Tag Best Corporate Cultures

Credit to:

Patrick Lencioni & The Table Group for the “First Team” concept,

Jason Wong of https://www.attack-gecko.net/

and  Dalmau Consulting for the image

I loved my job.

I was part of a powerful and effective executive team to whom I was loyal. I had no problem identifying that they were the team I was personally responsible for and accountable for.

They were my ‘First Team.’

I had built my team into a great team. People took on some of the most complex projects you could imagine and not just succeeded but excelled. I felt great loyalty to everyone who directly and indirectly reported to me.

But there is no doubt that my division was my ‘Second Team.’

Read about what Punk taught me about this situation.

“First Team?”

A First Team – best articulated by Patrick Lencioni – is the idea that true leaders prioritize supporting their fellow leaders over their direct reports—that they are responsible to their peers more than they are to their individual or “Second” teams.

If you’re not entirely on board with that concept, I get it.

In my experience, a “First Team” mindset has been transformational in creating a high performing organization by improving the quality of leadership and management practiced.  

When leaders have built trust with each other, it becomes significantly easier to manage change, exhibit vulnerability, and solve problems together.

I was part of a team who looked and functioned as like example A in the drawing:

When I fell out of my “First Team.”

Things changed when I got a new boss close to me and considered myself a trusted confidant. Over time she went quiet, stopped sharing reasons for decisions and stopped responding. People were hired onto the leadership team I belonged to, whom I believed did not demonstrate the standards I expected of them. My performance began to slip, and my reactions to events were not always as professional as I either hoped or was expected of me.

In retrospect, all the signs pointed to the simple fact that I was nearing or had gone past my best before date as far as she was concerned. To be clear, I have never purported myself to be perfect in any regard. Still, in this case, I was dealing with a boss who was not providing me precise and proper performance management nor effective leadership.

As pictured in example B, I lost faith in my boss and much of the leadership team.

So much so that I focused on my team, and slowly but surely, I became more and more isolated from the organization’s objectives.

 Other Examples of a Broken “First Team”

Imagine a world where the top leaders in your organization are gathered to solve the company’s most pressing challenges. Instead of coming together as a team focused on solving that problem, they approach the exercise more concerned about their self-interest than solving the company’s needs, as pictured in example D above.

Or are you part of a leadership team so disconnected from the rest of the company that they have

no idea what is happening on the shop floor? Picture example C above as the worst of ‘Undercover Boss.’ Where leadership has no idea.

But probably just another day at work for many people, and it’s why I spend a lot of time building a First Team mindset with my clients.

Read more about unaligned leadership teams.

Tragic?

Here are some of the ways I’ve had success in creating a First Team mindset:

Be Explicit

Be explicit about the behaviours you expect from your leaders. Be clear with my managers about their responsibility to one another, including detail of the First Team expectation in the job description and interview for how they’ve practiced it.

Treat Them Like a Cohort

If you don’t treat your leadership team like a cohort, they won’t become one. Ensure you regularly bring together your leadership team, including everything from mailing lists and slack channels to team-building exercises and social events.

Information and trust are the currencies of leadership, and demonstrating an equal distribution through shared experiences is a powerful tool.

Help Them Help Each Other

Encourage interdependence and normalization of help-seeking amongst team members.

Please encourage them to talk to one another about their problems and refer them for help.

Role-play difficult conversations with a fellow manager role play it.

Help Them Help You

Invite your First Team to help you solve your problems.

This vulnerability may feel scary, but it has proven beneficial to leverage your leaders’ capabilities to lead to better outcomes for your organization. And it is a great development opportunity because it exposes them to the types of problems they will face at the next level of their career.                   

Make it Stick

To ensure that you and your leadership team is adhering to the First Team concept, I recommend reviewing the following with your team:

• • At every opportunity, point out the priority of Team #1 before making any critical decisions.

This will put leaders in the correct frame of mind.

• • Demand that team members prioritize the executive team over all others.

When the executive team is truly cohesive and prioritized appropriately, their ability to face complex challenges with further confidence bonds the team and models unity to the organization, this requires an absolute, unwavering commitment to the First Team.

• • Explain how the team’s direct reports will be impacted.

We all know that if there is any daylight between executive team members, it ultimately results in unwinnable battles that those lower in the organization are left to fight.

