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Month: November 2018

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Growth Management Personal Development

9 Ways Leaders Can Prepare Key Players for the Unexpected

What if one of your key players:

  • got a once-in-a-lifetime job opportunity and left your organization?
  • was in an accident?
  • had a family emergency and was out for an extended period?
  • God forbid, died suddenly?
  • got sick and was in the hospital?
  • won the lottery and said adios amigos?

This week has been a bit challenging, but nowhere near the catastrophe it could have been. My computer hard drive unexpectedly crashed. Since a majority of my work and business are contained on that hard drive, it truly could have been devastating. Fortunately, though, I was prepared with backups to a local external drive and to an online/cloud service. So, yes, it has been inconvenient, but I didn’t lose data thanks to my backup plans.

This experience got me to thinking about how, as leaders, we need to make sure that we have backups for our people, not just our data. Would you be prepared if some unforeseen event happened?

I know no one wants to think about such things, but as an executive leader, you have a responsibility to ensure that your business operations could continue if some unforeseen event like this happened. Pulling the covers over your head, burying your head in the sand, or sticking your fingers in your ears won’t help you if one of the above events occurs. (I know. I’ve tried.) Author Ryan Holliday says that we should literally engage in negative thinking. For you leaders, that might mean thinking about worst case scenarios so that you can set up contingency plans to deal with the unexpected challenges that might crop up.

Organizing a contingency plan for your people is just good business. While many think that succession planning is just the HR Director putting names in boxes on an organizational chart, it’s actually about thinking ahead and being prepared, and yes, even thinking about the worst case scenario. And BTW, succession planning isn’t just for the CEO. If you’re a leader of a division, department, or a small business, you still need to think about this and be proactive. And repeat after me: It doesn’t have to be complicated.

Steps that you can take to jump-start your succession planning:

1. Start today. There’s an old Chinese proverb that says: “The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now.” Identifying and prepping someone to step into a leadership role can take some time, but you’ll be so glad you did if the unexpected happens. Just do it.

2. Don’t go it alone.  Get your leadership team, your board, and any other stakeholders involved. You’ll want their input and perspective on this.

3. Discover the skills and strengths of team members. If you’ve never taken the time to do this, the whole process will be beneficial for everyone involved. You may unearth a latent talent or strength that a team member has never put to work for your organization. Ideally, you want to have everyone working in their areas of strength so that they’re making their maximum contribution to the organization and they’ll feel engaged and dialed into their work. (If you’d like some help with this, give me a call. We’ll work with you to determine the best tools to help you tap into the strengths of ALL of your team members.)

4. Identify high potential leaders. Regardless of their current role, look for people who exhibit the characteristics and strengths needed to be successful in the leadership position.

5. Include high potential leaders in strategy discussions. Show him the big picture so that he has context and a broader perspective of the organization.

6. Assess your high potential leaders’ interest, willingness, and enthusiasm for taking the reins one day. No matter how good you think he might be, if he says he never, ever wants to be in a leadership role, you may need to look for someone else.

7. Offer coaching and training to top performers. How will you need to invest in her today, so that she’ll be ready tomorrow? While she may have the technical skills necessary for her current role, she’ll likely need some help with things like communication, delegation, coaching, and performance management.

8. Identify talent gaps. As you go through the process of identifying high-potential leaders within your organization, make note of where you may be lacking talent or skills.  Keep your succession plan in mind when hiring and recruiting and see if you can fill those gaps.

9. Refresh, revise, update. Your succession plan doesn’t have to be complicated, but it should be a living document that you update regularly as people, circumstances, and the business environment change.

Working through this process may open your eyes to the strengths and talents of the folks you’ve already got on your bench. And from my experience, helping your employees to recognize their strengths and putting them to work will cause them to be more engaged and eager to contribute their best.

Succession planning, like backing up the data on your computer, may seem like a task you can put off to another day. I encourage you to view it as insurance against a business-busting catastrophe. Just do it. You’ll be glad you did.

