Blanchard LeaderChat

Earlier this week Ken Blanchard appeared on Dave Ramsey’s business talk show to discuss the enduring impact of Ken’s classic book, The One Minute Manager, which he co-authored with Spencer Johnson.  Ramsey wanted to know Ken’s thoughts on why The One Minute Manager remained so popular today–18 million copies later.  Ken’s response?  The book remains relevant because it identifies simple human truths about working together.  See if you agree.  Here are the three secrets of one minute management: 

1. Set One-Minute Goals— All good performance starts with clear goals. Without clear goals your leadership doesn’t really matter. If people don’t know where you’re going, how can you help them get there?  Goal setting gets everything started. It is creating a clear picture of what good performance looks like and what are the expected behaviors to get there.
2. One Minute Praising.  The second secret is to look for opportunities to catch people doing things right.  People love to be acknowledged for their work.  It’s unique and rewarding when a manager comes around and is looking for things that are going right instead of wrong. You don’t want to be a seagull manager who only flies in, makes a lot of noise and dumps on people when there are problems. 
3. The One Minute Reprimand. This is how you deal with people when they’re not performing up to expectations.  The key here is to focus on the behavior and not the person. It’s also important to distinguish between “can’t do” behavior versus “won’t do” behavior.  A One Minute Reprimand is for people who have the skills and talent to do better.  If the problem is a lack of skills or training, then it is more appropriate to use redirection instead of a reprimand.  This means taking a second look at goals, identifying needed resources and support, etc.  

How do these three principles sound to you?  Are they still relevant in today’s business environment? Share your thoughts and comments below.

Join The Ken Blanchard Companies for a special complimentary webinar and online chat beginning today at 9:00 a.m. Pacific Time (12:00 noon Eastern). Senior Consulting Partners Chris Edmonds and Bob Glaser will be speaking on the topic of Creating a High Performing, Values-Aligned Culture. The webinar is free and seats are still available if you would like to join over 1,000 people expected to participate.

Immediately after the webinar, Chris and Bob will be answering questions here at LeaderChat for about 30 minutes.  To participate in the online discussion, follow these simple instructions.

Instructions for Participating in the Online Chat

1. Click on the COMMENTS link above 
2. Type in your question for Chris Edmonds and Bob Glaser
3. Push SUBMIT COMMENT 

It’s as easy as that!  Chris and Bob will answer as many questions as possible in the order they are received.  Be sure to press F5 to refresh your screen occasionally to see the latest responses.

We hope you can join us later today for this special complimentary event courtesy of Cisco WebEx and The Ken Blanchard Companies.  Click here for more information on participating.

Gordon Pitman is the Manager of Global Management Development Programs at AkzoNobel, a global leader in coatings and specialty chemicals with more than 57,000 employees in over 70 countries. In this One Minute Interview, Pitman talks about drawing out learning from the recent economic crisis.

Q. What is the top business, or people management issue, you’re looking at? 

A. I think one of our main challenges for 2010 is helping leaders make sense of what happened in 2009 in a way that helps then take those skills into 2010. Just as we saw a country by country entry into the economic crisis in 2009, so are we seeing a similar, country by country, emergence.  I think that enabling leaders to reflect on their 2009 experiences will be a continuing challenge for global organizations like AkzoNobel and others.

The impact for those of us working in an HR, OD, or training function is to facilitate this self reflection process with our business leaders. Over the past six months a lot of our people managers and executives have had to learn, or relearn, some skills that perhaps they may not have had to use in a while.  This includes how to lead change, how to handle difficult conversations, and how to drive business performance in a climate where no matter what they do, the results don’t seem to come.

I am getting the sense that some of our business leaders have become much more flexible in their thinking and behavior in order to enable them to do things differently this past year.  I don’t think that they have had time yet to reflect and assimilate what those experiences mean for them and their leadership style.  So I think that will be one of the things that will be a focus in 2010—enabling and supporting our leaders to really make sense of what 2009 has been like, both personally and for their teams.

Q. What are some of the biggest challenges leaders face as they attempt to make these changes?

A. I think the challenges are around making sense of these experiences.  So the first challenge is a self-awareness and assimilation of these new behaviors.

A second challenge is how to make those skills a part of my ongoing leadership toolbox.  How do I keep some of those new skills that perhaps I may not get to readily use again, and how do I continue to build and develop some of those skills which I was forced to learn, relearn, or reuse? 

Q. What are some of the challenges from a human resource, or training perspective, that go along with helping managers build up skills again?

A. AkzoNobel is a global organization with 57,000 employees across 70 plus countries.  Being able to find a way to facilitate those dialogues and self reflection moments with our leaders is the first challenge.  For HR & OD people, enabling and supporting those conversations on a global scale is complicated, because most of those conversations happen one-to-one looking at the experiences that individuals have had within their department, or with the situation in their country.  Consistency across the organization is a second interesting challenge. 

The final challenge is then resourcing that global conversation, and effectively keeping your finger on the pulse, using all the different communication channels within the organization.

Q. Any advice for people looking to get ahead of the curve?

A. Ask great questions.  Because great answers usually come from great questions.  Make sure that there is a way to start to dialogue with your senior leaders and ask them the right questions. 

For example, “What do we see as a top management, or strategy priority for the year?  What have you learned through the economic crisis?  What skills have you identified that you need to develop more of?  What skills have you seen your managers are lacking?”  

And some of those questions asked in the right way, at the right time, would be a very insightful way to start a conversation about what your organization needs to really look at, and what needs to happen next to really take advantage of the global economic recovery.

