Leading at Light Speed©

Ten Quantum Leaps to Build High-Performing Organizations

Categories » Leadership Development

August 11th, 2010

Helping New Managers Achieve “Flow”

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In my new book, “Leading at Light Speed,” I describe in detail the 10 quantum leaps needed to build high performing companies in a time of accelerating change. The sixth quantum leap is “Stimulate Creative Flow.” I was reminded yesterday why this sixth quantum leap is so important as I facilitated a discussion about helping new supervisors and managers be successful.

Why is the concept of “flow” important?  The reason is simple. People who are in a state of flow do their jobs better.  They show a high level of focused attention and intrinsic satisfaction. As a result, they are both happier and more effective.

According to the author Mihály Csíkszentmihályi, there are three conditions that are necessary to achieve flow:

  1. People must be involved in tasks with a clear set of goals. This adds direction and structure to the task.
  2. People must have a good balance between the perceived challenges of the task at hand and their own perceived skills. People must feel confident that they are capable to do the task.
  3. The task must have clear and immediate feedback. This helps people negotiate changing demands and gives them time to adjust their performance to maintain the flow state.

Here are some specific things you can do to help new supervisors and managers achieve a state of flow:

First, give new managers and supervisors a structured way to think about the task of managing. Two of the most important tasks are managing effective meetings and clarifying roles and responsibilities. Then give them opportunities to “job shadow” highly experienced, capable managers. Let them see first-hand how to run an effective meeting, how to organize their day, how to give direction, and how to provide feedback. Let them sit in on an employee appraisal.

Second, provide them a mentor or a coach, someone who can shadow them and give them prompt, positive feedback to build their confidence. Do this as soon as they are promoted into supervisorial or managerial role.

Third, ask the same coach to work with each new supervisor and manager to create an Individual Development Plan (IDP) with 2-3 clear, actionable steps they can take to improve.

Finally, don’t put too much faith in management training. This has the least payback for professional development. The most beneficial ways to develop new managers and supervisors are 1) on-the-job experience and 2) feedback and coaching. Provide that, and you’ll help them find their “flow.”

By the way, our firm has talented coaches who can accelerate the success of new managers and supervisors. We’ll be happy to answer any question you might have.

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August 2nd, 2010

The Case of the Restless Board


I’m working with a Board of Directors that is proving most challenging! This particular Board is a chamber of commerce composed of business owners. Every meeting is a marvel of micro-management. Should our web site have a blue banner or green? Which vendor should we use to host our annual meeting? Tactical decisions like these, which should be left to staff to decide, become all-consuming conversations for this Board.

The root problem is a lack of trust between the Board and executive director. I’ve tried to create systems to build trust. I facilitated the development of a clear and comprehensive business plan. We have developed a performance scorecard. I have talked to the Board about the importance of letting things play out, to see whether the executive director and his staff are up to the task. But no sooner do I make this speech, when I turn around and witness a Board member who wants to talk about the choice of vendors at a cocktail reception!

Boards that truly want to make a difference, that want to generate lasting, sustained success in their organizations, need to stay focused on the things that Boards should do: clarifying and communicating the strategic focus of the organization. This will build trust and enable the executive director and staff to act nimbly and effectively in the face of constant change.

But members of this Board seem only interested in what’s in it for them, today. Part of it stems from the unique way that the organization is funded and structured. Each Board member represents a specific constituency that pays into a central fund that supports the organization. Board members are intrinsically motivated to make sure they get their “fair” share of the kitty.

What I’ve come to realize is that I haven’t done enough to build a collective sense of stewardship on this Board. They still see their job as steering the ship, rather than setting the course. We need to spend more time on long-range vision and specific measures of success tied to that vision.

People often ask me which of the quantum leaps described in my new book “Leading at Light Speed” is the most important. All ten are important. But I would say that aligning people around a clear strategic focus is the most important. It is the framework and the vehicle that enables a Board like this one to build trust and start moving at light speed.

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May 17th, 2010

Strategic Planning on a Tight Budget


The president of the Board of Directors of a non-profit in Washington D.C. called me today and said:  “We have a limited budget for strategic planning. We have two days to develop our plan. What do you think we should be asking for from a consultant – particularly on a tight budget?”

I responded: “What do you hope to get out of it? What do you think you most need as an organization?”

