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Category: Growth

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Management Marketing Personal Development

Are Clever Marketing Methods Killing Your Brand?

 

Marketing budgets are increasing as more pressure builds on organizations to raise awareness of their brands and stand out from their competitors with clever advertising, sponsorship and digital media. This is happening at a time when customers and clients are demanding a higher level of customer experience, trust, respect and a touch of ‘personality’ to the brands they deal with and buy into. However, on the other hand, our research at Walking TALL has found that there is a general increase in corporate bad manners within organizations and a slide towards the other extreme to that of apathy and often scripted, unauthentic & insincere communication.

In addition, communication turn-around and response times are getting longer, and call waiting times extended in the ever-increasing call centre systems we all so frequently have to endure.  In turn this can create a significant roadblock between your customers and your brand, and the business success you strive for, need and indeed work hard to achieve.

It’s not difficult to see the obvious and dangerous void opening up here.

In fact this phenomenon is creating a sinkhole that is devouring client loyalty and great customer experience, potentially losing your company $millions in brand investment. The level of loss cannot easily be measured however it’s not difficult to visualize the impact to the brand when you consider as a customer how you feel and how you subsequently talk about that brand to your friends and colleagues when the experience you have with an employee of that company is negative.

Let me explain further – with the sophisticated marketing methods that are available to us as businesses today and the trend of brand focus on values and themes such as integrity, trust, caring, green, social responsibility, innovation and family-orientated to name but a few, teamed with the increasing brand reach, customers and all stakeholders have forgivably high expectations of the experience they will get from their interactions with your company. They expect to receive that level of care and interest in them that is so heavily advertised, therefore when it’s not there, there is a very high height to fall from, that in turn damages your brand.

This sinkhole is going to expand if organizations don’t wake up to the critical need to provide the employees with the behavioral training required to ensure that they interpret and internalize for themselves the meaning behind the values you have created. There is a need for a deeper appreciation of your corporate messaging on a level that employees can relate to, than perhaps you have undertaken already. Unless your people can understand the values, and live and breathe them every day, authentically, then you are wasting your corporate brand investment. Ultimately therefore, your increasing marketing budgets will kill your brand, due to the apparent falseness of your brand claims when a customer experiences your brand for themselves.

This goes for the leadership team also – the true personality of the corporate brand can be heavily influenced by the culture in part created by your senior team and executive. This includes their behaviors, external brand image and visibility & profile.

Typically Marketing and Brand Directors are not as focussed on people behaviors and the impact they have on the brand as they should be. This tends to be the responsibility of the HR and/or Learning & Development departments with little interaction with marketing. However, in order to reach the true marketing and brand objectives, would it not make sense to integrate people behaviors into any brand strategy at an early stage?

We are at a point in our business environment, where we need to re-align the corporate culture with that demanded by our clients and customers, if we are to stand out, create loyalty and get widely talked about for the right reasons.

It’s time to align people brand and behaviors with your corporate brand in a way that sticks.

Read more on this topic in Corporate Brand Personality by Lesley Everett, published Feb 2016

 

Categories
Growth Human Resources Management Personal Development

Three Reasons Why Feedback Can Be Fearful

Have you ever had to tell someone something but you hesitated?  Perhaps they said something hurtful.  Perhaps they disappointed you in some way.  Instead of speaking up, you avoided the confrontation.  You second guessed your position.  You may have even made up excuses for the offender’s poor behavior.  Giving effective feedback can be quite difficult and if it’s avoided can cause even more damage.

For years I personally found it very difficult to give effective feedback to others.  In my first business partnership I experienced difficult situations.  My partner would often embarrass me in front of clients.  Or perhaps he would omit important information for me to do my job.  I was often caught being either confused or ineffective in front of clients.  I always found excuses not to give him feedback about these difficult situations because I was afraid.

Eventually the partnership had to be dissolved.  Over time, I came to realize that I contributed to the demise of our company because I lacked the ability and willingness to tell him the truth.  It was at that moment I decided to commit myself to giving necessary feedback without fear.  I created the process called Fearless Feedback.

