24 January How to be a great leader January 24, 2021 By SuperUser Account Leadership, Skills, Strategy Leadership, Vision, Clarity, Decision-making, skills 0 Three skills you can work on. Vision, Clarity, and Effective Decision-making. Colin Powell, the retired US Four-Star General says to remain calm and be kind. He also has a rule - to have a demanding vision. Vision, he says, is our destination. Have a Vision of the future Vision, what is it? Where do I find it? Vision is not “Establishing vaccination guidelines and agreements, activating a network of furloughed retail workers, and implementing a military supply-chain technology for transportation and storage.” That is the strategy. Vision is not “Vaccinating all the citizens against COVID by September 2021”. That is a goal, that will be driven by the Strategy. Vision is higher than that. Vision is not something that exists today. It is something that is imagined that could be created in the future. Developing a compelling vision is done by looking into yourself. What are your beliefs? What do you believe is possible? Figuring out who you are, why you are here, and what is most valuable to you. Cultivating vision is a process. It does not emerge during an off-site, or from reading leadership philosophies, or watching an inspiring movie. To be visionary you need to set aside significant time to percolate these questions. 2. Provide Clarity of desired results Bruce Lee may have said, “The successful warrior is the average person, with laser-like focus.” Results require change. Without change there is no result. Motivating anyone to change is expecting them to work towards the unseen and unknown. At every level of challenge this is a fundamental issue that needs an answer every day. Giving your team the answer they need is not difficult, your job is to provide clarity. You need to communicate to your team the information they need to risk working on the unseen and unknown. Explain to your team what is most important. Work with them so they understand why the choices made are the best choices. When the team is aligned on what is most important they will have clarity on the desired results. Demonstrate effective Decision making Nelson Mandela said that “Action without vision is only passing time. Vision without action is merely daydreaming. But vision with action can change the world.” Standing on the shoulders of giants, I say the sum of the actions will not be productive without a robust decision-making process. The problem with change is that, only after starting, on the way to achieving results, does the solution emerge. The detail is previously unknown on what is required, how it will come together, and what is needed. Leaders who make the mistake of communicating their vision from on high, hiring the best team, and delegating all responsibility for results will be in for a surprise. Leaders need to reserve time to develop vision and they need to be effective at engaging others to deliver lofty goals. However, do not let go of the steering wheel and don’t look away from the dashboard. You need to ensure that everyone is aware of and reliant on a process for obtaining your decisions on how the strategy and goals are to being met. You need to ensure that you are aware of and broadly communicating key decisions to all stakeholders. If you miss this – you will more than likely not recognise the final product. Questions for you, the readers. What would be an example of a Vision that is supported by the vaccination goal and strategy mentioned above? How have great leaders from demonstrated these three skills of Vision, Clarity, and Decision-making? (e.g., George Washington, Martin Luther King Jr., Captain Kirk) STEPHEN D WISE INTEGRATION PROFESSIONALS DRAMATICALLY IMPROVE TRACTION Related Articles The most powerful leadership skill an expert Project Manager needs for success No one can be an expert in all fields. A Project Manager is a skilled expert on leading teams to initiate, plan, execute and close projects. These are among the most important skills, but not the most powerful. If you aren’t feeling well you go to see your General Practitioner (GP). Your GP understands the big picture and upon identifying a specific issue or risk with your health may refer you to a specialist. In this analogy the GP is like a Project Manager – they do not need to be an expert in every field and one difference between okay GP’s and excellent GP’s is the speed and quality and follow-up related to the referral. All Project Managers will tell you that the most commonly used skill on a project is communication. However, neither communication nor planning are the most powerful skills in the arsenal. The true multiplier, the most powerful skill, is the ability to learn from others. The ability to learn from others enables the PM to absorb the nuances of the culture, mitigate the hidden risks of the processes, and allow for the complexity of the technology. When a diverse project team gets together it doesn’t matter who is the smartest or most senior in the room. What matters is learning from everyone’s skills and experience and channeling that back to the team so the whole is greater than the sum. The most powerful leadership skill is the ability to apply the greater whole in order to reach the objectives of the project quicker and with less risk of failure. Stephen Wise https://www.IntegrationProfessionals.com Six things I must do to bring value Part 1 of 2. Six things I must do to bring value. Part 1 of 2. Even in tight times, when the number of resumes floating around has risen dramatically, many Project Management Office (PMO) leads are still saying there is a shortage of talent. “Get me a good Project Manager”, they say to the headhunters. I take it for granted that good managers are great leaders and excellent communicators. What are the differentiators that make a good manager a good Project Manager (PM)? I believe there are six things a PM must do during the planning and execution of a project in order to bring value as a Project Manager: Create a Work Break Down Structure. Determine which tools, methodology, and documentation will be used on the project. Facilitate the creation of an appropriate schedule and save the baseline. Use Earned Value to track schedule and budget progress against plan. Hold regular status meetings. Escalate unresolved issues and significant change requests to a management team. 1. Create a Work Break Down Structure. The 100% rule is the key. The rule is, ‘At any level of the Work Breakdown Structure (WBS), the entire scope of the project and all deliverables is captured 100%.’ To create the WBS, I engage potential participants using pre-mails and then hold a group session with a large white board, all stakeholders represented, and lots of post-it notes. I like to stop at only three or four levels deep into the WBS – but this is really the call of the team members who are doing the work. After the meeting, MS Visio Organization-Chart helps to quickly show the WBS graphically on one page. This page gets tweaked as necessary and is dragged to every meeting I attend. I use this tool to manage scope creep, engage stakeholders, accept deliverables, and avoid gaps in accountability. It’s the one Project Management tool I can’t live without – it becomes the entire project on one page. 2. Determine which tools, methodology, and documentation will be used on the project. Every new project is mashup of culture and organizational objectives. A good PM uses diplomacy and leadership to follow the norms that have been set and break the rules when the situation calls for it. Usually it’s not up to the PM to determine, between PRINCE2, PMBOK, Agile, SDLC, and CMMI. Whatever the methodologies employed it is the PM’s responsibility to ensure the approach is communicated to the team and guidance on how to implement it appropriately is available. My goal is that issues related to the tools, methodology, and documentation float to the background as the team presses ahead with work at hand. 3. Facilitate the creation of an appropriate schedule and save the baseline. A good PM will facilitate team creation of a schedule that documents a) activities that must be completed, and; b) name of the one person responsible for providing status updates. My rule of thumb is that an identified task that takes longer than 2 weeks should be broken down into smaller pieces and a task that takes less than 2 days is too detailed – but this is the team member’s call as they own the schedule, not the PM. When the team agrees that the schedule drawn up is doable, save a copy, this is the (first) baseline. Team Building - Plea of the Project Manager The top global business challenge is hiring and developing the right team members to continue positive business growth, according to the 2011 edition of the PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) Private Business Barometer.[1] This report marked the second year that staffing dominated the barometer of business challenges, but it is merely the ongoing documentation of a problem businesses of all sizes face in the present talent market environment. Despite historically elevated global unemployment levels, businesses worldwide face a significant shortage of competent staff members. Firms that are unable to find the talent they need go to the market at a disadvantage. Firms with the right talent can secure additional market share, meet customer needs, and innovate for the future. How then can firms ensure that they are not left behind in the global talent race? It is not hopeless. There are a number of specific solutions employers can pursue to make themselves hiring leaders in their target talent markets. These solutions are not merely to throw money and perks at the problem. Instead, through the strategic implementation of hiring and competency development standards, organizations can set themselves apart as the discoverers and creators of an elite pool of loyal talent. This post is first in a series on Team Building for the enterprise. Stephen Wise www.IntegrationProfessionals.com [1] The PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) Private Business Barometer. Human Capital Magazine, May 5th, 2011. Retrieved August 1st, 2011 from: www.hrleader.net.au/articles/B5/0C0705B5.asp Team Building - Environmental Factors Fourth in a series on Team Building. Along with personnel factors, there are also a number of business environment factors affecting firms' ability to hire and develop quality team members. Just as the world population is evolving, so too is the world work environment, and the speed of change is leaving many firms breathless. Businesses must increasingly compete on a global scale and deal with staff just as mobile as their corporate leaders. Virtual teams are rising, freeing workers from the confines of the office, which in turn makes it more difficult to control and train talent pools. With lower loyalty levels to organizational leaders, the global, mobile, and virtual workplace can mean a staff free-for-all when competing for talent. GLOBALIZATION The blending of talent pools from around the world brings diversity of ideas, cultures, and practices to the business environment. For some firms, this is a wholly positive experience. For other firms, this is disruptive and difficult to adapt to in daily practice. Yet the shifting demographics of the world mean that globalization forces are more likely to increase than decrease, requiring staffing managers and business planners to adapt or lose at the global talent game. RISE OF THE VIRTUAL WORKPLACE In the United States, 58 percent of companies consider themselves to be virtual workspaces, according to the Insight Research Corporation.[1] This rise of virtual work and virtual office environments presents a challenge to hiring and developing quality team members. Culture and fit to culture is a prime driver of employee success, but how can this be assessed if the employee will never spend time in the office? What is the role of workplace learning culture over Twitter or via Skype conferencing? How can team member development be instigated and monitored remotely to ensure training and development investments are paying off? These questions and many more are becoming larger and larger issues for recruiters and managers worldwide. DECREASED LOYALTY/INCREASED MOBILITY Adding to the challenge of managing virtual work teams is the challenge of managing less loyal and more mobile workforces. While previous generations of workers were bound to one company for the effective duration of their careers, some 80 percent of modern workers are ready to go work for another firm if it appears more attractive according to research firm Right Management.