CEO Circle

Great Leaders - Development & Delegation

2008-09-29T07:57:00.000-07:00

In the third post of the “Great Leader” series, let’s discuss some additional skills required: Development and Delegation

Develops People and Invests in Organization’s Development- The great leader today is constantly improving themselves and their people. All organizations should have employee development programs whether they are large or starting up. For a large company, Training & Development will be appropriate for managing the training needs of the organization. In a smaller company, the choices for employee development are many and just as important. Successful companies send their employees to seminars or webinars focused on specific work or management skills. Others will bring in consultants and coaches for focused group learning or one on one coaching. Regardless of where your skills are on the management and leadership spectrum, it is a “continuous improvement” skill. There is no finish line, we all need to grow, evolve and learn constantly throughout our career.

The reason why I have embraced coaching as my career is because of the impact my CEO coach had on my own leadership skills and those of my team. I hired a coach to first work with me and found it to be such a great experience that he then worked with all of our VP’s and then our directors. Over the next 5 years, our coach helped me in many areas but these three are the ones I consider to be the most important:
1. Expand my skills as the company grew larger and more successful and therefore complex.
2. Understand the human side of organization
3. Act as a sounding board for ideas and issues

More and more CEO’s and their senior team are turning to individual and team coaching. The experience of someone who has built and accomplished what you are trying to replicate is invaluable. The insight that a leader finds when he or she looks outside of themselves only makes them stronger.

Delegation – The skill of delegation is a true measure of the weak or new manager from a highly skilled manager. What and how someone delegates tells a lot about their experience and skills. It comes to down to confidence in one’s self, trust in others, and how you hand off and coach the person you delegated to. A great leader will delegate the right things, to the right person, at the right time, and with the right instructions, coaching and follow up. It is important that you delegate and then not micro-manage. It is also important that when you delegate you pass on the responsibility for the task but keep the ownership. The ridiculous perspective that “I can do it faster or better” than someone else, shows a new or weak manager. Of course you might be able to do it better, but your job is to grow the people not to remain the bottleneck as the company expands.

An example of how this works is the role to lead people requires trust, openness and honesty. I had recently hired a new VP Marketing. He had come into my office with three new advertising concepts for me to review and select the best one. He asked which concept I would like to choose. I told him that it was his decision, which advertising concept did he choose? He looked at me inquisitively, and asked why I wouldn’t tell him my decision. I told him that I hired him to be the VP Marketing and to make these decisions. If I was going to make his decisions I wouldn’t need him. I also said that if I made this decision, I couldn’t hold him responsible and accountable. This is a key message. If you hire good people, let them run.

Regardless of where we are in the leadership skills spectrum, outside help to evolve is critical. Today’s business climate is so complex that we cannot be expected to grow our companies and grow ourselves without help. Leadership is an art, not a science, and we are always learning in this tough business world.

Any of your stories and comments are welcome.

What Makes A Great Leader - Part 2

2008-09-10T06:57:00.000-07:00

In the second post of the “Great Leader” series, let’s discuss some more of the skills required.

Culture Creation – The culture of an organization is directly related to values and actions of the CEO. A great CEO creates and communicates his or her values in a number of ways. We are all familiar with the statement of values. This is the baseline for all of the decisions and actions of the company. Just as important as stating / posting the values is the leaders’s actions, decisions and behaviors that support these values.

As an example, life balance was a very important value for our company. It was imperative to me that everyone work hard at work but also be home with their families.

We were all traveling a lot in those early days to stake our new strategy in the ground. This meant we were away from our families quite a bit and that takes a toll on everyone. To ensure that everyone remained connected to their families, we bought one webcam for each member of our traveling team and one webcam for their home computer. If you were going to travel for the company; we were going to make sure we kept you close to your family. The ability to say goodnight or work on homework or share the events of the day, made being on the road easier and dramatically improved our results.

The culture is the life blood of the company; it can determine success or failure. When I walk into an office I can usually tell about the culture just by watching people and their environment. Is the office fun, hard driving, and collaborative?

Builds High Performing Teams – Can you build a high performing team? One that thinks and works as one? Do they think that “we are great” as a group? Do they support each other? There are many keys to a high performing team (probably a good blog post on its own). As a start, a great team needs at least one person from each of the four social styles, driver, analytical, amiable and expressive. This creates a balance view on each issue or discussion. Next is the alignment of goals; the team must be focused, motivated and incented towards the same goal. Conflicting goals and objectives will not produce the results that company is seeking.

Our high performance team started with getting them excited about the vision from the moment they joined the company. Then surrounding them with equally talented person whose personality styles would compliment their own. Lastly, I delegated, trusted and empowered them to succeed.

This is part two of an eight part series on “What Makes a Great Leader”, I welcome you thoughts, challenges and new ideas.

What Makes Great Leaders

2008-08-25T13:42:00.000-07:00

A number of readers enjoyed the post on Weak Managers and asked for a post on Great Leaders. So for the next eight posts, I will describe what I think makes a great leader. In this first post, let’s discuss two of the skills required.

Communication – Leaders must be great communicators. They must be able to adjust their communication style and content depending upon the audience. How do they communicate with employees vs outsiders (board, investors, and analysts)? Some communications are simple, some are complex, some are technical but all must be motivational.