Jennifer Ledet, CSP, is a leadership consultant and professional speaker (with a hint of Cajun flavor) who equips leaders from the boardroom to the mailroom to improve employee engagement, teamwork, and communication.  In her customized programs, leadership retreats, keynote presentations, and breakout sessions, she cuts through the BS and talks through the tough stuff to solve your people problems.

For more resources on leadership and employee engagement, be sure to sign up for our monthly Ezine and you will receive our report: “7 of Your Biggest People Problems…Solved.”

You might also like:

Why You Shouldn’t Bother with Strategic Planning Until You First Do This

The One Program Your Organization is Missing

Ten Tactics for Leading Through Tough Times

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Categories
Best Practices Growth Leadership Personal Development

Small Businesses are the Heartbeat of Our Neighborhood

Get Your Walking Shoes Ready! 

On Saturday, November 24th we have an opportunity to pay it forward, celebrating small businesses and all they do for the community. Created by American Express in 2010, Small Business Saturday showcases the importance of shopping and dining local, which fuels the economy as a whole. Small Business Saturday is the analogue to Black Friday and Cyber Monday which spotlight big retailers and e-commerce outlets. Small business is defined as privately owned corporations, partnerships, or sole proprietorships that have fewer employees and/or less annual revenue than a regular-sized business or corporation. , during one of the busiest shopping periods of the year.
According to the US Small Business Administration, there are nearly 30 million small businesses in the United States employing 47.8 percent of US workers, all of which have a big impact on the US economy. Small businesses create jobs, drive innovation, and give cash, time or goods to support local nonprofits or other community groups. They also provide opportunities for entrepreneurs to achieve financial success and independence, and often adapt quickly and creatively to changes in the economy.
A surge of national and local initiatives have increased the popularity of Small Business Saturday with 88 million consumers shopping small last year, up 14.9 percent from 2013, spending $14.3 billion at local and independent businesses. In a world where much of human interaction is through a digital platform, it is vital to experience personalized service and create relationships. Small Business Saturday helps keep the little guy in the public’s mind.
Small business owners are key to a thriving and developing community and it’s no secret that small businesses are BIG business. Thanks to their unique character and charm, attention to detail, and one-of-a-kind personas, small businesses make a profound impact on our communities and neighborhoods. Putting small businesses center stage on this day is the least we can do as customers for businesses and the people that work within them who do so much for us year round.
Categories
Growth Human Resources Leadership Personal Development

Keys to Effective Training

Let’s take a look at two professional trainers. For this article, let’s call them Joan and Jack.

Both Jack and Joan are energetic trainers who get their audiences laughing quickly. They will both do whatever it takes – using props or quacking or asking trainees to do silly things – to illustrate a concept or get their trainees excited and engaged. And when trainees leave at the end of the training day, they feel energized, happy and ready to take on new challenges.

But there are significant differences between the results that Joan and Jack achieve. A few weeks after training is over, the performance of the people who trained with Joan has improved dramatically and measurably. The performance of the people who trained with Jack? Well, it hasn’t improved much at all. Most of them quickly went back to “business as usual.”

In other words, Jack’s training is edutainment. Joan’s isn’t, because it gets results. And that is true, even though someone who peeked into either of their training rooms wouldn’t notice much difference.

How Can You Avoid Wasting Money on Frivolous Training?

The first step is understanding that although good training is often entertaining, it is not entertainment. In other words, training is supposed to achieve demonstrable results, not just make people laugh or enjoy themselves or kick back and enjoy a day out of the office or away from the selling floor.

I call the wrong kind of training edutainment. It’s entertaining, it does well on the “smile sheet.” but doesn’t actually have long impactful results.

