In CV's (or résumé) you often see the phrase results driven. Sounds impressive doesn't it?
I have to admit that this is better than just doing a task in order to tick a box, irrespective of it's outcome. To be actively seeking to deliver a result rather than just blindly following the process likely set in place by someone else, unquestionably and without thought. Not bad.
However, maybe the phrase should be outcome driven or effect driven or purpose driven or even worth driven (See the book, The Gift: How the Creative Spirit Transforms the World by Lewis Hyde on the idea of worth).
Perhaps this is a better way for you to define your hard work and labours. Perhaps this might encourage you to consider the reason for, and the value of, the results you work so hard to deliver.
Considered this way, are your results still so impressive?
Please see my website at www.managingforthefirsttime.com for more techniques, tips and advice on this topic and others.
Wednesday 31 August 2011
Wednesday 24 August 2011
Appropriateness of Feedback
This Sunday morning as I was sitting having breakfast and surfing the web on my iPad (I know; I should really put it down) when I started to read a comments trail which followed a researcher's open request on LinkedIn to complete their masters dissertation questionnaire.
I had responded to the request earlier in the week by completing the survey online. I feel it's right to support those that are asking for relatively free things from others (5 minutes of your time) especially if it's for student research (I was a student too looking for support).
I found that people were using the open forum comments section to criticise and denounce aspects of the survey they did not agree with. It staggered me as to how damaging this feedback was.
Feedback is supposed to be a gift
Usually I find that managers find it hard to give valuable and constructive (but often negative) feedback to support and develop their employees. I work hard to support them to have the management courage to ignore the short term uncomfortable situation in order to give this ultimately positively impacting feedback.
Here I found feedback being given but in entirely the wrong way. I could see it being taken in no other way than negatively, with no real support to help the individual improve. One of the biggest problems was that it was given in an open forum, hardly an environment where the individual would be focused on the feedback itself and learning from it, rather than worrying about what everyone else reading it would be thinking.
Would you walk up to one of your employees in the middle of the office and give them feedback in front of everyone else on what they did wrong and what you therefore thought of their work? Of course not.
That's the key message with feedback.
It has to be given in a way that helps and directs the individual to make the improvement by promoting reflection and learning. Anything other than that is scoring points against them. You may not mean it, but that's the impact.
Feedback is a gift but as the giver of it (the communicator), you have to responsibility to ensure you do it right.
Please see my website at www.managingforthefirsttime.com for more techniques, tips and advice on this topic and others.
(Photo by striatic via flickr used under a creative Commons Licence)
I found that people were using the open forum comments section to criticise and denounce aspects of the survey they did not agree with. It staggered me as to how damaging this feedback was.
Feedback is supposed to be a gift
Usually I find that managers find it hard to give valuable and constructive (but often negative) feedback to support and develop their employees. I work hard to support them to have the management courage to ignore the short term uncomfortable situation in order to give this ultimately positively impacting feedback.
Here I found feedback being given but in entirely the wrong way. I could see it being taken in no other way than negatively, with no real support to help the individual improve. One of the biggest problems was that it was given in an open forum, hardly an environment where the individual would be focused on the feedback itself and learning from it, rather than worrying about what everyone else reading it would be thinking.
Would you walk up to one of your employees in the middle of the office and give them feedback in front of everyone else on what they did wrong and what you therefore thought of their work? Of course not.
That's the key message with feedback.
It has to be given in a way that helps and directs the individual to make the improvement by promoting reflection and learning. Anything other than that is scoring points against them. You may not mean it, but that's the impact.
Feedback is a gift but as the giver of it (the communicator), you have to responsibility to ensure you do it right.
Please see my website at www.managingforthefirsttime.com for more techniques, tips and advice on this topic and others.
(Photo by striatic via flickr used under a creative Commons Licence)
Saturday 20 August 2011
Give a Due Date for everything
This is one of the simplest techniques I think I have every learned in management. When assigning a task or discussing it, make sure you assign a due date to it right then and there.
Now it might need reviewing or modifying later but that will be a conscious decision. Not setting one on the other hand leaves things open to interpretation and inevitably to slipages and missed expectations.
It also has two additional benefits:
1. It reinforces that it is important. By giving a due date you are implying that it is important enough for you to set a follow up date up front. Don't underestimate these unspoken messages.
