Dear Madeleine,

I manage R&D for a large medical device company. I am at the tail end of my work life. I wanted to retire at the end of this year, but our executive team is encouraging me to stay until I feel comfortable that someone on my team can step into the role.

Right now, I am not seeing a likely replacement. The job requires a wide mix of skills and activities. Although I have shared development ideas with my direct reports, I don’t see anyone doing anything differently.

I just sense that no one really cares much about the job or has the ambition to do anything other than the bare minimum. How can I light a fire under these people?

Where Is the Spark?

______________________________________________________________________________________

Dear Where Is the Spark?

It might be you, my friend. It sounds like you have made some suggestions that your folks may not quite know what to do with. And they may not know why they should bother.

Getting your people fired up to develop themselves for a senior leadership role requires you to intentionally and systematically tap into their dreams and aspirations, understand their identity—how they see themselves, and convince them of their agency—the extent to which they are empowered to go beyond where they think they can go. It’s up to you to create an environment where each of your people sees what’s possible, why it matters, and how they can grow into it.

Here are some ideas for how you might approach creating such an environment:

1. Share a Vision of What Leadership in Your Organization Can Be

You can do this with your entire team, in small doses.

• Describe what great leadership looks like in your organization—not just in competencies, but in impact.
• Share examples of leaders in your company who are admired. Why are they effective?
• Talk about the difference leaders can make at a senior level. Tell stories. You might say something like: “Leadership here isn’t about position—it’s about shaping direction, driving culture, and building something bigger than yourself.”

The challenge with this idea is that you will also be held to the standards you talk about.

2. Spot and Call Out Potential

People rarely see leadership potential in themselves unless someone points it out.

• Tell individuals specifically what strengths or behaviors you’ve seen in them that signal leadership potential.
• Make it personal and credible: “I see you as someone who could be a strategic leader here because you consistently…”

Don’t wait for them to ask. Plant a seed anytime you see something a person can build on.

3. Connect to Personal Purpose

Deep motivation comes from alignment with identity and values. Who is each team member, at their core? How do they see themselves? What matters most to them?

• You might ask: “What kind of impact do you want to have?” or “What problems do you care most about solving?” or “What interests you most about what we do here?
• Once you get some answers, you can connect to ways that senior leadership might offer them a bigger lever to engage in activities that mean the most to them.

4. Share Responsibility

Growth accelerates when people feel responsible for something bigger than their job. Look at what you do daily and figure out what you can delegate. Start out small, and build.

• Assign stretch responsibilities that align with senior leadership competencies, such as cross-functional work, strategy development, or mentoring others.
• Let them lead change, not just manage tasks.
• Frame it: “This is a great chance to build the skill set senior leaders need.”

5. Make Development Visible and Structured

If development feels fuzzy or unsupported, it can easily fall by the wayside—which is what has been happening for your people.

• Build or recommend a clear pathway: rotational projects, leadership coaching, mentoring, strategic courses. Build on strengths or identify specific gaps they can work on.
• Use individual development plans (IDPs) tied to specific leadership competencies. If your organization already has these, use them. If it doesn’t, create the ones you think are most critical. Start with one or two and be careful not to overpower people with too much, too soon. The key is to start with low-hanging fruit. What is a small thing that might be possible and would make a big difference?

6. Celebrate Progress and Model the Way

People need to see development as a rewarding investment; otherwise, it just feels like extra work.

• Acknowledge each person’s accomplishments and growth in public settings. This reinforces motivation and can inspire others in the group to rise as well.
• Share your own development journey, including struggles. This normalizes growth and makes leadership feel attainable. It would require you to be vulnerable, which could be uncomfortable. But it will humanize you and remind your people that you weren’t always the boss.

You will learn a lot about your people as you try some of these suggestions. The obstacles will become much clearer. You may uncover irrational fears that you can allay. You may find that some of your folks are already overwhelmed by their workload and don’t have the bandwidth to take on anything else. You may uncover some cynicism; e.g., you may hear that the organization is perceived as very political. Cynicism is data that can help you pinpoint assumptions about falsehoods that you can dispel, or about realities you hadn’t noticed or considered important. You can help everyone shift their mindset and support them in navigating obstacles.

This will be a lot more work for you—and, of course, for them. But if they know you care and are paying attention, I guarantee a few will rise to the top. And then you can retire!

Love, Madeleine

About Madeleine

Madeleine Homan Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services as well as a key facilitator of Blanchard’s Leadership Coach Certification course. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.

Got a question for Madeleine? Email Madeleine and look for your response soon. Please be advised that although she will do her best, Madeleine cannot respond to each letter personally. Letters will be edited for clarity and length.

Dear Madeleine,

I work for a global company that had a very flexible work-from-home policy before Covid happened. I have been managing hybrid teams for more than 20 years and have never had trouble with performance.

We got a new CEO last fall, and he has a very strong belief (despite all the research that says otherwise) that people simply don’t work as hard when they work from home. One of his opening moves was to institute a full-time return-to-office plan that started in January.

I’m lucky. I have always come in three days a week, and I have a short commute. But about half my people had just enough time to move back, or simply move, so they could keep their job. I had to replace people who didn’t want to move, or couldn’t, and we lost some excellent talent in the process. The disruption has been epic. It all feels like a waste of time, energy, and focus.

Now that everyone is getting into the groove of coming into the office, there is a new problem no one seems to have anticipated: We don’t have enough room for everyone! People are sharing offices and cubicles, which is tricky since almost everyone is on conference calls all day. There weren’t enough headsets to go around and people had to bring their personal ones from home. There aren’t nearly enough conference rooms, and if you have one reserved and someone else gets there before you, it is a standoff. People can’t hear themselves think.

There aren’t enough parking spaces, so people are late because they must drive around looking for a spot. There aren’t enough restrooms—people have mere minutes between meetings only to encounter a line, so many are forced to step out in the middle of meetings. The cafeteria was not remotely prepared to manage the volume, so lunch hours had to be staggered and regular meetings moved. Not only are we not more productive, we are way less so.

My boss has assured me that all of these issues are being worked on—but in the meantime, no flexibility has been offered to help alleviate them. Everyone, myself included, is in a constant state of annoyance. The whole policy has been an unmitigated disaster.

I just don’t know what to do. I hate inefficiency. I hate policies that are out of touch with reality. I hate to see my smart, hardworking people struggling with stupid rules. As a senior-level manager, I have taken great pride in walking the fine line between taking care of my people and supporting senior leadership, but I am really struggling to do that at this point. I have completely lost respect for the CEO, who is oblivious to reality and blathers on about how great it is to have everyone together. He thinks he appears tough, while everyone who works for the company seems to agree that he is just stupid. More to the point, my team’s morale has nosedived and I can’t do anything about it.

I have run out of the energy needed to hold the company line and not betray that I am 100% opposed to the way things are being handled. I feel like I can’t support my boss, who is cowardly and keeps acting like everything is fine, or the executive team he reports to—and it makes me feel like a traitor. I have headhunters calling me constantly and am starting to take their calls, but I feel like I would be letting my team down. Can you think of anything I could do to turn this around?

Done

________________________________________________________________________________

Dear Done,

There is nothing quite as dispiriting as a new CEO who imposes new rules based on opinion versus facts and causes needless chaos for their people. It sounds like you had a good thing going and it has all been blown up. I do wonder how the whole company is doing, and if the new CEO is doing enough good things to offset this one really stupid thing.

Do I have any bright ideas for you? I wish I did. I read your letter several times, trying to spot a silver lining or creative ways you might approach the situation. You might check with your team and see what viable tactics come up—carpooling, bringing lunch from home, ways to share space that make sense. The bathroom situation is way beyond me. But I don’t think this is what you are looking for.

My suggestion is that you read what you wrote and ask yourself these questions: Whose permission do I need to find a better leader to work for? What is keeping me from finding a better situation—and taking my best people with me?

The principle here is that a leader is only a leader if people follow them. You feel like a traitor, but it doesn’t sound like your CEO has done anything to earn your loyalty. So, really—what is keeping you from voting with your feet?

Your team will be fine. One of them will probably be delighted to take your job. You won’t be betraying anyone or letting anyone down by remembering that the only people you owe anything to are yourself and a leader worthy of your respect that you choose to follow.

I could be totally off base here. If that is the case, it will probably have the effect of helping you see the silver lining and find the wherewithal to stay the course where you are. The key is that it will be a conscious choice and you won’t feel like a victim.

I wish you effective and efficient policies that make going to work and doing work fulfilling again.

Love, Madeleine

About Madeleine

Madeleine Homan Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services as well as a key facilitator of Blanchard’s Leadership Coach Certification course. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.

Got a question for Madeleine? Email Madeleine and look for your response soon. Please be advised that although she will do her best, Madeleine cannot respond to each letter personally. Letters will be edited for clarity and length.

Dear Madeleine,

I am a supervisor and team leader in a technology company. We have several products on the market that are doing well. All my projects are in new products—a combination of market research and product testing; and all my teams are cross-functional—project management, software developers, marketing and customer support, and designers. The timelines for going to market keep shrinking and the demand to get high-quality products to the testing stage (i.e., in perfect condition) keeps growing.

I have noticed a shift in my teams. People are getting quieter in meetings, though the volume of general grumbling is growing. I finally asked someone I trust if they have noticed it, and she told me that people have developed a fear of speaking up.

When I asked her opinion about why this is happening, she wasn’t able to point to one thing. I think it may be the constant pressure to get new products to market faster—because to innovate, we have to experiment and make mistakes.

I have spoken to my boss about it and he said the only solution is to innovate faster. I get that, but I also know that getting new things right takes the time it takes. I’m not at all sure what to do to get us back into the rhythm that always worked well before.  

I would appreciate any ideas you have.

Faster & Smarter

____________________________________________________________________________

Dear Faster & Smarter,

Well, something happened. Is this all your teams? Something is off here. This doesn’t sound like a response to the constant “better, faster, cheaper” refrain that anyone working in business is now accustomed to. People don’t disappear like snails into their shells for no reason.

Your people are acting as if they feel threatened. You can waste a lot of time and energy speculating about what it is, or you can come right out and ask them. Britney Cole, our chief innovation officer, says that Enemy #1 of innovation is fear, so getting to bottom of what people are afraid of is one possible avenue for you. Either they are afraid of something you haven’t registered, or they are afraid of you.

You can meet with each whole team or with individual people, share your observation that something has changed, and simply ask questions:

• Did something happen that I am unaware of?
• What am I missing here?
• Is there something I have done or said that has made an impact I did not intend?
• Is there something that someone else has done or said that has resulted in people feeling uncomfortable or unsafe?
• Is there something you think I should know about?

Our Fearless Innovation program proposes that leading innovation calls for grace, curiosity, and proactivity, and that the environment as a whole needs to support innovation. Your investigation will reveal that there is something you can do to be a more effective leader, or that there is messaging/feedback from the organization that is causing the dampened spirits.

This article about leading innovation might spark some ideas for you and help you shape more targeted questions. And here is an eBook that details the factors that encourage innovation in organizations.

You may not like what you discover. Either you will hear something about yourself that you need to work on or you will see a larger pattern in the organization that will require you to step up and advocate for your teams. Hopefully, you will uncover enough intel to help you craft a plan to increase the sense of safety and trust and get your teams back on track.

It will take a lot of grace and curiosity. It will require action on your part, which will require grit and courage. If your team sees you being proactive and speaking up, it will give them permission to do the same. And hopefully that will help you all get your groove back.

Love, Madeleine

About Madeleine

Madeleine Homan Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services as well as a key facilitator of Blanchard’s Leadership Coach Certification course. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.

Got a question for Madeleine? Email Madeleine and look for your response soon. Please be advised that although she will do her best, Madeleine cannot respond to each letter personally. Letters will be edited for clarity and length.

Dear Madeleine,

I’m a tech founder and have developed a tool called “burnout tracker,” which is embedded into our 1:1 tool. Without going into too much detail, the tracker is able to predict when a support conversation between manager and employee is needed.

Here’s my challenge: What is common sense to me seems to be a foreign language to many of the managers using our tool; for example, that during a support conversation, the leader listens to the direct report and provides help where they can.

Yes, the phrase “support conversation” is a bit vague. But to me, that’s where the gold is. By simply asking “How can I best support you at the moment?” the leader can get the team member to provide insights into what they need. Unfortunately, this isn’t happening.

I think the managers feel ill-equipped to have support conversations. It feels strange to them—they mistakenly believe they need to play the role of therapist. 

So, if the employee says they are burned out, what should the manager do next? My natural response would be to first ask the employee more questions. Sort their answers into two buckets: (1) things I can help with; and (2) things I can’t. Then help with the things I can, empathize with the things I can’t, and find resources that may be able to assist. 

Is there a framework or model I can share that would help managers feel more confident going into a support conversation?

With gratitude,

Burnout Support

P.S. Thank you for your blog. As I’ve mentioned in the past, I’m a huge fan of your work and am a better leader because of you and your insights.

_____________________________________________________________________________________

Dear Burnout Support,

First, thanks for your kind words. They mean the world to me!

Now, to your question. I love the idea of a burnout tracker. If only we humans had a handy gauge on our forearm—like a gas gauge—that could alert us to an empty tank while we still have time to do something about it.

This is a big can of worms, partially because you are right—managers are terrified of conversations about the complexities of being people. It is sad that smart people think they need an advanced degree and a credential to do that. When I taught coaching skills to managers and leaders, I heard the question “Wait, are you telling us we need to be therapists?” a million times.

So the first order of business is to train all of your managers in simply being a human being who can have conversations with other human beings about being a human being. To be fair, this is a big ask in the tech industry, since many who end up working in it would much prefer to not have to interact with humans. Am I biased? Maybe. But this is what being a manager means, so it would be good if managers understand that from the get-go. I know you can’t go back in time, but it’s never too late.

The average manager doesn’t receive manager training until they have been managing for ten years. So you are not alone. Here is a white paper—Core Skills Every Manager Should Master—that outlines the core skills every manager needs as well as the elements that help, or prevent, the building of trust.

Trying to track burnout is also a can of worms because, in my opinion, once symptoms of burnout appear, things are already so far gone that it’s hard to turn them around. It’s best to catch the problem early before it causes real trouble.

Christina Maslach, coauthor of the book The Burnout Challenge: Managing People’s Relationship with Their Jobs, says helping people cope with stressors is a good step. But it is far preferable to address the origin of the stressors that cause burnout in the first place. You might check out how she recommends your managers do that.

Finally, I propose that individuals who are feeling chronically overwhelmed, cynical, and hostile about the organization, and also losing faith in their own effectiveness, are probably not going to be willing to make themselves vulnerable to their manager. The manager can ask questions all day long, but if they are hoping their people will spill the beans about what is really going on, that will only happen if the relationship was properly set up at the beginning.

You have to remember that many employees, no matter where they were raised, internalize the story that work is a contact sport. It is a Darwinian fight to the death out there, and only the strong will survive. The age of managers being the agent of a harsh organization is not that far behind us. People need to have evidence that their managers see them, hear them, and have their backs. Managers need to nip the “Hunger Games” story in the bud by seeking to understand their employees’ strengths, development areas, and dreams. They need to do their utmost to tailor the job to the best of each employee and monitor each person carefully to make sure that the job is actually doable for each person.

So, the question “What do you need?” should be asked at every 1:1 meeting. Having a manager ask questions and identify how they can help is best done weekly. Address the small obstacles and blockers early and often, and escalate the large organizational ones before they get out of hand.

Burnout is just a modern word for the despair experienced by humans who are stuck doing jobs that can’t be done. The condition is universal and ancient. The best way to avoid it is to build support into the manager/employee relationship early, and weave in support every step of the way. That way, when people need it the most, they will be much more likely to avail themselves of it.

Your instincts are right on. It is inspiring to know that at least one tech founder out there cares enough to create a tool and ask the question. Keep going!!!

Love, Madeleine

About Madeleine

Madeleine Homan Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.

Got a question for Madeleine? Email Madeleine and look for your response soon. Please be advised that although she will do her best, Madeleine cannot respond to each letter personally. Letters will be edited for clarity and length.

Dear Madeleine,

I manage a massive sales function for a software company. I am so exhausted from all my people quitting! What is going on? At the end of the Q1, FOUR of my managers quit. And a month ago, my right-hand person, who followed me from our last company, submitted her resignation. At least she gave me a month to replace her and train someone new.

We always expect a little attrition at vesting periods, but I have never seen anything like this. It isn’t like our quotas are going to change, so everyone else is overburdened. The regional VPs can’t keep up with onboarding and training all of the new hires. Our recruiters are bringing us fewer viable candidates and the viable ones are demanding starting salaries that are more than what I make! I’ve been doing this a long time but have never felt so exposed.

 I don’t know what to do. I just feel—

Panicked

_______________________________________________________________________________

Dear Panicked,

I am hearing the same thing from my clients and we have experienced the same thing in our company. One client recently reported that a candidate for an executive assistant position demanded $300K as a starting salary. He literally did a spit take at that. That is an extreme example of how people are aiming high and also illustrates the point that unemployment is at an all-time low.

What is going on? Well, the collective wisdom is that the world grinding to a halt, the fear of imminent death during the height of the pandemic, and the massive changes in the workplace have sparked a collective re-evaluation of how we all spend our time and resources.

People are asking themselves:

• What is really important to me—and does what I am doing right now reflect those things?
• What are my long-term goals—and am I going to be able to achieve them where I am now?
• Do I really love my job? Or have I let myself get complacent?

And why wouldn’t people ask these things, given all that we have been through? There is nothing like a deadly virus that makes a trip to the grocery store feel like a commando maneuver—or, far worse, losing a loved one—to starkly accentuate the reality that we only get one shot at this life so we’d better make the most of it. Seen in that light, the phenomenon you are currently struggling with does make sense.

What can you do? As a senior leader, a lot. The first step is to actively strive to re-engage your people. Find out what makes them tick and show them you care. You can get more detail on how to do that in this wonderful article: 8 Keys to Re-engaging a Fatigued Workforce.

Another idea is to task all of your VPs with having stay conversations. A review of exit interviews conducted before the pandemic revealed that a common answer to the question “Why are you leaving?” is “Nobody asked me to stay.” If employees don’t see and hear evidence that their boss and their company value them and want them to stay with the organization, they will assume their leaving won’t be a problem for anyone. This is just human nature: in the absence of information, people will make things up. The antidote is to have bosses literally ask their employees to stay and ask for insight into what will make that likely.

Our own research on employee work passion shows that people are as motivated by meaningful work, appreciation, and connectedness to colleagues and the organization as they are by money. So you can:

• help your people understand the value and meaning of their work,
• make sure they feel seen and heard as actual humans, and
• actively build ways for them to feel more connected to each other and the company.

More detail on stay conversations can be found here.

In terms of attracting viable candidates, again, money is not the only thing that matters. Make sure your recruiters are emphasizing every potential benefit of joining your company—flexible WFH options, career paths, the quality of your leadership—anything you can think of that makes your company special.

Action is the best antidote for the kind of anxiety you have. You can get the ball rolling by having stay conversations with your VPs to demonstrate what a good job looks like. Start today. No time to lose.

So, take a deep breath, make your plan, and get going. It will make a difference. I promise.

Love, Madeleine

About Madeleine

Madeleine Homan Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.

Got a question for Madeleine? Email Madeleine and look for your response soon. Please be advised that although she will do her best, Madeleine cannot respond to each letter personally. Letters will be edited for clarity and length.

In my new book Simple Truths of Leadership: 52 Ways to Be a Servant Leader and Build Trust—cowritten with my colleague, trust expert Randy Conley—we take a look at some practical, day-to-day leadership principles leaders can apply in their organizations.

Simple Truths of Leadership is broken down into 52 concepts/quotes, half on the topic of servant leadership and half on trust. Each concept has descriptions and activities that will result in increased trust, collaboration, innovation, and engagement in relationships involving leaders and their team members.

A focus on both servant leadership and trust is an important consideration in today’s work environment. It’s a one-two combination that Randy and I believe will bring renewed focus to the importance of empathy and the human touch in workplace relationships.

Here’s a sample of the first three Simple Truths we cover in the first half of the book.

SIMPLE TRUTH #1: Servant leadership is the best way to achieve both great results and great relationships.

Organizational leaders often have an either/or attitude toward results and people. For example, leaders who focus only on results may have trouble creating great relationships with their people and leaders who focus mainly on relationships may have trouble getting desired results.

Yet you can get both great results and great relationships if you understand the two parts of servant leadership:

• The leadership aspect focuses on vision, direction, and results—where you as a leader hope to take your people. Leaders should involve others in setting direction and determining desired results, but if people don’t know where they’re headed or what they’re meant to accomplish, the fault lies with the leader.
• The servant aspect focuses on working side by side in relationship with your people. Once the vision and direction are clear, the leader’s role shifts to service— helping people accomplish the agreed-upon goals.

MAKING COMMON SENSE COMMON PRACTICE

This one-two punch of the aspects of servant leadership enables you to create both great results and great relationships:

1. Let your people know what they’re being asked to do by setting the vision and direction with their help. In other words, vision and direction, while the responsibility of the leader, is not a top-down process.
2. During implementation, assure your people you are there to serve, not to be served. Your responsibility is to help them accomplish their goals through training, feedback, listening, and communication.

It’s important for servant leaders to establish this both/and mindset toward results and relationships.

SIMPLE TRUTH #2: Every great organization has a compelling vision.

When I explain what a compelling vision is to some leaders in organizations, they either give me a blank look or say something like “I’m sure we have one on the wall somewhere.” So what is a compelling vision?

According to my book with Jesse Stoner, Full Steam Ahead! Unleash the Power of Vision in Your Work and Your Life, a compelling vision includes three elements: your purpose (what business you are in), your picture of the future (where you are going) and your values (what will guide your journey).

A compelling vision is alive and well in companies that are leaders in their field, such as Disney, Southwest Airlines, Nordstrom, Wegmans, and Starbucks.

MAKING COMMON SENSE COMMON PRACTICE

Here’s how you can incorporate the three elements of a compelling vision in your organization:

• Make sure the people in your organization know what business they are in. For example, when Walt Disney started his theme parks, he said, “We are in the happiness business.”
• Confirm that your people know where they are going—what good results would look like. At Disney, the picture of the future is that all guests of the parks would have the same smile on their faces when leaving as when they entered.
• Find out if the people in your organization are clear on what values will guide their journey. Disney’s first value is safety. Its next values are courtesy and “the show,” which is about everyone playing their parts perfectly, whether they are a ticket taker or Mickey Mouse. Disney’s final value is efficiency—having a well-run, profitable organization.

If you can share your compelling vision as clearly as Disney does, congratulations! You have just made common sense common practice.

SIMPLE TRUTH #3: Servant leaders turn the traditional pyramid upside down.

Most organizations and leaders get into trouble during the implementation phase of servant leadership if the traditional hierarchical pyramid is used. When that happens, whom do people think they work for? The people above them.

The minute you think you work for the person above you, you assume that person—your boss—is responsible and your job is to be responsive to your boss’s whims or wishes. “Boss watching” can become a popular sport where people get promoted based on their upward-influencing skills. As a result, all the energy of the organization moves up the hierarchy, away from customers and the frontline folks who are closest to the action.

Servant leaders know how to correct this situation by philosophically turning the pyramid upside down when it comes to implementation. Now the customer contact people and the customers are at the top of the organization, and everyone in the leadership hierarchy works for them. This one change makes a major difference in who is responsible and who is responsive.

MAKING COMMON SENSE COMMON PRACTICE

To make servant leadership come alive, implementation is key:

• Communicate to your people that you work for them, not the other way around. Your job is to serve, not to evaluate.
• Empower your people by letting them bring their brains to work. In this way, they become responsible— able to respond—to their internal and external customers. Your job is to be responsive to them, helping them accomplish their goals.

This creates a very different environment for implementation and makes it clear to everyone who is responsible, and to whom.

I hope I’ve piqued your interest in learning about how you can introduce our commonsense leadership practices into your organization. If I have, check out the free eBook we’ve put together that shares a little more information about Simple Truths of Leadership—and check out what others are saying about the book through retail booksellers such as Barnes & Noble or Amazon.com.

The world is in desperate need of a new leadership model—one that focuses on results and people. Trusted servant leadership is the approach Randy and I believe in. Let us know what you think!

“Five areas contribute to creating a psychologically safe environment in the workplace,” says Randy Conley, expert on building and maintaining trust. He joined Chad Gordon on a recent episode of the Blanchard LeaderChat podcast to discuss the importance of creating psychological safety.

Conley defines psychological safety as the beliefs individuals have about how others will respond when they are vulnerable and put themselves on the line. He describes the five most important areas to consider:

1. Leader Behavior. Leaders are always being watched; they set the example of preferred behaviors. In addition to being available and approachable, leaders must not only explicitly invite input and feedback but also model openness and fallibility.
2. Group Dynamics. Team members tend to assume certain roles, such as the “father figure” who offers sage advice, the “favorite” who can do no wrong, or even the “black sheep” who tends to stir up trouble. The interplay of these roles creates the group dynamics that will either encourage or inhibit psychological safety within the team.
3. Practice Fields. This term was coined by Peter Senge and described by him as one of the hallmarks of a learning organization. Just as sports teams, pilots, and even surgeons practice and work on skill improvement prior to the game, flight, or surgery, organizations need to create an environment where it is safe to learn and make mistakes without fear of being penalized.
4. Trust and Respect. Supportive, trusting relationships promote psychological safety. When team members and leaders are respected, individuals are willing to be vulnerable and take risks. A lack of respect shuts down communication and innovation.
5. Supportive Organizational Context. It is the responsibility of the organization to give employees access to resources and information to help them perform at their best. Working in a “need to know” environment creates suspicion, tension, and stress. Helping people feel safe creates a healthy, ethical culture where everyone can thrive.

Conley advises us all: “Don’t underestimate the personal influence you can have within your own team and the organization. Psychological safety starts with each one of us.”

To hear more from Conley’s interview, listen to the LeaderChat podcast and subscribe today.

Quitting your job for a new one is the new normal.

Almost 4 million Americans resigned from their positions in June 2021.[1] More turnover is on the horizon: Some 40% of the global workforce is “considering leaving their employer in the current year,”[2] while “95% of workers are contemplating a job change.”[3]

This amount of turnover is historic. A record-breaking 10.9 million jobs were open at the end of July 2021.[4]

The pandemic is driving the turmoil. Americans are reassessing their priorities because of it, and they’re looking for jobs that offer remote work possibilities, greater fulfilment, career advancement, and flexibility.

The High Cost of Turnover

Turnover­ always demands your attention—and especially so at this unprecedented moment. To start, turnover is incredibly costly for a company: 30% to 40% of the annual salary for entry-level employees; 150% for mid-level employees; and up to 400% for highly skilled employees.[5]

What about the unquantifiable cost of turnover?

When a high performer leaves, so do their expertise, brilliant ideas, and contribution to the cultural fabric. An even more worrisome trend is high performers leaving with their colleagues for greener pastures.[6]

Tips for Keeping Your High Performers Happy

Keeping top performers at your company in this time of extraordinary change is critical. Here are some tips your managers can use to help them stay. 

Give high performers the spotlight: This is your time as a manager to flip the script. Instead of you telling your high performer what they should do, ask them how they accomplished something so impressive.

Let them talk. Let them share. Let them teach their colleagues.

When people share the strategy behind their successes, they feel energized and appreciated. It also increases their confidence, giving them the courage to take on even more strategic projects.

Let them choose new challenges: A high performer has earned the right to explore. Encourage them to pursue projects that are interesting. Don’t pigeon-hole them even though they are an expert at an important task.

Ask your high performer, “What interests you? How would you like to contribute?” Give them the opportunity to use their talents.

When your high performer takes on a different kind of challenge, they’ll be an enthusiastic beginner at the start of the project—the honeymoon phase, when we’re filled with excitement and enthusiasm. That state drives retention: When people love their work, they’re 50% more likely to stay at their jobs.[7]

Show appreciation: Let your people know that you’re grateful for their contributions. They’ll be even more engaged and productive. Make your words of praise specific if you want them to have the most impact.[8]

Don’t assume your people know that you appreciate them. Research shows that leaders believe their people know how they feel about their work, when in fact, they don’t.[9] And when people feel unappreciated, they start looking for another job.

Since the brain stores data in images, not words, saying things like, “Good job! Way to go! Nice work!” goes in one ear and out the other. 

For appreciation to stick, you need to share what they did, the effect it had, how it made you feel, and your gratitude for their partnership and efforts. For example: “When you stayed after the meeting to address the client’s hesitation, you deepened her trust and showed that we want to exceed customer expectations. I’m so grateful for your dedication, empathy, and desire to help everyone be successful. Thanks so much.”

Help your people take care of themselves: Just because someone is a high performer doesn’t mean they’re immune to stress. They can be so busy doing fantastic work that they forget to take care of themselves. Then one day, they wake up and say, “I can’t do this anymore.”