Communication is critical to success of a company and is probably the weakest area for most. Many focus on communicating with the customers and prospects but neglect the internal communications between departments, teams, or the organization as a whole.

One of the ways we promoted internal communications was “Muffins with Michael”. Every other month at Webplan, we hosted muffins and coffee in the conference room. For two hours, I was available to meet with any non senior management employees who wanted to ask a question or hear first hand the latest updates for the company. For employees, this meeting was a refreshing opportunity for them to speak to their CEO and feel that they were heard as well as speak honestly without fear of repercussion. For me, these sessions offered great insight, information and ideas from the people closest to our customers and marketplace.

Vision – A great leader has the ability to:
1. See the future
2. Be able to articulate that future
3. Be able to tie that future to what the company is doing now (and how it will get there)
4. Be able to motivate, focus and “rally the troops for the cause”
5. Simplify so everyone gets it.

A good example of this last point is when Bill Gates said “there will be a PC on every desk”. It was short, clear and got everyone excited to make it come true.

Vision is that future destination that when it is achieved, people will say “life is so much better here”. The vision sets up the roadmap to eat the elephant one bite at a time. Without a clear action plan and roadmap, the vision is just a dream. The difference between a dream and a vision is the action plan.

I joined Webplan in 1994, when the company was on the verge of bankruptcy and actually filed in 1995. It was the only way to save the company and build from the ground up. It was around this time that I changed the name of the company and the vision for our future. Webplan, as it would now be known would be the trading partner that offered collaborative, web-based planning up and down the supply chain. This would dramatically change our direct sales model as well as every other aspect of our company. Keep in mind, this was not the internet we have today, this was the early, early days. How was I going to convince my team that our future was on the internet, a technology they knew very little about? Our approach to get everyone to appreciate the new vision; we paid for every employee to have internet access at home. They were able to play with the internet at home, get their families involved and begin to see the use and capabilities it had to offer. This escalated buy-in to our new strategy from all of our employees not just technical staff.

One year later, we were profitable and by 1999 Webplan was honored by Deloitte and Touche as one of the 50 Best Managed Private Companies in the country, a distinction we received three years in a row.

This is part one of an eight part series on “What Makes a Great Leader”, I welcome your thoughts, challenges and new ideas.

Don't Be A Weak Manager

2008-07-16T08:33:00.000-07:00

We have all worked with weak or new managers. They all display similar traits and characteristics. In today’s highly competitive market, managers need to spend more time fine tuning their soft skills of leadership than the functional skills that garnered them the managerial position they now hold. Here are my eight ways to spot a weak manager:

1. Delegation: New or weak managers do not delegate, they have not learned to trust others or to train others to be self sufficient in order create a scalable team for the future. As a manager, it doesn’t matter that if you can do the task faster or better, it matters how well your team performs the task. The weak manager needs to learn that they will be judged by how well their team performs not necessarily by how much they produce. I can always tell new or weak managers by their delegation skills. Weak managers do not delegate anything, great managers delegate everything. Of course, there is a complete spectrum in between these extremes.

2. Remote Workers: The weak manager feels the need for all their direct reports to be physically located in their same office. They feel that remote workers are goofing off and cannot be trusted without “adult supervision”. This weak manager has an issue with control. The need to keep the team within arms reach is not a question of productivity; it is a question of personality. If you hire the right people and have the processes and support in place to enable their success, a remote worker can be more productive than an officed employee as demonstrated by companies such as Best Buy who have adopted telecommuting and remote offices in almost every department within their corporation.

3. Weak Performers: This weak manager will not address or confront their weak performers. They usually keep them around too long, they convince themselves that with a little work, the weak perfomer can be changed. New managers spend too much time trying to “fix” the problem employees and lose the big picture perspective for the organization and its overall performance. Take the example of how GE uses the practice of top grading, removing the bottom 10% performers each year to manage productivity. GE understands the larger challenge for an organizations’ success and does not allow itself or its managers to become fixated in the details of weak performer.

4. Asking For Help: The new manager will not ask for help because they view asking for help as a sign of weakness or failure. As a manager becomes stronger and more experienced, they realize that everyone needs coaching, help or mentorship to perform in today’s tough business climate. All highly successful, high performing athletes have coaches, usually several to train them in different areas. So to, a manager needs guidance and assessment to improve their game.

5. Office Door Closed: This weak manager will keep their office door closed most of the time. The barrier they unknowingly create for themselves; trying to reduce the interaction with their team, works! It reductions interaction and increases alienation. The rule of thumb here is that your office door should only be closed for confidential discussions on compensation, HR, or employee reviews. When building the new corporate headquarters for a company I ran; we debated whether to eliminate the office doors all together. We decided to have windows in all office doors instead so that although the manager had some privacy when necessary, they still appeared accessible.

6. Insecure: One of the under-lying reasons these weak manager behaviors exist is the human trait we all share. We all carry a sense of insecurity about something. New managers probably face the greatest sense of insecurity and do their best to hide how unsure they are in their capabilities. Sometimes this insecurity is for personal reasons, sometimes it is professional. Whatever the reason, there is a great old line that we should all keep in mind, “never let them see you sweat”. So if you are insecure, don’t show it.

