 Dec 2008 02:34:25 GMT

One of the simplest ways to improve your effectiveness is to know the pecking order of persuasion. I wrote a post on Sources of Insight about how character trumps emotion trumps logic. This is a pretty important piece of information, considering it impacts how well you influence your peers, your kids, your manager, your stakeholders or anyone, really.

To bottom line it, if your arguments based on data aren't working, consider that if you win the heart, the mind follows, and that who you have on board can make all the difference in your success. Change your approach and you'll be surprised by the results. One simple thing you can do is use more metaphors to make your points. Visual words stick more and they help bring some emotion to the table. Choose carefully, of course.

Tests for Success

J.D. Meier — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 17:28:52 GMT

How do you identify the bull's-eye among your stakeholders? Nothing's worse than finishing a project and missing the mark you didn't know was there. At patterns & practices, one of our effective project practices is to use "tests for success" to help avoid this scenario.

What are Tests for Success
"Tests for success" are the prioritized success criteria that the stakeholder's agree to. It's basically a set of test cases, that if the project passes, the project is perceived as a success. They help clarify outcomes and priorities.

Example Tests for Success
Here's an example of "tests for success" from one of my projects:

Single multi-dimensional information model?
Single unified perspective of the product model?
Single unified perspective of the content model?
Backlog is mapped to the information model?
Capability to do comparative analysis and produce “Consumer reports” view of the catalog and the proposed work? (e.g. What’s customer demand? ... What’s our coverage?)

Stakeholders for the project created and prioritized this list, with prompts from the project team. This exercise helped clarify a lot of ambiguity as well as do a level set for the team.

How Can You Use This
Whether it's a personal project or a project at work, you can create your own tests for success. I think a small list of the vital few works better than a laundry list. Phrasing the tests as one-liner questions makes them easy to create and use. Here's some prompts to trigger your own tests for success:

How will the world be a different place when the project is done?
How will we know we did a good job?
What's the most valuable outcomes for the project?
In order for the project to be successful, we need to .... ?

When you're in the thick of things, you'll appreciate having a small set of criteria to go back to and help keep you and everyone involved on track.

Use the System to Educate

J.D. Meier — Sun, 03 Feb 2008 00:25:38 GMT

Hitting a wall? Sometimes pushing an idea from the inside-out, doesn't work. Sometimes you need an outside-in approach. One of my mentors has a simple way to phrase this -- "Use the system to educate."

Examples

Use customers to educate your product teams (argue the customer data).
Use your manager's peers to educate your manager.
Use surrounding teams to educate your team.
Use other companies to educate your company.
Use a consultant to change your group's perspective.
Use analysts to educate your domain.

It's along the lines of "you can't be a prophet in your hometown" ... sometimes the change agent needs to be external.

Success Strategies

J.D. Meier — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 19:39:33 GMT

As part of my improvement sprint focused on leadership, I'm making my way through The First 90 Days, by Michael Watkins. In a nutshell, it's a guide for how new leaders can be successful. I think it's actually relevant for any new role or situation. It's a very practical guide, full of real-world lessons learned. In this book, Watkins basically studies the failures and success of people on the job and turns them into patterns and anti-patterns for success.

I'm finding that the book is full of gems of insight. In order to share with my friends, family, co-workers and mentees, I've been posting bite-sized nuggets on The Bookshare. The Bookshare is simply where I chunk information from my favorite books, down into bite-sized nuggets that are fast to read and easy to turn into action.

My latest post is a distillation of the recipe for success from The First 90 days, along with my key take aways. If you're a new leader or dealing with change, or simply want to be aware of key strategies for success at work, read my post on Ten Key Success Strategies.

Leadership Styles and Development Levels

J.D. Meier — Thu, 03 Jan 2008 19:27:32 GMT

One leadership style doesn't fit all. According to the Situational Leadership II model, the leadership style depends on the development levels within the team. Here's a summary:

Scenarios

If there's high competence and high commitment, use a "Delegating" style which is low support and low directive.
If there's high competence, but less commitment, then use a "Supporting" style, which means provide more support and encouragement.
If there's low competence and low commitment, then use a "Coaching" style, which provide more direction and support
If there’s low competence but high commitment, use a "Directing" style, which provides more direction, but less support.

Competence is knowledge and skill for the task. Confidence is motivation and self-confidence. I think competence breeds confidence which can help breed and sustain motivation.

The main point is that if somebody has a bunch of competence, get out of their way. If somebody needs more encouragement, support them. Ideally, you help somebody get to a high competence, high commitment development level.

Key Take Aways
While this might sound obvious, I think the important point is to be flexible in your style. Be able to vary your leadership style by situation (the context) and tailor it to the individual development levels within the team.

