Leadership, Responsibility, Roles

Make Music

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I would like to think of myself as something of a musician. I have actually been up on stage at a few venues (including The Hard Rock Café) and performed in various bands and even got paid for doing it. I guess that minimally qualifies me as a professional musician.

 

Every now and then however I have had the pleasure of associating with “real” musicians. These are the people who have “the” talent. They can play. I understand music theory and application. I enjoy practicing, learning new works and with time can master most techniques, but I recognize that in some instances I really don’t have “the” talent that will elevate me to the exalted levels of a “real” musician.

 

I have also learned that I don’t care.

 

You need to enjoy making music. It is something I want to do. I have found that I would rather be the weakest player in a very good jazz combo than the best player in a garage rock band. I have been both. Being the weaker player in the better group doesn’t embarrass me. It motivates me. I find I work harder, to get better, to not let down my band-mates, and that the final product that we produce is always better.

 

You also learn that being a musician requires a certain amount of interpersonal skills. I have been in a few bands that were pretty good, but could not survive more than a gig (performance – I have to use band “speak” lest people think I am really not a musician) or two simply because they could not get along. The band needs to understand the personal arrangement in much the same way as they have to understand the musical arrangement. Not everyone can be “the” leader, and not everyone can solo at the same time.

 

It is said that the band “Cream” (Eric Clapton, Ginger Baker, Jack Bruce) were three virtuosos soloing all the time. They were great, and in some cases spectacular, but they couldn’t hold it together either, and quickly broke up. They have reunited some forty years later for a few concerts, but think of all the spectacular music that didn’t get made.

 

I found that bands I was in, where the members brought down their personal desires to solo and lead made better music. The final product (at least for me, and I think them too) was ultimately much better, and much better received by the audience. There is a time and a place to step forward, but not everybody can do it at once.

 

You want to be in with musicians that smiled. Making music is fun. You are getting to do something that not everybody gets to do. It should be a pleasure. It is something to enjoy. If you are not having fun, if you can’t find the enjoyment, even in the practice and the mundane aspects of making music, than you shouldn’t be doing it.

 

I do have fun. I hope my kids see that I do and that they do too, some day. I was well out of college before I learned to enjoy it, but I did.

 

I play the bass. As I said I would like to call myself a bass player, but that might insult some of the bass players out there who can really, really play. I know my role. The bass is a transition instrument which helps connect the melody (guitars / keyboards – chords) to the rhythm (Drums – beat). I try to be the best bass player I can within the group, whether I am playing a simple repetitive riff, or improvising a walk through changing keys and chords. I enjoy them both.

There is a musician joke that holds very true for me.    Who is the guy standing around with all the musicians?…..The Bass player.
 

I also practice the bass. I try to learn new songs, new styles, and new techniques. The Jazz group I am currently in is playing several old standards, but in varying new and different styles. Old standards that were written to be played as a “swing” sound new and are interesting to play as a “Tango” or “Bossanova”. It seems that with music you can continue to take the old and make it new again. It helps keep you, the music and the band refreshed.

 

I would like to thank the other members of the band I am in. Gene (keyboards), Jay (Guitar), and Billy (Drums) – Thanks. I am having a ball. I hope you guys will continue to let me play in the band.

 

I guess a lot of the same ideas associated with making music would also apply to business, wouldn’t they.

Commitment, Compliance, Time

Reason and Force

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I recently read an article where the author contended that there were only two ways to get people to do something. You could reason with them and get them to do what you want of their own volition, or you could use force to compel them to do as you would desire.The authors thesis was that the gun was a sign of civilization in that by being armed you removed everyone else’s capability to compel you to do anything (due to your capability to meet force with force) so that the only way to get things one would be through reason. It was an interesting argument, but not one I will go into here.

What I would like to address is the concept of force and reason to get thing done in the business arena. As business leaders, you can in fact use “force” to get things done. By being in the position of authority you can compel people to do as you want under penalty of potentially losing their job. We have all known those managers that have employed this method of management, and may have also employed it our selves from time to time.

