Blanchard LeaderChat

October 31 is Halloween Day in the United States, a time when people of all ages dress up as different characters—some heroic, some funny, some scary.  Along with the latest popular celebrities from movies, television, and popular culture, you’re sure to see some classic monster characters from the past. 

The only problem is that some of these characters don’t disappear on the day after Halloween.  Instead, they continue to haunt and torment people in workplaces everywhere.  See if you recognize some of these personalities working in your organization.  See anyone familiar?

• Frankenstein’s Monster: Functioning at a basic level. Has all of the pieces, but missing the emotional intelligence to function successfully in the work environment.
• Dracula the Vampire: Vain, self-absorbed, and elitist.  Operates in their own sub-culture, focused mostly on their own needs.   Uses people.  Sucks the life out of everyone around them.
• The Mummy: Mostly asleep. Spends most of their time unaware of what’s going on, but once you disturb them, or slight them in some way, watch out.
• Wicked Witch: Always plotting and concocting schemes.  Spends most of their time engaged in office politics and manipulating things behind the scenes.
• Werewolf: Generally destructive.  Given to emotional outbursts.  Unable to control urges. Often acts without thinking.

While these labels are seasonal, the behaviors behind them are not. If you report to one of these personality types it can be especially challenging.

If you are currently dealing with a personality like this in your work environment, authors Katherine Crowley and Kathi Elster of Working With You Is Killing Me have a great four step “unhooking” process that can help you deal with monstrous behavior. Here’s their advice from an interview with Good Morning America:

Unhook physically: Release unwanted negative energy so that you can see your situation more clearly. For example, you come out of a business meeting feeling upset because your boss unfairly bashed you in front of your peers. You know you need to cool down. You look at your options. If you can grab a brisk five-minute walk outside, you go for it. If you can’t go outside, you go to the bathroom, splash your face with cold water, and BREATHE. When you’re in a distressed physical state, the last thing you want to do is calm down, but the fact is that if you want to change your life at work, you have to focus on relaxing physically first.

Unhook mentally: Unhooking mentally is the internal version of talking yourself down off the ledge. It involves looking at your difficult situation from a fresh perspective. Start with a quick inventory of the situation:

• What’s happening here?
• What are the facts of the situation?
• What’s their part?
• What’s my part?
• What are my options?

Unhook verbally: Verbal unhooking involves finding ways to say no without jeopardizing your job, speaking up when you feel overlooked, or tolerating your boss’s temporary silence immediately after you ask for a raise. To unhook verbally, you must be willing to focus on your overall goal in any situation rather than staying stuck in the petty details. It’s a high-road approach to communicating. The goal is to express your ideas and convey information in a manner that resolves problems rather than perpetuating them. High-road communication contains no judgment, no anger, and no accusations. It includes taking responsibility for your side of the situation.

 Unhook with a business tool: A business tool is any standard procedure or written document used in a business setting. It includes contracts, timesheets, job descriptions, memos, performance reviews, company policies and procedures, and other forms of documentation. Business tools help depersonalize challenging situations by providing objective ways to track events and measure performance. To unhook, survey the business tools available to you and identify which ones can help improve your situation.

Don’t let a boss’s bad behavior keep you from being productive at work. To learn more about the unhooking process, be sure to check out more information about  Working With You Is Killing Me here.

It’s easy for leaders to fall into the trap of thinking they need to have the answer to every problem or situation that arises. After all, that’s in a leader’s job description, right? Solve problems, make decisions, have answers…that’s what we do! Why listen to others when you already know everything?

