3 Performance Killers Leaders Should Watch for and Stop

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Performance killers are a reality, but it is up to an organization’s leadership to be on the watch for such behaviour.  In fact, it is essential for managers to be trained to spot and address these destructive behaviours in order to build high-performance teams.  And herein lies the difference between teams and departments.  In teams you don’t have this behaviour.  In departments that are experiencing challenging times and/or people competing to avoid downsizing, this behaviour is rampant.

As someone who has managed teams for close to 20 years, a former colleague reached out to me recently get some advice on some behaviours he was seeing in his own department.  With that in mind, I offered him the following description of what I was trained to lookout for as a manager.

Here are three performance killers that managers need to address and end:

1.  Cliques or Power Coalitions

Coalitions frequently form in group settings.  In this case, a few people align themselves with the leader and withhold praise or positive feedback outside the clique or coalitions.  In fact, giving praise to other members of “team” is intentionally withheld.  Members of the cliques may even go as far as to persuade the leader that the other parties are not performing.
 
Performance Killers, taylormade solutions, heather anne maclean
 

2.  Enforced Silos

Silos can occur in conjunction with cliques or independent of another action.  In these situations, people involved are focused on self-promotion and their careers rather than the overall good of the department and ultimately the team.  Individuals involved in these actions will ensure that information is withheld from others. Marginalization of other departmental members usually occurs.

3.  Alienators

In this case, Alienators work quietly at first dropping hints to the leader that other people are not doing their jobs and/or not performing as well as should be expected.  Alienators are very skilled at creating the perception that he or she is concerned about the “team’s” reputation and ultimately the leader’s reputation.  Through continued conversations, the discussions escalate to the point where the leader believes that the Alienator has his or her best interests at heart.
 

The Remedy:

Managers should be on the lookout for these behaviours, particularly during troubled times. And when he or she sees this occurring, the manager must take the bull by the horns. Individual staff members can’t address this situation.  The situation for those individuals will only worsen.
 
Managers need to look closely at the members of his or her  department and ask questions like:
 
  1. Who is always finding fault with members of the department?
  2. Is there a select group to who never gets any criticism?
  3. Is the same group, who is never criticized, jointly criticizing the same people?  Is the messaging eerily similar?  Same words?  Same timing of complaints?
  4. Who uses pass aggressive techniques to slide in negative comments?

The only way to stop this destructive behaviour is to set the stage that team members support one another and make each member in the department look good both within the department and outside the department.  That is a true sign of team participation.  While this is not easy for many mangers, good managers make it a practice to not accept anything less, even from people with whom they have befriended in the reporting structure.

These are only three destructive behaviours that can occur.  What would you add to this list?

Who “Owns” the Customer?

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In a Social Enterprise Asking “who owns the customer” is Not Only Antiquated, it is Ludicrous

Each day we have interesting and insightful conversations that get our juices flowing.  Sometimes we get a new idea or sometimes we exit those conversations just scratching our heads. I recently had dinner with someone I have a great deal of respect for, but I have to say that I left that conversation scratching my head.   I have known this person all of my life and I can say that he is usually very insightful and spot on when it comes to intuitively knowing that the customer wants.  In this conversation however, he was dead serious when he spoke of his organization and who should be making decisions about the customer.  His exact words were:  ‘Why should PR be involved in this issue?  This is a customer issue and therefore, it is our decision what to say or do when it comes to the customer.  They are our customers not theirs.  What do they know about customers?”

I have to say that I was floored – from two perspectives.  First off I have to state my bias.  I do come from the “PR world” and was integrated into PR when they actually controlled the message.  I also spent enough time in the public sector to know how the various interested parties want a say in the message, the timing, etc.  However, and thankfully so, I have seen the light.  Because of my passion for social media and the intrigue around the democratization of knowledge, I know that no one single person or business unit owns the message.  That being said, I also know from experience that no one single unit owns the customer.  If an organization approaches its customers from the standpoint that only the Customer Service department has a stake in the customer, then heaven help us.

In today’s social enterprise, we all have a stake in the customer.  We all have a say in how to communicate.  We have moved beyond someone thinking that a department owns the customer.  Or, at least I thought we have.

Over the coming weeks, I will explore some actual best practices that I was working on in my last organization and how these practices can move organizations to being social enterprises as opposed to anti-social enterprises.

If you have experiences that you would like to share as well, I welcome your thoughts and conversations.  After all, it is about being social.

The Ostrich Effect

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In my last blog posting I spoke of people, in general, having a fear of social media. The question is why?

The answer could be as simple as “it is human nature”, but that would be letting me, and you, off the hook way too easily! We need to dig a little deeper. For this posting, let’s look at the issue from the perspective of an organization or institution.

Thanks to research presented earlier this year by Nancy Bain, we know that 75% of all Canadians are now on-line, that there are some 18,620,000 Canadians on Facebook and that the time that we spend on Twitter is up 3700%.

These numbers can be daunting for businesses or institutions. These numbers are significant and it means that decisions makers have to take a hard look at actions that will involve the use of new communications’ tools, new technology and very open and public discussions. This is a frightening thought for many.