There are three major reasons why feedback can be difficult in organizations.  First, our definitions are confusing.  Feedback can be misinterpreted as criticism.  People do not like to be criticized and most people are fearful of delivering criticism because it won’t be easily accepted.  It is interesting how 96% of people want feedback if they know it can improve their performance. (Folkman, 2014)  Furthermore, 92% agreed that negative information is effective if delivered properly. (Jack Zenger, 2014)

A useful distinction is needed.  Feedback is data for the purpose of learning and criticism is an opinion or judgment.  Unless we make this clear distinction confusion and resistance will be the result.

Second, many managers will avoid being seen as a judge of behavior out of fear of making things worse.  This explains why many of us hesitate to say anything. We don’t want to make things worse than they already are.  We fear damaging trust and relationships by speaking our truth and so we remain silent.  Many fear they will be seen as biased and their insights will be rejected.  This rejection can cause hurt to the giver not just the receiver.

Third, many managers were never taught how to give effective feedback.  This lack of knowledge damages confidence.  A lack of confidence not only damages the credibility of the information but it can also create fear of loss of credibility by the giver.  A loss of credibility is the greatest fear in the workplace. (Kathleen D. Ryan, 1998)

What if there was a way to change our mindset about feedback such that we welcomed it with open arms?  What if there was a way to deliver it without fear?  What if people expected it and felt obligated to both give it and receive it? The next two blogs will explain the details of the Fearless Feedback process including what it is and how to use it. Stay tuned.

 

 

Folkman, J. Z. (2014). Feedback-The-Powerful-Paradox. Retrieved December 26, 2016, from http://zengerfolkman.com/: http://zengerfolkman.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/ZF-Feedback-The-Powerful-Paradox.pdf

Jack Zenger, J. F. (2014, January 25). Your Employees Want the Negative Feedback You Hate to Give. Retrieved December 26, 2016, from https://hbr.org: https://hbr.org/2014/01/your-employees-want-the-negative-feedback-you-hate-to-give

Kathleen D. Ryan, D. K. (1998). Driving Fear Out of the Workplace. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Inc.

Wally Hauck, PhD has a cure for the “deadly disease” known as the typical performance appraisal.  Wally holds a doctorate in organizational leadership from Warren National University, a Master of Business Administration in finance from Iona College, and a bachelor’s degree in philosophy from the University of Pennsylvania.   Wally is a Certified Speaking Professional or CSP.  Wally has a passion for helping leaders let go of the old and embrace new thinking to improve leadership skills, employee engagement, and performance.

Why Feedback can be Fearful

How to Know When to Give Feedback

Categories
Best Practices Growth Human Resources Management Personal Development

You May Not Be As Influential As You Think Are

Click here to watch You May Not Be As Influential As You Think You Are

Today’s fast-paced business environment requires leaders who can create influence others with sound communication practices.  In today’s world of emails and text messages, it’s easy to overlook the importance of face-to-face communication and the discipline required to be influential Monday to Monday®.

How you deliver determines whether or not others see you as credible, knowledgeable and trustworthy. Without doing this effectively, you inhibit your potential to: influence, increase profits and build a reputation you’re proud of Monday to Monday®.

Message take-aways

  • What influence is and what it is not.
  • What it means and takes to be influential Monday to Monday®
  • Sabotaging your influence without knowing it
  • What are the misperceptions of influence?

Categories
Growth Human Resources Leadership Skills

Belle’s World – Age

Original Prompt published on July 15, 2017 on Belle’s World.

Age is something we don’t really talk about. So my question is why?

As our cultural paradigms are shifting, individuals are redefining what age really means.  When people tell me, I look young or they mention an age much younger than my age, I used to feel frustrated. Today, I take it as a compliment and very proudly announce I am 40 years old and at the tail end of the X-Generation.

