David Maxfield, Author at Crucial Learning

Create an Accountability Culture in Six Steps

David Maxfield — Fri, 06 Mar 2020 17:00:22 +0000

I am a trainer in a non-profit organization. Because we are a close staff, we tend to avoid accountability discussions around inefficient patterns rather than discussing solutions for improved performance. People arrive late for meetings, fail to complete time-sensitive tasks and spend a lot of time talking. I do have plans to introduce Crucial Accountability in the future. Until that happens, what are some steps I can take to introduce the concepts of the course to our leadership team?

Thanks for a challenging question which a lot of trainers can relate to. Maybe we don’t work in a non-profit, but we struggle with a culture that is low on accountability. Or, we work under a management team that seems more interested in keeping the peace than improving performance. I’ll suggest some actionable ways to create an accountability culture ahead of introducing the full training course to your organization.

Partner with a Leader. It sounds as if you have a good working relationship with your leadership team. Wonderful! The first step to inspiring change is to partner with someone of influence who shares your desire to have a more efficient professional culture. As you prepare to roll out training, it is vital to work with a leader who is likely to share your concerns, has the skill and autonomy to try new ideas with their team, and who will be able to influence other leaders through their success. If you have a leader you are already working with in this capacity, then you are on the right path for transformation. For those trainers looking for a vested partner, don’t expect the right leader to immediately volunteer for this pathfinder role. They may have other concerns that are equally or more important than yours. Finding and nurturing a partnership will require listening, fact-finding, patience, compromise, and a shared mutual purpose.

Focus on the Fool’s Choice. We humans are quick to see decisions as either/or, even when they aren’t. In Crucial Conversations we call these Fool’s Choices. Examples include thinking we need to choose between peace and honesty or between winning and losing. The challenge many trainers face is a Fool’s Choice between holding people accountable and treating them with caring respect to maintain the integrity of the working environment. The way you break free of a Fool’s Choice is to ask, “How can we do both?” In this case: “How can we hold people accountable while still showing them our caring respect?” This is the question you and your leadership partner will need to address and answer.

Turn Purpose into Measurable Goals. Another common challenge that many organizations, especially non-profit organizations, face is a culture of “service values” as a substitute for measurable results. The behaviors you mentioned of arriving late to meetings and not addressing performance issues are a common symptom of service values becoming minimum standards of behavior, rather than challenging targets for teams and organizations to achieve.

As a trainer in your organization, you have an important role to play in recognizing and influencing behavior at your company. When you partner with your leadership advocate, consider using a method called Strategy On A Page (SOAP) to cascade your broad purpose and vision down to measurable goals for your team and organization. Create a SOAP that details the links between your organization’s ambitions (what it wants to achieve in the world) and the measurable results departments and individuals must achieve for this ambition to be realized. Identifying measurable results provides an immediate reason to hold people accountable.

Identify Problem Behaviors. As a trainer, you have the unique opportunity to involve the relevant parties affected by the problems you describe (lateness, chatting, etc.) in identifying problem behaviors. The goal is to have leadership and teams agree on the behavior changes they want to see within their team. A powerful way to involve them is to use a Start, Stop, and Continue exercise. This exercise can be used to direct leadership and teams to identify new behaviors they need to Start doing in order to achieve their measurable results, existing behaviors they need to Stop doing if they are to achieve these results, and existing behaviors they need to Continue doing to achieve the results they want to cultivate. Notice that these behaviors might be related to your organization’s “service values” but will be far more focused. Document these behaviors, create posters that describe them, and ask everyone to sign these posters as their commitment to change. This is a great exercise to do ahead of training as it helps participants and leadership begin to think through the elements of creating a culture of accountability.

Build New Skills and Norms. As VitalSmarts leaders, we ask for 200 percent accountability for the behavior changes teams have identified. This means that team members and leadership alike are 100 percent accountable for their own behaviors and 100 percent accountable for the behaviors of their colleagues. Instead of leaders being the only ones to hold others accountable, everyone in the team holds everyone else accountable which helps build support and reinforces the importance of individuals contributing to the organization’s accountability progress. As a trainer, using the Start, Stop and Continue exercise is a great way to check-in with teams and leadership to ensure strategies are aligned across departments and changes made where there are gaps.

Provide Leadership Support. When it comes to accountability, follow-through is everything. Helping individual team members identify formal and informal leaders who can hold them accountable for commitments, goes a long way in culture change. These leaders will play a champion role: coaching people who don’t feel skilled enough to hold a peer or boss to account, pushing people who don’t want to hold others accountable, and stepping in when an accountability discussion goes poorly or results in retaliation.

I hope these ideas give you a place to start introducing some basic accountability practices ahead of training your organization. What other ideas for creating an accountability culture have worked for your organization? Please comment with your ideas below.

Best,
David

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How to Talk to a Student’s Parent in Crucial Moments

David Maxfield — Tue, 12 Nov 2019 21:51:20 +0000

Dear David,

I am a school principal and recently we had an incident where a student injured another student. I will be meeting with the father of the injured child, who is very angry. He feels the school has failed to protect his daughter in the past and this exacerbates the situation. While the school does bear some responsibility, the student has also been difficult to manage. In hindsight, the school possibly could have handled this student better. She seems to be at the center of a number of school issues and, when addressed, the family makes her the victim. What can I do?

Signed,
Perplexed Principal

Dear Perplexed,

I believe that you and other educators have one of the toughest and most important jobs in our society. You live at the frontline of many of our toughest social problems, and we count on you to deal with many of them—as well as to educate our precious children.

Today, you face a tough and sad situation. A student has been injured, her parents are angry, and it’s complicated by the student’s own behaviors. I will outline some actions you can take to begin to mend the situation, but the first step is for you and your school to own your role in this problem.

As principal, you need to come to terms with what has happened in the past, attempt to repair the relationship with the student and her parents, and create a future in which this student and all students are safe and successful. It’s a tall order.

