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Management Observation Program Best Practice 11 – Anyone Can Write an Observation

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StrategyDriven Management Observation Program Best Practice ArticleThe name, Management Observation Program, suggests that authorship of these documented performance assessments are or should be limited to those who supervise work. Yet, in a healthy organization, workers are encouraged to provide upward feedback and report conditions adverse to quality. All organizations should embrace a safety culture within which individuals are responsible for both their safety and the safety of their coworkers. (See StrategyDriven whitepaper, Preventing Catastrophic Industrial Accidents) So why not allow everyone within the organization to submit management observations?

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About the Author

Nathan Ives, StrategyDriven Principal is a StrategyDriven Principal and Host of the StrategyDriven Podcast. For over twenty years, he has served as trusted advisor to executives and managers at dozens of Fortune 500 and smaller companies in the areas of management effectiveness, organizational development, and process improvement. To read Nathan’s complete biography, click here.

The Big Picture of Business – Communications Reflect Your Strategy

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The biggest problem with our business in our society, in a capsule sentence: People with one set of experiences, values, wants and perceptions make mis-targeted attempts to communicate with others in trying to get what they want and need.

Success is just in front of our faces. Yet, we often fail to see it coming. Too many companies live with their heads in the sand. Many go down into defeat because it was never on their radar to change.

One of the biggest cop-outs that businesses in denial use is the term Messaging. They say, “We’re in the right business. We only need to improve our messaging.” That’s a rationalization to avoid confronting key strategic issues.

7 Biggest Communication Obstacles:

  1. Lack of people skills, manners
  2. Wrong facts
  3. Denial-avoidance of the real issues
  4. Non-communication
  5. Saying the wrong things at the wrong times, for the wrong reasons
  6. Failure to pick up subtle clues
  7. Failure to master communication as an art

7 Levels of Communicating:

  1. Sending out messages we wish-need to communicate.
  2. Sending messages which are intended for the listener.
  3. Communicating with many people at the same time.
  4. Eliciting feedback from audiences.
  5. Two-way communication process.
  6. Adapting and improving communications with experience.
  7. Developing communications as a vital tool of business and life.

Lack of communication is symptomatic of fear, which is the biggest handicap for any company. Because of fear, productivity suffers, turnover increases and profitability drops. There are four main fears in the business environment:

  • Reprisal. This includes disciplining, termination, transfer to an undesirable position. When employees fear reprisal, more effort is spent on affixing blame to others than achieving pro-active progress.
  • Communication. Rather than risk going out on a limb, employees either don’t learn or use their communication skills. This stymies employees’ professional development and hampers company productivity.
  • Not knowing. Rather than admit areas where information is lacking, employees often cover up, disseminating erroneous data, which comes back to hurt others. The wise employee has the building of knowledge a part of their career path… sharing with others what we most recently and most effectively learn.
  • Change. Managers and employees with the most to lose are most fearful of change. Their biggest fear is the unknown. Research shows that 90% of change is good. If people knew how beneficial that change is, they would not fight it so much.

Each member of the organization should understand and covet the position they play. It is just as important how, when and why we communicate with each other:

  • Shows that the company is a seamless concept… an integrated team working for the good of customers.
  • Indicates sophistication by each representative… that every team player knows how to utilize each other for mutual benefit.
  • Reminds customers that the company is detail-focused and quality-oriented… with an eye toward continually improving.
  • Underscores how internal communications are comparable to the way we will interface with customers.

Pictures Convey Impressions, Symbolic of Corporate Culture.

One of the hottest and most accessible vehicles is the photograph. With cameras now on phones, people are snapping more pictures than ever before. Some get distributed on the internet, through social media and in direct transfer to friends.

This resurgence in photography comes after a conversion of the industry from film to digital. Photography is presently at an all-time high in terms of societal impact. The irony is that its principal corporate contributor (Eastman Kodak) fell by the wayside, a victim of changing technologies. The same fate had fallen the electronics industry, whose innovator (the Thomas Edison Electric Company) fell behind others in leading the trends and usage.

Photographs convey thoughts, ideas and experiences. Hopefully, their usages represent thoughtful communications. Organizations can see photography as a boon to their business, if utilized properly.

Every business person and company needs a website and social media presence. Photographs convey what you’re doing new. They’re indicative of the scope of your business activity.

Use photography to personify the company. Pictures draw relationships to the customers. Think of creative ways to show employees doing great work. Show customers as benefiting from the services that you offer.

Most companies would do well to devote a portion of its homepage to its charitable involvements. Show employees as being engaged in community activities. Promote and graphically portray your company’s designated cause-related marketing activities. Interface with outside communities tends to grow your stakeholder base.