How can you make sure that your training is hitting the right targets? Here are some steps that can help assure that you are getting a good ROI on every training dollar you spend, because your trainers and your training are hitting the right goals:

1. Think of training as a strong combination of education, engagement and usefulness. Training must educate by teaching skills, transferring knowledge, cultivating attitudes and hitting other specific targets. Yet training that is purely educational doesn’t get results. That is why training must present information in ways that are engaging, interactive and require the learner to think and use the information learned.

2. Apply the VAK Attack model to increase learning. VAK stands for the three ways that people learn, and your live training should make use of all three. Visual learning happens when people watch materials that can include videos, PowerPoints, charts and other visual elements. Auditory learning happens when people learn by listening to people who might be other trainees, compelling trainers, visitors and others. And kinesthetic learning happens when people get out of their seats and move around as they take part in work simulations, games, and other meaningful exercises.

3. If you’re hiring an outside trainer, speak with other organizations where he or she has worked. When you do, ask for specifics about what the training accomplished. Did average sales orders increase by a certain percentage? Did customers report measurably higher levels of satisfaction when they were polled? Did thefts and losses decrease by a certain significant percentage when training was completed? Remember to look for hard data about results. Statements like “We loved Paul’s training!” might be nice, but they don’t tell you much about whether Paul’s training was worth the money it cost.

4. Define outcomes and make sure your trainer can reach them. Do you want your salespeople to contact 25% more new prospects? Do you want the people who deliver and install appliances for your store to give true “white glove” treatment to customers? Or do you want your hotel front-desk staff to delight guests with exceptional service?  Your trainer should explain his or her plans to break those processes down into individual steps and address them directly through training.

5. Help your trainer know who your trainees are. A good trainer will want to know about their ages, prior experience, educational level, current jobs, and all other factors that can be leveraged to engage them more fully in training.  A concerned trainer will also want to be aware of any factors that might cause them not to engage.

6. Let your employees tell you what they need to learn during training. Your salespeople know the biggest challenges they face on the retail floor every day. Your service technicians know the glitches that arise most often when they are interacting with customers. Why sit back and hope that your training developers will guess or already know what those issues are and address them in training? It is less haphazard to ask your employee what they most need to learn in training, then make sure those topics are covered.

7. Work with your trainer to develop meaningful metrics. If you work together to define what you will measure after training is completed, chances are good that your training will accomplish much more, because its goals are well defined.

8. Monitor sessions and make sure that training stays on track. If you are a company training director or a member of senior management, you might not want to attend sessions, because your presence could put a damper on trainees’ ability to relax and learn. If that is the case, ask a few trainees to check in with you at lunchtime or other breakpoints to tell you whether the trainer is hitting the benchmarks you created. If not, a quick check-in with the trainer can often get things back on track and avoid wasting time and money.

The Special Challenges of Training within Franchise Systems

The structure of franchise systems makes it even more difficult to deliver effective training, especially to front-line retail and service employees who work at the franchisee level – in other words, the people who are doing the work. Delivering training to them becomes a two-part process because it is first necessary to train the franchisees, who must then train their employees.

Strategic use of e-learning technologies can go a long way toward simplifying and optimizing that process. In fact, that is why Tortal Training was created: to create effective training at low cost via e-learning to franchisors to offer franchisees.

It’s All About Getting Your Money’s Worth and Getting Results

If you are a training director who wants to record serious results from serious training, it’s important to work closely with professional trainers who don’t only entertain, but educate.  That’s the difference between training that’s frivolous and training that offers a good ROI on your investment.

Categories
Entrepreneurship Marketing Personal Development

This Entrepreneur Saw the Glass Half Full and Perfected his Product into the Perfect Holiday Gift!

Perfectly chilled beverages, no more shattered glass, and a solution for every can size!

BrüMate, The Dehydration Company:

On a mission to put an end to boring drinkware, one sip at a time. Hate warm beer? Can’t stand warm wine? They have a solution for everyone.