Acknowledge the Past. We teach a skill that goes by the acronym CPR—for Content, Pattern, and Relationship. It highlights the different aspects of a complicated problem. Let’s try it with yours:

Content: An individual incident. Here, it’s the recent incident in which the student was injured.
Pattern: A recurring issue. In your case, it’s the school’s history of failing to protect this student. A second pattern to check for is across other students. This may not be the only student who has been injured.
Relationship: The impact the incident or pattern has had on the overall relationship. For you, it’s how the pattern has undermined the parent’s trust in your motives, your competency, your respect for him and his daughter, etc. A second relationship issue to check for is amongst other students and parents. You may have lost the trust of a whole group or category of parents.

You will need to take responsibility for each aspect of this problem. Given the incident and the pattern of incidents, it makes perfect sense for the father (or group of parents) to have lost faith in you and your school. He is not being unreasonable.

Repair the Relationship. It will be hard to plan for the future, unless you can build some trust. An apology is a good place to start, though it may not be enough. Here are the elements I look for in an apology:

Admit to your past failures. Keeping children safe is fundamental to your job, and you failed—more than once. Don’t get caught up in apportioning blame. Even if you think the school is only 20% responsible, say that you are sorry for your part.
Apologize unequivocally. Focus on your actions, not the father’s reactions. Don’t say “I’m sorry you feel this way.” Say “I’m sorry I failed to protect your daughter.” Avoid any qualifications or buts. Don’t say “I’m sorry, but your daughter is . . . ” Say “I’m sorry. I take full responsibility. I let you down.”
Pledge to fix the situation. Promise to create the kind of safe, nurturing, and supportive learning environment all of us want for our children.
Back up your words with actions. These actions are intended to mend the wound in the relationship. If you think of these actions as a bandage, they will have to be at least as large as the wound in order to work. This means going above and beyond what would normally be expected in a relationship. We think of it as making a sacrifice. Below are a few examples:
- Ego Sacrifice: Admit your failings in public. Admit that you have violated your own sense of values and accept the consequences.
- Time Sacrifice: Demolish your calendar with all of its plans and to-dos and rebuild it around solving this problem.
- Priority Sacrifice: Push aside several of your cherished priorities and move this one to the top.
- Dollar Sacrifice: Reallocate budgets away from your current priorities and toward this one.
Don’t assume your apology will be enough. Don’t use the apology to silence the other person, as in “I’ve already apologized for that. You need to move on!” The hurt party has no obligation to accept your apology.

Establish Mutual Purpose. Involve the father (or group of parents) by having him identify his aspirations and fears for his daughter. Use this process to demonstrate that you agree with these aspirations and fears. Use them as common ground on which to build a plan for the future.

Expand this Purpose. As a principal you have multiple stakeholders and many responsibilities. You can’t allow a single student and parent to overwhelm all your other priorities. Instead, use this single relationship to see what every student and parent wants from you and your school. Establish goals that set standards in these areas of mutual purpose, for example: safety, academic achievement, connection, and support.

Identify Crucial Moments. Identify the times, places, people, and circumstances when these goals are at risk. Involve a team of administrators, teachers, parents, and students in this process. Make sure this specific student and parent are involved either directly or through frequent outreach. Examples of these crucial moments might include:

Normal teasing begins to turn mean.
A student shows a pattern of disrespect.
A teacher is struggling to control a class.

Create and Implement Solutions. Determine best practices for handling each crucial moment. Use training, coaching, and mentoring to make sure these solutions are put into practice.

I hope these ideas help. I would love to hear from you educators and parents who have faced similar problems. What have you seen that works?

Best of luck,
David

The post How to Talk to a Student’s Parent in Crucial Moments appeared first on Crucial Learning.

How to Foster Accountability in a Tight-Knit Culture

David Maxfield — Wed, 25 Sep 2019 03:12:52 +0000

Dear David,

Our organization is non-profit with a family-oriented culture. Unfortunately, we act like a family that has no accountability. Instead of holding people to account, our approach is to avoid and dumb down. No one is ever fired for poor performance. People arrive late, fail to complete time-sensitive tasks, and chat a lot—I mean they sit and chat for hours. Meetings don’t start on time because we wait for stragglers. I could go on. Those of us who have a work ethic and a sense of responsibility have to pick up the slack. When we took our concerns to management, they wrote out a list of service values and code of civility, rather than directly address the performance issues. Is there anything I can do?

Signed,
Wanting Accountability Tactics

Dear Wanting,

Thanks for a challenging question that a lot of us can relate to. Maybe we don’t work in a non-profit, but we struggle with a culture that is low on accountability. Or we work under a management team that seems more interested in keeping the peace than in improving performance. I’ll suggest some ways to begin having an impact.

Partner with a Leader. It sounds as if you are not in a supervisory position. Changing these norms will require you to partner with someone who is. You need a leader who is likely to share your concerns, who has the skill and autonomy to try these ideas with their team, and who will be able to influence other leaders through their success. Don’t expect the right leader to immediately volunteer for this pathfinder role. They may have other concerns that are equally or more important than yours. Finding and nurturing a partnership will require listening, fact-finding, patience, and compromise.

Focus on the Fool’s Choice. We humans are quick to see decisions as either/or, even when they aren’t. In Crucial Conversations we call these Fool’s Choices. Examples include thinking we need to choose between peace and honesty or between winning and losing. In your case, the Fool’s Choice is between holding people accountable and treating them with caring respect. The way you break free of a Fool’s Choice is to ask, “How can we do both?” In this case: “How can we hold people accountable while still showing them our caring respect?” This is the question you and your leader partner will need to address and answer.

Turn Purpose into Measurable Goals. It sounds as if your organization is using “service values” as a substitute for measurable results. Unfortunately, these service values have become minimum standards of behavior, rather than challenging targets to achieve.