7. Decision Making: This weak manager will be hesitant to make a decision, any decision and convinces themselves that research and analysis is the same as making the decision. Or they make the opposite mistake and make a decision too quickly without enough data or based upon their own personal reaction to a situation. Both avenues signal a problem. A strong manager looks for just the right amount of information, makes the decision, and if wrong, is strong enough to admit the mistake and change the decision or direction.

8. Over-Commits to Upper Management: Lastly, the weak manager has a tendency to over-commit to upper management or the board of directors because they are not strong enough to say no or to negotiate a more reasonable goal or objective. This over-commitment starts the circle of motion known as a “fire-drill” and only further alienates the staff. When a weak manager over commits the team, they will feel like their leader is not looking out for their interests or worse, setting them up for failure.

These are my top eight signs of weak managers. I would love to hear your thoughts or share other signs or traits you have witnessed or experienced.

The Eight Quarter Company

2008-07-07T06:55:00.000-07:00

I am often asked “when should I begin to see results from different programs, plans and changes within my company”. Result time horizons, of course depends on the industry and the stage of your company. For example, an automotive company such as Ford might plan in 10 year time horizons, while a high tech start up might plan in months or have a one year plan (to survive).

There are always extremes and exceptions to any business example, but in general I believe planning should be done in eight quarter (24 month) increments. This is a logical choice between the one year budgets and financial plans and the three to five year strategic plans that quite often get put in a drawer after a fabulous 2 or 3 day off-site planning meeting.

The company that manages to an eight quarter plan can view this like a football or basketball game with 4 periods. These four x six month periods are when you will see results from starting or making changes in each area. The four periods are:

Direct Sales Results, Quarters 1 & 2 = Sales is the shortest term results and are tactical in focus and timeframe. The impact time from direct sales depends on the sales cycle length and complexity. This is the most costly way to get revenues but is also allows you the most control. A direct sales model change or a new sales rep given an average sales cycle length should begin to show some results by the sixth month.

Marketing Results, Quarters 3 & 4 = Marketing is a mid-term results strategy. It can see results in weeks or months with targeted lead generation campaigns and events, while taking years for image and brand creation. But in general, Marketing with its broad expanse of programs will begin to see results in 6 – 12 months (quarters 3 & 4). Marketing is not as black and white in measuring results as sales but is equally important to a company’s success. Without good marketing, you won’t win or achieve what you should achieve.

Channel Sales Results, Quarters 5 & 6 = Sales through a channel partner program is always underestimated in revenue impact timing. It typically takes the channel partner six months to get up and going (shorter if a simple consumer product, longer if a complex software solution). Many companies use channel partners as an after-thought or secondary to a direct sales strategy, so the program planning, launch, training, support and management is usually lacking. This results in lack luster revenue performance. However, if done right this is a very cost effective business model and it is easily leveraged and scalable.

Strategic Planning Results, Quarters 7 & 8 = The strategic results that happen from planning will on average begin to show results in months 18 – 24 (quarters 7 & 8). These might include an acquisition, a new business model or decision to enter a new market etc. Another area that typically takes this long to demonstrate results is launching internationally. Many executives underestimate the length of time, planning and effort it takes to launch a regional push into Europe or Asia.

So this is your eight quarter company. To play this game requires your focused attention to operate as efficiently as possible and understand the timing and results you need to see.

What do you think? How does your company handle this?

Managing by Task Specific Readiness

2008-06-30T15:35:00.000-07:00

There are many leadership and management styles to choose from depending on your employee’s social style (driver, analytical, expressive & amiable), experience, skills, knowledge, stage of company, your motivational style, etc.

One key management approach (along with social style) that I use to determine how I will manage an individual is by that person’s “task specific readiness”. This means each person has tasks, roles or jobs they have done over and over and are very competent in that task. Therefore the management of this person for this task is simply ask them to do it, or let them know “what” you want them to do.

If an employee is new to a role, task or job, they will need coaching, direction and a more hands on style. They will need to learn from you not just the “what” but the “how”. When introducing a new task or responsibility, a more positive reinforcement and a nurturing coaching style may be necessary. The Task Specific Readiness Managerial Style constantly comes into play because we are always asking our people to do different tasks. Some they are competent in, some they are new to. This can be a new employee (low on task specific readiness because they don’t know your company, product, or processes), or a seasoned veteran that you are asking to take on a new challenge, role or task (also low in task specific readiness).

While the task specific readiness management style is needed in today’s changing and challenging business environment it is important to note that many leaders do this instinctively. But new managers or weak leaders need to consider this or risk their employee failing at the task, or worse having that employee who is high on the readiness scale feel they are being treated like a child.

The challenge in learning how to lead people is not only identify the social style of each of your employees and then flexing and mirroring your behavior to communicate your expectations successfully but to then adjust your management style based upon their task specific readiness. This takes time and practice until it becomes second nature.

What are some of your ideas and thoughts on this?

Corporate Values are Important

2008-06-10T12:34:00.000-07:00

One of the corporate identities that young companies and even more mature companies miss is the power of communicating the values of the organization. It is the foundation upon which the company is built. It is a vehicle which conveys to its employees, shareholders and customers what they stand for; what they hold important and will measure as their benchmark for success (besides the numbers).

It is really up to the CEO to set the stage for the describing the corporate values by first looking inside themselves to determine what drives them, what is their truth and what makes them and their company special.

The company values are really an extension of the CEO’s personal values. The CEO sets as the example for how the company conducts itself inside the office and out in public. The leader sets the tone for work ethic and integrity, for pace and productivity and a sense of team work and collaboration.

