Leadership Caffeine: Surviving as a Leader When Things Go Horribly Wrong
Filed under: Career, Crisis Leadership, Leadership, Leadership Caffeine, Leadership Skills, Management Education, Professional Growth, Talent Management, Your Professional Development "To Do" List
When faced with unexpected challenges, a good friend of mine intones what I believe is a fitting old Yiddish quote, “Man Plans and God Laughs.”
Our modern incarnation of that is a less reverent but eminently understandable, “Stuff Happens.” My word choice here is the less frequently referenced “S-word” from this common phrase.
Learning to cope with the unexpected deviation from your most carefully laid plans is an important part of growing up as a leader.
The most challenging work and life experiences are the ones that shape and mold our character and help us earn the rare and valuable attribute of wisdom.
Of course, it’s hard to sit back when the “Stuff” is hitting the fan and think, “Gee, I’m going to come out of this stronger and wiser.” Instead of reflecting on your predicament, it’s helpful to have your own approach to cope and act. There will be ample time for reflection down the road.
7 Suggestions for Developing Your Crisis Leadership Skills:
- Early recognition is key…teach your team members to use their senses and sources to identify and report problems as early as possible. This is harder than it sounds and many otherwise smart leaders establish cultures that discourage early reporting without the whole picture being available. Don’t shoot your messengers. Encourage them to look and listen for patterns or signs of problems and to be comfortable taking action to stomp out smoldering fires or to highlight approaching firestorms. Accurate, early recognition will save the day.
- Panic and confusion are powerful forces…eradicate them as quickly as possible. Train the people around you to metaphorically shift gears from their initial human reactions of fear or panic to those of reading the situation, processing, response development and action. Save valuable time by minimizing the “churn” phase. I’ve watched as teams and leaders squandered precious months attempting to determine whether a problem was real. Don’t fall into this fatal time trap.
- Remember that the team mirrors your approach to the crisis. I mentioned shifting gears earlier. YOU need to find another performance and leadership gear that sets the tone and tenor for the team. If you flail, panic and show fear, your team’s ability to accurately process and respond will melt away. A concerned but confident demeanor is critical.
- It’s time to trust. You might have the title and earn the big bucks for being in charge, but now is not the time to assume that you have to think of everything. If you’ve cultivated and trained and empowered your team properly, it’s time to trust them to execute on their jobs. If you cannot trust them, you’ve got bigger leadership problems than the crisis at hand.
- It’s OK to issue essential orders in a crisis. While seemingly contradictory to my “trust” mandate above, I’ve observed leader that failed to galvanize an effective response to a crisis by allowing people to spend too much time trying to figure out what to do next. This is a balancing act. Don’t hesitate to issue orders on items critical to getting your team to the next step of managing the crisis. This is why you get paid the big bucks. Earn them.
- Breakdown the seemingly impossible challenge facing the team into discrete, manageable steps. Individuals and teams are easily paralyzed when the scale of a problem or a fix seems overwhelming. Emphasize discrete steps and focus efforts on what’s in front of them and controllable and fixable right now.
- Manage the environment. The effective crisis leader stays involved and aware of what’s working and what’s not. Encouragement, support, resources, help, decisions and knowing when to stay out of the way are all critical tasks and tools of the crisis leader.
The Bottom-Line
One of the worst mistakes that you can make as a leader is to assume that because you said, “Make it so,” your plans will magically unfold without so much as a hiccup. Whether you subscribe to the belief that “Stuff Happens,” or “Man Plans and God Laughs,” you are well served to recognize that a large part of your role is helping others navigate problems.
Develop an approach that allows you to leverage these great opportunities to teach, to test and to cultivate leadership skills in others. You will learn a great deal about yourself and your team members in the process.
The First Work Week of January, 2009: Once Again Into the Storm
Welcome to the first work week of 2009. There are no more opportunities to hide behind a social calendar filled to the brim with diversions and distractions. It’s time to face the worst economy of our lives head on with a steely resolve to overcome and succeed.