Consider using a method called Strategy On A Page (SOAP) to cascade your broad purpose and vision down to measurable goals. Create a SOAP that details the links between your organization’s ambitions (what it wants to achieve in the world) and the measurable results that departments and individuals must achieve for this ambition to be realized. Identifying measurable results that must be achieved provides an immediate reason to hold people accountable.

Identify Problem Behaviors. Involve the people affected by the problems you describe (lateness, chatting, etc.) in identifying problem behaviors. The goal is to have the group agree on the behavior changes they want to see within their team. A powerful way to involve them is to use a Start, Stop, and Continue exercise. This exercise asks the group to identify new behaviors they need to Start doing in order to achieve their measurable results, existing behaviors they need to Stop doing if they are to achieve these results, and existing behaviors they need to Continue doing to achieve the results. Notice that these behaviors might be related to your organization’s “service values” but will be far more focused. Document these behaviors, create posters that describe them, and ask everyone to sign these posters as their commitment to change.

Build New Skills and Norms. We ask for 200 percent accountability for the behavior changes the team has identified. This means that team members are 100 percent accountable for their own behaviors and also 100 percent accountable for the behaviors of their colleagues. Instead of leaders being the only ones to hold others accountable, everyone in the team holds everyone else accountable.

Provide Leadership Support. When it comes to accountability, follow-through is everything. Work with your leader partner to identify formal and informal leaders who can help team members hold each other accountable. These leaders will play a champion role: coaching people who don’t feel skilled enough to hold a peer or boss to account, pushing people who don’t want to hold others accountable, and stepping in when an accountability discussion goes poorly or results in retaliation.

I hope these ideas give you a place to start. What have other readers seen that works? Please comment with your ideas below.

Best,
David

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How to Discuss Childhood Immunization with Reluctant Parents

David Maxfield — Tue, 27 Aug 2019 21:50:10 +0000

Dear David,

With the recent rise of children getting measles and the increasing number of people who refuse to have their children vaccinated, I have become very curious about the decisions that parents are making about their children. I work in healthcare and support vaccinating children, and I know that people who refuse to vaccinate their children can put together an informed case to support their point of view. I think their case is flawed and I can identify specific flaws in their case, which makes it difficult for me to hold a conversation with them.

Do you have some suggestions about how to hold conversations with parents opposed to vaccinating their children when I really do believe that they are taking a huge and unnecessary risk with their child and, as a result, other children?

Signed,
Concerned Healthcare Professional

Dear Concerned,

Thanks for a great question. It’s not just vaccines that cause communication breakdowns. We see breakdowns across our culture, which makes your question especially relevant. I’ll outline some tips below that should help.

You Can’t Win an Argument. It’s a paradox that it becomes harder, instead of easier, to convince someone when you are supremely confident in your own point of view. It has to do with Dale Carnegie’s insight, “You can’t win an argument.” Here is how a conversation can turn into an argument:

I ask the parent why they don’t want to vaccinate their child.
The parent shares all the reasons they have against vaccination.
I attack their reasons and try to add reasons for vaccination.
They attack mine and defend theirs.
I attack theirs and defend mine.
Rinse and repeat.
They win, because it’s their child.

In trying to win an argument I’ve fallen into what’s called the Persuasion Trap. I have become the champion for my cause and pushed the parent into being champion for the opposite cause. The result is an argumentative cycle I can’t win.

Motivational Interviewing. Motivational Interviewing is an approach that is designed to avoid the Persuasion Trap. Instead of taking sides, it helps the parent explore and resolve the ambivalence they probably feel about vaccinating their child. And it recognizes the reality that it’s the parent who will make the final judgment. The goal is to engage the parent’s own intrinsic motivation. Below are a few principles you can use:

Ask for Permission. When the parent says they are unwilling to have their child vaccinated, don’t launch into an argument. Instead, ask permission to discuss it further. This puts the parent into the decision-making role.

Explore their Ambivalence. Most unwilling parents have doubts. Make it safe for them to voice their concerns. This establishes your role as helper, rather than opponent. Below are how these first two elements might sound in a conversation:

YOU: Your child is due for her measles immunization today, but I heard you declined it from the nurse. Would it be okay if we discussed it?

PARENT: Um, okay.

YOU: Many of my patients are concerned about the safety of vaccines and whether their child is more likely to get sick from the shot than the actual disease. Others have questions about how bad it would be if their child got the measles. Would it be like a common cold, or could it affect their heart? Could their child die? Still other parents want to spare their child the pain of one more shot. These are all valid concerns. What do you see as the pros and cons of having your child vaccinated?

I like to draw a line down the middle of a piece of paper and write the pros on the left and cons on the right side of the line. This helps the parent turn their vague feelings and fears into a finite number of specific concerns—concerns that can be addressed.

Paraphrase to Ensure Understanding. Summarize each concern. This makes sure you understand it and also demonstrates that you are listening. “So, correct me if I’m wrong, but you are worried the vaccine will make your child’s arm sore and that she might feel sick for a week. You’ve also heard that measles used to be considered a relatively minor childhood disease. So, you have questions about how serious a problem it is. Is that right?”

Address Each Concern with Facts. But first, ask for permission (again), “Would you mind if I provided you with more information about the measles, so you’ll have all the facts before you decide about the vaccine?” Then provide clarifying information in a nonjudgmental way.

Consider the Messenger. Ask yourself whether you are the right person to provide the facts. If you are a nurse, a physician, or another healthcare provider, consider yourself credible. Your profession puts you among the most trusted people in our society. If that’s you, then you might make your presentation more personal, “I’ve had all of my children vaccinated. My son, Elijah, hates shots, but none of my children had any kind of bad reaction. I feel very good about my decision.”

If you don’t think the person sees you as a credible messenger, then use information that comes from a more credible source. Provide a handout from the American Academy of Pediatrics or a pamphlet from your local public health agency.