Don’t just view photography as something that everyone does. Establish company ground rules for the usage of pictures. Tie activities to customer outcomes (the tenet of Customer Focused Management).

Nourish Communications Skills

It is important to generate ideas and suggestions via writing memos, E-mail messages and internal documents. Their succinctness and regularity of issue have a direct relationship to your compensation and the company’s bottom line.

Before presenting ideas to a customer or prospect, consider organizing your approach:

  • Predict reasons why someone might oppose your suggestions.
  • Seek out supporters, early-on.
  • Determine goals. Is the objective to get the idea accepted or get credit for it?
  • Understand your audience. Understand differing personality types of your audiences.
  • Think of yourselves as leaders, who are good communicators.
  • Listen as others amplify upon the idea, which shows their buy-in potential.
  • Determine as much accuracy in others’ perceptions to your ideas. Don’t fool yourself or be blind-sighted to opposition.
  • Throw out decoy ideas for others to shoot down, so they don’t attack your core message.
  • Use language that is easily understood by all. Avoid technical terms, unless you include brief definitions.
  • Don’t over-exaggerate in promises and predictions.

Other pointers in effectively communicating include:

  • Speak with authority.
  • Make the most of face-to-face meetings, rather than through artificial barriers.
  • Remember that voice inflection, eye contact and body language are more important than the words you use.
  • Charts, graphs and illustrative materials make more impact for your points.
  • Don’t assume anything. If in doubt about their understanding, ask qualifying questions. Become a better listener.
  • Sound the best on the phone that you can.
  • Use humor successfully.
  • Get feedback. Validate that audiences have heard your intended messages.
  • Attitude is everything in effective communications.

About the Author

Power Stars to Light the Business Flame, by Hank Moore, encompasses a full-scope business perspective, invaluable for the corporate and small business markets. It is a compendium book, containing quotes and extrapolations into business culture, arranged in 76 business categories.

Hank’s latest book functions as a ‘PDR of business,’ a view of Big Picture strategies, methodologies and recommendations. This is a creative way of re-treading old knowledge to enable executives to master change rather than feel as they’re victims of it.

Power Stars to Light the Business Flameis now out in all three e-book formats: iTunes, Kindle, and Nook.

Building Trust Develops Team Cohesiveness

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LDRSHIP is an acronym for the seven core values of the U.S. Army: Loyalty, Duty, Respect, Selfless service, Honor, Integrity, and Personal courage. These principles were instilled in me during my eight years in the U.S. Army Infantry, and later in my career as a Drill Sergeant. These values were foundational to many of my business decisions. The growing reality in retrospect is that these same principles not only made me an effective leader, but they enabled me to develop something in the workplace that every organization strives for but often struggles to achieve: team cohesiveness.

Team cohesiveness doesn’t simply happen, it is created. It’s created through a process of due diligence and a deliberate effort to intentionally and consistently integrate the seven core values into the workplace. Simply put, one has to try. With consistency, trust will be developed.

Developing this trust starts with loyalty. Loyalty is subjective, but its basic definition is faithfulness to the commitments you’ve made and remaining true to the obligations at hand. That means you need to look out for your employees, defend them, advocate for them, and represent them — they are your team. Let your words and actions demonstrate that you’re committed to your team, and doing so consistently will mean that the depth of your commitment is never questioned but it’s understood to be deeply rooted and unbending. This established sense of loyalty builds team harmony because of the trust that it creates. You know what it feels like when somebody truly and legitimately supports you. Did it empower you? Do your employees feel the way you do when a team has your back?

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About the Author

Jason LevesqueCEO Jason Levesque, a US Army veteran and entrepreneur, founded Argo Marketing in 2003, and has become a widely respected Maine business owner. Jason has created numerous job opportunities and he remains committed to further developing and supporting his local community. Argo Marketing Group currently has three offices located in Portland, Lewiston, and Pittsfield, Maine; making Argo Marketing Group one of the largest privately held, third party contact center operations in North America.

The Big Picture of Business – The Statistics Tree: Understanding Figures and What They Symbolize, Relating Directly to Your Business Success

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Business bases much of what it does on statistics. Most often, they’re financial numbers or sales goals. More importantly are the Big Picture statistics that affect every aspect of business growth and success. The way in which the bigger issues are interpreted has direct bearing on strategy and implementation.

Here are some of the most significant statistics that relate to your ability to do business:

Only 2% of the businesses have a plan of any kind. What many of them think is a plan include some accounting figures or sales goals. That is not a full-scope plan. Of the companies who continue to operate without a plan, 40% of them will be out of business in the next 10 years.