Force and reason in the business environment equate to compliance and commitment by the business team.

If the team is “forced” to do something, they most normally will “comply”. They will do as they are told.They will not have bought into the plan or project, or internalized their motivation. All motivation will have to come from you, and it will normally be a “negative reinforcement”, meaning they will work to avoid the negative consequences that would arise from not doing as they are told.

If the team is “reasoned”with, in order to achieve a goal, they will become “committed”. They can buy into the plan, and internalize their motivation. They can align their personal goals with that of the organization and their motivation will be positively reinforced and based on achievement instead of based on the fear of lack of“compliance”.

The down side of reason / commitment vs. force / compliance is time. It takes time to reason issues through and gain commitment. It takes far less time to just tell someone to do something. The key to leadership is to know how much reason is required and how much force to use in order to get both the commitment desired and compliance needed to attain the desired objective within the allotted amount of time.

Meetings, Travel

The Elegance of Travel

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As the leader of your organization it is your responsibility to be both visible to the team, and to be where you are needed. This will necessitate travel. In some situations, a significant amount of travel. Do not delegate it. Get the ticket. Get on the plane and go.

 
Many people consider the concept of travel to be elegant. They associate it with the way it is portrayed on TV. I guess it depends on what your definition of “elegant” is.

Most of the time you will be leaving later in the day (so that you can get at least some work done earlier in the day). You will be arriving at your destination later in the day / evening (if you are traveling domestically. If you are travelling internationally there is no telling when you will be arriving).

You will travel on what amounts to a glorified bus with wings, except that it will be more cramped than a bus, with less leg room. There will be only stale, recycled air to breathe and no place to put your luggage. You will strive to get to the front of the line to board so that there may be room for your carry on bag because you don’t want to take the risk of losing you bag should you be forced to check it.

You will rent a small car, at night in an unfamiliar town. You will not be allowed to rent a GPS system due to cost saving measures by your company. You will then try and locate an unknown hotel, in the dark, based on directions given to you by the stranger behind the car rental counter. Since this is the only map and directions you have, you will trust them implicitly.

Once you find the hotel, in the dark, you will rent a room. There are two types of rooms at hotels; Non-Smoking, and those that are uninhabitable. Hopefully you will have reserved the correct one. You will then hang up your clothes for the next days meeting and put your toiletries in the bathroom.

Here is where the “elegance” will come in. You will most likely order Room Service for dinner and start scanning the channels on the TV for anything of possible interest.

You will eat hotel food for dinner. You will sleep poorly in a strange bed. You will get up, eat (again, hotel food), rely on the directions from the stranger behind the hotel desk on how to get to your destination (hopefully on time), and try to navigate the rush hour in a strange town, amongst the friendly people on the road who have little to no time for people who do not know where they are going.

You will have your meeting.

You will then hurry back to the airport to try and return the car, get through security and get on your glorified bus in record time so that you can get home before midnight so that you can get a few hours of sleep before your 8:00 meeting the next morning in your office.

 
Conference calls are good, but they are sometimes not a substitute for “being there”. It is your responsibility. Pack up and go.

And just smile and nod when someone reminds you about how much fun, and how elegant travel is.

Finances, Management, Matrix Organizations

Follow the Money

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Organizations today come in many forms and structures. They can be created along geographic lines, product lines, markets and even customers. In most major corporations today there are usually aspects of each of these organizational structures present. This has given rise to the organizational “Matrix”. While this structure probably was not the basis for the popular movie trilogy, it can be comparably confusing.

 
The drives to specialize and push repetitive labor intensive functions into low cost labor environments and to take advantage of low cost manufacturing while streamlining supply chain operations have resulted in an organization structure where ownership for the business and its associated processes is fragmented, while the responsibility for the overall solution usually remains centrally vested. Despite all of this diversification and fragmentation of the business structure, there is one thread running through the business that enables the business leader to draw it all together and drive the solution.

Follow the money.

