Capturing Talent and Creating Great Customer Experiences: They Go Together
The Poor Interviewing Habits of Many Managers
You would think that we would have this problem crossed off the list by now. I wonder how organizations and leaders in good faith can let managers recruit talent without teaching them HOW to interview and holding them accountable for executing this task effectively.
Most organizations offer some cursory training in the compliance and legal issues of interviewing, but I’m hearing from too many job seekers with hilarious (sad, but true) examples of miserable interviews. Consider the slob that took two smoke breaks while interviewing a talented professional. In-between breaks, his focus was on convincing the individual that he should come to work for the firm, even though they could not pay him what he was making now. Great recruiting! Impressive. This person has no business interviewing.
Questions to consider:
- Are the interviewing skills of your managers helping or hindering when it comes to recruiting talent?
- Do you know what your managers are saying in interviews?
- What’s your organizational batting average on landing the top recruits (and then keeping them)?
Great Marketing: Building Value with The Complete Customer Experience.
I received my new 24” Apple iMac yesterday and once again, marveled at how hard this company works at creating an incredible experience for the customer. The unpack to on-the-internet time is about 4 minutes, but the experience transcends the simplicity of set-up. My wife helped me with the unpacking she marveled at the detail and quality of the packaging materials. “It feels like we are unwrapping something very special,” was her comment.
It’s hard not to be awestruck by the beautiful design and the spectacular display on your desk, and I’m going on five years with our stable of Macs growing as our two sons head to college. The products always work and it’s still exciting to use one.
Questions to Consider:
- Are your customers saying the same things about your offerings?
- Are your employees obsessed with creating great customer experiences?
The Bottom-Line: Talent Fuels Performance:
There’s no way that an organization that accommodates sloppy interviewing habits is landing and retaining the best and brightest. As a business leader, you want your customers to constantly be surprised and delighted. A manager that takes mid-interview smoke breaks and badgers a talented candidate about salary expectations is someone that I want working for my competitor.
My suggestions:
- HR, get it in gear as the trustee of talent and create systems and tools to ensure best interviewing practices are developed and reinforced.
- Leadership Team: It’s not all HR’s job. Set high standards and demand excellence at all levels in the hiring process.
- Managers at all levels: evaluate the interviewing habits and track records of your managers and supervisors.
There are no excuses for getting this wrong and just one reason for getting it right: success.
Yeah, “Why Don’t Managers Think Deeply?”
There's an interesting post today in the Harvard Business Review Working Knowledge newsletter entitled "Why Don't Managers Think Deeply?"
Professor James Heskett highlights GE CEO Geoffrey Immelt's recent pronouncements that he is: looking for managers to think deeply about innovations that will ensure GE's longer-term success. He has vowed that he will protect those working on the breakthroughs from the "budget slashers" focused on short-term success. (Professor Heskett also reviews the book Marketing Metaphoria and the perspectives of the authors: Gerald and Lindsay Zaltman on why managers don't think deeply.)
As I leader, I've wrestled with this topic for years, and have worked around and with many individuals perfectly content to let their days unfold in a transactional nature, with no time to think deeply or even strategically. Days pass into months and months to years, and still these individuals prefer conquering the issue of the moment versus wondering whether they are even working on the right issues.
I look forward to learning more about what the Zaltmans have to say about this issue above and beyond what Professor Heskett highlights in his post when I read their book. For now, here are a few of my perspectives on why managers don't think deeply:
- Personal characteristics: some people are not great strategists but excellent operators and they focus on where they are most comfortable making a contribution.
- Poor leaders above them that don't create the forums and opportunities to think big. This fits with my strategy-fueled theme where in my opinion; the best leaders involve everyone in sharing insights and developing ideas for strategy. This provides ample opportunity for individuals to contribute and teaches otherwise task-oriented people that it is OK to get out of the moment once in awhile.
- Bad personal time management habits. Some managers like crossing off a bunch of lower-level, "C" priorities than focusing on one "A" priority. This can be corrected.
- Fear of being accountable for something. I worked with a sales manager that absolutely hated to work on anything beyond the deals of the month. While his focus on results created some good outcomes for us, as the business changed and evolved, his ability to contribute dropped dramatically. When it was said and done, he admitted that he was uncomfortable considering big changes when it was so hard to drive short-term results.
- Frustration with impediments to change. If Immelt is imploring his people to innovate, the GE culture better darned well be willing to turn ideas into actions or the creative flow will shut down quickly. I've observed cultures where the leader preaches change as the rest of the team nods and then proceeds to do nothing.
The bottom-line for now:
It's hard for most of us to think creatively on command. Moving from a transactional model to a state of lateral or divergent thinking requires making and taking time. As leaders, we can help improve and support Mr. Immelt's suggestion (hard to argue with the intent) by creating opportunities for the right types of discussions and by supporting the movement of ideas into actions, products and services. Try holding your leaders accountable for creating a culture of innovation and then let them loose. The results may surprise you.
