Category: Reflections

Are there organizations that operate as true meritocracies? While many espouse to be, fundamental things get in the way – like ego, habits, biases, personalities, nepotism, favouritism … the list goes on. One of the key things that gets in the way of open dialogue and the right people contributing to problems is hierarchy. Titles and rankings, while they can be well deserved badges of achievement, they can also feed egos and drive insecurities.

Consider the scenario where 5 directors are working on a problem / program. One director decides to invite the sr. manager from their because of a specific expertise. The other directors, feeling it unfair their sr. managers didn’t get invite, won’t have it and invite their people as well.  An efficient working team of 5 has now grown to 10, not because of contribution, but because of the seeming need to be “fair”. In the case – the platform for fairness is a ranking.

This has many negative impacts to the organization:

• It’s inefficient – too many cooks in the kitchen (especially ones not contributing) slow things down – leading to….
• It’s costly – piling on resources to a problem doesn’t help it get solved any more quickly. The number of bodies in a room is directly related to burn
• It reinforces egos – condoning this behaviour perpetuates the ego underneath the rankings and titles
• It drives lower performance – by bringing in potentially irrelevant voices, the discussion cannot get to a higher level

I don’t have a solution for this deeply embedded behaviour other than to call it out when it happens and changing my own behaviours and decisions to focus on merit, capability and experience over titles, rankings and ultimately ego. How would you handle these scenarios?

Questions I have tonight as I think about what it means to be a parent.

• How do you create a system for your child to learn how to be organized AND be creative?
• How do you accept who they are – their unique operating model AND teach them life skills when you see things going sideways?
• How do you refrain from imposing your operating model on the amazing person they are going to become?
• In what situations do carrots work better than sticks?

If I changed the subject from a child to my team, I may ask the same questions. Interesting parallels in the universe.

What happens when you meet a team that is truly inspiring? I’ve just come from 2 days of coaching where the entirety of the schedule was so well structured and flawlessly executed. My perspective has shifted in how I would develop programs for my team. This includes:

• Being clear about expectations. We often do a terrible job at setting parameters, making assumptions that our teams already know things they would have no way of knowing.
• Be obvious. Related to the above, when giving instructions, be specific and clear about what you are asking the team to do. I often say the words amazing, great and awesome. These are no where near the specificity needed
• Walking the talk. Once you have defined expectations – as a leader, you need to also act in the way we want our teams to behave.
• Create a safe environment. I don’t think I fully understood what this meant until these past two days. The coaches I worked with truly made our cohort of very different people feel like we could speak up. There was feedback but without judgement. They were kind and open and truly embodies the values they espoused. They emphasized how important it was to make the audience of your messaging feel safe with simple techniques. Tell them where you’re going. Give them guidance.
• Techniques to cope with stress. Our teams faces unexpected situations. As leaders, we’ve likely faced these before. When creating programs, identify the potential challenges and develop simple ways to cope with examples.
• Have a clear structure. Each part of a program needs to make sense and have significant value. Each needs to have a core set of simple components so teams can easily digest what it means for them. And … the key is that the sum of the parts needs to be greater than the whole

• Create moments of buy in along the way. No one likes a process being forced down their throats. Use social engineering tactics to create the build connectors. Simple things like – a pledge, key markers / rules (being on time and lights flickering), repeating principles and living them through examples, creating demand to want to learn more – eg – creating master classes once team members reach a certain level.
• Building in small touches. The extras add value to en environment. Toiletries in the bathroom, thoughtful snacks at each session, printouts, lanyards, water bottles. Small touches can elevate an experience in many ways
• Measure and improve. Poll your teams on their experience of the program. Gather feedback and when it makes sense, adapt programs to the feedback.

These are just a few of the things from my experience these last two days that I will use in building any program in the future.

Life is going to throw all kinds of stuff our way. From the small to the life changing. I’ll call the small ones curveballs and the life changing ones flips. Here’s how I’m starting to make sense of their distinction.

Curveballs are temporary – events that change the course of a few days or weeks. We all have them. My current curveballs are a termite infestation ( gross but manageable ) and a complete change in week end plans to help a friend in need.

Flips are longer term, more dramatic and longer term changes to life context. An example parents can relate to are the changing perspectives required as your children age. When they’re young, you want to protect and nurture them. As they get older, the approach needs to flip to encouraging independence.

Why do we care about these distinctions? Because it’s important to understand what is temporary and what is permanent. The temporary are things we can let slide and roll with the punches. We deal with them as they come but they don’t have a lasting impact on how we live. The more permanent however, are fundamental changes to how we need to approach the world because the world has literally changed.

Both require a growth mindset, but the mental toughness required to rewire your approach to the world requires 10x the effort. Once you recognize which you’re dealing with, you can allocate proportionate energy.

Make your mark on this world
big or small.

Stake your claim and
most importantly
follow through.