Consider Multiple Influences. You asked how to have a conversation with an unwilling parent. These conversations are important, but they’re only one aspect of a comprehensive influence strategy. If it was your job to improve vaccination rates in your region, country, or hemisphere, you would want to employ a combination of strategies at the Personal, Social, and Structural levels. These would include conversations, but also involve community leaders within schools, churches, and sports teams. They would also include changes to laws, incentives, and perhaps the way the vaccines are delivered. I hope this is helpful. Try a few of these approaches and let us know how they work.

Best,
David

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How to Align Your Management Team

David Maxfield — Tue, 06 Aug 2019 22:18:16 +0000

Dear David,

I’m the Human Resources Business Partner for a region within a global organization. We often feel as if we are our own freestanding company, but, in fact, we all have bosses at headquarters. Many of our local leaders condemn headquarters’ decisions in front of their peers and direct reports. Needless to say, this impacts the team negatively. What can I do as an HR professional to improve the environment?

Signed,
Stuck in the Middle

Dear Stuck in the Middle,

You’ve described a very common problem: an “us against them” mindset that pits one group against another and puts management out of alignment. This mindset creates silos and divisions that can fracture an organization. And it’s reinforced when leaders turn “us” into helpless victims, and “them” into villains.

The key to stopping this behavior will be to demonstrate its negative impacts, create a range of positive alternatives, and to influence your peers to hold each other accountable for using these alternatives.

Clever Stories. When your peers condemn HQ’s decisions, they are telling Clever Stories. These are stories that excuse their own inaction, weakness, or disloyalty. It allows them to feel good about themselves, while avoiding a difficult responsibility, such as speaking up to their boss at HQ or explaining an unpopular decision to their people. Whenever you hear a Clever Story (a Victim, Villain, or Helpless Story), ask, “What is the difficult responsibility the person is trying to avoid?” and “What is the positive action the person could take to try to solve this problem?”

Ask, “What if it was safe?” People often tell Clever Stories because they don’t think it’s safe to take action. You can challenge these Clever Stories by asking, “What if it was safe?” For example, “I know you disagree with the new sales policy from HQ. What if it was safe to discuss your concerns with them? What would you want to see different? And why?” Then, together, develop a plan for taking positive action.

Accountability for Clever Stories. It helps to label the problem so that anyone can call it out when they hear it. Make sure your peers know the label “Clever Stories,” and can recognize Victim, Villain, and Helpless Stories. And, most importantly, make sure they understand that behind every Clever Story lies a Sellout. When they tell a Clever Story, they are selling out the values they hold as a leader. Ask each leader to commit to the following: “Whenever you hear me telling a Clever Story, where I’m the Victim, HQ is the Villain, or I’m acting as if I’m Helpless, please call me on it. That’s not the kind of leader I want to be.”

Nature abhors a vacuum. This maxim includes a truth that applies to human nature too, but with a twist. When we don’t know what a person or group is thinking, we fill the vacuum with stories about their motives. The twist is that these stories are overwhelmingly negative. We imagine the worst. So, imagine the following: HQ takes an action that doesn’t make sense or that hurts people in the region. People are quick to assume bad motive, and the Clever Stories begin. The solution is to fill the vacuum with accurate information.

Fill the vacuum. When HQ’s actions seem uninformed, misguided, or wrong, ask leaders to take the following actions as alternatives to Clever Stories.

Become curious, not condemning. Assume that the people at HQ are well intentioned and approachable. Avoid jumping to negative conclusions.

Get HQ’s perspective. Don’t delay. Go to the source to understand the facts as HQ sees them, and to see how these facts fit into their enterprise-wide perspective.

Explain impacts in your region. Explain the facts that relate to your region. These include elements that make your region unique (laws, regulations, workforce, customers, etc.), negative impacts the decision will have on your region, and alternative ways to achieve HQ’s objectives while minimizing impacts on your region.

Determine where you are in the decision-making process. The kinds of HQ-versus-Region problems you’ve described happen most often when HQ has either failed to get input from the region before making the decision or has decided against the region’s recommendations. Find out whether the decision has already been made, whether there is any room for modifying the decision, and whether the region has any flexibility in how the decision is implemented.

Develop a communication plan. Decide how you will communicate the decision within your region. The goal is to fill the vacuum with accurate information in a way that communicates action, strength, and loyalty. This may mean explaining why your region is making a sacrifice for the good of the greater enterprise.

I hope these ideas can help you with your colleagues and reach alignment. Let me know what works for you.
David

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Influence Versus Manipulation

David Maxfield — Tue, 16 Jul 2019 22:00:11 +0000

Dear David,

The culture in my organization is toxic. We have intelligent, proud, committed leaders who are beginning to learn the talk of collaboration and empowerment. However, they still cling to the quick-and-dirty solution of compliance. My question is, how is intentional influence different from manipulation? I fear that the concept of intentional influence will enable a dysfunctional culture. I think cultural change in medicine will be a long, slow process if it is to be meaningful and sustainable. But how do we avoid manipulation/forced compliance in the process?

Regards,
Committed to Functional Change

Dear Committed,

This is a nice, hard question. I like the thought you’ve put into it, and I’ll try to give it the kind of answer it deserves. First, I want to explore the toxic environment you describe because it’s a common problem for cultures in transition. Second, I’ll focus on intentional influence and tackle the conundrum of influence without manipulation.

Your Toxic Environment. It sounds as if you have leaders who talk the right talk and may buy in to the need to improve collaboration and empowerment across the culture. But, when they need quick action, they revert to their old ways of forced compliance. It’s a classic case of actions speaking louder than words. People see them as hypocrites and the culture becomes toxic. Here are a few ideas for overcoming this hurdle.