Your job is to remind your team that self-care is their top priority. Here are best practices you can use to keep your high performers happy:

• Hold walking meetings—even when they’re virtual. Instead of sitting in front of a monitor, everyone calls from their cell phones, pops ear buds in, and meets while moving.
• Offer to buy those interested an exercycle or treadmill.  Sounds expensive? Not compared to hiring someone new.
• Give people a brain break in meetings. Ask your team to stand up and have someone lead them in exercises for five to ten minutes. Most teams usually have someone who can do this. If you don’t, you’ll find plenty of free online fitness videos.
• Let people know when you are taking care of you. Share, “Today I am doing my run from 12:00 p.m. to 1:00 p.m.” Be the example. Help people celebrate self-care.
• Oh, Won’t you stay? You’ve heard a high performer wants to leave. Why not ask, “What would it take to make you stay?” You’ve nothing to lose at this point and may be pleasantly surprised that you meet their demand.

The Great Resignation is causing a flood of resignations. Now you know how to stop the surge and keep your best people.

[1] https://www.cnn.com/2021/08/24/success/how-to-quit-your-job/index.html

[2] https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/worklab/work-trend-index/hybrid-work#:~:text=Today%2C%20our%20research%20shows%20that,major%20pivot%20or%20career%20transition

[3].https://www.yahoo.com/now/youre-not-only-one-whos-102605650.html

[4] https://hbr.org/2021/09/who-is-driving-the-great-resignation?utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter_daily&utm_campaign=dailyalert_actsubs&utm_content=signinnudge&deliveryName=DM150635

[5] https://www.clickboarding.com/employee-turnover-what-is-it/

[6] https://hbr.org/2021/01/your-star-employee-just-quit-will-others-follow

[7] https://www.fastcompany.com/90679528/i-spoke-to-5000-people-and-these-are-the-real-reasons-theyre-quitting?partner=feedburner&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=feedburner+fastcompany&utm_content=feedburner&cid=eem524:524:s00:09/23/2021_fc&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=Compass&utm_campaign=eem524:524:s00:09/23/2021_fc

[8] https://hbr.org/2020/01/the-little-things-that-make-employees-feel-appreciated

[9] https://hbr.org/2020/01/the-little-things-that-make-employees-feel-appreciated

Now that we’ve dealt with the initial implications of leadership and development in a COVID environment, L&D professionals are increasingly turning their attention to what the future will look like in a post-COVID world.

Remote working will not go away after COVID—in fact, many research firms predict that 2021 will see the number of employees permanently working from home double from pre-COVID times. If these predictions are correct, organizations will need to transform how they manage their workforce in several important areas.

For example, from what I understand from client sessions as well as research I’ve been reading, at least half of employees may look for other jobs if their current employer doesn’t provide a work-from-home option in the future. It doesn’t have to necessarily be full-time, but it must be an option. That’s going to require a major shift in the day-to-day leadership practices of managers worldwide. Although the immediate need to keep doors open and lights on has been met, there is a lot of work to do to keep working from home a viable alternative.

In some ways, the COVID-19 pandemic has exposed the need to implement a lot of policies that should have been in place before COVID. For instance, people who worked remotely used to feel like second class citizens who often were forgotten about when it came to development opportunities, being informed on what was going on in the organization, and, of course, social gatherings. Once nearly everyone was working from home due to COVID, this situation drastically improved. Many people report that they know their team members much better now than they did before.

But there are still issues to be resolved. A majority of at-home workers feel overworked and have trouble setting boundaries when there is no explicit end to the workday. Solving this problem may require more discipline around how, when, and how often we meet using online platforms.

Managers also need to be more aware of each individual’s home office setup. One colleague of mine is working out of a 400-square-foot apartment in Hong Kong with his wife and two children. They both work and homeschool their kids. That’s radically different than my home setup with a separate office and two monitors.

For managers, this means recognizing if somebody’s kids aren’t able to go to their physical school, there may be a certain time during the day when they’re in class and need their parents’ attention. That parent won’t be able to attend a meeting during that time. Kids will end up back in the actual classroom, of course, but it will still be important for remote managers to be aware of people’s personal environments.

Performance management will also change. Measuring an employee’s productivity by the amount of time they sit in an office chair was never the right thing to do. The future of work is to measure by outcomes. That means managers will have to become even more skilled in proper goal setting—clearly identifying what is to be accomplished by when, and having reporting processes that are transparent to everyone.

Management now will be seen as more of a partnership. Good managers will check in with their people instead of checking in on their people. These new post-COVID leaders will make regular one-on-ones a priority just to see how people are doing, and will ask questions such as “How’s it going?” and “What do you need from me?” In the future, we will see more shared scorecards that everyone can access and keep up to date so all members of the team can see what their teammates are up to.

L&D has an important role to play in this future. We’ve made great strides in converting content to virtual and digital formats over the past 12 months. The next step will be refining our content to address the new skills needed for leading in a virtual world.

Training can help. In addition to goal setting, performance management, and day-to-day coaching, we will help future leaders build awareness, trust, and community. You can learn more about the complete list of 12 skills The Ken Blanchard Companies has identified here.

As we all step into this new virtual world together, leadership qualities such as being available and being responsive are more important than ever. These characteristics will be valued more highly than were some of the qualities we thought we needed from leaders in the past. Successful companies will work on equipping their virtual leaders to excel in more areas like these.

To learn more about some of the ways The Ken Blanchard Companies can help you on your post-COVID leadership journey, visit the Leading Virtually homepage on the Blanchard website.

Dear Madeleine,

I am a director in a global manufacturing company. I manage managers and I am responsible for about 300 people around the globe. I was trained as an engineer and I really loved my job— until recently.

I am not sure what happened, but about a year ago—long before the COVID crisis—I noticed that I just didn’t care anymore. There’s still plenty of work and plenty of urgency, and I still have the same team reporting to me that I care so much about—but I just don’t feel like any of it matters. We are getting good results, and in many ways the current crisis is benefiting our business, so it’s not that I am overwhelmed. I have total job security. I thought it might be burnout, because I do work a lot. But I read up on that and it isn’t quite that.

I think it is somehow connected to not having a sense of purpose. What do you think? How important is it to have a sense of purpose? And if it is important, how do I find mine?

Just Don’t Care

Dear Just Don’t Care,

What yucky way to feel. I’m sorry. Burnout is, in fact, the usual suspect when people feel the way you describe. But if you have reviewed the literature and don’t think that is the root cause of your yuck, there are a couple of other ideas to consider. It might be a combination of a bunch of different things.

Grief. Is it possible that you lost someone dear to you a bit before you started feeling this way? In Western culture, we tend to feel like grief should be something we need to get over in a prescribed time period and that it is an act of will. It just is not so. Grief can last a very long time, to the point that we don’t even connect how sad we are to the precipitating incident. I once worked with a client who was feeling the way you described. When I asked if he thought it might be grief, he said: “I lost my partner four months ago, but it can’t be grief because she was really sick for a long time and I knew she was going to die.” I was stunned. Where did that rule come from? Grief is grief. It has its own timetable. You just have to find small ways to make life bearable until it lifts. Or, if you think it has gone on way too long, you can get some help with it.

Depression. If you have a family history of depression, you may recognize it. If you think you might be depressed, you could start with focusing on getting your needs met and finding your path to a purpose. You may also consider diet, exercise, or getting outdoors—all of which literally change your brain chemistry. Depression is such a common diagnosis these days, if that were the problem it’s likely you already would have self-diagnosed.

Core personal needs. It is possible that you have some fundamental core needs, or even just one, that isn’t being met. Either you were getting your needs met, something changed, and now your needs aren’t getting met but you haven’t noticed it; or you never noticed something critical was missing, and now you do. Linda Berens, an expert on personality types and the way personality differences affect relationships, has this to say about needs: “The needs represent … the driving force. Individuals unconsciously and consciously seek every avenue to get the needs met. When these needs are met, the individual is energized and light of spirit. When these needs are not met, the individual is drained of energy and suffers dissatisfaction or stress.” If you are interested in understanding more, check out Linda’s work here.

Another expert on needs, Abraham Maslow, established a now widely accepted theory that all human beings have a hierarchy of needs that must be met in a specific order. His work has flowed into the zeitgeist the way Freud’s notion of the unconscious has—although his view of humans is more optimistic than Freud’s. According to Maslow, humans are hardwired to satisfy basic needs for shelter, air, food, and water. Once those have been satisfied, people are free to then build stability and safety for their lives. This is generally represented by a strong and safe family unit.

Then, when people feel safe and stable, the natural impulse is to seek groups so that they feel accepted and build camaraderie. This is the need for belonging. Then, and only then, are people free to meet their esteem needs, which usually take the form of competence or mastery. There is overlap between the need to belong and the esteem needs. Humans naturally seek to belong to groups that recognize their accomplishments.

The last need in Maslow’s hierarchy is self-actualization, or the deep desire for people to maximize their potential. Self-actualization often takes the form of a search for knowledge, a quest for mastery, a life devoted to God, and what we generally think of as self-fulfillment. There is a good chance that you have the first two, or even three—moving from the bottom of the pyramid up—pretty much covered. Possibly, you have been super focused on other needs, and, now that they are fully met, it is time to turn your attention to the next level.

Values and purpose. Another possibility, the one you suspect, is that you have become aware that is it time to identify your purpose. Your purpose will be rooted in your values—those things that you say are important to you. When people spend too much of their time devoted to work that is not aligned with their values, they can easily fall into a funk. Maybe something changed about your job or at home so that you are no longer allowed to be focused on what is most important to you. It might be useful to identify what has changed; it could help you to identify what is missing now. This state of mind can be subtle and creep up so you don’t even notice it until—you described it really well—you wake up one day feeling like nothing matters. Some people manage to go through their entire lives without ever thinking about their purpose, while others seem to be driven by it early on.

My experience with clients is that having a clear purpose is especially useful when you are committed to doing hard things over a long period of time or when you are going through times that are tedious. If you have never done purpose work—often referred to by Simon Sinek as your “WHY”— now is the perfect time to give it some thought. Of course, there are entire books and courses devoted to this topic, so here are some questions to get you started:

Questions to ask to define your purpose:

• What do you do easily and naturally that you are known for, that people come to you for, and that others thank you for?
• What are you doing when you are in the zone, lose track of time, and would do it for free if you didn’t need a paycheck?
• What are you willing to do despite knowing you might be judged by others or that it might make you look foolish?
• What dream did you have when you were younger that you meant to defer but then forgot about?
• Considering what is important to you, and your purpose to the extent that you have a sense of it, what do you see is reasonably possible (with a fair amount of work and commitment) for you?
• Can you paint a detailed picture?
• What does the picture tell you?
• What could you do now—just as a first step—so that the picture can be manifested in reality some day?

You will have to experiment a little and notice what gives you joy and feels like the right direction. That’s okay, you have time, and you will start feeling better once you start picking up clues and penciling out a plan. I personally dabbled in a topic for thirteen years before finally getting serious and signing up for classes. Seven years later I am still a neophyte, partially because it takes decades to master, partially because there is still the family (husband, four kids, three dogs), the full-time job (which I love) and, you know, life. But I have made slow and steady progress, which allows me to feel 100% on purpose and gives me extraordinary satisfaction.

Finally, I would be remiss if I didn’t suggest that you schedule a physical with a doctor. There might be a chemical reason for feeling the way you do; you just never know. If your hormones are wildly out of whack or you are deficient in some key nutrient, a visit to your doctor will rule it in or out. Your doctor may diagnose depression—which of course might be true—but unmet needs or a lack of purpose and values alignment are often diagnosed as depression.

Of course, the feeling might just lift on its own, but I do encourage you to continue your inquiry—it can only help. Good luck to you. There is so much joy to be had in this life. I hope you can find your way back to it.

Love, Madeleine

About the Author

Madeleine Homan Blanchard is the co-founder of The Ken Blanchard Companies’ Coaching Services team.  Since 2000, Blanchard’s 150 coaches have worked with over 16,000 individuals in more than 250 companies throughout the world. Learn more at Blanchard Coaching Services.

By Pat Zigarmi and Judd Hoekstra

The coronavirus pandemic upended our world in a matter of weeks.
Businesses closed. Stores shuttered. Unemployment soared. And worst of all, the virus took our loved ones.

Companies were forced to reinvent the way they worked in just a few days. IT departments scrambled to provide equipment for employees. Managers and their people struggled to adjust to the new reality.

For those of us fortunate to keep our jobs, the boundaries between work and home vanished. Spare rooms became offices. Some of us worked exceptionally long hours. Some had little to do.

When historians chronicle these dark days, they will write how fear and uncertainty cast a pall over the world. They will also share that there were surprising pockets of innovation as employees exercised their newfound autonomy and rose to the challenges of the moment.

Now, organizations around the globe are reopening, sort of. Unevenly for sure. Making decisions without complete information. Uncertain about the future.

This creates an opportunity for all leaders to embrace the changes ahead in a radically different way.

The Business Case for High-Involvement Change

The pandemic acted like a microscope.

It magnified how courageous, curious, agile, and resilient we (individuals and organizations!) can be. It gave us new ways of thinking about how and where work gets done.

So what are some of the lessons we’re learning?

The command-and-control leadership style looks like a relic from the past. The idea that a few at the top know what is best for the many seems untenable. Additionally, unlike hierarchical organizations of the past, today’s frontline employees have more access to information than ever before. The Internet has become a great leveler, empowering employees and making command and control look slow and old.

The conclusion is that leaders must invite all stakeholders to conversations about change.

We also know that the pre-pandemic status quo suppressed employee engagement and enthusiasm. Creative solutions emerged when employees took ownership of problems. An inclusive, high-involvement environment is the only way to keep alive the surges of creativity, resourcefulness, and collaboration we’ve witnessed in the last months.

The coronavirus pandemic also showed that employees could co-create solutions and implement changes that met organizational and individual needs.

When employees return to the office, it will be a critical time for leaders to capitalize on their creativity and rethink how and where work gets done.

Essential Conversations Ahead

Change means different things to different people. We define it in our Leading People Through Change® (LPTC) workshop as “the gap between what is and what could be.”

In the case of the pandemic, change is the gap between what was, what is, and what could be. The challenge facing all companies is jettisoning what didn’t work (like endless face-to-face meetings) and embracing what did (like agility and empowerment).

To understand what did and didn’t work before and during the pandemic, leaders need to have meaningful conversations with their people. Before leaders announce any change, they need to share what they saw/see with their peers and understand the implications. Finally, they need to ask employees what they saw/see and know.

These conversations will help your organization define potential changes about where and how work gets done going forward and ensure that the proposed solutions solve the right problems.

The goal of these conversations is to help each other appreciate different perspectives about work before and during the pandemic so you can co-create the “what could be” for your workplace.

Why is this so important?

Change initiatives are notoriously difficult undertakings—they fail 75% of the time. And most are unsuccessful for the same reason: 80% of companies use a top-down, minimally inclusive approach. And yet we’ve also learned this from our change work over the years: “Those who plan the battle rarely battle the plan!”

Involving others to develop realistic and right-resourced change plans will also let you discover potential implementation problems before you reopen. Casting a wide net has inherent value. Our founder Ken Blanchard powerfully summed up the reason: “None of us is as smart as all of us.”

Once you reopen and/or adapt some blended solution of working from home and at the office, your employees will have concerns that arise in a predictable sequence. The Leading People Through Change® Stages of Concern model, below, illustrates this.

Perhaps the most important conversations you’ll have with employees when you reopen are what we call Concerns Conversations. These surface people’s unanswered questions with the proposed changes.

When you think about reopening your organization, we bet that these are the questions keeping people awake at night. But if you use a high-involvement approach to change, you don’t have to have all the answers. The answers come from bringing those affected by the change into the conversation.

In reality, the only thing fast about a top-down approach is decision-making. However, the speed of implementation and realization of results are significantly slower with a top-down approach because those outcomes rely on the commitment of those being asked to change.

An African proverb captures the essence of Blanchard’s high-involvement approach to change: “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.”

Get Ready to Go Far

The pandemic is demanding change in your organization. Leading People Through Change® can make it a transformative moment.

Joe Dunne, director of sales enablement at Global Industrial, recently went through LPTC training with forty sales leaders. Here’s what he had to say about it:

“Leading People Through Change® has been a game changer for us. The highly interactive virtual sessions were delivered flawlessly, under a tight time frame, by our trusted partners at Blanchard. We’re seeing immediate on-the-job application of the mindsets and skillsets we learned as our people return to the office from working remote.”

Leading People Through Change® can be conducted as a one-day face-to-face session, a seven-hour virtual instructor-led training (four virtual sessions), a two- to four-hour executive overview, and a soon-to-be-released 35-minute digital overview.

Please contact your Blanchard sales consultant if you would like to learn more about our Leading People Through Change® solution.

Marcus Buckingham believes some basic assumptions about work are simply no longer true in today’s business environment. He shares his insights in his latest book, Nine Lies About Work: A Freethinking Leader’s Guide to the Real World, coauthored with Ashley Goodall.

Lie #1: People care which company they work for.

Many companies use their corporate culture as a recruitment tool. Although it is true that people will join a company for their projected culture, people will stay—or leave—because of the team they work with every day. Team members who truly care about one another and have each other’s backs create their own culture. Leaders who observe and understand what makes teams perform well, and then encourage that behavior in other teams, will create a stronger organization.

Lie #2: The best plan wins.

Executives spend months developing a strategic plan, getting it approved by the board, and then disseminating it through the entire organization. The more rigorous and detailed the plan, the longer it takes to develop—and during that extended amount of time, reality probably changes. Planning is a good way to scope a problem, but what leaders really need is intelligence. Smart leaders empower their frontline people to deal with situations immediately and then check in regularly to see how they can help. Buckingham’s research indicates that this method lowers turnover and improves productivity while it builds an intelligence system that outperforms a complicated planning system.

Lie #3: The best companies cascade goals.

It has been common practice for a CEO to have annual goals that are cascaded first to the executive team, then through each department structure, to the individual level. The problem? Things can change over a year—but fewer than 5 percent of people go back to look at the goals or recalibrate their need. Truth be told, goals work only if you set them yourself. Freethinking leaders know what they need to accomplish, take the responsibility to explain it to team members, and then set goals they can achieve. The best practice is to cascade meaning—not goals.

Lie #4: The best people are well rounded.

Companies spend time defining competencies they want employees to develop—and then spend more time trying to improve people’s weakest competencies. This practice creates employees with just-average performance. Freethinking leaders look for the skills that people do well and leverage those skills. High performers usually do something a little differently than others—and that difference, when used intelligently, can be a competitive advantage.

Lie #5: People need feedback.

Feedback is a tricky subject. On one hand, if you don’t give any feedback and ignore someone, it destroys them. On the other hand, if you approach someone saying you want to give them feedback, their brain pattern looks almost exactly like fight-or-flight brain waves. The person feels like they are being attacked. Many times, feedback isn’t helpful because it isn’t delivered in a way that helps the person learn how to change a behavior. When freethinking leaders see someone doing something that works, they ask the person what they think worked well and why. This line of questioning as a method of feedback serves as the learning moment. The interrogation of the action—good or bad—is the most important conversation.

Lie #6: People can reliably rate other people.

Forty years of research shows that ratings of the performance of others is more a reflection of the person doing the rating than the person being rated. We simply can’t rate other humans on things like strategic thinking, creativity, business knowledge, or overall performance. Accurate rating of other people’s performance takes a much deeper conversation based on observations—it’s not about selecting a number on a scale.

Lie #7: People have potential.

Of course people have potential. The danger comes in identifying certain people as high potential, because doing it presupposes that others are low potential. By creating these designations, we are deliberately not seeing 85 percent of our people. The truth is that everyone has potential—but we have never found a way to measure just how much potential they have.

Lie #8: Work-life balance matters most.

Work-life balance is a great aspiration, but it is important to remember that balance is stationary. So, if you feel like you are totally in balance, you are probably stagnant. The trick is to find activities that give you strength in work and in life, and then spend as much time as possible on those things. Of course, none of us can spend 100 percent of our time being happy. But if we are deliberate about spending time doing things that invigorate us, it lessens the chance of us burning out and increases the chance of us being happier and more productive.

Lie #9: Leadership is a thing.

The main thing Buckingham wants leaders to know about the power of human nature is that each human’s nature is unique. If we see this as a problem that needs to be fixed, that’s a shame. But if we make a home for the unique individuals, we can build work environments where people are seen and challenged to become a better version of themselves.

You may completely agree with what Buckingham has to say in this book, or you may question some of it. Either way, once again, he’ll give you something to think deeply about.

To hear host Chad Gordon interview Marcus Buckingham, listen to the LeaderChat Podcast, and subscribe today. Order Nine Lies About Work on Amazon.com.

For more information on Marcus Buckingham, go to www.freethinkingleader.org

Dear Madeleine,

I am what’s called a “people leader”—I lead individual contributors at a global software giant. I am also a technical contributor as a subject matter expert in a specific application.

I don’t love managing people. I am quite reserved and I find it tiring—but it is the only way to get ahead in this company. I’ve always thought I would stay here forever and rise through the ranks. But there has been so much change over the last 18 months that I have had three different bosses. The last one barely seems to know I am alive and has no idea about my technical expertise.

The person who runs the team on which I am an SME disagrees with the strategic direction of the organization and is planning to leave. He wants to take me with him. He is convincing me that if I went, I would make a lot more money and be able to focus on my technical expertise. I am single and could move, although I would be leaving my family and friends.

I have gotten myself into a state and have no idea what I should I do. Thoughts?

Stay or Go?

Dear Stay or Go,

Ah, these big life decisions. Of course, I can’t recommend a course of action one way or the other. I personally have a bias toward action, which has brought me enormous joy and probably more than my fair share of really bad mistakes. But I can help you review the situation as you have laid it out.

You enjoy the technical part of your job, but you have been pressured into managing people. The company you work for is unstable and you get no attention or support from management. The one senior person who seems to grasp and appreciate your value is leaving the company and wants to take you with him. So far, he has made promises, but as yet you have received no official offer. If you were to agree to an attractive offer, you would have to move and leave a settled life with an established community.

Essentially, you just don’t have enough information yet. I think before you do anything rash, you have to get a solid offer that includes a substantial raise, a clear job description, and your moving expenses covered. Until then, it is all pure speculation.

But this event is a bit of a wake-up call that everything is not quite right in your current position. And it’s an opportunity for you to define for yourself what would be better for you. To make these big life decisions, it is helpful for you to understand your core psychological needs and your values.

Values are important. What makes you smile? What do you gravitate to naturally? What gives you energy and pleasure? Ask yourself: Will I be more aligned with my values in this new situation?

Your needs are even more critical. They are what you have to have. To figure out your needs, think about what you must have to be fully functional. It sounds like you might have a need to pursue your mastery of your technical expertise, but you have no need to be in charge of other people.

Some needs don’t really become apparent until they aren’t met. One of the best ways to identify your needs is to think about a time when you behaved badly or became almost sick with unhappiness. Chances are some fundamental need wasn’t being met. What was it?

Do you like to be appreciated or do you need it? Do you like having a close community near you, or do you need it? If you get a reasonable offer, you will want to ask yourself Will I be able to rebuild a life in a new place where I can get what I need to be stable?

If I could be so bold, I’d like to recommend my book Leverage Your Best in this column. It has some great detail on needs and values and it might be worth your while. The more you understand about yourself, the easier it will be to make these big life choices.

If in the passage of time and events you decide to stay where you are, this exploration will still be useful and will help you shape your career path and inform the requests you make of your current management.

I hope you do a little self-reflection and learn more about who you are and what you really want out of life. The more thought you put into it now, the more likely you will be able to create an extraordinary life with few regrets.

Love, Madeleine

About the author

Madeleine Homan Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.

Got a question for Madeleine? Email Madeleine and look for your response here next week!

For most, if not all organizations, their employees are their number one asset. This makes the wellbeing, the engagement of employees very important. Why?  Because engaged employees are passionate about their work.  They strive to provide superior customer service, solve problems, and find innovative approaches. 

A great way to generate a significant positive affect on employee engagement is through individualized attention and one way to get started is through coaching.

Every employee in an organization is different.  Coaching is a wonderful way to give employees individualized, customized attention.  Coaching is uniquely tailored for the person being coached. A coach works with an individual to understand what make them tick—to understand the employee’s own strengths and work passion.  Coaching helps to draw out employees’ ideas and opinions and helps employees to discover how to best make their own contribution.  It makes employees feel valued and appreciated.  All this attention gets employees to engage more in their own career.

Is engagement an issue in your organization? Consider some of these ways a coach provides individualized attention to those they serve.

A coach:

• Takes the time to build rapport with those they coach to get a sense of who they are, not just what they do. Great rapport often increases employees’ motivation to work hard in their role and on the goals of the organization.
• Values employees’ contributions and cares about their professional success.  This in turn often empowers them to take more ownership of their own continued development.
• Cares about the individual, working with them to understand their strengths and foster greater development. 
• Checks in with those they coach to see what is working, what isn’t, and what might the employee do different in the future.

Coaching gets clients to engage more in their role, their development, and the goals of the organization. When employees receive coaching, they feel positively supported and valued by their organization which in turn generates and builds more engagement. 

Engagement has been shown to increase retention, innovation, and performance, and as a byproduct, revenue.  What organization wouldn’t welcome that?

When people feel that their manager cares about their development their commitment and energy increases. This leads to growth, increases their confidence, and helps them to reach their full potential. Use a coach approach to individualize attention, either by hiring outside coaching or developing those capabilities in-house. Individualized attention pays off for the individual and the organization.

About the Author

Joanne Maynard is a senior coach with The Ken Blanchard Companies’ Coaching Services team.  Since 2000, Blanchard’s 130 coaches have worked with over 14,500 individuals in more than 250 companies throughout the world. Learn more at Blanchard Coaching Services.

Hi Madeleine,

Earlier this year I joined a consulting firm that works with companies in my previous industry. I had taken a break to get a management degree and got a taste of consulting doing an internship that was part of my program.

I believed consulting would be a different world where I would learn a lot—but now, seven months in, I recognize that I learned a lot more five years ago when I started my career as an entry level employee.

My workload isn’t interesting or challenging. My peers are all younger than me, and all they do is complain about their jobs and bad mouth others. And when I told my supervisor how I feel about my job during my midyear review, she didn’t seem to care.

I’ve always had opportunities in the past to work with people my own age or older—people I could learn from who knew more than I did. I’m worried that I’m stuck in the wrong job and that it will negate the five years’ experience I had when I came here.

Please help!

Feeling Stuck

Dear Feeling Stuck,

Everyone is motivated to work for various reasons—the need to pay the bills is usually number one. But it is clear that you deeply value a safe and collegial working environment. A learning environment, challenging work, and adding value also seem to be very important to you.

It sounds like you are not going to get any of those where you are now. But you are only “stuck” if you are being held hostage. It doesn’t sound like that’s the case, so … go! Go as soon as you can. You haven’t let so much time go by that you have lost the value of your previous stint. In fact, you might think about going back to your old company, perhaps this time in a management position.

Honor your own experience and instincts. Find yourself a job where you can excel and a working environment that brings out the best in people.

Love, Madeleine

About the author

Madeleine Homan Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.

Got a question for Madeleine? Email Madeleine and look for your response here next week!

“In this model,” says Blanchard, “Leaders assume a traditional role to set the vision, direction, and strategy for the organization—the leadership aspect of servant leadership. After the vision and direction are set, the leaders turn the organizational pyramid upside down so that they serve the middle managers and frontline people who serve the customer. Now the leader’s role shifts to a service mindset for the task of implementation—the servant aspect of servant leadership.”

Many organizations and leaders get into trouble during implementation, warns Blanchard.

“When command-and-control leaders are at the helm, the traditional hierarchical pyramid is kept alive and well. All of the organization’s energy moves up the hierarchy, away from customers and frontline folks who are closest to the action. When there is a conflict between what customers want and what the boss wants, the boss wins.”

Blanchard suggests that leadership, learning, and talent development professionals correct this situation by philosophically turning the traditional hierarchical pyramid upside down—putting customer contact people at the top of the organization and top management at the bottom.

“This philosophical mind-shift reminds everyone in the organization that when it comes to implementation, leaders serve their people, who serve the customers. This change may seem minor, but it makes a major difference between who is responsible and who is responsive.”

The next step, according to Blanchard, is to align policies, practices, direction, and support to remove barriers for the people who are taking care of customers. This high-investment approach to talent management is designed to bring out the best in everyone.

“Servant leaders are constantly trying to find out what their people need to perform well and live according to their organization’s vision. In top organizations, leaders believe if they do a good job serving their people and showing them they care, the employees will, in turn, practice that same philosophy with customers.”

The Biggest Barrier to Servant Leadership

In looking back at all of the organizations he has worked with over the years, one of the most persistent barriers to more people becoming successful servant leaders is a heart motivated by self-interest, says Blanchard.

“As a leader, you must ask yourself why you lead. Is it to serve or to be served? Answering this question in a truthful way is so important. You can’t fake being a servant leader. I believe if leaders don’t get the heart part right, they simply won’t ever become servant leaders.

“Managers who somehow have themselves as the center of the universe and think everything must rotate around them are really covering up not-okay feelings about themselves. This is an ego problem that manifests as fear or false pride. When you don’t feel good about yourself, you have two options. You can hide and hope nobody notices you, or you can overcompensate and go out and try to control your environment. I always say that people who feel the need to control their environment are really just scared little kids inside.”

“I learned from the late Norman Vincent Peale that the best leaders combine a healthy self-acceptance with humility.  As I learned from Norman, “Leaders with humility don’t think less of themselves—they just think about themselves less.”