2. It simply makes it very easy for you to plan your follow up and takes it off your mind. You don't need to put any more thought into how and when to revisit the topic. Just put a reminder in your diary, and forget about it. Not doing this will mean that it is always on your mind worrying about when the right time is to follow up. That's not time well spent in my opinion.
These are such simple (almost insultingly obvious) things yet we fail to do them and make our lives harder time and time again.
Do yourself a favour and try and remember this one thing this week. I guarantee you'll see some results immediately.
Please see my website at www.managingforthefirsttime.com for more techniques, tips and advice on this topic and others.
(Photo by Claude via flickr used under a creative Commons Licence)
Now it might need reviewing or modifying later but that will be a conscious decision. Not setting one on the other hand leaves things open to interpretation and inevitably to slipages and missed expectations.
It also has two additional benefits:
1. It reinforces that it is important. By giving a due date you are implying that it is important enough for you to set a follow up date up front. Don't underestimate these unspoken messages.
2. It simply makes it very easy for you to plan your follow up and takes it off your mind. You don't need to put any more thought into how and when to revisit the topic. Just put a reminder in your diary, and forget about it. Not doing this will mean that it is always on your mind worrying about when the right time is to follow up. That's not time well spent in my opinion.
These are such simple (almost insultingly obvious) things yet we fail to do them and make our lives harder time and time again.
Do yourself a favour and try and remember this one thing this week. I guarantee you'll see some results immediately.
Please see my website at www.managingforthefirsttime.com for more techniques, tips and advice on this topic and others.
(Photo by Claude via flickr used under a creative Commons Licence)
Wednesday 17 August 2011
Reactions to Guidelines and Frameworks for Personal Development
There has been a lot of talk over the past week or two in the UK about the government's new five a day parenting guidelines.
A positive article from the BBC can be found here whilst a more scathing one from The Telegraph can be found here.
This has sparked a great debate about whether people should be told or even helped in the 'right' way to raise their child. On one side, the argument is that parents who don't know should be helped through guidelines and education. On the other, parents should be left to do the right thing for their child rather than a one size fits all approach.
Intervention
A lot of the debate is around the word 'intervention' (which I particularly dislike, but seems to have become the word of choice in training and development circles).
The 5 a day proponents say that this is not intervention anyway, merely proportional help and that without it further intervention may be inevitable later in life (schooling/social/criminal etc problems) if the parent fails in the role. The opponents clearly don't agree with intervention at an early stage.
So I guess the question is what does the parent need and how best to identify and then satisfy that development need. This same situation appears in the workplace all the time.
How do you help people to understand something that they might not currently even have awareness of? Intervention is only intervention (assuming the negative connotation) when it be forced upon a person who already has awareness and have chosen to either develop in a certain and different way, or not at all, but with a rationale behind their choice.
Just a reference point?
I honestly can't see why guidance and a framework aren't a great place to start. Those with awareness can find their place in that framework and develop from there. Those with no awareness might just have their eyes opened to the possibility and pathway to develop. Surely that's a win-win and doesn't sound like a 'one size fits all' at all.
Those ready to fight it seem to want to fight whether it's right or not, whether it's needed or not. They don't seem open to the idea that everyone can improve and be ready to ask themselves "where am I in this framework and do I need to do something to develop". Perhaps it's a fear thing, to analyse yourself. Blame the framework, rather than focus on themselves and how best to use the information to their advantage.
I'm sure that you see this type of behaviour in the workplace all the time. People who think their way is the right way without referencing outside influences or new ideas. You must constantly challenge this with new ideas and external reference points. Challenge your team to be unafraid to constantly reassess. The answer might be that they are in the right place already, but it's good to check.
There is nothing to fear and everything to gain. Try and help them understand that.
Please see my website at www.managingforthefirsttime.com for more techniques, tips and advice on this topic and others.
A positive article from the BBC can be found here whilst a more scathing one from The Telegraph can be found here.
This has sparked a great debate about whether people should be told or even helped in the 'right' way to raise their child. On one side, the argument is that parents who don't know should be helped through guidelines and education. On the other, parents should be left to do the right thing for their child rather than a one size fits all approach.
Intervention
A lot of the debate is around the word 'intervention' (which I particularly dislike, but seems to have become the word of choice in training and development circles).
The 5 a day proponents say that this is not intervention anyway, merely proportional help and that without it further intervention may be inevitable later in life (schooling/social/criminal etc problems) if the parent fails in the role. The opponents clearly don't agree with intervention at an early stage.
