Blog - Just Ask Leadership, Executive Coaching - CO2Partners

iPhone App Just Ask Leadership

2010-02-08T12:45:00.003-06:00

You can now go to iTunes to download the Leadership App!

Reputation is built slow and it degrades in light speed

2010-02-03T16:40:00.002-06:00

Paula Prahl Senior VP of Communications, Public Affairs and Corporate Social Responsibility at Best Buy said, "It is so difficult to measure reputation because it moves forward so very slowly and it is dramatic how fast you can lose it on one small issue."

Glassdoor.com find out what you're worth

2010-02-03T16:18:00.001-06:00

Glass Door is a website that will help you know what you should be paid and what you should pay your team. And much more... Check it out!

All Employees Need Media Training According to Chris Brogan

2010-02-03T16:12:00.002-06:00

GeoTagged, [N44.86306, E93.30562]

It use to be true that executives needed media training, but not anymore. With every other person carrying a video device, all your employees are likely to be showing up on some blog or media outlet. What opportunity can this create for your organization?

Chris Brogan - Trust Agents speaking on Reputation in social media

2010-02-03T15:17:00.002-06:00

I am not a professional marketer. I see social media as a way of saying "I see you". It is really about recognizing there is someone on the other side of the conversation. Recognition involves three simple steps:

1) Listening. The bulk of people who engage in social media are doing so to talk first, listen second (if at all). If you demonstrate that you're really listening, others will value that skill. Do a Google search on "grow bigger ears" for further info.
2) Connecting. There's a limit to the number of people you can maintain significant social relationships with--it's called the Dunbar number (and it's generally agreed to be 150 people). But that doesn't mean you shouldn't try to connect with people outside your traditional network. Be the person that helps the competitors. It will be remembered. Don't think that the customer is there for you. That is the old media model. Look at these people and ask, "What do they need?" You don't have to start a community from scratch. You just have to participate in one. Be part of the community and be helpful. How can we equip people? Stop, collaberate, and listen.
3) Publishing. If all you do is listen, people will start to wonder if you're trustworthy. Everyone gathered around the campfire has a responsibility to share at times.

iPhone App on Leadership - Get Posts Real Time

2010-02-03T14:27:00.002-06:00

Go to your App store on your iPhone or on iTunes and search for "Just Ask Leadership" and get your free leadership app. Hope you enjoy it. Discover events on topics of leadership!

Why Work Sucks: And what are you going to do to fix it - Interview with Cali & Jody - Part II

2010-01-29T06:41:00.009-06:00

Click to go to Part I of the interview with Cali & Jody

Gary Cohen: What successes and failures have you had with ROWE since you started your new organization? What was the context that allowed for the success and failures?
Jody: There have been countless successes with ROWE since our organization, CultureRx, has spun off from Best Buy. Each person who says “My life is better now because of the ROWE mindset” or “I’m producing 20% more now than I used to”, or “I won’t be taking a position at another company for more money because they don’t have ROWE” is a success story. ROWE teams become more productive, are more engaged in their work, retain their best employees, and in general, are much happier.

Cali: When the ROWE movement is stunted in an organization, it’s due to leadership not walking their talk. We were working with an organization awhile back where the CEO had communicated to the employees that ROWE was going to be their future. We brought the employees about halfway through their ROWE migration and at that point in time, the CEO became very, very uncomfortable about the reality that was staring him in the face. In order to get to increased productivity and engagement, he realized he would need to let go of the traditional control he had. He’d been used to having control over employees’ time and physical location, but in a ROWE, you’re not paying for a chunk of time. You’re paying people for a chunk of work. In this particular organization, the ROWE migration ceased. This was extremely unfortunate because the employees had had their eyes opened to a much more efficient, common sense way of approaching work – which would make them much happier – and it was snatched away from them.

Gary Cohen: Changing any culture is difficult at best. What were the obstacles that you faced during the change?
Cali & Jody: The biggest obstacles to this culture change are:
1) The power of time. Today, the workplace operates under this equation: Time + Physical Presence = Results. This is an old, outdated, out to lunch way of looking at things. Time and physical presence mean nothing. Every day, people are sitting in their cubes for hours on end, but they might not be producing anything. Managers have a false sense of security that if their employees are sitting in their cubes, they’re producing. Not the case.
2) The beliefs we have about the way work should happen.
3) Judgment (Sludge) – [defined in a separate response]

ROWE is a grassroots change. It’s bottom-up. This scares leadership in organizations because they fear that their control is going away. Control over things that don’t matter does go away, but the new control is all about whether or not outcomes are being reached. This is a very difficult shift for managers to make because they’ve been trained to be hall monitors. The new generation of companies, though, will be all about results – and their managers will be, too.

Gary Cohen: If a company was not willing to take on such massive change, what one small step could they take that would provide inspiration for further change?
Cali & Jodi: Depending on the size of your organization, there are different strategies for moving into a ROWE. If you’re an organization of more than 500 people, we’d recommend identifying one group to pilot ROWE. Once success occurs and there’s data to show, the rest of the organization can move in chunks. This way, the culture change moves at a good pace. In an organization of 500 or fewer, have the leadership team read Why Work Sucks and How to Fix It and engage everyone in a discussion about the pieces of a ROWE that are most appealing and most nerve-racking. The discussion will lead to a few things you can focus on that will move you closer to the ROWE mindset.