Good leaders know they don’t have all the answers. They spend time listening to the ideas, feedback, and thoughts of their people, and they incorporate that information into the decisions and plans they make. When a person feels listened to, it builds trust, loyalty, and commitment in the relationship. Here are some tips for building trust by improving the way you listen:

• Don’t interrupt – It’s rude and disrespectful to the person you’re speaking with and it conveys the attitude, whether you mean it or not, that what you have to say is more important than what he or she is saying.
• Make sure you understand – Ask clarifying questions and paraphrase to ensure that you understand what the person is trying to communicate. Generous and empathetic listening is a key part of Habit #5 - Seek first to understand, then to be understood – of Covey’s famous Seven Habits of Highly Effective People.
• Learn each person’s story - The successes, failures, joys, and sorrows that we experience in life weave together to form our “story.” Our story influences the way we relate to others, and when a leader takes time to understand the stories of his followers, he has a much better perspective and understanding of  their motivations. Chick-fil-a uses an excellent video in their training programs that serves as a powerful reminder of this truth.
• Stay in the moment – It’s easy to be distracted in conversations. You’re thinking about the next meeting you have to run to, the pressing deadline you’re up against, or even what you need to pick up at the grocery store on the way home from work! Important things all, but they distract you from truly being present and fully invested in the conversation. Take notes and practice active listening to stay engaged.

My grandpa was fond of saying “The Lord gave you two ears and one mouth. Use them in that proportion.” Leaders can take a step forward in building trust with those they lead by speaking less and listening more. You might be surprised at what you learn!

This is one in a series of LeaderChat articles on the topic of trust by Randy Conley, Trust Practice Leader at The Ken Blanchard Companies. For more insights on trust, visit the Leading with Trust blog or follow Randy on Twitter @RandyConley.

Although some features of a narcissistic personality may look like confidence or healthy self-esteem, it’s not the same. Narcissism crosses the border of healthy confidence and turns into a self absorption that puts your leadership at risk. 

Now, instead of a healthy confidence that is attractive to followers, you come across as “conceited, boastful or pretentious. You often monopolize conversations. You may belittle or look down on people you perceive as inferior. You may have a sense of entitlement. And when you don’t receive the special treatment to which you feel entitled, you may become very impatient or angry,” according to researchers at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota.

How can you tell the difference?  Here are ten warning signs. While all of us could probably see something of ourselves in this list, identifying closely with more than five of these characteristics could signal an overactive ego and an at-risk leadership style.

10 Symptoms of Narcissism

1. Believing that you’re better than others.
2. Fantasizing about power, success and attractiveness.
3. Exaggerating your achievements or talents.
4. Expecting constant praise and admiration.
5. Believing that you’re special and acting accordingly.
6. Failing to recognize other people’s emotions and feelings.
7. Expressing disdain for those you feel are inferior.
8. Being jealous of others. Believing that others are jealous of you.
9. Setting unrealistic goals
10. Having a fragile self-esteem. Being easily hurt and rejected.

Regaining your balance

Is your ego on overdrive?  If that’s the case, here are some suggestions for keeping things in perspective.

Practice humility.  Mathew Hayward, author of Ego Check recommends that before you make any big decision, ask yourself three questions.  “Am I getting the right input into this decision?”  “Do I have someone whom I can trust to tell me when I’m wrong?” “Am I the very best person to be making this call?” 

Be curious. David Marcum and Steven Smith, authors of Egonomics encourage you to, “Give yourself permission to test what you think, feel, and believe to be true.  Remember that you aren’t expected to know everything about anything.”  They also recommend that you seek the truth. Find out what is really going on.  It helps close the gap between your perception and reality.

Practice self-compassion. Authors Jean Twenge and Keith Campbell of The Narcissism Epidemic remind you to be kind to yourself while accurately facing reality. Also, be mindful. Practice living in the present. It keeps the self from entering every experience in your life. Mindfulness quiets the self-absorbed voice in your head so you can see the world more clearly. Finally, acknowledge commonalities with others.  Research shows that when narcissistic personalities discover something in common with others, egotism dissipates.

Best-selling business author Ken Blanchard often tells his audiences that EGO stands for Edging Good Out.  Don’t let an overactive ego limit your effectiveness as a leader.  Keep things in perspective for best results.