Like many of the concepts I consult on, First Team is as powerful as it is simple.

Learn more about how I work with executive teams

I have seen highly educated leaders with vast experience have an “aha” moment about the First Team concept resulting in an immediate impact on their team’s cohesion and ability to succeed.

To some, this entire year feels like a storm of bad news. As a leader, you’re leading in a crisis and during unprecedented times. Naturally, world events might get to you. But are you taking this out on your team? They deserve better than you being an ass.

I have been blogging about leadership for a few years now. I draw the subject matter from my observations of other leaders, the questions readers and clients ask, and from my own experiences and mistakes. To protect the privacy of others – and my ego – I usually veil names and circumstances when I relate a story … but this one is all about me!

My own experience leading in a crisis

I spent a few years leading a public-sector organization. Things were going very well until a series of events pushed me into a place where I wasn’t sure who I could trust. I felt many of the people I was working with weren’t acting ethically and I began to feel undermined, paranoid, and under attack.

On the ‘Fight, Flight or Freeze’ spectrum, I do not fly or freeze well. When threatened, my instinctive reaction to fight. In that setting and at that time, I felt my temper becoming quicker to light. I was in such a state that I once slammed a door so hard it nearly came off its hinges.

Not one of my finest moments.

Maybe, maybe my reaction was understandable. But it was unacceptable and inexcusable.

My personal and professional expectation is to hold myself to a higher standard. In times of uncertainty and adversity and crisis, any signs of leadership immaturity will make your employees feel unsafe and insecure.

I needed to be the paragon of composure and not an ass.

So, if you’re leading in a crisis, let me save you from these same mistakes.

Here are seven ways to maintain leadership composure during the most pressure-packed moments.

Get A Grip On Your Emotions

Grow up!

You are the adult in the room so learn not to wear your emotions on your sleeve. When you allow emotions to get in the way, your employees interpret this as you not being objective and too passionate about the situation.

Balance expressing concern and care while maintaining your composure.

Read more about demonstrating leadership even in tough times here.

Try Not To Take It Personally

There are lots of reasons why decisions and circumstances don’t always play out logically.

Remain calm and never start thinking that your moral indignation will justify your actions.

Keep Positive

Employees are always watching your actions, behaviour, relationships, and overall demeanour.

You must maintain a positive mental attitude and manage a narrative that keeps their employees inspired and hopeful–even when you’re leading in a crisis.

This is where your leadership and resolve can shine. Stay strong, smile, and demonstrate authentic compassion and empathy.

Remain Courageous

Fear is contagious. So, act like a duck! Calm on top and paddling like hell underwater.

No matter what kind of crisis you’re leading in, project a sense of steady confidence. That way, you will instill it in others.

Remain fearless and cool to communicate a sense of composure to those you lead.

For more on moral courage, click here.

Be Decisive

Maintain your composure and never show doubt.

Speak with conviction, confidence, and authority. This gives employees the comfort that everything is under control.

Be Accountable

You have chosen to assume leadership responsibility, and it’s more important than ever when you’re leading in a crisis. So take the required steps to problem solve before things get out of hand.

You Got This

The most effective way to maintain composure during challenges is to act like a leader.

You have solved complex problems many times before. Knuckle onto this one with the same compassion, elegance, and grace.

It’s easy to lose composure during times of crisis if you let worry turn into fear. By remaining calm and in control you can step back, critically evaluate what is going on.

Your composure puts those you lead at ease and creates a safe and secure workplace culture where no one needs panic in the face of adversity.

Leading in a crisis and beyond

Oh yeah, and don’t be an ass.

If you’ve been thinking about moving your career to the next level? Looking for support while you’re leading in a crisis? You’ll also want to have a look at my 1-on-1 coaching services.

If you enjoyed this article, be sure to check these out, too:

The High Cost of Poor Leadership
10 Signs You Have a Scary Boss
People Pleasing Leaders & Soup Sandwiches – 5 Messes You Make When You Try to Make Everyone Happy

This post was originally published in March 2017, and has been updated just for you!

Have you, as a leader, established a culture of safety in the workplace?

Leadership is not a position.

It is an attitude – management is the position.

One has nothing to do with the other.

Safety, too, is an attitude.