Gary Cohen: Is there something in the timing of human development and this mix of generations (Boomers, X, & Y) that makes ROWE work today or would this always have worked?
Cali & Jody: Interesting question! The ROWE mindset would always have worked. We actually heard from a ROWE fan with a point of view that ROWE has always existed. Thousands of years ago, people had to figure out the most efficient ways to reach their outcome – eating. That’s ROWE. If you have to find food to stay alive, you’re probably not going to spend your time chatting with the people around you. That’s ROWE.
The mix of generations just provides the perfect scenario for the benefits of ROWE to be experienced. It could be easy for Boomers and Traditionalists to dictate to X and Y how they need to approach work. However, that severely undermines efficiency and holds organizations back from what they could be producing.

Gary Cohen: What type of companies does this work for and where would you expect it to fail?
Cali & Jody: ROWE works in every organization. Focusing on results is something every organization in the country – in the world – should be doing. ROWE makes that real. The only way ROWE fails is if the people in the organization don’t take accountability for making it happen.

Gary Cohen: If all things are currently working well in an organization (good margin, motivated work force, and clear and compelling mission) is ROWE something I should know about or investigate? And why or why not?
Cali & Jody: If things are working well in an organization, looking into ROWE would be a very smart move for two reasons: 1) how is “doing well” defined? And how “well” do you want to be doing? You can always go higher. 2) ROWE is inevitable. With technology improvements and societal demographics shifting, ROWE will be everywhere. The question isn’t if organizations will change, but when. And those that shift soonest will have the advantage.

Gary Cohen: What tends to be people's first reaction to ROWE when they learn about it?
Cali & Jody: When people learn about ROWE, they form a pretty concrete opinion – either they like the idea and see the benefits or they don’t like it and think it won’t work. One side or the other – not too many folks land in the middle.

Gary Cohen: How do you respond to those reactions?
Cali & Jody: We spend our time on the people that can see the benefits of ROWE. It’s tempting to focus on those that are adamant ROWE won’t work – to keep trying to convince them of the benefits. The reality is that if they really are adamant about their point of view, it’s best to let them see the success stories occur around them. Energy is best spent on those that can see the opportunities.

Gary Cohen: How do you get around the issue of leaders and the myth of control that is so prevalent in our culture? What breaks down the power and control in organizations so they can move to a ROWE? (Interview continued tomorrow)

Related blog Posts:
Why Work Sucks and How are you going to fix it

Why Work Sucks! And How to Fix it. Interview with Cali Ressler & Jody Thompson

2010-01-27T21:07:00.004-06:00

Cali Ressler & Jody Thompson Interview

Cali and Jody created the Results-Only Work Environment from within the bowels of Corporate America – while juggling families, careers, and all the other demands of life.

Work sucked and the traditional solution--more flexible schedules--wouldn't address the problem. So they set out to fix it. Today, Cali and Jody are leading a global movement to forever change the way we work and live. For everyone.

Gary Cohen: In your book, Why Work Sucks and How to Fix It, you discuss a process you call ROWE. What is ROWE?
Cali & Jody: In our book, Why Work Sucks and How to Fix It, we explain exactly what a Results-Only Work Environment (ROWE) is. It’s an environment where each person is free to do whatever they want whenever they want, as long as the work gets done. It’s a true adult work environment where measurable outcomes are agreed upon and everyone reaches those outcomes how, when, and where it makes most sense.

Gary Cohen: What is it that ROWE is not?
Cali & Jody: ROWE is not telecommuting, flextime, a 4-day workweek, or any other kind of flexibility program. In fact, ROWE is not a program at all. It’s a culture shift in the way we approach work that breaks down the 1950s rules and beliefs that have kept us shackled us for so long.

Gary Cohen: How does it work?
Cali & Jody: Currently, there is a cycle that exists in workplaces that continues to keep everything operating as if it were 1950. The cycle consists of 1) the power of time, 2) the beliefs we have about the way work should happen, and 3) judgment. The ROWE migration process breaks this cycle.

The first step involves identifying the language in the work environment that makes judgments about how people are spending their time. We call this Sludge. Sludge might sound like this: “10:00 and you’re just getting in? I wish I could come in late every day”, “Banker’s hours again? Must be nice”, or “There goes Jill to pick up her sick kid again at daycare – wish I had a kid and could get some time off”. During the ROWE migration process, employees learn about an Environmental Sludge Eradication Strategy that they put into practice that rids the environment of this language. That is the catalyst for rewiring our decades-old beliefs about work.
The migration process is paced appropriately so that the new order emerges gradually and new ways of approaching work continue to evolve.

Gary Cohen: What is the mental model you have for ROWE? And how do you transfer that to others?
Cali & Jodi: The mental model we have for ROWE is based in an adaptive change process. It hits at the heart of what people believe about their co-workers, what constitutes ‘dedication’ to an organization, what ‘hard work’ looks like, and more. ROWE throws out the permission-based, childlike, paternalistic environment that exists in so many organizations today and replaces it with an adult environment that’s all about accountability.

We have a finely-tuned 3-phase process that we bring organizations through if they want to become ROWE-approved. We also conduct speaking engagements around the country at conferences, organizations, and universities for people that just want a dose of ROWE to kickstart their own mindsets.
More about the ROWE migration process can be found at www.culturerx.com or by e-mailing info@culturerx.com.

Gary Cohen: Where did you first introduce this idea?
Jody and Thompson and I created ROWE while we were employees at Best Buy. We first introduced it, on the down-low, to two departments at their corporate headquarters.

Gary Cohen: What was the question you were answering when you decided to lead the change that transpired at Best Buy?
Cali & Jody: When we decided to lead the change at Best Buy, we were answering this question: “What would the perfect work environment be like – where people could live their lives the way they want to and the organization would be getting maximum productivity?”