An Old Model for a New World of Work?

Blanchard explains that leaders with a servant heart thrive on developing people and helping them achieve their goals. They constantly try to find out what their people need to perform well. Being a servant leader is not just another management technique. It is a way of life for those with servant hearts.

“When I first began to teach managers back in the late 1960s I met Robert Greenleaf, who was just retiring as a top AT&T executive. Bob talked about servant leadership—the concept that effective leaders and managers need to serve their people, not be served by them. It was entirely new thinking then. In many ways, Bob is considered the father of the term servant leadership.”

It is much easier for people to see the importance and relevance of servant leadership today than it was back then, says Blanchard.

“Today when people see you as a judge and critic, they spend most of their time trying to please you rather than accomplishing the organization’s goals and moving in the direction of the desired vision. ‘Boss watching’ becomes a popular sport and people get promoted on their upward-influencing skills. That role doesn’t do much for accomplishing a clear vision. People try to protect themselves rather than move the organization in its desired direction.

“Servant leaders are constantly trying to find out what their people need to be successful. Rather than wanting their people to please them, they want to make a difference in the lives of their people—and, in the process, impact the organization.”

Servant Leadership: The Power of Love, Not the Love of Power

A few years ago, Blanchard received a letter from a man in New Zealand with a line that he believes sums up his leadership philosophy.

“The man wrote that he felt I was in the business of teaching people the power of love rather than the love of power.

“I believe the world is in desperate need of a different leadership role model. We need servant leadership advocates. Spread the word to everyone who will listen! And remember: your job is to teach people the power of love rather than the love of power.”

Would you like to learn more about creating a servant leadership culture and leading at a higher level?  Join us for a free webinar with Ken Blanchard!

Servant Leadership: 4 Keys to Leading at a Higher Level

Wednesday, September 12, 2018, at 9:00 a.m. Pacific Time / 12:00 p.m. Eastern / 5:00 p.m. UK / 4:00 p.m. GMT

In this special event for leadership, learning, and talent development professionals, best-selling business author Ken Blanchard looks at servant leadership and how to create an others-focused culture in your organization.  You’ll learn how to:

• Set your sights on the right target and vision. Great organizations focus on three bottom lines instead of just one. In addition to financial success, Ken will share how leaders at great organizations measure the satisfaction and engagement levels of their employees as well as their customers.
• Treat your customers right. To keep your customers today, you can’t be content to just satisfy them. Ken will share how to create raving fans—customers who are so excited about the way you treat them that they want to tell others.
• Treat your people right. You can’t treat your people poorly and expect them to treat your customers well. Ken will share how treating your people right includes setting clear, meaningful goals, providing day-to-day coaching, and finally, setting up performance reviews so that there are no surprises.
• Develop the right kind of leaders. The most effective leaders recognize that leadership is not about them and that they are only as good as the people they lead. Ken will share how servant leadership principles can guide the design of your leadership development curriculum.

Ready to take your organization to the next level?  Don’t miss this opportunity to explore how to create an others-focused culture and leadership development strategy based on the principles of servant leadership. The event is free courtesy of The Ken Blanchard Companies.

REGISTER USING THIS LINK

I am a mid-level manager with a large team in a low-profile but significant government agency. I say significant because substantial numbers of citizens depend on us for critical services.

The chaos here has been profound over the last year or so. Senior leaders keep quitting or getting fired, mandates turn on a dime, and my boss is so demoralized that most days she just comes to work and shuts her office door. She could be playing solitaire on her computer all day, for all anyone can tell.

The mission and goals for my team are straightforward, though, so we keep plugging along and serving our constituents. I have lost some of my best people who have gone to the private sector—and because of the leadership vacuum and the budget freezes I have not been able to replace them. Of course, this has put more pressure on my remaining people.

I don’t know how much longer we can go on this way. I am very close to retirement so I know I can hang on, but I feel terrible for my people. I would need to hire at least five people in order to do the job we are supposed to be doing.

I am running out of steam here and I’m tired of fighting with no support.

Feeling Paralyzed

Dear Feeling Paralyzed,

Wow. This sounds like an exhausting and tricky situation. But you are not ready to walk away, so you might as well create a plan to keep going.

It sounds like you don’t have much to lose—which in a messed-up way could afford you an opportunity here. This would really depend on your relationship with your boss, but I wonder if you could knock on her door, interrupt her game of solitaire, and request her assistance. Tell her you need her and you need guidance, direction, and support to solve the problems you are grappling with. Maybe she’ll buck up and get her head back in the game.

If you can’t do that, I guess you are truly on your own. I mean, seriously, it sounds like there isn’t anyone paying enough attention to fire you! Go ahead and submit requests for hires to HR and see if you can get that ball rolling. If that won’t work, you will just have to do your best with the hand you’ve been given.

Look at the numbers and figure out what you can do with your limited work force. Explain your thinking to your team and inspire them to do their best with a lousy situation. You probably won’t be able to do everything you want to do, or feel you should do, but you can do something. The people you serve will really appreciate it.

What else can you do but your very best? Who is going to stop you?

Fight on!

Love,

Madeleine

About the author

Madeleine Homan Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.

Got a question for Madeleine? Email Madeleine and look for your response here next week!

Dear Madeleine,

I am a senior manager in a large government agency that has been decimated and paralyzed by our current administration. Don’t worry, I am not going to get political.  But I do need help, because growth and opportunity have ground to a standstill in our organization and I have a whole team of mission-driven, smart, passionate folks who really should be promoted.  

We old timers are used to rolling with constant change because our senior leadership can and often does change every four years. But this is the first time things have been this dire. 

What do I do when I have four people who should be promoted to their next position and should be getting a bump in salary, but I have an available position and budget for only one?  I am afraid if I move one person, the rest will be so mad that they will quit and then I really won’t be able to get anything done. I am at a loss as to how to keep people motivated under these circumstances.

Swimming Upstream

Dear Swimming Upstream,

It sounds as if you are fighting the good fight in an impossible situation.  I’ve worked with a lot of folks in government, so I’ve had a front row seat to the four-year merry go round.  It can be hard to get anything done under the best of circumstances, which these clearly are not.

You can’t be the only leader dealing with this situation—in fact, it must be situation normal for everyone in management.  Your first stop is probably to discuss this with your boss, who I hope has some ideas for you.  Perhaps there are some underutilized development opportunities for the whole team that can be creatively deployed.  It is probably worth doing some sleuthing—you never know what possibilities have been forgotten because their champion left with the last administration.  Check the fine print!

The silver lining of this situation is that the cause of the standstill is clear to all.  In regular for-profit organizations, when this kind of thing happens it can be hard to know who to blame—and the mission is often uninspiring. Things like hiring freezes, travel bans, and pay cuts happen all the time in almost all organizations. In smaller, flatter organizations it is almost impossible to use promotion and large salary bumps as a motivator, so management must find other ways to keep people engaged.

Your team must know what is going on. They can’t be expecting you to pull a rabbit out of a hat.  I am always a big fan of telling the truth as you see it so they know what to expect.  If you can promote one person, you will want to be clear about what criteria you are using to make the choice.  The least fraught would be to promote the person with the most longevity, but we know that isn’t always how it works based on availability of openings and skill sets.  It is certainly everyone’s prerogative to quit—but if, as you said, they are mission driven, you might encourage them to hang on for a few more years when there’ll be an opportunity for the situation to turn around. It is easy to lose steam when the powers that be are not on your side, but that could change relatively quickly.  Keep the focus on what you can do under the circumstances and the differences you can make.

Courage, Swimming Upstream. Remember that everyone in your agency is in this together, and you can use the awareness of being the underdog to fire up everyone’s sense of purpose.

Love, Madeleine

About the author

Madeleine Homan Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.

Got a question for Madeleine? Email Madeleine and look for your response here next week!

An increasingly complex business environment requires an engaging and easy-to-understand service vision says Vicki Halsey, co-author of Legendary Service: The Key Is to Care.

In a short, one-minute video featuring key concepts from The Ken Blanchard Companies new Legendary Service training program, Halsey shares a great story about how one major league baseball stadium engaged all employees in creating “major league memories.”

For the leaders I coach, much of their workday moments are spent in email, in meetings, or tap, tap, tapping on their cellphones. Also competing for their attention are one-on-one interactions with clients, colleagues, and direct reports. It’s easy for them to be anything but focused in the present moment.

That said, I think most people will agree that being as present as possible, in the here and now, is valuable. We’ve all experienced having someone be fully present with us, really focused on what we had to say. It’s quite energizing. When we strive to be more in the present we give a gift not only to people we interact with, but also ourselves.

How about you? Could a little more mindfulness help in your interactions with others? Here are a few points to keep in mind.

• Knowing about mindfulness is not practicing mindfulness. I’ve heard a lot of people say, “Oh, mindfulness, sure, I know what that is.” Then they dismiss it like it’s old news. But in reality, they may have never tried practicing mindfulness.

• Mindfulness is a learned habit anyone can acquire. Just wanting to be more mindful doesn’t make it so. Instead, we have to be intentional and we have to practice. The good news is that absolutely anything we do can be an opportunity to practice greater awareness.

• If at first you don’t succeed… If you commit to practice mindfulness, you will notice that the mind definitely seems to have a will of its own. What to do? Every time your mind starts to leak away, bring it gently back. Bring your consciousness back to what is taking place in the moment.

• Focus on the present—not the past or future. As we work to be more in the present, we often find ourselves thinking about things that happened in the past or something that may or may not happen in the future. This causes us to unproductively spin our wheels. Mindfulness is about focused attention in the present moment.

It’s not always easy to remember to be mindful. Trust me, I know from experience! But the rewards from being in the here and now—in the present time and in the present space—are plentiful. Any movement toward more mindfulness is better than not trying. If you are interested in learning to be more mindful, the internet is loaded with more information. Give it a try. I would love to hear about your mindfulness experiences.

About the Author

Joanne Maynard is a senior coach with The Ken Blanchard Companies’ Coaching Services team.  Since 2000, Blanchard’s 130 coaches have worked with over 14,500 individuals in more than 250 companies throughout the world. Learn more at Blanchard Coaching Services.

Coaches at Blanchard have learned a few things over the years about performance coaching.

• Instead of asking for help early, managers tend to either go it alone in trying to improve performance or they spend too much time documenting problems and talking to HR about their frustrations. By the time they call for a coach, they are hoping for a miracle.
• When performance coaching is done too late, it does not work. Often at this point an employee is interested only in seeking another position within the firm or even creating an exit strategy to get out of the organization altogether.

When we arrive late in the process to coach valued employees who are struggling with performance, we often find a seriously damaged relationship between boss and employee that simply can’t be repaired with a few sessions. In this situation there are 3 options.

1. Coach the employee – but with realistic expectations. Coaching does not offer a personality transplant. If the employee isn’t a good fit for the organization, recognize it, discuss it, and help the employee find a better fit.
2. Coach the manager – it is a better investment and can have positive impact on leader growth. Put the investment with the person who will stay, not the person who will probably leave.
3. Get clear about the ideal outcome. If the manager feels in their gut or heart that the employee’s performance will never be up to par, then do what needs to be done so all parties can move on.

The best time to work with a coach is well before performance slips far enough to warrant an improvement plan. If you really truly need and want to save an employee, review the information above and bring in a coach early on, when performance problems are still able to be resolved.

About the Author

Patricia Overland is a Coaching Solutions Partner with The Ken Blanchard Companies’ Coaching Services team.  Since 2000, Blanchard’s 150 coaches have worked with over 14,500 individuals in more than 250 companies throughout the world. Learn more at Blanchard Coaching Services.

Dear Madeleine,

I am fairly new to managing a large team in the property management industry. I was a team member for a long time. One of the reasons I was promoted was because I was a work horse. I have a lot of energy and was used to putting in ten- and twelve-hour days on a regular basis. I raced around in my truck going from task to task at different properties, helping people solve problems.

I really like the challenge of being a manager—but something has begun to worry me. I start at 7 a.m. and by 2 p.m. I am exhausted, even though I work from home most days. I’m on the phone in endless meetings dealing with strategy, budget, and gnarly personnel issues—and by the middle of the afternoon I’ve got nothing left.

What is happening to me? I am worried that my boss is going to think I am a slacker. Maybe I am not cut out for management? Help!

Out of Battery Power

Dear Out of Battery Power,

Okay, let’s review. You had a job that had constant variety, allowed you some nice mental breaks while driving around, and let you win several times a day because you knew what you were doing and got to interact with nice people who were grateful you showed up. Now you have a job that requires you to sit at a desk at home by yourself, engage in creative visualization of an uncertain future, crunch massive amounts of numbers and translate reality from them, and ponder and try to solve problems regarding the most complicated thing there is: people. What could possibly be wrong?

Your brain is tired, as well it should be. In your old job you got breaks, you spent time with people, and you got to solve solvable problems—which was fun! Now you probably get no breaks at all, you spend time alone, and you have to try to solve unsolvable problems. Also, you are new in the job so the learning curve feels brutal.

Cut yourself some slack. Give yourself a little time to get your head around the job. And try these strategies to take better care of yourself and your brain.

• Get some exercise before you start for the day. You used to be in constant motion, which was clearly energizing for you. Even a walk around the block will improve the blood flow to your brain and increase your creative problem solving.
• Get a good headset so you can pace while on conference calls. You used to be on your feet a lot. Now you are an extension of your desk chair and it’s killing you slowly.
• Remember to eat breakfast and lunch. People who work from home seem to either eat constantly or forget to eat.
• Remember to stay hydrated. Research shows that dehydration can cause lightheadedness and confusion.
• Get out of the house during your workday. Going to a nearby park would be ideal, but at least sit on your front step. When you do this, don’t look at a screen—look at faraway things; a horizon line if at all possible. Gazing at a horizon releases a very specific kind of endorphin which increases our feelings of well-being. Try to have lunch with a friend or colleague at least twice a week. You will have to resist thinking about work, but it will make you more effective in the long run. Can you work from the office a couple of days a week? Do it if you can.
• Take tiny mental breaks throughout the day. You may not realize how many breaks were built into your day in your old job—moments when you were operating on auto pilot and your brain was essentially at rest. If you are in constant meetings from 7:00 to 2:00 with no breaks built in, your brain goes on tilt.
• If possible, do your more difficult tasks before 2 p.m. and leave everything that’s easy to deal with until later in the day. I once heard a senior executive say out loud that she didn’t schedule anything hard after 2 p.m. and I was impressed with her self-awareness and honesty. Her afternoons were reserved for reading, responding to email, and administrative tasks that she could do in her sleep.

I have yet to work with a manager or leader who gets the amount of “white space” they need to just think about everything that needs thinking about. Welcome to management! You may be fried by 2 p.m., but I would bet a paycheck that you never, ever stop thinking about your job now. Before, when you finished your shift, you were done for the day. Now your job is 24/7—so you need to learn how to pace yourself and settle in for the long haul.

Until you get actual feedback from your boss about your performance, stop wasting valuable mental energy judging yourself. Devote that energy to taking better care of yourself and I’m certain you’ll notice an increase in your mental stamina.

Give yourself a break—literally.

Love, Madeleine

About the author

Madeleine Homan Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.

Got a question for Madeleine? Email Madeleine and look for your response here next week!

Dear Madeleine,

I have been managing a team in the insurance industry for the last fifteen years. There has been a lot of change—mostly reductions in staff size and increases in work load—but basically it is pretty much the same stuff, just a different day, and has been for a long time. 

My last kid will graduate this coming spring and already plans to travel the world working odd jobs to pay for it. All day long I dream of doing the same thing. I am actually envious of my kid.

I am so bored with my job that I literally dread going to work. I watch the clock all day. I used to care so much that I would take work home and work on weekends. Now I literally leave things undone, but either my boss doesn’t notice or doesn’t care. I had committed to myself to stick it out until retirement, but that is a good ten years from now. 

For a while I was just kind of asleep, but now it is feeling like a nightmare.

What to do?

Asleep

Dear Asleep,

In our business, we call this condition “quit and stayed.” You are not alone. There is something about human nature, especially for people of certain temperaments, that too much security and sameness puts us to sleep. Your business isn’t happy about it, even if you haven’t seen the evidence yet. If you are senior enough to have a big salary but you aren’t inspiring your people and going the extra mile, I guarantee you are in somebody’s sights. What I want for you is to be at choice so you can make the best decision for your immediate future before someone makes it for you.

I have two words for you. Wake up.

You have so many choices—with the two ends on the continuum being (A) stay and make it work and (Z) go travel the world. You can stay where you are and decide to re-engage: take some training, get interested in developing your people, get trained for a new role. You can craft a plan to leave: stay in your job, reduce your expenses, save up for a big adventure. You can volunteer, get involved with new committees at work, take up yoga. The beautiful thing about envy is that it gives you data about what your heart truly desires. If travel has seized your imagination, maybe you can get a transfer with your company and go do your job somewhere else.

It is possible you have lost sight of what is important to you and what your strengths are.You might take a look at the Values in Action assessment to re-connect with what makes you wonderful and what  is most important to you.

If you really can’t snap out of it by yourself, go talk to a professional. You may be suffering from depression and it has sapped you of all verve and imagination. One thing is for sure, though—if you aren’t already depressed, trying to stick it out with no changes for another ten years will certainly do the trick.

This situation is not your fault. It is part of being human. But now that you know the reality of the situation, you need to take action. Talk to your friends.Talk to a professional. Make a plan and follow through. Don’t put it off. This is your life, and I would hate for you to regret not having taken advantage of this moment of clarity.

Love, Madeleine

About the author

Madeleine Homan Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.

Got a question for Madeleine? Email Madeleine and look for your response here next week!

Dear Madeleine,

I am about eight months into my first senior department manager position at a government agency.  I have a lot of experience in this sector and was brought in to shake things up and make some changes.  My boss literally told me that my job is to kick *ss and take names. 

After I had been on board a short while, everyone at my level underwent a 360 degree assessment—including me.  My results were terrible. 

My direct supervisor, her boss, and I had all thought I was doing really well, but my nine direct reports were brutal.  The open-ended comments were particularly mean. I have included the report for your review.

I know this is all on them, because I graduated from top schools and have had an extremely successful career so far. I took a look at the whole picture when I first took the job and I really do know exactly how to fix things—but I can’t get anyone to do what I tell them. What to do?

They Hate Me

Hi They Hate Me,

Wow.  They really do.  I have never seen results quite like this.  Clearly, your plan was to come in, decide on what changes needed to be made, and enforce all new ways of doing things.  But after reading the comments, it appears to me that you are not attempting to get any input at all from your team, who has been in the trenches for a long time.

The way I see it, you have two options:  continue the way you have been doing things—which will probably result in your needing to fire everyone and start fresh (tricky to do in a government agency); or figure out how to win hearts, minds and followership.  You simply aren’t going to succeed here unless you get your people on your side. I have written often about Power Dynamics, which explains that you are at the mercy of the fact that people can and will exercise their fundamental right to withhold cooperation.

The rest of what you need to know could easily be a book, and has been written about at length by the leadership greats.  Consider picking up The New One Minute Manager, because it boils things down simply and well.  In the meantime, here are some quick ideas for how you may improve your situation.

1. Get clear about the strategies and goals of your new regime. Spend time explaining what, how, and why to the whole team.  Get input on it all, listen carefully, and consider all ideas.
2. Publish, in writing, the final strategy and goals and once again explain the why and how.
3. Do not withhold information to use as a power tool. Share all of it.
4. Catch people doing things right, and praise publicly.
5. Re-direct when needed, in private, kindly.
6. If it doesn’t need to be said, don’t say it.
7. If you don’t have anything nice to say, keep your mouth shut. Never, ever call people names.
8. Remember how much power you have and how vulnerable your people (obviously) feel.

Intelligence and being right is only the ante to get into the game.  To actually win the game, you have to win people over.  This is often startling news to people—you are not alone.

Good luck.

Love, Madeleine

About the author

Madeleine Homan Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.

Got a question for Madeleine? Email Madeleine and look for your response here next week!

Dear Madeleine,

I hate my job. I am just bored to tears. When I completed graduate school, I was recruited into what I thought was the perfect job for me—the job description was exactly what I was looking for. A year later, I am doing a ton of mindless administrative work and almost none of what was in the original job description.

I have tried to speak to my boss about this, but she says I need to pay my dues and that she will consider me for the next project that would suit my skills. In the meantime, my peers keep dumping their admin work on me.

I dread going to work. I have stopped going to the gym and I fear I am sliding into full-on depression, which I have a history with. It scares me. I would quit, but of course I have crushing student debt now. What do you think?

Bored to Tears, Maybe to Death

Dear Bored to Tears, Maybe to Death,

This is a terrible situation and I am so sorry. It must be really demoralizing to spend the money and make the big effort to complete an advanced educational program and then find yourself in a job that is killing your soul.

It sounds as if you are in a very bad way. Depression is no joke. I highly recommend that you find a therapist right now, I mean right this minute, to talk to and get some perspective. Given the details you provided, I suspect your company has an Employee Assistance Program and that you can probably get six sessions with a therapist. It will be totally private and will get you back on an even keel, back in the gym, and able to think straight. Exercise has been proven to be an excellent hedge against anxiety and depression, so get moving.

Once you have stopped the downward spiral, you will need to start an upward spiral. I hate to say it, but this probably involves looking for a new job. You may be able to make a go of it where you are now, but you would need to set a whole lot of boundaries and train everyone around you to see you in a new way.

Unfortunately, your boss and your peers have been getting away with treating you unfairly. I really don’t want to be mean, but people will continue unacceptable behavior as long as you allow it—and you have allowed it. Unless there was an upfront disclosure about having to pay dues with tasks that were not in your original job description, you seem to be the victim of some kind of bait-and-switch situation.

You didn’t say anything about salary, but I suspect they are underpaying you as well. And they will keep doing it as long as you put up with it. You may choose to have the hard conversation with your boss about how she needs to either upgrade all of your work assignments—now—or risk losing you. That conversation will go a whole lot better if you feel safe to leave, meaning you have another option.

The good news is that you have a graduate degree and a year’s worth of work experience under your belt. I think it is worth the push to brush up your resume and try hard to start over with a new organization and a new boss—who won’t take advantage of you because you won’t let them.

Get into action. In this order:

1. Get immediate help. Talk to a therapist, talk to friends, go to the gym.
2. Once stable, start applying for other jobs.
3. Use the new job possibility as leverage to fix your current situation; or simply walk away from people who do not have your back and go toward people who do.

It is really hard to stand up for yourself, Bored TTMTD, so you are going to need a lot of support. You are going to want to nurture your inner warrior. You might consider looking at Amy Cuddy’s work—her book is Presence: Bringing Your Boldest Self to Your Biggest Challenges. The validity of some of her research has been challenged, but that does not diminish the power of her experience and work helping people who feel powerless to rise to a difficult occasion.

I am glad you wrote. I am sorry you are in such a rough spot. Get help. Now.

Love, Madeleine

About the author

Madeleine Homan Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.

Got a question for Madeleine? Email Madeleine and look for your response here next week!

Without a clear sense of the positive financial impact, it’s easy for a leader to dismiss a new proposal as being too disruptive, too expensive, or too time consuming.

An analysis of more than 200 organizations by The Ken Blanchard Companies found that every year of delay in improving leadership skills costs the typical organization an amount equal to 7 percent of their total annual sales.  This represents millions of dollars each year—because poor leadership behaviors not only increase the loss of high potential employees, they also lower the employee work passion and productivity of the people who remain with the company.

Employee Retention

Research originally conducted by Leigh Branham, a leading authority on turnover and retention and author of The Seven Hidden Reasons Employees Leave, identified that at least 9 percent and possibly as much as 32 percent of an organization’s voluntary turnover can be avoided through better leadership skills. Branham, who partnered with Pricewaterhouse Coopers in conducting the study, identifies that trust, hope, worth, and competence are at the core of most voluntary separations.  When employees are not getting their needs met in these key areas, they begin to look elsewhere.

Employee Work Passion

Research conducted by The Ken Blanchard Companies using its Employee Work Passion Assessment has found significant correlation between positive work intentions and a leader’s ability to build trust, use coaching behaviors, and create an engaging work environment. This environment includes high levels of Meaningful Work, Autonomy, Growth, Fairness, Collaboration, and Feedback, along with six other factors (see complete list here.) Failure in any of these areas on the part of the leader leads to lowered intentions on the part of employees to perform at a high level, apply discretionary effort, remain with an organization, endorse it to others, and act as a good corporate citizen.

Employee Productivity

Providing employees with the tools, resources, direction, and support they need to perform at their best is the key to creating a high performance work environment. Research conducted by Dr. Paul Leone with a large Fortune 100 financial services company involving 300 managers and 1,200 direct reports found a 5 to 12 percent increase in productivity among direct reports of managers who attended leadership development training and immediately began using the new skills they had learned.

Leadership Impacts the Bottom Line

Leadership matters! After all, leaders help employees set goals. Leaders make sure those goals are in alignment with overall corporate strategy. And leaders are responsible for providing the direction and support employees need to succeed on a daily basis.

Even though a leadership development initiative—like any change—can be disruptive, difficult, and financially challenging, taking no action is often the most expensive option of all.

Most executives instinctively know that strong leadership is essential for overall organizational success. By evaluating and improving leadership practices throughout their organization, leadership, learning, and talent development professionals can remove a persistent drain on financial performance and allow their organizations to grow and thrive.

# # #

Want to learn more about quantifying the impact of leadership training?  Join us for a free webinar!

Making the Business Case for Leadership Training

Thursday, August 24, 2017 at 9:00 am Pacific Daylight Time

Organizations lose millions of dollars each year due to poorly trained leaders. In this webinar, David Witt, researcher and author of The Ken Blanchard Companies eBook 7 Ways Poor Leaders Are Costing Your Company Money, will share how poor managerial behaviors negatively impact engagement, alignment, productivity, and employee retention.

Drawing on original research conducted by The Ken Blanchard Companies, Dave will explore:

• The 7 biggest gaps between employee expectations and leader behaviors
• The 3 ways to measure the bottom-line impact of leadership training
• The 5 keys to leadership training that works

Don’t miss this opportunity to learn how to evaluate your current level of leadership readiness, how to measure the impact of your leadership development, and how to get started on deploying training that makes an immediate difference. The event is free, courtesy of The Ken Blanchard Companies.

Register here!

– People who exhibit the behaviors of a self leader are more likely to expend discretionary effort on behalf of their organizations.

– People who are self leaders are more likely to have positive feelings about their jobs.

– Self leaders are more likely to perform at high levels, endorse their organization to others, remain with their organizations, and act as good organizational citizens.

For organizations looking to create a culture of self leadership in their organizations, Susan Fowler, one of the lead researchers in the study, recommends that everyone, regardless of their position in an organization, learn the skills necessary to become a self leader. Fowler explains that self leadership is a mindset and skillset that can be taught and learned.

The mindset of a self leader includes three attitudes.

Challenge Assumed Constraints. Fowler says that for individual contributors to evolve into self leaders, they need to challenge their assumed constraints every day at work. For example, if you assume that no one will listen to your idea because you tried once and were rejected, then you seriously limit your ability to effect positive change.

Activate Points of Power. Next, Fowler says, is to recognize and leverage the power you have instead of focusing on the power you don’t have. Fowler explains that people often point to a lack of position power (having a position of authority to allocate budget and make personnel decisions) instead of recognizing four other types of power they could leverage.

• Task power (the ability to influence how a job or task is executed)
• Personal power (having personal characteristics that provide an edge when pursuing goals)
• Relationship power (being connected or friendly with people who have power)
• Knowledge power (experience and expertise)

Be Proactive. The third component of a self-leadership mindset is the ability to be proactive. Self leaders don’t always wait to be told what to do, says Fowler. Instead they hold themselves accountable for getting what they need to succeed. They think for themselves and make suggestions for improving things in the department and in their roles. They conduct proactive conversations at every level of their development to solicit feedback and ask for direction and support.

With a proper mindset in place, Fowler says people can begin to develop a three-part self leadership skillset.

Setting Goals. Self leaders take the lead to make sure their goals are specific, motivating, attainable, relevant, and trackable. If a goal lacks specificity, they seek clarification. If a goal is not attainable or relevant, they negotiate to make it more fair, within their control, and tied to the company’s metrics. If a goal is not optimally motivating for them, they reframe the goal so it is meaningful by aligning the goal to personal values or a noble purpose.

Diagnosing Development Level. In this second component of a self-leadership skillset, people learn to diagnose their own development level—their current level of competence and commitment for achieving a goal or task. Among the hallmarks of self leadership is learning to diagnose personal competence and commitment and identify what is needed to speed up the process of development and growth.

Matching. The third component of a self-leadership skillset teaches people how to get a leadership style that matches their needs. After diagnosing their competence and commitment on a particular goal, self leaders proactively ask for the direction (guidance and clarification) and support (listening and problem solving) they need to make progress on the goal.

Fowler points out that people equipped with the skills of self-leadership feel more positive about themselves and their jobs. They also have the characteristics of employee work passion: they perform at higher levels, endorse the organization positively, have higher levels of autonomy and competence, and are more likely to remain with the organization.

“When people become empowered self leaders, they’re proactive self-starters who look for ways to make your organization flourish.”