Only 2% of those who call themselves Consultants really are just that. That 2% includes all the doctors, lawyers, accountants and engineers… those of us who actually advise. Most so-called consultants are vendors who peddle what they have to sell, rather than what the client companies really need. The answer is for companies to utilize seasoned advisers, rather than coaches and other vendors.

Research shows that change is 90% positive and beneficial. Why, then, do many organizations fight what is in their best interest? The average person and organization changes 71% per year. The mastery of change is to benefit from it, rather than become a victim of it.

92% of all business mistakes may be attributed to poor management decisions. 85% of the time, a formal program of crisis preparedness will help the organization to avert the crisis. The average person spends 150 hours each year in looking for misplaced information and files. One learns three times more from failure than from success. Failures are the surest tracks toward future successes.

One-third of the Gross National Product is sent each year toward cleaning up mistakes, rework, make-goods, corrective action and correcting defects. Yet, only 5.1% is spent on education, which is the key to avoiding mistakes on the front end.

50% of the population reads books. 50% do not. Of all high school graduates, 37% will never read another book after formal schooling. Of all college graduates, 16% will never read another book. Thus, a declining overall level of education in our society and serious challenges faced by organizations in training the workforce. Yet, the holdings of the world’s libraries are doubling every 14 years.

Today’s work force requires three times the amount of training they now get in order to remain competitive in the future. 29% of the work force wants their boss’ job. 70% of corporate CEOs think that business is too much focused on the short-term.

The human brain has more than 300 million component parts. The human brain connects to 13 billion nerves in the body. The human body has 600 muscles. The human body has 206 bones. The average person speaks 30,000 words per day. The average person is bombarded with more than 600 messages per day. More enlightened, actively communicating people are bombarded with more than 900 messages per day.

98% of all new business starts are small businesses. 45% of small business owners are children of small business owners. 83% of all domestic companies have fewer than 20 employees. Only 7% of all companies have 100 or more employees.

The current success rate for organizational hires is 14%. If further research is put into looking at the total person and truly fitting the person to the job, then the success rate soars to 75%. That involves testing and more sophisticated hiring practices.

Retaining good employees, involving training, motivation and incentives, is yet another matter. According to research conducted by the Ethics Resource Center:

  • Employees of organizations steal 10 times more than do shoplifters.
  • Employee theft and shoplifting accounting for 15% of the retail cost of merchandise.
  • 35% of employees steal from the company.
  • 28% of those who steal think that they deserve what they take.
  • 21% of those who steal think that the boss can afford the losses.
  • 56% of employees lie to supervisors.
  • 41% of employees falsify records and reports.
  • 31% of the workforce abuses substances.

On any given day, Americans spend over $33 million buying lottery tickets. On that same day, 99 American families fall below the poverty line. 68% of Americans do not like to take chances. 5% of all Americans go to McDonald’s every day.

99% of American women think that contributing to or bettering society is important. 35% of Americans are involved in community service and charity activities. During the last 3,500 years, the world has been at peace only 8 percent of the time.

Data from the Census Bureau shows that 69% of new companies with employees survive at least two years, and that 51% survive at least five years. An independent analysis by the Bureau of Labor Statistics shows that 49% of new businesses survive for five years or more. 34% of new businesses survive ten years or more, and 26% are still in business at least 15 years after being started.

Small businesses really do drive the economy. Many people believe that businesses frequently fail because there are a large number closing every year. In 2009, for example, more than 550,000 businesses were opened, and more than 660,000 closed. This occurred during a recession. However, during an economic expansion, the number of new businesses would outnumber the closures.

Many people may not realize how many small businesses there are in the country. In 2011, the Department of Commerce estimated that there were 27.5 million businesses in the United States. Only 18,000 of those businesses had more than 500 employees, and the rest were considered small businesses.

29% are still in business at the end of year 10. And the biggest drop comes in the first 5 years, when half of startups go belly up. This shows that the odds are against startups staying in business. The internet home business success rate is only 5%.

7 Primary Factors of Business Failure:

  1. Failure to value and optimize true company resources.
  2. Poor premises, policies, processes, procedures, precedents and planning.
  3. Opportunities not heeded or capitalized.
  4. The wrong people, in the wrong jobs. Under-trained employees.
  5. The wrong consultants (miscast, untrained, improperly used).
  6. Lack of articulated focus and vision. With no plan, no journey will be completed.
  7. Lack of movement means falling behind the pack and eventually losing ground.

What Could Have Reduced These High Costs:

  1. Effective policies and procedures.
  2. Setting and respecting boundaries.
  3. Realistic expectations and measurements.
  4. Training and development of people.
  5. Commitments to quality at all links in the chain.
  6. Planning.
  7. Organizational vision.