Gary Cohen: What change were you seeking and what modifications were made to your expectations from your initial idea?
Cali & Jody: With ROWE, we were seeking to create an environment where people could do whatever they want whenever they want, as long as the work gets done. We’ve never made any modifications to that definition because it’s the way things should be! We did, however, create markers to guide people in the right direction – the 13 Guideposts.

Gary Cohen: What successes and failures have you had with ROWE since you started your new organization? What was the context that allowed for the successes and failures? (Continued)

Art - Take One Moment and you will Watch all 8 Minutes it is Amazing

2010-01-24T16:38:00.004-06:00

Warren Bennis says that you know a leader because they are the original and not a copy. Kseniya Simonova, 24, is an original. She can be seen in the YouTube video above, competing in "Ukraine's Got Talent." She won and clearly deserved the 75,000 Pounds prize.

Kseniya Simonova says:"I find it difficult enough to create art using paper and pencils or paintbrushes, but using sand and fingers is beyond me. The art, especially when the war is used as the subject matter, even brings some audience members to tears. And there’s surely no bigger compliment."

Trade-off Interview with Kevin Maney - Part II

2010-01-23T10:03:00.006-06:00

Part I (click here)

Gary Cohen: Have there been some examples that you have seen that are able to defy the fidelity belly for an extended time?

Kevin Maney: Nobody’s convinced me of one so far. Though, as with any model, there are always examples that don’t fit. I’m sure some exist.

Gary Cohen: Some of your examples in the book seem to be in a retrospective view of how things turned out for certain organizations based on their choice of fidelity or convenience. Did you have a clear sense if those organizations understood these trade-offs before being interviewed by you?

Kevin Maney: Certainly some did. Tiffany understood what it was doing when it pulled back away from moving toward convenience in order to reclaim an exclusive, high-fidelity position. I’m not sure Tesla, for instance, understood that it was creating the first high-fidelity electric car.

Gary Cohen: Kevin, in interviewing leaders for my book Just Ask Leadership I found that many if not most of those I interviewed never released until after the interview that they were spending most of their time asking questions. I am wondering if the same phenomenon happened in doing research for your book. Of the leaders you interviewed for the book how many of them actually carried this idea of trade-offs in their business as clearly as you have illustrated it for the reader?

Kevin Maney: Some of the people who were the early inspirations for the book had long held a version of this model in their heads – though with some variations and different language. Trip Hawkins, the founder of Electronic Arts and Digital Chocolate, articulated this idea to me years ago. Reed Hastings, CEO of Netflix, had always run his company with a version of the trade-off in his head. I tried to find the common ways these CEOs thought about the trade-off, and pull them together into a single simple construct.

Gary Cohen: For those who found themselves in the fidelity belly, what was their reaction to your questions once they understood your mental model?

Kevin Maney: Jeff Bezos argued with me that the Kindle was not, in 2008, in the fidelity belly. It’s slowly climbing out, but at $300 a pop, I still think the cost makes it too inconvenient for most readers, while the quality of the experience for most readers still doesn’t equal a paper book.

Gary Cohen: What are your top questions you would ask of a leader to understand the trade-off for their business?

Kevin Maney: The first question is, how do you define the market you’re playing in? Then I’d ask who customers would perceive as the high-fidelity player, and who they’d perceive as being the high-convenience player. If you’re not either of those, then where do you fall in relative terms? If you’re dead in the middle, you have a problem.

Related Blog Posts:

Trade-off by Kevin Maney (Intro by Jim Collins)

2010-01-23T09:09:00.007-06:00

Tiffany's Sells Swatches! Extremely unlikely, given their pull-back on $100 charms because they recognized the trade-off they were making in serving that low-cost customer versus serving the elite-quality-oriented customer that they built their reputation on. So says bestselling author Kevin Maney in his recent book Trade-Off: Why Some Things Catch On and Others Don't (Random House) Forward by Jim Collins.

Kevin explains how organizations who excel inherently understand this trade-off. His book will help you get crystal clear about the trade-off that you need to make if you're going to compete in the marketplace and have your product or service catch on. He gives examples of both those who never made the trade-off and shrank into oblivion and those who made the break-out that most organizational leaders envision. This book is not an academic tome; it is alive with wonderful examples that remain with you long after you put it on your bookshelf or archive it on your Kindle.

One of the examples he provides, in fact, is of the development of Kindle. I marvel at the richness of his social network and how it elevates the details and understanding that he draws from these relationships. It provides credibility and insight that many books miss.

Business books often overdo it just to fill pages, where you likely will feel diminishing value after the first three chapters. Not this one. Kevin keeps it interesting from the first page to the last or from the first click to the last. I read all his reviews on Kindle and I thought I would give him a chance to respond to those critics (not that there were many critics) in an upcoming interview on Just Ask Leadership's Blog.

Many academics give you a list of what to do, Kevin gives you a mental model that will help you think about your business and the trade-off the market is wanting you to make to get your products or services to catch on. What is that trade-off for your organization?

Related Blog Posts:

Check out CO2 Partners' Leadership Style Assessment

Strategic Thinking - An Interview with Kevin Maney on the Trade-Off Business Leaders Need to Make

2010-01-23T07:47:00.015-06:00

(Review of Trade-Off) Firstly, Kevin, I want to say how much I enjoyed reading your most recent book, Trade-Off: Why Some Things Catch On and Others Don’t (Random House 2009). What was particularly enjoyable was the way in which you made strategic thinking approachable. Whether you’re a small business owner, nonprofit leader, or running a large corporation, the message is consistent. For those who are not familiar with Kevin Maney he is an author and journalist who has interviewed many of the biggest names in business in a career spanning 25 years.