As Fowler and her research colleagues identify, the most crucial element in successful initiatives lies in the proactive behavior of the individual contributors required to carry them out.

“Organizations would be wise to equip their employees with the mindset and skillset to diagnose their situation, accept responsibility, and hold themselves accountable for taking action.”

Interested in learning more? Be sure to download the complete research report here. You can also join Fowler for a free webinar on June 21—Taking a Top-Down, Bottom-Up Approach to Leadership.  The event is free, courtesy of The Ken Blanchard Companies. Learn more here.

The best way to reduce turnover and increase engagement is to make sure managers set aside time once or twice each month for employee-directed one-on-one meetings. In these meetings, the manager sets the time but the employee sets the agenda.

Your role as manager is to simply show up and ask questions such as “How’s it going?” or “What’s on your mind?”  Then—this is important—fight the urge to talk. Instead, simply listen. That’s it! (For more on listening, check out the blog post 3 Reminders on How “Just Listening” Is Sometimes the Best Approach by Joanne Maynard.)

A Case Study from a High Turnover Industry

At The Ken Blanchard Companies, we know that listening to your people can make a critical difference.  We were once called upon to help a fast food chain in Southern California with a problem prevalent in the quick service industry—high turnover.

This restaurant chain’s turnover rate hovered close to 100 percent—with one glaring exception. The rate at one location was found to be significantly lower than that of all the other stores.

In talking to the manager of the exceptional store, we learned that he ran his store in exactly the same way as all the other managers except for one thing: this manager met with each of his employees for a few minutes every week to see how they were doing.  He encouraged each worker to talk about how things were at the store, what was going on at home, or how they were doing at school—whatever happened to be on their mind at the time. Except for these casual meetings, every procedure at this location was identical to those at other stores in the chain.

When asked why he conducted these one-on-one meetings, the manager said, “I figure if my workers know that I really care about them as individuals, they’ll be less likely to go down the street for a new job just because it might pay a little more.”

This really intrigued Dr. Margie Blanchard, cofounder of our company.  She wondered if weekly one-on-one meetings could really make that much of a difference.

To find out, she conducted a test with 20 Blanchard managers.  She asked every manager to meet with each of their direct reports for 20 to 30 minutes at least every other week.  She specified that the direct report set the agenda and decide what to talk about during their time with the manager.

At the end of six months, Margie separately interviewed three different groups—the managers who had set up the meetings; the department heads who had ensured all the managers participated; and the direct reports who had guided the discussions—to get their feedback on the process.

Several managers told Margie that at first they were disappointed in their abilities as a manager. When their employees had questions or asked for direction, they felt ineffective when they couldn’t immediately fix a problem. One of the managers said, “I don’t know what I was doing before, but I don’t think I was managing very well. I believe I’m a better manager now because I know the people on my team on a more personal level.”

Next, Margie asked the department heads if they had noticed any changes in the relationship between managers and direct reports. All of them said yes—there had been a noticeable positive difference in the level of communication taking place.  There was a better overall vibe.

Finally, Margie talked to the direct reports. This group had the most telling feedback, summed up by one person: “It’s been good. My manager doesn’t always know the answers, but I still appreciate that she takes the time to ask about what’s going on in my world. It’s been a very positive experience and has helped our work relationship.”

We Spend Time on What We Care About

You don’t need to have all the answers to create a connection—just make the time once or twice a month to sit down and find out what people are thinking about.  It’ll make a big difference! Consider how much it means to you when someone shows an interest in what is happening in your life.

In a busy world, the way you spend your time reveals what is important to you. People stay with managers and organizations that care about them.  Ask your managers to help you demonstrate that care.

Two new research reports just published by The Ken Blanchard Companies point to strategies that learning and development leaders can use to improve the level of trust in their organizations.

Drawing on an 1,800-person survey, the study looked at the connections between coaching and trust behaviors and employee intentions to:

1. Remain with an organization;
2. Apply discretionary effort;
3. Be a good organizational citizen;
4. Perform work at high levels; and
5. Endorse the organization as a good place to work.

Results of the survey show that trust in one’s leader has a large degree of correlation to the five intentions as a distinct unit.

The research also looked at the impact coaching behaviors had on trust. There was a strong relationship between trust and the coaching behaviors of facilitating, inspiring, and guiding—and it was found that individuals are more likely to trust their leader when they perceive the leader exhibiting these coaching behaviors.

You can read more about the new research in the January issue of Ignite!—Blanchard’s monthly briefing for leadership and talent development executives.  Access the January issue here.

Why don’t more managers schedule regular one-on-ones? Time pressure is one factor but sometimes uncertainty on what to discuss can also be a problem. But as this story explains, managers are not expected to have all the answers.

Ready to take a second look at one-on-ones? Here are three posts to offer you help and encouragement if you are ready to make one-on-ones a part of your management skill set in 2017.

Could You Be More Coach-like in Your One-on-One Conversations? Consistently, the data shows strong correlations between a leader’s coaching effectiveness and measures of employee commitment…

Need More Time? How Recurring One-on-One Meetings Can Help I recently coached an ambitious sales person with ten direct reports after he attended a three-day Managing People workshop…

Getting the Most from Your One-on-One Conversations: 6 Tips for Managers and Team Members A recent survey conducted by Training magazine found that 89 percent of those polled want to meet with their manager at least monthly, and 44 percent want …

Trust and empower employees. Respondents identified they look for leaders who believe in them enough to trust them with significant responsibilities and to empower them to use their experience and knowledge. As one respondent put it, “When my manager trusts me, it makes me want to do an extremely good job so I don’t let her down and so that trust increases.”

Provide regular feedback to everyone. Respondents indicated a strong desire for positive feedback when it is deserved—for example, when they show advances in learning a new task or when they offer ideas that benefit their company. They also want to know when they make mistakes or do things wrong. The important caveat? They want the person giving the feedback to respect them as someone who wants to grow and improve.

Make sure goals and expectations are clearly stated—and hold people accountable for achieving outcomes. Survey participants identified that they want leaders to hold them accountable but they don’t want surprises. As one respondent put it, “People don’t like surprises, so managers should make expectations clear up front.” Another survey respondent said, “When the manager explains goals, the employee can take ownership.”

Be open to hearing new ideas and input from everyone. As one respondent stated, “When managers listen to people’s ideas, energy levels can soar. It makes employees feel important and valued.” Respondents also indicated that Millennials want active, involved leadership, a feeling of collaborative teamwork, and unstructured access to information. Implicit in this finding is that information and ideas flow in both directions—from manager to employee and from employee to manager.

Do not micromanage. One respondent noted, “Leaders need to trust their people to do their jobs, but they also need to be available for help when needed—such as when an employee is new in a task.” One key point that came out of the research: the majority of those surveyed expressed a desire to be allowed space for trial and error. This allows the employee freedom to learn from mistakes while having their manager nearby to ward off larger problems.

The report highlights that the growing Millennial generation of workers is looking for clear definitions of expectations, regular feedback, and a receptive ear by managers about their ideas. They do not want to feel micromanaged, but trusted and empowered. They embrace transparency from their managers and want the opportunity to contribute.

You can access the complete report, Millennials in the Workplace: How Do Managers Inspire Them? at the Blanchard website. It contains additional analysis as well as advice for Gen Xers and Boomers, and is available free of charge courtesy of The Ken Blanchard Companies.

I love being permanently connected to the world and I adore the feeling of control I get from remaining on top of everything that comes my way. I guess this means I don’t really know how to distinguish between work and life anymore. They’ve merged into one.

Many articles online feature people who chip away at the time they spend with their families and friends, lose sleep because they’re too busy speaking to the boss or check work email during dinner or on weekends. But this goes beyond work interfering with life. What happens when life interferes with work?

What do you do when a message comes in from a friend who works a different shift so weekdays are the only time they have to chat? What happens when your plumber is available to fix the sink only during your working hours? What if you need to go to your child’s school play on a Friday morning?

For me, the lines between work and life are so blurred that I can barely see them. Generally, when I’m physically in the office I’m at work and when I’m out of the office I’m not at work. However, I work remotely one day a week, so my physical location isn’t much of a distinction. I often check work email when I’m out of the office—and I often check messages from friends when I’m in the office.

These fuzzy boundaries have no effect on my productivity. I’m still an effective member of my department team and I get my work done. If I need to concentrate on a task, I set my phone to Do Not Disturb so that I can focus. If I take a lunch break with a friend and we run late because we are busy catching up, I work a little later to make up the time and get everything finished. So far, I haven’t had the feeling that work is taking over my life. I can still easily walk away from email, go read a good book, and switch off from all electronic connectivity.

I love this flexible approach to working and balancing my life however I please. In earlier posts I have identified that, as a millennial, I’m drawn to the concept of flexible work—and today’s technology makes this work style increasingly achievable. When my parents were my age, as soon as they stepped out of the office they weren’t readily contactable, so their work needed to be completed before they left. Now, I can leave the office at 5:00 p.m. and continue to work if I want to. If I were job hunting and found two equivalent jobs at different companies, one offering flexible work and the other offering a 9-to-5 fixed schedule, without a doubt I’d happily choose the company that offered flexible work.

Organisations who want to attract younger workers need to be increasingly open to flexible work while at the same time deciding how their company will define the concept. Can people check their social media occasionally in exchange for an extra 30 minutes of work, or will their policy be more (or less) strict than this? Are employees allowed to take half a day off with the understanding that incomplete work will be finished another time—for example, taking a morning off in exchange for working into the evening? Could people have the freedom to compress their work week into four 10-hour days and take Friday off?

It is important to note that flexible working does come with a price—and it isn’t for everyone. Stuart Heritage, writing for The Guardian, identifies in his article that each employee needs to make sure they are the right kind of person for flexible work. If you can’t make a clear switch between your work and your personal life it might not be the right move for you. Employers must take on the burden of not only recognising the symptoms of burnout and identifying when people are working too hard, but also calling out someone when their life is taking over and their work output isn’t quite up to scratch. Keep in mind, too, that flexible work isn’t possible for all professions. My mum, for example, is a nurse. She can’t exactly nip out on a Tuesday afternoon to do her Christmas shopping and then pop back in later to finish her shift, when there are patients in need of urgent care.

What do you think? Do you think organisations need to harness the flexibility of new technology and changing attitudes, and be open to flexible work for their employees? Do you think there’s a place in today’s constantly connected global market for people to choose when, where, and how they work? Or do you think it’s more important for employers to control the exact hours employees work to maximize productivity and avoid employee burnout? Share your thoughts in the comments below!

A summer morning stands out with vivid clarity in my mind. I was eight years old. My younger sister, Dee Dee, and I were up before our parents. We were excited to put on our new summer shorts and begin our day. But we were up so early, all our neighborhood friends were still sleeping. And we were bored.

That’s when something magical happened. We went outside and discovered we could turn the steps in our front yard into a game. We ran in opposite directions around the house to see where we met each time. We practiced jumping over the wooden fence between yards. We used the sheets hanging on our backyard clothes line as a makeshift tent.

Exhausted, we flopped down in the grass and began pointing at puffy white clouds in animal shapes against the blue sky. I remember feeling full and satisfied, inventive and adventurous, with a love of games—especially the ones my sister and I created for ourselves.

Dr. Edward Deci, the father of intrinsic motivation, has long lamented that we over-program our children’s lives, robbing them of the discretionary time to be bored. No one wants to be bored, Deci reasons, so we find ways to entertain ourselves. And that’s when we discover our intrinsic motivation—what we enjoy doing simply because of our inherent interest in doing it.

Today’s organizations are filled with employees who are not intrinsically motivated because they haven’t had the discretionary time to discover or tap into their intrinsic motivation.

Do yourself a favor and try these 3 ideas:

Use discretionary time to discover your intrinsic motivation. When you have an unplanned moment, notice the activities you gravitate toward. When there is empty space in your life, what do you want to do? Even if you don’t have the time to get into it or aren’t in a position to do it, recognize your yearning—take note of it. Your discretionary time can reveal the things you are intrinsically motivated to do.

For example, years ago when I would find myself on an airplane without work to do, on vacation with blocks of unplanned time, or with a rare free afternoon on a weekend, I would notice an intense longing to write. Today, I still experience that tug to pull out pen and paper (or iPad) and capture thoughts and ideas. My down time reminds me of my intrinsic motivation.

Tap into your intrinsic motivation at work. When you know what intrinsically motivates you, it’s fun to find ways of integrating it into your work.  I link writing to a variety of work-related tasks such as returning emails, explaining details in written form, drafting proposals, and blogging.

Help reveal other people’s intrinsic motivation. I remember thinking that if my boss caught me reading at work, I’d be branded as lazy. Don’t be that boss. Don’t perpetuate the myth that you need to drive productivity through pressure and constant motion. Instead, encourage your employees to take mindfulness moments. Talk to them about their interests, both work related and personal. Help people discover their own intrinsic motivation. And then help them find creative ways to integrate it into their everyday tasks.

Remember, intrinsic motivation is a good thing. When people are intrinsically motivated they pursue goals for the enjoyment it brings, not because of an external reward or outside pressure. They are more apt to attain a state of flow—that place where time flies and they are in the zone because the demands of the task are matched with their competence to do it. Compelling evidence demonstrates that when people are intrinsically motivated, they generate positive energy, higher degrees of creativity, and sustainable productivity.

One more idea. Do your kids, and their future employer, a favor. Leave them alone with nothing to do sometimes. It might drive you crazy for a while, but it will be precious time where they can discover their intrinsic motivation for writing, reading, teaching, learning, memorizing, running, sports, music, history, or math. Helping your children discover their intrinsic motivation is a gift that will keep on giving.

About the Author

Susan Fowler is a senior consulting partner with The Ken Blanchard Companies, co-creator of the company’s Optimal Motivation and Situational Self Leadership training programs, and the author of the bestselling book, Why Motivating People Doesn’t Work … And What Does: The New Science of Leading, Engaging, and Energizing.

IMPROVING LEADERSHIP ONE CONVERSATION AT A TIME

Executive coach Madeleine Blanchard held the phone to her ear, listening attentively as her newest client explained the problem she was having communicating with her direct reports. “They say that I’m not a good listener. I’m trying to connect, but it just doesn’t seem to be working. Any suggestions?”

Blanchard thought for a moment and replied, “Well, I can hear you typing right now, so I suspect you are actually answering emails while we talk. Do you do that when you are with your people? What would it be like if you actually gave each person your undivided attention?” READ MORE 

MANAGING IN A BUSY WORLD

Managers are struggling to find the time to have needed conversations with colleagues and direct reports. Ann Phillips, a senior consulting partner with The Ken Blanchard Companies, knows this firsthand.   “I always ask leaders ‘How many of you have enough of your own work to do each day?’

The leaders in class typically tell me that every day they have 8 to 12 hours of their own work that doesn’t include addressing the needs of their direct reports.  Lack of time kills many good intentions.” People want to be better leaders, says Phillips, but they don’t have the open space in their schedules. READ MORE 

CREATING A DEEPER CONNECTION AT WORK

You have to put yourself out there if you want to create an authentic connection with people. Sharing your Leadership Point of View is one of the most powerful ways to accomplish that, according to coaching expert Joni Wickline.

“Your Leadership Point of View is about the people and events that have shaped who you are. It also speaks to your values, your beliefs, and what drives you as a leader.” Wickline says creating a Leadership Point of View is an emotional journey and a lot of leaders play it safe when first given the chance to share. READ MORE

MID-LEVEL MANAGERS: TAKING CARE OF THE HEART OF THE HOUSE

Scott Blanchard, principal and EVP at The Ken Blanchard Companies, likes to use the phrase heart of the house to describe the important role middle managers play in an organization. In Blanchard’s experience, if mid-level management is neglected, the result is a slow-moving organization that doesn’t respond well to feedback.

Blanchard says that to be successful, middle managers must be skilled in communicating what is expected and how it is to be achieved.  That means connecting the dots from the boardroom to the frontlines. If middle management is ineffective, the staff both above and below this level suffers. READ MORE

ALL GOOD PERFORMANCE STARTS WITH CLEAR GOALS

The ability to set goals effectively is a key managerial skill. It’s also the key to being a successful individual contributor, according to leadership expert and best-selling author Ken Blanchard.

“All good performance starts with clear goals. If people don’t know what you want them to accomplish, what are the chances they will be successful? Not very good. “Peter Drucker used to say, ‘If you can’t measure something, you can’t manage it.’ Measurements are important to give both managers and direct reports more clarity when assessing performance.” READ MORE

The most shared topics include coaching tips for leaders, biggest mistakes, and “the #1 thing I’d wish I known before becoming a manager.” A great cross section of advice. Be sure to check each out—and maybe share with the people you know also!

The Number One Thing I Wish I’d Known BEFORE Becoming a Manager

By Randy Conley

Becoming a manager for the first time is a significant career milestone. It is both exciting and nerve-wracking stepping into a role where you are now responsible for others and not just yourself. If that’s you, a new manager, remember the number one priority.

What Is The Biggest Mistake Leaders Make When Working with Others? (Infographic)

By David Witt

It is essential for new managers to develop good communication skills as they step into their first leadership roles. Becoming skilled in each of these areas not only helps new managers get off to a great start but also can help them succeed for years to come. How are your managers doing in these critical areas?

8 Personal Qualities for Success: A Coach’s Perspective

By Madeleine Blanchard

With focus, assistance from others, and a disciplined, patient, persistent approach, a coach can help a client attack each component and stay with the job as long as it takes. And a little pinch of luck never hurts!

10 Ways Leaders Aren’t Making Time for their Team Members (Infographic)

By David Witt

Researchers from The Ken Blanchard Companies teamed up with Training magazine to poll 456 human resource and talent-management professionals. The purpose was to determine whether established best practices were being leveraged effectively.

Four Tips for Being Fully Present with People

By Terry Watkins

When you are fully present with team members, you listen more deeply and also from a curiosity perspective. As a result, team members—like clients—feel heard, understood, and acknowledged. This leads to people feeling safe and secure in their partnership with you. It also increases trust.

Hi Madeleine,

I am a hotel manager for a high end property in a large metropolitan city.

I am trying to create a program where department heads and midlevel managers at the hotel can come together to chat candidly about their career goals and how to achieve them. I have a vision to devote 30 to 60 minutes each week to this new program. 

Any suggestions on what sort of things I should focus on in that time duration?

I’d also appreciate your suggestions on what to call these meetings so it sends a good message. Thanks for any feedback. 

Developer

Dear Developer,

Well, isn’t your team lucky to have you! I applaud your desire to develop people; it’s not as common an idea as you might think—despite our best efforts to spread the word.

With the amount of time you are devoting, it will be important to generate consistent value that hits your goals. I have some thoughts about how to do that:

• First, get input. Ask the folks you’re inviting a couple of questions, such as: “What would make you attend?” “What would you want to get out of it?” “What would you want to give?”
• Second, you might want to think about starting with a small cohort of your very best people. Meet someplace nice, make it visible, and spread the word that the group is by invitation only. This way when people are invited to join, they feel singled out for something positive. The group is seen as a reward—an elevation of status.
• Don’t be surprised if people are a little skittish at first about sharing their aspirations. It may make them feel exposed and vulnerable. They need to feel safe before they open up. Starting with something relatively broad like discussing current goals. Ask each person for one goal they would want to share with the group to get accountability and support. By choosing what to reveal, they feel a sense of control.
• Consider discussing higher level management topics like servant leadership, building trust, managing change, leading teams, personal development, or time management, to name a few. Invest in a couple of good leadership books—I’d suggest you start with the greats (Drucker, Bennis, Maxwell, Dupree, Blanchard, Collins, or Goldsmith, for example) and discuss concepts from them.
• For those who don’t consider reading that much fun, excellent lists are available of current top management thinkers. Provide links to short blog posts for ideas that spark discussion.
• Alternatively, each session could be driven by a question such as: What makes a good leader? How should a leader deal with someone who is late all the time? What do you know you should be doing as a manager but don’t quite know how?

In terms of what you might call your group, consider tying the name of the group to one of the stated values of your organization. For example, a value at Zappos is to “Deliver Wow with service.” They might call a group like yours The Wow Club.

Here are some other idea starters: Future Focus Conversations, Career Maps, Plan A Club , Brainstormers, Opportunity League, Look Ahead Club, Onward and Upward, Growth Guild, Career Club, Career Alliance, Rising Stars, or Talent Incubator.

There is always the possibility of a clever acronym—maybe something like LEAD—Leadership Exploration And Development, or MILE—Maximum Impact Leadership Effectiveness.

(You might get more ideas in the comments.)

Do let me know how this works out!

Love, Madeleine

About the author

Madeleine Homan-Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.

Got a question for Madeleine? Email Madeleine and look for your response here next week!

These gaps are found in performance planning and performance review discussions as well as day-to-day coaching. According to a supporting white paper, this disparity translates into lowered employee intention to perform at a high level, apply discretionary effort, or even stay with the organization.

It’s a problem that needs to be addressed immediately, says Scott Blanchard, principal and EVP with The Ken Blanchard Companies. From Blanchard’s perspective, managers should meet with their direct reports weekly or at least biweekly to review progress, give feedback, and provide additional direction and support as needed.

“All good performance begins with clear goals. It’s about getting people focused and setting their priorities so that they know where they are going,” says Blanchard.

“Next, it’s about identifying the skills and motivation a direct report brings to a particular goal or task. Is it something brand new to the person that will require a lot of direction, or is it something they have experience doing? The manager needs to provide the right combination of direction and support to match the employee’s level of competence and commitment on the goal or task.”

In a recent article for his company’s Ignite! newsletter, Blanchard explains that the challenge for a manager is to be able to provide all four of the different styles of leadership people need based on their ability to accomplish a task. He points to research that shows most managers are adept at delivering only one style of leadership out of the four—for example, only directing or only supporting.

“Only 1 percent of managers we’ve worked with were already able to adjust the levels of direction and support they provided their direct reports based on specific needs. The good news is this is a skill that can be learned.”

Blanchard believes job one for a manager is to create commitment and clarity with people about where they’re going and what they’re doing. After that, the manager must make time to check in and evaluate progress on a regular—think weekly—basis.

“The best managers conduct these check-ins frequently by way of structured conversations with each direct report. This is more difficult than it sounds. Consider all of the projects being worked on by all of a manager’s direct reports. The manager needs to make sure they know which project is being reviewed. They may need four or five different conversations with a given employee depending on how many projects need to be discussed.”

Blanchard explains that the smart manager takes a situational approach to communication: they look at competence, confidence, and motivation to decide which management approach works best.

“It’s about flexing your leadership style based on what the direct report needs in a specific role. More than ever in today’s world, managers need to stop for a moment and think about the individual they are speaking with, the type of conversation they are having, how productive the conversation is, and how the direct report feels—and then decide on the best words to say.”

Getting Started

Blanchard encourages leaders to take the time to develop additional management skills.

“It can be a challenge at first, but it can be learned. We believe the success or failure of a manager hinges on the quality of the conversations they have with their people. Great managers know how to have useful conversations—how to talk things through, resolve issues, create clarity, and keep things moving forward. The capacity to learn how to have successful performance management conversations creates the foundational skill all managers need to succeed.”

Interested in learning more? 

Learning and talent development executives are invited to join Blanchard for a free special online event October 26.

Leadership 201: Developing a Leadership Curriculum for Midlevel Managers

October 26, 2016, at 9:00 a.m. Pacific Time

In this webinar, Scott Blanchard will share the advanced skills needed in any leadership development program aimed at midlevel managers. Drawing on the key principles from Situational Leadership® II, Blanchard will share the recommended components learning and talent development professionals should focus on when they create a midlevel manager curriculum, including:

• The Five Elements of Advanced Goal Setting: A new take on the popular SMART Goal model that puts a special emphasis on motivation. Managers draw people into aligned goals instead of constantly having to hold them accountable to overall organization objectives.
• The Four Stages of Development: How to identify the starting mindset of direct reports on new tasks; also, the four stages of development all people pass through when taking on a new goal or project.
• How to Flex Your Leadership Style: The steps required for a leader to develop beyond a comfortable, default leadership style in order to provide appropriate direction and support for every direct report.

Don’t miss this opportunity to learn about the essential skill components midlevel managers need to succeed in today’s diverse and fast-paced work environment. Discover the components you should be considering as a part of your leadership development offerings.

Every interaction we have with a service provider leaves us with some sort of emotional response, from neutral and bland to deep anger and frustration at one extreme, joy and delight at the other.

We’ve all felt the stress associated with a provider whose customer experience is unresponsive and sometimes downright antagonistic—and the health effects of stress are well documented.

So are you killing your customers with stress and hostility? What are some straightforward steps you can take to nurture their long-term well-being? And why should you care?

Much has been written on the profit impact of customer service. Ken Blanchard sometimes describes profit as “the applause you get for delivering Legendary Service to your customers.” But there is a more simple, subtle, and powerful aspect to customer care. Customers will naturally move toward experiences that meet their needs and align with their values (see Susan Fowler’s book Why Motivating People Doesn’t Work—and What Does for more on this). Consistently creating these experiences—and building a reputation for service so good that it’s legendary—is just a matter of a little CARE:

Culture of Service

Your customers and their needs should be at the heart of your organisation’s values, rituals, stories, and celebrations. Ensure that your people are focused on customer well-being first and foremost and eliminate processes that don’t serve your customers. Celebrate and reward behavior that is service oriented and redirect any behaviour that detracts from it.

Attentiveness

Listen to your customers. Take the time and interest to really get to know them, what they need, how they prefer to communicate, and so on. But more than this—you can help build their competence by asking yourself What do I know that would be valuable if I shared it? And remember that in order to be able to serve your customers, you must be in good physical and mental shape—your customers are depending on it!

Responsiveness

Once you understand your customers’ needs, you need to respond to them in a way that demonstrates a consistent, genuine interest in serving them. This is best demonstrated when a situation arises that has the potential to disappoint the customer—if you keep a positive attitude, you will have a better chance of resolving the issue. When necessary, apologise sincerely for the problem. Remember, from the customer’s perspective you are the company. Listen to their concerns and work with them to develop a resolution strategy. Most customers will return if a challenge can be addressed promptly.

Empowerment

If you are in a service delivery role—and nearly everyone is—you probably have more control over the customer service experience than you realise! Blanchard’s EDGE assessment instrument, which compares individuals’ perceptions of their level of empowerment with the perceptions of their supervisor, routinely reports that people could be taking far more initiative and ownership than they do currently. Stay true to your organisation’s vision, mission, and values, and you can do a lot to build customer loyalty by delighting your customers just a little more with each interaction.

In their book Legendary Service: The Key is to CARE, coauthors Ken Blanchard, Kathy Cuff, and Vicki Halsey write, “Legendary Service means consistently delivering ideal service that keeps customers coming back and results in a competitive edge for your organization.” We experience amazing turnarounds when we help clients implement these practices in their companies.

Try it yourself—add a little more CARE for your customers today and see the difference it can make!

About the Author

Ian Beeson is the managing director of Blanchard International, Australia. He can be reached at ian.beeson@blanchardinternational.com.au

Traditionally, this term refers to those who choose to work while sick or unwell. But this definition has now widened to encompass a generation of young people who feel they are forced to fake the extent of their workloads in order to win favor with their superiors, according to research conducted by Ricoh with office workers in the UK.

A new report entitled Overhauling a Culture of ‘Presenteeism’ at Work points to the belief among many employees that working long hours at their desk is the best way to secure career progression and positive endorsements from senior stakeholders at work.

Additionally, the report reveals that 39 percent of currently employed 18- to 26-year-olds believe working away from the office could damage their career progression, while nearly half (41 percent) feel their bosses favor staff that work in the office longer than their contracted hours. Perhaps as a result of these perceptions, more than two-thirds (67 percent) of the 18- to 26-year-olds admitted to faking the extent of their workload by staying late at the office.

The study recommends that employers consider different attendance standards based on changing work styles.  I agree.  We are experiencing a changing of the guard when it comes to the work style of a group I call the inbetweeners (millennials).

As the report concludes, “By embracing a culture in which the onus is placed on outputs and delivery of work, rather than being present in the office, young professionals would be happier, more motivated and would benefit from an improved work / life balance.”

If you are skeptical about the less-is-more work style theory, here’s a story from my home town of San Diego that may convince to at least take a second look.

One good way to measure productivity is revenue per FTE (Full Time Employee). This year, Tower Paddle Boards in San Diego will generate $9 million in revenue with just ten employees—a small sample, but still very impressive at $900K per FTE! Did I mention that Tower employees work only five hours a day? This is a staggering metric when you put it into perspective.

If some employers are able do more with less time, what can the rest of us do to move in that direction? Remember, the goal always must be efficiency and output. Neither of these should be sacrificed in exchange for a person simply being present.

A new working generation of Americans is seeking a new level of flexibility. If you are a manager, which do you think is more important: quantity of hours put in or quality of work?  Both have impact. Only you can decide which one has a more positive and productive outcome for your organization.

Here is the synthesis of the brilliance from amazing leaders just like you.

