Top "Soft" Planning Tip

When planning the execution of new or modified operations, there are some critical "soft" factors that any strategist or project manager should be aware of. Most importantly of all is this:

Do not separate the "planners" from the "do'ers".

Many successful strategies are formed through an "emergent process" of organisational learning - learning from those doing the work that feeds back into, and modifies the detailed plans laid out beforehand. One recent example of the U.S. military conducting successful emergent planning is the evolution of the "Surge" Strategy in Iraq. This has been the result of a bottom-up feedback of learning from the leaders on the ground, rather than from top-down directives. This identified issues that would otherwise have been missed had plans simply been the product of a top-down strategic review. As such, learnings such as the need to firstly provide law and security for the local population were implemented.

Disappointing results from traditional models of strategic planning also led General Electric's renowned CEO, Jack Welch, to begin his transformation of the company by making major reductions in the overly bureaucratic strategic planning mechanisms that were in place in the early 1980s. Over the next several decades, other leading corporations such as Intel, Honda, Royal Dutch / Shell Group, Exxon and Google have followed more successful "emergent" planning strategies. As a rule of thumb, highly volatile markets and dynamic environments are best planned for with this approach. The role of emergence relative to formal design increases as the environment becomes increasingly volatile and unpredictable.

Henry Mintzberg and colleagues at the McGill University in the 1980s developed the learning model of emergent strategy formation, basing it on the premise that the “complex and unpredictable nature of the organization’s environment, often coupled with the diffusion of knowledge-bases necessary for strategy, precludes deliberate control; strategy-making must above all take the form of a process of learning over time, in which, at the limit, formulation and implementation become indistinguishable.” Mintzberg's "emergent strategy" is a pattern of action that develops over time in an organisation, often despite vision, mission, and goals, or in addition to them. Decisions emerge from complex processes whereby individual managers have the freedom to interpret the intended strategy and to adapt it to changing external circumstances as they are happening, rather than realising after the event, say during the post-project review, usually when it's too late and damage has been done, or market-share has already been lost.

Emergence is the result of multiple decisions at many levels, particularly within middle management, and is a true bottom-up process. As said earlier, the military employs this approach in planning operations as well as in countering terrorism. At Intel, a key historic decision to abandon memory chips and concentrate on microprocessors was the result of a host of decentralized decisions taken at divisional and plant level that were subsequently acknowledged by top management and developed into a strategy.

Two key "soft" traits required at every level, above all others, for emergence planning to work, are opportunism and curiosity, starting with the CEO. Mintzberg advocates strategy-making be an iterative process involving experimentation and feedback and so, as with any trial and error learning, there will be moments where curiosity must prevail over uncertainty. If the boss needs high levels of certainty and exhibits anxiety in the face of the unknown, then he or she will not be sufficiently adaptable for such a volatile environment nor embrace emergent planning. This is also true where decision-making processes have become highly bureaucratic.

The learning organisation's role for the strategist or planner is very different to the role of the strategist in a sclerotically bureaucratic organisation. Self-proclaimed "control freaks" need not apply! In my next blog I will address the conditions required for emergent planning to work.

Do We Work Better for Causes or People?

Positive psychology (psychologists studying the psychology of success) has become very interested in organisational capacity to tap into what they often refer to as the "added discretionary effort" of the people. Is it the the cause or company that is the driving force, or is it the relationships and the connections, that make an organisation truly successful?

One position is that people join good companies (or causes) but often leave because of poor management or decision-making. All the money, time and effort spent recruiting and training an employee, as well as their unique knowledge, can easily be lost. Another position is that good managers are worth their weight in gold, particularly where the organisation itself is weak on either process or people-management. In the war film, "Black Hawk Down", director Ridley Scott offers his view through the words of lead US marine, Hoot:

"When I go home people'll ask me, "Hey Hoot, why do you do it man? What, you some kinda war junkie?" You know what I'll say? I won't say a goddamn word. Why? They won't understand. They won't understand why we do it. They won't understand that it's about the men next to you, and that's it. That's all it is."