Why is it important for me to let someone know my age?  It’s important because if someone assumes I am much younger they are not giving me credit for the experience (professional and life) that I bring to the table.  I appreciate the world giving me the compliment of being youthful but I also want to be known for my knowledge and the impact I can make.

Each age brings something to the table and we should appreciate the individual, for their life journey and what they offer rather than having a bias on age.  It’s important for us to engage the benefits of being in a certain generation based on age.

Millennials were brought up with technology and are adept at learning to use them and make things efficient or easier through it.  They spend much of their time interacting with each other through their devices and have always had information overload since they were children.  Millennials worry about the generation coming after them, that have had technology in their hands since they were born.  Let’s utilize the Millennials ability to be comfortable with technology to teach other generations especially boomers how to make it useful in their lives.  They may not have as much life experience but they are the driving force of how we interact with technology going forward and how most businesses are transforming to engage with them as consumers.

The X – Generation created many of the technologies that were the forefront of our technology acceleration today.  They are the conduit between technology and the human element of still interacting with people to build relationships.  They have 20 – 30 years of business experience and are able to translate much of the technology paradigm shifts along with cultural paradigm shifts.  They are going through an awakening of understanding they have a much longer life span and are still not in the prime of their lives like they expected to be.  They are sandwiched between the Millennials and Boomers and are quietly trying to transform how we live, work and play while the media focuses on the outer generations.

Boomers have experience and have built relationships over many years.  They also are living longer and healthier lives.  Retirement as it once stood has been turned on its head and many boomers are continuing to work because they enjoy it and not necessarily because they need to.  They have been doing it for so many years that it’s become a part of who they are and it continues to motivate them to enjoy their life journey.  The Boomer generation didn’t grow up with the technology, but many of them are very open to learning it and have adopted it as part of their life.  It’s key to remember that adopting technology takes a mental shift and those Boomers who are adapting are critical to our changing lifestyles.  If we have an open mind that they are more than just “old” people we could be utilizing their experience and loyalty to help move us forward.

Lastly, the silent generation, who aren’t around much but those that are live their life and are proud of how far they have come and truly appreciate the people in their life.  If we all have something to learn, it is to understand what really matters in the long run. The one main idea they all resonate with are the experiences and people in their life matter today.  The work, the money, the success are all part of the journey but they are not what brings them to happiness today.

Be proud of your age / generation and what you bring to the table.  There are no rules anymore of what you should be doing or how you should look at your age.  Own this valuable piece of your life journey and let others know what you can do to make an impact on their organization or in life.

 

Welcome to Belle’s world. Everything in this world is based on a bell curve. Our media concentrates on giving advice to make everyone be a part of the masses.

This is a weekly series of Urvi’s insights on her perception of the world. They say perception is reality and she lives in her own fantasy world. This allows her to delve into the human element of our lives, helping individuals decipher their own souls, to understand, who they are and what they want, in the journey of life.

Belle’s world explores the extremes and goes beyond the surface. Ready to read about some of the “elephants in the room?”

 

Contact urvi, for a free, 30 minute consultation, if you want to build your emotional wealth and enhance your life based on your inner core. #thehumanelement

Categories
Industries Leadership Marketing Personal Development

Good Tipper or Scrooge – What Are You?

 

Some people love to tip and others don’t. However, it appears that, nowadays, everyone is expecting a tip even if they are just serving you at the checkout!

When you see a tip jar by the cash register what do you think? To me, the tip jar says “I deserve a tip”. But it says quite a bit more, too, and none of it good about your Customer Experience.

When ordering at a cash register, we Brits tend to feel a tip is not necessary as we offer gratuity when waited on at a table. However, I also recognize that when I am in the states, tipping rules are different.

The tip jar is there nonetheless. Now, as a customer, I must decide. Tip now, even though it’s not a situation where I would perceive a tip to be necessary, or ignore it and risk appearing rude to the person making my taco/latte/sandwich.

Say I go ahead and tip. How much do I tip? The loose change I get back from the cashier? A couple of dollars?  20% of my entire check? What is customary for the tip jar next to the cash register?