To rally your people to unleash the dream of Legendary Service and fuel repeat business, drive customer loyalty, and increase employee devotion, you must:

• Listen to people’s ideas for improvement. Really listen. Spotlight situations where you have acted on their ideas. Listen with curiosity, not necessarily to find solutions.
• Empower your team. Set clear agreements about their decision making authority. Ask them to describe circumstances where they would like the power to solve a customer’s issue without manager approval. Continually build their authority by increasing their scope of influence.
• Generate Meaning for the work they do. Let them see the impact of their efforts on the greater purpose of the organization and the world. People thrive when they know their work is meaningful.
• Energize others. To keep people energized, hold standing or walking meetings—20 percent more energy goes to the brain when you are standing! Get them to set a goal for taking better care of themselves. Help them remember to take regular breaks during the workday. You can also energize emotionally by asking them to share with you what they are proud of or how they achieved one of their great successes.
• Notice Your People. Look at them when you walk by. Ask them about the project they are working on. Pay attention to what they say and ask questions to engage. Start sending out birthday notes. In addition, help them to notice each other. People often tell me after the training experience how much they loved being with and learning about their peers. They say it enabled them to better serve their external customers—and they felt more inclined to find opportunities to serve at the highest level.
• Develop Their Capacity. Send people videos, white papers, books, links to TED talks, and articles you think will up their game. Educate them through the power of learning and have them teach each other what they put into action from that learning.
• Attend to their needs to either be taught or teach others. When they come to you with something to discuss, ask my favorite question: “Would you like me to share my ideas for how to do this, or would you like to share your ideas for how to do this?” If they want your ideas, they are asking for help. If they want to share their ideas, they are ready to unleash their talents.
• Recognize their efforts. Celebrate small and large successes. Start meetings with status reports where people share what they are proud of or how they made a difference due to their ingenuity. And give them opportunities to praise each other at meetings.

There is one last, vital element:

• You! You are the person everyone is watching at work and discussing at the dinner table. How are you taking care of you? Are you leaving your people with the same legacy of service that you want them to leave with external customers?

Use these nine ideas and strategies to create L-E-G-E-N-D-A-R-Y (can you see the acronym?) internal and external service in your organization!

About the author:

Dr.Vicki Halsey is VP of Applied Learning at The Ken Blanchard Companies and coauthor of Legendary Service: The Key Is to Care. 

Surprisingly, while meetings should include discussions about goals and objectives, it’s not happening as often as it should.

Survey participants were polled on a wide variety of issues related to one-on-one meetings—including frequency, duration, and topics discussed.  In three key performance management areas—goal setting, goal review, and performance feedback, respondents identified a serious gap between how often they discussed these topics versus how often they wish they were discussing them.

Here are some of the key takeaways:

Goal Setting Conversations—Some 70 percent of people want to have goal-setting conversations often or all the time, but only 36 percent actually do. And 28 percent say they rarely or never discuss future goals and tasks.

Goal Review Conversations—Some 73 percent of people want to have goal review conversations often or all the time, but only 47 percent actually do. And 26 percent say they rarely or never discuss current goals and tasks.

Performance Feedback Conversations—Some 67 percent of people want to have performance feedback conversations often or all the time, but only 29 percent actually do. And 36 percent say they rarely or never receive performance feedback.

IMPLICATIONS FOR LEADERS

The performance management literature is clear on the importance of setting goals, providing feedback, and reviewing performance on a frequent basis. How is your organization doing with helping managers get together with direct reports to set goals, provide feedback, or discuss direction and support where needed?

If people haven’t been meeting as regularly as they should, use this survey data as a starting point to encourage managers and direct reports to schedule their next one-on-one soon. People want and need to have conversations with their immediate supervisors. It’s one of the foundations for strong, productive relationships that align people with the work of the organization in a satisfying and meaningful way. Don’t wait—your people and better performance are waiting!

*Learn more about the original survey and view the complete results by downloading the Blanchard white paper Are Employees’ Needs Being Met by One-on-Ones?  Also check out Blanchard’s brand new look into The Problem with Performance Review, just released this month.

Want to share the infographic?  Use these links to download a PDF or PNG version.

But that’s not true. In fact, that kind of misinterpretation of the research can lead to assumptions that actually perpetuate disengagement, such as the concept of organizations needing to use incentives, rewards, promotions, praising, perks, status building, pay raises, games, competition, or prizes to get anything accomplished.

Knowing the truth behind the nature of human motivation will not only help you reframe the research and rethink your basic beliefs, it will also allow you to embrace new practices that result in employee engagement and work passion. Let me explain.

People’s Basic Nature is to Thrive

In the 2014 movie Gravity, Sandra Bullock’s character goes into space because she has no reason to live on planet Earth. When circumstances spell certain death, she contemplates giving up. But then we witness her remarkable resilience and creativity as she fights to return to Earth.

As we learn watching the plot unfold in the movie, our true human nature is to thrive by making choices, finding meaning, and developing skills to cope with what the world throws at us. But is that a struggle we have to take on alone? I don’t think so.  In fact, I think leaders can greatly accelerate the process by developing strategies to help people experience what every human being needs to thrive: the three psychological needs for autonomy, relatedness, and competence.

For example:

• Define boundaries people need to know and then help them explore the choices they have within those boundaries.
• Demonstrate you care about people through proactive listening.
• Encourage people to develop new skills on a regular basis. Even mundane work is brought to life when people identify transferable skills they can develop such as learning how to focus, improving people skills, practicing different communication styles, etc.

Nobody Wants to be Bored and Disengaged

People want to make worthwhile contributions. People appreciate meaningful challenges. Two of the world’s leading researchers on motivation, Edward Deci and Richard Ryan, wrote a beautiful explanation of human nature*:

“The fullest representations of humanity show people to be curious, vital, and self-motivated. At their best, they are agentic and inspired, striving to learn; extend themselves; master new skills; and apply their talents responsibly. That most people show considerable effort, agency, and commitment in their lives appears, in fact, to be more normative than exceptional, suggesting some very positive and persistent features of human nature. Yet, it is also clear that the human spirit can be diminished or crushed… “

What does this mean for leaders? That it’s important to engage in one-on-one conversations to help people explore their inherent interests, align tasks with their deepest values, and connect their work to a sense of purpose.

Promote Human Thriving

If you believe the high number of disengaged employees reflects a natural state of being, you probably tend to depend on traditional means to fix disengagement—like the incentives, rewards, promotions, etc., I mentioned earlier.

But as you run out of resources and find your workforce is still disengaged, you may need to stop looking for different ways of motivating people and rethink your basic beliefs about human nature and disengagement. Only then will you spark the innovation to develop strategies that promote human thriving—and true engagement—in the workplace.

About the Author

Susan Fowler is a senior consulting partner with The Ken Blanchard Companies, co-creator of the company’s Optimal Motivation and Situational Self Leadership training programs, and the author of the bestselling book, Why Motivating People Doesn’t Work … And What Does: The New Science of Leading, Engaging, and Energizing.

*Self-Determination Theory and the Facilitation of Intrinsic Motivation, Social Development, and Well-Being, https://selfdeterminationtheory.org/SDT/documents/2000_RyanDeci_SDT.pdf

But that’s not all. Leaders who use coaching skills are more likely to retain their key people as well as have more productive teams. This in turn generally translates into a positive effect on the organization’s bottom line. When the leader uses a coach approach to foster direct reports’ development, everyone benefits.

One of the key areas that Zenger and Stinnett focus on is conversation, which they look at from two aspects:

1. What should we talk about?
2. How was that for you?

Both of these questions get at a major source of problems when managers and direct reports have one-on-one conversations. First, rarely are the conversations about a topic the direct report wants to discuss. (Most managers discuss what is important to them as a leader and assume that it is also of value to the team member.) Second, leaders rarely ask for feedback after the conversation to see if it met the needs of the direct report. As a result, one-on-one meetings are hardly ever as effective as they could be.

The best coaches—and the best leaders—know that the greatest amount of personal change occurs when it is a partnership. From a leader’s perspective this means talking less and listening more. It also means learning how to ask effective coaching questions and how to be in service of their people’s ongoing development.

Specifically, Zenger and Stinnett recommend that leaders use a Coaching Topic Checklist as a tool for structuring one-on-one conversations. Their approach is to have the direct report choose from a series of possible topics ranging from, “The progress I am making in my career,” to “How I could contribute more to the organization,” and even more tactical like, “How to handle a specific challenge.”

Through it all, they suggest leaders consider a coaching mind-set, which promotes discovery and growth and frequent stops to check in for feedback on effectiveness.

Many people would say that their best managers were those who used a coach approach to partner with them in achieving their goals. Do you currently use a coach approach when interacting with your people? If not, could it be time to learn? I’d love to hear your thoughts.

About the Author

Joanne Maynard is a senior coach with The Ken Blanchard Companies’ Coaching Services team.  Since 2000, Blanchard’s 130 coaches have worked with over 14,500 individuals in more than 250 companies throughout the world. Learn more at Blanchard Coaching Services. And check out Coaching Tuesday every week at Blanchard LeaderChat for ideas, research, and inspirations from the world of executive coaching.

As I read through the results, I realised how important it is to ask questions like this. People are obviously looking for different things from their companies and their leaders.

To that end, I have a question for you: As a leader, have you ever sat down with each of your employees, one to one, and asked, “What makes you feel valued?” or “How can I serve you?”

This is the starting point. After you receive an initial answer, dig a little deeper. You may be surprised at what you learn. Let me give you some examples from three of the topics identified above.

Appreciation/Recognition

Suppose someone answered your question by saying “I want to be appreciated.” You might think you know what they mean by that statement, but keep in mind that everyone is different. One person may define appreciation as a pat on the back and another may be thinking of a raise in salary. Take the time to find out what appreciation means to that person. Assume nothing. 

Flexibility

The same goes for flexibility. If a person says “I need more flexibility,” are they asking for more control over their schedule, over their tasks, or both? Keep an open mind. (Note: as of June 30, 2014, all employees in the UK have the right to request flexible working hours.)

When the Olympics were held in the UK, many employers let their people work from home to beat the traffic. The mayor of London at the time, Boris Johnson, said he thought working from home would encourage people to waste time. However, companies surveyed by the Telegraph said during that time their employees actually were more productive—and it fostered a positive work-from-home perception. So don’t be afraid to test out new ideas on a trial basis!

Opportunities for Growth 

Growth is a big issue these days. However, it gets tough when a company that is not performing well isn’t able to offer traditional growth opportunities such as promotions. Instead of throwing up your hands, consider other ways you could get creative with growth. This will not only help employees feel valued but also could assist the company in exploring different options.

A recent Gallup survey showed that, worldwide, only 13 percent of employees are engaged at work. This is a scary number. Five of the questions Gallup uses to measure engagement are directly aimed at leaders asking questions and caring about the answers.

So get together with each of your people and ask them questions about what they need and value. You’ll not only learn what makes them tick, you’ll also let them know you care about them as individuals.

Consider this story shared by a woman in a workshop I was teaching on motivation.

While taking her normal elevator ride up to her office she found herself alone with the CEO of her company, whom she had never met. As she explained, “My heart raced. Should I introduce myself? When will I ever have another chance like this? But what if I make a bad impression?”

By the time the woman could gather her thoughts and decide what to do, the elevator stopped, the CEO stepped out, and the moment was lost. As she rode up the final few floors she was flooded with emotion.

“I was shaking. I was sad—disappointed—mad—frustrated—angry. I couldn’t believe how one person entering the elevator and not saying a word could generate so much negative emotion in me.” The woman said it had been a horrible way to start the day.

What caused all of the mental anguish? Real and perceived power. Without the woman’s perception of the CEO’s power, the dynamic in the elevator would have been far less tense for the woman. Research bears this out.

Dr. Drea Zigarmi, Dr. Taylor Peyton Roberts, and I recently completed research on how a leader’s power affects people’s motivation. We found that leaders at all levels need to be mindful and clear about the types of power they have and use. Our findings showed that the use—or the perceived use—of leader power usually results in people experiencing suboptimal motivation. Let’s take a closer look.

In 1959, social psychologists John R. P. French and Bertram Raven described five bases of power that are typically in play in the workplace.

• Reward power: A leader’s power to promise monetary or nonmonetary compensation or incentives.
• Coercive power: A leader’s power to use threats and punishment.
• Referent power: A leader’s power that causes followers to want to identify with, be associated with, or to believe in the leader.
• Legitimate power: A leader’s power of position or title that gives the leader the right to request compliance from another individual.
• Expert power: A leader’s power that comes through depth and breadth of knowledge.

Why are perceptions of power so important to understand? Because of their impact on motivation. A leader’s use of power can undermine people’s need for autonomy, relatedness, and competence (ARC)—the three psychological needs required for people to thrive, produce, and sustain high performance. Because people can potentially perceive their leader as having power over them in any of these five areas, you could be undermining people’s motivation and not realize it.

Here are insights on how to use your five bases of power more wisely:

• There are two types of reward power—impersonal and personal. Consider how you are using impersonal reward power to grant special benefits, promotions, or favorable considerations. Think about how you might be using personal reward power to influence employees’ feelings of being accepted, valued, and liked by you. Misuse of either leads to suboptimal motivation.
• Understandably, the use of coercive power usually results in a negative relationship—and suboptimal motivation in those you lead. Coercive power creates a workplace where people waste emotional energy to avoid suboptimal motivation.
• If referent power becomes too important, it can result in people who are afraid to disagree with you. It might surprise you to discover that when employees report managers exhibiting referent power, they also report experiencing suboptimal motivation because of their dependence on that leader for their internal state of well-being.
• Even legitimate power—often referred to as position power—can be misused when it is perceived as “Do this because I tell you to.”
• Finally, while expert power won’t necessarily result in people’s optimal motivation, withholding it can put them into suboptimal motivation.

As my colleague Dr. Drea Zigarmi so aptly puts it: “Power is very precious stuff. It entices the leader into flights of self-delusion and separateness from those they lead.”

Over 125 years ago, Lord Acton wrote the famous line, “Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely,” and the less famous line, “The sole advantage of power is the ability to do more good.” Based on our research, we might follow with this advice: Let go of your dependence on power to get work done. Instead, consider your power as an opportunity to do more good by developing ARC-supportive skills to understand, appreciate, and respond to people’s psychological needs. You will create a workplace where people are optimally motivated to achieve results and have the energy, vitality, and well-being needed to sustain those results. Powerful!

About the Author

Susan Fowler is a senior consulting partner with The Ken Blanchard Companies, co-creator of the company’s Optimal Motivation and Situational Self Leadership training programs, and the author of the bestselling book, Why Motivating People Doesn’t Work … And What Does: The New Science of Leading, Engaging, and Energizing.

And while it’s good that we’ve made progress, we still need to keep moving if we truly want to leverage what the new science of motivation is teaching us.

In the June issue of Ignite, Susan Fowler, best-selling business author of Why Motivating People Doesn’t Work…And What Does, explains that individuals bring one of six motivational outlooks to any goal or task they face.Three of the outlooks correlate to positive, long-lasting, and consistent energy for getting a job done—and three don’t.

The three positive optimal motivational outlooks are

• Aligned. This is where an individual derives a sense of meaning from the goal or task, is able to align the task with important personal values, and is making a conscious and deliberate choice to do the right thing.
• Integrated. This is where an individual is motivated because the goal or task fulfills a deeply felt sense of purpose or is regarded as a self-defining activity.
• Inherent. This is where an individual perceives the goal or task as pure fun and enjoyment.

The three suboptimal motivation outlooks are

• Disinterested. This is where an individual feels overwhelmed, cannot find value in the task, or doesn’t have the energy to manage what’s required.
• External. This is where an individual is primarily motivated by the promise of a tangible reward or incentive, or the expectation of increased power, status, or respect.
• Imposed. This is where an individual is motivated by pressure to perform by either self-expectations or the expectations of others. Their actions are an attempt to avoid feelings of guilt, shame, or disappointment.

Fowler explains that looking beyond a simple extrinsic/intrinsic model of motivation creates additional choices and gives leaders more options to help facilitate a shift to a better outlook. Her approach is to teach leaders how to have conversations that help others identify the reasons for their motivation. The result is higher quality motivation that is based on meaningful values and a noble purpose.

Fowler is quick to point out that this kind of shift is more than a theoretical idea—it is a practical enhancement that makes the application of other leadership skills more effective.

“A strong foundation in motivation science elevates traditional leadership skills,” explains Fowler. “For example, consider the benefit when you combine traditional goal setting with a motivational outlook conversation about achieving the goal. These conversations give managers an opportunity to help people find relevance, meaning, and deeper connection to their goals. Skipping over the motivational outlook conversation or jumping to a problem solving or action planning conversation with people when they are suboptimally motivated on the goal, problem, or plan usually leads to suboptimal results down the road.

“People work best when they are pursuing goals for high quality reasons. Ask people questions that help them connect their goals to their values and sense of purpose. People who make this connection don’t just perform at a high level and achieve their goals—they flourish.”

You can read more about Fowler’s approach to workplace motivation in the June issue of Ignite.  Also, be sure to check the information about Fowler’s upcoming webinar on Leadership Skills: Applying the New Science of Motivation.  The event is free, courtesy of Cisco WebEx and The Ken Blanchard Companies.

Is your organization experiencing heart trouble?  This can be not only frustrating, but also damaging to performance in today’s fast paced business environment that requires a lean and agile approach.

Blanchard explains, “Managers working in the heart of the house play a couple of different roles. First, senior leaders look to middle managers to put goals and action plans in place to achieve strategic results.  But that is just one side of the coin.  Middle managers are also responsible for the environment in which the work is accomplished. So the middle manager’s job is twofold: to get things done and also to manage people’s emotional relationships to their work, their company, and their coworkers. Middle managers set the tone for the workplace.”

Blanchard says that to be successful, middle managers must be skilled in communicating what is expected and how it is to be achieved.  That means connecting the dots from the boardroom to the frontlines. If middle management is ineffective, the staff both above and below this level suffers.

This can be a challenge if managers don’t get the training and support they need.

“If managers are not getting the support they need from the organization to grow and to meet challenges, they can feel stuck in the middle. When this happens, mid-level managers can become disengaged and fall back into transacting business with their people in a way that causes the people to not care as much, to not understand as much about the importance of their work, and to not be as connected to the mission and vision of the company as they could be.”

The good news, according to Blanchard, is that there are approaches organizations can use to help mid-level managers get things done and build commitment in a way that creates positive regard and advocacy from employees.

Blanchard points to a couple of programs in The Ken Blanchard Companies portfolio as examples.

“It’s important to take a foundational approach when helping managers develop skills. The goal is to provide a framework managers can use to guide performance. Two of our training programs can help: Situational Leadership® II, which is our flagship product and the most widely taught leadership framework in the world; and our new First-time Manager program, which is designed specifically for people stepping into leadership for the first time. Both programs teach managers important skills including how to effectively set goals, how to provide day-to-day coaching and support, how to engage in a partnership with direct reports, and how to have effective discussions around performance.”

On the emotional side of the equation, Blanchard refers to the Building Trust and Optimal Motivation programs as examples of content designed to help managers create a safe and engaged environment where people thrive.

“It’s about having useful conversations.  Leadership is about getting things done with and through people. Performance and results are one side of the coin and environment and commitment are the other side. You can’t do one without the other.”

You can read more of Blanchard’s thinking on taking care of your middle managers in the May issue of Ignite.  Also, check out a complimentary webinar he is conducting on June 1, Designing a Leadership Curriculum for the Heart of Your Organization.  It’s free—courtesy of Cisco WebEx and The Ken Blanchard Companies.

I was out of town with a friend of mine who is building a new home and we needed a measuring tape to measure some things in the kitchen. We found the tape at a nearby store and took it to the counter to check out. The young man checking us out picked up the item to scan, but the price did not show up. As we all know, this happens from time to time, so he paged a runner to go to the aisle and find out the price.

After a couple of paging attempts, it was apparent no one was going to answer the call. Since the cashier could not leave the counter to check on the price, he told us to just take the measuring tape—for free. “Don’t worry about it,” he said. My friend felt strange about taking it and offered to walk back and get another one or write down the information for him, but he kept insisting she take it for free, saying, “No one will ever know.”

This item was under four dollars—not a lot of money in the grand scheme of things—but think about the underlying attitudes this behavior represents.

• Does this sound like an employee who was surprised no one answered his store page for a price look-up? What does this say about an internal expectation of responsive service in this store?
• Does this sound like an employee who was proud to work at this store and who felt like a part of the team? Or was he just trying to move things along—even to the point of giving away merchandise?

Attitudes matter. If each employee at the store felt this way and allowed at least one customer a day to take something for free—or a similar scenario—think about how quickly those cases would add up and impact the store’s profitability. Sure, some customers may have said “Great, thanks!” and left, but no one feels good when standards are lowered. It reflects poorly on the store, the individual employee, and even the customer if they accept the trade-off.

Serving customers is not about giving away the store. It’s about demonstrating a genuine, caring attitude toward them and making them feel taken care of and responded to. If you want your employees to know the difference, do these three things to help them serve your customers at a higher level—a level that makes everyone proud of every interaction.

1. Onboard your people with the right amount of training before they have customer contact so that they are ready to answer questions and serve customers with the right information.
2. Share company financial information with employees—it will educate them and give them a sense of ownership in the business.
3. Train all employees on the skills you would like them to demonstrate in providing legendary service to customers. Don’t expect people to know what a high level of service looks like—show them what it looks like in your work environment. Then hold all employees accountable for using those skills on the job.

While the young man probably thought he was serving the customer, my friend felt uncomfortable not paying. She gave him four dollars, saying she knew it wasn’t more than that, and asked him to ring it up when he found out the information. But the damage was done. My friend didn’t feel good about the experience at all. She walked out of the store vowing to find a better place to shop the next time she needed similar products.

Low standards don’t benefit anyone. Teach your people to serve at a higher level. When they do, everyone will feel better about the experience—and your customers will come back.

About the author

Kathy Cuff is a customer service expert and coauthor, together with Ken Blanchard and Vicki Halsey of the book,Legendary Service: The Key is to Care.

Pretty heady stuff.

He realized he couldn’t drive people to be more just, client focused, and service oriented. The only way a radically different culture would emerge was through employees working together and making their own decisions to find new approaches for managing people’s wealth.

This powerful executive recognized that only through the power of tapping people’s honest and authentic need for autonomy, relatedness, and competence (ARC) would he be able to achieve the results he was looking for—a high functioning, self-motivated organization.  He realized that any driving for adherence to new policies and procedures would undermine people’s sense of ARC—and his firm’s cultural evolution.

It was a great bit of insight on his part. And it’s something we can all learn from as we endeavor to build highly motivated work environments.

• When you pressure people to perform, the pressure you create has the opposite result of what you intended. Pressuring people erodes their sense of autonomy.
• When you focus on metrics as priorities, people fail to find meaning in the metrics for themselves. When people feel used as a means to your end, it diminishes their sense of relatedness.
• When you drive for results and declare you are holding people accountable for those results, you are also sending the message that you don’t trust people to perform or achieve their goals. You undermine their sense of competence.

Here are four alternatives.

1. Encourage autonomy by helping people appreciate the freedom they have within boundaries. What is within a person’s control? What options do they have? Identify areas for creativity and innovation.

2. Deepen relatedness by engaging people in conversations about their values and aligning their values with the company’s goals. For example, help an employee who has a value for service explore how his service might improve through the company’s new approach.

3. Build competence by providing opportunities for training, clarifying expectations, and illuminating the unknowns. Don’t assume people know how to cope with change. Don’t try to sell change by sharing how the organization will benefit. Focus instead on helping people deal with the personal concerns they have for how the change directly affects them.

4. Teach leaders the skill of conducting motivational conversations. If leaders don’t know how to facilitate people’s shift to optimal motivation, they will default to what they know: driving for results. Leaders also need to practice optimal motivation for themselves. Leaders with suboptimal motivation tend to drive for results from others.

If you want real, sustainable, high quality results, stop driving yourself crazy trying to hold people accountable for outcomes that are not connected to individual needs for autonomy, relatedness, and competence (ARC.)  Instead, help people satisfy those needs. When people experience ARC, they thrive—and you don’t need to drive.

About the Author

Susan Fowler is a senior consulting partner with The Ken Blanchard Companies who heads up Blanchard’s motivation and self leadership practices.  Susan is also the author of the business best-seller, Why Motivating People Doesn’t Work… And What Does.

There are a number of definitions for the word pain. For our purpose, let us consider the Old French verb pener, which means “to strive for or endeavor.”

At its most basic purpose, pain is an indicator—a messenger, if you will—from the body to the brain.  It’s uncomfortable. It hurts. So we tend to shy away from it. We want to ignore it, downplay it, medicate against it, and in every way try to block the message.

But consider what would happen if we embraced pain. If we listened to what pain was trying to tell us.  What if we heard a message that shouted, “Strive! Endeavor!”

I recently met with a client who was about to embark on a huge project. As we discussed the outcomes and the mechanics of delivery, she became increasingly quiet. When I asked her what was going on for her, she said, “I’m in pain. My neck hurts and I’m really uncomfortable.”

Then I asked, “What message do you think your body is trying to send?” and she had a realization.  The upcoming work would require new skills, lots of effort, and longer hours—perhaps, in the short term, involving evenings and weekends.  Once we pinned down what was making her so uncomfortable, we were able to focus on how to address these issues. She put a plan in place to ensure she had backup and support, especially in the areas where she felt she wasn’t strong. We also looked for ways to alleviate at least some of the long hours such as dividing up some work, offloading other work, and moving back deadlines that were less critical.

By exploring the underpinning reasons for the pain, she was able to shift into a place of excitement. She was ready to strive. She became excited about the project and ready to endeavor, stretch, and grow.

Pain is a message. It is your body clamoring to be heard.  When you listen, you can discover so much more than if you ignore it.  What are your pain points? What is your body trying to tell you?

About the Author

Patricia Overland is a Coaching Solutions Partner with The Ken Blanchard Companies’ Coaching Services team.  Since 2000, Blanchard’s 130 coaches have worked with over 14,500 individuals in more than 250 companies throughout the world. Learn more at Blanchard Coaching Services. And check out Coaching Tuesday every week at Blanchard LeaderChat for ideas, research, and inspirations from the world of executive coaching.

To test a theory they had developed, the researchers used a ring-toss game and gave each group the following instructions: Take these three rings and go into the adjoining room. You will find a stake on a stand in the center of the room. Practice getting the rings on the stake.

The researchers then watched through one-way glass to see if the high performers approached the task of practicing differently than the low performing group. They noticed a striking difference.

The group identified as low performers didn’t do much goal setting for themselves. Some members of the group saw the stake in the center of the room, walked right up to it and placed all three rings on the stake and left the room–they set goals that were too easy and not very motivating.  At the other end of the spectrum, some members of the low performing group saw the stake in the center of the room, moved away from it as far as they could and tried to hit the stake from all the way across the room–they set goals that were too difficult or even impossible to reach.

The behavior of the high performing group was distinctively different. The members of the high performing group saw the stake in the middle of the room and placed themselves a couple of feet away for their initial toss. If they missed, they tried again, or moved a little closer. If they made it, they moved a little farther away for their next toss. This group set practice goals for themselves that were just the right amount of difficulty.  They went to great lengths to keep themselves engaged in the task by setting goals that took them just to the edge—or a little beyond—their present capabilities.

How are your goals looking for the coming year?

As you set goals for the coming year, it’s important to find the right amount of difficulty. Have you set goals for yourself that are too easy? Too easy may seem like a smart play but it is unlikely to bring out your best performance.  Chances are you’ll put the task on auto-pilot and follow a routine similar to the previous year.  Have you blindly agreed to goals that are too difficult? You’ll probably deem the task as unrealistic, not make a serious effort toward attaining it now, and hope to reset properly later on.

Get yourself off to a fast start in 2016. Set goals that are just the right amount of difficulty.  Challenge yourself to higher levels of performance.  Goals that are just out of reach are usually the ones we are most compelled to achieve!

PS: Still working on your 2016 goals? Could you use a little encouragement? Join Ken Blanchard for a free webinar on January 27. Managers and teams from around the world will being joining Ken for a hands-on goal setting class where everyone will set their goals for 2016. The event is free courtesy of Cisco Webex and The Ken Blanchard Companies. Learn more here.

I recently saw Casnocha speak at The Ken Blanchard Companies’ 2015 Summit. He explained that a tour of duty was a modern day approach to engaging top talent who will innovate and take an organization to new heights. This approach goes hand in hand with an organization’s need to innovate—to embrace employees’ entrepreneurial instincts to do things differently and stretch beyond current thinking. Not only did this approach resonate with me personally, it also got me thinking about the coaching we do with our client leaders. In coaching, leaders often work with their coach on stretching for their next promotion; essentially, their next tour of duty.

Coaching and tour of duty concepts are both catalysts for growth—growth that catapults both employee and employer to new heights. It’s about lifetime employability versus lifetime employment.

Wondering if you could use some growth in your career? Start by answering these questions:

• Are you stuck in the doldrums at work?
• Do you have the right amount of demanding work that pushes you to stretch and learn?
• Have you mastered the role you are currently serving and want more?

If you answered yes to any of these, you likely don’t need to do much additional analyzing—you know when it is time.

