Do You Use Critical Thinking or Counterfeit Thinking?

Excerpted from an article published by Patrick M. O'Shei in Uncommon Wisdom.

Do you attempt to solve problems with critical examination of root causes and clarity around the objectives -or- do you merely deal a "tried-and-true" solution off your deck of management card tricks?

 

The episode of the Simpson’s where a lobbyist suggests to Mayor Quimby and the community leaders that all Springfield needs to cure its problems is a “Monorail”, mocks the counterfeit thinking so often employed by politicians in their “pork barrel” funding of projects that have zero possibility of producing the results promised but follow the pattern of similar projects done elsewhere.

As opposed to “counterfeit” thinking, the term "critical thinking" takes thinking in a focused and diagnostic direction as it means "thinking" directed at finding and examining that which is fundamental to understanding something.

Critical thinking is about finding patterns not following patterns. The leap from thinking about something -to- developing an understanding of something is the same as the difference between standing on a pool deck and looking at an object on the bottom -and- diving into the pool, swimming to the bottom and examining the object down there.

To read the full article in Uncommon Wisdom click on Critical Thinking.

Project Management Performance Through Engagement and Respect

Leaders and business owners often face critical project and team management issues when faced with challenges that leverage the future of the business.

For the most significant leveraged projects such as construction, expansion, acquisitions or mergers, a business must secure the services of independent professionals and firms due to the required expertise and licenses. A world-class architect, engineer, lawyer or accountant in a specialized field is both a valuable and costly asset. They have the potential to contribute great value or (if misdirected) squander a lot of cash on behalf of the owner. But the individual capabilities offered by specialized team members are only one part of the picture; to get real business value, the business needs to create a powerful and well-functioning team from both the internal staff and specialized external service providers.

Patrick O'Shei writes about managing a team of independent professionals to produce an optimal timely and valuable business outcome on a recent project. Creating this type of result is an incredibly difficult business challenge due to the complexity, competing interests, the high-stakes project demands, and the workloads of the professional team members involved.

Building Engagement and Respect across the team are keys to this effort. A successful leader and project effort ENGAGES team members on two levels - both formally, and informally - in the following ways, so that each team member:

1. Makes specific emotional commitments to the desired end-result as defined by the owner-organization.
2. Works willingly within the constructs of a proper professional engagement as defined in a work agreement or contract.

To achieve good outcomes, the team needs to offer RESPECT to each other (and experience it, across and among its members) - on three levels:

1. Each person treats others with respect on a human level with time for listening and addressing concerns.
2. Each person treats others with respect on a professional level with weighing of opinion, and appropriate deference, based upon their areas of expertise.
3. The business and the team treats each team-member (whether person or firm) with contractual respect. This means that all seek to make and understand decisions in the context of the contractual obligations, licenses and liabilities of each participating professional or firm.

These qualities set the ground-work for high performing teams in the complex and time-sensitive circumstances of strategic project management.

Case: A non-profit teaching institution faced erosion of margins and threat of survival. Read how the senior business manager formed and managed a professional team to implement a dramatic solution that is leading the business out of the crisis...

Read more on services we offer supporting businesses, owners and leaders to shape powerful teams when considering game-changing, high-stakes projects.

Transformational Leadership: Problems, Solutions, & Structure

Patrick O'Shei, in "Uncommon Wisdom", writes about the link between "problems" and "solutions".  Capable leaders have the awareness to recognize what the "frame" around these two orientations is, within which they and their organizations might operate:  When confronted with a challenge, do you see problems? or do you see solutions & possibilities?

A solution orientation is always broader and longer in scope, results-oriented and anticipates future implications.  Seeds of both new opportunities and future problems get planted along with new solutions.  A solution orientation is akin to playing chess where past play and the current board both provide data and guide the player; she subsequently can evaluate each potential move in terms of the potential impact on the future.

As an analogy:  A sinking ship is a problem--but what is the best solution? The solution orientation discerns between:

• Immediate problems and urgent failure (a penetration to the hull of the ship, leaking seams or joints in the hull of the boat, a terrible storm),
• Constraints on current performance (poor ship design, misuse or neglect of the ship) and
• Faulty application/ approach (using the wrong ship for the task, using a ship instead of a bridge).

While urgent problems may require pumping quickly and getting the sinking boat back to harbor, most long term leverage comes from understanding what outcome you seek and the possible solutions for creating that outcome.

Organizations and people who see first and predominantly "the problems" they face, may both effectively handle current problems--and entrap themselves in a world where they accomplish less, spend too much (over and over again), and ultimately fail. This occurs because they can only see solution of their problems in terms of eliminating the problem itself.

