Which of your supervisors holds the best meetings?

I was in a session at HR Florida and the speaker tossed out that question. Most of the audience likely ignored it, but I couldn’t get it out of my head. I honestly didn’t know the answer within my own company, and I’m willing to bet many of you probably feel the same way.

When you’re looking for ways to coach managers and help them be better leaders, you should be asking questions like that. Why? Well, for starters, it helps you to see who your real leaders are. Just because someone is in a position of authority doesn’t necessarily mean they are a leader in the organization. These types of questions help to uncover the hidden aspects of what occurs in a department and how that impacts the organization as a whole.

On another level, it’s your job to provide support to these leaders. How can you do that when you don’t know what’s going on and how they are doing it? 

Yes, it’s a tough question to ask yourself, but it’s worth it to understand where the gaps are for your people and to start thinking ahead about ways you can help to close those gaps.

Other questions to consider asking

As you consider asking these questions, keep these thoughts in the back of your mind: do the managers know the answer, and (no matter if they do or not) do they understand the importance of knowing and utilizing this information as a leader? Then put the shoe on the other foot. Do you know these answers for your own people? 

• How do your people like to be recognized for their efforts?
• What kinds of activities do you do on an interdepartmental level that add value to an employee’s day?
• What do your employees enjoy about working here?
• Who holds the best meetings? What about them is enjoyable or appealing?
• Do you let your people have a say in hiring decisions? Why or why not?
• What sort of feedback do employees prefer to receive?
• Do employees have a way to offer praise in a public or private setting for their peers? Is it encouraged?
• Are employees aware of upward feedback methods? Do they utilize them?

And that’s just off the top of my head. There are others, and I’m sure you have some to share. What questions can you ask to help ensure that supervisors know the necessary information about their staff to make informed decisions about leadership?

Stay tuned for more posts coming to you live from HR Florida 2011!

Who holds the best meetings? (and other questions you should ask) is a post from: UpstartHR

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Today I’m going to make the case for leadership development at all levels, not just at the top of the organization. Think about it, do you want those employees positioned closest to your customers to have that training? I would. Yes, it’s a question of cost for many companies, but if your customer-facing people aren’t doing the right thing, then cost won’t matter when you lose the customers!

That was just a taste of what you’ll find in the video below. Subscribers may need to click through to view.

(Fair warning, the video sometimes is skippy and doesn’t seem to align with the audio track, but the info’s still thought-provoking!)

The case for developing leaders at all levels is a post from: UpstartHR

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If you don’t know who Mike Durant is, you are missing out on an amazing story. He is the pilot of Super Six Four, the Black Hawk helicopter that was shot down in Somalia in 1993. He was captured by the enemy, put through a horrible experience, and lived to tell the tale. But that was long ago. Now he’s a CEO, speaker, and all-around great guy. I just finished reading his book “In the Company of Heroes” (highly recommended!) and he wraps up with his thoughts on leading others. Just had to share.

Trust and empower your people to do their jobs, then stand behind them. Unless they are absolute lowlifes, always, even when they screw up, go to bat for them. However, also call a spade a spade. Supporting your people doesn’t mean carrying the deadweight.  If there are stellar performers and nonperformers, make it clear that you know the difference and reflect that in mission taskings and performance evaluations… Be dedicated to your people, the mission, and the customer first and foremost, and only then to yourself and your career. (pg 383-384)

I know we’re a few days past Independence Day and the patriotic feelings here in the US, but I thought this was worth mentioning. It’s not common to find the kind of loyalty that Mike has for his people in senior leaders today. I can attest to the fact that he lives by his words: the customer, mission, and employees come before his own needs, and if you ever get the chance to meet him, you’ll understand that fact very quickly.

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Communicating layoffs has to be hard work. I’ve never done it, but even having conversations that affect the livelihood of employees one-on-one is tough enough. Recently I ran across this great article titled “The Speech I Wish CEOs Would Give [for Layoffs]” by Dale Dauten. Link to the original post is at the bottom, but this was too good not to share. After you read it you’ll see that it’s less about how to communicate layoffs and more about alternative solutions, but trust me, it’s worth your time.