No organization within the corporation does anything for free. They have people, equipment and overhead that they need to pay for. The way they sustain and pay for these items is to provide or “sell” their particular service to you as the business owner. In this corporate structure, certain specific functions may not report to the business unit (Matrix) but they are funded by it.

Over time it is possible for these business funded functional groups to assume and believe that they are in fact entitled to the ongoing funding of the business group. They normally have multiple businesses providing funding to them in addition to delivering on their own organizational commitments. It is possible for them to lose their focus and begin to deliver what they chose and prioritize to provide, not what the business has chosen and required of them.

This should not the case.

As the business owner it is your responsibility to require performance from all aspects of the business, whether they are internal or external to the business or corporation. And just as is the case with external suppliers, the way this is accomplished with Matrix reporting internal providers is with money. Setting clear expectations of deliverables, requiring year over year efficiencies and business improvements, and yes in some instances refusing to pay (fund) unacceptable performance are some of the tools that can be used to assure desired performance of the Matrix group.

In today’s Matrix based organizational environment the business owner may not and probably does not own all of the aspects and functions that go into running the business, but more often than not they still own the checkbook. And while they may not have direct reporting control over the prioritization and performance of those Matrix organizations, no group (internal or external) is “entitled” to their funding. Today’s business owner needs to understand and remember that they can no longer simply direct other organizations on what needs to be done. They also need to understand that they are not at the mercy of internal organizations and must pay whatever is required by the functional group. They can and must remind the Matrix organizations that if the desired work is not performed, that the business will in return stop paying (for) them, just as they would any other under-performing supplier. The health and performance of the business should always more important than any of the functions that supply and support it.

Communication, Customer Management, Sales

Great Expectations

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A colleague of mine had been working with a difficult customer for some time. He was making good progress with the customer and their issues. Late on a Thursday he sent me a request for support with a customer deliverable for the following Monday morning at 7:00 AM. This request would require essentially a one business day turnaround, or the team to work over the weekend.

 
Now sometimes a customer request should and does require the weekend work. After a little discussion with my friend it was determined that his request was a “nice to have” not a “have to have” capability for the customer. I then asked why we wanted a “nice to have” deliverable in a “have to have” time frame. He responded by saying he was trying to show our responsiveness to the customer.

 
I explained that my concerns were multiple: I didn’t know if we could scope the work (estimate the time effort and complexity of the request), and implement properly it within the time frames he was trying to set. I also told him I thought that there was a significant risk that our demonstration of responsiveness could backfire on him. He asked how.

 
Customer satisfaction is based (in my opinion) on economic expectation theory. Simply stated that means if you set your customer’s expectations at a specific level, and then meet those expectations, your customer will be satisfied with your performance. In this instance I pointed out that if he set the customers expectations for receiving this incremental functionality (nice to have) in an achievable time frame, and we in fact were not able to deliver it in the desired interval, we would not have met the customers expectations. This would have turned a potential opportunity to build customer trust and relationship into a negative experience for the customer.

 
It would not have mattered that we were trying to do something for the customer that might have been above and beyond the requirements of the contract. What would have mattered is that we would have committed to providing something to the customer within a certain time frame and then not delivered on it. The point here was that when you commit to providing something, even something you are not contractually required to provide, it becomes an expected deliverable and is viewed as such by the customer.

 
What we instead did in this instance was commit to providing the desired incremental functionality for the Monday a week later than my friend wanted. This provided us with the time required to properly scope and perform the desired tasks. We ended up providing it on the Thursday of the week that my friend wanted (not the Monday) and were able to be perceived by the customer as both providing incremental functionality and providing it ahead of our commitment – a two for one on the customer satisfaction score card. More over we were able to set a reasonable expectation by the customer and then meet it.

Leadership, Reorganization, Team Building

Don’t Ask – Do Tell

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I think we have all be in organizations that have implemented reorganizations. Some of us have been through it several times. We have seen some good ones and we have seen some not so good ones. In most instances difference between a good reorganization and a bad one depends on the first steps taken by the new leader. Those first few statements and actions by the new leader set the tone for the new organization.