I don’t know too many people that are sad to see 2008 in the rear view mirror. I also don’t know too many people that expect this new year to be a day at the beach. Let’s face it, even if we don’t get clubbed over the head with more systemic shocks, it’s likely that we are still peering down into the abyss that is this economy. We may bottom out this year…but it feels like the unwinding has a long way to go.
The good news is that the secret is out. Things stink. There’s no more wondering about a recession. You can let the worry of things getting bad quit renting space in your mind. Frankly, none of us have time to preoccupy on the fear of bad news. We’re in the storm and we need all of our faculties to focus on putting one foot in front of the other in order to keep moving.
I scan the popular business press for content for this blog, my MBA classes and my workshops. I’m always looking for material that showcases organizations and individuals that have adapted their thinking and their approaches to find opportunities in spite of the prevailing headwinds. There is very little of this content to be had.
Apparently, the world’s population would rather read endless stories of hardship, failure, layoffs, and other content that preys on our fears. Quit reading and listening to this crap…it is wasting your time, draining your energy and keeping you from focusing on the challenges in front of you. Instead, focus your attention on creating the positive story in your work environment. Set a goal on creating successes by better understanding and serving internal and external customers.
Make your department, team, organization the model case study for future MBA students on how you rethought traditional approaches to value creation, management and operations and came out the other end a market leader. Surviving and prospering in this environment is the Big Hairy Audacious Goal (BHAG). While your competitors are retrenching and retreating, we all want to read about you innovating and succeeding. Your success….even your small victories will remind us that good things are possible in the worst of circumstances.
The Bottom-Line for Now:
A model worth referencing in these times is the conduct of the British people during the Blitz in World War II. Armed with a fearless leader in Churchill and a resolve characterized by the phrase, “Keep a stiff upper lip,” the people went about the business of survival, rebuilding, helping and ultimately winning, all the while bombs were dropping randomly on their homes and businesses.
Well, the economic bombs are dropping and the damage is spreading. Great. Now keep a stiff upper lip and help clean up and rebuild. Hiding isn’t going to accomplish anything.
Have a good first working week of the year and as you generate some small victories, remember to share your stories. Maybe we can turn the tide in the popular press and focus on what’s working and what people are doing right. Success is contagious.
Sixty Years of Deming and American Managers Forgot to Pay Attention
Filed under: Crisis Leadership, Current Affairs, Leadership, Leadership Skills, Leading Change, Marketing, Organizational Transformation, Product Management, Quality Systems Management, Surviving Lousy Leaders
Note from Art: this distinctly non-holiday post couldn’t wait for a better time. There’s no time like the present for leaders and managers to be thinking deeply about their businesses and the road ahead.
Dr. Deming once stated that he hoped one of his life’s accomplishments was to keep American companies from committing suicide. The public spectacle of Detroit and Wall Street committing suicide in the same quarter would indicate that he failed in his mission.
The site of these firms begging in the streets for alms from taxpayers is nauseating. T
Deming spoke, taught and wrote about what we should be doing. He was clear in his belief that the U.S. was the “single most under-developed country in the world,” principally due to our philosophically bankrupt leadership and business management approaches.
He talked to many of the leaders in the U.S. auto industry. He described a theory of management that if adhered to, would cure U.S. firms of the “Deadly Diseases” of traditional U.S. management practices. These were the very diseases that got automakers and so many other firms in such big trouble to begin with. Short-term thinking, ego, false leadership models, lack of constancy of purpose and so many others that are in plain sight for all to see and fix.
From the ashes of World War II, Japanese leaders and managers worked to develop a new style of management. This tiny country (in land mass) with no natural resource other than a motivated workforce and leaders and managers relentless in pursuit of quality and collective prosperity, rose in a few short decades from laughingstock to the world’s second largest economy. Peel back the layers of Japanese success and you will find Deming at the center.
Deming’s Theory of Profound Knowledge and 14 points offered (and still do) keys to many of the answers. They are not prescriptive, but rather they combine to create a philosophical approach to running a business, that if adhered to, will stand a chance of succeeding for customers, workers and partners on a global stage.
