Management Principles #8: Candor
Sunday, September 14, 2014
Management Principles: Candor
Merriam Webster’s dictionary defines candor as “the quality of being open, sincere, and honest”. As for the 16 management principles I am using for the basis of my most recent blog topics, it talks about candor as not being afraid of saying the phrase, “I don’t know”. But that is not all candor is; let’s breakdown the very definition of candor.
Being open. I see being open as becoming vulnerable, which is not a bad thing. In the workplace, sharing your motives and ideals from the beginning can be a successful tactic that creates unity in the work environment. Being open is crucial to gaining the trust and cooperation of your people. To complete a task with high morale and efficiency, remaining open about your goals is always the first step.
Being sincere. Being sincere is one of the best traits you can have. It is very welcoming and inviting, and shows your people that you truly care. They can sense compassion and understanding through sincerity. Once you gain trust based on your sincerity, it is a bond that is tough to break. If one of your people comes to you being open, as discussed above, and you show sincerity acknowledging their bravery in this time, you will have the respect of those around you as a person who is very approachable. The idea of you being an approachable boss leads to open discussions and allows people to share ideas more freely.
Being honest. Honesty should always be a core value in a leader. Honesty should always be the first thing you think about and a trait you never hesitate to use. While honesty can be very blunt, you can find a way to always be honest with tact. When asked a question, even a white lie could steer somebody wrong. You must always be honest not only to your people, but to yourself as well. Honesty is rarely easy. When it is time to do a peer review, withholding from your people the truth is accepting the flaws you are choosing to overlook. If they are not performing well and you do not tell them, then they will never know they need to improve. This will hurt you, them, and the company. If you are honest with them, with tact, openness and sincerity, then they will be open to criticism and together you can create a personal improvement plan that both parties can agree to. Openness and sincerity make honesty easier and more easily accepted.
Candor is a big deal. These are just examples of how candor can affect the workspace. What are some of your examples of candor as a leader?
Sunday, July 20, 2014
Management Principles: Decision Making and Doing Your Homework
Mangement Principles #6 & #7: Decision Making and Doing Your Homework
Sometimes the toughest part of management is decision
making. It definitely comes with the
greatest amount of pressure, and usually it is a self-imposed pressure because
you can become very vulnerable once the decision is made. Once you make a company decision, or what I
call a command decision, you then feel exposed to every one watching and
evaluating the outcome of that decision.
This can be very scary for some.
In fact, it is sometimes the reason people who otherwise are very
capable for promotions choose not to take them.
Likewise, it is sometimes the demise of leaders who make poor decisions
and stick to them, or who simply never make decisions at all. The worst of these is making no decision at
all. It shows the manager to be weak, and it provides no direction to your work
force.
Let’s
discuss the direction piece. By making
command decisions you are providing a path for everyone. Knowing not all of your decisions are going
to be the right ones, you must accept that you may alter the decision as more
information becomes available. If
decision making were a journey, then standing still or not making a decision
would get you nowhere. Making a decision
is the momentum to carry you onward in your journey, and as you learn new
things during the journey, you would use the new information to alter your course. The same comes with making a decision. You are providing momentum to move forward,
but it doesn’t mean that you won’t need to make course corrections during your project.
What
separates those who make good decisions and those who don’t—from those who made
a decision and those who won’t—is simply one thing: Doing your homework. You doing yours, your people doing theirs,
etc. Only through knowledge can a good
decision be made. It is just like the friend
who comes late into a conversation, misses 30 minutes of it, but tries to solve
your problem based on the 30 seconds of conversation they were privy to. It is never sage advice. I am sure you have had those friends in your
life, or even coworkers. Homework
ensures you know what the subject is that your decision effects. How?
First way to gain a thorough knowledge of your Area of Responsibility
(AOR) is to get out from behind your desk and actually get involved at all
levels; from the deckplate to the boardroom.
You cannot lead from behind a desk.
Second, engage your people to teach.
If they can teach both at the deckplate and at your level of management
then you are creating a cohesive workforce.
Never believe you cannot learn from those junior to you. They are the next you or more. Third, ask questions. The first two steps help you to prepare for
anything that may come your way in the future. Asking questions can help you to
make decisions in the moment. If a major decision is to be made, it will take
your experience and the experience of those at the table to collectively help
you make the right decision. Ask
questions and allow those questions to be answered. Even if they become action
items to be answered prior to you making the decision, be patient (but don’t
waste time, either).
Now,
it’s time to make a decision. Once you
do, give it time to develop before you take praise or change your
decision. Allow it to grow. Don’t make a decision then just walk
away. It may need some nurturing. Slight tweaks. Stick with it, but do not make the mistake of
thinking your decision was the right one because Murphy is always lurking around
the corner.