Rather cliched some might say, but also a true reflection of what keeps people pulling together. On the downside, even where it is a dubious or lost cause, as history has witnessed many times, people can continue to pull together.

The organisation having the ability to intervene where there is blind loyalty, to encourage intelligent critique, innovation or better practice, as much as the capacity to create cohesive team spirit, requires certain learning processes as well as accompanying "soft" skills. Unsurprisingly, many of these processes were developed for the military, through activities such as "Wash-Ups" between task forces following certain operations, in order to identify what went well and what could be learned from. These, along with many others are now utilised to leverage not only continued loyalty, or added discretionary effort even, but importantly improved practice and innovation. Whether it's the people or the cause that is more influential is still very much open for debate and so I'll leave it up to you the reader to decide which matters most to you. Ultimately, they both count in encouraging added discretionary effort.

Staff Incentives Don't Need To Cost Much

My last blog talked about the importance of encouraging positive feelings in the workplace; acknowledging that how people feel at work will impact upon their productivity levels as well as innovation capability more than the material benefits being promised. I read an article reiterating this in Saturday's Financial Times, Aug.21st 2010 (Everyone Welcomes A Slice of the Pie, Jonathan Moules; Keep Spirits Up - Ask the Experts, London Business School, p.26): "It is too easy to think that you can motivate people with money. The majority of people would take an honest day's pay for an honest day's work rather than be bribed - particularly if it was for a low-paid job" - Rupert Merson, Professor, London Business School (extracted from FT article).

Without further ado, in addressing some requests that I received after my last blog about what I considered good alternatives to financial incentives, here are a few pointers:

- Take money off the table by paying fairly. Hang on a minute, in your last blog you were saying that money is not a good motivator, I can hear some of you wondering. Although not great at motivating, money is a very good demotivator and so a certain amount is necessary in order for goodwill to be available. Cooperation and esprit de corps will more readily follow where money is no longer the issue driving malcontent. Most people want a fair day's pay for an honest day's work.

- Avoid company-wide bonus schemes. These usually disincentivise more than motivate and can be time-consuming and complicated to administer.

- Involve everyone in business performance improvement, in a way that stimulates camaraderie and reduces internal competition. For some companies, this may involve engaging in generating improvement ideas over informal, friendly lunches together. For others in more service-oriented, technical or creative fields, it can also entail discussion forums, quality circles, communities of practice or localised improvement initiatives, in smaller focus groups. Most importantly, not everyone performs well in a large team-building or Quality Circle / Kaizen / Six Sigma or Lean forum. Staff members juggling home life with work life will not necessarily appreciate a drinks-after-work session or weekend retreats. Getting to know your staff and taking into account their different needs, strengths and weaknesses, will bring out the best in them, avoiding inadvertently discriminating against, or even alienating some.

- Have an open-door policy and a good quality working environment. Allow your staff a decent measure of autonomy and control over decision-making affecting them and provide opportunities for developing new skills. Importantly, everyone enjoys a degree of challenge, along with high appreciation and trust. How readily and confidently you can answer these four questions will indicate whether there are opportunities to improve here: 1. How well do staff on the "shop floor" feel heard?; 2. do they trust that in raising performance, productivity or quality issues that these will be swiftly addressed?; 3. do they believe that they will have a measure of control and involvement in finding the right solutions or adaptations? 4. do they believe that their inputs and opinions are welcomed and taken seriously?

- Detect early chronic stress in middle management. Bad moods, high stress, and fatigued managers are a cancer in the workplace. I say middle management as this is the area of most businesses prone to chronic stress and yet they are key to linking the vision of your business with the execution. It is one of the more challenging positions to hold in an organisation, coping with the expectations from above but also with the multitude of changes and needs from below. There are of course other areas where stress is more likely, including ongoing change initiatives, mergers, restructuring and downsizing. A smiling face, a service philosophy and a proactive approach to problem-solving from middle management goes a long way!