Crucial moments. Humans are hard-wired for self-protection. As a result, we are always on the lookout for bad news—and we’re naturally suspicious of good news. This makes us quick to read bad intent in others’ actions. So, when leaders talk the talk about collaboration and empowerment, we tend to hold back and watch their actions for evidence of their true intent.

We’re also pretty good at masking our own motives—putting on a good face—and we know our leaders are good at it too. So we don’t trust their more scripted and formal interactions. The evidence we find most credible is how they behave when the stakes are high, and supporting new values requires painful sacrifices. It’s these crucial moments that test leaders’ resolve.

Hypocrites and heroes. In these crucial moments, leaders’ actions will make them either hypocrites or heroes. There is safe ground in between.

The temptation is to revert to familiar tactics from the old culture, which is what you’ve witnessed in your organization. When action needs to be fast, your leaders revert to forced compliance and look like hypocrites. Using old tactics to create new norms can create some weird situations. For example, I visited a company that had created what they called their “MPM program” to introduce greater empowerment into their stubborn culture. I asked what MPM stood for and the frustrated senior leader said, “Mandatory Participative Management.”

The best leaders capitalize on crucial moments by doubling down on their support for the new culture. They turn the crucial moment into a symbol of their support by making a sacrifice. By sacrifice, I mean a trade-off. They trade another value—their time, ego, money, or another priority—in favor of the new cultural value. Here’s an example: A CEO of a major aerospace and defense corporation was in the middle of an employee-feedback session when his assistant passed him a message, “The Prince has arrived a half hour early.” The Prince was a royal buyer who was there to discuss a multi-billion dollar order. This was a crucial moment, and the CEO recognized it. Royalty doesn’t like to be kept waiting and the sale was important. In the old culture, the CEO would have ended the feedback session on the spot. But this time he didn’t. Instead, he explained the situation to the group and then said, “I know you’ve all invested time and energy in preparing for this meeting. And I’m anxious to hear your perspectives. Let’s continue our meeting. I’ll have my assistant work with the Prince until we’ve wrapped up here.” He put his meeting with the Prince at risk in favor of getting feedback. You can bet people noticed. Making the trade-off signaled that the CEO’s verbal support for employee input was genuine and sincere.

Intentional Influence. How can leaders drive rapid change without resorting to forced compliance or manipulation? We wrote Influencer: The New Science of Leading Change in order to answer this exact question. I’ll outline a few key concepts so you can see how the process works.

Manipulation versus influence. First, I’ll define manipulation, so we can see how influence is different. An action is manipulative if it derives a part of its power from subterfuge—i.e., from being hidden or underhanded. If explaining exactly what you are doing and why makes the action less effective, then it is manipulative. The influence strategies we teach in Influencer are just the opposite: they become more powerful as people understand how and why they are being used.

Make the business case for change. Don’t assume that a desire for open dialogue will be enough to drive culture change. Instead, make a detailed business case that ties these behaviors to bottom-line results. Share the facts you have—the good, the bad, and the ugly—about the need for the cultural change.

Measure it like it matters. Measure both behavior change and results. Cascade behavior change goals as key performance indicators for senior leaders, managers, and employees at all levels.

Turn leaders into influencers. Involve both formal and informal leaders in all phases of the culture-change initiative. These leaders, including senior leaders, must teach, model, and hold each other accountable for the new norms.

Employ all Six Sources of Influence™. Too often leaders rely on a single source solution. For example, they over-rely on training, or incentives, or motivational speeches and posters. Our research has shown that combining four or more different sources of influence makes you ten times more likely to succeed.

Culture change doesn’t have to move at a glacial pace. If the organization recruits all Six Sources of Influence to work for the change, they will find that the improvements are profound, rapid, and enduring.

Best of Luck,
David

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How to Improve Employee Morale

David Maxfield — Tue, 14 May 2019 20:49:29 +0000

Dear David,

How do you suggest a large institution go about changing a can’t-do attitude to a can-do attitude when morale is low? We’ve had budget and staffing cuts and have a history of “silos” throughout the organization. Can you help?

Signed,
Salvaging What I Can

Dear Salvaging,

You’re taking on a challenging and worthy goal. If you can improve morale, you will not only improve performance but also change lives. And don’t believe you are attempting the impossible. We’ve seen and been a part of many of these positive turnarounds.

I don’t know your institution, your industry, your history, or your competitive environment. This lack of information means my suggestions will have to be fairly general. The good news is that they will be relevant to a wide range of readers.

I’ll take an outside-in approach, first looking for barriers that impede the culture, and then at motivators that could pull the institution in the right direction.

Begin by Addressing Barriers

This is the most efficient place to start, because removing a small number of demotivating obstacles can release a flood of positive energy. Conversely, if you allow barriers to remain, they generate negative stories, rumors, and beliefs. People imagine the worst and begin to question leaders’ motives.

Conduct a Listening Tour

Bring together a group of decision-makers and have them conduct listening tours. Ideally, this group will include formal and informal (opinion) leaders from across the institution. The first goal of the tour is to identify patterns of problems that span regions and silos. The second goal is to position leaders as listeners, as people who want to understand and remove barriers.

Ask each leader to conduct both one-on-one interviews and focus groups. A few guidelines: have the leaders interview people who don’t report to them—people from other silos or regions. Give the leaders a bit of training, so they use the interviews to genuinely listen and learn, rather than lecture and solve problems. Have each leader conduct four to five one-hour interviews and participate in at least two ninety-minute focus groups.

Create Public Problem-Solving Rituals

I like a modified version of GE’s ritual, the Work-Out. Select a key barrier you discovered during your listening tour—a barrier that spans silos, impacts a lot of people, and is particularly demotivating. Bring together the decision-makers who can take positive action and have them discuss and solve it in a time-limited workshop or series of workshops, while a larger group of stakeholders observes. The goal is to get problems solved in a way that demonstrates responsive and decisive leadership. By calling this a “ritual” I’m suggesting that these Work-Outs become a regular, ongoing part of your institution.