Let’s say I do tip, but then have a terribly long wait getting my taco/latte/sandwich. Or it comes cold. Or wrong. Do I get to fish my tip back out of the jar?

The presence of a tip jar reflects poorly on the Customer Experience. Whether it’s feeling unsure if you should tip, experiencing guilt because you didn’t, wondering how much to tip or wishing you hadn’t tipped at all, these situations do not enhance the Customer Experience.

The Origins and Customs of Tipping

There is some dissension about where tipping originated. One argument is that it originated in 17th Century England taverns where customers would give their server extra money “to insure promptitude” or T.I.P. Wikipedia asserts it began when English houseguests left money for the host’s servants.

Wherever it started, it didn’t make it to the U.S. until after the Civil War. The Washington Post submits tipping began because employers hired freed slaves to serve food but didn’t want to pay them an hourly wage. Over time, tipping became the norm for several industries, from hotel workers, to delivery employees, and your favorite coffee baristas.

Tips and the amount of them is subject to the country and social customs thereof. In the States, tipping is customary, ranging from 10% to 20% in most cases. In the UK, it isn’t, or at least not with same amount of expectation, which is also true in many European countries.

It’s different because of the compensation workers receive in the different countries. Many employees in the U.S. make less than the federal minimum wage because their tips are meant to make up the difference. In many states, these employees might make little more than $2 an hour in employer-paid wages. In the UK, however, employers must pay employees the minimum wage, which ranges from £7.20 to £9.40 ($8.99 to $11.74 currently), depending on the city where the worker lives.

Because UK workers make the “living wage”, there is less tipping. While there are still situations where a tip is given in the UK, there is not the same culture for tipping there that exists in the states. There are numerous situations where tips are neither given nor expected.

What a Tip Jar Says about Your Brand

Entrepreneur detailed all the ways the tip jar hurts your brand. First and foremost, a tip jar says you don’t pay your employees enough. A tip jar also make your establishment look cheap, which is never a goal of a brand. Affordable? Yes. Cheap? No. To my point, Entrepreneur asserts that tip jars are also misplaced because customers are “asked” to tip before they receive the service. Moreover, it confuses people that lack a shared cultural background.

Co-author Professor Ryan Hamilton and I present a related concept in our latest book, The Intuitive Customer: 7 imperatives for moving your Customer Experience to the next level (Palgrave Macmillan, 2016). One of our imperatives is to “accept that apparently irrelevant aspects of your Customer Experience are sometimes the most important aspects.” To summarize, this concept addresses the fact that when things get ambiguous or difficult to evaluate, customers might use high-level impressions of a brand to judge their experience. Expectations play a big role in these evaluations, and these expectations are set by your brand promise.

When a tip jar is present, it also creates an expectation. If you don’t live up to the customers’ expectations, your brand suffers for it. For small businesses, these small things can add up to big problems.

They are everywhere these days. They have weaseled their way into the most unlikely of places, quite brazenly if you ask me.

Enough is enough, as they say. Well, I have had enough with the omnipresent tip jar at the register of various establishments. If you have one sitting there now in your business, you should have enough, too, because it’s not doing anything good for your Customer Experience.

If you liked this article, you might also enjoy these:

Revolutionary Thinking on Customer Loyalty

Astonishing BIG Gains from Little Changes!

Act Now to Turn Customer Pain Points into Pleasurable Profits

Colin Shaw is the founder and CEO of Beyond Philosophy, one of the world’s leading Customer experience consultancy & training organizations. Colin is an international author of five bestselling books and an engaging keynote speaker.

Follow Colin Shaw on Twitter @ColinShaw_CX

Sources:

Roth, Carol. “Small Businesses That Encourage Tipping Are Killing Their Brand.” www.entrepreneur.com. 16 January 2017 Web. 30 January 2017. https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/287793.