What is a culture of safety?

A culture of safety is a state of mind and a way of living your life. Safety is the result. Safety is the choice in every moment of every day.

Those with a safety leadership attitude who promote a culture of safety will choose to do the job safely at every moment.

Companies are waking up to the fact that people who blindly follow orders on a job site still get hurt. But safety leaders who choose safety in every moment save themselves from harm by the choices they make.

In the workplace, a culture of safety is quickly becoming a coveted element in any organization.

Developing a culture of safety

Here are the 7 cultural traits an organization with a culture of safety performers will possess:

Honesty

This comes wrapped in accountability and responsibility.

Any attempt to deflect accountability negates honesty. Honesty is the trait that allows leaders to be vulnerable and accept that they don’t know everything. You can fix what you don’t know, but you can’t fix what you cover-up. Honesty is a willingness to be who you are and make no excuses for it. Values and core beliefs are tied to honesty.

One of those core beliefs will be promoting a culture of safety and self-preservation.

Want to talk more about honesty? Please take a look at this post, where I discuss moral courage as a leadership characteristic.

Communication

This is the key to keeping yourself and others safe on a job site.

If no one is talking, then no one is listening. When no one is listening, instructions get missed, and people get hurt. Communication doesn’t happen by scolding or by lectures. People don’t respond well to scolding and being lectured. Communication involves conversation. People engage themselves in conversation.

When they are engaged, they are paying attention.

For more on communicating with your people, take a look at how to Improve Your Conversations By Not Talking – 3 Tips You Can Start Using Today.

Confidence

Anyone working without it is a prime candidate to get hurt. Some work is simply intimidating. And when a worker lacks confidence in performing the job, others are put at risk. When a worker is continuously scolded, they will lose their trust.

Lack of confidence is a distraction.

Setbacks happen on every job site. When a setback occurs, people turn to those who display confidence and an “I’ve got this” attitude–all commitment to a culture of safety.

Commitment

It’s perhaps the most contagious of all traits.

Working alongside those without the commitment to the job is tenuous. Knowing that a co-worker could quit at any moment leaves workers unsure and confidence on the job site wanes.

But when you are surrounded by those who have a deep-seated commitment to the job, it brings a sense of peace and sureness about doing the job safely. Commitment means to focus, and when workers are focused, they will act safely.

Positive Attitude

Regardless of whatever adversity you may face, your attitude is critical.

A positive attitude is what turns someone’s debilitating roadblock into a temporary setback that is easily overcome. People focused on the worst attract the worst. People who can find the silver lining will emerge as victors. They see what needs doing and take action instead of wallowing in fear. A positive, supportive worksite tends to attract those who will contribute to it.

Speaking of positivity, here are three 3-minute articles to discuss with your team to create a lifetime of positive change (for everyone).

Intuition

When you are plugged into your surroundings, you can see what is coming and prepare for it.

There is a quiet confidence in merely “knowing” what is about to happen. You can prepare yourself and those around you. You can address issues before they become issues. The tough decisions are easy to decide when you can depend on your gut instinct for answers.

Learning to trust yourself is as essential as your team learning to trust you.

Sense of Humour

There is no reason safety can’t be fun.

The benefits of being safe are happy and joyful. So why can’t we laugh on the job site?

There is little reason to laugh when you don’t feel confident, lack commitment, or frequently face safety issues. But when you and your workmates have a sense of self, have confidence, excellent communication, and a great attitude, there’s no reason that you can’t have fun at work.

Humour allows people to settle into their work comfortably.

Establishing a culture of safety is the new Leadership.

Start by looking for these seven traits in yourself and your teammates.

And if you want to talk about Leadership and a culture of safety at your next safety meeting, I can help.

 

If you enjoyed this article, be sure to check these out, too:

5 Steps You Can Use To Build a “First Team” Mindset
80% Of Projects Fail Because Of ‘People’ Issues … Here Are 6 Things You Can Do To Reduce That Risk
People Pleasing Leaders & Soup Sandwiches – 5 Messes You Make When You Try to Make Everyone Happy

This article was originally published in February 2019 and has been updated.

Much of success in business relies on getting everyone on the same page.

And inevitably someone has to choose to lead the charge in getting clarity. 