He told me he’d listened to me talk about the importance of aligning a Board and staff around a set of well-understood goals, objectives and performance measures. “Bottom line,” he told me, “that’s exactly what we need. We need alignment.”

I listed for him the key elements I thought he should ask a consultant to provide.

1. Facilitate clear agreement among the Board on the vision of the organization.  How do you want to change the world? What impact do you want to have? Do you want to enact a new piece of legislation? Do you want to build 250 new chapters? How would you measure success? Internally, do you want to build membership to a certain level? Do you want to increase fee for service revenues a certain amount? Get the Board to agree on what success looks like.

2. Design your road map. What strategies will be the most effective in achieving those goals? What are the most important objectives and actions tied to each goal? Your consultant should help you write them down in a clear, easy-to-use format. Your consultant should also keep you focused the Board’s role vs. the staff’s role. What will the Board do? What will staff do?

3. Define your measuring system. The Board should be clearly aligned around how it’s going to monitor progress. Document each goal and exactly what information the Board will receive so that it can monitor progress. Remember, the Board doesn’t need to be in the business of micro-managing. It should be in the habit of looking for results. This measuring system is the part that most consultants overlook. It’s also the most important to assure alignment.

4. Put it together. All this work needs to flow together into a clear, easily understood document. Before you hire a consultant, ask for examples of other strategic plans he or she has helped put together. Look for a plan with all these elements. It’s tempting to make compromises when you’re on a tight budget, but good consultants are out there. Keep looking until you find the right one!

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May 17th, 2010

Crisis Management Reflections on the Gulf Oil Spill


Watching executives from British Petroleum, Transocean and Halliburton testify before Congress about the Gulf oil spill on Tuesday reminded me of the cardinal rules of leading through a crisis. Unfortunately, it looks like the BP-TO-HB trio never got the memo.

There are two rules to follow in a crisis. Rule number one is this: Protect other people first – customers, employees and citizens. Not your shareholders or yourself. Protect the public and your customers, and the shareholders will follow. Why? Because the long-term reputation and goodwill of your organization are more important than any short-term risk to shareholder value or your own job security.

Rule number two is a corollary to the first: Be prepared to reframe and expand your level of responsibility. In other words, accept responsibility even if you’re not at fault. This may feel counter-intuitive, especially when someone else is clearly culpable. But reframing and expanding your level of responsibility will help lead you out of the crisis.

Consider the Exxon Valdez disaster. When it went aground in Alaska’s Prince William Sound in 1989, eleven million of oils spilled onto pristine shoreline. In the immediate aftermath, Exxon’s CEO Lawrence Rawl was slow to accept responsibility. Instead he issued a flurry of press releases stating that the company was investigating the accident. The opportunity to quickly contain the spill was squandered. Hundreds of miles of coastline were fouled.

Public furor built and the company’s reputation plunged. Several weeks passed before Rawl grudgingly announced that the company would take responsibility for the clean up. Eventually, thousands of workers and volunteers were mobilized to mop up the oil, save the wildlife, and minimize the damage to the extent possible. But Exxon’s public image was left in tatters because its immediate response was too slow. William Reilly, then head of the Environmental Protection Agency, said Rawl’s response was “a casebook example of how not to communicate to the public when your company messes up.” Rawl’s reputation never recovered.

In contrast, when a container of Odwalla apple juice contaminated by the bacteria e coli resulted in the death of a child in 1996, CEO Greg Stepensall stepped in right away and assumed personal responsibility. He recalled every Odwalla product. He paid out huge sums to the families affected by the tainted products. He held regular press conferences to ensure the public knew what was going on and how the company was responding. For more than a year, Odwalla retooled its production lines, adding flash pasteurization to ensure no future incidents could occur. Sales fell 90 percent but Odwalla survived with its reputation intact.

As the Exxon Valdez and Odwalla examples show, leaders have a clear choice in how they frame their response to a crisis. On the one hand, they can respond out of a “protect ourselves” mentality. Or leaders can think and act out of a larger ethical context, as Odwalla did.

The Tylenol scare in 1986 is another case in point. It was clear when cyanide-laced containers of Tylenol were found on supermarket shelves that a pathological killer was responsible. Johnson & Johnson’s executives could have focused on the criminal aspects and exhorted police to take responsibility for catching the perpetrator. (Indeed, he was caught within a matter of days.)