 
Those leaders that took a little time to meet and understand their new team showed they were taking the time and interest to understand what the team faced. A team will normally respect this approach. Those that took immediate actions showed they had a plan and were going to be decisive. The team will again normally react positively to this approach as well and look for the logic and goal associated with the changes.

Then there are those leaders whose first action is to question their team.

They will ask if the team has the competitive drive, the talent, the training, the spirit, the desire, etc (pick one or more) to accomplish the task or challenge that is in front of them. This is not what a team needs to hear from its new leader. The team does not want to hear the leader questioning their capabilities or mind sets.

A team wants to see those attributes in question, in their leaders. They want to see it in statement, action and deed by the leader. The members of the team don’t want to be questioned about their own commitment or attributes. An organization is a reflection of the leader. A new leader needs to be dynamic in setting both the new structure and clearly annunciating the organizational goals and expectations.

A new leader needs to step in, and up and clearly state what the needs and goals of the new organization are. The leader should not ask the team if they have the requisite attributes. The leader should tell the team they have the attributes needed to achieve the desired goals.

It is a small but very important difference in getting a new organization going.

Communication, Customer Management, Sales

Are They Really Buying?

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In a previous post I noted that customers associate value with that which they pay for. That means, in my opinion, that if you give a customer something for free, the customer will not really recognize it as valued. I would like to address the concept of customer value, when it comes to sales. I will relate a story to illustrate my point.

 
Several years ago I was dealing with a customer users group. As with every good users group they were in the habit of prioritizing their product enhancement desires and requests and presenting those requests to us at our joint user’s group meetings (which actually occurred twice a year). A specific request for a specific enhancement started to appear regularly at these meetings.

 

As time passed and other issues were dealt with, this request continued to rise in priority on the request list.

Soon it became a point of contention. The customers wanted to know why the feature was not being made available (despite the availability of “work arounds”), and the sales teams wanted to know when they would be able to sell the capability to the obviously pent up demand.

 
It became time to deal with this topic directly. During an open forum meeting with the users group, they were asked how many of them wanted this capability, even though there was a work around. All hands were raised. They were then asked how many of them would be willing to pay for this capability, since incremental development and work would need to be expended by the manufacturer to create it.

Despite the popular concept to the contrary, we were in fact a “For Profit” institution.

Several hands went down. When it was shared with them what the actual price of the capability would be, to cover costs and provide profit and on going support, almost every hand dropped.

There are always those things that are “nice to have”. Those are normal items that customers do not associate value with. If they did, they would probably be categorized as “need to have” instead of “nice to have”. Need to have items can, should and normally will be paid for by the customer in association with the value they bring the customer. Items that are classified more as “wants” instead of “needs” may not.

The quickest way to separate the “wants” from the “needs” is to associate a price with the request. If the customer recognizes the value, there will be a negotiation / agreement. If the customer doesn’t recognize value, you will know very quickly and can then move on to the next topic.

Management, Style, Value

Time For a Reality Check

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I think we have all heard some of the somewhat hackneyed and stale marketing blurbs such as “Give them the steak. Sell them the sizzle.”, and “Perception is reality.”, and the like. This is basically the statement that style has triumphed over substance. Personally, I have not found the consuming of the “sizzle” to be nearly as satisfying as the consuming of the steak. I think that the focus on style and perception is also part of the list of issues we are encountering every day as we try to run a business.

 

It seems that sometimes we are actually more concerned with how we are perceived than with what we actually do and accomplish. In good times, when opportunities are rife, we may be able to succeed with a style focus. In tougher times, when there can not help but be a more attentive focus on the bottom line, it will be the quantifiable value that is provided that will be key.

 

In a difficult market it seems that there is a great deal more attention paid by management to how things are being done than there is to what is actually being done. As difficult as it may be, that behavior needs to stop. It is even more difficult to do when others within the organization are displaying the same bad behavior.