In the Army, we reviewed ‘comms’ (communications) procedures during pre-mission briefings to ensure that everyone would be on the “same frequency.”

In this case, gaining clarity could mean the difference between life and death.

In team sports like football and baseball, we see players and coaches using all sorts of signals and methods to achieve communications clarity to have precise execution of the play.

Without clarity things fall apart as the play unfolds; the feedback loop is immediate and obvious—from both the players and the fans.

The Challenge

At work, it is not as obvious as the fans booing you when there is a loss of alignment and focus.

I see it every day, and I understand why it’s so easy to fall into this trap.

We’re all uniquely designed and are naturally inclined to communicate in unique ways.

The goal is to understand your natural behaviour and make positive adjustments so that everyone clearly understands your message.

Clarifying Clarity Clues

Here are also two important clues to clear up the murky fog of communication and gain greater clarity –

Don’t assume that everyone hears (and visualizes) your message.

We have a natural tendency to assume that something is clear to us; we assume that it would be clear to everyone else. 

Using the sports analogy, teams usually have set plays, and they rehearse them in practice for weeks before they execute them in the game.

Work situations may not have a playbook, so when the leader calls the play, team members create their individual mental diagrams/pictures of what it’s supposed to look like.

Read about different images of the future

And,

Some are distracted and never even hear the message. 

As a leader, we must regularly and publicly clarify our expectations.  

At the top of the organization, most of these expectations are at the 37,000-foot level. 

As we move down the organization, the clarity needs to get more granular as standards more specifically to the tasks.

This is hard work because it takes mental discipline, time, and energy to clarify what is expected of our employees and to supervise the level of detail is required.

Read about expectations

Clarify Where You Are

How are you doing on clarifying standards and expectations?

Reflect on it yourself and look for times when people were not on the same frequency with you.

What happened?

Whose responsibility was it?

Get feedback from a couple of your stronger players on how well you are doing on clarity.

The author, Douglas Adams once said … “I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go by.”

According to a 2018 PMI (Project Management Institute) report, roughly 48% of projects don’t finish on schedule.  

Imagine, nearly half of all project deadlines are missed, resulting in increased costs, unhappy customers and ruins reputations and careers.  

What to do?

Here are three reasons deadlines are missed and what you can do to keep things or track:

1. Optimistic Planning Creates Unachievable Timelines

It is very human to be overly optimistic about how long it will take to complete a task.

This is called “planning fallacy.” (A theory developed in 1977 by Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky)

Imagine your last project took 16 months to complete. It’s natural to assume you can do it in less time, because now you have more knowledge and experience.

But that optimism can quickly lead to missed deadlines.

Other causes of optimistic timelines are:

• • • Assuming the project will go as planned, with no issues.
    • Not understanding how long it’s taken to complete similar projects.
    • Failure to realize constraints on resource.

How to Create Realistic Timelines

The key to a more realistic schedule is to rely on analysis and data.

If you’ve completed similar projects in the past, use that data as the basis for realistic estimates. The more data you have, the more confident you can be in your estimates.

If you don’t have enough past project data to guide you, then you can use the following methods:

Method 1: Use a multi-point estimation technique

Take multiple estimates and combine them to arrive at a more realistic timeline. For example, average:

1. 1. 1. The most optimistic amount of time you think it will take.
      2. The most pessimistic amount of time you think it will take.
      3. The amount of time you believe it’s most likely to take.

Method 2: Engage your team to create ‘bottom-up’ estimates

A bottom-up approach to estimating requires that you build your timeline by having team members estimating each individual task and then combining them to arrive at an overall project estimate.

This ensures tasks they may understand but you may not be aware of are not over-looked.

And, you increase employee buy-in and confidence in the schedule.

Method 3: Build in Contingencies

By building contingencies into your schedule, you can help account for known and unknown risks, which will result in a more achievable timeline. It’s typically a flat 5–10% of the project cost and/or timeline added to the schedule baseline in case something unforeseen occurs.

2. Unclear Expectations Result in Missed Deadlines

If your team is unclear on when a deadline is, how can they meet it?

Communication problems can lead to you thinking your team understood their deadline when they didn’t.

Imagine the following conversation:

You: “Can you get this back to me by Thursday, at the latest?”