But Johnson & Johnson’s executives understood the need to immediately take responsibility for the safety of their consumers. This led the company to recall every Tylenol product, design strong anti-tampering packaging, and conduct a massive awareness-building campaign. It is estimated to have cost the company $2 billion, but Johnson & Johnson emerged the stronger for it.

The bottom line is this: When a crisis hits, two dynamics take over: Trust and Empathy. These dynamics are illustrated in the figure below.

The Trust/Empathy Matrix

trustempathymatrix

The empathy scale is governed largely by facts outside your control. In the case of the Exxon Valdez tanker spill, there was little question that the captain was drunk and that Exxon, as his employer, was at fault. Exxon’s leaders had little control over the empathy scale. But they did have control over the trust scale, which they messed up. In the Tylenol case, Johnson & Johnson was clearly not at fault. Yet it chose to assume full responsibility. As a consequence, the company was rewarded.

In Japanese corporate cultures, managers are trained to accept personal responsibility for anything that goes wrong on their watch. To Western eyes, this seems odd. We’re amazed when a Japanese CEO resigns because of the incorrect action of a freighter captain or an accounting irregularity. Yet as the Trust/Empathy Matrix shows, it’s also smart business. When a crisis hits, assuming responsibility and taking immediate, corrective action is more important than safeguarding your job.

Too bad the folks at British Petroleum, Transocean and Halliburton haven’t learned that lesson.

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March 22nd, 2010

Lessons for a Board President


governance development

In passing the leadership torch at a non-profit organization, I was asked to name the things that effective Board presidents do. Here’s my list:

1. Facilitate and preside over the Board meetings, starting on time, ending on time, keeping the conversation on topic, calling on people who are quiet, trying to engage everyone.

2. Model the behaviors you want to see in others during Board meetings. Be present and attentive. Listen carefully, paraphrase people’s positions, and clarify the action steps. Provide positive feedback.

3. Be clear about the role of the Board. The Board needs to make decisions that are appropriate for the Board: i.e. adopt a strategic plan, approve a budget, and decide on other important matters. Treat those matters with the seriousness they deserve. Don’t let the Board slip into bureaucratic behaviors (for example, by appointing committees to oversee staff’s work).

4. Be direct and straightforward about any conflicts you see or issues before they become elephants in the room.

5. Keep a focus on the organization as a business. Keep focused on generating market-driven revenues, in addition to philanthropic fund-raising. Keep asking “who pays, who benefits” types of questions. Challenge people when they drift into non-business-like thinking.

6. Be actively engaged in planning the Board’s agendas. Feel free to elevate things that you think the Board needs more time with. Don’t rubber stamp staff’s suggested agendas.

7. Be available to the chief executive and staff as a sounding board. Spend time with them separately, talking through matters of importance and thinking through how best to optimize the expertise and talents of Board members. Help them understand the role of the Board.

8. Think about the legacy you want to leave as Board president. Pick one or two goals, such as diversifying the Board or elevating its fund-raising capabilities, and commit yourself publicly to achieving them.

9. Be thoughtful about who you want to succeed you. A Board president has a lot of sway over his or her successor.

Leadership Tools

When a Board of Directors serves in a governing capacity (e.g. for a non-profit, a public agency, or a corporation), the Board needs to act in certain ways in order to assure high levels of performance throughout the organization. This tool lays out the five habits of high-performing governing boards.

The Board of a non-profit organization typically follows an evolutionary path as the organization matures. This tool lays out three stages of Board evolution and identifies the characteristic behaviors of each stage. This tool can apply to public agencies, city councils, non-profits, and co-ops. Board members can use this tool to help clarify their role and adapt the Board’s focus accordingly.


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February 8th, 2010

Aligning Employees Around the Things That Matter


Developing a high-performing organization starts with defining and aligning employees around the things that matter, or what I refer to as the organization’s core values – the actions and behaviors essential to the organization’s success. Customer service, reliability, and financial sustainability are three examples of core values that every company needs to explore.

To do this successfully, you must engage your employees in a series of conversations about what it means to be a values-driven organization, what behaviors support the core values, and how important employees are in the daily realization of the core values.

Here are some techniques we use here at LRI in aligning employees around an organization’s core values.

First, we use focus groups. Managers, supervisors and employees get a chance to discuss the core values and explore what they mean and what behaviors are most important to supporting them. We spend time brainstorming and then narrowing lists of specific, measurable behaviors.

