A couple of decades ago, Stephen Covey recommended that we “start with the end in mind” as one of his seven habits. Covey’s book has stood the test of time because of its practical relevance. Many so called “how to make your life better” books have been great at espousing lofty, elusive and sometime metaphysical concepts. The Seven Habits was not only a “what to do” book, it was a “how to do” book. Having said that, many of us read authors’ exhortations convinced, even after the reading, that we’re doing the right things when we’re not. There’s no better example than organizational leaders and managers who, by definition, must rely upon others’ efforts and accomplishments for their own success but who cultivate compliance and conformity rather than confidence, capability and commitment.
An Instructive Example
Let’s look at an example: After five years as a super sales guy with Jackson & Jackson, a Fortune 500 pharmaceutical and consumer goods company, Steve accepted a position as a division sales manager with Phicom, a similarly large company focused primarily on pharmaceuticals.
Steve wanted to hit the ground running. He gathered his new team of high achievers together on his first day and gave them the Knute Rockne, “get one for the Gipper” speech, really impressing his new boss and his own team with his energy and eloquence.
During the next couple of months Steve traveled with his sales people individually to demonstrate his closing technique. In so doing, he personally closed a lot of sales. This guy was a rainmaker extraordinaire.
Steve then turned the reigns over to his sales team; they flopped. Here’s what happened, why it happened and what should have happened:
Steve believed that his closing skill would provide sufficient inspiration to propel his sales team to success. It didn’t. Inspiration does not guarantee success.
If Steve had really thought about it — starting with the end in mind — he might have reached the conclusion that what he really wanted was a sales team that was capable, confident and committed. None of those ends was achieved by Steve’s demonstration of personal selling talent.
An Example From my own Executive Experience
During a talk I once gave as a Fortune 500 executive to my new staff, I outlined what I believed every employee deserved. These criteria also go a long way toward developing capability and engendering confidence and commitment. Here’s that part of the presentation:
“Managers must work with you to convey in advance what’s expected of you, how your contribution and performance ‘fits into the whole’ and how that performance will be measured. We need committed people; not compliant people. Committed people make independent decisions. Committed people make aggressive contributions. Compliant people – people who just ‘do what they’re told’ – don’t challenge convention; they just obey and can’t or won’t make the kind of contribution that’s necessary. We cannot assess how effective we are as managers at doing that. It can only be measured by whether we achieve planned results and seen in the energy, tenacity, enthusiasm, courage and fortitude of the people who make results happen.
“A healthy environment encourages people to achieve their own aspirations as well as the company’s. Solid managers place a lot of emphasis on that, because while the enterprise is responsible for creating opportunities, people must be prepared when those opportunities arise.
“We have to limit our tolerance of marginal or poor performance. We do not currently do an adequate job of distinguishing levels of performance. Part of that is because we don’t do a great job of precisely defining expectations. Some managers kid themselves into believing that time will correct performance problems or that being fair means being indulgent. We have to work with people to improve, but we can’t dodge our responsibility to be aggressive performance managers. By indulging or, in some cases, rewarding anemic performance, we’re condoning it. High fliers will not work where poor performance is indulged.
“When performance issues are neglected both the company and the person pay. A failure to be candid – sensitive and empathetic but candid – can easily hurt someone’s chances of being or becoming an effective contributor. The flip side of the coin is the development of superior achievers. We have to identify those in a systematic way and reward them in a more substantial way.”
How we Implemented our “People Philosophies”
At this company, we also developed, implemented and regularly reviewed the procedures and processes for managing performance. Those included:
• Appropriate linkage of objective and action plans that guaranteed that individual results summed to organizational performance.
• Annual objective-setting discussions with all people. These were face-to-face and one-on-one.
• Regularly scheduled interim, face-to-face reviews that included discussions of results vs. plan, corrective action plan development and a person’s prospects for future assignments.
In my experience as a consultant and coach, I’ve worked with many executives who demonstrate a belief that at more senior levels, managers should be self-sufficient, immune from the need for development discussions and emotionally inoculated from criticism. That’s simply not the case.
Take a look at your own development and performance management activities with the people who report to you. Do your actions demonstrate the priority of cultivating commitment, confidence and capability rather than mandating conformance and compliance? If not, you’re not leveraging your people resources to the degree necessary to be successful. If you are, write to us. We’d love to highlight that in a future issue.