“Service 101: A Brief History of Tipping.” www.foodwoolf.com. Web. 30 January 2017. < http://www.foodwoolf.com/2010/08/history-of-tipping.html>.

Ferdman, Roberto A. “I dare you to read this and still feel good about tipping.” www.washingtonpost.com. 18 February 2016.

Web. 30 January 2017. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/02/18/i-dare-you-to-read-this-and-still-feel-ok-about-tipping-in-the-united-states/?utm_term=.c4cc5b94ac1c

“Gratuity.” www.wikipedia.org. Web. 30 January 2017. <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gratuity>.

“United Kingdom: Tipping & Etiquette.” www.tripadvisor.co.uk. Web. 30 January 2017. https://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/Travel-g186216-s606/United-Kingdom:Tipping.And.Etiquette.html. 

Categories
Growth Leadership Skills

How to Publish a Book

How to Publish a Book – What are the Options?

You have a wealth of knowledge about running a company. You want to share your knowledge in a new way – through publishing a book. You may have a body of work ready to repurpose (such as a blog you’ve maintained for several years) or a ghostwriter at the ready. Or you just really like to write; you find that writing the book comes easy.

How do you share your book? How can you get your book published? There used to be only one option: a traditional publisher. Now you have several choices.

PDF Ebook. Probably the simplest method to publish a book, all that’s required with an ebook is to click “Save as…” in your Word document and choose “PDF.” Then you can sell the resulting file on your own website, or upload it to a number of other ebook marketplaces online.

However, as a member of a c suite, you may want a higher profile product. Ebooks don’t have the authority that printed books carry. But this can be a viable option to get you off the ground. It’s also a great way to share your book with people who will write reviews for you before you publish your book. Advance readers will give you those all-important testimonials.

Kindle. Amazon’s Kindle marketplace makes it easy for you to publish your book. In fact, with just a few minutes of formatting, and another several minutes spent on their step-by-step uploading system, you can have your book on their virtual shelves in less than an hour. You can also readily find people with experience in formatting a book for Kindle. Check out a site I use, http://upwork.com, where you can hire people for a project like this.

With its incredible popularity and the ability to offer “free days” during which anyone can download your book at no cost, Kindle is a great way to build a buzz quickly.

Print on Demand. Print on demand means just that. Someone orders your book and it is printed in response to that order. Print on demand is a more economical model than vanity presses which require you to pay for hundreds if not thousands of copies up front, leaving you with a room full of books to sell on your own.

Create Space is the giant in this industry. As part of Amazon, Create Space makes it easy for you (or your graphic artist hired through Upwork) to load a book and its cover.  I recommend you hire someone to do this. It is not hard, but there are steps best tackled by someone who understands the process.

Buyers order your book from sellers such as Amazon and the book is printed and shipped the next day. This makes it easy and cost-effective for everyone to become a published author. But not all self-published books are well-written. Invest in an editor to polish your manuscript, to catch those embarrassing typos, and to help ensure that what you wrote is going to be clear to others.

Traditional Publisher. The options for self publishing have had a profound impact on traditional publishers. Their world has shrunk, and this affects you as an author if you are seeking a traditional publisher. They are bombarded with manuscripts and are very selective about the ones they take on. There are advantages to signing on with a traditional publisher. Getting your book published with a traditional print publisher will get you the most audience and press. The publisher may hire a publicist to get you on radio interviews, for example.

It is extremely difficult to get a traditional publishing house to take on a new author. An agent can be effective in getting the attention of a publisher. Your name, your brand, your platform (the ability to attract buyers) are crucial and may be even more important to the publisher than your content.

If you do manage to get a publisher, your royalties (the amount you earn from your book) will be very small—maybe as little as 8% of the net cost. The publisher may ask you to purchase a specific number of copies of your book and will rely on you to help promote it.

Indie Publishers. These publishers vary from the pattern of traditional publishers in the sense that they may expect you to make a substantial financial contribution to underwrite some of the costs of producing a book. The publisher spreads the risk to you, knowing the sad truth that the majority of books don’t sell well.