References

Narcissistic personality disorder symptoms from Mayo Clinic website

Ego Check by Mathew Hayward

Egonomics by David Marcum and Steven Smith

The Narcissism Epidemic by Jean Twenge and Keith Campbell

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Join The Ken Blanchard Companies for a complimentary webinar and online chat beginning today at 9:00 a.m. Pacific Time (12:00 noon Eastern).  Senior Consulting Partner Phil Reynolds will be sharing essential feedback skills in a presentation on How to Deliver Feedback in a Way that Gets Results.

The webinar is free and seats are still available if you would like to join over 1,100 people expected to participate.

Immediately after the webinar, Phil will be answering follow-up questions here at LeaderChat for about 30 minutes.  To participate in the follow-up discussion, use these simple instructions.

 Instructions for Participating in the Online Chat

• Click on the LEAVE A COMMENT link above
• Type in your question
• Push SUBMIT COMMENT

It’s as easy as that!  Phil 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 to register or learn more.

10/20/11 update: Webinar recording just posted.  Access here by clicking How To Deliver Feedback in a Way that Gets Results

We’ve all been there.  A team member’s performance is slipping and needs to be addressed.  Before you set up a meeting to discuss the situation, here are a couple of questions to ask yourself:

1. How clear were you with expectations?  Don’t expect an accountability conversation to go well if there is any fuzziness about what the goals were.  If you have concerns, use the time to re-clarify expectations.
2. How is your relationship with the team member?  The right to be candid with a person about their performance is the byproduct of a strong working relationship featuring frequent conversations.  If your relationship has been more of a “no news is good news” relationship in the past, shore that up first.

If you are feeling good about where you stand with these first two questions, congratulations—this meeting should go well.  (I’m also guessing that your good work in these first two areas means you don’t have to have many of these types of conversations in the first place!) 

Now, there are just a few more finer points to consider when delivering potentially sensitive feedback.

• Only give feedback on behaviors that can be changed (not on traits or personality).  Feedback works best when it is focused on behaviors instead of personality traits.  You shouldn’t be asking your people to make personality changes like,  ”be more extroverted, or more feeling, or less linear in your thinking.”  Instead, focus on the things you see someone doing, or the things you hear someone saying. 
• Remember that people are okay—it’s just their behavior that is a problem sometimes. As a manager you need to separate the behavior from the person.  Don’t be judgmental.  Keep the focus on the behavior that needs to change. Say what needs to be said and let it sink in.  Then reaffirm the person and move on with expectations that behavior will change and that the person is up to the challenge.
• Help employees monitor their own behavior going forward.   Whenever possible, you want people to learn how to monitor their own behavior.  Teach them how to solicit feedback and be “participant observers” in their interactions with others.  Your goal is to help employees become self sufficient. You don’t want to create a dependent relationship where they are constantly looking for you to tell them how they are doing.

Providing feedback is one of the key ways that managers can improve performance and make things better at work. Don’t avoid feedback—even negative feedback. Done well, it will actually enhance your relationships at work. People will know you care and that their work is important.

PS: If you’d like to learn more about the finer points of delivering effective feedback, be sure to join The Ken Blanchard Companies for a free webinar on October 19.  That’s when senior consulting partner Phil Reynolds will be speaking on How to Deliver Feedback in a Way that Gets Results.  (Over 2,000 people are registered!) Click here for details.

The way you reward and recognize your people may be promoting some unwanted behaviors.  That’s because the use of extrinsic motivators (like money, perks, bonuses, and promotions) may change an employee’s focus at work and can also lead to a never-ending cycle of unfulfilled needs, unrealistic expectations, or an overdeveloped sense of entitlement. 

The bad news is that you may have brought the problem on yourself by the way you structured compensation, rewards and bonuses.  

Once you set people on a path of extrinsic rewards, you will need to prepare to keep increasing the pay, bonus, or promotions every year, or be prepared to disappoint people when you are not able to do so.  (A situation many companies find themselves in today.) 