Bad Bosses, A Walk with Dante and Your Leadership Legacy
Thankfully, the human brain does a pretty good job of managing memories by helping us smooth out the bad times and enhance the good. This seems to work pretty well for a lot of things in life, with one major exception being our memories of lousy leaders that tormented us at some point in our career.
Ask a room full of mid-level managers to talk about great leaders that have supported them and you get a few nice stories. Ask them for examples of bad leaders and bad leadership practices and you may have to run for high-ground as the trickle of mildly repressed memories turns into a torrent of frightening anecdotes described by individuals with a far-away look in their eyes and a tone tinged with revenge in their voices.
OK, I may be exaggerating a bit on the glazed eyes and revenge stuff, but not a bit on the ease with which people can describe being victimized by bad bosses. The stories of micromanaging, verbally abusing, backstabbing, credit taking, time wasting and endless pontificating flow freely and are told with gusto. One story begets another and pretty soon you have a room full of people trying to out do each other with, "you think that's bad, I had a manager that… " Unfortunately, there's a lot of material for bad boss stories.
I've often imagined inserting an additional section to the manuscript of Dante's Inferno where the poet Virgil and Dante upon journeying through the circles of hell come upon a special place reserved solely for evil managers, probably between Circle 5 and Circle 6. I'll leave it to your imagination to work out what the appropriate punishment would be in this guaranteed blockbuster of a re-release of this literary classic. I can see the caption now…Leadership Lessons from the Inferno! Remember, you heard it here.
If you find yourself embarking on or immersed in a role in leading others, you have a distinct choice to make about the impact you will have on those fortunate or unfortunate enough to serve with you. You can add to the inventory of "bad boss" stories by focusing on yourself, not understanding what your true role is and doing everything possible to build your career on the backs of others. Or you can take the much harder, but ultimately more rewarding path of doing the right things all of the time for the people in your care.
Some suggestions to build a leadership legacy that ensure you don't end up as fodder for more bad boss stories or find you in a conversation with Dante and Virgil during one of their strolls:
- Get to know the people that work for you. Your effort to pay attention and show genuine interest is a show of respect for your associates. Learn names, learn the names of their spouses and children, and pay attention to the pictures and personal mementos on their desks.
- Listen more than you talk. Two ears, one mouth…use them in proportion. Take the time for formal and informal discussions where you ask for input, feedback and ideas. Bad managers think that they are being paid to generate the best ideas. Effective leaders understand that their people are the source of the best ideas and they work hard to create forums for those ideas to be uncovered and developed.
- Dispense credit liberally. Never ever take credit that belongs to someone else.
- Ensure that your actions match your words. We all know that words are cheap. If you want people to commit to you and your vision, you've got to show that you are committed. One leader suggested that, "The Say and the Do" have to match.
- Know when to stay out of the way. If you've done your job in picking people, creating the right working atmosphere and providing general direction, it's time to get out of the way and let people work.
- Everyone respects accountability. Enforce it fairly, evenly and consistently. No exceptions.
- The only finger pointing you should ever do is at yourself. Back your people, recognize that you are responsible for their results and if the results come up short, it is your fault, not theirs.
- Keep your agenda visible. People sense when someone has a different or personal agenda. Don't let this be an issue. Your agenda is your team, your company and achieving goals.
The bottom-line for now:
Every time I feel like we're making some headway on stamping out bad bosses, I run into another group of great professionals that remind me that too many of our managerial experiences are lousy. Effective managers and leaders are made one person at a time, and every one of us makes a choice every day to do it right or not. What will your legacy be?
Values-Based Leadership: More of What I Learned at Matsushita
I’ve highlighted on occasion my pride in being an alumni member of one of the world’s great organizations, Matsushita (now formally known as Panasonic). I left in 1996 to continue my still-early career development, and like most other things in life, I figured out a number of years later what a remarkable and formative experience it truly was.
While there are many memorable elements of my eight years working in and for this Japanese company, including a tremendous exposure to the country and people of Japan, I credit my experience here for opening my eyes to the power of establishing strong values as bedrock for leading and for managerial decision-making.
I reflected on the Basic Business Principles as the values are known at Matsushita, when I co-authored the Values for a future employer, and I reflect and draw upon them regularly as I teach sections on Values-Focused Leadership in workshops and classrooms. A typical session will end with a majority of participants highlighting how they never understood until now how powerful the corporate values could be in strengthening their culture, driving performance and guiding behavior. This is a valuable lesson to learn for all of us.
Three Simple, Low Cost Ideas to Help Jump-Start Leadership Development
One of the most frequent questions that I get at seminars or workshops goes something like this:
"Art, I’ve read your leadership book, I’ve listened to you in the workshop and I understand how important it is for me to put time into the development of leaders on my team. Where should I start?"
It’s actually a great question, and one which some creative and conscientious leaders have offered me some great, low-cost, easy to implement ideas that I am happy to share with you.
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