Now, move from acknowledgement to planning and discovery. Begin by having a conversation with your manager. You must position with your manager that you have a desire to discover your next role—it’s not going to come looking for you, so you need to take responsibility. A few things to consider:

• Make a list of your strengths. What is your value contribution to the organization? What have you accomplished to be leveraged elsewhere in the company?
• Get clarity on your passion. If you are not clear about what excites you in the field of work, spend time figuring it out. Look back over the last year and make a list of times when you were firing on all cylinders and loving the work you were doing. What was it?
• Create options. Do you want to do the same job in a different area, or to be with different people? Is there a part of the organization that has a need not currently being served where you could add value? Should you look outside of the organization? Of course, organizations don’t want to see their top contributors leave. But it shouldn’t be a surprise when it happens if those contributors are not enabled to learn and grow.

What else would you recommend a leader do in discovering and finding their next tour of duty? What other resources or advice do you have for people who want to learn and grow?  I’d love to hear your thoughts on the topic.

About the Author

Joni Wickline is Vice President, Professional Services with The Ken Blanchard Companies. You can read Wickline’s posts as a part of Coaching Tuesday here at Blanchard LeaderChat for ideas, research, and inspirations from the world of executive coaching.

In his new book, The Optimistic Workplace: Creating An Environment That Energizes Everyone, Shawn Murphy, my friend and fellow advocate of human worth in the workplace, offers six straightforward strategies leaders can employ to develop a sense of community and belonging in workplaces that builds trust and collaboration.

1. Send employees to learn other parts of the business — Early in my career I worked in the funeral service business. Yes, I said funeral service, as in cemeteries and funeral homes. I worked in the corporate headquarters of the cemetery division, far removed from those on the “front lines.” In order to help everyone learn the business and build collaborative relationships with those who worked in the field, all new employees were sent to work at a cemetery or funeral home for three days. It was an experience that transformed me. I came away from it with greater understanding of the business, more appreciation for colleagues working with our customers, and an increased connection to the important service we were providing.

2. Inquire regularly into the team’s effectiveness — Peter Drucker said that nothing good ever happens in organizations by accident. It takes intentional planning and effort and that’s especially true when it comes to staying in touch with how your team members are feeling and performing. It’s easy to fall into the practice of “no news is good news.” An important way to foster trust is to have regular check-in meetings with your team members. We advocate 15-30 minute one-on-one meetings every 1-2 weeks. The agenda is driven by the team member and it can be anything on their mind: how they’re feeling, discussing how things are going at home, direction or support they need on a particular task, or just sharing an update with you about their recent accomplishments. Knowing what’s going on with your team members removes barriers that often derail collaboration.

3. Hire people with collaborative tendencies — In his book, Murphy shares an example of how Menlo Innovations tests job candidates for collaborative tendencies. Candidates are put into pairs, given a challenge to solve, and told that their goal is to make their partner look good. People with a tendency to collaborate make it to the next stage in the hiring process. Instead of asking your job candidates if they like to collaborate, devise some sort of exercise that allows them to demonstrate their skills. Murphy points out that collaboration is not merely an action, it’s also a mindset.

4. Develop routines that reinforce collaboration — You know those committees that get formed to plan holiday parties, team BBQ’s, or other group activities? They can be really frustrating, can’t they? But they serve an important purpose: they reinforce social and team norms that allow people to collaborate and bond with each other. Many of these practices seem out of date in today’s technology-enabled world. Who needs a committee when you can just create a Facebook event and invite everyone, right? Wrong. Leaders who foster high-trust and collaborative environments look for opportunities to bring people together.

5. Create spaces for random collisions — I love this recommendation! We all know that many times the most important decisions or creative breakthroughs happen in the hallway or lunch room conversations after the formal meeting. Murphy recommends we look for ways to structure our work environment that allow people to naturally and routinely “collide” with each other. When people collide in these natural ways, they feed off each others’ energy. It leads to deeper engagement between team members which results in more creative exploration of ideas and concepts. For some organizations the open work space concept works well, while for others it doesn’t fit their culture or business needs. Whatever approach you use, look for ways to help people interact in positive ways.

6. Make time for face to face meetings — Knowledge workers are increasingly isolated as we move to more people working virtually. It’s no longer necessary for everyone to congregate in the same location to get work done. Work is not a place you go; it’s something you do. In this environment it’s even more important to foster human connections. Webcams, Instant Messenger, and other technologies are good starts, but nothing replaces face to face interaction. It’s critically important to bring your team members together at regular intervals so they can deepen their relationships with one another. Trust and commitment to each other is built during these times and it’s the lubrication that keeps relationships working smoothly.

The climate of our organizations set the tone for how people “show up” on the job. Unfortunately, too many leaders are thermometers, reflecting the poor climate of their teams, rather than being thermostats, the climate controllers. Murphy’s book offers a wealth of tips on how leaders can take a proactive approach to being those “thermostats” that create more optimistic workplaces where people flourish.

Dear Madeleine,

I am a creative director at an advertising agency, and I have been managing teams of people forever. I was the darling of the advertising world when I started, and developed a reputation for hatching brilliant ideas—in fact, you would recognize some of my work. It is a fast paced business with crazy hours. I just barely manage to juggle a household, two elementary school-aged kids, and a husband who works equally nutty hours. This job, which always has been kind of nuts, is now just a 24/7 slog.

I am a good manager. My people love working for me and I attract the best talent to my projects. My problem isn’t with managing people. My problem is that I feel as if I have lost my creativity. Kids in this business are innovative and quirky and fun, and I just don’t have any good ideas any more. I am worried that I am going to be found out, and that stress is really taking a toll. —Am I washed up?

Dear Washed Up,

No. But where you are right now sure is unpleasant, and for that I am truly sorry. To get to be a creative director at an agency you must have started out with amazing ideas and kept it going for a long time. So, fundamentally, you are a clever and imaginative person. But here is the thing. Creativity is a little like a water well, and it isn’t so much that yours has run dry; it is more that you need to prime the pump. Your life sounds exhausting and I am pretty sure what you are experiencing are classic symptoms of burnout. This is tough but reversible.

I have a few ideas. Some may make you roll your eyes because they are obvious, but others might be new to you.

1. Remember. Look to your past life and former self for clues. What did you used to do regularly when you were at your most creative? I guarantee you will think of some activities you did on a regular basis that you no longer do, whether it’s because you simply don’t have time or because something has changed. For example, when asked this question one client realized that she did her best thinking in the bathtub and had recently moved into a new home with a cruddy tub. She re-prioritized the planned renovations and got to work on the bathroom first!
2. Put yourself first. Howard Gardner, one of the foremost researchers on creativity, examined creativity through the lives of some of the great creative geniuses like Stravinsky, Einstein, and Picasso. He found one of the hallmarks of these people to be that they were very good at taking care of themselves so they could do their work. Not only that, they were particularly good at getting other people to take care of them so that they were freed up to think and create. What this would mean for someone like you would be so radical that you might use the label Extreme Self Care. What would this actually look like? Delegating mundane tasks someone else can do, for starters. If you can’t afford help at home, make your kids empty the dishwasher while you meditate for six minutes. Instead of doing laundry, drop it at the Fluff and Fold. Ask yourself, of all the things that suck the life out you at work, what might some of your direct reports be able to do? Your problem may very well be with managing in that you are not giving away enough tedious stuff and keeping some fun work for yourself. I have found that many people will put up with all kinds of overwhelm until they realize that the cost is too high. Sometimes it is a big health scare. Sometimes it is the death of their creativity.
3. Walk. Most people go to the gym so that they can stay in their skinny jeans. But a pile of evidence now shows that the part of you that really needs exercise is your brain. A study from Stanford shows that walking, even for short periods, increases idea generation and problem solving capability. So get up out of your chair and walk. Have walking meetings. Walk around the block for 15 minutes. Just walk.
4. Write morning pages. These next two ideas come directly from Julia Cameron, who wrote a book called The Artist’s Way that swept New York City, and the world, by storm in the early 1990s. “Morning pages” is a practice that involves grabbing a notebook upon first waking and writing 3 full pages of stream of consciousness. That’s it. No censoring, just free flow writing, for 3 pages. It doesn’t have to take more than 15 minutes. I can’t tell how or why it works, but I have used it myself in times of crisis and many clients have used this practice to get through rough spots in their lives, and magical things happen.
5. The Artist’s Date: Also from Julia Cameron, is the concept of the Artist’s Date. She recommends that you take two hours every week to do an activity that involves experiencing, sensing, and observing, with no real agenda other than to simply be in the moment. This can mean a walk in the park, a visit to a museum, listening to music. (I just heard you laugh out loud at the idea of taking two hours a week. To be fair, as a working Mom I feel pretty pleased if I do this two or three times a year, but even that makes a difference.) For more detail on Cameron’s work: http://juliacameronlive.com/basic-tools/

Finally, Breathe. Is that annoying? It probably is, but too bad. I’ll bet on a regular basis your shoulders are up around your ears and your abdomen is tight—and not in a good way—with anxiety. Take a deep breath in, and release your shoulders on the exhale. Take another breath in and think about what you are trying accomplish, and with the release let go of the judgment you have about your own creativity. The third breath will bring the idea, the word, or the solution. The spirit comes in on the breath. Always. You haven’t lost your creativity forever, I promise. But you will have to fight hard to get it back.

Love Madeleine

About the author

Madeleine Homan-Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.

Got a question for Madeleine? Email Madeleine and look for your response here next week!

This issue presents a tremendous challenge for organizational leaders. Even worse than dealing with the effects of people who leave your organization (studies show replacing employees can be 1.5 to 3 times their annual salary), you have to manage these disengaged workers who have decided to “quit and stay.” You’re still paying them to under-perform and ultimately undermine the effectiveness of your organization!

In conducting over 19,000 exit interviews of employees who voluntarily left their jobs, Leigh Branham, author of The 7 Hidden Reasons Employees Leave, identified four basic needs that weren’t being met that started people on the path to disengagement and ultimately quitting a job.

The Need for Trust — The number one priority for any leader is to build trust with his/her team members. Trust is the foundation of any successful relationship, and in the workplace it’s a non-negotiable if leaders desire to tap into the full effort and passion of their employees. Employees won’t give you their best if they don’t believe you have their best interests in mind. They will shy away from taking risks or making themselves vulnerable if they don’t feel safe and trusted. They expect company leadership to deliver on their promises, to be honest and open in communication, to invest in them, and to treat them fairly. The ABCD Trust Model is a helpful tool for leaders to understand what it means to be trustworthy and build trust with others.

The Need to Have Hope — I’ve had the privilege of meeting football legend Rosey Grier, a member of the “Fearsome Foursome” when he played with the Los Angeles Rams, and now a Christian minister and inspirational speaker. He said something I’ve never forgotten. When speaking about his work with inner city youth in Los Angeles, Rosey said “Leaders aren’t dealers of dope, they are dealers of hope!” So true…leaders are dealers of hope. We need to instill a sense of hope in the people we lead. Our people need to believe they will be able to grow, develop their skills, and have the opportunity for advancement or career progress. It’s our job as leaders to foster that hope and support our employees in their growth.

The Need to Feel a Sense of Worth — Despite its struggles and challenges, work is an intrinsically rewarding experience for people. We derive a tremendous amount of self-worth from our work, whether it’s something we’re employed to do or whether we volunteer our time and effort. Employees have a need to feel confident that if they work hard, do their best, and demonstrate commitment and make meaningful contributions, they will be recognized and rewarded appropriately.

The Need to Feel Competent — Employees need to be matched in jobs where their talents align with the challenges of the work. If the work is too simple, then it’s easy for people to lose interest and become disengaged. If the employee is in over his/her head and the work is too challenging, it can lead to discouragement and frustration. Leaders are on a constant quest to find ways to place employees in that sweet spot where they are challenged at just the right level. But it’s not all on the shoulders of leaders to do this work. Employees need to take responsibility for their own development and learn how to manage their motivational outlooks.

Ignore these four needs at your own peril! Poor leadership results in tremendously high costs to organizations, as my colleague, David Witt, discussed in a webinar yesterday. I encourage you to view and listen to the recording. He shares a wealth of research and information that illustrates the importance of effective leadership. You’ll be exposed to several resources, including additional research from Leigh Branham, that will help you improve your own leadership practices.

Randy Conley is the V.P. of Client Services and Trust Practice Leader at The Ken Blanchard Companies and his LeaderChat posts normally appear the fourth or last Thursday of every month. For more insights on trust and leadership, visit Randy at his Leading with Trust blog or follow him on Twitter @RandyConley.

• Benefit from innovation – Everyone has a different style, learn from the top talents why they do things the way they do.
• Help understanding the ‘big picture’ –  These individual’s know how the work they does fits into the wider organizational strategy, they can answer questions like, ‘what benefit does the work we do have on the end customer’ or ‘why do we spend so long on X process and not on Y’.
• Highlighting pitfalls – We often talk about ‘trial by fire’ or learning through making mistakes. This is all part of learning within a role, but shadowing a top performer will help the learner understand the potential pitfalls and hopefully lessen the risk of something going wrong.
• Relationships and getting the most from others – Not only will shadowing build a network for the learner, but it will also allow them insights into other people that they would not find out about immediately. Perhaps they will be working with is generally slow at responding to requests and so the top performer always picks up the phone rather than emails. Or, that the person likes extra information provided on certain tasks and that produces a better quality of output and less time spent asking questions that could have been addressed upfront.These may not be written down, but you are hearing about the top performers experience and how they have got the most from the team around them.

It’s so important that any learning isn’t just reading a manual of process steps. It also isn’t enough to put a learner with an average achiever. If you want individuals to gain both the skills that can be verbalized and those that cannot you need to get them to shadow your top performers.
Don’t let that tacit knowledge go to waste – if you don’t use it, someone else will.

Dear Madeleine,

I manage a fairly large team of supervisors. The days are long and hectic but I have a good flow going with the group. 

Recently, though, it has become clear that one of my best people—the person I am grooming to take my job, as I am up for a promotion—is looking for another job.  I know this because her coworkers and one of her direct reports have overheard her talking on the phone, and she has been taking long breaks in the middle of the day with no explanation.

I guess I wouldn’t mind so much, but she is not discussing it with me. I always thought we had an open relationship—in fact, we have often talked about her career and how I can help her to develop.  I also wish she were being more discreet.  I feel kind of mad about the whole thing and don’t know how to proceed.  Thoughts?     —Kind of Mad

Dear Kind of Mad,

I don’t blame you for being mad. It sounds as though you’ve gone the extra mile for this employee and she’s now going behind your back—and it doesn’t feel good.  But this isn’t really about you. Your best bet is to continue being as open as you always have been.

Set up a meeting and tell your employee what you have heard and what you are thinking and feeling.  She must have her reasons for looking for another job, and it is up to you to create a safe environment so she can help you understand what they are.  The best way to do this is to ask an open ended question and then stay quiet long enough for her to answer it.  Examples of questions that might feel right:

“What is going on that makes you want to leave?”

“What is missing for you in your current job?”

“Is there something I should know that I have been missing?”

Stay quiet for as long as it takes – the less you talk, the more your employee will talk. Don’t argue or judge, simply seek to understand. You may find out she is really upset and frustrated with something in her current situation, or you may find that her job search has nothing to do with that.  Either way, the only way to find out is to ask—and, again, don’t judge.

It is an accepted wisdom that many employees leave jobs because no one asked them to stay. You can certainly do that if it makes sense.  If it doesn’t—and it is, in fact, time for her to go—you can certainly offer to provide an excellent reference.  And then you can ask her to be more discreet.

Consider this a good wakeup call. You can leverage it by reviewing who your best folks are and crafting a plan to retain them.  One good tool is the stay interview—a regular conversation you have with each of your high performers to assess their engagement and job satisfaction and what you might be able to do to make staying with the job continually attractive to them.  To be ultra-prepared, it might serve you to understand more about motivation. Susan Fowler has literally written the book on the topic, and here is an excellent white paper to get you started.

So don’t get mad, get smarter about retention!  Good luck.

About the author

Madeleine Homan-Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.

Got a question for Madeleine? Email Madeleine and look for your response here next week!

Dear Madeleine,

I’ve got a member of my team who has “retired in place.” No matter what I try, I can’t get him to engage. Any thoughts?

Frustrated

Dear Frustrated,

I think the only thing to do in this situation is to have a serious sit-down with your disengaged team member. First, put the facts as you see them on the table and let him know you’re looking for a substantial change in attitude and behavior. Be prepared with:

• A clear vision of what it would look like if he were to “come out of retirement”—a picture of a job well done.
• Concrete observations of how his disengagement is affecting both the team and the results the team is trying to achieve.
• Clear requests for the changes you want to see, with a timeline. This is a critical piece—there has to be a deadline.
• Unambiguous consequences—what will happen if you see no change?

Now I’ll add a second component.

All the latest research about motivation makes it clear that people can choose to be more engaged—it is an internal proposition. Blanchard’s research into Optimal Motivation focuses on three key psychological needs all people have—needs for Autonomy, Relatedness, and Competence.

Consider what you could do to encourage autonomy and perception of choice; deepen relatedness (quality of relationships, meaning and purpose); and increase competence (a sense of growing and learning) for this employee. Exploring these areas with him could get at some of the root causes of his disengagement.

This kind of conversation takes a certain amount of courage—but I guarantee it will bring about results of one kind or another. Your only alternative is to allow the situation to continue, which would eventually cause resentment among the rest of your team.

For detailed help on how to have Challenging Conversations, see our white paper Challenging Conversations–Strategies for Turning Conflict into Creativity. And let me know how things work out!

About the author

Madeleine Homan-Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.

Got a question for Madeleine? Email Madeleine and look for your response here next week!

1. Doing more = getting less – We do not have an infinitive capacity for work – more work and more targets do not automatically mean more output.
2. Learn when to say no, be selective for the right reasons – Don’t over-commit yourself, it’s sometimes OK to say no and remember that there are trade offs (if I do X, I cannot do Y – am I OK with that?).
3. Add more time to your commitments – give yourself extra time to do a good job (we all think things take a lot less time than they actually do), are you being realistic about what can be achieved?
4. What are your optimum levels – Think about ‘optimum’ levels – are you in balance? Review goals and your ‘to do’ list.
5. Think about your quality – for example, this could be the impact on customer service and quality assurance. Don’t spread yourself or your team to thinly – make a ‘quality contribution’.

So the question is: where are you on the U-curve?
Lisa is the EMEA Client Services Manager at the Ken Blanchard Companies. The Client Services Team specialise in delivery; Project Management, Learning Services (virtual learning and online assessments) and Staffing (trainer allocation).

Drawing on research from Blanchard senior consulting partner Susan Fowler, the two Blanchards explain that a better approach involves looking for ways to connect a task or goal to something deeper and more meaningful. This requires some introspection, as each person comes to work with a different set of values and beliefs and a different set of personal drivers that are unique to them.

And while there are some common factors like Autonomy, Relatedness, and Competence—which are important needs for everyone—more subtle factors, such as Self-Regulation, Personal Values, and Mindfulness also come into play. The more you understand what is important to you and how you react to different motivators, the better able you are to understand how others might react.

Six Action Steps

For leaders ready to get started, the Blanchards point to six action steps from Fowler’s new book, Why Motivating People Doesn’t Work … And What Does. 

• Encourage autonomy (perception of choice)
• Deepen relatedness (quality of relationships, meaning and purpose)
• Develop people’s competence (sense of growing and learning)
• Promote mindfulness (capacity to see new options)
• Align with values (including personal values, not just the organization’s)
• Connect to a noble purpose (both personal and the organization’s)

Then they pose an important question—to what degree are a leader’s needs being met in each of these six areas—and to what degree are leaders helping others?  You can learn more about the leader’s role in identifying motivators, avoiding common motivational mistakes, and how six different motivational outlooks play out at work by reading the complete article, Check Your Motivation to Lead in the Spring 2015 issue of Training Industry Magazine.

In the latest issue of Ignite! Fowler explains that individuals bring one of six motivational outlooks to any goal or task they face—and that three of the outlooks perform better than the others for generating positive, long-lasting, and consistent energy for getting a job done.

The three optimal motivation outlooks are

Aligned. This is where an individual derives a sense of meaning from the goal or task, is able to align the task with important personal values, and is making a conscious and deliberate choice to do the right thing.

Integrated. This is where an individual is motivated because the goal or task fulfills a deeply felt sense of purpose, or is regarded as a self-defining activity.

Inherent. This is where an individual perceives the goal or task as pure fun and enjoyment.

The three suboptimal motivation outlooks are

Disinterested. This is where an individual feels overwhelmed, cannot find value in the task, or doesn’t have the energy to manage what’s required.

External. This is where an individual is primarily motivated by the promise of a tangible reward or incentive, or the expectation of increased power, status, or respect.

Imposed. This is where an individual is motivated by pressure to perform by either self-expectations or the expectations of others. Their actions are an attempt to avoid feelings of guilt, shame, or disappointment.

The challenge for leaders is to help themselves (and their team members) identify which of the six motivational outlooks is currently in play, shift to one of the more positive outlooks, and then reflect on the impact. Fowler’s research shows that this three-step process leads to greater performance, productivity, and well-being.

You can read the complete article, Motivated Leadership, by checking out the March Ignite! online newsletter.  Be sure to see the link to a free webinar that Fowler will be conducting on 3 Skills for Activating Optimal Motivation at Work. Want to diagnose your own motivational outlook?  Fowler has a short online assessment you can take!

• What makes you feel energized?
• What makes you get up in the morning?
• What keeps you going when things get tough?
• What makes everything you do worthwhile?

Passionate leaders spend time with their employees – learning about employee needs and desires, how to communicate with them, and what makes work meaningful to them. Employees with a passionate leader – where this passion is communicated and shared – are more enthusiastic and engaged. Organizations must provide meaningful work, autonomy, and opportunities for growth, encourage collaboration and recognition, and address the concept of fairness in order to maximize Employee Passion. Passion, in turn, creates driven, enthusiastic, committed and hard working employees.
Employees with a positive attitude create success.
Find your passion, grow it, and share it!
– – –
About the author: Jemma Garraghan is an EMEA Project Manager at the Ken Blanchard Companies. She can be reached at jemma.garraghan@kenblanchard.com

The 950-person study looked at the correlations between three different motivational outlooks—Disinterested, Suboptimal, and Optimal—and five subsequent intentions to act in a positive manner—apply discretionary effort, perform at a high level, endorse the organization, remain with the organization, and be a good organizational citizen.

As expected, people who identified their motivational outlook as Disinterested showed no measurable correlation to exhibit the five desirable behaviors. However, the research showed that people with a carrot and stick (gain reward or avoid punishment) motivational outlook, labeled Suboptimal by the researchers, also showed no measurable correlation back to positive intentions.

Only people who identified their motivational outlook as Optimal—participating in a project or task because they were able to link participation to a significant value, life, or work purpose—showed a strong correlation.

Implications for Leaders

For managers—especially those using rewards and sanctions as performance management tools—this new data requires a rethinking of the best way to go about encouraging long term high performance. For best results, the Blanchard researchers suggest six ways managers can build stronger links to positive intentions.

• Encourage autonomy—by inviting choice and exploring options within boundaries
• Deepen relatedness—by sharing information about yourself and the organization, showing empathy and caring, and discussing your intentions openly
• Develop competence—by emphasizing learning goals and not just performance goals and by providing training and appropriate leadership style matching a person’s level of development
• Promote mindfulness—by encouraging self-reflection and asking open-ended questions that identify options
• Align with values—by helping individuals align goals to their identified values and by exploring natural interest and enthusiasm for a goal
• Connect to purpose—by providing rationale and big picture overviews to help individuals connect the goal to a work or life-related purpose

The research cautions leaders that taking motivational short cuts may spur action short term, but may do more harm than good long term. Instead, take the time to connect and align work goals in a way that builds autonomy, relatedness, and competence. You can learn more about the research—including source materials and additional tips for leaders, by downloading the 12-page white paper, A Business Case for Optimal Motivation.

The article summarizes some of the key takeaways from the book, and shares important concepts for individuals and leaders to consider when evaluating their own motivation—or when they are trying to help others with theirs.

1. Recognize that each of us is already motivated—it just the quality of our motivation that might be a problem. Some forms of motivation are sustainable, satisfying, and promote well-being while others don’t.  Fowler explains that leaders need to ask why people are motivated to do what’s been asked of them.  Otherwise we end up with well known examples such as the young student who hates law school because of the pressure his parents put on him to succeed.
2. Encourage autonomy. Give people options.  Even when you are discussing deadlines, frame them as useful information for achieving important goals rather than hammers for applying pressure.
3. Deepen relatedness. Appreciate the vital role emotions and feelings play in creating connection.
4. Develop people’s competence. At the end of the day, it’s not just about what a person accomplishes; it’s also about how they are growing.
5. Promote mindfulness. Prompt awareness of options a person may not have considered. Ask open ended questions to help individuals rise above old, unhelpful patterns of behavior.
6. Align with values. Help others align their work to meaningful values that generate positive energy, vitality, and sense of well-being.
7. Connect to purpose. Few things in life are more powerful than acting from a noble purpose.

You can read the entire Costco Connection article here.  For more information on Fowler’s new book—including a free chapter download—visit the Why Motivating People Doesn’t Work … And What Does book page.

I frequently ask participants in my workshops: “How many of you are getting too much praise?” I generally get a chuckle but rarely a raised hand. Yet time and time again, employees report that sincere, meaningful praise is a significant motivator to perform and engage at work.

A recent survey by TINYpulse asked over 200,000 employees across more than 500 organizations the question: “What motivates you to excel and go the extra mile at your organization?” The third highest response was “feeling encouraged and recognized.” Just in case you were wondering, number one was “camaraderie, peer motivation,” and number two was “intrinsic desire to do a good job.”

Research by Bersin and Associates found that employee engagement, productivity, and customer service are 14% better in organizations where regular recognition occurs. However, only 17% of the employees who participated in their study indicated that their organizational culture strongly supports recognition. Over 70% of the respondents indicated that they are only recognized once a year (a service award) or not at all. What a sad commentary on many work environments.

YES, praise and recognition are important to each of us and clearly impacts our engagement and performance. However, the recognition needs to be done in the right way. Here are six best practices for recognizing employees:

1. Recognize people for specific behavior and results. Service awards for just showing up do not impact engagement or performance in any meaningful way. Stay away from comments like “great job today” or “good work” and be more specific—what did a person do specifically and what was the impact.
2. Tailor the recognition to the individual. Know your people. Some of us (me included) love public praise. Others prefer it to be done in private. One person may want regular on-going praise during a project where another team member would find that annoying and only wants the praise at the end.
3. Give the recognition as close to the event as possible. Don’t save the praise for a meeting or performance review. Take the time to walk around and look for opportunities to catch employees doing something right and give the praise in the moment.
4. Encourage peers to recognize each other. Employees report that peer recognition is more impactful than recognition from a manager because a peer is closer to the work and it’s not their “job.” NOTE: Managers still need to give regular praise also.
5. Share success stories. Use team, department, or company meetings to highlight individual and team success. Share these on the organizational bulletin board or intranet.
6. Link recognition to your company values or goals. For example, at Blanchard, we nominate our peers for annual awards that link to our core values.

As the year comes to a close, I encourage you to take the time to send a note of gratitude and praise, to recognize a staff member, colleague, or even a boss for a specific behavior or accomplishment. Then let’s start the New Year with a renewed desire to catch people doing good things!

“Nothing else can quite substitute for a few well-chosen, well-timed, sincere words of praise. They’re absolutely free and worth a fortune.” ~ Sam Walton

About the author

John Hester is a senior consulting partner with The Ken Blanchard Companies who specializes in productivity and performance management.

Blanchard goes on to explain that the same principle applies at work, yet many people who’ve been in a job for a while see the days ahead as something to endure rather than an exciting opportunity. These workers do their jobs at a basic level, but are sullen and unmotivated in a quiet way that can be hard to remedy. Fortunately, there is a solution according to Blanchard.

Refiring in Four Key Areas 

While working on his most recent book, Refire! Don’t Retire, Blanchard and his co-author Morton Shaevitz began to wonder why so many people take the “best is behind us” approach to life. When they looked at people who were loving life and compared them to those who were struggling, they found that when people think differently in four key areas—Intellectually, Emotionally, Physically, and Spiritually, they behave differently—and those behaviors lead to greater engagement and satisfaction in life. Leaders who encourage people to refire in these four areas can help them find meaning and joy in their work, as well. And when people thrive, organizations thrive.

• Refire Intellectually. Continuous learning is vital to organizational health. Companies like Apple and Google have figured this out, offering stimulating environments, free educational seminars, and tuition reimbursement. Blanchard reminds readers that it’s imperative that leaders also continue to refire intellectually themselves.

• Refire Emotionally. Everyone needs emotional nourishment. Blanchard research shows that people who have meaningful connections at work are happier, more loyal, and more productive. The most successful leaders create opportunities for meaningful connection at the office by offering workshops, retreats, and celebrations, and encouraging work friendships. Creating an emotionally connected culture not only gives people a morale boost, it also increases innovation and collaboration. 

• Refire Physically. Work requires energy—and energy comes from having a healthy body and a sense of well being. While many organizations give lip service to wellness, those that back up their claims with health-friendly policies enjoy higher levels of employee engagement and productivity. Sufficient vacation leave, reasonable workloads, and wellness education programs need to be implemented, not just talked about. Blanchard recommends getting creative by instituting walking one-on-one meetings, after hours yoga classes, or lunch-and-learn sessions with guest speakers.