His most recent book is Trade-Off: Why Some Things Catch On and Others Don't, published in the fall of 2009 by Broadway Books. He writes for Fortune, The Atlantic, Fast Company and other magazines.

Kevin was recruited by Conde Nast Portfolio magazine prior to its launch in 2007, and was a contributing editor there until its demise in April 2009. Kevin was previously technology columnist and senior technology reporter at USA Today. He is the author of the critically-acclaimed The Maverick and His Machine: Thomas Watson Sr. and the Making of IBM, published in 2003 by John Wiley & Sons. Working with Chicago firm VSA Partners, Kevin is currently an historical consultant and collaborator helping IBM plan for its 100-year anniversary in 2011.

He also wrote the 1995 BusinessWeek bestseller Megamedia Shakeout. Kevin is often on television and radio, and has appeared on PBS, NPR, CNBC, and other media outlets. He is a frequent keynote speaker and on-stage interviewer.

Gary Cohen: Kevin, with the flood of books today on the market--I believe the current number is 3,000 new titles per day--what was it that inspired you to write this book and face the daunting competition?

Kevin Maney: I guess I had to feel like I had something constructive to say. There was also a pull to write about the trade-off between fidelity and convenience. I had written a couple of columns exploring the subject while at USA Today. Those columns prompted the most extraordinary email responses I’d ever received for something I’d written. The emails were what first made me feel like I had an interesting concept here.

Gary Cohen: Who do you believe will benefit most from reading your book?

Kevin Maney: I’ve heard from all kinds of people who emailed to say the book helped them – from a real estate agent in the DC area, to an owner of a fitness center, to several engineering students at NYU after I gave a talk, to the head of a division of one of the biggest technology companies.

Gary Cohen: Can you help our readers understand what you are referring to in your book as the "trade-off"? And what is the "fidelity belly"?

Kevin Maney: When buying or using a product or service, people constantly weigh a trade-off between a great experience – which I call fidelity – and great convenience. You’re willing to give up some fidelity for convenience – for instance, you’ll gladly buy MP3 music for your iPod because it’s so convenient even though the sound quality is 10 times worse than music on a CD. And you’ll give up convenience to get a great, high-fidelity experience – which is why you’ll buy $200 tickets to a U2 concert, fight for parking, and all that just to see the band live.

As it turns out, the most compelling products and services are either clearly high fidelity or clearly high convenience. Stuff in the middle is not enough of one or the other to get people excited – this is the fate of the compact disk. In the book, I’ve labeled that zone of so-so fidelity and so-so convenience as the “fidelity belly.” You don’t want to be in the fidelity belly.

Gary Cohen: Many leaders who have been formally trained by schools like Harvard, Northwestern, Stanford and others have studied strategic thinking of Michael Porter, Jim Collins, W. Chan Kim & Renee Maborgne, Kaplan & Norton. How do you see your thinking either aligning or diverging from such notable academics?

Kevin Maney: Jim Collins wrote the foreword to Trade-Off. He’s a good friend, and he’s probably had more influence on my thinking over the past 15 years than anyone. I talked through the book’s concepts with him before writing a word. I also think the book closely aligns with Clay Christensen’s Innovator’s Dilemma, but from a different perspective. Andy Grove’s strategic inflection point informed some of the ideas in the book, too.

Gary Cohen: Clayton Christensen at Harvard this year gave a speech that I attended where he explained how business schools can go wrong. One of his key points was that when professors provide models, without a clear understanding of the context in which the model is useful or not useful, it can lead to damaging consequences for their organizations. In which context do you see your model most useful and where will it not provide the correct guidance?

Kevin Maney: Judging from the reactions to the book, I’d say that it’s most useful in branding conversations – both consumer brands and business-to-business brands. It’s probably less useful in markets where there’s not a clear range of strong players from high fidelity to high convenience – like in health care or legal services.

Gary Cohen: Have there been some examples that you have seen that are able to defy the fidelity belly for an extended time?

Kevin Maney: .... (Part two of this interview will be continued tomorrw)
Related Blog Posts:

Raising Money From Venture Capitalists

2010-01-21T12:28:00.005-06:00

Because many of my friends and clients are entrepreneurs, I am often asked, "How do you go about raising money?" Our early funding was entirely government grants that we received in exchange for bringing jobs to the rural communities. When my business partner and I needed to do additional fund raising, we decided to go to the public markets and list on NASDAQ. In doing that we avoided the very challenging effort of going to the VC communitiy.

We went on the road with very skilled fundraisers who did it for a living. We were not left up to our own devices, which may or may not have been a good thing. Today, when asked about how to raise money, I often direct people to David Rose's presentation at TED.

Leadership Definition

2010-01-20T21:44:00.001-06:00

Executive Coaching Explained on the Back of a Napkin!

2010-01-17T16:43:00.002-06:00

Just Ask Leadership iPhone App

2010-01-17T01:21:00.004-06:00

Just completed building a Just Ask Leadership App for the iphone. It will be published within the next two weeks. The App will carry content from the Just Ask Leadership Blog, YouTube, Twitter and Eat The Book events in Minneapolis. Please stay tuned - You will find it on itunes under the name "Leadership"!

Gary B. Cohen will Speak at Common Good Breakfast Series (Jan 21st) in Minneapolis

2010-01-16T09:39:00.003-06:00

Common Good Breakfast Series
Thursday, January 21

The Common Good breakfast series highlights businesses and nonprofits who are taking some uncommon actions to solve the challenges they face and to thrive. These leaders are truly driving for the common good, making the region a better place to live and work for all of us.