Let’s use a sailing analogy, the values are the rudder and the culture is the steering wheel, the employees are the sails and the market is the wind.

I love a great set of corporate values that are believed in, posted in the office, on our website, and constantly used to reinforce how to make decisions, support our employees and serve our customers.

Some examples of corporate values that I have established in the past:
• Life Balance
• Trust and Loyalty
• Collaboration
• Open Communication
• Passion & Work Ethic

What are some corporate values that you thought were successful in motivating the organization and conveying its goals and objectives?

Effective Leadership - The Amiable Style

2008-05-17T07:50:00.000-07:00

The fourth and final style in this blog series on Leadership & Social Styles is the Amiable. This style is the ultimate team player as they will try to get along with everyone. They focus on the friendships and relationships in their professional and personal life. Amiable do well in careers that are people orientated such as Human Resources. They measure their success by the warmth and attention they receive from others.

Strengths: cooperative, supportive, diplomatic, patient, loyal
Under Stress: acquiesces to others, will comply with request but heart is not in agreement, may not do what they say
Positives: idealistic, helpful, easy-going, caring, insightful
Negatives: impractical, push-over, gullible, passive, pleaser, self-deprecating

Amiable Behaviors:
Walks, talks and decides slowly
Very feelings focused
Less risk orientated
Will always ask the “why” question, and relies on “acceptance” to get the job done
Tend to be quiet in meetings may express ideas after others have spoken

Other Clues of an Amiable:
Prefer to spend leisure time with people and one-on-one interactions or small groups over solitary activities or large groups
Reading tends to be towards biographies, fiction and inspirational literature
Dresses informally, but in tasteful conformity
Office décor may be informal and homey, with pictures of family
Remembers personal data about others, sends birthday cards and gifts

How to Mirror an Amiable:
Make genuine personal contact; be more casual, informal and friendly
Start each meeting on personal stuff, how’s the family, etc
Focus on feelings and observe body language - amiables are unlikely to voice disagreement but you will see it in their body language
Be supportive with emphatic listening skills and express sincere appreciation for their contributions
Provide structure. Make sure job is well defined and goals are clearly established
Don’t overdo facts and logic

How to Motivate an Amiable:
Allow them to make relationships within the organization. Give them responsibilities and/or projects that are people orientated.

Effective Leadership - The Analytical Style

2008-05-10T08:17:00.000-07:00

The third post in the Effective Leadership Series will focus on the next personality style: the Analytical. This style is the stable, data driven person who often keeps the other styles rooted in reality. They are the voice of logic and reason. They define the technical requirements of our products or services and manage the financial information. Analytical people do well in careers that involved data research & development. Most engineers and accountants are analytical. They measure their success by their ability to prove that their concept or work is accurate. They want to be intellectually superior.

Strengths: logical, thorough, serious, systematic, prudent
Under Stress: avoids conflict or confrontation by physically or emotionally leaving, sulks, may intellectualize with cold detached logic, doesn’t let on insides are churning
Positives: practical, factual, unflappable, knowledgeable, methodical
Negatives: uncreative, data-bound, boring, plodding, critical

Analytical Behaviors:
Makes decisions slowly and is slower paced in walking and gestures
Speaks quiet and slower and qualifies ideas
Appears serious, may like to work alone, appears detached from feelings
Asks the “how” question, and relies on “expertise” to get the job done
Tries to save face if a mistake is made and needs to learn to relax and take risks

Other Clues of an Analytical:
Prefer solitary leisure activities such as reading. Tends to do the most technical reading
Clothing may be more conservative, proper and not very colorful
Office décor may be tasteful, conventional, neat and formal

How to Mirror an Analytical
Slow your pace, talk slower
Listen more and talk less
Don’t rush an analytical in their decision making
Don’t come on too strong, relax a bit
Be systematic in your approach and thought process
Be organized, detailed and factual
Be more task oriented and de-emphasize feelings

How to Motivate an Analytical
Allow them to work on projects that you deem “difficult” and offers them the opportunity to demonstrate their expertise and intelligence.

Effective Leadership - The Expressive Style

2008-05-03T09:25:00.000-07:00

As I mentioned in my last two posts, there are four leadership and social styles that play an important role in our business lives, our social circles and our family dynamics. Understanding these styles and how to relate to them can foster richer communications and closer, more productive relationships. The second of the four styles is the Expressive. The Expressive Style is the fun, life of the party person. They are about enjoying the journey in life and business. They are wonderful because they bring humor to meetings and remind us not to be so serious. They are great communicators, collaborators, and evangelists for the company or product. Expressives are great marketing people and sometimes sales people (if managed properly). They measure their success by recognition (awards and applause) and the attention they receive; good or bad.