In his book, The Path of Least Resistance, Robert Fritz declares that "structure determines performance". When we implement solutions, they create structure. "Excellent" solutions--generated from a robust consideration of possibilities, alternatives, questioning of desired outcomes, and reflecting on underlying purposes--produce desired results for longer periods of time without creating significant new problems. Excellent solutions leverage strengths across "what works" in the world.

As a leader, visualizing the desired outcome, in full, rich, clear detail--is an important part of generating solutions, as the gulf between current problems (reality) and the desired outcome may only be bridged in the mind initially. Some excellent solutions require a number of steps. Each step addresses current reality with an implementable solution--and each fully anticipates a future solution, naturally producing both interim results and providing leverage for achieving the future solution. This path of leveraged solutions is akin to building bridges, where organizations take intermediate steps in coordinated fashion, to bring into being one overall solution that really works.

excerpted from "Uncommon Wisdom/ A Solution Orientation:  What Floats Your Boat", Patrick O'Shei, 2/2010.

Private Business Owners, & Monetizing Business Value, When Exiting

The economy is apparently emerging from recession-good news for all, hopefully to include those who need jobs. However, there's one group of people for whom the hard work, introspection and self-examination about their future cannot and should not be over: private business owners, especially those running small businesses.

Most small business owners are running hard to meet day-to-day obligations, serve customers, make payroll, hire the next employee, file the taxes. The economic downturn for many has taken substantial income out of their pockets.
For too many owners, the urgent reality of "today's market" overshadows the far more dramatically important: the looming and critical decisions about how they plan for their exit from their business-and how they package the business to enable this exit, at the time of their choosing, with the economic nest-egg they need.

I recently spoke with a group of about 20 private business owners, running retail service businesses, for whom this issue was front-and-center. They are "subject matter experts", technically adept in their fields, most in business for more than a decade, some for several. Many of their businesses gross $1-5MM annually. Like many, they're working hard to make ends meet these days.

Over the last 10 years, a fragmented set of studies paints a potentially worrying picture for business owners like these. While the data are a little sketchy, enough "data points" exist for the direction to be clear (these data sourced from entrepreneur.com; for more information, you might want to review these sources provided by some small-business experts: http://bit.ly/SmallBusStats ):

• 45%: proportion of small-medium sized business people who say their biggest regret was starting to save too late for retirement. Harris Interactive, September 2006
• 30%: proportion of self-employed business owners who say they have no retirement savings. National Association of Self-Employed, January 2006
• 30%+: percentage of private business owners who've done NO exit planning.
• In a related topic, Inc. Magazine cites a 2005 PricewaterhouseCoopers study of 364 CEOs of privately-held companies:
• 65% of the respondents said they planned to leave their company within 10 years.
• 51% thought they would leave via a sale to another company.
• 43% of the respondents said they had done little or no succession planning.
• #1 reason why private businesses don't sell: lack of planning by the seller. PriceWaterhouseCoopers study

These statistics worrying enough-but here's a final one to sharpen the point-this one courtesy of Rick Taft:

• 25%: estimated proportion of small businesses for sale, that actually sell.

Most private business owners, especially in smaller companies, are "fully invested" in their businesses-and yes, that means that "in the business" is likely where they've put "investment" that might have funded retirement. Most must be banking on "good luck" at that moment of successful sale-but apparently many haven't begun to imagine what's required in order to get there, quite yet.

As a small-business owner-how are you thinking about your exit? How are you positioned to manage your transition? 

We've assembled a high-level questionnaire to touch on the key areas related to preparation and "packaging" of a private business for sale (here). These questions don't assume that every owner wants to sell-but do assume that every owner seeks as much value as possible from what he/ she has created.

We welcome your feedback, comments, thoughts-and want to hear your experiences.

Business Growth: Complexity & Mixed Messages in Customer Service

Don Mick wrote of a recent automotive service experience...  one with which many might empathize. 

In his post, he writes of being alternately blessed (with affirmations and appreciation of his status as a customer of the auto dealership) and cursed (with negative and diminishing encounters that communicate that--as a customer--he's a bother and an inconvenience)--all within the same customer service transaction.  As a business leader, please consider the following observations:

1. How challenging is it, for even energetic and well-intentioned leaders to get all of the parts of an organization (and the people working within the organization) on the same page/ engaging with customers in a consistent and synchronous fashion?
2. How confusing and anxiety-provoking is this experience for the customer, a "whipsaw" effect? I hazard that the absence of consistent and clear communication regarding a customer's status, is in fact an overall strong negative/ "dissatisfier", with regard to how that customer feels about the dealership/ service provider;
3. How little of this story is really about immediate "competence". Most of Don's story is really about empathy (or the lack thereof), the ripple effects of poor quality (first, in the product; then, in the service-event that attempted to fix the product), and the missing "end-to-end view" of the customer transaction and the "special" customer, by the dealership service team, and by a single dealership "owner."