• Refire Spiritually. Boredom and dissatisfaction spring from a focus on self, says Blanchard, so give people an opportunity to focus on something outside themselves. As Chief Spiritual Officer of his company, Blanchard shares how he leaves a morning message every day to praise and inspire people. Leaders who provide opportunities for giving and spiritual growth help people understand that it’s not all about them.

By encouraging behaviors that refire people intellectually, emotionally, physically, and spiritually, and by modeling these behaviors themselves, leaders can inspire people with the idea that life is good—and the best is yet to come. To learn more about Blanchard’s thinking, be sure to read Relight That Work Fire in the January edition of Chief Learning Officer.  Interested in learning more about Ken’s new book, Refire! Don’t Retire: Make the Rest of Your Life the Best of Your Life.  Check out the pre-order page at Amazon.com.

Researchers from The Ken Blanchard Companies teamed up with Training magazine to poll a cross-section of 456 human resources and talent management professionals. The survey found gaps of 29 and 39 percent between how often direct reports had career conversations with their leaders when compared to how often they wanted to have those conversations.

29% Gap in Job Development Conversations

Survey questions in this section asked respondents if their immediate manager conducted performance planning in a way that resulted in at least one developmental goal that would help a direct report progress in their current job. Questions asked respondents to evaluate the frequency with which their leader discussed job assignments that would help to broaden the direct report’s job experience and knowledge. Questions also asked respondents to evaluate how often their leader discussed the training needed to improve the direct report’s performance during the current performance period and whether the leader made time and resources available to help the employee get the training they needed.

39% Gap in Career Development Conversations

In this section respondents were asked to evaluate the degree to which their leader prepared them for career advancement. Questions asked respondents to evaluate the degree to which their boss understood the steps needed to prepare the direct report for career advancement, explained the organization policies and procedures that impacted career development, and discussed potential career opportunities for the direct report. Questions also specifically asked if the leader clarified the steps a direct report could take and whether the boss felt those steps were fair and reasonable.

Make sure managers are taking the time to have “stay” interviews so they can avoid having “exit” interviews

Leaders play a key role in job and career growth. This survey suggests that significant gaps exist between employee expectations and what they are experiencing at work. Left unaddressed, these gaps create a drain on overall organizational vitality through lowered employee intentions to stay, endorse, and apply discretionary effort as needed.

Retention experts Beverly Kaye and Julie Winkle Giulioni, authors of Help Them Grow or Watch Them Go, believe that job and career growth conversations are one of the most powerful and under-utilized tools at a leaders disposal.  In an article for Executive Excellence, they identify that:

• Conversation has the power to touch employees’ hearts and minds.
• Genuine career development isn’t about forms, choreographing new assignments, or orchestrating promotions. It’s about having quality conversations that facilitate insights and awareness, explore possibilities, and inspire responses that drive employee-owned action.
• When leaders reframe career development in terms of ongoing conversations—rather than procedural checkpoints or scheduled activities—theyhave more flexibility and the chance to develop careers organically.

Mirroring the sentiments of the respondents in the Blanchard survey, Kaye and Giulioni identify that:

• Shorter conversations fit better with the cadence of business today
• Frequent, ongoing dialogue communicates a genuine commitment to the employee and development
• Iterative conversations allow employees to layer awareness, insights, and action more naturally
• The ongoing nature of the conversation keeps development alive in everyone’s mind (vs. tucking it away for a formal meeting.)

Growth opportunities at the job and career level are important drivers of employee work passion and one of the better ways that leaders can show team members that they care and are invested in them. Be sure that your leaders are taking the time to discuss ways that employees can improve their skills in their current role and also how they can continue to advance in their careers.  You can learn more about the Blanchard research by accessing the white paper, Ten Performance Management Process Gaps (and How They Negatively Impact Employee Intentions).  Read more of Beverly Kaye and Julie Winkle Giulioni’s thinking by reading Career Conversation: It’s today’s common sense competency.

In her new book, Why Motivating People Doesn’t Work … And What Does, author Susan Fowler reminds leaders that employees are always motivated—it’s just the quality of their motivation that’s a problem sometimes. Fowler shares how the repeated use of motivational carrots & sticks might get results in the short term, but often have negative consequences long-term.

That’s why she labels a motivational mindset created by the use of rewards and/or punishment as sub-optimal and why she encourages individuals and leaders to check-in on their own motivational mindset occasionally to make sure that they aren’t just going through the motions.  Fowler knows from the research that sustained, healthy, long-term motivation comes from an aligned and integrated motivational outlook where work is connected to a higher purpose and people see how their role fits into the bigger picture.

How can you tell when it might be time for a motivational outlook check-up?  Here are some of the common symptoms Fowler has seen. Consider a one-on-one conversation focused on motivation when normally productive employees are:

1. Missing deadlines
2. Performing below expectation on important goals or projects
3. Not living up to their potential in a role
4. Often in a bad mood that permeates the workplace
5. Not taking initiative in circumstances where it is needed
6. Displaying emotion that is out of character or seems disproportionate to the situation
7. Undermining the positive energy of others
8. Rejecting helpful feedback
9. Getting defensive easily or often
10. Seemingly out of alignment with the organization’s purpose and values
11. Ignoring health and or safety issues

Any or all of these symptoms can indicate an employee with a sub-optimal motivational outlook.  To reframe and potentially upshift motivation to something more optimal, Fowler recommends a conversation focused on the issue, but she cautions against three common mistakes managers make; trying to problem solve, impose your values, or expect an immediate shift.

To avoid these common mistakes, Fowler recommends the following:

Refrain from Problem Solving:  This is a different type of conversation.  As a leader, you will be sorely tempted to share your expertise, but do not confuse a conversation about internal motivation with a problem-solving session.

Don’t Impose Your Values: One of the biggest mistakes leaders make with motivational outlook conversations is assuming another person holds or appreciates the same values. Despite your good intentions, imposing your values on others tends to provoke an imposed motivational outlook—one of the sub-optimal outlooks you are trying to avoid.

Do Not Expect an Immediate Shift: Relax, practice mindfulness, and allow the conversation to take its course. Realize that a person may not shift during this first conversation—it will happen when the person is ready. Remember, the purpose of a motivational outlook conversation is to discuss and explore motivational options and then shift, if they choose to do so.

To learn more on improving motivation inside your organization, download a free chapter of Fowler’s book, Why Motivating People Doesn’t Work … And What Does.  You can also check on your own motivational outlook through a mini-assessment. And don’t miss an opportunity to participate in a live webinar with Fowler on Wednesday, October 22. Susan will be presenting on Rethinking Five Beliefs that Erode Workplace Motivation. The event is free, courtesy of Cisco WebEx and The Ken Blanchard Companies.

“There is a huge difference between seeing your job as holding people accountable for results versus helping them to be accountable. People want to be accountable. They want to make a contribution and do the right thing. If you, as a manager, find yourself having to hold people accountable, there is a breakdown in the process and in the way that goals, metrics, and the work environment have been defined.”

“People are always motivated,” explains Fowler. “Your job as a leader is to understand why a person is motivated the way they are and then help them understand their choices, opportunities, and options.”

Fowler encourages leaders to recognize different Motivational Outlooks—or reasons people are motivated. Motivational Outlooks fall into two broad categories with significantly different implications: Optimal and Suboptimal.

Suboptimal Motivational Outlooks are generated by external incentives such as money, rewards, status, and power, or negative repercussions if targets aren’t met.

Optimal Motivational Outlooks describe motivation based on work aligned with higher-level values or connected to a noble purpose, or inherent joy and pleasure. Fowler explains that when people act from Optimal Motivational Outlooks, they see the value of their work and how it helps them experience an increased sense of control, enhanced relationships, and new skills.

Organizations whose practices promote Suboptimal Motivational Outlooks not only suffer long-term performance, productivity, and innovation loss, but also find themselves dealing with the aftermath of thwarting people’s psychological needs: namely low morale, high turnover, absenteeism, inventory shrinkage, and other ways of people acting out to make up for what they are missing. It leads to an attitude of work as a transaction, “I will only do this if I get that.”

“There is a huge opportunity loss with this approach,” explains Fowler. “We are not getting the best from people under those conditions. Workplaces based on Suboptimal Motivational Outlooks—carrots or sticks—to increase results may achieve short-term behavior change but end up with compliance, not commitment.”

Take a Different Approach

Fowler encourages leaders to take a different approach. To begin, Fowler recommends promoting autonomy, relatedness, and competence. “A good place to start is to change the way you present goals and deadlines that too often undermine people’s sense of autonomy. Reframe goals and deadlines as vital information that will help people succeed instead of techniques for holding people accountable.

“Promote relatedness through values conversations; help people align their work with meaningful values and a sense of purpose. Tap into what is inherently rewarding to people. The best leaders create an alliance with their people that goes beyond compliance.

“Develop people’s sense of competence by asking, ‘What did you learn today that will help you be better tomorrow?’ instead of only focusing on ‘What did you get done today?’”

It’s about having Motivational Outlook Conversations with people to surface the type of motivation people already have and guide them to better choices—for their own well-being and the benefit of the organization as well.

To learn more about Fowler’s approach to motivation, download a free chapter of her book, Why Motivating People Doesn’t Work … And What Does or check out her complete interview in Ignite, Employee Motivation: Focus on Process Instead of Results.  Also be sure to take a look at a complimentary webinar Fowler is conducting on October 22, Rethinking Five Beliefs That Undermine Workplace Motivation.  It’s free courtesy of Cisco WebEx and The Ken Blanchard Companies.

In Edmonds’ experience, leaders—especially senior leaders at the highest levels in organizations, are often disconnected from their company’s culture as experienced by the rank and file members of the organization.

Wondering if you might be out of touch with what is happening in your organization?  Here are four questions to ask yourself to make sure that you are getting an accurate read of what is happening inside your company.

1. Are you overly insulated? Over time, leaders unintentionally find themselves depending on a select group of people closest to them at the top of the organization to give them information about what is happening throughout all the different layers of the organization.  Edmonds’ suggestion?  Increase the number of your sources inside the company. Get out of the office to learn from different people throughout the organization to ensure you’re getting a bigger, more accurate picture.
2. Are you genuinely connecting with others? Employees know which leaders are truly interested in them as people, not just in them as contributors or “cogs in a wheel.” Edmonds recommends that leaders connect at a personal level.  Engage in conversations beyond business.  Over time, these genuine connections will enable others to tell you their perceptions, concerns, and hopes.
3. Do you have truth-tellers? It is all too common for leaders to surround themselves with people who reinforce the leader’s current beliefs and perceptions. However, the most effective leaders also have truth-tellers included in their inner circle—people who aren’t afraid of sharing their perceptions of the reality of the leader’s plans, decisions, and actions. Knowing more people’s truths can help make the leader’s future decisions more effective.
4. Have you checked your assumptions lately? Edmonds recommends that leaders check their assumptions on a regular basis by sharing them with team members. Listen without defending and continue to refine your assumptions, plans, decisions, and actions.

Creating an uplifting and engaging culture begins by identifying where you are at and where you can improve.  The key is accurate information!

To learn more about ways to accurately identify and improve your corporate culture be sure to check out The Culture Engine microsite.  You can download a free chapter of Edmonds’ new book and see some of the additional questions he recommends for assessing your organization.  For a more in-depth look at the topic, join Edmonds and Weaving Influence host Becky Robinson for a free October 1 webinar on Driving Results With An Organizational Constitution

In Fowler’s experience, the motivation practices used in many organizations have undermined engagement more often than they have engaged employees. Fortunately the new science of motivation has identified three psychological needs—Autonomy, Relatedness, and Competence—that can help managers create the type of environment where employees thrive.

Autonomy.  Diverse studies over the past 20 years indicate that adults have a psychological need for autonomy. For example, productivity increases significantly among blue-collar workers in manufacturing plants when they are given the ability to stop the production line. Similarly, the productivity of white-collar workers in banking firms has been shown to increase in workers who report a high sense of autonomy.

Autonomy doesn’t mean that managers are permissive or hands-off, but rather that employees feel they have influence in the workplace. Empowerment may be often considered a cliché, but if people don’t have a sense of empowerment, their sense of autonomy suffers, and so does their productivity and performance.

Relatedness. Relatedness is the very human need to care about—and be cared about, by others. As Fowler explains, “It is our need to feel connected to others without concerns about ulterior motives. It is our need to feel that we are contributing to something greater than ourselves.”

Fowler encourages leaders to help their people find meaning, social purpose, and experience healthy interpersonal relationships at work.

“Beliefs such as, ‘It’s not personal; it’s just business’ diminish an aspect of work that is essential to our healthy functioning as human beings—the quality of our relationships” says Fowler.  She reminds managers that applying pressure to perform without regard for how that makes people feel actually limits performance.

Competence. People are naturally motivated to learn, but managers often undermine employees’ desire to grow and learn new skills by assuming that people need to be incentivized to learn—either through rewards or punishment.

As a leader Fowler suggests seeing learning and growth in a new light by asking about, and providing opportunities, for people to grow and develop. “What did you achieve today?” What did you learn today?” How did you grow?” are great questions to ask when combined with opportunities to use strengths and develop new skills.

Create an Engaging Environment

In closing her article, Fowler stresses that it is a mistake to think that people are not motivated. In her experience, they are simply longing for needs they cannot name. The greatest thing a leader can do is create an environment that allows people to satisfy these needs, grow, enjoy their work, and build lasting relationships.

You can read Fowler’s complete article in the September issue of Personal Excellence.

Also be sure to check out the website of her new book, Why Motivating People Doesn’t Work…and What Does, which is available for presale now and will be available in bookstores on October 4. You’ll find great resources for leaders–and you can download a free chapter to learn more!

pent behind fancy knot

Who could rejoice with thee now?

 
Pent beneath fancy knot

 
Still pent beneath fancy knot
 
by J. Diamond Arnold
Jason Diamond Arnold is a Leadership Consultant and Learning Media Producer at The Ken Blanchard Companies. He is Coauthor of Situational Self Leadership in Action a real time, real work, leaning experience that develops effective communication and collaboration skills for individuals in the workplace. He is Co Producer and Director of Stepping Up to Leadership with Scott Blanchard, at lynda.com.
 
 

But I really don’t care if you’re happy at work. In fact, I think all the hype about happiness at work is a bit misguided. Now, before you blow up my Twitter feed with negative feedback or blast me in the comments section of this article, let me explain.

I’m all in favor of being happy. Personally, I much prefer happiness over sadness. If I have a choice, I’ll take happy every day of the week and twice on Sunday. When it comes to work, I’ll take happy there, too. I’d much rather work with happy people than mean people, and I know I’m more productive, creative, and a better teammate at work when I’m happy.

But here’s the deal…On the surface, all the talk about happiness sounds great. But If you aren’t careful and discerning about what you hear in the media and popular culture, you’d think that happiness of employees should be the primary goal of every leader and organization. I don’t buy it and here’s why:

1. Happiness is a fleeting emotion largely dependent on external circumstances – Defining happiness can easily lead to a battle of semantics, but a common, basic definition of “happy” is: delighted, pleased, or glad, as over a particular thing (e.g., to be happy to see a person). I’m happy when I come home from work and my kids have straightened up the house or loaded the dishes into the dishwasher. When it doesn’t happen (which is often), I’m not happy. Does that mean I love my kids any less? No. Is my life less fulfilled because I’m not happy? No. Happiness comes and goes, so it’s not something I want to build my life around. Happiness is too dependent on circumstances beyond my control for me to make it my goal. However, I can control how I respond to the circumstances of my life and I can choose to have a positive attitude. There are many times when work and life deal us a crummy hand. We have to work overtime, business travel takes us away from important family events, or we make a mistake and get reamed out by the boss; none of those things make us happy. But if we have the right attitude and perspective on work and life, we can put those situations in their proper place and learn and grow from the experience.

2. Happiness should be a pleasant outcome of good leadership and organizational culture, not the goal – My job as a leader is not to make you happy. If that was the case, then I’d serve ice cream every afternoon and cater to your every need. No, my job is to help you develop to your fullest potential while accomplishing the goals of our team and organization. If I’m smart, I will lead in a way that builds your commitment to the organization and fosters engagement in your work. I’ll also strive to create a culture that supports your health and well-being and makes your work enjoyable. Oh, and by the way, if you’re happy as a result, then great! Your happiness is not my goal, but you’re free to make it your own.

It is the very pursuit of happiness that thwarts happiness. ~ Viktor Frankl

3. Happiness is negatively correlated with meaning – It didn’t take scientific research studies for Viktor Frankl to understand a fundamental truth: pursuing happiness as your primary goal is like a dog chasing its tail. Studies have shown that people who place more importance on being happy end up becoming more depressed and unhappy. Rather than happiness, we need to pursue meaning and purpose. Sadly, according to one study by the Centers for Disease Control, 40% of Americans either do not think their lives have a clear sense of purpose or are neutral about whether their lives have purpose.The same study also reported that nearly 25% of Americans feel neutral or do not have a strong sense of what makes their lives meaningful. Having purpose and meaning in life and at work increases overall well-being and satisfaction, improves mental and physical health, enhances resiliency and self-esteem, and decreases the chances of depression. As a leader, your efforts at helping employees understand and connect to the purpose and meaning of their work will reap more benefit than striving to make them happy.

4. Happiness is self-focused; true fulfillment in life (and work) comes from being others-focused – At its core, happiness is a pretty selfish motive when you think about it. Psychologists explain it as drive reduction. We have a need or drive, like hunger, and we seek to satisfy it. When we get what we want to meet the need, we’re happy. However, lasting success and fulfillment in life comes from what you give, not what you get. The greatest example of this is Jesus and his demonstration of servant leadership. This ancient truth is echoed in contemporary research by Adam Grant, the youngest tenured and highest rated professor at The Wharton School. In his book Give and Take, Grant identifies three ways people tend to operate in their relationships: as givers, takers, or matchers. Not surprisingly, although givers may get burned occasionally, they experience higher levels of fulfillment, well-being, and success in life compared to takers or matchers. I’ve experienced it in my own life and seen it in the lives of others. Those who chase happiness as their primary goal tend to be the most selfish and unhappy people I know. Those who give to others tend to be the most fulfilled, joyful, and happy people I’ve seen.

Happiness is a great thing. As I said, I much prefer it to the alternatives. But when happiness at work becomes such a primary focus that organizations start having CHO’s – Chief Happiness Officers – you know happiness has jumped the shark. Happiness at work is a byproduct of doing a good job in all the other fundamental areas of leadership, but it’s misguided to make it our ultimate aim.

Feel free to leave a comment with your thoughts, opinions, or questions.

Randy Conley is the V.P. of Client Services and Trust Practice Leader at The Ken Blanchard Companies and his LeaderChat posts normally appear the fourth or last Thursday of every month. For more insights on trust and leadership, visit Randy at his Leading with Trust blog or follow him on Twitter @RandyConley.

We chatted about how the new direction had impacted her and she said that she now looked forward to coming to work. She proceeded to show me a new display of jewelry on the counter (as opposed to behind/under the counter where it had been before) that she had influenced.  She also pointed to the new purse display that her friend had created.  Wow!

Let’s dissect this interaction in terms of consistently delivering the Legendary Service you want your organization to be known for.

1. It is important to remember that people thrive when they feel their work is meaningful, when they have a chance to grow, and when they feel autonomous and recognized for their contributions. The salesperson was very excited to share with me that she had a new manager who acknowledged her ideas and allowed her to implement them. The truth is, a new manager can bring a real sense of hope to a team. If you are a manager who has been with your team for a while, think about this and ask yourself: What outdated or ineffective patterns of management behavior could I freshen up in order to lift my team and inspire them anew?
2. On a regular basis, whether they serve internal or external customers, ask your people for their ideas on how to improve customer service. This will keep them always thinking of new ways to create a better customer experience.  This is the backbone of Legendary Service: creating a culture that inspires people to think: If I were in charge, what would I do to serve customers at the highest level?
3. Because your frontline people interact with customers every day, they are at the forefront of knowing what your customers want. Take advantage of what they know! When they share their ideas with you, act on those ideas whenever possible. My service provider’s idea was that customers would be happier if they could actually touch the jewelry, instead of having to wait in line for her to show them different pieces.  Her new manager empowered her to act on her idea—so she took lower priced, but still sparkly and beautiful earrings, necklaces, and bracelets and created six different displays on the counter.  The result? Sales have increased and customers are happier—they can now have fun matching jewelry to their new outfits!

How can you update your management style?  Can you promote a Legendary Service culture by asking front-liners for ideas, and accelerating those ideas into action? As we move into a new quarter, think about what you can do to inspire innovative, customer-centric ideas and let your people know they matter.  They will appreciate the opportunity and you’ll be surprised at the great ideas they come up with to serve and delight customers!

About the author:

Dr.Vicki Halsey is VP of Applied Learning and coauthor (together with Ken Blanchard and Kathy Cuff) of the new book, Legendary Service: The Key Is to Care now available in bookstores everywhere. You can read an excerpt from the book, download an online quiz, and learn more about Legendary Service at this book page.

He says that the process he uses keeps the projects moving forward “against a backdrop of the normal daily chores that any business owner must perform, such as motivation, recruiting, marketing, accounting, and the like.”

At first blush I am glad that employee motivation is on the list.  But then I notice that it’s a list of daily chores.  And while I was happy that motivation was on a list of core business functions, it was strange to hear it called a chore.

I suppose if you were a recruiting expert you might also wonder how recruiting could be seen as a chore.  Perhaps you are thinking, “Oh, relax.  It’s just a word.  At least motivation is on a key list or normal daily anythings.”

But words matter.  Words matter especially to the phenomenon of employee motivation because they stimulate the creation of meaning.  Meaning of what is in large part a function of what the words are.  So a particular kind of motivation is more likely stimulated by calling your focus on motivating me a chore as opposed to viewing it as a strategic focus of your time and energy aimed at helping me be my best and do my best work.

Seeing motivation as a strategic focus

The more useful way to view employee motivation is as a strategic focus that sits at the heart of the value creation process.  Motivation means to move.  The question is, if motivation is a chore, in what ways are employees likely to be moved?

Here are three ways to think about employee motivation that are more aligned with the value creation point of view, and less with the employee motivation as a daily chore point of view:

1. Employees naturally want to do good work, and the CEO could best help them do that by fostering an environment in which it is easy for them to bring their best intellectual, insightful, and creative skills to bear on the organization’s needs.
2. Language matters.  Take great care to talk about employee motivation in ways that speak to the meaning of what the organization does, and how much employees want their contributions to matter.
3. Make sure all employee contributions matter.  Even if the employee is still learning and making mistakes, celebrate the learning and affirm the effort.

This is not an exhaustive list of how to look at motivation in a value-optimizing way, but it’s a good start. Please share your thoughts and additions.

About the author:

The Motivation Guy  (also known as Dr. David Facer)  is one of the principal authors—together with Susan Fowler and Drea Zigarmi—of The Ken Blanchard Companies’ new Optimal Motivation process and workshop.

Liberman’s basic point is that people are having trouble keeping up with the amount of tasks added to their plates and the pace of change occurring in their organizations. Recession-driven layoffs, restructures, and job modifications have forced people to take on extra work, new job duties, or assume different roles and it’s taking a toll. As job scope increases, people feel overwhelmed with the amount of work they have to accomplish, and it leads even the most engaged employees to gravitate toward focusing on the least complex, simple tasks they can control, rather than focusing on the most important and complex issues that need to be addressed.

According to Liberman, much of the fault lies at the feet of senior leaders. Whether it’s pursuing the latest management fad, reorganizing on a whim, or doing a poor job of managing change, senior leaders can be prone to lay the blame of organizational failure at the feet of employees who aren’t performing up to snuff, not taking into account those same employees are still trying to come to grips with the previous round of changes. Wharton professor Peter Cappelli says, “Today, work demands are through the roof. Not just the amount of work but challenges that employees do not know how to meet, in part because they may not be achievable.” Workplace frustration leads to insecurity which leads to a lack of trust and confidence in leadership.

I can identify with these conditions. The team I lead has experienced increased job scope and responsibilities over the years as our business has grown more complex and demanding in today’s global economy. “Task saturation” is a word we’ve used to describe this condition and the insecure, frustrated state of mind it induces. Here are six strategies I’ve found helpful to deal with this “performance anxiety” in the workplace:

1. Create a safe and trusting environment—The number one job of a leader is to build trust with his/her followers. Fostering a culture of safety is essential for trust to not only survive, but thrive. People need to know they can count on their leaders to look out for their best interests, protect them when necessary (even from themselves sometimes), and to genuinely care about them as people and not just worker drones showing up to do a job. Simon Sinek speaks to this truth in his insightful TED Talk, Why good leaders make you feel safe.

2. Ask people for their opinions—One of the most tangible ways leaders can combat frustration and insecurity in the workplace is to ask people for their opinions. But asking is just the first step; you have to do something with what they tell you. The higher up a leader rises in the organization, the easier it is to lose touch with the daily frustrations and battles your employees face. It’s easy to oversimplify the problems and solutions our people face and dismiss their expressions of frustration as whining or griping. Listen with the intent of being influenced and be willing to take action on what you learn.

3. Start, stop, continue—As you consider your next round of corporate restructuring, job modification, or process improvements, ask yourself these three questions: What do we need to start doing? What do we need to stop doing? What do we need to continue doing? I’ve found it’s easy to keep adding new tasks while continuing to do the old tasks. It’s much, much harder to identify those things we should stop doing. We can’t continue to pile more and more work on people and expect them to perform at consistently high levels. There is only so much time to accomplish the work at hand. As an addition to the start, stop, continue strategy, I’m seriously considering adopting a strategy from the simplicity movement: for every new task I add for my team, we have to eliminate one task. Enough of task saturation!

4. Manage change, don’t just announce it—Managing a change initiative involves more than just announcing a new strategy. That’s the easy part! The hard part is actually implementing and managing the change well. People go through specific stages of concern when faced with a major change and leaders need to be equipped to address those concerns throughout the process. By addressing the information, personal, and implementation concerns of employees, leaders can be much more successful in helping their people adapt and endorse the change initiative.

5. Focus on development of boss/employee relationship—One of the primary factors in an employee’s success, satisfaction, and engagement on the job is the quality of the relationship with their boss. Intentional effort needs to be placed on cultivating high-quality boss/employee relationships founded on trust and mutual respect. Frequent and quality conversations need to occur regularly between the boss and employee so the boss is aware of the daily challenges faced by the employee and can work to remove obstacles.

6. Foster empowerment, control, and autonomy—People don’t resist change; they resist being controlled. Much of today’s workplace frustrations are caused by workers having a lack of empowerment in their role, little control over what effects them at work, and scant autonomy in how they perform their tasks. Leaders can build engagement by focusing on the development of these three qualities in the work people do.

Workplace frustration and insecurity is like organizational high blood pressure—it’s a silent killer. This silent killer is not always evident through outward symptoms, but it’s always lurking underneath causing damage day after day. We have a choice…will we do anything about it?

Randy Conley is the V.P. of Client Services and Trust Practice Leader at The Ken Blanchard Companies and his LeaderChat posts normally appear the fourth Thursday of every month. For more insights on trust and leadership, visit Randy at his Leading with Trust blog or follow him on Twitter @RandyConley.

But discussing motivation in terms of how much someone has is not very useful, so I’ll ask if we can rephrase “more motivated” to something more specific.  In these cases, “more motivated” usually should mean that the manager wants an employee to voluntarily—and without manipulation or coercion from anyone else—align with what is expected of them.  From there the discussion would go to, “How can I help employees align?”

The answer to that question starts with who the employee is and what she or he wants for her or himself.  But for many managers, it’s easy to mistakenly think that alignment shouldn’t have to consider those things.  After all, isn’t an employee responsible for what an employee is responsible for?

But when employees are asked for their side of these motivation stories, they often report that alignment is hard for them because their personal goals and those the organization is asking them to be responsible for are out of alignment.  It is just like when a car is out of alignment.  They know it should go one way, but it pulls another.  When misalignment persists for a long time, managers start to think that the employee may not be a good fit for the organization, and the employee thinks the same thing.

But, what if the misalignment was not a bad thing?  What if the pull in a slightly different direction meant that the employee was hungry for new projects, a role, or a job in the company that lined up better with who they are and what they find personally interesting, fulfilling, and meaningful?  Many employees have told me that if they could design a job they really loved with their current employer, they would be much happier, “more motivated,” and more productive.  So, here are some initial steps you can take if you (or someone you care about) is struggling to fix an alignment problem:

– Examine:  What specific projects, tasks, goals, or situations do you (or they) really enjoy working on, especially when the work gets complicated and difficult?  Examine the aspects of the current work that you dislike and that you dread doing.

– Evaluate:  Take an inventory of your technical skills.  Where do you have proven expertise that others would readily recognize and value?  Which skills are you good at but don’t enjoy using?

– Decide:  Make a clear decision about whether you want to be a manager or an individual contributor.  Great managers want to be managers; they don’t resent the responsibilities that go with the territory.

– Explore:  What cross-functional projects or teams, roles, or jobs might allow you to do most of what you love and are masterful at most of the time?

– Investigate:  Begin to look for ways to truly create such a role, and be sure to share with others that you are looking into this so that you, they, and the company all benefit.