In addition to offering intriguing speakers, Common Good Breakfast Series will make a donation to a nonprofit organization highlighted at each session. In addition to our sponsorship, a portion of the breakfast charge will go directly to a featured nonprofit; attendees are not asked to give any additional funds at these events.

We look forward to your participation in any session of the Breakfast Series. Membership is not required; the breakfast/program fee is just $35. See our initial schedule, make a reservation, or ask to be added to our email update list for announcements of speakers. Space is limited; please register early.

Thursday January 21st, 2010

7:30 - 9:00 AM

NEW LOCATION
Carlson School of Management
Private Dining Room
321 Nineteenth Avenue South
University of Minnesota West Bank
Skyway connection to 19th Avenue Parking Ramp

Featured Speaker
Gary Cohen
CO2 Partners
Author of "Just Ask Leadership - Why Great Managers Always Ask the Right Questions"
Gary Cohen interviewed leaders from around the country and shared how questions are at the core of their leadership success - Gary will share anecdotes and great insights from his research.

Nonprofit Partner: H.I.R.E.D.

Registration

Sponsors:
Neuger Communications Group
Minnesota Business

Leadership Resolution - Interview with Stewart Levine author of "Getting to Resolution"

2010-01-16T00:12:00.009-06:00

I would like to welcome Stewart Levine to our Just Ask Leadership Blog.
Stewart Levine is founder of Resolution Works and author of "Getting To Resolution" Stewart is a creative problem solver. He is widely recognized for creating agreement and empowerment in the most challenging circumstances. He improves productivity while saving the enormous cost of conflict. His innovative work with "Agreements for Results' and his "Resolutionary" conversational models are unique.

Gary Cohen: How did you decide to make conflict resolution your area of expertise?

Stewart Levine: It was what I naturally did in situations. Here’s the opening story from my book:

During my second year of law school I had my first “real” lawyer’s job. I was an intern at a local legal services clinic. On my first day I was handed 25 cases “to work on.” This would be my job for the semester. Three weeks later I asked the managing attorney for more cases. When he asked about the 25 he had given me, I told him that I had resolved them. He was very surprised—and very curious. He asked how I had done it. I told him that I had reviewed the files, spoken to the clients, thought about a fair outcome and what needed to be done, called the attorney or agency on the other side, and reached a satisfactory resolution. I knew nothing about being a lawyer. I had no inclination that the cases were difficult, needed to take a long time, or had to be handled in any particular way. With common sense and a “beginner’s mind,” I found the solution that worked best for all concerned. Simple? It was for me! I spent the next 12 years becoming a “successful” lawyer—and becoming less effective at resolving matters. Then, feeling frustrated, anxious, and fearful, I stopped practicing law. I have been in “recovery” ever since, recovering what I knew about resolution when I started, discovering its component parts and learning how to teach and model it for others. As a young attorney, although I listened politely to more senior lawyers, I was surprised at the coaching I received. Standard practice discouraged communication among the parties in conflict, communication that I had used in my legal services cases, communication essential for efficient resolution. Many lawyers were playing a very different game from the one my natural instincts chose. Since you have spent much of your career helping others resolve or embracing conflict, how has it informed the way you behave in your personal relationships (You know the shoe makers dilemma)? I live my life very congruent with my work…I do walk the talk…and I sleep very well at night!

Gary Cohen: There are many books on the subject of dealing with conflict resolution what was it that you thought was not being offered in those that you have address with your most recent book, Getting to Resolution?

Stewart Levine: I provide a step by step road map…a conversational process people can follow by the numbers.

Gary Cohen: Some businesses today are deciding to merge companies together to survive this economic downturn. In merging companies together there are usually conflicts between cultures. Sometimes as dramatic as when one side of the business is unionized while the other side is not unionized. What would you recommend to resolve such possible cultural and economic conflicts?

Stewart Levine: Dialogue, conversation, giving people on the front line the tools, capacity and responsibility for creating their own solutions.

Business Partners rarely value each other until it is too late. What advise do you have for partnerships to increase their performance and enhance their appreciation of differing perspectives?

Make sure they have clear agreements on the front end, and I do not mean legal agreements.

The best way to prevent conflict is to have a covenantal relationship – meeting of mind and heart.

My agreement model provides the conversational template to do that.

Gary Cohen: What resolution have you been involved in that had the biggest impact for you or your client? And what did you do to accomplish this outcome?

Stewart Levine: Resolution Gives Life Gail Johnson is the executive director of Sierra Adoption, a nonprofit transforming lives of foster children through finding permanent adoptive families. Thousands of children are trapped in the California foster care system, out of reach of adoptive families. More than half of foster youth who come of age without a permanent family are homeless, in prison, or dead within two years. Gail’s success recruiting and preparing families to adopt children with disabilities often ended in the frustration of being told such children were “unadoptable.” Because of Gail’s work, California no longer considers any child unadoptable! In 1999, Sierra was engaged in a federally funded partnership with the Sacramento County agency that was referring children to Sierra. The working relationship had fallen apart. Gail wanted to resolve long- and short-term conflict, get beyond mistrust, and forge a high-performance team. Few believed the partnership could be salvaged, let alone become a high-performance team. Sixteen people were gathered and over twelve hours in two days using the Cycle of Resolution, the conflicts were resolved and a working agreement was structured. That agreement was the foundation for a healthy, productive partnership with a new vision of collaboration. In the first year following the intervention, 109 “unadoptable” children were placed in permanent families.

Gary Cohen: Stuart, you work with a great number of leaders in your work under high stress circumstances. How do you find leaders use questions to demonstrate their leadership? And what kind of questions do they ask?