“There is no better feeling of accomplishment than taking an idea on pen and paper and creating something great from it. That is my passion,” says Jacob. 

REDUCE YOUR CARBON FOOTPRINT

KEEP YOUR DRINKS AT THE PERFECT TEMPERATURE

WORKS WITH HOT OR COLD BEVERAGES

PERFECT FOR ANY OCCASION

Brumation is a term used for the hibernation-like state that cold-blooded animals utilize during very cold weather. On the other end of the spectrum is a state known as aestivation, which like brumation, provides a way for reptiles to handle temperature extremes.

Check out the interview here: http://brainhackers.com/the-brains-behind-it-dylan-jacob-brumate/ 

Categories
Best Practices Marketing Personal Development

Use Adverbs with Caution

I could have written “cautiously,” but I didn’t want to be guilty of using an adverb before I’d even begun the body of the article.

I say “guilty” because adverb overuse is one of the cardinal errors of writing.

What Is An Adverb?

Adverbs provide additional description to verbs, adjectives, another adverb, phrases, sentences, or clauses. Often, but not always, they end with “ly.”

They ran quickly.

She was very beautiful.

She so hoped that she would the prize.

What’s Wrong With Adverbs?

The above examples look harmless. This is why they’re not.

“They ran quickly” is awkward and doesn’t provide a strong visual image.

Try

  • “They raced.”
  • “They dashed.”
  • “They hurried.”

Each of these changes implies speed and urgency much more effectively than the original.

“She was very beautiful” is equally awkward, in part because “beautiful” might seem like an absolute. If someone is more than beautiful, try “gorgeous,” “stunning,” or “breathtaking.”

In “She so hoped that she would win the prize,” “so” is meaningless. It doesn’t suggest how much she hoped. Was she eager, desperate, anxious? We have no idea.

An Indictment of Adverbs

“I  believe the road to hell is paved with adverbs.” —Stephen King in On Writing.

King gets to the heart of why adverbs don’t add much to writing. He says in using them, writers signal that they haven’t expressed themselves clearly. The adverb gets tacked on for additional emphasis.

And they have a tacked-on feeling. That’s why “ran quickly” and “very beautiful” sound so awkward. They’ve been added without a feeling for elegant writing. When I say “elegant,” I don’t necessarily mean great literature. I mean something you can read without getting jolted by literary potholes.

Show, Don’t Tell

One of the biggest problems adverbs present is that they tell, rather than show.

Consider the following examples.

  • “He spoke angrily.”
  • “He growled.”
  • “He roared.”

Examples 2 and 3 give the reader a sensory impression. You can hear and feel a roar or a growl.

Whenever possible, replace a verb and an adverb with a stronger verb.

Don’t Throw Out Adverbs Altogether

Occasionally, adverbs have their purposes. The general opinion about their recommended usage is about once in every 300 words.

If you want to measure your adverb use, do a word count on something you’ve written and then read it and count the adverbs. If the count is within the 1 to 300 ratio, you’re fine for frequency, but also look at how you’ve used the adverbs. If you can find a way to replace them with stronger verbs, do so.

Your readers will thank you.

Pat Iyer is a ghostwriter and editor. People hire Pat who want to write a book without writing a word. Reach her through her website at www.editingmybook.com. She is one of the original 100 C Suite Network Advisors.

Categories
Growth Operations Personal Development

Do You Have a Customer Intel Team?

Customer service departments in a lot of large companies are for complaint resolution only. They’re typically seen as some kind of a call center, which pushes these departments to the very bottom of the corporate pyramid. These are the people who pick up the 800-number complaint calls, and who are expected to get on the customer’s level to help solve their problems.

In a typical “top-down” pyramid structure, marketing and production are higher up than customer service and even sales. Products and services are pushed from the top down to salespeople. And when complaints come back up? That’s right, they’re pushed down even further to customer service.