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The One Minute Interview is LeaderChat’s new monthly series featuring interviews with some of today’s most intriguing HR-focused thought leaders and practitioners. Gordon Pitman is a featured speaker at this year’s Blanchard Summit 2010.

The underdog New Orleans Saints defeated the Indianapolis Colts 31-17 in yesterday’s NFL Super Bowl, in large part I believe, to the power of their purpose. Purpose is defined as “the reason for which something exists or is done; an intended or desired result; determination, resoluteness.” Not that the Colts didn’t have a purpose because they certainly did. Every NFL team has a purpose of winning the Super Bowl each year. But this year it seemed as though the New Orleans Saints connected with their own purpose on a much deeper level that fueled them to victory when it counted most.

The story of Hurricane Katrina in August 2005 and its devastating impact on the city of New Orleans has been well chronicled. In March 2006, Drew Brees joined the Saints football team having just come off major shoulder surgery that threatened his playing career. Brees has been quoted as saying that he felt his decision to join the Saints was a “calling” – a higher purpose that he needed to fulfill, not only to resurrect his own career, but also to help the people of New Orleans resurrect their city. This deep connection to his own personal purpose and that of the city at large created a culture change within the Saints organization which ultimately led them to achieving the greatest prize in their profession.

After the game Brees was quoted as saying, “We played for our city. We played for the entire Gulf Coast region. We played for the entire Who Dat nation that has been behind us every step of the way.”

Teams of all kinds, whether in the sports world, corporate America, or the non-profit sector, can take a lesson from the Saints and the power of purpose. When chartering a team, one of the first priorities is to establish a clear purpose. “Why do we exist?” and “What are we trying to achieve?” are key questions that need to be answered.

Once a team is clear on its purpose, it can establish the values that will guide team members’ behaviors and decisions and in turn establish goals that will help them achieve their purpose. Finding a way to connect each team members’ personal purpose to that of the team will exponentially increase the productivity and morale of the team, allowing the team to achieve more than any one individual possibly could. When the team faces adversity, it will be their firm belief and commitment to their purpose that will carry them through.

“Just to think of the road we’ve all traveled, the adversity we’ve all faced,” Brees said.

“It’s unbelievable. I mean, are you kidding me? Four years ago, whoever thought this would be happening? Eighty-five percent of the city was under water. Most people left not knowing if New Orleans would ever come back, or if the organization would ever come back.

“We just all looked at one another and said, ‘We’re going to rebuild together. We are going to lean on each other.’ That’s what we’ve done the last four years and this is the culmination in all that belief.”

That sounds like the power of purpose to me.

Earlier this week, Fortune magazine announced this year’s 100 Best Companies to Work For, an annual listing of the companies that provide employees with the best combination of pay, perks, and culture.

It’s a great list that highlights some of the best employers, but sometimes the publicity that accompanies the list’s release gives people the wrong idea about what makes up an engaging work environment. While the consultancy that scores the companies, Great Place to Work Institute, goes to great lengths to measure each company on five serious organizational factors, the follow up stories tend to get reduced down to a series of unique perks and benefits that are fun to read and easy to describe.

That’s unfortunate because there are some very strong cultural concepts common to each of these organizations that can get lost in the shuffle. Here are the five items that each of these best employers has in common:

• Credibility—managers communicate the company’s direction and plans while involving others.  Leaders “walk the talk” when it’s time for action.
• Respect–the organization provides employees with a professional work environment that includes the equipment, resources, and training they need to do their job well.
• Fairness—compensation, benefits and rewards are distributed fairly and equitably.
• Pride—the company maintains a good standing in the industry and in the community.  The organization structures jobs so employees have individual work that they can be proud of.
• Camaraderie—the organization creates a hospitable work environment that is friendly, welcoming, and where people feel that they are part of a team connected by common values and purpose.

As we celebrate these great companies, it’s important to remember what makes them great. On-site saunas, concierge service, and a game room are all nice perks, but the real definition of a great place to work is an environment where employees experience trust, have pride in what they do, and enjoy the people they work with.

Do you think about the culture operating in your organization? Unless you’re employed in a human resource capacity, the answer is probably “no.”  In a new article entitled Creating a Culture That Works, senior consulting partners Chris Edmonds and Bob Glaser say that culture is usually poorly understood in most organizations even though it is a key factor that impacts employee satisfaction, engagement, and overall employee productivity. Considering the importance of a supportive and aligned culture, why is it under the radar for most senior executives?

• Part of the reason is that culture is hard to define in most organizations. It operates in the background while other, easier-to-measure aspects of corporate performance—like goals and tasks, preoccupy leadership discussions.
• Senior executives greatly underestimate the power of an organizational culture plus very few leaders have ever had any real experience in dealing with culture change.

For executives who know that their organization’s culture is not what it could be, Edmonds and Glaser recommend taking a three-step approach:

1. Examine the existing culture—look at the underlying beliefs and assumptions that are influencing people’s existing behavior. Especially look at getting senior leaders to examine their own personal beliefs about getting things done in the organization.
2. Define the desired behavior—don’t assume that everyone agrees what good behavior looks like.  Take the time to formally define values in behavioral terms. Gather input from employees and boil it down into clear, actionable items.
3. Hold people accountable for living the stated values—once the values and behaviors have been identified and defined, the final step to creating a culture that works is holding people accountable

A strong, working culture helps to create satisfied employees who feel cared for, trusted, and respected, which increases engagement and ultimately leads to better productivity. To read the entire article, click here.