Create Systems for Information Gathering

A listening tour is a great way to kick off a change, but lasting change requires a way to systematize the process. You need a way for people to voice their concerns in a positive way, or they will voice them instead as negative, self-defeating stories. One method that works is to schedule regular, perhaps quarterly, focus groups with opinion leaders from across your institution. Use these meetings to surface concerns that haven’t been solved through your regular channels.

Magnify Existing Motivators

Reinforce the connections that already motivate people within your institution. This means examining the purposes that motivate your workforce and improving the connections between their daily jobs and these purposes. We find it’s helpful to group purposes into the following five categories:

Themselves and their Loved Ones. People can find meaning in their ability to earn the necessities and pleasures of life. They take pride in providing for their loved ones and themselves. For example, the sales clerk who invests extra effort because she has children at home who count on her.
Customers and their Impact on the World. People can find meaning in the impact their work has on their customers and the broader world. They take pride in accomplishing their organization’s mission. For example, the nurse who achieves fulfillment through the impact he has on patients’ lives.
Organization and Team. People can find meaning in their working relationships, team, and organization. They take pride in being an important player on a winning team. For example, the case officer who sees herself as a key member of a highly reliable team.
Development and Personal Growth. People can find meaning in their personal growth and development. They take pride in their ability to take on new responsibilities and advance their career. For example, the engineer who masters new programs and systems or takes on new responsibilities to manage projects or people.
Tasks and Profession. People can find meaning in the activities that make up their job or profession. They experience the joy that comes with mastering their craft. For example, the teacher who loves being in the classroom, or the chef who loves to cook.

As leaders, our goal is to make these connections as clear and fulfilling as possible. Ideally, employees experience tight connections to all five of these values.

As you work to foster these connections, begin by looking for the values that have the weakest and the strongest connections. Sometimes an incident or event can cause people to lose connection to a value. Look for ways to rebuild it. Often, one of the connections is strong but could be stronger. Look for ways to strengthen it.

Strengthening these connections can take several forms. Generally, you want to make the connections easier for people to see and experience, as well as find ways to remind them of those connections during trying times.

Consider as an example the following short video. Imagine a workforce that’s under a lot of stress, juggling a lot of tasks, and not always succeeding. Now add that people’s lives are on the line. “Thanks For Trying” was created to remind employees of the positive impact they have—even when they fail.

I’d love to hear what others have done to improve morale across an institution.

Best of luck,
David

Want to master these crucial skills? Attend one of our public training workshops in a city near you. Learn more at www.vitalsmarts.com/events.

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What To Do When You Think a Coworker Resents Your Promotion

David Maxfield — Thu, 28 Mar 2019 02:38:45 +0000

Dear David,

I have recently been promoted and am now responsible for a group of program managers and their projects. I have been with the company about two years and am the newest member of the team. One of the program managers has taken significant issue with my promotion. He has changed his entire demeanor towards me. He was the person I worked closest with when I first came on board. Now, I am his boss. We used to chat all the time about topics unrelated to work, but not anymore. He continues to be a productive member of the team, and makes it clear when he accomplishes a task, but avoids me since the promotion. I want to discover the issue and find some common ground. I’ve tried to sit down and discuss the matter, but to no avail. What should I do?

Signed,
Promoted and Estranged

Dear Promoted and Estranged,

I often see leaders write off employees like yours. One leader told me, “An employee, who was a bit tipsy at a holiday party, gave me what he might have thought was a compliment: ‘Even though I’ve never thought you should have gotten your promotion, I have to say that you’re doing a really good job.’ He’ll probably never know it, but that was the end of his career here. He will never get another pay raise or promotion as long as I work here.”

As a leader, it’s tempting to write off a pouting employee, to work around the person, or to push them out. I’m glad you’re not taking that route. Sometimes, there is more going on than meets the eye. Sometimes, you’ll discover that you’ve misread the situation or that you can repair the damage and recover a valuable employee. Below, I’ll outline some ideas you might try.

In Crucial Conversations, we observe that “If you don’t talk it out, you’ll act it out.” As humans, our emotions leak into our expressions, our tone of voice, and our actions. Because of this, others know—or have a pretty good idea—what we are thinking and feeling, even when we try to keep it to ourselves. In this case, it sounds as if your employee continues to have issues about your promotion. But please allow me to challenge this conclusion at least a bit.

Facts and Stories

The story you and I are telling ourselves is that your employee resents your promotion and that this resentment is impacting his behavior towards you. What are the facts behind this story? You mention his change in demeanor, his efforts to clarify his accomplishments, and his ending of any small talk. Examine these incidents. Ask yourself if there are any other reasons that might explain them. For example, is he taking extra care to clarify his accomplishments because he believes you or others have overlooked them in the past? If so, is he right about that? Could there be other reasons?

Clever Stories

A “clever story” is an explanation or conclusion we tell ourselves that makes us look good, makes the other person look bad, or that justifies retaliation or bad behavior on our part. Often, these clever stories tell only our side of the story. Is it possible that there is more to this particular story? Ask yourself, “Is there anything I did at the time of the promotion or since the promotion that might cause a reasonable, rational, and well-intentioned person to respond the way he is?”

When we ask you to examine your story, we have two goals: The first is to help you see the bigger picture and to examine the facts from all perspectives. The second is to increase your empathy and understanding—to soften your heart toward the other person. You won’t be able to restore your relationship with him until you decide that you want to.

Start With Heart

This is the next step. Ask yourself what you really want, long-term, for yourself, for your employee, and for your working relationship. Do you really want to restore your relationship? You probably have your own resentments over the employee’s behavior. Can you get past these feelings? And what would be the benefits of an improved relationship? Would these benefits be worth the investment of your time and ego? If you decide to move forward, then see if you can find common ground through a Mutual Purpose.