We’ve seen some companies rate the effectiveness of their customer service team by how few complaints make their way up to management. This view of customer service is limited, and we think it’s unprofitable, unfair, wasteful, and ultimately foolish.

This vision of customer service completely disregards the fact that your customer service team is the only team in your company that speaks to your customers on a daily basis, aside from your sales team. They know exactly what your customers want, like, and dislike when it comes to your products and your brand. And they hear all about the competition. On a daily basis, your customers give them suggestions about how to improve. Your customer service people have the power to turn your complainers into advocates.

We don’t even call it “customer service.” We prefer “customer intel.” A popular speech we present to big companies who want to foster entrepreneurial spirit is “The Two Division Company.” These two divisions are Sales (including customer service) and Sales Support (including everyone else—from the CEO to administration).

A customer can provide only two things: Their feedback and their money. Feedback is invaluable—it’s what you need to stay on top of your distribution system, keep your products and services relevant, and stay ahead of the competition. Simply put, you need it to stay in business!

Unlike those studies and focus groups that marketing people spend a fortune on, the information given to customer service is unbiased, relevant, and comes straight from the source—from those customers who care enough to pick up the phone and call. Many of these customers want to find resolution for one of their favorite brands, for the products they’ve convinced their friends to purchase. These are your brand advocates, and now your brand let them down. If their issues are resolved, they won’t spread the word about the problems they ran into. Instead, they’ll focus on the solutions your customer service team gave them, and will continue advocating for your brand.

Once their issues are solved, your customers can provide essential information: Where did they find this product? Was it fully stocked? How long have they been buying your brand? Were they satisfied up until now? How would they suggest improving your products, services, and marketing? Would they recommend your brand to their loved ones?

We strongly suggest establishing formal lines of communication between customer service and sales on the one hand, and production, marketing, and management on the other. When you directly focus on the customer and sales, instead of specialization, chains of command, and division of labor, you’ll notice that some suggestions and complaints will crawl up to where they belong, back into the company structure, to keep your brand relevant and your products competitive.

Why not start by referring to your customer service department as “customer intel” and learning more about your customers? Your customer intel team is capable of so much more than just resolving complaints.

For more, read on: http://c-suitenetworkadvisors.com/advisor/michael-houlihan-and-bonnie-harvey/

 

 

Categories
Growth Human Resources Investing Leadership Personal Development

Are You Sure You’re Training the Right Things?

Not long ago a training consultant got a call from a sales manager who said, “We need sales training!”

The consultant answered, “Are you sure?”

The caller explained that some of their customer service reps were doing four times the volume of others. It had to be because they were better salespeople … right? So, they needed sales training!

The consultant agreed to help, but insisted on observing the company’s top performers to get a better understanding of what sales techniques they were using.

As it turned out, the top producers weren’t better salespeople at all, but rather had developed a more effective method for processing customer transactions. Once the consultant recognized that, it was easy to document their techniques and build short training interactions around them. The result was an almost instant uptick in sales across their entire customer service rep population.

The message? To get the results you want, you need to understand the reality of your situation. Here are some non-obvious, commonsense steps to help you do that and avoid wasting time and resources.

Step One: Get Real Information from the Right People

A modified version of DACUM (which stands for Developing a Curriculum) can be effectively used in situations like that one. DACUM, which was created by educators to design courses, analyzes what people really do and what they need to learn.

In stark contrast to getting only the leadership team or training department heads in a room, training designers should invite the “boots on the ground.” These are the top performers, the gurus, and the go-to people everyone in the organization knows and relies on. A facilitator leverages a process by which they can extrapolate all that delicious institutional or “tribal” knowledge that exists only in their heads.

Diversity of perspective is key here, so don’t be afraid to have a mix of people. Here’s a sample group:

The new person who really gets it! – That person on your team who’s been in a role for six months to a year and really seems to get it. He or she provides a fresh perspective.

The go-to person who has been there forever! – He or she can be described as having forgotten more about the job than most people will ever learn. They provide historical knowledge about how the role has changed over the years.