 

When others are concerned with perception and position, publically focus on deliverables and accomplishments. If some are not being as forthcoming with information and support, make sure to copy them and others on all pertinent documents and information.

 

It is not entirely clear if or when the business climate may improve. The needed “Reality Check” in today’s business environment is to focus on the “real” and quantitative aspects of business. We need to concentrate on the doing of what is needed to get the job done and the measuring of progress both within the business and with the customers. I think that once that reality sets in, and takes root, we can continue getting back to the business of providing value and making progress.

Character, Leadership

Sometimes You Are Wrong

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When I was younger my dad had 2 rules for life around our house: Rule 1 – Dad was never wrong. Rule 2 –Whenever dad was wrong, see Rule 1. This worked pretty well until I became a teenager, and like all teenagers I knew better….usually…I thought.

 

In business however, unlike my formative years, no one gets to be right all the time. We all work hard to make sure we are right as often as possible. It is the way you matriculate upward in management. Being right more often than not is a hallmark of the successful manager. There are times when despite your best efforts, you are not right. What you do now will tell many people a lot about your character as a leader.

 

If you are wrong, accept that things did not go as you had planned. It happens. Don’t equivocate – “We were 75% correct”. Don’t try and spin doctor the results – “We met our commitments, but didn’t reach the objectives…” Learn from it.

 

Identify what did go right,and also identify what did not. Specifically identify what needs to be done in the future to assure that when the same or similar issues arise in the future,the outcome will be different. The idea is to focus on the future and not waste cycles trying to explain, or bury the past. What is learned and assimilated into the business and how it is prepared to move forward is far more important than the protection of your ego over some perceived “failing”.

 

If at some point it turns out that you are wrong, despite however unlikely an occurrence this is believed to be, identify the issue, get it right and move on. In both the short and long term it will be better for you and the business for you to be the leader that corrected the issue and moved forward, and not the manager who tried to recast the past.

 

My dad still likes to remind me about Rule 1 though.

Leadership, Priorities, Teamwork

Beware of the Tiger….Team

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There are many corporate animals in the organization, but one that has the potential to do so much good, also has the capability to cause significant harm. That corporate “animal” is the Tiger Team. Tiger Teams normally evolve from some sort of issue that has lingered unresolved for a significant amount of time. When senior most management’s frustration with the current problem owners group’s inability to drive a resolution boils over, they will create the Tiger Team. This is when scarce resources will be thrown at the problem.

 

Every manager has a reasonable idea of who their best performers, problem solvers and go-to for solution people are. These are also usually some of their busiest people. When a problem reaches a certain age, or criticality, it is usually these people who are called on. They become members of the Tiger team, and begin work on the solution.

 

In many instances this will be the end. The team will form, the team will work, and the team will solve the problem and move on. Case closed.

 

However in some instances Tiger Team members can be drawn from one group to help solve the problems of a second group, and placed under the temporary management of someone from a third group. There are now at least three members of management (and possibly more) that feel they have at least some claim to that resources time and the prioritization of their work.

 

Unless reporting lines are very clearly drawn, and work is very clearly prioritized, some of the most highly regarded resources in the organization have now been put in a very difficult situation. How are they supposed to arbitrate between the demands of so many different members of senior management? If they were working close to or at capacity before, which work will be delayed based on the additional duties required by the Tiger Team? If left on their own to decide, whatever direction they choose will leave at least one and possibly more managers unhappy because their work requirements were not met.

 

The key elements of a successful Tiger Team are the understanding by all members of the entire organization what the work priorities, and the leadership priorities of the Tiger Team are with respect to the entire organization. If the work of the Tiger Team takes temporary precedence, then the leadership of the Tiger Time also needs to take temporary management precedence. This is sometimes a tricky situation when the resources in one group must be provided to help solve the issues of another group, and their current accompanying work deliverables must be temporarily de-prioritized.

 

Without the clear establishment of responsibilities and priorities, a Tiger Team has the potential to turn into an exercise in trying to herd cats, with about as much opportunity for success.