We now face the daunting task of regenerating our economy. All of us that work, manage and lead have an opportunity to contribute. While our ashes are paper and not buildings like Japan in 1950, the situation is just as dire.
One reader mentioned in an earlier post of mine that it was interesting how Deming was rolled out when things got bad. My perspective: it’s interesting how we paid him lip-service when we should have worked to understand, adapt and apply his principles.
Dr. Deming saw that much of American industry had sown the seeds of its own demise in flawed management practices, even when times and numbers looked good. If you are looking for ideas during this time of trouble, Deming’s philosophy of management is a good place to start.
*Suggested reading: Out of the Crisis, W. Edwards Deming
The Counterintuitive Nature of Management Excellence
Filed under: Crisis Leadership, Current Affairs, Leadership, Leadership Skills, Leading Change, Life and Business, Marketing, Organizational Transformation, Product Management, Project Management
I suspect that most readers will agree that examples of management excellence, high performance and great leadership are not the topics dominating the news in this emerging “we’ve never seen anything like this before” economy. Instead, we are fed a constant stream of downward revisions, requests for bailout and examples of management failure of “someone should go to jail” Whole sectors are crashing, great old brands are on the brink of fading into the history books and recently great businesses are floundering.
Contrast this current phase with the other extreme of recent memory, the dotcom bubble of the late 90’s, when the laws of physics were upturned, profits didn’t count, and it was all about clicks and eyeballs. Everyone knew someone that was a gazillionaire and massive amounts of paper wealth came into existence overnight. And then disappeared. A few firms like Amazon, eBay and Google ultimately emerged from the carnage following the bust, to play major roles in a changed world. Ironically, this changed world looked more like what we knew than what had been professed by temporary pundits feasting on the momentary gullibility of the masses.
The point. It’s easy to ride with the herd in boom and bust periods. It takes no management skill whatsoever to spend a fortune building up clicks and it definitely takes no skill to slash budgets, cut headcount, freeze programs and hunker down and wait out the storm.
It does take remarkable management courage and skill to run against the crowd and conventional wisdom by investing in strategic initiatives and talent during tough times and resisting the temptation to chase mythical fortunes during boom times. Leveraging adversity to stimulate creativity and rethink business models, refocus on customers and look everywhere for innovation that will create value is counter-intuitive to the “flight” response that so many firms are exhibiting. This counter-intuitive nature is also the hallmark of great management and great managers.
Deming dared to call U.S. manufacturing on the carpet and predict their ultimate suicide if they ignored quality during a time when quality got in the way of volume and profits. Drucker spent a lifetime teaching managers the rules of management excellence. Based on recent news, most of us forgot to listen.
You face the choice everyday to stay with the herd or dare to do something different in pursuit of management excellence. In case you are looking for some thought-starters on counter-intuitive ideas, consider these:
- Resist the temptation during tough times to make all of the “hard calls” by yourself. Talk with and involve your employees in decision-making and idea generation. They are just as concerned as you are about their survival and they want to help.
- Don’t shred your strategic plan because “everything has changed.” It’s great to challenge your assumptions or as Ayn Rand often said, “Check your premises.” There may be new or more opportunity than you imagined, and the plan may need revision, but don’t scuttle it based on fear.
- Invest in your talent now. While you may be culling the herd of poor performers, you should also be investing in building the leadership and strategic thinking skills of your workforce. If this ends, they will propel you to new heights, and if this economic environment lingers, they will save your skin. Either way, you need to invest.
- Your customers are as perplexed and worried as you. It’s time to seek nontraditional relationships with key customers and partners. These relationships include joint-strategic planning, joint brainstorming and true partnering solutions that transcend the traditional press-release relationship.
- Take a sledgehammer to internal silo walls. The dysfunction inherent in most sales and marketing or marketing and engineering relationships is significant enough to sink your ship.