——

Sure, there are situations where layoffs are inevitable, but I believe many could be avoided. Here’s how I wish executives would think about layoffs, expressed as The Speech I Wish CEOs Would Give…

[Speaking to all employees] As you know, our sales revenues are down. I know that you must be worried – fear is a rational response when the media are full of images from the Great Depression. Indeed, everyone is expecting me to announce layoffs – stockholders and other investors want me to do something – anything — to help keep profits from declining, and layoffs are tangible evidence that a CEO is responding. However, I am announcing today that we will NOT be having layoffs anytime soon.

When companies proclaim that they are going to cut staff, here’s what usually happens. Some of those “cuts” are merely positions that were put in the budget and have yet to be filled, so eliminating them doesn’t actually reduce current spending, just future budgets. Next, and more importantly, the cuts tend to be among the least expensive employees, especially entry-level employees. Thus, should you succeed in reducing the headcount by 10%, you’ve actually cut the spending on personnel by less than 5%, perhaps only two or three percent.

Further, total spending on salaries is just a fraction of overall costs; in our case, one-quarter of total expenses. So if you announce a ten percent lay-off, you reduce one-quarter of expenses by a few percentage points, meaning that you succeeded in cutting costs by one or two percent.

And what is the cost of that cost savings? You have fearful employees, hunkering down, devoting much of the internal conversation organization to worry. That’s not what we hired you to think about.

So today, instead of announcing staff cuts, I am asking you to do join with me in doing the cutting – cutting waste out of our system. My goal is that we find ways to reduce costs by 10%. This will have a financial impact five times greater than cutting the staff by 10%. Further, I want you to find new efficiencies that allow us to take out expenses while better serving our customers. In other words, I’m asking you to be creative, and for that I need confident, bold employees.

If we do this right, and do this together, we will become a better, faster organization. Together we can go without layoffs. Instead of worrying about who will stay and go, I invite you to join me in worrying about how we will become even more useful to each other and to our customers. Instead of getting rid of some of you, I’m counting on all of you – now go out and prove me right.

Originally posted on Dale Dauten’s blog.

Communicating layoffs is a post from: UpstartHR

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Today I’m kicking off a video series on the Top Five Senior HR Competencies. I recently found a white paper that listed the top competencies for senior HR leaders, and I knew I wanted to delve into each of them and give a few thoughts on all five. Below you’ll find the intro video and every day this week there will be a new video post for you to enjoy. Hope it’s beneficial to you!

Email subscribers click through to see the video.

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Recently John Hunter reached out to me to participate in the 2010 Year in Review Carnival. Being one of those people who says “yes” to everything, I jumped in and chose three different blogs to review. All three of them are new to me, but there is some great content! Let’s get rolling. I’ll link to the blog and then provide links to my four favorite posts by them in the previous year. If you see something you like, feel free to click through. Each link opens in a new web browser window so you don’t lose track of this page.

Making IT Clear

• Two Questions to Ask After Each Project is Completed-want to do better next time? Look at these two critical questions to help you improve.
• Which Do You Have? A Job, a Profession, a Career, or a Passion? I love the breakdown on these terms. Sometimes it’s tough to admit we have a “job,” but maybe that admission is necessary to help lead us toward our own passion?
• 6 Things I’d Like to Tell Your Boss about IT-Love the down-to-earth points in this one. Great overview of where tech stands today.
• The 7 Biggest Challenges of a Manager-I enjoy writing about managing people, and this post outlines some of the most critical points for managers to understand. Fantastic stuff.