Simply proclaiming customers as "special" and providing them with "bling" does not make them so.  Even if service providers proclaim it (but don't act consistently with the proclamation) customers sure won't believe it.

Only when an organization actually organizes its work with the customer (and the customer's experience) at the center, as a top priority--and changes "business as usual"--will consistent messages, and unqualifiedly happy customers, emerge from the front doors.

As a business leader/ manager:  What is YOUR "teaching story" of a specific moment of customer engagement--and what did you observe/ learn from it, both about yourself as a customer--and/ or about the perspective of the service provider?

What Conditions Make for Top-Performing Senior Teams?

In a wide array of recent engagements with companies and projects, covering an array of senior executive teams led by CXO's, we observe that SOME perform with real synergy - where the teams are able to create dramatic, innovative value beyond the individual contributions of their members - while energetically engaged with each other, connected in important emotional and psychological ways.

OTHERS...  cannot create business outcomes, are slowed by friction, full of unhappiness, rife with defection and "retirement-in-place".

What leads to these dramatically different outcomes?  Observation suggests that results do not FOLLOW "good feelings" on the team, but precede or run in parallel with good feelings.  Further, the role the senior leader plays in the group, and how s/he plays that role, has some impact - that the "leadership stance" the senior leader is able to create, can dramatically organize and motivate positive team process and outcomes  or work against good outcomes.  The stances of individual team members - leaders in their own right - shape the dynamics of the team.  Finally, observation suggests that the personal connection of each member to the team's shared commitment (its mission, or purpose, or objective) is fundamental to the ways the team operates.

In your observations of senior teams - in your organization - what have you observed about how top performing senior teams work - and what contributes to their success or failure?  What stories about "best" team experiences can you share?

© Jaggat ... | Dreamstime.com

 

Inspirational Leadership - What Values Will We Embody?

IN a recent post (21 March 2009) in the New York Times, Thomas Friedman writes about his concern that we don't have any "adults in charge" - and that as a result, "politics worse than usual" prevail.

Mr. Friedman said, "Inspiring conduct has so much more of an impact than coercing it."  ... 
He goes on in one paragraph to quote Dov Seidman, CEO of LRN, on what it might look like to actually have leaders behaving like leaders - and engaging citizens, stakeholders (and now, yes, SHAREHOLDERS) around those values, motivations and principles that draw us forward - the greater values we hold in common.

"There is nothing more powerful than inspirational leadership that unleashes principled behavior for a great cause...  What makes a company or a government “sustainable" is not when it adds more coercive rules and regulations to control behaviors.  It is when its employees or citizens are propelled by values and principles to do the right things, no matter how difficult the situation.  Laws tell you what you can do. Values inspire in you what you should do. It’s a leader’s job to inspire in us those values.”

What are the best examples of inspiring leadership - in your home, organization, or nation - that have propelled you to virtuous action? 

Who has been the best example of this kind of leader for you?

Tough Times

These are Tough Times

Many businesses are experiencing restricted access to investment capital.

Workforce morale is poor; many have experienced downsizing. Survivors grieve their departed colleagues. The fear, uncertainty and doubt has disheartened workforces – who see their company lowering its sights, but without a new clear vision in view.

Working capital is constrained as lenders focus internally on their cash and balance sheet issues – and grimly, on their own diminished prospects.

Sales volumes are down.

Forecasts for the future are gray.

For many companies, the weakening brought on by many factors like those above has increased competitive pressures, challenges to find and keep the right talent. For some, the gathering storm has raised the specter of more imminent acquisition.

In Challenges, We Find Opportunities

During these times, people question many fundamental assumptions – about how the business makes money, about whether the business model itself remains viable, about our collective capabilities and will, about the future and what it may hold, for good (or we fear) for ill.

Some of this questioning is valuable. To the extent that all assumptions and questions are “valued equally” – and to the extent that people are putting too many assumptions “in play” at one time – the process of questions assumptions in this way might actually contribute to anxieties, and stoke fear, uncertainty and doubt.  To the extent that excessive questioning paralyzes, and limits meaningful action, it can be unhealthy.

For many during this time, the writing is on the wall that “the future” will look different from “the past.” The process of holding on to the past, hoping that some vestiges of it will survive – and grieving the losses that accompany its passing – complicates the situation, and may add emotional challenges to the very real and rational economic, organizational and personal ones.