Second, growing from the focus groups, we work with the senior management team to hone the core values and develop a list of “we statements” that everyone agrees are the behaviors most critical to supporting the core values. The management team commits to measure these behaviors consistently over time.

The next step is for the management team members to measure how well they are currently upholding the core values and related behaviors. They then publicize the results and make commitments to improve in areas where the scores are weaker.

Next, we assess how well people in the organization exemplify the core values. Internally, a survey goes to all employees. Externally, we survey customers and other constituents. We systematically track the results and provide feedback, focusing people on those areas that score low and devising strategies to improve them.

To deepen the alignment, we make sure that employee recruitment, orientation, training and promotion are tied to the core values. All employees get regular orientation and training. People who demonstrate alignment are promoted over others.

Finally, we retool the company’s performance appraisal system so that it is aligned with the core values and we statements. That cements the pieces, creating an integrated system of communication and performance measurement that assures continued attention is placed on the things that matter most to the company’s success.

Those are the ways we align people around an organization’s core values. Above all, it means creating a culture in which the core values truly live in the organization – not simply as words on paper, but on a day-to-day basis in people’s hearts and minds.

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January 7th, 2010

New Report Highlights Unhappiness in the Work Place


What an interesting report this week from The Conference Board!  The report says that Americans of all ages are increasingly discontent at work.  Only 45 percent of those surveyed say they are satisfied with their jobs, down from 61 percent in 1987, the first year in which the survey was conducted. The report said that the youngest employees (those currently under age 25) express the highest levels of dissatisfaction ever recorded by the survey.

A high level of job dissatisfaction obviously bodes poorly for organizational performance. It inhibits innovation, which stymies long-term growth. It affects the attracting and retaining of top talent (talented people will always go where job satisfaction is higher, even if it means going abroad) and on inter-generational knowledge transfer (people who are unhappy are less likely to provide useful coaching and mentoring to  younger workers). Over the long term, high levels of job dissatisfaction will stunt the growth of our economy.

My new book, “Leading at Light Speed,” lays out a model for increasing job satisfaction by building trust and sparking innovation. The book (soon to be in stores) describes 10 quantum leaps that help create high performing organizations. One key is increased levels of communication and engagement by senior leaders and managers. While it’s too much to expect that every organization will embrace these 10 quantum leaps, if even 10% of the organizations in the U.S. adopted these techniques, we’d see a reversal of the trends in this report.

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August 27th, 2009

Business Management Problems: Staff or Management?


The chief executive of a non-profit organization asked me to come to a meeting of her management team to talk about the performance of staff. When I arrived, she ushered me into a conference room. The four other members of the management team were already at the table.

“We want to tell you what’s going on,” she said.

“First, the staff doesn’t seem very motivated,” said one vice president. “I wish they would just do their jobs.”

“Everyone’s feeling overwhelmed,” said another v.p.

“They don’t show any initiative,” said another.

The conversation continued. As they continued to criticize their staff, I picked up a few more clues. The CEO said she was trying to be more democratic in making decisions. A senior v.p. said he hadn’t met recently with staff because of his workload. I jotted some notes in my notepad. “Management or staff?” I wrote. I decided to trust my instincts.

“Look, here’s what I think is going on,” I told the management team. “I think the problems with your staff begin with you. I am guessing you are not communicating very well. Your meetings don’t have clear action items. Your delegations to staff aren’t clear.”

“Change happens in three ways,” I said. “It can be top down, bottom up, and inside out. In this case, I think the change you’re hoping to see in your staff begins with you.” I paused. They were looking at me. “Can you help us?” one said.

“Sure,” I said. “We can provide you tools to help you manage decisions better and run meetings more effectively. We can begin next week.”

“That would be great!” they said.  “Would you draw up a proposal for that?” said the CEO. They were all smiles as I left the meeting.

It was a good reminder: Don’t always believe what your clients tell you!

Here is an instant download we recommend from our Leadership Tools:

Issue Mapping – Identifying and Resolving Tough Business Problems

Next blog article: “Strategic Change Management“

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May 19th, 2009

7 Best Traits of Successful CEOs


traits of successful ceos

A recent study measured successful CEOs for the Big 5 personality traits (openness, agreeableness, conscientiousness, extraversion, and stability) and found the closest correlation with conscientiousness.