These steps are just the start of the process of creating alignment between work that brings you alive and the work the company needs done.  After all, the pull you feel can be a really good thing when you use it to serve everyone involved.

About the author:

The Motivation Guy  (also known as Dr. David Facer)  is one of the principal authors—together with Susan Fowler and Drea Zigarmi—of The Ken Blanchard Companies’ new Optimal Motivation process and workshop.

This is a great question often posed in our Optimal Motivation workshops. I understand that you are between a rock and hard place—on one hand, you are responsible for getting results; on the other hand, the traditional tactics you use destroy the high energy, dedication, creativity, innovation, and initiative people need to achieve those results. The irony of pressing for results and pushing deadlines is that you promote the exact opposite of what you hoped to encourage. You need a new approach in 2014.

Reframe Goals into Something Meaningful

When I was an itinerant speaker for the world’s largest public seminar company, I conducted over 125 day-long workshops a year—each one in a different city, state, or country. I appreciated the work, but I was literally bone weary. The company imposed hard metrics that meant termination of your contract if not met: Collect 75% or more of participant evaluations (typically 200) and score a 4.5 or better on a 5-point scale.

Those goals exhausted me even more! If I had focused on meeting them, I would have burned out and quit—many of my colleagues did. Instead, I reframed the company’s goals into outcomes meaningful to me. I will remember at least 20 people’s names and something about them by the end of each day. If at least one person tells me I made a difference in their life, then it was a good day. (After all, that was why I was doing what I was doing.)

Reframing goals into results that were meaningful to me was energizing. I focused on the values of what I was doing and the by-product was consistently achieving the organization’s measures of success. Consider taking the time to help your employees reframe the organization’s goals.

When employees reframe organizational goals into results that are meaningful for them, everybody wins.

Turn Deadlines into Data

Deadlines exist. I am working on one right now as I write this blog. The trick is to view deadlines (or live-lines, as a colleague of mine chooses to call them) as critical information. Leaders can help people shift the way deadlines are interpreted. Instead of considering deadlines as points of pressure, position deadlines as communication tools that describe what is needed for people to do their jobs effectively. Instead of imposing deadlines that undermine people’s autonomy, position timelines as data points that provide valuable insight about how to allocate time, make thoughtful choices, and decide what to do next—or not at all.

Deadlines are a reality, but leaders can position deadlines as data to help employees live a more autonomous, optimally motivating, and high-quality life at work.

About the author:

Susan Fowler is one of the principal authors—together with David Facer and Drea Zigarmi—of The Ken Blanchard Companies’ new Optimal Motivation process and workshop.

One of the most persistent beliefs leaders tell themselves and employees is that if you can’t measure something, it does not matter.

I can easily refute that belief with two questions:

1. Do you love your partner/spouse, mother, father, or children?

2. If yes (no one has answered no yet), then tell me precisely how much.  And when you answer, please pick an amount and a unit of measure.  So your answer would be something like, “I love my children 12 gallons,” or “I love my husband six kilometers.” 

Naturally, that’s absurd.  The love you feel matters a great deal and yet seems impossible to measure.

Employee motivation is a bit like that.  It matters a great deal to the well-being of your employees and the financial success of the company.  And yet it seems impossible to measure.

But that’s the thing—it is remarkably easy to measure.  Here’s how.

1. Using yourself as a test case, the first thing you will want to do is upgrade how you think about measurement.  Most often you’re thinking in terms of numbers.  Instead, think first in terms of categories.  Then you can think of numbers.
2. Specifically, think in terms of these six categories—or types—of motivation.

• Inherent – You do something because it is fun for you personally
• Integrated – You do something because the purpose and deep meaning of it serves others and is in harmony with your own deep sense of purpose
• Aligned – You do something because it is compatible with your goals and values
• Imposed – You do something because you want to avoid a hassle, drama, or feeling guilty
• External – You do something to gain something outside the task and yourself such as money, status, or reputation
• Disinterested – You do not do something because it just does not matter to you.

3. Create a table featuring the six categories above and tally your thoughts, feelings, and what the running dialogue in your head is saying about what type of motivation you experience on each specific situation, task, or goal.
4. What pattern do you notice?  Most coaching clients with whom I have used this simple technique notice a pattern pretty quickly.  In fact, for everything on their to-do list, they usually realize they are experiencing one or two types of motivation.  In time, one of them will become the most clear.
5. BAM!  You just measured your motivation by discerning what type you are experiencing.  And, the tally you came up with reveals how intensely you feel one type over the others. 

Now you may ask does measuring your motivation using that simple technique even matter?

It absolutely does, because the type of motivation you experience has a big influence on how you go about your daily work—and your probability of success.

More specifically, research reveals that your motivation type has a lot to do with how much creative, out of the box thinking you bring to your work. It greatly influences how persistent you are in the face of tough challenges.  It not only explains, it determines how enthusiastic, frustrated, or bored you feel about the minutia of your work.  And over time, the type of motivation you experience has a lot to do with the decisions you make to stay with the company or leave for somewhere better.

In future posts in this series, I’ll share with you equally simple techniques for shifting from one type of motivation to the one you want to experience.  That’s remarkably straightforward, too.

You probably already have a sense of which type of motivation would most help you succeed.

The first step is to measure what type of motivation you’re experiencing on each task, goal, or situation on your list.

So, start tallying!  After all, motivation matters—and now you can measure it!

About the author:

The Motivation Guy  (also known as Dr. David Facer)  is one of the principal authors—together with Susan Fowler and Drea Zigarmi—of The Ken Blanchard Companies’ new Optimal Motivation process and workshop.

The answer to this entrenched belief is so obvious that at a recent speaking engagement, I had over 300 people spontaneously fill-in-the blank by yelling in unison, “Results!”

I then asked them to consider the affect this tyranny of results has on the workplace. It was not easy. Leaders tend to tune out as soon as you mess with results. Executives cannot imagine what else matters at the end of the day, but results.

As it turns out, the science of motivation is shedding light on the high price being paid for blind allegiance to results and leaving alternate opportunities unexplored, unmined, and under-appreciated.

Consideration #1: Redefine and reframe results.

If you are like most leaders, you define results in terms of quantifiable goals and specific outcomes expressed through ROI, net profit, financial gain, labor hours, reduced costs, lower turnover, productivity measures, and other dashboard metrics. Reasonable, but here is the irony: Your persistent focus on driving for results without emotional meaning may be creating the psychological distress, tension, and pressure that undermines achievement and makes it less likely you get the results that you—and those you lead—are seeking.

If you ask managers what matters at work, they will point to results such as achieving high standards on goals, making numbers, reducing production times, increasing output, and eliminating waste. Ask individuals what matters at work and you get a different response. Yes, people want to achieve those goals (when they are fair and agreed upon), but more important than a quantifiable goal is a meaningful one. Research concurs—in the end, it is the quality of the goal being achieved, rather than the quantity of something being achieved, that matters most.

Leaders and individuals need to learn how to frame results differently and trust that they will achieve organizational metrics.

When I was an itinerant speaker for the world’s largest public seminar company conducting over 100 day-long events a year—each one in a different city, state, or country—I appreciated the work, but I was literally bone weary. The company had a hard metric that meant termination of your contract if not met: Collect 75% or more of participant evaluations (typically 200) and score a 4.5 or better on a 5-point scale.

Those goals made me feel even more exhausted! If I had focused on meeting them, I would have burned out and then quit—as many of my colleagues did. Instead, I reframed the goal in ways meaningful to me. I will remember at least 20 people’s names and something about them by the end of each day. If at least one person tells me I made a difference in their life, then it was a good day.  (After all, that was why I was doing what I was doing.) By reframing what results looked like to me, I was energized—and consistently achieved the organization’s measures of success.

Consideration #2: Ends do not justify the means.

If we believe that results are what really matter without consideration as to why those results are meaningful and how people go about achieving them, we are in essence saying the ends justify the means. What a sorry picture this paints. We do not need the science of motivation to prove that means matter as much, or more, than the ends—we see the scandals and horror stories of people, organizations, industries, and countries who prize ends over means every day in the news.

However, we tend to overlook the obvious in day-to-day practice. The evidence is clear that even if people achieve the results you want, they are less likely to sustain or repeat those results if their basic psychological needs are thwarted in the process. You may experience short-term gains when you have a results focus, however, those gains are at risk and compromised when people feel pressure instead of autonomy, disconnection instead of relatedness, and “used” without a sense of the competence they have gained.

Try this for the next month: Reframe the belief that the only thing that matters is results. Consider this belief instead:

In the end, what really matters is not just results, but why and how those results are achieved.

Observe the shift in energy when you focus on what really matters in the workplace—achieving meaningful results that are also psychologically fulfilling. Then trust the numbers will add up.

About the author:

Susan Fowler is one of the principal authors—together with David Facer and Drea Zigarmi—of The Ken Blanchard Companies’ new Optimal Motivation process and workshop. Their posts appear on the first and third Monday of each month.

Editor’s note: This post is the fourth in a five part series on beliefs that erode workplace motivation. You can read Susan’s first three posts in the series by clicking on Rethinking Five Beliefs that Erode Workplace Motivation , Five Beliefs that Erode Workplace Motivation, Part Two , and  If You Are Holding People Accountable, Something Is Wrong.

Liz Wiseman, author of Multipliers – How The Best Leaders Make Everyone Smarter, spoke at Blanchard’s annual Client Summit the past two days. She shared the following six ways leaders diminish the performance of their team and offered strategies to combat these tendencies. Do you recognize yourself in any of these descriptions?

1. The Idea Guy – You know this kind of leader…He never came up with an idea he didn’t like! Every new business book he reads is a reason to redesign the organization. Every wild idea about a new product or service results in changing business strategies. His ideas are always the best, and even though he may pay lip service to the input of others, he’s always the smartest guy in the room and his ideas prevail. At some point team members get their ideas shot down enough that they stop trying. Even though this leader thinks he’s doing a good thing by coming up with new ideas, he’s actually diminishing the performance of his team dramatically.

How to Fix It: Instead of offering ideas, consider asking questions like: What do you think? How would you solve this problem? What are the pros and cons of our alternatives?

2. Always On – The Always On leader is, well, always on! He doesn’t have an off switch and he’s constantly moving at Mach 5 with his hair on fire. It’s one thing to have a strong work ethic and give work your all, but it’s a whole other thing to expect (or require) people to live at the same breakneck pace you choose for yourself. You’ll eventually burn people out and reduce their effectiveness.

How to Fix It: Play Your Chips – When you go into meetings with your team, pretend you only have 3 to 4 poker chips to play. Reserve your input for the most strategic and important times where you feel you can add the most value. That will allow your team members the space to breathe and devise their own strategies for managing the work.

3. Pacesetter – In a noble effort to set the pace for his team, the Pacesetter leader takes pride in being out in front of his team and setting the example they should follow. That’s a key function of being a leader, but it can diminish your team’s performance if you get too far out in front of your team. If your performance, goals, and expectations are so ridiculously high, your people will give up before they even start the race. Why? They know they don’t have a chance to win. You’ve already got too far of a head start.

How to Fix It: Stretch the responsibility of your direct reports. Instead of you leading the charge on all the important projects, delegate assignments to your team members. Assuming they have the competence and commitment needed to succeed on the particular goal or task, you’ll not only get more work done by involving others, you’ll also increase their engagement and morale.

4. Rescuer – Leaders like to feel needed, and there’s no better way to feel needed than coming to the rescue of your team members (cue Superhero music). Unfortunately, constantly rescuing your people creates learned helplessness on their part, and because you are required to always step in to save the day, it lowers the performance and capacity of your entire team.

How to Fix It: Learn to hold and fold and give the work back to the person who owns it. Assuming you hired the right people and properly trained them, they should be capable of handling their own work.

5. Rapid Responder – The Rapid Responder diminishes the performance of his team because he’s always the first one to respond to a problem or challenge. This leader seems to be everywhere at all times, always putting out whatever fire might exist. What happens over time? Your team members eventually learn that you’ll be the first one to tackle the issue and they can just sit back and watch you do your thing.

How to Fix It: Pause and allow debate. Give your team a chance to respond and figure out a solution before you jump into action.

6. The Optimist – I can identify with this diminishing behavior. In an effort to minimize negative energy or dissent, it’s easier to play the role of the optimist, cheering your team on to success while blindly ignoring the difficult realities of the situation. Life isn’t always full of sunshine, rainbows, and unicorns, and your insistence that “this shouldn’t be too hard” destroys the morale of your team.

How to Fix It: Create space for mistakes. Acknowledge the hard realities facing your team and let them move forward, knowing they’ll make mistakes, learn from them, and improve along the way.

These behaviors are idea killers, energy sappers, intelligence drainers, and diminishers of talent and commitment. With a little self-awareness and self-control, leaders can shift from being diminishers of talent to multipliers of talent.

Randy Conley is the Trust Practice Leader at The Ken Blanchard Companies and his LeaderChat posts appear the fourth Thursday of every month. For more insights on trust and leadership, visit Randy at his Leading with Trust blog or follow him on Twitter @RandyConley.

That analysis found a 14-point customer satisfaction gap, a 16-point employee productivity gap, and a 45-point employee retention gap which translates into over $1 million dollars for the average organization.

In looking at the ways that leadership impacts each of these three areas, separate Blanchard research into the Leadership-Profit Chain and Employee Work Passion has found that better day-to-day operational leadership practices—including those that promote autonomy, collaboration, connectedness, and growth can significantly improve employee intentions to stay with a company, perform at a high level, and apply discretionary effort in service of company goals.

Taking some first steps

Looking to identify and address operational leadership in your own organization?  Here’s a three step process for getting started.

1. Double-check on goal alignment at the team and department level.  Make sure that all team members are working on the highest priority tasks.  Ask managers to check in and review priorities with their people.  Make sure the work is meaningful, on-target, and contributing to overall organizational goals.  You’ll be surprised at the amount of misalignment that occurs over time.
2. Identify what people need to succeed at their high priority tasks.  Depending on their experience and confidence with the tasks they are assigned, people can be Enthusiastic Beginners, Disillusioned Learners, Capable, but Cautious Performers, or Self Reliant Achievers.  Each of these development levels requires a different style of leadership—either Directing, Coaching, Supporting, or Delegating.  (Surprisingly, without training only 1% of managers are skilled at identifying and being able to deliver all four styles when needed.)
3. Make sure managers meet with their people on a regular basis.  While it is always best for managers to be able to adapt their leadership style to perfectly meet employee needs, that doesn’t mean that they should put off meeting on a regular basis to review goals and provide direction and support as best as possible while learning.  Even if managers aren’t perfect, people still appreciate a chance to talk, discuss progress, and ask for help.

Begin today

Academic research has established a strong correlation between leadership practices, employee engagement scores, and subsequent customer satisfaction scores.   The bottom line is that leadership practices matter. Encourage your leaders to review goals with their people, identify how they can help, and set up a regular time to review progress.  Take care of the people who take care of your customers.  It’s good for them—and your business too!

Interested in learning more?  Join me for a free webinar!

On October 30, I am going to be presenting a more in-depth look at the Cost of Doing Nothing analysis and sharing some strategies for addressing it.  This is a free webinar courtesy of Cisco WebEx and The Ken Blanchard Companies.  Over 500 people are registered and I hope you’ll join us also. Use the link below to learn more.

High Potential Leadership: Three Strategies to Boost Your Bottom Line

You’ll learn that:

• Less-than-optimal leadership practices cost the typical organization an amount equal to as much as 7% of their total annual sales
• At least 9% and possibly as much as 32% of an organization’s voluntary turnover can be avoided through better leadership skills
• Better leadership can generate a 3 to 4% improvement in customer satisfaction scores and a corresponding 1.5% increase in revenue growth

LEARN MORE >

His firm had just released a new product that his company leaders believe has the potential to become a real game changer.

Development time lines have been aggressive and productive. A company-wide, cross-functional team has created major innovations in the product itself, along with new distribution methods and a streamlined go-to-market strategy.

“All of that is so positive,” he said.

Then he started to choke up.

“I’m now being told to ask my team for even more effort, even more time.  But they’re already fried.  They are working crazy hours and losing time with their families and friends as it is.”

“They have been pushed to the limit,” he continued.  “There is just no way I can ask them for more effort.  The rumor is that some are beginning to question whether they want to continue working here. They’re worn out, and so am I.”

This executive is known for delivering on his promises, and for caring deeply about his team.

Knowing this, I asked, “The emotion that is welling up right now may be trying to give voice to something big.  What does it want you to say?”

He said, “I fear we are dangerously close to losing some of our integrity as a company.  We tell the world that one of our core values is relationships and caring deeply about one another.  Yet, we just keep squeezing each other harder.  Do we value relationships or don’t we?  What do we really value?  Who are we really being?”

His questions hung heavy in the air like a dense fog.

Enhancing Motivation and Well-Being

How would you respond if you were in this manager’s shoes?

The challenge here is a group of high performers who are feeling the relentless demands imposed by senior management is negatively impacting and imposing upon their well-being and quality of life.  This is causing them to question the company’s sincerity when it claims to care deeply about people in addition to results.

In some organizations, the grumbling and questioning might just be an expected part of the process when people are asked to put in extra effort.  In those organizations, traditional approaches to spurring employee motivation might emphasize accountability.

In other organizations, another common leader response is to avoid the subject and just keep the conversation focused on the task at hand.  Maybe a reminder that the project will eventually be completed and if the staff could just push through a little more it will all be worth it in the end.

But in motivational terms, these employees are no longer aligned with their work—and maybe the company.  Here is an additional course of action that might not be as typical but would certainly better address the situation with a more optimally motivating approach.  (Send us a note with your added suggestions!)

1. Hold an out-in-the-open discussion either one-on-one or in small groups about the company stated values and how people are feeling right now.  The first skill of a mature motivational leader is empathy.  Let people express themselves clearly and boldly.  Listen, listen, and then listen some more.  Be careful not to respond defensively.

2. Seek suggestions from the staff about how they might work together to lessen the pressure, first without extending delivery timelines.  Generate a dozen suggestions.

3. Allow the staff to choose implementation strategies for two or three of their suggestions.  Modify as needed.  The key here is the employees get to choose ways to address the issue productively.

4. Discuss how each chosen suggestion would demonstrate that everyone in the company honors the relationships value, without undermining goal achievement.

5. Lastly, make sure the leaders who have been applying the pressure are part of the process and are fully aligned with the adjustments.

6. End the meeting by celebrating the collective effort and affirming everyone’s dedication to continually enriching the work relationships while striving for meaningful results.

7. Monitor progress as needed—and be careful not to slip back into the old, habituated ways of doing things.

Think Motivationally

In today’s hyper-competitive business environment, employees everywhere are being asked to constantly focus on increasing performance.  Too often leaders see results as an either/or choice that requires sacrifices in other areas—such as honoring core values.  It doesn’t have to be that way.  Think motivationally—consider how you can achieve results and promote autonomy, values, and relationships along the way.  You don’t have to choose—a focus on results and relationships will create the results you want and promote the sense of well-being that employees genuinely need in order to thrive.

About the author:

The Motivation Guy  (also known as Dr. David Facer)  is one of the principal authors—together with Susan Fowler and Drea Zigarmi—of The Ken Blanchard Companies’ new Optimal Motivation process and workshop.

“It’s all about values and principles. It’s not about the numbers.”

Leaders, perhaps the most ambitious, will tell you that this is their mantra—but when you take a close look at what’s really going on, let’s face it: it is all about the numbers. It’s about hitting goals, frequently even at any cost. The urgent sprint becomes the norm—the new zero point. Actually, it’s now a condition of employment. “You want to work here—this is how you behave.”

Frequently though, organizations don’t recognize the damages of a long-term, “success at any cost,” strategy. Short-term gains may come at the cost of long-term emotional loss.

This may not be a big problem for a business in temporarily lean economic times, when there aren’t many alternatives for people on the payroll. The employees are inclined to stay right where they are. Actually, they may not have any other options. After all, other opportunities are few and far between.

But what about after things start improving? As the human marketplace emerges from contingency plans and belt-tightening, leaders need to be especially aware of what’s going on around them. Previously loyal employees may be hearing of, or actually getting, other opportunities, internal or external. Regardless of where they go, you’ve lost them. And by the way, who do you think gets the most offers, your average producers or the very best?

Here are three ways to reconnect with your people and move forward:

1. Encourage feedback from associates, and then act on it, even if it hurts. Now more than ever, don’t assume everybody is a happy camper. The fact that you haven’t heard any complaints is not necessarily good news. What you don’t know can hurt you. A common leader reaction when good people leave is, “I had no idea he or she was floating resumes out there.” That’s tragic when you think about it.
2. Open your eyes and ears to discouragement and resentment. Emotions like these eat at people’s hearts and poison relationships. If you ignore this condition, it multiplies. When people are uninformed, they accentuate the negative—and the reality is rarely as bad as the scenario they create in their minds.
3. Don’t try to use the same skills that were appropriate in different times. Don’t act like the Lone Ranger. Don’t singlehandedly swoop in to give your people a quick fix. Share news now more than ever. Talk about issues. Problems won’t go away on their own—you must address them. Delaying will only compound the situation.

Finally, as a leader, it’s very possible that you may have been feeling the same stress as your people.  You might have felt put-upon when a lot has happened that was out of your control. But whatever you do, don’t make excuses or offer evidence that you’ve been victimized like everybody else—even if it is true. Remember that you’re the one who chose to be a leader. Play the hand you’ve been dealt. Don’t blame others. After the crises, everybody must face a new reality. That reality starts with the person in charge. That’d be you.

About the author

Dr. Dick Ruhe is a best-selling author, keynote speaker, and senior consulting partner with The Ken Blanchard Companies.

My previous blog challenged you to complete five common statements related to motivation. It wasn’t much of a challenge. These beliefs are so deeply embedded in our collective psyche that they roll off the tongue. What is a challenge is to let go and replace these statements with beliefs that promote an optimally motivating workplace.

In Part 1, we flipped the first statement: It’s not personal, it is just business, became If it is business, it must be personal.

In this post we explore the second eroding belief: The purpose of business is to make money (a profit).

We will explore the other statements in upcoming posts.

• We need to hold people ___________.
• The only thing that really matters is _______.
• If you cannot measure it, it _________ ________.

Your Beliefs Determine the Way You Lead

When you hold the belief that money is the purpose of business you are likely to over-emphasize results. You are apt to resort to pressure to motivate people to get those results. You may be tempted to employ questionable ethical practices. When given a choice, you might choose quantity over quality, short-term results over long-term results, and profits over people.

Consider how an alternative belief would generate a different approach to your leadership. How would your decisions and actions be different with the following statement?

The purpose of business is to serve.

Think how this reframed belief might alter your organization’s dashboard metrics—or at least the content and quality of the goals. How might reframing goals so they focus on internal as well as external service, quality of people’s efforts as well as the results of their efforts, or celebrating learning and growth in addition to accomplishments, change the way you lead day-to-day?

Hard-nosed businesspeople will push back on these ideas with a traditional argument, “You can serve all you want, but this soft stuff doesn’t make you money and if you don’t make a profit you will go out of business. Then you won’t be serving anyone.”

It is true that a business must make a profit to sustain itself. But it is an illogical leap to conclude that profit is therefore the purpose of business. You need air to live, plus water and food. But the purpose of your life is not to just breathe, eat, and drink. Your purpose is richer and more profound than basic survival. And the more noble your purpose and developed your values are, the more they influence how you live day-to-day. When you believe that the purpose of business is to serve, you lead differently. Your decisions and actions are more likely to cultivate a workplace that supports people’s optimal motivation.

The nature of human motivation is not in making money. It is in making meaning.

Ken Blanchard says, “Profit is the applause you receive for serving your customers’ needs.” I would add “and your people’s needs.” Research conducted by The Ken Blanchard Companies found definitive evidence that organizational vitality measured by ROI, earnings by share, access to venture capital, stock price, debt load and other financial indicators, is dependent on two factors: customer devotion and employee work passion[1]. It does not work the other way around—organizational vitality is not what determines customer devotion or employee work passion.

Leaders who focus on serving their customers’ needs and satisfying their people’s psychological needs will enjoy organizational vitality. The old sports analogy works equally well in business: Focusing on money and profit is like playing the game with your eye on the scoreboard instead of the ball. In business, service is the game you are playing. Keeping your eye focused on customer service and people development will result in scoring—both to the bottom line and in other more meaningful ways that sustain high performance over time.

Try this for the next month: Challenge the notion that the purpose of business is to make money. Try changing that outdated traditional belief to an Optimal Motivation belief: “The purpose of business is to serve—both your customers and your people. Money is a by-product of doing both of these things well.”

Watch how your people respond to your changed belief. Then notice the results and accept the well-earned applause.

______________________________________________________________________

About the author:

Susan Fowler is one of the principal authors—together with David Facer and Drea Zigarmi—of The Ken Blanchard Companies’ new Optimal Motivation process and workshop. Their posts appear on the first and third Monday of each month.

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• Job Factors – Autonomy, Meaninful Work, Feedback, Workload Balance, and Task Variety
• Organizational Factors – Collaboration, Performance Expectations, Growth, Procedural Justice (process fairness), and Distributive Justice (rewards, pay, and benefits)
• Relationship Factors – Connectedness with Colleagues and Connectedness with Leader

Without question, all of these factors are vital toward achieving an engaged and passionate workforce. What jumps out at me, and with most other’s research on the subject, is that the focus areas all tend to be very, for lack of a better word, work-centric. Whether you subscribe to the notion of work-life balance or work-life integration, my belief is that, in addition to these crucial work-centric factors, any number of outside personal factors may significantly influence an individual’s level of engagement and passion at any given time. And yes, this may even include an individual’s reaction to the weather outside.
It’s important to remember that regardless of your industry, you’re in the people business. Your colleagues and customers are human beings who are affected by other life experiences, both good and bad, besides those that occur while they’re working. We are individuals with unique needs, wants, situations, and emotions. In future posts in this series, we’ll further discuss situations and possible solutions to achieve a deeper understanding of what drives the engagement and passion of the unique individuals who make up your workforce.
Follow me on Twitter: @adammorris21 | Add me on Google+: gplus.to/AdamMorris21

Most leaders believe that focusing on people versus focusing on performance is an either/or decision.  The belief is that you can’t have both.  Still for some reason, Southwest and WD-40 have been able to pull it off.  They have been able to create a caring culture and industry leading results year after year.  How are they able to strike this perfect balance?  It all begins in an important two foot space within each organization—the distance between managers and their direct reports.  By holding their managers accountable for creating an environment that features equal amounts of trust, respect, and accountability, they are able to drive results and create an environment where people feel proud and cared for. 

Would you like to build some of that same spirit into your organization?  Here are three tips for getting started.

Take the time to connect.  Find out a little bit more about your direct reports.  Share a little bit more about yourself.  Create a people-based connection.

Demonstrate trust.  Trust is an important component in any relationship.  Cultivate trust by being transparent in your thinking.  Demonstrate trust by doing what you say you’ll do.  Show that you are consistent and can be relied upon.

Have high expectations.  Expect a lot from your people and encourage them to expect a lot from you in return.  Once you’ve set up a foundation of trust and respect you have the ability to ask for more from your employees and to hold them accountable for delivering on it.

Too many organizations today act as if the human element is unimportant.  Leaders and managers don’t take the time to build connections or demonstrate trust.  But this short-cut comes back to haunt them when it’s time to set goals and hold people accountable for achieving them.  Without a relationship in place, it’s hard to ask people to give their best—and even more difficult to have a conversation when performance comes up short.  Don’t let this happen in your organization.  Follow the example set by great companies like Southwest Airlines and WD-40.  Practice trust and respect-based relationships that get results and creates a winning, people-based spirit.

In his book, Punished By Rewards: The Trouble with Gold Stars, Incentive Plans, A’s, Praise, and Other Bribes author Alfie Kohn points out that when reward and recognition is conditionally based, it can actually undermine performance by: 

• Setting up a competitive atmosphere where some people win while other people lose 
• Discouraging risk taking when employees fall back on what has worked in the past instead of trying new things which may or may not work 
• Eroding natural interest by replacing intrinsic motivators with extrinsic ones

Perhaps most importantly, improper use of rewards and incentives can sometimes get in the way of good management.  This happens when managers rely to heavily on the use of rewards and incentives instead of drilling down on the reasons why employees may not be performing up to level. 

For organizations looking to improve the creativity, innovation, risk-taking and intrinsic motivation of their employees, Kohn recommends that leaders focus on three areas: 

1. Rethink financial incentives.  Instead of putting so much emphasis on pay-for-performance, pay people a little more than industry norms and then do everything in your power to help them put money out of their minds. 
2. Reevaluate evaluation. Make performance evaluation an ongoing process instead of a once-per-year event.  Make sure that it is a two-way conversation that is separate from conversations about compensation. 
3. Create the conditions for authentic motivation.  Kohn recommends focusing on collaboration—helping employees work together, content—design meaningful jobs and help people find the value in their work, and choice—wherever possible, give people the opportunity to determine how the task will be accomplished.

Kohn is a provocative thinker in this area. For leaders looking for the complete picture on the use of rewards and recognition in their organizations, he offers a great alternative viewpoint on the use of incentives.  I highly recommend him to you and invite your thoughts and comments here.