Finding The Way Forward

During this time is an opportunity for leaders to make a new call to action. An opportunity to rethink the business model. To refocus on core principles. To affirm vision, and describe and define how that vision might come into being in new, fresh, innovative and compelling ways. To reconnect and affirm relationships with good customers. To rethink basic assumptions, in a structured and progressive way. To hold candid and courageous conversations that do not shrink from clear language and clear description, and that enable all participants to find inspiration, motivation, and value - and the strength and will to move forward.

Now is the time to position and drive your organization – in the ways demanded by these times, and the new realities your organization faces. Now is the time to approach people and thinking in new ways. Now – more than ever – is the time to “double down” on leadership. But perhaps not leadership as it has always been practiced...

What key questions are you asking yourself – about the direction for your organization, what you discern as needs and priorities to address, about your leadership?

Managing the "Right Stuff" - Leadership Lessons from the NBA

The No-Stats All-Star - NYTimes.com

I’m not a basketball fan. Before reading this article, I couldn’t have named a single player on the Houston Rockets – and in fact, had never heard of Shane Battier, who is the subject of this article.  Shane Battier, his approach, and the observations made about the larger “mode of managing” illuminated here have leadership repercussions what we focus on, where we find ourselves as a society and an economy today – and I can feel the tremors rippling through leader- and management development as well.

In summary:  Shane Battier is an individual with undistinguished individual statistics.  However, he does many of the "right things", the unselfish things, the ego-less things... those things that make his teammates' performances improve, that dramatically improve his team's overall odds of winning games - and increase opponent's odds of losing.  The Houston Rockets have been able to create a "meta model" of performance - and measure these intangible but very real contributions of Shane Battier - and in fact, of every Houston Rocket.

[Note to author Michael Lewis: Basketball isn’t the only ‘arena’ where we should be looking at team-level performance metrics (and the ways that individual performance affects the team and other members on it). Basketball isn’t the only place where we should be attending to “team dynamics” and team performance – instead of individual performance. It isn’t the only place where we should be thinking about metrics and measures that really matter to the long-term health and vitality of the enterprise. Just thought you’d want to know.]

Our economy – and esp. the financial system, set up with incentives and loose regulation for the Masters of the Universe, could drive sales (see this note elaborating a view on the financial system meltdown). 

Apparently, however, this system could not review the odds as well as Daryl Morey and Shane Battier, apparently can’t digest and respond to data as well, or understand from the data what it is that they should be doing.  Apparently, this system and the leaders and players in it, could learn a lot about managing – and about winning, overall as a team - from watching the NBA, and from studying the Houston Rockets.

The No-Stats All-Star - NYTimes.com

Article Excerpts:

Statistical Anomaly His greatness is not marked in box scores or at slam-dunk contests, but on the court Shane Battier makes his team better, often much better, and his opponents worse, often much worse.

Here we have a basketball mystery: a player is widely regarded inside the N.B.A. as, at best, a replaceable cog in a machine driven by superstars. And yet every team he has ever played on has acquired some magical ability to win.

He may not grab huge numbers of rebounds, but he has an uncanny ability to improve his teammates’ rebounding. He doesn’t shoot much, but when he does, he takes only the most efficient shots. He also has a knack for getting the ball to teammates who are in a position to do the same, and he commits few turnovers. On defense, although he routinely guards the N.B.A.’s most prolific scorers, he significantly ­reduces their shooting percentages. At the same time he somehow improves the defensive efficiency of his teammates...

... the big challenge on any basketball court is to measure the right things. The five players on any basketball team are far more than the sum of their parts; the Rockets devote a lot of energy to untangling subtle interactions among the team’s elements. To get at this they need something that basketball hasn’t historically supplied: meaningful statistics.

There is a tension, peculiar to basketball, between the interests of the team and the interests of the individual. The game continually tempts the people who play it to do things that are not in the interest of the group.

... [in the game], the player, in his play, faces choices between maximizing his own perceived self-interest and winning. The choices are sufficiently complex that there is a fair chance he doesn’t fully grasp that he is making them.

... instead of grabbing uncertainly for a rebound, for instance, Battier would tip the ball more certainly to a teammate. Guarding a lesser rebounder, Battier would, when the ball was in the air, leave his own man and block out the other team’s best rebounder.  A player whom Morey describes as “a marginal N.B.A. athlete” not only guards one of the greatest — and smartest — offensive threats ever to play the game - but renders him a detriment to his team.

Knowing the odds, Battier can pursue an inherently uncertain strategy with total certainty. He can devote himself to a process and disregard the outcome of any given encounter.