Lean Leaders Blog

• Connecting is at the Heart of Developing People: Relationships-This post brings us back to the fact that any organizational changes, mentoring, or engagement is useless without first forming a personal connection with the receiver.
• Your Culture is Your Brand-Best quote from this post: “Successful people and organizations work on culture and then work on it some more and never take it for granted.“
• Thanks Chief, but you really aren’t in charge…The talk that has to happen-It’s always tough telling a superior or senior leader that they can’t do something, but sometimes that talk just has to happen. This is a great explanation of how to make that conversation less painful.
• Know the Goal…Are you being productive, or are you just busy? This post kicks off with a quote by Heinlein and frames the whole idea nicely. “In the absence of clearly-defined goals, we become strangely loyal to performing daily trivia until ultimately we become enslaved by it.“

Girl’s Guide to Project Management

• Get Started Using Social Media on Your Projects: Take the free course! I love finding great, free stuff. If you click  this link you can find out how to get a free email course on using social media for project management. Neat stuff!
• Zombie Project Management-I am a fan of zombies here (as long-time readers know), and this post is just another example of how zombies are destroying our organizations from the inside out. Check it out!
• Scope creep, shopping-style! We’ve all had scope creep knock us on the back of the head while we are hip deep in a project. This is a little personal story about how Elizabeth realizes her project is out of control.
• Project Management Book Reviews-This one isn’t a post. It links to a category about book reviews, because as I scanned the archives of 2010, there were more than a dozen of them in there, and I think they are valuable tools to help people read more. If you’re looking for books on project management, this is the link for you!

And just like that, we are finished! I had a lot of fun checking out the great posts and hope you find something valuable in there. Like what you see? You can find more at the Curious Cat Management Carnival 2010 post.

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Well, it was bound to happen eventually. In a week I’ll be venturing to Washington, DC in order to attend the SHRM Leadership Conference. It’s geared towards SHRM Volunteer Leaders, and I definitely have an interest in becoming one. Much of what I do now isn’t exactly in the spotlight when it comes to helping SHRM leaders learn and grow. Things like the SHRM chapter leadership guide are pretty unobtrusive, but they can really help chapter leaders to think about things critically instead of running their chapter “the way it’s always been done.”

I pushed hard to attend, talking with my local chapter, reading up on the requirements, and even going so far as to pitch the idea to SHRM to help me get there (yeah, right, but I still had to try). In the end my local chapter backed me up (as they always seem to) and the big boys at SHRM didn’t (as they always seem to). I thought the pitch was a good one. I’ve included the text of it below.

I have heard so many great things about the leadership conference, but the problem is that it has all been from word of mouth. I’ve never read another blogger really dig deep into what happens there and how they benefited from attending the event. While I spend a considerable amount of time volunteering with my local chapter, my position as webmaster/social media coordinator doesn’t qualify me for a ticket to the event. Bottom line: I would love to have the opportunity to share about the event and promote it to my audience and network.

I know it is more of a niche event, but I believe it has the potential to radically change how SHRM reaches and guides its volunteer leaders. I so strongly believe in the idea of bringing volunteer leaders together that I have created a LinkedIn group to gather feedback and form some close ties to the SHRM leaders in the field.

Because I’m also involved with the HRYP committee with Chuck, I’d love to find a way to help reach the young volunteers and help bring them into the leadership conference experience. WIthout them seeing the value in attending, the event will be losing a lot of attendees in the coming years.

I’d like to write about the leadership conference from several angles:

• First, from that of a first-time attendee. What’s it all about and is it even worth the trip?

• Second, from the young volunteer leader’s perspective. Is this a tool that can provide me and my chapter with value?

• Third, from my blogging persona. This event really is where a lot of connections and changes are made that other people never even have the opportunity to observe. I want to push bloggers to learn more about SHRM and share how their experiences have influenced their careers and organizations, because this is where the magic happens.

See? Not really a hard sell, but it has a lot of potential if they want to prove the value to the young HR professionals and other new and future SHRM volunteer leaders around the country (world?). Anyway, like I said, my local SHRM chapter made it happen for me, so I’ll be going and focusing on ideas to really help them in the coming year. I have a lot of ideas on my mind already, and I’ll be traveling with our president-elect, so there will be some deep discussions on chapter strategy on the trip to DC. If you’re going, shoot me an email. I’d love to meet you there!

By the way, my friend Dave Ryan did a little survey and realized that only 1.57% of the attendees for the event are active on Twitter. Not sure if that’s above or below the average, but I’m interested to see what happens when we get together.

SHRM Leadership Conference is a post from: UpstartHR

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