- Promote pride and recognition for work being done. Celebrate the good stuff and fix the bad. The good stuff is all around and rather than offering best staff member of the month awards or best improvement idea awards, etc., develop methods which encourage the efforts of the majority as much as the few shining stars.

In effect, as much as what is said or promised is important, how it is said and how people feel about that is equally so. In return, rather than costing you money, these incentives will pay back with dividends, creating a mood that ensures people want to come to work, as well as help you grow your business.

Connecting People with Passion

When I ask someone “what most inspires you?” the answer rarely comes back as simply money. Money is the thing that must be taken off the table in order for people to be able to think clearly about their life and it is definitely the vehicle for meeting most of our basic needs. Where it is being offered by the truck load it is cited as pretty inspiring (as in the case of banking). Most companies however cannot offer this much and even if they can, it does not guarantee that the right decisions will be made. In fact, at best money has a pretty inconsistent effect on human motivation and at worst it interferes with making good decisions. Social studies have shown that where even rudimentary cognitive skills are required, where more money is offered as the incentive, poorer decisions are reached. Many companies know this already and view profit as a necessity rather than their ultimate goal. The classic business doctrine “Maximise shareholder wealth” is understood, however businesses that are run simply to fulfil this tend to have bad things happen, to the environment, to their company, to the products, or to people. Companies that continue to innovate and prosper, do so based on other guiding principles. A more meaningful and inspiring raison-d’etre. Read on to explore the meaning or purpose of some of these organisations.

Stanford University:

To enhance and disseminate knowledge that improves human kind.

Lost Arrow / Patagonia (outdoor clothing and accessories):

To be a role model and tool for social change.

The John Lewis Partnership (UK Retailer):

The Partnership's ultimate purpose is the happiness of all its members, through their worthwhile and satisfying employment in a successful business.

Skype:

To be disruptive, but in the cause of making the world a better place.

Atlassian (software developer):

Our mission is to build a different kind of software company — one that listens to client needs, values innovation in development and solves customer problems with brilliant simplicity.

Google:

Your future is our purpose.

Waldorf Schools (Rudolph Steiner’s Anthroposophical schooling methods):

Teachers in Waldorf schools are dedicated to generating an inner enthusiasm for learning within every child… This eliminates the need for competitive testing, academic placement, and behavioristic rewards to motivate learning. It allows motivation to arise from within and helps engender the capacity for joyful lifelong learning.

The Dandelion Time Project (UK social care trust):

Dandelion Time is a charity dedicated to helping children with emotional, behavioural and social difficulties, and their families, through engaging families in every day activities and reconnecting them through nature.

An interesting point about these is that they are not very prescriptive. Rather they succeed in creating a positive mood, a sense of self-worth, and movement in a positive direction. I have worked for some organisations intent on nailing down values and behaviours into a menu-style list for everyone to follow. There is a place for these "behavioural contracts" (e.g. where behaviour has derailed into a conflict) however the rest of the time it's pretty much a passion-killer! Who wants to be so tightly controlled? People tend not to be too inspired when being told exactly how to behave; nor do they tend to behave in the way intended. It risks creating an unhealthy parent:child dynamic and interferes with our need for autonomy.

Few people come to work every day with the intention of maximising profits for their organisation; or to create a greater number of widgets than yesterday; or to cram in more tasks into their daily work routine. In fact, the real reasons are varied, and will differ from employee to employee. I say few do, because under certain conditions which have been quite manipulated (I'm thinking about the UK schools' league performance tables here), there are people becoming focused on productivity measures. When intelligent and flexible thinking is manipulated however, as I said before, the cost is that undesirable and often bad things happen. The opposite to behavioural manipulation is putting into practice what truly inspires and motives us towards a common goal.

Mostly, people are guided by their pursuit of meaning, mastery and autonomy, whether at home or at work. Removing obstacles to delivering one's best and inspiring sufficient meaning, respect and challenge, is the golden opportunity of our time.