Strengths: outgoing, enthusiastic, persuasive, fun loving, spontaneous
Under Stress: will unleash an angry personal attack, strong language, high volume, emphatic gestures
Positives: flexible, energetic, socially adept, inspirational, exciting, initiator
Negatives: inconsistent, disorganized, loud, aggressive, manipulator, opinionated

Expressive Behaviors:
Dislikes routine and deadlines
Decides quickly and exerts pressure for decisions
Speaks rapidly, moves fast, speaks loud
Asks the “who” question, and relies on “charm” to get the job done
Tries to save time and expend the least amount of energy while completing a task

Other Clues of an Expressive:
Read the least of any of the styles
Flamboyant and colorful clothing style
Office will be open, bold, colorful, and disorganized
Prefers spending leisure time with people partying

How to Mirror an Expressive:
Pick up your pace, speak, walk, make decisions quickly
Demonstrate higher energy
Focus on the big picture
Say what you think, speak up more often, tell more and ask less
Don’t be a stickler for rules

How to Motivate an Expressive:
How you motivate an expressive is by allowing them to be visible. They enjoy the public praise but needs to be managed with direction. Feed their need for attention only if they are able to keep on task and on time.

Effective Leadership - The Driver Style

2008-04-26T10:23:00.000-07:00

It is important for me to give credit where credit is due. Denis Shackel is the management consultant that taught me these skills and is responsible for the content ideas below. With any style it is important to first determine your style and the styles of the people that you work with. Everyone falls into one of four social styles as I mentioned in the last blog. If you can understand the attributes and driving behaviors of your team, you can increase your ability to effectively work with them and increase productivity. The first of the four styles is the Driver. The Driver Style is a very determined and focused. He/she is completely goal driven; everything is about accomplishing the goal. Strong leaders and highly successful salespeople are drivers; they measure their progress strictly by results. Their satisfaction comes from getting the job done and winning.

Attributes of the Driver:
Strengths: independent, candid, decisive, pragmatic, efficient
Under Stress: autocratic, pushy, dictatorial, insistent
Positives: forceful, confident, risk-taker, competent, change agent, sense of urgency
Negatives: aloof, stubborn, critical, ruthless, boring, too serious

Driver Behaviors:
Communicate by telling others what to do, phrasing is direct and to the point
Makes decisions quickly, risk oriented, short term focused
Moves quickly, demonstrates task focused energy, expresses facts/opinions strongly
Vocal intensity and eye contact when making a point
Asks the “what” question, and relies on “personal competence” to get the job done
Tries to save time and will cut corners to finish the task

Other Clues of a Driver:
Prefers brief reading materials such as business articles or short stories
Office is set up for functionality and is often sparsely decorated
Leisure time may be spent actively; loves competition
Clothing is functional, neat, action oriented

How to Mirror a Driver:
Pick up your pace: move and speak faster than usual
Demonstrate high energy to match theirs
Become more task oriented
Don’t get bogged down in details
De-emphasize your feelings
Be clear about your goals Say what you think
Cut to the chase

How to Motivate a Driver:
Have a contest. Allow your drivers to compete and recognize them when they win. They enjoy the recognition as much as the success.

Effective Leadership Styles

2008-04-14T08:17:00.000-07:00

Over the next four blogs, I will discuss the four basic personality style categories that everyone falls into. I will explore and share how to take that understanding to adapt your communication and management style to match other styles to gain optimal results.

Once you understand these styles and can easily recognize the styles in others, you will be able to “flex your style” to mirror the style of the person you are dealing with. Whether people realize it or not, they respond better when the person they are speaking to is like them. They feel a connection with the other person that they might not be able to articulate but they recognize that the other person “gets them”. Understanding personality styles and changing your communication behavior to mirror someone else’s is not deceptive; rather it is a way to form a stronger bond with that person because you have taken the time to understand how they look at the world and use language and thoughts that are meaningful to them. Without this understanding, we continue to make the same mistake over and over again. We suppose everyone thinks like we do, is motivated by the same things we are and if we just keeping banging them over the head, they will change and perform.

I learned these styles when I was CEO of a software company. It dramatically changed my work relationships and the team’s productivity. When we understood what our fellow colleagues needed in order to do their job, the results were undeniably incredible. I saw such an impact on how others reacted and responded to me when I mirrored their style that I decided to bring this new way to communicating home and use it in my personal relationships with my friends and family. The results were the same. I was able to dramatically improve my relationships with my children and family because I knew what was important to them and based my conversations and expectations around how they viewed the world. It made such a noticeable difference in my family that everyone read the material I had learned at work and it continues to be the foundation for the rich relationships we experience today.

There are four basic personality styles: Driver, Analytical, Expressive, and Amiable. Statistics show that in North America, there are an equal number of people in each quadrant. And while everyone has a primary style, we all have a secondary style as well. Sometimes a person’s primary style it is very obvious, other times it might be hard to determine. It was the work of Robert and Dorothy Bolton in their “Social Style / Management Style: Developing Productive Work Relationships” that first identified these styles and began the practice of personality style based communication.

I first learned about this theory when I brought management consultant and professor Denis Shackel into our company to conduct a two day communications seminar for the executive team. We took a simple 2 page test which identified our primary style and our secondary style. It turned out I was a Driver primary and Expressive secondary.

Over the next four blogs I will discuss how to manage each style, how to motivate each style and how each style measures their own success (which might be different from how you measure their success). We will also review which functions/jobs each style excels at, and what flaws in each style impede their success. Lastly, I will review how each style reacts under stress and how you can adapt and “flex your style” to help reduce that pressure.

I hope the information in my upcoming posts will improve your company results, management team performance and personal / family relationships as much as it has helped mine. See you next week.