An adjacent collaborator role – Don’t be afraid to bring in someone who is not in the role, but “close” to it. This individual can provide an outsider’s perspective and bring knowledge and experience to a different role.

Key stakeholders – This group is essential because they need the results. They are often your champions who need to understand the process and often support your budget.

Step Two: Create an Occupational Definition – Prime their Minds!

Get everyone in the room focused on the role and get discussions about leadership, work ethic and good communication out of the way. You can use a simple quadrant matrix to document:

  • Reporting lines – Who does the role report to up, down and laterally.
  • Critical knowledge and skills – What specific skills are essential to doing the job well?
  • “Nice to have” abilities and traits – What type of person tends to perform well?
  • Learned but wasn’t taught – What were those “a-ha moments” your group had on the job?

Step Three: Define the Body of Knowledge for Peak Performance – The Meat and Potatoes!

A Duty/Task Matrix can be used to define the body of knowledge necessary to perform in the role. You only need some big post-it notes and sharpies. Get the information on the wall so everyone can see it. Put duties down the left, and tasks going across left to right. Here are the definitions and some examples:

  • Duties – This is a something that is top-of-mind for the role. It doesn’t have a beginning or an end. It is ever-present while on the job and usually ends in –ing. Some examples:

Restaurant Manager. Duty: Maintaining food safety

Automotive Maintenance Manager. Duty: Selling products and services

  • Tasks – These are processes or procedures that have a beginning and end. They usually can have a metric associated with them. These roles fulfill duties by repeatedly completing a series of tasks, usually four or more. A defined task requires an object, verb and qualifier. Some examples:

Restaurant Manager. Task: Wash hands properly

Automotive Maintenance Manager. Task: Write a customer-facing estimate

When you identify all the duties and the tasks required to fulfill a role, you’ve documented the entire body of knowledge used by your experts in the room. You’ve also just blown your LT away, because they had “no idea!” your people did all this stuff!

Step Four: Understand the Gaps and Criticality

Your Duty/Task Matrix stands before you and now you need to know where the information is and what tasks have the highest impact on performance. Here are steps to follow:

Draft a Gap Analysis – Go task by task. Where is it documented how to perform this task? In HR? Marketing? Sales? Ops? Or is it in one of your expert’s head? Has it been passed down over time? If it’s the latter, it’s a gap!

Consider criticality – Everything in your Duty/Task Matrix is important … but what’s most critical? Use a simple rubric and define the impact to the business, performance, individual or team upon failure. Ask the question: If the worker fails to perform this task, does anyone notice? Does it create some rework—possibly a lot? Will you lose a customer? Will someone get hurt?

Step Five: Build Your Plan

You now have all the information you need to build your plan. You know what the role looks like, contained in your Occupational Definition. You know the body of knowledge that needs to be learned, as described in your Duty/Task Matrix. You know what exists and what doesn’t, laid out in your Gap Analysis. And you know what information is critical to performance, as summarized in your Criticality Analysis.

You can build your Learning Maps for the role, from beginner to expert. You can start to design and develop training around the gaps that really impacts performance. You can map these duties and tasks to competencies and leverage them in cross-team training interactions, and make decisions on the right method for delivery

Now you are armed, much like a marketing department, with an analysis of your customer base and potential for results based on empirical data and not simply feelings. Now you can go to your LT with a plan that justifies a budget and will deliver results. Oh, and you’ve done it all in two days. Good luck!

Categories
Growth Management Personal Development

Great Leaders Leverage Great Attitudes for Great Results

So, we’ve all been there. We have something important to tell our supervisor, it can’t wait. As we get closer to her office, we see the look on her face. We can see her mood and we quickly decide, “It can wait.”