Stewart Levine: Good leaders take responsibility FIRST…they always ask what they did or did not do to create the particular challenge they face What implications are there for leaders who over use telling verses asking? …they are not leaders… They may get compliance, never inspiration People do not learn to think People resent not having control They do not develop successors, leaders

Gary Cohen: Is there any other insight you would like to share with us?

Stewart Levine: Critical to engage and:
Realize it is a learning process – teaching and learning about each others perspective… Show up…be present to deal with the situation Listen to them Tell YOUR truth (know there are other truths) Allow yourself to be influenced by what you hear

Gary Cohen: What are your Top 10 Questions that you ask or suggest to your clients to ask when needing to find resolution to conflict? (Tomorrow's Blog Post)

Find out what your Leadership Style is with CO2 Partners Leadership Style Assessment!

Leadership Book Signing in Scottsdale

2010-01-15T23:57:00.005-06:00

Third book-signing event in Scottsdale, Arizona. We had over 70 friends and leaders enjoying dinners and drinks!

We discussed the complexity of the world and the need for organizations to adapt to these wild economic shifts by creating resilience. Just Ask leadership will help employ and build such resiliency.

5 Questions to Build Trust - Leadership Questions

2010-01-15T22:36:00.007-06:00

Trust begins with me. Trust begins with each and every one of us. Trust building is everyone’s responsibility. Here are a few key questions in which to start:

How am I, as a leader or team member, practicing behaviors that foster, encourage and empower trust?
Where am I experiencing areas of fear, vulnerability or doubt? How am I responding to those situations--in trustworthy or trust-breaking ways?
Where is trust strong within our team or organization? Where is it weak?
What behaviors are we as a team or organization practicing that build trust?
What behaviors are we as a team or organization practicing that break trust?

From an interview with Dennis & Michelle Reina

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Building Trust In Your Organization as a Leader

2010-01-10T17:05:00.009-06:00

Building Trust in Your Organization - Interview with Dennis & Michelle Reina.
I am excited to welcome Dennis S. Reina and Michelle L. Reina, principals of The Reina Trust Building Institute, who specialize in the development of trust in the workplace. Based on this work, they have developed a model that defines the three types of trust and illustrates factors that contribute to the development of trust in workplace relationships. They are coauthors of Trust and Betrayal in the Workplace and our featured guests this week.

Dennis & Michelle, what is the question you were trying to answer in writing this book?

Business is based on relationships and trust is the foundation of effective relationships. Trust is essential for effective business relationships. Many people talk about the importance of trust, they often speak to the value of it; corporations have trust or some related simile in their mission, value or principles statements. Yet, there is only one way that trust is built or broken--that is by behavior--at the individual, team and organizational levels.

Through pioneering research and practice with clients across North America and other parts of globe for the last 20 years, this book defines the behaviors that build trust, break trust and the steps to rebuild and transform the capacity for trust in workplace relationships at all levels of the organization.

Your title talks about betrayal. Where does that play out in your work with organizations?

There are many challenges to building and maintaining trust in the workplace: Trust is highly complex, emotionally provocative--both in the positive and negative sense and it means different things to different people.

From years of studying the dynamics of trust, we have found that trust and betrayal are natural elements (behaviors) of the human condition (in interpersonal relationships). Trust is built and trust is broken everyday on the job. Betrayal plays out at all levels of the organization--from the blatant to the subtle--the most prevalent in the workplace are the subtle, minor ways that trust is broken.

What are the different ways to betray your coworkers and stakeholders?

First, let us start with what we mean by betrayal. We define betrayal on a continuum from major to minor, intentional and unintentional. While major betrayal decisively breaks trust, most often it is the minor unintentional ways that trust is eroded over time that breaks trust in the workplace--each and every day. Behaviors such as gossip, not showing up to meetings on time, not delivering as promised, shunning, work-arounds, leaving people out of communication that should have been a part of, etc. are examples of minor betrayals. Minor betrayals accumulate over time and become major. Our research shows that 90% of employees experience these types of betrayal frequently.

The net result of these minor betrayals is major--people mentally and emotionally check-out. They may wait it out until the economy improves and walk out the door and the organization loses years of corporate intelligence and experience and its good employees. Or worse yet, they may stay--becoming the “working wounded”--doing as little as they can to get away with--no more, no less.

Trust is often brought up as one of the core competencies that leaders must demonstrate. What is unique about your approach that helps leaders become trustworthy? (Read more tomorrow!)

Upcoming Posts From This Interview:

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Trust Begins with Me! What is your Trust Score?

2010-01-10T16:57:00.007-06:00

What has been your favorite assignment in helping an organization to enhance their ability to trust?

We enjoy working with committed leaders over time that recognize the value of trust in workplace relationships and the importance of building trust within their organizations to produce business results. (We don’t just build trust for the sake of building trust. Having more trust can support every key organizational initiative in being successful.) Supporting these aware leaders to build, rebuild and transform trust makes a difference with their employees; between employees and with the customers and stakeholders they serve.

What are the key symptoms that you look for in an organization to know that there is a low level of trust?

We utilize our statistically valid and reliable trust measuring instruments to diagnose the level of trust at the organizational, team and leader levels and pinpoint the key symptoms. Often we get called in to work with a leader and their organization because ‘trust scores’ on their organizational culture or employee satisfaction surveys are low and have been declining over a number of years.

The Reina Trust Building instruments are developed after years of research and are based Reina Trust & Betrayal Model®. The questions on each of the surveys that load to the each of the 16 behaviors that builds Transactional Trust.