Telecommuting can be a Win - Win

2008-03-24T10:39:00.000-07:00

CEO’s regularly ask me about the impact of telecommuting on an organization. Have I seen it work? What compromises are made in productivity and communication, and what is there to be gained?The traditional management view is that employees need to be seen and monitored in order to develop confidence that they are performing their responsibilities. What if you can’t see your workers anymore? How do you know they are working? How do you measure productivity when they are not in the office? Are they more or less distracted at home?

A recent study by The Journal of Applied Psychology appears to debunk this old school mentality. A couple of professors at Pennsylvania State University reviewed 43 studies featuring 12,883 employees. Their results showed that working from home is good for business and for staff.

There were seven positive results of employees working from home:

Increased Control – Telecommuters were free to manage their time, dress as they want and layout their home office environment as they like. They skipped the commute time to an office and usually worked more hours because of this.

Increased Life Balance – Workers decide when they work and when they integrate work and family obligations. This means they were better at making work and family schedules work together. Many staff set aside a room at the home for an office to avoid disruptions.Telecommuting reduces the tension that can exist between doing one’s job and meeting family obligations.

Improved Boss – Staff Relationships – The research found that telecommuting had a positive effect on supervisor – staff relationships. This is because usually both parties make an extra effort to stay in touch when staff work from home. Telecommuting means boss and worker see each other less often, so the quality of their interactions is increased.

Reduced Stress – Not having to rush to work through commuter traffic, spend extra money on lunches and business attire, or worry about being late can reduce stress. Coupled with an improved boss relationship and less tension at home, the telecommuter is less stressed out.

Increased Job Satisfaction – Workers who have increased control over their work, who can attend to their familial obligations and experience autonomy are more satisfied and less likely to quit their jobs. Knowing that an employer trusts and appreciates the worker and is flexible and supportive of a telecommuting lifestyle is hugely positive.

Worker Retention – Staff who are ready quit their jobs often cite tensions between work and family, lack of employer flexibility and difficult supervisors as reasons they desire to leave. People stay at their jobs when they feel appreciated, respected and they are contributing to the company’s success.

Improved Productivity & Career Prospects – Contrary to many old school managers, the productivity of a work at home employee increases. Staff are less distracted, less gossip, less time wasted chatting at the coffee machine.

Telecommuting might not be the right solution for all companies. A key consideration for success according to one of my fellow CEO friends, Ray Parsons, is the stage of your company, how developed your business processes are to support a remote worker, and level of maturity and responsibility of the employees. Ray has a great point. The telecommuting employee can be at risk in a start up company because structures, processes and culture have not developed fully, leaving the employee to flounder. For a more established company with a formal infrastructure in place, the opportunity has a greater chance to succeed.

Today we have great communication and collaborative tools that really support telecommuting. These include email, instant messaging, video conferencing, CRM tools, etc. Now it does not matter where you work so long as you get your work done. If a company is able to measure the work process and attain the results it needs to be successful, all the better! What do you think? Any thoughts pro or con on telecommuting?

Fuel For The Brain

2008-03-12T14:36:00.000-07:00

A number of business books have come out over the past ten to fifteen years that have guided me in a number of different areas. I love to read about leadership; personal, self-improvement or spiritual growth, and lastly general business books I will not touch on the first two groups of books in this post, but will instead focus on what I believe are some of the best business books and where I have learned the most valuable lessons.

The first book (in chronological order of release) is Crossing The Chasm by Geoffrey Moore. This was the first marketing book that pointed out that the old ways of marketing high technology products no longer work. Geoffrey proposed a “New Technology Adoption Life Cycle”, which explained why most high tech products fail to become mainstream; Moore asserts that they fall into the “chasm” defined as being between the early adopters and the majority market; he calls it “the pragmatic herd”. This book is a step by step guide on how to get technology products past the early adopters (risk takers) and into the pragmatic majority.

The second recommendation is The Discipline of Market Leaders by Treacy & Wiersema. This was eye opening for me as it’s thesis is that key for successful organizations (the “market leaders”) to excel in delivering a particular kind of value to their customers is focus. The authors speculate that market leaders choose a single “value discipline” such as best total cost, best product or best solution, and then build their organizations around it. This great book offers understanding and examples of the three disciplines that a company must select from and follow in order to be successful. First, is the discipline of Operational Excellence, second is the discipline of Product Leadership, and third is the discipline of Customer Intimacy.

Who Moved My Cheese by Spencer Johnson is my next suggestion. It is an amazing parable of four characters that live in a “maze” and look for “cheese” to nourish themselves and make them happy. Cheese is a metaphor for what you want in life and the maze represents where you look for what you want. The book is primarily about change: how we can embrace change and enjoy less stress. It shows us that in many cases, change can be good, and can lead to a better life, love, career, money.
In our businesses today, change is constant. I learned from this book not to fear change, but rather to embrace it as an opportunity.

The next great book for business is Blink by Malcolm Gladwell. This is about rapid cognition, the kind that happens in the blink of an eye. When you are confronted with a new situation or a new person, usually your first two seconds of processing yields the correct perspective. Blink is about how powerful those first two seconds can be and how to recognize them.

Another favorite is Good to Great by Jim Collins. This seminal book is about why some companies move to greatness and why most do not. It explains what Level 5 Leadership is all about, the Hedgehog Concept, and the Culture of Discipline. Level 5 Leaders build a company to survive long after they’re gone. Once gone, the level 5 leader wants their company to grow and thrive, not suffer and wallow.