[2] Over the course of their working lives, the average American worker will have 8 – 11 jobs, and up to five different careers. While this represents greater mobility than other parts of the world, it is not unusual for top talent in developing nations to switch jobs annually in pursuit of pay increases or promotions. Brazil, facing a 7.5 percent annual growth rate, can't keep up talent wise, while India and China face broad-based skill shortages as workers routinely jump ship to pick up the double-digit wage increases that are expected even in a down market.[3] Firms can no longer expect that workers will stay with them throughout their working life. On one hand, this makes organizations reluctant to invest in talent that may head for the door at the first opportunity. Yet on the other hand, firms who can grow talent become less dependent on individual workers and better able to pass knowledge between team members to reduce the impact of a highly mobile workforce. Adapting rather than complaining about the turnover rates is going to provide smart firms with real talent advantages. Stephen Wise www.IntegrationProfessionals.com [1] Insight Research Corporation. “The Mobile Workforce and Enterprise Applications 2007-2012.” Retrieved August 5th, 2011 from: http://www.insight-corp.com/reports/mwf.asp [2] Harnish, Tom. “Be Flexible To Modern Staffing Challenges.” Open Forum March 25th, 2011. Retrieved August 4th, 2011 from: http://www.openforum.com/idea-hub/topics/managing/article/be-flexible-to-modern-staffing-challenges-1 [3] Kazmin, Amy, Robinson, Gwen, and Weitzman, Hal. “Talent Shortage Adds To Growth Strains.” Financial Times, published May 19th, 2011. Retrieved August 4th, 2011 from: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/5d288c4-816a-11e0-9c83-00144feabdc0.html#axzz1UNIic5IA Trust us. We have block chain and we are here to help. Block chain's great Promise Middlemen are part of our daily lives. The great promise of block chain technology is eliminating the middleman. The original / most famous application of block chain is cryptocurrency, such as bitcoin. With no middleman, for example, with no bank to have to deal with, we could avoid those annoying fee’s and charges. Sounds great! Really? Who is going to do the work to provide a monthly statement of all your deposits and withdrawals? Who is going to do the work to lend money so you can buy a house or car, or pay for the hundreds of smaller purchases you make? Who am I going to call if I am having trouble logging in and can’t access my money? Who am I going to call if my bank engages in fraudulent activity? Block chain's technology Block chain uses crowd sourcing, massive computing resources, and math. The result is a process to allow us to exchange value directly with each other, without using a middle man. You might think we do this already. For example, if I make a deal with the neighbour to cut my grass for $25, you may think there is no middleman. But there is a middleman. I can’t pay unless I deposit my pay cheque and take out money from my middleman/bank. The promise of Block chain is that we can eliminate the middleman and instead of using a middleman/bank to keep track of our money, we will use the crowd to keep track of our money. The block chain response is something like, ‘Isn’t this going to be fantastic? We will deal direct with each other and rely on math and big computers as a proxy for trusting our bank/middleman’. This is not so fantastic. In the current models, we have no way to reverse a fraudulent transaction, no way to track money laundering, and no way to stop terrorist financing. Governments and banks aren’t going to hand over the keys to the economy so easily. Peak frenzy We are approaching block chain peak frenzy. I know because I failed my second-year statistics course but still read Satoshi Nakamoto’s paper on distributed databases, probability, and time-stamping. The trouble right now is the conversation is being dominated by charlatans jumping onto the next big thing. If not charlatans it is geniuses interested in the math, or disaffected folks interested in disrupting big corporations. Or, all the above. Steve Jobs Something big is happening but block chain is missing it’s Steve Jobs. I think block chain’s Steve jobs will emerge from Toronto, but that is for another article. Team Building - Performing effective onboarding Once promising new hires have been selected, the next step for organizations is to complete effective on-boarding of their new hires. The on-boarding process introduces new hires to the organization as functional workers and links them to the knowledge that they need to be strong performers right from the start. The on-boarding period has been called one of the most critical times for businesses and new hires. This brief period, often no more than 90 days, is a make-or-break moment for both sides. Workers have to show their knowledge and ability to perform in role, but companies also need to ensure workers are mapped to the appropriate resources and contacts within the organization to successfully execute their assignments, notes leadership transition expert Michael D. Watkins. His groundbreaking book, The First 90 Days, points out that nearly a quarter of all workers enter new roles each year, and bringing these workers smoothly into their new roles gives organizations significant competitive advantages.[1] Workers who were hired with clear metric to support their acquisition by the organization know what is expected from them, easing the on-boarding process. Companies then simply have to ensure that the most effective training is given near the start of the work contract to bring potential top talents up to speed quickly and ready to execute on behalf of the firm. Stephen Wise http://www.IntegrationProfessionals.com [1] Watkins, Michael. The First 90 Days: Critical Success Strategies for New Leaders at All Levels. Harvard Business Press, 2003. Showing 0 Comment Comments are closed.