Here are a couple of ways to minimize the downside when using these traditional forms of extrinsic motivation.

Keep things in perspective. You want to reward and encourage people who attain the goal—but you don’t want it to become the goal. You don’t want to hear people saying, “I’m just here for the money.”

Make sure the goal is self attainable.  If you are going to use extrinsic motivators, make sure that attainment is completely self controlled by the employee.  You don’t want a manager or supervisor dangling the reward in front of an employee like a carrot on a stick.  This is a coercive strategy that just encourages boss-watching and brown-nosing with people spending half their time making sure the boss notices what they are doing.

Deepen the experience. The tough economic times of the last two years have shown how shallow the employer—employee relationship has become in many organizations.  As Warren Buffet reminds us, “It’s only when the tide goes out that you learn who’s been swimming naked.”

Look beyond money (but still provide it) and then shift the discussion to linking individual work goals into larger organizational goals.  The task is to move people away from short-term transactional thinking and into something larger and more sustainable.  

Learn more

For specific strategies on how to make this happen in your organization, be sure to check out the following articles by Scott and Ken Blanchard at Fast Company

The Role Money Plays in Engaging Employees

Maintain A Startup Attitude for a Passionate Office

Managers: Set People Free to Promote Growth and Get Results

PS: On January 25, The Ken Blanchard Companies will be hosting a Leadership Livecast on the problem of Quitting and Staying.  Have you successfully addressed quitting and staying in your organization? Can you share it in five minutes or less?  Videotape yourself and send it to us.  You could be a featured speaker!  Click here for details.

Only 20% of people say that they are truly passionate about their work according to a recent survey from Deloitte.  The vast majority of workers are disengaged, with an estimated 23 million “actively disengaged” in the U.S. alone according to Gallup. 

The lingering economic slowdown has created a real motivational problem for today’s leaders.  A shortage of resources has limited the ability of organizations to provide raises, promotions, and other perks. It’s been just as bad for employees as the widespread scope of the problem has left them with few alternatives beyond their present organization.

The result has been a perfect storm where millions of workers have resigned themselves to their jobs and effectively “quit and stayed.”  These workers show up and do their job at a basic level, but they are sullen and unmotivated in a quiet way that is hard to get at. 

It’s not so much what these workers do, as much as it is what they don’t do.

Here are the five intentions that passionate employees embrace.  Wondering if your people have “quit and stayed?”  Ask yourself to what degree your people:

1. Actively endorse the organization as a good place to work?
2. Go above and beyond the basic requirements of the job in terms of performance?
3. Think beyond themselves and strive for win/win solutions?
4. Go the extra mile when it is necessary to get the job done?
5. Intend to stay with the organization long term?

If you can’t answer YES confidently to these five questions, here are a couple of additional questions to ask yourself to get at the cause of the problem. A lack of passion is usually caused by negative perceptions at a job, organizational, or relationship level.  Probe a little bit in each of these areas and you will likely find the problem area. 

• Job Factors: Do your employees see the importance of their work?  Are people empowered to make decisions about their work and tasks? Are workloads reasonably proportioned for the time people have to accomplish them?
• Organizational Factors: Does the organization still seem committed to growth? Have clear goals been set? Are decisions about resources being made fairly?
• Relationship Factors: Do people feel connected? Do employees have a supportive professional relationship with their leader? Are leaders checking in and providing feedback regarding employee performance?

No one wants to be the type of person who quits and stays, but sometimes people fall into that trap.  Help people up.  Open up a dialogue around these issues.  Just taking the time and asking how things are going in each of these areas will show people that you’re noticing, that you’re willing to help, and that you care.

PS: Do you have a “quit and stay” solution to share?

On January 25, The Ken Blanchard Companies will be hosting a Leadership Livecast on the problem of Quitting and Staying.  Have you successfully addressed quitting and staying in your organization? Can you share it in five minutes or less?  Videotape yourself and send it to us.  You could be a featured speaker!  Click here for details.