Imagine a Mutual Purpose

Even though it might be tempting to write off this employee, try to imagine a mutual purpose. Currently, he may see you as standing between him and his advancement. Do you want to be an obstacle to his career? Or, could you imagine working with him to help his career? Is there a different purpose that he values strongly enough for it to serve as your common ground?

State Your Path

Meet with your employee and share your thinking. Begin with your observations, and then share the story you are telling yourself. Try to make your story as balanced as possible, so that it doesn’t come across as an attack or a condemnation of his behavior. Then, use your listening skills to encourage your employee to share the way he has experienced the last few months. If your employee denies any resentment, you can decide how hard to push. Maybe the denial is a harmless way for him to save face. Or, maybe you need him to admit that there is a problem in your relationship.

Share Your Intent

Explain what you really want and suggest a mutual purpose. Check to see if your employee is open to considering that there is common ground. What you may see is some verbal agreement followed by a period of skepticism and testing. This is to be expected. After all, you haven’t walked your talk yet.

Demonstrate Your Commitment

Once you’ve shared your intent, act on it. The most convincing way to demonstrate your commitment is to sacrifice your time or ego to support it. For example, find a project or series of projects that you and your employee can work on together, projects that will give him visibility with the people above you and that will demonstrate your support for him.

I hope these tips help you in finding the common ground you seek.

Best of luck,
David

Want to master these crucial skills? Attend one of our public training workshops in a city near you. Learn more at www.vitalsmarts.com/events.

The post What To Do When You Think a Coworker Resents Your Promotion appeared first on Crucial Learning.

What to Do When Someone Undermines Your Role

David Maxfield — Tue, 22 Jan 2019 23:55:45 +0000

Dear David,

I am a long-time volunteer and employee for a small, nonprofit organization. Recently, we got a new Executive Director and his management style is very challenging. I am the director of Learning and Education and previously planned all learning events. The new ED has created learning events of his own, but does not consult with me. He publicizes his own events, but not the ones I plan. I have forged partnerships with a number of outside organizations. The ED set up get-acquainted meetings with them, but doesn’t include me. Recently, he invited key volunteer leaders to a visioning retreat led by an outside consultant, and did not include me. When I’ve tried to discuss these omissions with him, he gets terribly defensive and angry. I feel like communication with him has completely broken down. My work has been curtailed. I hesitate now to plan some learning events, as I don’t know what he is planning on his own. What should I do?

Sincerely,
Feeling Undermined

Dear Feeling Undermined,

While this may sound like a one-of-a-kind situation, it’s not. In fact, anyone reading this could be next in your shoes. I’ll set the scene: You joined an organization, starting at the very bottom, in this case as a volunteer, and worked your way up into an influential role. Suddenly, you have a new boss and everything changes for the worse. What can you do? I’ll suggest some general approaches.

Look for Organizational Issues

Begin with a broad diagnosis of the situation. While it would be easy to label this problem a “relationship issue,” check for deeper organizational concerns.

Has your organization experienced recent setbacks, or does it face significant risks? I look for financial stability, balanced fundraising streams, an effective board, a clear strategic plan, programs that are aligned and effective, etc. When a board loses or chooses to replace an executive director, it often needs to address problems in one or more of these areas.

Remember that your boss has bosses, too, and this issue might be more about them than you. You can bet the board has given him a set of priorities, and it’s possible they’ve told him not to share these with staff. In other words, this problem might not be personal—or at least not about you.

Understand the ED’s Priorities

You describe the ED as “defensive” and that sounds accurate. What is it that he’s defending? How might he see you as standing between him and his priorities? I don’t have enough information to do more than guess, but here are a few possibilities:

Maybe the board has hired him to take the organization in a new direction, and you represent the “old way.”
Maybe the board has asked him to take the lead on a set of changes, and this means that you can’t be seen as leading out.
Maybe the ED’s background is in learning/education, and it’s a place where he feels comfortable and able to have an impact. He wants to make his own mark there, and not have you share the limelight.

Some of these possibilities aren’t flattering to the ED. I’m not trying to defend him but to understand him. The more you know about his priorities, the better able you’ll be to find Mutual Purpose, or at least avoid getting in his way.

Determine What You Really Want

Ask yourself what you really want long-term for yourself, for the ED, and for the organization. You joined the organization as a volunteer, so you must be committed to its mission. You’ve worked there for a long time, so I’m guessing you have coworkers who are friends. And you like your role as the director of learning/education. Which of these (and other) values are most important to you?

It sounds as if the ED has taken over your learning/education role. Is the organization large enough to have other roles you might enjoy—roles that would let you continue to focus on the mission with colleagues you care for? Or is there another organization that serves a similar mission, and needs your experience in learning/education? Consider your alternatives, so that you’ll have options in case your role needs to change.

Look for Mutual Purpose

From what you’ve shared, my guess is that the ED sees you as standing between him and his purpose—maybe even as a competitor. Ask yourself whether he is right. Does your support for the organization include support for him? Do you disagree with his direction for the organization? Have you raised concerns in a way that could cause him to believe you are not on his side?

If you feel you can support your ED, then you need to find a way to demonstrate your support—to convince him that you have his back. If you can convince him that you are on his side, he will stop treating you as an opponent. But it will likely take more than words.

The most convincing way to show support is to make a sacrifice. The most common sacrifices are time, money, other priorities, and ego. Think about what you would be willing to sacrifice, and what would convince him that you are really on his side.

Influence With Your Ears

Ask the ED for a chance to just listen and learn. Be clear that you are open and supportive. Ask open-ended questions such as, “What do you see as the organization’s biggest challenges?” “How does the organization need to change over the next year or two?” “How can I best support you?” Use follow-up questions that keep him talking and explaining: “That’s interesting, tell me more.” And “Can you give me an example?” Don’t drill down to answers or even suggestions. Practice your listening skills.