On
another note, be sure you empower your people to make decisions as well, and
support their decisions while nurturing them.
You will develop a team that will go forth and do great things.
Wednesday, June 25, 2014
Management Principles: Solving Problems and Making Mistakes
Numbers 4 and 5:
Of the list of topics relating to the Management Principles,
these two definitely go hand in hand.
There are very few things that can
upset a manager more than the employee who comes to him or her with problems
but no recommendation of how best to solve the problem. Just problems. No solutions. My thought has always been if you are going to come to me
with a headache, you’d better bring the aspirin.
Fear
of making a mistake is another. If
you are always looking for someone else to be liable for what can go wrong,
then you will never be successful.
Do not be afraid to make a mistake. In fact, it shows your true character. How do you handle yourself when
something goes wrong, especially when it was your responsibility? Do you stand up and admit your mistake,
or do you perform some type of new Olympic event with the “duck, shuffle, and
point the blame”.
So
how do these go together? As a
leader I have many expectations. I
expect that when I direct and delegate, that you understand you have the wiggle
room to make deck-plate decisions without checking in with me on every
step. In fact, I trust you to use
your experience and expertise to make appropriate and timely decisions in order
to keep working. Given this
knowledge, I assume you understand that when a problem arises it is you that I
expect to come up with a solution and execute that solution. Will you always be right? Hell no. Will you make a mistake? Hell yes. But
that is the genius part of this. I
believe in you. I believe you did
not make a mistake on purpose. I believe that whatever mistake you have made
will in fact be a great lesson learned.
Now,
with that being said, there must be some rules to live by:
1)
Some situations will require a boss’s judgment, authority, or
experience to come to the optimum solution. Your job is not just to identify
problems, but also to develop, prepare, and execute solutions according to the
direction given by management.
2)
We must learn from our experiences and
expect our people to do so also.
Knowing this, you and those who
work for you should feel more empowered to come up with solutions to the
problem. Identify the risk versus
gain, and decide a plan ahead. If
during the execution of this planned solution you make a mistake, it is okay—take
a deep breath. Most of the time it
is a minor course correction that will get you back on the right path. It is so much better to make an
informed decision knowing that adjustments will need to
be made, than to never make a decision at all.
Thursday, June 19, 2014
Management Principles: Following Direction
Number 3: Following
Direction
This
one seems to be simple; just follow direction. Just do it. Go on, do what you are told!
When in fact, it is very
complicated—what if the direction contradicts something (e.g. morals, values,
higher authority).
As I
think about this, I realize that whether I receive the direction or I give it,
the expectation is the same….Follow direction.
If you walk away when given direction, then the expectation is you will
follow it. This then becomes your
responsibility. So, if you have a
question, concern, point to be made, MAKE IT KNOWN! Do not leave your
management thinking all is well if it is not.
Likewise,
if you direct someone to do something, wouldn’t you assume as they walk away
that it was going to be done as asked?
It’s the golden rule simplified; do for others as you expect others to
do for you.
Here’s the hitch in this as I have
posted in an earlier blog. When
directing your people, be sure to be clear and concise so when they do walk away,
you both understand what is being asked.
What exactly are the boundaries of this task? When do you want it
done? Do you want it followed a certain
way? Do you want to be informed at
certain points? Quite literally you
could ask these questions all day. There
also has to be a bit of trust in the relationship. It’s really the 80/20 rule, whereas you spend
80% of your time with 20% of your people.
For instance, after having a good working relationship with my people, I
know whom I can give direction to and how they will proceed afterward. Then, I have those who I must spend time with
to insure that they understand what is needed.
It may only be a couple of people, but I spend most of my time with them
to ensure the direction is followed.
I also want to take a moment to
discuss people in general. When I was an
instructor, I learned that a classroom full of students just meant I had a room
full of individual learners. No two
individuals necessarily learned the same way.
While one person needs to read about it first, the other may learn from
hands-on training. The same goes with
giving direction. While one person may
need to be told only once, another may require their hand held throughout the
process. Don’t ever forget this, and be
sure to understand this and how it can be applied. It will save you a lot of frustration. Also, alternately, the same goes for you
receiving direction. Your boss is not necessarily
a similar learner. He/she may give
direction, and have an expectation of direction being followed, which you may
not comprehend. This too is very
frustrating. Empathy, in both directions,
is the key to your sanity.
If you as a leader are not approachable; or as
a follower are not willing to stand up and speak, then you are now responsible
to carry out the direction. In other
words, if I tell you to do something and you walk away, I can only assume that
you are going to carry out my direction.
Tuesday, June 17, 2014
Management Principles: Commitment
Number 2:
Commitments.