Be sure to thoroughly read a publishing agreement so you understand the terms of a traditional or indie publisher, if you decide to take this option. I recommend having an attorney familiar with publishing contracts give you some guidance.

The important thing is to get your book written, and then publish where you’re most comfortable. The rest will come naturally.

There are an unbelievable number of books languishing on hard drives because the author did not take action to release them to the world. Share all that knowledge you have learned through your experiences in a corporate world!

Pat Iyer is a ghostwriter who has written or edited more than 800 books, chapters, online courses, case studies or articles. Her website is http://editingmybook.com – check it out for more information.

Categories
Entrepreneurship Personal Development Women In Business

How Did Eight Senior VPS Perform Against All Odds

Companies large and small have an opportunity to create a culture of success from looking at the lens of the employee.

Case Study

My business success and acumen presented me the opportunity to be the CEO of Girl Scouts. It was a position I will cherish forever. As CEO, my responsibility was to serve our staff, board members, girl and Adult membership. Girl Scouts is an organization to serve every girl everywhere. However, competition was growing fierce and girls were seeking other opportunities ~ opportunities that would compete with the Girl Scout programs.

Stakeholders were concerned with the loss of girl membership and quality of programs. Being the CEO allowed me to use my skill of Emotional Engagement; which means getting people to ‘want’ to do something. People don’t want to be told what to do. People in general ‘want’ to do what is right for the organization.

The culture was clear, the Girl Scout organization has a mission to serve the girls~ it’s not what’s in it for the organization… it’s what we can do for our members.

The outcome of the year was unexpected. As this was the year the Girl Scouts would realign its boundaries. The leadership team was under pressure to perform knowing that at the end of the year each would be re-applying for their position, myself included. That didn’t hold them back. A clear path was set, each were determined to work side-by-side to get the job done.

Creating a culture of Emotional Engagement was the strongest it had been in years. The council ended the year exceeding the membership goal by 86%, the number of Gold Award participants and individual Scout awards increased by 48% and philanthropy giving increased by 42%. The board grew in size while gaining members of influence and staff-rating scores set a record high because of the advocacy, pride, and enjoyment of the job. The organization flourished because the culture of emotional engagement flourished from the Camp Staff to the Board of Directors.

 

Be Unstoppable Together

Connie Pheiff, Unstoppable DIVA

 

Do you have questions or comments about the content in today’s post; want to know how to apply Emotional Engagement in your business, or how to help others grow a successful business? If so, contact me at connie@pheiffgroup.com or <CLICK HERE> to schedule a 20-minute discovery call to discuss with you personally.

Categories
Entrepreneurship Leadership Marketing Personal Development

Use Podcasting to Share Your Story

These days, you can’t run a successful business and be in a position of leadership without being connected to the online world. However, getting your business started online isn’t always easy. Just knowing where to start can be a challenge. It can be overwhelming and confusing, but you don’t have to do this alone. Podcasting is a great way to get your name out there and share your story, services, and even your products online. There are a lot of podcasts that cater to women in leadership and entrepreneurs. I know, this may sound a bit challenging for someone who’s not sure how to even get themselves started online, but don’t worry you’re in the right place. Here are 5 steps that will help you get booked on a podcast so you can share your story with listeners.