Another consideration is whether it's more effective to change your approach or change the situation to suit you (set yourself up for success.) There's mixed opinions on this and some interesting results, so I may post on this downstream.

Expectation Shapes Reality

J.D. Meier — Wed, 02 Jan 2008 09:23:12 GMT

How much do your expectations shape what you get? A lot. David Rock and Jeffrey Schwartz write about how your expectations and attitude play a larger role in your perception than previously understood in their article, "The Neuroscience of Leadership", in "strategy+business" magazine.

Mental Maps Play a Big Role
Rock and Schwartz write:

"Cognitive scientists are finding that people's mental maps, their theories, expectations and attitudes, play a more central role in human perception than was previously understood. This can well be demonstrated by the placebo effect. Tell people they have been administered a pain-reducing agent and they experience a marked and systematic reduction in pain, despite the fact that they have received a completely inert substance, a sugar pill."

You Get What You Expect
Rock and Schwartz write:

"The fact that our expectations, whether conscious or buried in our deeper brain centers, can play such a large role in perception has significant implications. Two individuals working on the same customer service telephone line could hold different mental maps of the same customer. The first, seeing customers only as troubled children, would hear only complaints that needed to be allayed; the second, seeing them as busy but intelligent professionals, would hear valuable suggestions for improving product or service."

Cultivate Moments of Insight
Rock and Schwartz write:

"How, then, would you go about facilitating change? The impact of mental maps suggests that one way to start is by cultivating moments of insight. Large-scale behavior change requires a large-scale change in mental maps. This in turn requires some kind of events or experience that allows people to provoke themselves, in effect, to change their attitudes and expressions more quickly and dramatically than they normally would."

Individuals Have to "Own" Their Change
Rock and Schwartz write:

"That is why employees need to "own" any kind of change initiative for it to be successful. The help-desk clerk who sees customers as children won't change the way he or she listens without a moment of insight in which his or her mental maps shift to seeing customers as experts. Leaders wanting to change the way people think or behave should learn to recognize, encourage, and deepen their team's insights."

Key Take Aways
Here's my key take aways:

If you're a mentor, ask insightful questions over giving conclusions.
If you're not getting results from the training you take, change your mindset. If you think nobody can teach you anything -- you're right. If you think they can, you're right.
Bake time in for reflection. I think reflection and introspection are a way to have more frequent insightful moments. For example, for my team we use two practices for this. First, we send a Lessons Learned mail around where individuals add their insights. Second, each Friday is our reflection (see Friday Reflection)
To change yourself, ask more insightful questions.

Leading and Influencing Mindful Change

J.D. Meier — Wed, 02 Jan 2008 08:24:00 GMT

Why do many leadership efforts and organizational change initiatives fail? Are there any new insights that might shape new management practices? David Rock and Jeffrey Schwartz summarize some counterintuitive conclusions in their article, "The Neuroscience of Leadership", in "strategy+business" magazine.

Leading and Influencing Mindful Change
Rock and Schwartz write the following:

"Managers who understand the recent breakthroughs in cognitive science can lead and influence mindful change: organizational transformation that takes into account the physiological nature of the brain, and the ways in which it predisposes people to resist some forms of leadership and accept others. this does not imply that management - of change or anything else - is a science. There is a great deal of art and craft in it. But several conclusions about organizational change can be drawn that make the art and craft far more effective. These conclusions would have been considered counterintuitive or downright wrong only a few years ago."

Counterintuitive Conclusions
Rock and Schwartz identify the following conclusions:

Change is pain. Organizational change is unexpectedly difficult because it provokes sensations of physiological discomfort. (See Working Memory vs. Routine Activity)
Behaviorism doesn't work. Change efforts based on incentive and threat (the carrot and the stick) rarely succeed in the long run.
Humanism is overrated. In practice, the conventional empathic approach of connection and persuasion doesn't sufficiently engage people. In theory, the person-centered approach might be an effective solution but there is rarely time to go through this process with employees and guarantee that it will produce the desired results.
Focus is power. The act of paying attention creates chemical and physical changes in the brain.
Expectation shapes reality. People's preconceptions have a significant impact on what they perceive.
Attention shapes identity. Repeated, purposeful, and focused attention can lead to long-lasting personal evolution.

Key Take Aways
I'm not actually surprised by the conclusions. I see these conclusions show up in my day to day at Microsoft. If I were to distill the most important points, I think they are:

The most meaningful changes come from within. It's more effective and efficient to help others come to their own insights.
Stay solution-focused rather than dwelling on problems.
Focus conscious attention on the improved result.

The Five P's

J.D. Meier — Thu, 20 Dec 2007 02:29:59 GMT

How do you design an org? While there's lots of approaches, one of my mentors shared the 5 Ps approach with me. To think about the org, you need to enumerate the 5 Ps to define the organization, the type of talent you need, overall organizational competencies, culture, etc. If you don't know what you're trying to do, you don't know who to hire.