Are you suffering from Holiday Deficit Disorder?

The holidays we Europeans are granted are often marvelled at (and sometimes ridiculed) by our North American colleagues. Currently however, the average vacation in America is being quoted at a mere three to four days - a long weekend. And this year, according to a recent survey, one in seven Americans will take no holiday break at all. In strong defence of the benefits of taking a break, read on to discover what happens when we do not switch off and how you can begin to redress the balance, if you think you are suffering from holiday deficit disorder:

- Working more than 48 hours a week doubles the load of stress our bodies are under. It puts one on course for heart disease due to a poorer quality lifestyle and also to our bodies increasing cholesterol production.

- A culture where working overtime is the norm is counterproductive as work is conducted by fatigued brains. This fatigue then seeps into regular working hours. Many studies show managers to be running on too little sleep.

- Companies who have a competitive "last to leave the office" culture generally suffer from poorer creativity, poorer tolerance of new ideas and are more prone to conflict. When we are stressed for too long our intelligent thinking capability goes out the window. As the brain's frontal lobes shut down (the intelligent thinking part) our "prehistoric brain" (the amygdyla) kicks into action, severely inhibiting intelligent thought in favour of survival.

- People who bring the "productivity" mentality on holiday go back to work exhausted (e.g. measuring number of sights seen, trying to cram in too many things into a short three day break, etc.).

So what can you do? Here are a few suggestions:

- Do things relating to your passions and build a holiday around the things you like to do with your friends or family.

- Practice the fine art of aimless wandering when on holiday. Practice letting go, exploring and discovering, with no other purpose than that of wandering!

- Linger with friends or family over at least one meal time per day.

- Put on your play hat. Connect with play, with your kids, your pets and loved ones.

- Enjoy the medecine of laughter. When was the last time you & loved ones laughed together? Relationships are much more resilient and mistakes more readily forgiven where laughter is present.

- Learn to live well in the moment as well as for the future. Life will pass by quick enough. Will you discover later on that most of yours was spent trying to fulfill the ambitions of your organisation at the expense of yours & those of people close to you? If this is not possible in your current job, consider what you need to do to find work with a better employer, one who actively promotes work-life balance.

- Recognise the impact of your own ambitions. Are you being guided by achievements which in hindsight no longer matter; or simply feel the need for high-adrenalin? If so, try to explore what it is you are really seeking? People who describe themselves as "Type A" (high-achievers); or "Type T" (high risk-takers or "adrenalin junkies" even) are prone to compromising important relationships and longer-term quality of life in order to experience the short-lived highs of achievements or thrill-seeking. Learning what you need to address in order to adapt to longer-term rewarding alternatives will bring healthy balance to your life and more harmony to your relationships.

Great Ideas That Almost Didn't Make It!

Good ideas usually come from outside sources rather than from inside the company or culture. This is largely due to our conditioned ways of thinking, which encourages us to think in terms of the common good, but unfortunately frequently makes us blind to new opportunities. The most creative companies rely upon ideas being generated outside of their walls as well as from within them. Here are some of the most famous ideas that nearly didn't make it (extracted from a great book - "Beyond Entrepreneurship, Turning Your Business Into An Enduring Great Company" by J Collins & W Lazier):

"the devise is inherently of no value to us" - Western Union internal memo in response to Bell's telephone, 1876

"in order to earn better than a "C" the idea must be feasible": a Yale University management professor in response to Fred Smith's proposal for reliable overnight deliveries. He went on to found the Federal Express Corporation.

"So we went to Atari and said, "Hey, we've got this amazing thing, even built with some of your parts, and what do you think about funding us? Or we'll give it to you. We just want to do it. Pay our salary, we'll come work for you." And they said, "No". So then we went to Hewlett-Packard and they said "Hey we don't need you. You haven't got through college yet.": Steve Jobs speaking about attempts to get Atari and HP interested in his and Wozniak's PC. Jobs & Wozniak founded the Apple Computer Co.