So I guess the question is what does the parent need and how best to identify and then satisfy that development need. This same situation appears in the workplace all the time.
How do you help people to understand something that they might not currently even have awareness of? Intervention is only intervention (assuming the negative connotation) when it be forced upon a person who already has awareness and have chosen to either develop in a certain and different way, or not at all, but with a rationale behind their choice.
Just a reference point?
I honestly can't see why guidance and a framework aren't a great place to start. Those with awareness can find their place in that framework and develop from there. Those with no awareness might just have their eyes opened to the possibility and pathway to develop. Surely that's a win-win and doesn't sound like a 'one size fits all' at all.
Those ready to fight it seem to want to fight whether it's right or not, whether it's needed or not. They don't seem open to the idea that everyone can improve and be ready to ask themselves "where am I in this framework and do I need to do something to develop". Perhaps it's a fear thing, to analyse yourself. Blame the framework, rather than focus on themselves and how best to use the information to their advantage.
I'm sure that you see this type of behaviour in the workplace all the time. People who think their way is the right way without referencing outside influences or new ideas. You must constantly challenge this with new ideas and external reference points. Challenge your team to be unafraid to constantly reassess. The answer might be that they are in the right place already, but it's good to check.
There is nothing to fear and everything to gain. Try and help them understand that.
Please see my website at www.managingforthefirsttime.com for more techniques, tips and advice on this topic and others.
Wednesday 10 August 2011
Checklists (People still aren't realising their value)
Whilst scanning the news online this week, I saw an interesting question on this very subject by the BBC writer, Michael Blastland entitled Go Figure: Tick box v check-list.
You can read the whole article but to summarise it, you've got to get past the idea of a checklist being a way to have to stop thinking. You're probably sick of me saying this but Begin with the Outcome in Mind. Answer this first, what is the purpose of using a checklist; what is its value?
The purpose of a checklist is to compliment and aid the thinking process, not replace it.
Until this is understood and bought into a don't think people will ever get past the idea of 'tick box'. Tick box suggests doing following the list simply in order to satisfy its own purpose. A checklist however has a measure of value in it. It is a check. That check is the value add.
Be really honest with yourself and ask how many simple mistakes you or for team made this week. How many? 1, 2, 10?
I used a checklist today and stopped 4 mistakes becoming issues which would have come back to bite in about 2 weeks time. 15 minutes to save about a days potential non value added work to fix the issues (let alone the grief and loss of reputation)?
Do yourself a favour and think seriously about how (with the right focus) checklists can help you and avoid becoming another tick box activity in your life.
Please see my website at www.managingforthefirsttime.com for more techniques, tips and advice on this topic and others.
(Photo by AlanCleaver via flickr used under a creative Commons Licence)
Wednesday 3 August 2011
Who's on your reading list?
An original thought is hard to come by nowadays with your thinking becoming a culmination of influences and inputs from a whole host of sources. This is no bad thing as the output is always greater than the sum of its parts.
So who do I follow? Whose 'Tribe' am I in? Who do I listen to?
I thought I would share some of my influences to open up your world to some of mine.
Creative thinkers
So who do I follow? Whose 'Tribe' am I in? Who do I listen to?
I thought I would share some of my influences to open up your world to some of mine.
Creative thinkers
- Seth Godin - This blog and books - A great provoker and has never ceased to make me think
- Dan Pink - His books and twitter feed - You must read 'Drive'
- Merlin Mann - I don't much follow him specifically as I really struggle to handle his rambling communication style but he does keep popping up with some great stuff
- Garr Reynolds - His blog and books - He really knows what presentation is all about
- Nancy Duarte - Great books and presentation design
- Ted Talks - By various folks, check out as many as you can
Efficiency and Productivity (making your life and work easier)
- David Allen - The master of Getting things Done (GTD), Essential Reading
- David Sparks - His books, blog and webcast (MacPowerUsers) - Just the nicest guy on using a mac and getting on with work and life
- Kourosh Dini - Brilliant GTD, OmniFocus and Pomodoro advice
- Practically Efficient - Tips and tricks, aways worth a read of the blog
- Asian Efficiency - Great web site and guides to using OmniFocus and twitter feed (although repeats their posts a lot)
I hope you try a few of these and get as much from them as I do. Enjoy.
Please see my website at www.managingforthefirsttime.com for more techniques, tips and advice on this topic and others.
Please see my website at www.managingforthefirsttime.com for more techniques, tips and advice on this topic and others.
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