The Five P's
The 5 P's are:

Purpose: What problem are you trying to solve and for who? This has to be more than a mission statement.
Principles: This should touch on both the culture you want to develop as well as your guiding light in how you think about the problem you're solving and tradeoffs you will need to make. This should effectively establish your decision making framework on what tradeoffs you are and are not willing to make.
Priorities: Enumerate all the things that are important to you, now stack rank them to focus the organization.
People: Enumerate the types of people, competencies, experiences, and roles you need to support your Purpose. Quantify how many of each type you need.
Process: This defines the rhythm of your business. Do you do monthly, semi-monthly, or quarterly progress reviews? With what frequency does your "leadership team" meet to discuss issues? How frequently is your management going to check in on the organization. Note you should stay away from detailed processes like scrum vs. waterfall and other day-to-day implementation details.

Outlook Reminder for Leadership Practices

J.D. Meier — Tue, 04 Dec 2007 12:37:00 GMT

I created a recurring appointment in Outlook for Fridays. It's a checklist of key leadership practices from The Leadership Challenge. Each Friday, I scan this checklist and reflect on how well I've demonstrated the practices and where I need to tune for the upcoming week.

Leadership Checklist

Model

Sets a personal example of what to expect?
Makes certain that people adhere to agreed-on standards?
Follows through on promises and commitments?
Asks for feedback on how actions affect people's performance?
Builds consensus around organization's values?
Is clear about philosophy of leadership?

Inspire

Talks about future trends influencing work?
Describes a compelling image of the future?
Appeals to others to share a dream of the future?
Shows others how their interests can be realized?
Paints "big picture" of group aspirations?
Shows conviction about meaning of work?

Challenge

Seeks challenging opportunities to test skills?
Challenges people to try new approaches?
Searches outside organization for innovative ways to improve?
Asks "What can we learn?"
Makes certain that goals, plans, and milestones are set?
Experiments and takes risks?

Enable

Develops cooperative relationships?
Actively listens to diverse points of view?
Treats people with dignity and respect?
Supports decisions other people make?
Gives people choice about how to do their work?
Ensures that people grow in their jobs?

Encourage

Praises people for a job well done?
Expresses confidence in people's abilities?.
Creatively rewards people for their contributions?
Recognizes people for commitment to shared values?
Finds ways to celebrate accomplishments?
Gives team members appreciation and support?

Pattern-based Leadership vs. Fact-Based Management

J.D. Meier — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 05:11:00 GMT

I found an interesting article about contextual decision making. "A Leader's Framework for Decision Making," an article in Harvard Business Review, is about tailoring your decision making approach based on the context. You can use the Cynefin Framework to figure out which context you're operating in, so you can choose the most effective response. The key is whether to categorize, analyze, probe or act.

Context's Characteristics
The Cynefin Framework includes five context types:

Simple - Repeating patterns and consistent events; Clear cause-and-effect relationships evident to everyone; right answer exists; Known knowns
Complicated - Expert diagnosis required; Cause-and-effect relationship discoverable but not immediately apparent to everyone; more than one right answer possible; Known unknowns
Complex - Flux and unpredictability; No right answers; emergent instructive patterns; Unknown unknowns; Many competing ideas; A need for creative and innovative approaches
Chaotic - High turbulence; No clear cause-and-effect relationships, so no point in looking for right answers; Unknowables; Many decisions to make and no time to think; High tensions
Disorder - This context is particularly difficult to recognize because of multiple, competing perspectives. The recommendation is to break it down into its constituent parts and assign it to one of the other four realms.

Fact-based Management
Simple and complicated are part of the ordered world. How to respond as a leader in simple and complicated scenarios:

Simple - (The Domain of Best Practices) - Sense, categorize, respond; Ensure proper processes are in place; Delegate; Use best practices; Communicate in clear, direct ways; Understand that extensive interactive communication may not be necessary.
Complicated - (The Domain of Experts) - Sense, analyze, respond; Create panels of experts; Listen to conflicting advice.

Pattern-based Leadership
Complex and chaotic are part of the unordered world. How to respond as a leader in complex and chaotic scenarios:

Complex - (The Domain of Emergence) - Probe, sense, respond; Create environments and experiments that allow patterns to emerge. Increase levels of interaction and communication. Use methods that can help generate ideas; Open up discussion: set barriers; stimulate attractors; encourage dissent and diversity; and manage starting conditions and monitor for emergence.
Chaotic - (The Domain of Rapid Response) - Act, sense, respond; Look for what works instead of seeking right answers; Take immediate action to reestablish order (command and control); Provide clear, direct communication.