The last business book I would like to suggest is The World is Flat by Thomas Friedman. This is an incredible view of the world today and how it is truly without borders from a business standpoint. This isn’t just about manufacturing jobs moving to China and India, it’s about US accountants sending tax returns to India for processing and radiologists getting x-rays read at night in India and analysis sent back by morning. The flattening world is about the triple convergence: New Players (China & India), a New Playing Field (internet) and New Processes for Horizontal Collaboration (eBay, Dell, Wal-Mart).

What books have you read that you would recommend to this blog’s readers?

Achieving a Life Balance is Tough

2008-03-04T15:43:00.000-08:00

As a CEO or senior executive, achieving a life balance can be a tricky thing. We all say we want it, but few of us actually give up the work reins to support our desires. I think there a few things that influence this dilemma:
 Ego
 Insecurity
 The sense of responsibility we have as leaders of our organizations

Being a CEO can be a lonely job. We have to motivate ourselves (as well as others) and rarely do we have anyone saying “good job” or providing feedback (other than at a quarterly board meeting). Our board feedback is usually while “looking back through the rear view mirror” rather than “looking forward through the windshield”. Our egos rarely get stroked. We have to keep ourselves moving forward and on pace with very little encouragement from anyone else.

The insecurity comes from the knowledge that the average tenure of a CEO in a company is under three years. One false move and it’s on to the next CEO. The days of long tenured C-level positions are over. It’s perform or perish. That kind of pressure will definitely keep you in the office. Lastly, the sense of responsibility we place upon ourselves can be incredible; we believe we can’t let our people down, we feel responsible for their jobs, their careers, and their families, as well as our own.

Achieving a life balance is tough but necessary in today’s world. Our business careers are like a marathon, not a sprint, and we need to keep our engines (mind, body, soul) in top running order. Life balance is about harmonizing four areas of ones life:
 Work
 Personal
 Spiritual
 Community / Charity

The work side of life balance shouldn’t be an all or nothing proposition, it must be a happy medium. As CEOs, we want to create a culture in our companies that encourages life balance. This means that we can only get involved in three areas of ones life; the spiritual or religious side is a individual, personal journey and has no place at work. To me, the personal or family side of life balance is about being at my child’s recital or sports practice. It means taking a family vacation each year and another trip with just my significant other. We need to continue to invest in our marriages / relationships as well as investing in our children. We need to be the role models for life balance for our employees and encourage them to keep their schedules in perspective as well.

The final area of one’s life is charity or community involvement. Every company needs to be a good corporate citizen by being active in community or charity functions. This area is less about writing checks to charities as it is about getting involved, such as giving employees two days of paid time off to build homes for Habitat For Humanity, or sponsor Special Olympic athletes and rent a bus for your employees to go cheer them on.

What are your thoughts on life balance?

Collaboration is Business

2008-02-26T07:56:00.000-08:00

One of my favorites subjects is collaboration. I was recently in Hawaii and watched the outrigger canoe paddlers each morning in front my condo. Most boats had six or eight paddlers with a person in the back calling the stroke rhythms. What is interesting in outrigger racing is it's not the strongest paddlers that win but the team that is completely in synch paddling. If one person is out of synch, the effort is lost. Think of the CEO as the caller in back keeping everyone (company or management team) in synch.

Another analogy is how a Canadian geese flock always flies in a V pattern. It is interesting to watch the geese as they "slip stream" or draft off each other, much like in bicycle racing, car racing or even swimming. The goose at the head of the V is always changing, they take turns pulling the flock. In the geese world the V formation allows them to be 15% more efficient. Meaning that as a collaborating team they can travel farther and faster, than on their own or not working together.

Collaboration in business is a cornerstone of a high performing team. Along with communication, purpose, measureable goals, and different perspectives (such as the different social styles of driver, analytical, amiable and expressive). Collaboration and communication go hand in hand. Just look at the proliferation of collaboration software tools and social networks in the last five years. Consider how sites like facebook, myspace, and linked-in allow people to connect and exchange ideas and information. Collaborating in business on a global basis is the key premise made by Thomas Friedman in his great book "The World is Flat".

One lesson I have learned in business (and life) is the better you are at collaborating with people, the better your business career and the better your life will be. I guess you could say collaboration is the measure of a person in business.

Cashing Out at a Strategic Price

2008-02-02T08:11:00.001-08:00

Selling your company is a fun, challenging and stressful time. It is when we realize monetarily all the sweat equity we have put into "our baby" but there is one major mistake and one major misunderstanding most companies make.

The mistake is made when most CEO's decide to sell their company, they look for a consultant or investment banker to help them navigate these unknown waters. Unfortunately this is usually too late to have any positive impact on valuation (selling price). The CEO will find themselves relegated to a financial price with the only up-side being if the consultant or I-Banker can get a bidding war going with 2 or three parties, this is not the norm and usually never comes close to a strategic valuation.

The major misunderstanding many executives have is when they decide to sell their company, most tell their consultant or banker they want a "strategic price". This means that they want a strategic buyer to pay a higher price, based on some intangible perception of increased value, vs a financial price, meaning simply a valuation determined but a multiple of EBITDA or revenues (which is always a lower price).