If you accept a task, you are
committed to it. If you assign a task
that someone else accepts, they are committed to it. But, what does commitment mean? Webster defines it as:
1.
responsibility:
something that takes up time or energy, especially an obligation
2.
loyalty:
devotion or dedication, e.g. to a cause, person, or relationship
Key words are loyalty, obligation,
responsibility, devotion and dedication.
If you commit to a task then my expectation—anyone’s expectation—is that
you will perform as directed. Now, if
you can’t meet your commitment then be sure to make it known. The problem with commitment today is that every
commercial you see on television says something like “stop with the Hassle
fees, switch to Key Bank”, or “your beer has too many calories and not enough
taste, switch to Miller Lite”. Even in
sports today we see LeBron undecided where he may end up, whereas Magic never
thought that way. So, we must understand
that commitment today may in fact mean something totally different from past
generations. A commitment today may be
only temporary compared to what they were before. With this being known, what does commitment
mean to you? You must realize this: the definition
has not changed through the generations, only the application has.
Here is what I expect from leaders. When we task someone or we ourselves are tasked,
a commitment is made. It becomes a binding agreement that full responsibility
must be taken for, and in the end, if failure has occurred, then you only have
yourself to blame. No one else. You accepted such a fate when you committed
to the task.
Now you ask yourself, how can I help this situation if
things are going south? First of all,
you are responsible based on a commitment.
Imagine that you have been tasked with a major project, one of great
importance. Each of those higher up that
you report to in this situation are bears.
If information is food, do you starve the bears or keep them fat? Easy answer, keep feeding them information as
it comes to you. This keeps those you report
to satiated. If you wait, and give
nothing, then the day you need to give an update, good or bad, the bears are
going to bite your head off. They have
been hungry and you have failed to keep them informed. The same goes for you subordinates that you
task, in this case though you are the bear.
How would you feel if you were kept in the dark on an important project
you delegated? Hungry!
My point here is, if you made a commitment, it is your
responsibility to keep your boss informed.
No one else holds that responsibility but you. You are the one who must face the bear with
both the good and bad news, because you are the one who has committed to it. Not only is that expected of you from those
you report to, but it is also the standard to which you must hold those who
have made a commitment to you.
Sunday, June 15, 2014
Management Principles: How To Succeed
Hello there. I know it has been a while and I offer no excuses. I am back now, and in full writing mode to share some more thoughts. In fact, many more. While I was away from writing I was never far from a notepad to jot down little nuggets of wisdom as I learned them. I am ready, are you?
I once heard that the most successful of people listen to books on CD’s while traveling to and from work. Take this another step, those who are successful read not for pleasure, but to learn and hone their skills and trade. While I walk through offices of many senior people, I look at their bookshelves to see what is there and what they reference. It is these books I want to read. I need to know how my peers and Senior people think so I know how they see things. Solve things. Hear things. You see, I don’t want to clone myself into my management; rather, I want to know how they think so I can get into their heads. With this information, I have a better understanding of how to present myself in a way I know they will relate to. I more deeply understand the methods and techniques management uses to reach team goals and can empathize with such direction because of my learning.
With this, I saw a poster in one the Senior Manager’s office that caught my eye. It was about management principles and how to succeed. There were 16 principles, written by J G Barber. What I want to present to you is these principles, in my own words. They struck a chord in me. I like to keep things simple, and this does just that. Plus, I agree with them. I have seen these principles in action and can tell you from a first person point of view, it’s about to get real in here.
The Management Principles:
1. Responsibility
2. Commitments
3. Following Direction
4. Solving Problems
5. Mistakes
6. Decision Making
7. Doing Your Homework
8. Candor
9. Technical Competence and Credibility
10. Responsibility and Discipline
11. Verbatim Compliance
12. Symptoms, Illnesses and Details
13. Integrity
14. Promotions/Evaluations/Removals
15. Bad News/Good News
16. “Bum Dope”
In the coming days and weeks, I will touch on each of these. For now, just think about these 16 principles. How do they resonate with you? Do you agree that it can be this simple? Which one means more than the next? Do they have an order of rank to them according to your principles and values?
I will leave you with a quote from Hyman Rickover, the father of Naval Nuclear Power, on Responsibility:
“It is a unique concept; it can only reside and inhere in a single individual, you may share it with others, but your portion is not diminished. You may delegate it, but it is still with you. You may disclaim it, but it is still with you. You may disclaim it, but you cannot divest yourself of it. Even if you do not recognize it or admit its presence, you cannot escape it. If responsibility is rightfully yours, no evasion, or ignorance, or passing the blame can shift the burden to someone else. Unless you can point your finger at the man who is responsible when something goes wrong, then you have never had anyone really responsible.”
I am really glad to be back writing. As much as I continue to learn, I truly want to share with you my learnings.
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