I mention again “statistically valid and reliable” trust measuring instruments because it takes years of research to develop a psychometrically sound instrument. As we the recent proliferation of trust books, so are the number of ‘trust surveys’- but they are not rigorous tested or psychometrically sound. Each of our instruments has gone through rigorous psychometric testing and retesting over the last 17 years. Most of our instruments are on their fourth generation of revision.

What personal experience did you have that informed your work in the area of trust?

We teach what we want to learn. Initially, Michelle and I each came to this work from our experiences in our personal lives. For example, I (Dennis) am a survivor of two bouts with cancer, a near death accident, a traumatic injury and shingles and a painful divorce many years ago. I was faced with trust breaking circumstances; I had to learn the hard lessons behind the experiences. In doing so, I was able to reframe the experiences and take responsibility. Much of those experiences have informed our work in building, rebuilding trust and healing and renewal.

Professionally, Michelle and I came to this work because we saw the need early on in our work with leaders and their client organizations. We saw that the success or failure of any key business initiative or change process predicated on the level of trust within the organization- leader with leaders, leader with employees, employees with employees.

How do issues around trust block people asking questions?

Fear: lack of safety, fear of retribution or retaliation. When there is low trust in a relationship or within a team or an organization, people are reluctant to share information, ask questions or take risks because they feel vulnerable. When there is low trust, people contract, withhold thoughts because they do not feel safe. They act in self-serving versus mutually serving ways. Distrust is created on all sides. Distrust creates distrust, which can lead to betrayal. Betrayal creates more betrayal- it is a downward spiral.

What questions do you ask your clients to explore the issue of trust?

What evidence is showing up within your team or organization that give you indications that trust is low or vulnerable?
Where in your team or organization is trust strong? Where is it low or vulnerable?
What is the business case for trust? (Given that trust supports achieving business objectives)
How would having more trust support your team or organization achieving its business goals or initiatives?
What support do you need to build, rebuild or renew trust within you, your team or your organization, board or stakeholders or customers?

Also see the attached Reina Trust Quiz®.

What idea around trust would really surprise people to know?

Some people are surprised when we mention that betrayal is a natural element of the human condition. Because we are human, we all have a shadow side. Given our busy, trying-to-do-more-with-less (usually too much) schedules, workloads and life styles, we trip up, inadvertently causing disappointment, hurt, and pain to others. We betray others and we betray ourselves.
The ‘work’ we each have to do is become more aware of ourselves and others. In doing so, we still may trip up and hurt others; that probably won’t stop. But knowing how to effectively handle our misgivings, and transgressions are essential. Knowing how to rebuild trust again and again and again is essential to building sustainable trust. It is essential to renewing confidence, commitment and energy with those with whom we work and serve and those with whom we live with and love.

Add up all your scores for the above questions to come up with your score of the team ________

SCORING
The highest possible score is fifty, and the lowest would be zero. The higher the score, the greater you perceive your team practices trust building behaviors, and the likelihood the team has effective working relationships.
Your team practices trust-building behaviors…
0 to 10 … Almost never. There is serious room for improvement!
11 to 19 … Occasionally, which damages trust within the team.
20 to 29 … Some of the time, which does not build sustainable trust.
30 to 39 … Frequently, and are most likely have effective working relationships.
40 to 50 … Almost always, and are probably viewed as a highly effective team.
Keep up the good work!

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90% of Employees Experience Betrayal Frequently

2010-01-10T16:39:00.010-06:00

Interview Part III with our guests Michelle and Dennis Reina from The Reina Trust Building Institute and authors of Trust & Betrayal in the Workplace

Often time’s people believe trust is earned over time. Is this really true? Is there a way to accelerate trust among co-workers?

There are no quick fixes to build trust- but there are quick ways to destroy it. Major intentional betrayals break trust instantaneously. Trust is earned incrementally- step by step and it is reciprocal in nature- you have to give it to get it.

Covey and many others have written on the topic of trust recently. How does your book differ from theirs?
We have been researching and practicing in this field for over 20 years developing a body of work regarding understanding the dynamics of trust, betrayal, healing and transformation in the workplace. When Michelle and I started our doctoral research back in the late 80’s, the topic was not popular.

In 1992, we founded the Reina Trust Building Institute whose mission is to study, develop and live models of trust, healing and renewal in service to the world. Michelle and I have written three books (1999, Jan. 2006, 2010) on trust, betrayal and healing, (our third on rebuilding trust is coming out this year), developed numerous statistically valid and reliable trust measuring instruments (at the individual, leader, team, organizational and customer levels), a Trust Building On-Line platform, numerous Trust Building® resources, workbooks, etc.
Not until 9/11, Enron and of course, the latest economic downfall, has the topic of Trust become popular and in demand- because there is so little of it- at all levels, in all areas of society and the globe. With this popularity, a lot of people have recently jumped on the ‘trust bandwagon’ becoming ‘instant experts’ because they saw the need and an opportunity to make money. (Much like they did in the 80s with the quality movement).

Learning and living Trust Building work is Michelle and my life’s work, purpose and passion. Michelle and I have devoted our lives and are committed to making a contribution to the field and being of service to leaders, their people and their organizations around the world.

There have been numerous books on how to build trust written in the last 4-5 years after both our books had been published. Our book goes where the others do not or are afraid to go- we name the ‘elephant in the room’- betrayal, which these authors are not overtly talking about. Yet people in the workplace are constantly at the effect of betrayal and have to deal with the consequences of.