So how do you get a strategic valuation for your business? My tracking of deals would indicate that a great majority (probably > 70%) of strategic valuations are paid for companies that already have some form of relationship. If you decide to sell your company this year and expect a strategic valuation, it probably won't happen. The way to orchestrate a strategic price is to begin the liquidity (selling) plan 24 months in advance (18 months at minimum).

You need to have a liquidity planning session that determines your top 5 potential acquirers and then assess the following:
- their business models
- their acquisition strategies
- the business models of the companies they have acquired
- did they pay a strategic price or financial price for their deals?

Strategic selling prices for companies happen two ways, 1)Through a partnership that built over time until your company is viewed as strategic to the buyer. 2)When a buyer needs the acquiring company to fend off a competitive threat or offers a key strategic advantage. Case in point the Microsoft huge offer to buy Yahoo. This is a direct result of Microsoft feeling that Google was getting too strong in search and Microsoft's search product was languishing.

Do you agree with the cashing out at the highest price concepts, any good experiences that you would like to share?

Real Leaders Delegate

2008-02-02T08:11:00.000-08:00

Delegation is the one of the areas of leadership and management that is talked about a lot, and not done very well. It separates the "men from the boys" in business, if you will allow me to use a sexist term Teddy Roosevelt once said that

"the best executive is the one who has the sense enough to pick good
men to do what he wants done and self-restraint enough to keep
from meddling with them while they do it".

This helps explain what I mean be "separating the men from the boys", I can always tell a new or inexperienced manager by HOW they delegate and HOW MUCH they delegate. New managers don't delegate, they do, tell, show, over-manage, and alienate their new subordinates. The new manager syndrome that all new managers(including myself when I first managed) fall into, why spent time telling my worker how to do a task, when I can do it faster or when no one does it as well as I do....so I will just do it myself.

A great leader knows how to delegate, they know there are four steps to delegation.
1. Choosing a capable person
2. Explaining the objectives
3. Give the means and authority to do job
4. Keeping in contact.

One thing I finally learned after many mistakes is that we are delegate authority and NOT responsibility. So while we delegate the authority to perform a task to someone else, the responsibility always stays with the boss. One way to think how this works is to consider your subordinate with whom you have delegated a task as your sub-contactor on the project. They do the work, you own the reponsibility.

I followed this typical business evolution in that I began in management and didn't delegate anything, then after 10 years as CEO, my mantra was "delegate till they drop". I laid out my management philosophy to my team and explained it was up to them to let me know when "their buckets were full".

Managing Things......Leading People

2008-01-28T10:14:00.001-08:00

Years ago I was trained (ok, coached is probably a better term) in the art of "managing things but leading people" by a Management Consultant named Denis Shackel. Learning and using this set of skills changed my career as well as my relationships with my family and friends. The management guru Tom Peters once said "The leader is not a devil's advocate, but a cheerleader". Just think about great leaders, what about great coaches in sports? Phil Jackson is a great leader whether he was with the Chicago Bulls or LA Lakers, he led his team, he didn't manage his team.

The premise here is that we manage from the left brain (the analytical side) while we lead from the right brain (the creative side). So we manage things, meaning we manage tasks, jobs, numbers and information. The challenge here is the difference between management and leadership in traditional forms, and the spectrum that the higher you climb the corporate ladder the less management and the more leadership you develop and focus on.

Well, I will put it out to you, that even first time managers who typically over-manage and have trouble delegating, need to lead their people, not micro-manage them. Leading people comes down to looking for the good, having a vision, and making the employee feel good about themselves. It's about motivation and getting employees to want to follow you. Some call these types of leaders "charismatic". Who are some of the great leaders of our past that have had a strong vision, motivated us, and had a special charisma?

What's a CEO?

2008-01-28T10:14:00.000-08:00

There are many definitions and roles of a CEO. It changes by the industry you are in, the functional background you elevated through, the stage of your company, and your style as a leader. Each of these factors are part of the mosaic of your Leadership style.

Are you a driver or analytical or amiable or expressive? Are you a teacher, dictator, teller or coach? Are you a talker or a listener? Are you an adaptive leader or innovative leader? Are you a great visionary or a great operator? Are you sales & marketing based or engineering based?

Is your company in the formation stage, or the growth stage, or the re-invention stage? Do you sell a product or service? Do you have a strong managment team or do you carry most of the ball yourself.

From a style perspective, do your people (employees) like you, or respect you, or are you a motivator. Do your people want to follow you?

Each of these questions above will at some point in the future be detailed in my blog. We will also look at how current pop culture news and people demonstrate different leadership styles. For example if you watch the TV show "House", the leadership style of Gregory House is the antithesis of leadership, which creates disfunction throughout the hospital. Even his boss, Cuttey, is rendered ineffective in dealing this House's style for managing up and managing down. That's another point, your management style will change by situation and by whether you are managing up (your boss or board of directors) or managing down (your team).

Leadership and managment styles should also be changed by the situation (often called Situational Leadership) of the task or said another way "the task specific readiness" of the individual. This means that for some tasks a person might need a "hands off" management style because they are good at that task and has done it before. However that same employee might be given a new task or promotion to a new responsibility, and your style must change to be more "hands on and coaching".

The CEO Corner blog is for CEO's to learn new tips, for executives to become better leaders, for managers to understand how to think like a CEO, for entrepreneurs who want to get better, and for people anywhere in their careers who want to learn how to lead.