Success is just in front of our faces. Yet, we often fail to see it coming. Too many companies live with their heads in the sand. Many go down into defeat because it was never on their radar to change.

About the Author

Power Stars to Light the Business Flame, by Hank Moore, encompasses a full-scope business perspective, invaluable for the corporate and small business markets. It is a compendium book, containing quotes and extrapolations into business culture, arranged in 76 business categories.

Hank’s latest book functions as a ‘PDR of business,’ a view of Big Picture strategies, methodologies and recommendations. This is a creative way of re-treading old knowledge to enable executives to master change rather than feel as they’re victims of it.

Power Stars to Light the Business Flameis now out in all three e-book formats: iTunes, Kindle, and Nook.

The Advisor’s Corner – How Do I Establish a Decision-Making Protocol?

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How Do I Establish a Decision-Making Protocol?Question:

What can we do to clean up decision-making habits in my workplace? No one seems to know who is making which decisions and it’s driving us all crazy!

StrategyDriven Response: (by Roxi Hewertson, StrategyDriven Principal Contributor)

Leaders get into trouble far too often simply because they don’t have good decision-making protocols in place on their team or in their business. If a decision matters to you, then make your decision matter!

Here are several all too common scenarios:

  • People keep wondering, “Who is making the decision about…?” and feel they are powerless to do anything in the meantime.
  • Someone comes up to you and says, “Why didn’t anyone tell me about that decision; it impacts my work?”
  • Another person says, “Well, if she’d already made the decision, why did she ask me my opinion?”
  • You hear, “When will he decide – he’s holding up everything at my end!”

There is such a simple way to prevent these and many other ‘dropped balls’ from happening in your workplace. Once you get in the habit of asking these 5 questions of yourself and/or your team, each and every time, you’ll find it could take as few as 60 seconds to get to the answers. Even better, it will save you and others frustration, confusion, hard feelings, lost time and lost profits. Best yet, you’ll gain more respect from those you lead because they can trust you to make decisions well.

5 Key Decision Making Questions

1. WHAT IS THE DECISION that needs to be made? BE EXPLICIT including who and what will be impacted. You need to know exactly what is to be decided. There are often layers of related decisions that need to be made – that’s why you need to start here. When you can clearly articulate the decision, you know what it is – and when you can’t, you don’t. So begin with a lot of clarity.

2. WHOSE DECISION IS IT? Again, you must BE EXPLICIT. This is essential to know and communicate upfront to the people who are impacted. Are you the decision maker? Is it a group? Do you want input or do you want others to make the decision? I’ve often observed that more anxiety is created by not knowing who is making a decision than even the decision itself. And, people lose trust if you pretend their input matters when you’ve already made the decision.

3. WHAT METHOD will you use to decide? Will this be a consensus decision everyone must be able to live with and support? Is it a majority, a plurality, or 2/3 vote, a unanimous agreement, or something else?

4. WHEN WILL THE DECISION BE MADE? The timeline is important for you and other people who are impacted. With a timeline, the decision can be managed well and people can get on with their work. Taking too long or not long enough can be frustrating and create unintended and even dysfunctional outcomes.

5. HOW AND TO WHOM WILL THE DECISION BE COMMUNICATED? This is often overlooked, and yet the success of a decision depends so much on how well it’s communicated. Consider who needs to know, who’s the messenger, how it will be shared, and through what means – in person, by email, over a loud speaker…Often the choice of messenger sends a message all it’s own – is it you, a team, your boss, someone else? The message will be perceived differently depending on the messenger.

It takes a lot of time and energy and sometimes money, to clean up the messes that happen when your decision-making is reactive or ad hoc. I really hope you will make it a point to be proactive in your decision-making because it’s a lot more fun when you are running your life and work instead of letting life and work run you.

About the Author

Leadership authority Roxana (Roxi) Hewertson is a no-nonsense business veteran revered for her nuts-and-bolts, tell-it-like-it-is approach and practical, out-of-the-box insights that help both emerging and expert managers, executives and owners boost quantifiable job performance in various mission critical facets of business. Through AskRoxi.com, Roxi — “the Dear Abby of Leadership” — imparts invaluable free advice to managers and leaders at all levels, from the bullpen to the boardroom, to help them solve problems, become more effective and realize a higher measure of business and career success.

The StrategyDriven website was created to provide members of our community with insights to the actions that help create the shared vision, focus, and commitment needed to improve organizational alignment and accountability for the achievement of superior results. We look forward to answering your strategic planning and tactical business execution questions. Please email your questions to [email protected].