The questions that immediately come to mind are: how will we learn to use these tools effectively? Who will train us? Do we need training? What are the full ramifications if we choose to not use these tools and resources? What are the ramifications if we do? Do we need new policies? Do we need to staff 24/7? And most importantly, what if something unsavoury is said about my organization? What can I do? This last question is probably really what would keep managers awake at night. Earlier this year Eisner Amper conducted a survey of Boards of Directors asking them what they felt was the biggest threat to their respective organizations. The result was a clear and decisive statement – reputational risk!

So, we know that reputational risk is a huge concern. That being said, why exactly would so many decision makers choose to not engage in social media? The reason – is what I like to call the Ostrich Effect! If one chooses to bury his head in the sand and therefore cannot hear what is being said on social media, it doesn’t exist, right? Wrong!

The fact is that there are many communications professionals that can assist organizations and institutions navigate the social media waters and prepare a social media strategy that meets your specific organizational needs. We are just a click away! What are you waiting for? Organizations and institutions need to be proactive. Waiting for a crisis to emerge is not the answer.

In my next posting, I will look at crisis communications and how social media can work to your advantage.

Trust…From the Employer Perspective

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Being able to trust, or not trust, is not just an issue for the employee or the consumer.  We know for a fact that as employers we have a few trust issues ourselves!

In fact, there is a fair amount of research to demonstrate that like employees, employers fall short in this area. According to Charlie Taylor and a study conducted in 2008 where 1,390 employers were surveyed, 83% of employers confirmed that they checked Facebook to see if an employee was really sick.  This same survey revealed that 67% of employers disciplined employees as a result of what they saw on Facebook.

The question is, just how many employers even allow their employees to use social networking sites?  According to Adam Ostrow and a survey of 1,400 Chief Information Officers with 100 employees or more, 54% of employers completely block access to social networking sites. I would argue that this is not very progressive thinking.

I would challenge employers to think differently about Social Media and social networking sites.  For those that think that employees will waste time or release confidential information, I hate to break it to you, but they don’t need social networking for that.  These employees will have already figured out a way to do this!

So, instead let’s take the positive approach and realize that:
1) Social Media is not a fad.  It is however, a fundamental shift in the way that we communicate.
2) As more people become mobile communicators, we need adjust the way we communicate.
3) A whole new generation is coming into the workforce using Social Media for communication.  Are you just going to ignore these employees?  You are if you aren’t employing Social Media.
4) Establish guidelines to help employees understand the do’s and don’ts of using Social Media.
5) Realize the tremendous potential for collaborating and sharing information.
6)  You need to take a leadership role!

In my next posting, I will cover some additional information about trust, or the lack of trust.

What kind of Social Organization do you want to be?

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So, we have already established that companies need to be involved in Social Media.  It is better to be a part of the conversation rather than just having everyone else talking about you.  That being said though, what kind of organization are you now?  What kind of organization do you want to become?

I suppose that companies could be happy with just being engaged with Social Media, but I would propose that we take it one step further.  Why not take the effort all the way and become a social organization.  Make all your business planning and efforts around how your entire organization can morph into a truly social organization.  To be a social organization you take the concept of sustainability and take it to the next level.  It is more than just being a company that talks about sustainability.  For example, ask yourself questions like:  what do we want to be known for?  Once you answer that, then you have the start of a plan. Keeping asking yourself these questions as you plan and execute that plan.

Do we trust? What does the research say?

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Trust.  Now there is a word.

Trust.  Who do you trust?  At work?  At home?  As a consumer?  As a person?  Who do you trust?

Trust is an area of interest that has had an interesting evolution.  Over the last decade or so, people and researchers have come to have a fascination with trust, and for good reason.  As people have become more connected and more knowledgeable, they have become more skeptical.   The question is why?  Why are people, regardless of where you are or what socioeconomic background that you have, just not as trusting as they used to be?

Even employers are doing research to understand how they need to communicate with their employees because of this very issue.  IBM for example, carried out a survey in 1997 and then again in 2003 looking at what the most trusted communication tools they had for their employees.  The results are interesting.  News media and employee’s immediate managers were two areas for example that took a big hit between 1997 and 2003.  Employees just did not have the same level of trust when it came to these sources.  On the other hand, executive letters and the company Intranet became the most trusted source in 2003.  Flash forward to 2008 however, and you see yet another picture.  The BlessingWhite Employee Engagement Report 2008 reports that only 53% of employees trust their organization’s senior leaders- not their managers, but the organization’s senior leaders.  In North America only 75% of respondents trust their immediate manager, slightly down from the 2006 report which showed that 79% trusted their managers. (This report is available at http://www.blessingwhite.com/EEE__report.asp).

Let’s look at the consumer side of things.  According to research and Erik Qualman, a marketing expert, 14% of consumers trust advertisements whereas 78% trust peer recommendations.

Why do we see a trend that shows employees and consumers becoming less trusting?

I may be overs simplifying things, but I believe it comes down to the history of control.  Companies, through their marketing and communications teams have traditionally had the control.  They created the message, the timing of the delivery and they held the purse strings.  In other words, they could embark on “campaigns”.  As an employee or a consumer, what could we do?
Enter Social Media.  With mobile devices that can upload stories and images in seconds, a different story could emerge and a conversation could start.  Control eroded as did trust.

In my next posting, I will continue on this theme of trust and explore trust from the employer perspective.