What are you listening for? You want to learn more about his priorities, how he views you and your role, and whether you think there is hope for the working relationship. Be open and take time to consider what you learn in the meeting.

Consider Leaving

I think you should also consider finding a new job. But remember, it’s always easiest to find a job while you still have one. And you’ll want a glowing recommendation from this ED. Don’t burn bridges, don’t lose your temper, and don’t criticize him after the fact. You live in a small, connected world.

I hope some of this is helpful. I wish you the best of luck. Have other readers faced similar challenges? What experiences, insights, and suggestions can you share?

Sincerely,
David

Want to master these crucial skills? Attend one of our public training workshops in a city near you. Learn more at www.vitalsmarts.com/events.

The post What to Do When Someone Undermines Your Role appeared first on Crucial Learning.

How to Deal with Delicate Workplace Issues

David Maxfield — Wed, 28 Nov 2018 00:30:10 +0000

Dear David,

I have a coworker who has FMLA approval (Federal Medical Leave Act), and I think she abuses it. She doesn’t come to work on time. Multiple times she has run out of the office, citing various personal issues—issues not related to her FMLA approved issues.

We have all agreed as a team that if we are not able to be on time, or need to leave early, or have an appointment, we will tell each other by text or in person. She has only followed through on this once. She might tell someone in leadership, but then leadership doesn’t let the team know. It is an ongoing problem. I have met with her and described the gap between expectation and her behavior. I cited ten instances of when this has occurred. She still takes no responsibility. Leadership members are aware, but they avoid conflict and have asked me to hold her accountable. I have no official authority. What is my next step?

Signed,
Unauthorized

Dear Unauthorized,

Your situation sounds very frustrating. Your coworker is not taking responsibility, your leaders are not stepping up, and you’ve tried to hold her accountable with no success. I admire your patience and resolve.

I want to help you. I’ll share a few ideas. However, I’m not optimistic that your coworker will change unless her managers require it, and it doesn’t sound as if they will. Let’s consider the various aspects of your situation.

FMLA Statute. The purpose of the FMLA statute is: “To balance the demands of the workplace with the needs of families . . . , and to allow employees to take reasonable leave for medical reasons . . . ” To accomplish this purpose, it permits, “Up to 12 workweeks or up to 480 hours of job-protected unpaid leave for family and medical reasons during a 12-month period.”

Notice two points: The statute assumes a balance between the needs of workplaces and families—that both will need to absorb some side effects for the greater good. Second, it puts a time limit on the side effects a workplace needs to absorb.

Your Leaders. It sounds as if your leaders believe your coworker’s actions are acceptable—a side effect they expect to absorb as a part of the FMLA statute. And they expect you and your team to absorb or manage the side effects as well. I’d like to raise a few questions related to this:

1. Ask yourself what you really want long term—for yourself, your coworker, and the team. For example, if you take a long-term view, say two years out, will your coworker’s FMLA issues go away? Will she return to being a good coworker? Basically, is this a short-term issue?
2. Ask yourself whether you agree with your leaders—that the problems you are experiencing are within the scope of the FMLA’s broad intent—and whether the legal risks of confronting the problems outweigh the costs.
3. Your leaders would like you and the others on your team to backfill for your co-worker while she is on leave. Is this possible? Or do you think your leaders need to take additional steps, such as hire a temporary worker to fill in? If your team needs short-term help, document the need and take it to your leaders.

Reflecting on these questions, I hope, provides you greater insight and clarity regarding the situation.

Yourself. Your frustration could easily get you into trouble. Remember, you don’t have your leaders’ support. They say they want you to hold your coworker accountable, but I don’t buy it. Here is my story: I think they are mostly saying that they won’t be the ones to hold her accountable—perhaps for fear of violating FMLA statutes. My guess is they want you to focus on getting the work done, while avoiding conflicts and any legal liabilities. The more you make an issue of your colleague’s behavior, the more your leaders may come to see you as the problem.

But don’t let my story prevent you from speaking up. If I were you, I’d check out my story with your leaders, taking care to make it safe for them, so they share their honest perspective.

Let’s suppose you decide you need to live with this situation for the next few months. How do you get your heart right? You don’t want to feel resentment toward your coworker or your leaders. This resentment won’t help you be a better person and is likely to leak out in your words and actions.

I’ll offer a few ideas, but I’m not sure which, if any, will work for you. First, try to identify and empathize with your co-worker’s situation. Look for what you can respect about her. For example, it sounds as if her life is difficult in many ways, and yet she is trying to stay employed. Second, tell yourself that this situation is limited in time. When you look back at it five years from now, it won’t matter. Third, focus on being the person you want to be. Be a role model for caring and patience. Use this circumstance as a test to demonstrate to yourself who you really are.

Your Coworker. Drawing on skills from Crucial Accountability, you could address your coworker’s motivation and ability. I would do so not with the intent to change your coworker’s short-term actions, but to make sure that when she completes her FMLA leave, she returns as a valued member of your team.

Motivation: Should you address the problem as a matter of motivation, I worry your coworker will feel excluded and punished by the team. That would violate the whole purpose of FMLA and could create long-term damage to her relationship with the team. Ask yourself what you and your team can do to let her know she is still a valued member of your team. She needs to know that her team is there for her in her time of need.
Ability: If you approach the problem as a matter of ability, ask yourself what you and your team can do to backfill for your coworker. Are there ways you can help her stay updated on information she misses? Can you extend her a lifeline or job partner who makes sure she doesn’t get left out or left behind?

Again, I respect your actions, your patience, and your persistence. I hope some of these suggestions help.

Best of luck,
David

Want to master these crucial skills? Attend one of our public training workshops in a city near you. Learn more at www.vitalsmarts.com/events.

The post How to Deal with Delicate Workplace Issues appeared first on Crucial Learning.