The bottom-line for now:
It’s an outstanding time for great leaders to stand up and be heard, and it is an outstanding time to focus on excellence in management. It starts by checking your conventional wisdom at the door. Go visit a customer, ask questions and listen. Do the same with your employees. And then do something that creates value versus something that reduces your chances of creating value. Your actions may just start a revolution.
Does Your Dashboard of Performance Measurements Include a Warning Light?
Filed under: Crisis Leadership, Leadership, Leading Change, Quality Systems Management, Surviving Lousy Leaders
Count me as one of the last idealists. Or perhaps the last of the naïve idealists. In a world filled with Quality Management Systems and Performance Measurement techniques backed by legions of people trained to implement and sustain quality performance, it seems reasonable to me that organizations are capable of not only keep themselves from imploding, but that they are armed to the teeth with tools to ensure prosperity beyond the wildest dreams of Dr. Deming.
As an aside, Dr. Deming once famously indicated that it was his hope that his legacy was to keep U.S. companies from committing suicide. Perhaps it is good that he is not here to see the firms elbowing each other out of the way in an attempt to get to the front of the line on the edge of the cliff.
- The U.S. auto companies are almost finished carrying out their joint suicide pact in a world where the rules for success as an automobile company are on display for everyone to see.
- Motorola, an icon of U.S. electronics has systematically destroyed itself by flailing and flailing in the mobile device (read: cellphone) world, and stands a reasonable chance of failing to survive without drastic action. (See my earlier post on the Dollar Bill Auction to get a feeling for Motorola’s problems.) The fact that Motorola is a Baldrige winner, one of the founding fathers of Six Sigma and an organization staffed with brilliant engineers, yet it cannot seem to engineer success is both puzzling and frustrating.
- Earlier this week, Boeing indicated that they would again delay the launch of its now several years late and much hyped 787 Dreamliner. The article indicated that the latest problem had to do with quality issues related to a new type of fastener required for the high tech and lightweight materials being used in the plane. The advance sale of 900 of these puppies at $178 million a piece and the expected 20% fuel consumption savings has customers hopping mad over this latest in a series of seemingly endless project management and supply chain problems.
- Financial services, banking, investment banking. Ugh. These icons of risk management succeeding in maximizing risk beyond their wildest expectations.
How does this happen in a world filled with balanced scorecards and legions of certified quality professionals constantly measuring, monitoring and striving to improve performance? I suspect that my own answer is that while we have ample tools available for our use in building, the one tool that we haven’t yet mastered is staring back at us in the mirror.
In discussions and lectures with the up and coming generation of leaders, there is widespread cynicism over the intentions and the capabilities of many of their firm’s senior leaders. There is little faith expressed that their leaders understand their firm’s key drivers and little confidence that the leaders are taking actions and measuring performance based on anything other than preconceived notions of what they think is right. Fewer organizations than you might think are doing anything to engender employee satisfaction…which is ironic given the mountains of data that indicate that employee satisfaction flows through to customer satisfaction and strong financial performance.
This current generation of senior leaders is failing, and the very imbalanced scorecard is visible all around us. The business cycle is one thing, but our problems go way beyond the business cycle to our preconceived notions of how to lead, how to run businesses, how to fuel innovation and how to create an environment where talent and calculated risk-taking are carefully cultivated.
Many organizations are hives of activity with no vector and the output is chaotic. Firms and top leaders need to quit guessing and start using the tools available to identify key business drivers and to measure and monitor the efforts and outcomes of focusing on those drivers.
The Bottom-Line for Now:
There’s nothing like a good old-fashioned crisis to engender creativity. Well, we have one. In spite of the difficulties, it’s a great opportunity for organizations and leaders to quit paying lip-service to cliché’s like customer-satisfaction, performance excellence and quality. It’s a big world with a growing population and while the forecast is stormy now, the seas will eventually calm and the sun will shine. It will be interesting to see who has the courage and fortitude to do the things necessary to make it through the storm. Even money that we find a whole new generation of leaders in the process.
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