Posts Tagged ‘leadership’

Praise the Behaviours you want to see

Tuesday, April 6th, 2010

If you want to change the culture of the organisation then one of the best ways to do it is to praise the behaviours you want to see.  If you want your people to be more adventurous, more entrepreneurial and more innovative then make a point of singling out for recognition those people who are acting like that.  Catch someone doing something good and make a fuss of them. 

Say you have a culture which is risk averse; where people are reluctant to try new things for fear of failure.  Find someone who tried something that did not work and then call them out at an all hands meeting.  ‘John tried an experiment.  Unfortunately it did not work.  But you know what?  Trying things is exactly what we need around here.  I want to say well done to John for having the guts to push this prototype.  We have learnt a valuable lesson.  If we are going to be innovative we have to try more things and be ready to cope with some inevitable setbacks along the way. So let’s have a big round of applause and hear it for John!’

This is much more powerful than praising those whose initiatives succeeded – though you should certainly do that too.  By praising someone for failing you are sending a strong message that countervails the current culture. 

At your next department meeting see if you can find someone to praise for:

  • Coming up with some great ideas. 
  • Trying something new. 
  • Challenging the conventional way of thinking. 
  • Bringing an external idea into the company. 
  • Collaborating with a different department or organisation. 
  • Taking a risk. 
  • Making something happen.

Praise is one of the most powerful weapons in the leader’s armoury. It should be used often.

Paul Sloane

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The 10 Most Common Failures of Bad Leaders

Friday, June 5th, 2009

There is an interesting article by Jack Zenger and Joseph Folkman in the Harvard Business Review on the most prominent shortcomings of poor leaders.  They examined 360 degree feedback on over 11000 leaders.  Their list is as follows:

The worst leaders:

  1. Lack energy and enthusiasm
  2. Accept their own mediocre performance
  3. Lack clear vision and direction
  4. Have poor judgement
  5. Don’t collaborate
  6. Don’t follow the standards they set for others
  7. Resist new ideas
  8. Don’t learn from mistakes
  9. Lack interpersonal skills
  10. Fail to develop others

The authors conclude, ‘These sound like obvious flaws that any leader would try to fix. But the ineffective leaders we studied were often unaware that they exhibited these behaviors.  In fact, those who were rated most negatively rated themselves substantially more positively.  Leaders should take a very hard look at themselves and ask for candid feedback on performance in these specific areas.  Their jobs may depend on it.’

Paul Sloane

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Lessons from the Leadership Conference

Friday, June 13th, 2008

The BQF annual leadership conference went well.   Here are some of the key messages I took away from the speakers:

Tim Cross, former army officer, gave an inspirational talk.  He argued that the key thing missing for most modern leaders was a sense of moral purpose.  We think we can solve society’s ills by exercising levers in politics and economics but without a moral imperative we will not succeed.

Susan Scott-Parker, founder of the Employer’s forum on Disability, asked whether the world was a frog or a bicycle.  Is it one organic whole or can you replace and upgrade parts?  She believes that assumptions are more powerful than facts.

Tim Peach, MD of Taylor Woodrow Construction, believed that everyone in the company could improve by 15 to 20% so he set about a programme to change behaviours.  This started with 360 feedback sessions and went on to a series of actions and activities that have affected everyone.  His message was very well received and he was bombarded with questions.

Nigel Risner, superstar speaker, gave an energetic and entertaining performance which challenged the audience in many ways.  Do leaders know the key personal priorities of their people?  What represents success for you and are you spending time on making it happen?  Are leaders handling different types of people in ways appropriate to their (animal) characters?  Each message was delivered with humour, interaction and creativity.

The was lots more excellent stuff from the speakers and it was good to network.  Make a note to come to next year’s event.

Paul Sloane

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Leadership Conference – June 11th

Saturday, May 17th, 2008

The BQF is hosting a leadership conference on June 11th 2008 with a terrific line-up of speakers including Nigel Risner, Tim Cross, Susan Scott-Parker and Tim Peach.  It will be held at the Latimer Conference Centre in Chesham.  There are more details here:

http://www.bqf.org.uk/sbp_studytours.htm

Paul Sloane

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