"Who the hell wants to hear actors talk?": HM Warner, Warner Bros, 1927.

"We don't like their sound and guitar music is on the way out.": Decca Recording Co. rejecting the Beatles.

"Drill for oil? You mean drill into the ground to try and find oil? You're crazy.": any number of experienced drillers who Edwin L Drake tried to enlist in his project to drill for oil in 1859. He later became the first man to strike oil.

"That is good sport. But for the military, the airplane is useless.": Ferdinand Foch, Commander in Chief, allied forces on the western front, World War I.

"The television will never achieve popularity; it takes place in a semi-darkened room and demands continuous attention.": Harvard Professor Chester L Dawes, 1940.

NB: Apple didn't create the basic idea behind the Mackintosh; those ideas had been around for years, developed by defense, and later at Xerox. A group of Apple executives attended a demo of mouse and icon technology at Xerox (which became an investor in Apple) and carried the basic ideas over to Apple.

The NIH syndrome (Not-Invented-Here) can be countered by various practices introduced by thought leaders, the media and if in companies, by structured processes. If you hear of someone saying, "that will never work", or "we don't do things that way here" then you can be sure that somewhere else, someone will be saying "how can that work?" or even "I love it, let's try it". If you're the one with the ideas, the music, the project or the curiosity then just continue on your path until you have found the receptive thinkers or audience for you. Good luck!

Sharing the Leadership

Now that our UK elections are over, we have a coalition government, an uneasy alliance between two quite different ideologies. My interest in this is in predicting what will be the outcome, particularly given the sharing of leadership across very different parties.

I read in The Guardian the other day about the imminent house share of the grace-and-favour residence of Chevening (a 115-roomed house) between the Deputy Prime Minister, Nick Clegg (Lib-Dem), and the Foreign Secretary, William Hague (Conservative). It illustrates quite neatly the challenges ahead - these two being the most unlikely of house mates. Clegg for example is a former MEP and ardently pro-European, whilst Hague, it would be fair to say, is eurosceptic, wanting to renegotiate on the UK's integration with EU human rights, social affairs, criminal justice and employment legislation.

The situation is made even more unstable given there are 18 Conservatives and 5 Liberals in the Cabinet. As one Cabinet Minister put it, "as we looked around the table, it was hard to imagine that only a week earlier we were tearing strips off each other on the campaign trail". In a most recent YouGov poll for the Sunday Times, 45% of respondents think the two parties will soon be fighting among themselves. As a mediator I should point out that conflict is not a bad thing, in fact it is necessary and healthy, but only when handled well.

It is not just the ideologies which will make this coalition pitted with problems but the personalities of the two leaders. As with most leaders, Clegg and Cameron are fiercely competitive, ambitious and single-minded in following their objectives through. Will this energy be put to mutual benefit or to tear one another apart however?

These challenges are in no way unique to politics. Much research has been undertaken on the subject of corporate mergers and acquisitions and a fairly dispiriting statistic is quoted of around 80% of large cap European M&As failing to deliver on their predicted value, and 50% of European small cap, within 18 months, due to differences in corporate "culture". The fact that the majority of M&As fail to meet the financial and synergistic expectations of shareholders or employees is put down to post-merger "cultural clashes". This is the least tangible or measurable element of any partnership (the ideologies, the codes of conduct and the history) yet it is the glue that either binds people together or where at odds, they come unstuck. This is true in politics, as it is in business, as it is in personal relationships. Within the corporate world, there has been some research undertaken about the style of leadership needed post-merger, one addressing the key processes of creation, change, and integration. Just how this will work within such disparate political groups remains to be seen however. As a musing observer, seeing the most unlikely of pairings between such opposing ideologies, at this stage unfortunately I do not rate their chances of success too highly. At best, this is going to be a severe culture shock for both parties, at worst it is going to be trench warfare.