In our book we also identify the seven steps for healing and help leaders and their employees rebuild trust. We identify the 16 core behaviors that are essential for leaders to practice to build trust and be trustworthy leaders. We name the four core characteristics that transform the level of trust in an organization, so their organizations become a place where employees WANT to work and produce.
What are the different elements of trust that can be built upon?

The three types of Transactional Trust are Contractual

- The Trust of Character, Communication
- The Trust of Disclosure and Competence Trust
- The Trust of Capability.

Each of these types has corresponding behaviors (the sixteen essential behaviors that build trust are as follows).

Contractual - The Trust of Character:

Manage expectations
Establish boundaries
Delegate appropriately
Operate with mutually serving intentions
Keep agreement
Be consistent in behavior

Communication - The Trust of Disclosure:

Share information
Tell the truth
Admit mistakes
Give and receive constructive feedback
Maintain confidentiality
Speak with good purpose

Competence Trust - The Trust of Capability:

Acknowledge people’s skills
Allow people to make decisions
Involve others and seek their input
Help people learn new skills

What do you find that leaders struggle most with when they are not willing to trust co-workers who are in fact trust worthy?

What you are talking about here is one’s own capacity for trust. If a leader has a low capacity for trust, they may have difficulty trusting another even if this individual is a trustworthy individual, because they have difficulty trusting themselves. You have to give trust to get trust. If a leader has difficulty trusting oneself (giving trust to oneself), he/she may have difficulty giving trust or trusting another.

What steps should a leader take to build a Trusting culture?

Practice the three types of Transactional Trust and the corresponding sixteen Trust Building behaviors. (see above)

What are the derailleurs to trust within an organization?

For fear of repeating myself again: The key deraileurs to trust within an organization are minor betrayals that happen everyday and erode trust over time. They are most insidious because they often do not get addressed; however they are definitely noticed. Behaviors such as gossip, not showing up to meetings on time, not delivering as promised, shunning, work arounds, leaving people out of communication that should have been a part of, etc. are examples of minor betrayals. Minor betrayals accumulate over time and become major. Our research shows that 90% of employees experience these types of betrayal frequently.

What has been your favorite assignment in helping an organization to enhance their ability to trust? (Read response in next blog post)

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Three Ways To Trust & Stop Betrayal

2010-01-10T16:11:00.008-06:00

(Continued)

This is Part II of an interview with both Michelle and Dennis Rienna based on the research done for their book Trust & Betrayal in the Workplace.

Trust is often brought up as one of the core competencies that leaders must demonstrate. What is unique about your approach that helps leaders become trustworthy?

We define the three types of Transactional Trust® and the 16 behaviors that are essential for a leader's trustworthiness.
The three types of Transactional Trust are:

The Trust of Character - Contractual Trust
The Trust of Disclosure - Communication Trust
The Trust of Capability - Competence Trust

Each of these types has corresponding behaviors.

Thousands of people completed on online values assessment that I created, and Honesty, Love and Trust are consistently the highest ranking values. With people putting Honesty and Trust at the top of their values, why are we having such issues around trust in the workplace?

As mentioned earlier in our interview, there are many challenges to building and maintaining trust in the workplace: Trust is highly complex, emotionally provocative--both in the positive and negative sense and it means different things to different people. Trust is fragile--yet it is taken for granted until it is broken; then people often do not know how to deal with the consequences; they do not know how to effectively rebuild trust.

At the interpersonal level, because trust means different things to different people- there are many disconnects and misunderstandings that take place. People do not fully know or understand the complexity of trust dynamics in interpersonal relations. They are often unaware of the minor, unintentional ways in which they inadvertently break trust. And instead of people dealing directly with these transgressions--they go unaddressed (not unnoticed) and accumulate and become major over time.

At the organizational level, trust is often broken through change. Yet, it is not the change itself that necessarily breaks trust, but how it is managed. Especially during times of transition, people have certain needs: needs for information--What is the direction the organization is heading? They have needs for belonging--What are my new roles and responsibilities? Where will I be working? Will I be working? Will I have a job? They have needs for competence--Will I be able to keep up with that which is expected of me?

There has been much debate recently about whether MBA programs ought help teach values such as trust. Some argue that it may be too late for students to learn values such as trust as an MBA student--that they need to figure this out much earlier, in their homes. Others argue that students ought to sign an ethics oath when they start their MBA program. How do you come out in this discussion? Where do you think developing trust can have the greatest impact in an organization or society?

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What we know from human development research is that learning to trust (our capacity for trust) starts at day 1 with our caregivers at birth. The first two years of a child’s life are critical to development of strong foundations of trust behavior. Our values are formulating up to around age 11 or so.

That said, in our executive coaching work with leaders, particularly those individuals who have come from rough beginnings-for example: an individual orphaned at an early age, bounced around different abusive foster homes growing up, etc. It is possible for this individual with a low capacity to trust to become a highly trustworthy leader. Yet, it takes a lot of inner work; starting with being aware of one’s own fears, challenges and continually working to overcome them.

Signing an ethics oath may bring to the students attention that trustworthiness is important but it does not insure the individual will be trustworthy in the moment of truth.
Building trust is everyone’s responsibility. In an organization, it starts at the top leadership; but again, trust building behaviors need to be practiced by everyone at all levels to transform the culture or society.

Most books talk about the need for leaders to surround themselves with trustworthy team members. It has always seemed to me that the leader must be the one who trusts their teams first rather than the other way around. Where do you think trust begins?

Again, trust is everyone’s responsibility--while leadership needs to initiate trustworthy behavior--everyone needs to practice it. (see above and below)

Oftentimes people believe trust is earned over time. Is this really true? Is there a way to accelerate trust among coworkers? (Read tomorrows post!)

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