Attitude is everything. And to a leader it is a tool that can completely change the environment of a team. Colin Powell has been famously quoted as saying, “Perpetual Optimism is a Force Multiplier.” We all know that person who is always up, always optimistic. They always have something positive to say. When they hear bad news, they just smile, laugh, and move on. Nothing seems to bother them. They have an amazing impact on us. Just their smile can have an impact on us.

In a Swedish study by Marianne Sonnby–Borgström, subjects were shown pictures of people displaying various emotions. When the subject was shown a picture of someone smiling, they were asked to frown. Amazingly, they found that instead of a frown, the facial expressions went directly to reproducing what they saw. It actually took conscious effort for the subjects to frown. The power of smile or a good attitude is far more powerful than most are aware.

Unfortunately, we also know negative people. The people who never have anything positive to say. The ones who feel it’s their job to “bring everyone back to reality” when things are going too well. The ones who shoot down every idea. The one’s whose favorite phrases are, “Here’s why that won’t work,” and “I’m just playing devil’s advocate.”

Leaders who are negative are not innovators nor do they lead innovative teams. They miss out on opportunities to be innovative. When opportunity comes, they don’t believe it. They shoot it down because they always have a reason why things either can’t work or can’t be done. Over time, their direct reports figure it out. They know that whatever they bring will be shot down. Who wants to go through that? Who knowingly wants to subject themselves to rejection? And who wants to do it over and over again? My dad would call that type of person a glutton for punishment.

So eventually people stop bringing ideas. They keep them to themselves. They see problems before they appear and opportunities to be gained, but they don’t present them. They keep their innovation in the closet where it’s nice and safe and the entire team suffers because of it.

The problem is not only that negative leaders miss out on innovation, they impact the people around them with their negativity. What leaders don’t realize is that their negativity is contagious. As a friend used to say, “These people are blackholes who suck the light out of everyone around them.” Or as Sigal Barsade, a Wharton management professor who studies the influence of emotions on the workplace, says, “Emotions travel from person to person like a virus.”

Years ago, I was given a team to lead, it was one of my first leadership experiences. My mentor said something I’ll never forget. He said, “Tony, you just lost the luxury of having a bad day.” I had never thought of it that way. I never considered having a bad day a luxury, but he was right. Having a bad moment is one thing, but allowing it to linger and letting yourself wallow in it is a completely different thing. You may be able to pull that off when you’re by yourself, although I wouldn’t recommend it.

But when you know that you affect a group of people and that your actions and your emotions act as a radio signal looking for someone to tune into your frequency, it’s no longer an option. Most people underestimate the control they have over their emotions. It’s easy to forget that when there’s nothing at stake, but as a leader, your effectiveness and reputation are on the line. Your emotions are a tool. They serve you, you don’t serve them.

The bottom line is emotions matter and as a leader, you have a dramatic effect on those around you. A Gallup study by researcher James K. Harter found that business unit sales and profits could be predicted by employees’ emotions. People’s emotions impact their performance, and if they’re healthy and happy, they perform better.

 

Categories
Best Practices Entrepreneurship Management Marketing Negotiations Sales Women In Business

Be Aware of the Straw Man

“Always attempt to control those that attempt to control you. By doing so, you’ll have greater control.” -Greg Williams, The Master Negotiator & Body Language Expert

Are you aware when others invoke a straw man to maneuver you? Be alert to such actions. Those actions may leave you instilled in fear. Worse, they may leave you confused about why you engaged in an action.

Straw man has several meanings. It can refute a response that veers from the initial point while giving the appearance of addressing it. As an example, a supervisor might say to his boss, “The team worked a lot of overtime to get the project in on time. I think we should give them a 2% bonus.” The boss’ response, “That’s horrible thinking! If we gave a bonus every time they did their job, there would be no incentive for them to do anything.” The boss’ rebuttal, while appearing to respond to the supervisor, ignored the overtime the employees worked to get the project in on time. It ignored that they went above their normal duties.