  • Identifying The Podcast That’s Right for You
    • The first thing you have to do is identify the podcast that will be right for you. Knowing which podcast is right for you is probably a lot simpler than you think. All you have to do is figure out what your demographic is. For example; If you are in a c-suite position, you should find a podcast that caters to people in high level positions like yours. If you’re an entrepreneur striving towards leadership and success, you’ll want to find a pod cast that focuses on entrepreneurs.
  • Make Sure You Do Research
    • After you have found a podcast that suits your agenda, make sure you do some research. Find out how many listeners the podcast has on average, listen to a few of the podcasts to make sure it’s a right fit, and make sure you are dealing with professionals. If you’re booked by a podcast that has unprofessional hosts with no experience, you will not be helping your business or cause at all. In fact, it can even do damage to your credibility.
    • You should also see what kind of topics the podcasts that you research covers. Up or Out with Connie is a podcast on the C-suite network that often covers topics surrounding both entrepreneurs and people that work in high level C-suit positions. It’s perfect for someone that is looking to go from C-Suite, to successful entrepreneur.
  • Devise A Plan
    • Before you can approach a podcast about sharing your story you’ll have to devise a plan. Think of what you would like to talk about on the podcast, and how you would like everything you say to come across to listeners. Figure out what your key points are as well. After you have done that, work on putting your plan on paper. You should also plan how you’re going to approach the podcast about sharing your story. Believe it or not, you may even be able to get some good advice about this listening to Up or Out with Connie. She’s all about lifting up women in leadership, and helping them to grow.
  • Reach Out
    • Now that you have done some research, devised a plan, and found the podcast that’s right for you, it’s time to reach out. Contact the podcast that you believe would be a good platform to tell your story. You can send them an e-mail or message with your plan attached. Remember, it’s not a marriage. You don’t have to stick to one podcast – so don’t get discouraged if someone turns you down. It’s always good to have a few prospects.
  • Crush It
    • Don’t underestimate the benefits of telling your story on the right podcast. If you don’t practice and don’t have everything together it can damage your bottom line. So make sure you study your plan, have some things memorized (especially your key points), and speak clearly. Don’t be shy either. If you show up with confidence it will show strong leadership skills, and you are guaranteed to get your point across to their listeners.

 

Be Unstoppable Together!

 

Do you have questions or comments about the issues in today’s post? Want to know how to apply them, or how to help others with them? If so, contact me at connie@pheiffgroup.com or CLICK HERE to schedule a 20-minute discovery call to discuss with you personally.

Categories
Growth Human Resources Leadership Personal Development

How to Know When to Give Feedback – Be a Supportive Reporter

Ever since Adobe, GE, Microsoft, Accenture, Deloitte, and SAP decided to radically change their performance management processes HR exerts have been touting the need for managers to give more frequent, less formal, and more useful feedback.  But how does an effective manager know when to give feedback?  Furthermore, do managers even know what to give the feedback about?  Putting aside how to give the feedback, let’s focus here solely on when the timing is right and the role of the feedback giver.  I suggest managers and leaders need to be “supportive reporters.”

In my experience, there are two clear situations that can trigger useful feedback.  The first is when integrity is broken.  The second when a process has too much variation.

Imagine you are a weather prognosticator (meteorologist).  You call for rain and it doesn’t rain.  Should your boss give you feedback?  Wouldn’t you already know that was a mistake?  Would your boss’s feedback help you to learn something new? If not, what’s the purpose?

Did you lie? Do meteorologists lie?  I know what you are thinking, do they exaggerate just to get ratings?  This seems to be especially true when a snow storm is forecast.  The reporting often seems a bit sensational and people scurry to the grocery store to empty shelves of water and milk.

If meteorologists don’t lie, then what was the root cause of the mistake?  Was it the computer models used to forecast?  Was it the data used to enter the models?  Maybe we don’t even know.  Obviously, the meteorological process has too much variation.

Again, there are two clear situations that can trigger useful feedback.  The first is when integrity is broken.  The second when a process has too much variation.

When people break their promises (agreements) they damage performance for themselves and for others. Any broken agreements require immediate feedback.  An agreement is like a promise.  It is a specific and time sensitive task where a predictable process is used to achieve it.

Delivering information completely and on-time can be considered an agreement.  Arriving on-time is an agreement.

In an organization (a system) people are interdependent.  If one person expects something from another, and they don’t get it, their performance will suffer.  If the meteorologist expected new data from an affiliate and did not receive it on-time, the quality of their prediction will suffer.  The affiliate broke an agreement.  The affiliate needs feedback to prevent that from happening again.