Team member: “Well, I don’t know. There are may be defects, if I have to correct errors, then I doubt I’ll be able to complete this before Monday.”

You: “Look, unless they’re critical, just leave the bugs and focus on this. I really need it no later than Friday.”

Team member: “Alright, I’ll try my best.”

Based on this conversation, the boss expects the task to be completed Thursday unless there are critical defects.

The team member believes they have till Friday, unless there are critical bugs, then Monday is the drop-dead deadline.

How to Communicate Expectations Clearly

Here are three ways you can ensure your team understands their deadlines.

Method 1: Use your project management systems

If you assign work informally or inconsistently, it can be easily misunderstood, forgotten, or considered unimportant.

When you hand out assignments verbally, people can easily forget about what was discussed or misconstrue your words. For instance, if you say, “I’d like to see this by the end of the week,” a team member may see that as a request and not a hard deadline.

When their name is assigned to a task in project the end date in the system allows for no question as to when their deadline is.

Method 2: Implement feedback loops

A feedback loop, or communication loop, is a simple process for ensuring what you’ve communicated has been heard and understood.

You ask them to repeat back to you what their deadlines are. In our hypothetical conversation, imagine if the team member was asked what the agreed-upon deadline was and replied: “Friday, unless there are critical defects, then Monday.”

You would have the opportunity to clarify expectations before missed deadlines.

Method 3: Conduct check-ins

The last thing you want is to discover after the deadline was missed that there was a misunderstanding as to when it was.

By incorporating periodic check-ins into your schedule, you’re achieving three things:

1. 1. Creating opportunities to remind employees of a deadline.
   2. Re-communicating the importance of that deadline.
   3. Creating opportunities for team members to give you feedback to so you better understand what is going on and identify potential problems and warning signs, without having to micromanage your team.

3. Poor Time Management

If you asked people how many hours a day they spend doing productive, project-related work, what answer would they give? Assuming an 8-hour work day, they may guess 7–8 hours.

But, research shows that this is a huge overestimate.

There are coffee breaks, bathroom breaks, smoke breaks and visiting.

In an average 8-hour work day, most people only accomplish 5 hours of productive work. Much of which is multi-tasking and constant interruptions.

In reality, your team is achieving less than 50% of their time doing uninterrupted productive work each week.

If you are assuming a 35–40-hour work week, but only achieving 12.5–25 hours of work, there is no wonder there are missed deadlines!

How to Improve Employee Time Management

Here are three ways you can help your team better manage their time and become more productive:

Method 1: Reduce time wasters

Have your employees record what and how they spent their time.

By tracking their own time for a few days, your team can discover time wasters and discover bottlenecks in the process, such as the time they’re forced to sit idle while waiting for reviews or approvals.

Or time spent in unproductive or unnecessary meetings. Consider giving your employees permission to attend only the meetings they are directly impacted by and allow them to excuse themselves from the unnecessary ones.  

Method 2: Eliminate distractions and interruptions

While being connected and accessible can boost collaboration and communication among the team, it can also detract from productivity.

Every time we’re interrupted, it destroys our focus, time that could otherwise be used to meet project deadlines.   

Here are three ways you can help your team eliminate distractions and interruptions:

1. 1. Encourage blocking time for specific tasks.
   2. Recommend employees only check email and messages at designated times.
   3. Provide a quiet, isolated space such as an empty office for employees working on anything complex or high-priority.  

Method 3: Avoid overloading your team

You may find that your team is still over-allocated, after all you can’t completely remove emails, meetings, and other interruptions.

Even if you can help your employees achieve 30 hours of productive work a week, you’re still overloading them by assuming a 35-40-hour work week in your schedule.

When people cannot get everything done in the time allotted to them deadlines will slip.

If your team members have too much on their plates, you will need to either increase the size of the team or push out the timelines.

If some of their workload is for another project or manager, ensure everyone is aligned on what is prioritized, and work together to agree to an attainable schedule.

Conclusion

Missed deadlines are all too common across all industries and businesses.

If your team is one of the nearly half of project teams with missed deadlines, it’s due to one of three problems: overly optimistic estimates, unclear deadline expectations, or poor time management.

Fortunately, all three of these are avoidable.

By following the advice above, you can ensure that your team doesn’t miss another deadline from here on out.