The authors of the study, Steven Kaplan, Mark Klebanov and Morten Sorensen (“Which C.E.O. Characteristics and Abilities Matter?”) relied on detailed personality assessments of 316 C.E.O.’s and measured their companies’ performances. So where do you think you are on the conscientiousness scale? What traits of successful CEOs do you have?

Here are some sample questions:

  • I am always prepared.
  • I am exacting in my work.
  • I follow a schedule.
  • I get chores done right away.
  • I like order.
  • I pay attention to details.
  • I leave my belongings around. (reversed)
  • I make a mess of things. (reversed)
  • I often forget to put things back in their proper place. (reversed)
  • I shirk my duties. (reversed)

Regardless of whether you think you score high or low on this scale, you should not leap to the conclusion that these are the most important traits of successful CEOs. On the contrary, I can point to dozens of case studies in which passion, honorable behavior, and humility played a much greater role in defining successful leaders and successful companies. The real difference between the successful and not-so-successful CEO has nothing to do with personality. It has to do with traits that are learned, like persistence, efficiency, analytic thoroughness and the ability to work long hours. It would be easy to miss this point if you were inclined to put too much faith in nature, not nurture.

Next blog article: “Executive Leadership Coaching – Traits of a Successful Leader Coach”

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November 23rd, 2008

How to Get Out of a Corporate Financial Crisis


corporate financial crisis

It is inevitable that you will at some point in your career face a situation that requires extraordinary courage under fire. For Citigroup, the world’s largest financial services company, that time is now. So far, the response is not impressive.

Part of the explanation may be the insular nature of the Citigroup’s culture. According to The New York Times, Citigroup’s CEO Charles Prince worried about the risk posed by mortgage-backed securities in 2007, but received assurances that Citigroup’s balance sheet was in good shape. How wrong can you be? Now Citigroup’s new CEO Vikram S. Pandit is facing his biggest test.

There are two rules to follow in a crisis. Rule number one is this: Protect other people first; customers, employees and citizens. Not your shareholders or yourself. Protect the public and your customers, and the shareholders will follow. Why? Because the company’s long-term reputation and goodwill are more important than any short-term risk to shareholder value or your own job security. Rule number two is a corollary to the first: Be prepared to reframe and expand your level of responsibility. In other words, accept responsibility even if you’re not at fault. This may feel counter-intuitive, especially when someone else is clearly culpable. But reframing and expanding your level of responsibility will help lead you out of the crisis.

Consider this well-known example. In 1989, the oil tanker Exxon Valdez went aground in Alaska’s Prince William Sound. Eleven million of oils spilled onto pristine shoreline. In the immediate aftermath, Exxon’s CEO Lawrence Rawl was slow to accept responsibility. Instead he issued a flurry of press releases stating that the company was investigating the accident. The opportunity to quickly contain the spill was squandered. Hundreds of miles of coastline were fouled. Public furor built and the company’s reputation plunged. Several weeks passed before Rawl grudgingly announced that the company would take responsibility for the clean up. Eventually, thousands of workers and volunteers were mobilized to mop up the oil, save the wildlife, and minimize the damage to the extent possible. But Exxon’s public image was left in tatters because its immediate response was too slow. William Reilly, then head of the Environmental Protection Agency, said Rawl’s response was “a casebook example of how not to communicate to the public when your company messes up.” Rawl’s reputation never recovered.

In contrast, when a container of Odwalla apple juice contaminated by the bacteria e coli resulted in the death of a child in 1996, CEO Greg Stepensall stepped in right away and assumed personal responsibility. He recalled every Odwalla product. He paid out huge sums to the families affected by the tainted products. He held regular press conferences to ensure the public knew what was going on and how the company was responding. For more than a year, Odwalla retooled its production lines, adding flash pasteurization to ensure no future incidents could occur. Sales fell 90 percent but Odwalla survived with its reputation intact.

As the Exxon Valdez and Odwalla examples show, leaders have a clear choice in how they frame their response to a crisis. On the one hand, they can respond out of a “protect ourselves” mentality, as Exxon did in the Exxon Valdez disaster. Or leaders can think and act out of a larger ethical context, as Odwalla did. Citigroup has committed the financial equivalent of that catastrophic oil spill. Let’s see how they respond.

Next blog article: “Obamas Leadership Style: Lessons in Commanding Attention and Message Control”

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