Anytime an agreement is broken, there is an immediate opportunity for feedback. The feedback discussion will focus on preventing that agreement (promise) from being broken in the future.  An apology from the offender might also be appropriate. The discussion will center around improving the process to keep the agreement next time.

This past Sunday I was supposed to be the lector at the Church. It was not in my schedule on my phone and so I showed up at the Church not expecting to be the lector. Somehow I made a mistake and mis-read the schedule.  I still don’t understand how that happened.  I just missed it. A friend of mine had to stand in for me at the last minute. I had no idea I made a mistake (broke my agreement from the perspective of the Priest and the lector coordinator) until she called me later that morning and told me I had broken my agreement.

She and I laughed about it. She was loving and caring and funny in her feedback. We laughed even though I was embarrassed.  I immediately checked the schedule (and my phone) again to be sure that wouldn’t happen again (my process).

We need to be sure employees are aware they broke an agreement and that you and others know they did it as well. Because it is so important employees understand and appreciate the need to keep their agreements, feedback in these situations is essential.  It’s important everyone self-manage their own agreements and the feedback encourages this skill.

Be a supportive reporter and a coach for integrity and help others if they need help.  My friend in Church was a supportive reporter.

The second reason to give feedback is when a process needs improvement.  This is a bit more complicated and usually requires the use of quality improvement tools.

When integrity is broken and when processes need fixing are the two triggers when feedback is needed.  Anything else might be interpreted as either micro-management, and or bullying.  Be a “supportive reporter” instead.

How-to-Know-When-Feedback-Video

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Best Practices Growth Management Personal Development

Motivation and the Big Picture

In the first article on motivation we explored how to motivate your team and then we dug deeper on the topic of alignment. In this article we explore the second way to tap into your teams motivation with the big picture.

You’ve already heard me talk about internal and external motivation so let’s look at how the big picture can help your team internalize their motivation to enhance productivity and results.

The fact that most people are motivated by more than just money is even truer today because Millennials are more commonly driven by purpose. This is important because this diverse and well-educated group is expected to make up 36% of the U.S. workforce by 2018 and nearly half of all workers by 2020. For you to have the best of the best employees and stay competitive in this ever-changing marketplace, this is a group you want to take seriously, whether you have been running your organization for a long time or are an emerging leader.

Your workforce wants to know where they fit into the big picture, what the organizations goals and mission is, and that their work has purpose. Punching a clock or showing up to do a job with no meaning is not going to cut it anymore. Your most loyal, dedicated, and hard working employees will be the ones that understand and believe in the purpose of their role in the organization.

The message on purpose starts with you helping to ensure everyone understands the big picture, the purpose of the organization; what the organization set out to accomplish and why. What is the reason the organization was founded in the first place, who did the founders want to serve, and why? If you, as a leader of your organization cannot articulate this it may be time to re-visit the mission and vision. These statements should be more than just plaques you hang in the lobby or around the office; they need to be beliefs that people can understand and be part of. But they have to be easy to articulate and understand for everyone in your organization for them to be meaningful.

Once the big picture is communicated, it needs to be included in conversations on a regular basis so that your employees will start to work towards that mission, because they are part of something bigger than themselves. However, for this to be true they need to continue to hear the mission, its importance, and how they are helping make this happen. There are many times when an employee does not understand the direct link between his or her job and the bigger picture. With each role, each task, each project, continue to communicate and teach others to communicate why the work is important to the big picture, why it has purpose.

Encourage these types of conversations among the ranks; it should become a viral conversation that anyone can have at any time about the purpose, mission, and vision of the organization. The more people truly feel the connection to something bigger, something important, the more they will dedicate themselves to serving that purpose. And once they start to internalize this purpose you have made the important shift from external motivation to internal, which is the most important type of motivation to move people forward.

For more resources visit www.c-suiteresults.com where you can find articles, videos, assessment tools, books, and the C-Suite Success Radio show. To discuss purpose and motivation in more detail reach out to sharon@c-suiteresults.com