A straw man can also refer to a person lacking in integrity or substance. An example of this might be, “As he felt backed into a corner, he said, you can do to me as you like, but my followers will make you pay for your deeds.” The reference to, ‘my followers’, was an attempt to conjure up a straw man that would seek retribution.

Suffice it to say, always attempt to control those that are attempting to control you. In so doing, you’ll be in a better position to maintain control of yourself … and everything will be right with the world.

What does this have to do with negotiations? 

Who uses a straw man?

During a negotiation, a straw man can be invoked to foster a position to embolden its user. It might be employed to inject fear, reward, happiness, or retribution into the negotiation process. If stealthily employed, it can give the appearance of its user’s fingerprints not even being on the suggested deed (e.g. one negotiator to the other – they may harm both of us if we adopt that position). Thus, it can be one way to insulate one’s activities from any blowback. In this case, think of the straw man as being the image that one wants to cast that’s greater than the image of the one doing the casting.

Why are straw men used?

a straw man is yet another tactic used in a negotiation by savvy negotiators. Some stumble into its usage, not realizing the effect it can have on a negotiation.

When used deftly, this tactic can alter the course of a negotiation by distracting from the point at hand, altering the flow of the negotiation, and casting doubt in the mind of the negotiator that adopts a position.

In your future negotiations, take note when a straw man is attempted to be used against you. Also, consider when it might be beneficial to invoke your own straw man. Doing so will take your negotiation abilities to higher heights.

Remember, you’re always negotiating! 

After reading this article, what are you thinking? I’d really like to know. Reach me at Greg@TheMasterNegotiator.com

To receive Greg’s free “Negotiation Tip of the Week” and the “Sunday Negotiation Insight” click here http://www.themasternegotiator.com/greg-williams/

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What is a Psychological Evaluation?

Psychological evaluation is defined as a way of assessing an individual’s behavior, personality, cognitive abilities, and several other domains. The purpose behind many modern psychological evaluations is to try to pinpoint what is happening in someone’s psychological life that may be inhibiting their ability to behave or feel in more appropriate or constructive ways; it is the mental equivalent of a physical examination. Other psychological evaluations seek to better understand the individual’s unique characteristics or personality to predict things like workplace performance or customer relationship management.

The real purpose of a psychological evaluation is an attempt to answer a question. In business, two of the most common usages of psychological evaluations are to determine (1) what is wrong with one of my employees and (2) predicting employee candidate’s future behavior. 

When there is something wrong with an employee, the employee may have a decompensation in his/her performance or are engaging in unusual behavior. Both instances could have a psychological basis. Employers often request for a psychological evaluation, called a fitness-for-duty evaluation, on incumbent employees to answer questions such as:

  • Does the employee have a diagnosable condition?
  • Is the employee suffering from a condition which is impairing judgement and reliability?
  • Is the employee likely to cause harm to self or others?

These evaluations are valuable in helping to determine if there is something wrong with the employee. They are also valuable in terms of liability prevention. In the event that an employee does engage in harmful behavior, or needs to eventually be terminate, the employer can say that efforts were made to mitigate the employee’s behavior.

Psychological evaluations can also be used to predict human behavior. No… psychologists do not posses a crystal ball or use therapy couches to have information travel by way of osmosis. However, psychologists use a compilation of learning about past behavior which is the greatest predictor of future behavior as well as administering psychological tests. The goal is to evaluate an individual’s past and present in order to predict the future about things which include judgement, reliability, and ability to succeed. A common way that non-psychologists try to do this is through the college admission procedure. Universities take a student’s standard tests, high school grades, and use this to determine if the student will be successful at the university.

However, some other situations may require more in-depth analysis that need to be done by a psychologist. For example, before one becomes a law enforcement officer, one often needs to go through a series of tests and an interview to determine if one has the judgement and reliability to perform in a weapon carrying capacity. Many other high stakes positions can use psychological evalutations for similar reasons.