Managers have good intentions when it comes to delivering feedback to employees, but the reality is that most of them aren’t very good at it. In a new article for The Ken Blanchard Companies Ignite newsletter, senior consulting partner Phil Reynolds identifies a lack of clear expectations upfront—and a subsequent emotional response down the road—as the way most managers get off-track.

As Reynolds explains, “Leaders often think that people should know something through their own devices and so they don’t give them feedback, or clear expectations, or redirection toward the target that they (the leader) are looking for.” These managers are often surprised later when they find out that their people aren’t doing what they’re supposed to be doing.

By avoiding the situation and not addressing it early, managers will tend to create a lot of emotion around the issue when they finally deal with it. At that point, the tendency is to come down hard, and say things like, “You’re doing this wrong; fix it!”  Once that happens, resistance goes up.

With newer managers, Reynolds will often see behavior swing to the other side of the scale. Now the emotion centers on the relationship and how the feedback may damage it. As he explains, “Younger managers want to project a positive image and have people like them. When feedback gets tied up with emotion, these younger leaders find it difficult to give corrective feedback or to hold people accountable.”

Advice for Senior Leaders

For senior leaders recognizing these symptoms in their organizations, Reynolds recommends a 3-step approach:

• Take a look at your organization’s culture. Culture drives organizational behavior more than anything else. Make feedback a priority, recognize people who are good at feedback, and let people know that feedback is something that is valued and encouraged.
• Provide training. People can only do what they know how to do. It’s unreasonable to ask people to do something at which they don’t have the training or skill set to be effective.
• Model what effective feedback looks like. Demonstrate what positive and redirecting feedback looks like for the people reporting to you.

Read more about Reynolds’ advice for improving feedback in your organization here.  Also be sure to see the information about a free webinar Reynolds will be conducting on October 19, How to Deliver Feedback in a Way That Gets Results.  It’s a complimentary event, courtesy of Cisco WebEx and The Ken Blanchard Companies.

Gallup’s latest report on The State of the Global Workplace 2011 identifies the levels of engagement and subsequent wellbeing of workers from over 120 countries.  It’s another great report from a pioneer in the field of employee engagement.  Overall the report shows that only 11% of workers are engaged, with 62% identified as disengaged, and 27% identified as actively disengaged. 

One item buried deep in the report was something that I hadn’t seen Gallup talk much about in the past.  In a section looking at implications for leaders, the report identified the two factors among the twelve that Gallup measures that are consistently among the lowest rated worldwide. Can you guess what they are?

I’ll give you a hint.  It’s something you can do personally and it won’t cost you a thing.

The two lowest rated items are, “In the past seven days, I have received recognition or praise for doing good work” and “In the past six months, someone at work has talked to me about my progress.”

In looking at why this might be occurring, Gallup researchers identified three possible causes

• Larger spans of control might be making it more difficult to give the kind of individualized attention required to ensure these needs are met.
• When it comes to jobs with a high degree of routine, feedback and recognition may be overlooked because managers do not differentiate individual contributions.
• It might just be that we are “…better wired to receive praise than to give it. We feel our own hunger more than we empathize with others around us.”

How are you doing with the praise and recognition of your people?  If you are a little rusty, here are three tips for getting started.

1. Make it timely.  Praisings are most effective when they are delivered as close to real time as powerful.  Don’t “save up” your praisings for a specified time.  Praise in the moment!
2. Give specific examples.  A general comment like, “You’re really doing good work,” is nice, but a praising that identifies a specific action is better.
3. Repeat often.  You really can’t overdo it—as long as you are specific and sincere in your praising.

For over 30 years, Ken Blanchard has asked audiences worldwide, “How many of you get too much praise at work?”  No one ever raises their hand.  We all have a deep-seated need to be recognized and appreciated.  Everyone enjoys a pat on the back.  Don’t be stingy with your praise.  Catch someone doing things right this week.  Guess what?  You’ll feel better too!