Happy Neurones

Asian Rise : when will it catch up with USA ?

2012-01-01T11:07:00.000-08:00

Dear Readers,

Happy 2012 !

To celebrate this New Year, I would like to share some interesting statistics about India and China economics growth .... and predictions about the date that they will catch up with United States in terms of income per person.... big Change & challenge to come. Although 2 years old, this is a very good eye opener by the excellent Hans Rosling at TED-Conference in India.

Get ready !

The 4 key principles to succeed an offshoring project

2011-12-18T04:42:00.000-08:00

After 2 years of experience on Offshoring projects, there are 4 key principles that I can share with you. These principles should be applied in addressing the Change Management approach:

1. The Roles and Responsibilities regarding offshored team set up activities (trainings, ramp up, etc.) should be clearly defined as soon as the beginning of the project.

2. Since Change Management is a transversal stream, the Change Management approach and all Change Documents should include the whole business scope including Offshored business scope (even if a transition team is responsible for the offshored team set up and activities). For instance, the process presentation or Training documentation should cover the whole business process End to Ends (onshore & offshore).

3. To ensure the fluidity and efficiency of the new organization, it is essential that Change Management plan early as a key activity teambuilding between Onshore & Offshore.

4. When possible, planning a Pilot prior to actual Offshoring consists in offshoring a part of a process in the old system / old process and enables to reassure teams and empower them while creating collaboration between teams.

Image Flickr, Kaan Sezer
Thanks to Anne and Anna for their contribution to this post

Why do we need Change ? Have a look at this...

2011-12-13T10:02:00.000-08:00

Offshoring gives multinational companies opportunities to create more values at lower costs; but what about Change Management ?

2011-12-11T05:54:00.000-08:00

Offshoring gives multinational companies opportunities to create more values at lower costs. That means boost in productivity for the global economy – a bigger pie for everyone to share. But gains don’t flow automatically to the people it affects… Offshoring accelerate the pace of change in every society it affects.*

I am currently working on that kind of project. With the help of a strong team (Anne, Anna, Big thank you if you read this post), we have developed a methodology to mitigate the hardships of those who are impacted and ‘build bridges’ between teams and continents.

This the first post of a serie of 10 that will cover this topic. Let’s start by the beginning :

Offshoring projects are projects aiming at offshoring a part or a whole business activity in another country . These projects have major impacts since they generally lead to :

Change of business processes with new actors and business rules
New organizations (to be aligned with processes),
Change of skills of impacted populations,
New resources offshored.

For Offshoring projects, the impacts on organizations, people and business are huge. Thus Change management is a key activity and a key enabler to ensure a smooth transition.

From a Human Resources perspective:
• Redeployment of resources,
• New offshore Teams Recruitment & Ramp up on business activities,
• Onshore teams transition to new skills/organization,
• Extended team management with possibly remote management,
• Multicultural differences.

From a Business Perspective:

• Continuity of Business activity,
• Fluidity and efficiency of processes,
• Support the development of analysis skills for onshore teams (usually identified as a key benefit in offshoring activities),
• Follow up KPIs and reach ROI.

The next post will cover the 4 Key principle for Change Management within offshoring projects.

* Offshoring, Understand the emerging Global Labor market- McKinsey Global Institute – Edited by Diana Farrell – Harvard Business school Press.
**Picture : Flickr, Andy Kaye, Ganesha
*** Thanks to Anne & Anna for their great contribution to this post.

Awarded !

2011-10-22T05:44:00.000-07:00

I received the Change Management Trophee 2011 from ESSEC Business School and La Tribune Financial Newspaper ! Feels great !

Think different

2011-10-01T10:51:00.000-07:00

Very inspiring.. worth to be shared !

Can traditional Managers be Change leaders ?

2011-09-05T14:27:00.000-07:00

Unfortunately, traditional managers seldom make good change leaders. The reason is in the mindset. Good managers try to keep things under control; Change Leaders are determined to shake things up. Good managers drive results via budgets and quotas; Change Leaders achieve objectives by mobilizing a broad base of people. Good managers are often motivated by personal success; Change Leaders want to make a difference in performance. Good managers like to delegate; Change Leaders enjoy getting their hands dirty.

Good managers can probably learn Change Leaders skills if they acquire the right mindset, but few seem to be doing so…

Source : Mc Kinsey Quarterly
Image : estheticcore -Flickr

The 2 sides of change : an Elephant story …

2011-08-18T14:01:00.000-07:00

Do you know Dan Heath's book : Switch, How to Change Things When Change Is Hard ?

The core idea of this excellent book is that there are two sides to the way human beings think about any issue.

There’s the rational, analytical, problemsolving side of our brains, which may think, “I need to eat less.” But there’s an emotional side that’s addicted to impulse or comfortable routines, and that side wants a cookie.

At work, the rational side may say that the company needs to go in a different direction. But the emotional side is comfortable with the old ways of thinking and selling, and it has great anxiety about whether the company can change successfully.

Dan Heath’s favorite metaphor for this dynamic comes from the psychologist Jonathan Haidt 1, who talks about a human riding atop an elephant. The Rider represents our analytical, planning side. The Rider decides, “I need to go somewhere, here’s the direction I want to go,” and sets off. But it’s the Elephant, the emotional side, that’s providing the power. The Rider can try to lead the Elephant, but in any direct contest of wills the Elephant is going to win—it has a six-ton advantage.

So part of achieving change, in either our lives or in organizations, is aligning both sides of the brain by pointing out the direction for the Rider but also motivating the Elephant to undertake the journey. Of course, the Path the Elephant walks down matters too. High-ranking executives can shape that Path, that environment, and make the journey easier even when the Elephant is less motivated.2

So, dear Readers, let’s take care of the Elephant too…Lets make our people think : “We’re the kind of people who can successfully make this change.”

1. The Happiness Hypothesis: Putting Ancient Wisdom to the Test of Modern Science,

London: William Heinemann, 2006
2. In Switch, the words Rider, Elephant, and Path represent characters in the mental play

that the book describes.

Source :The Emotional side of Change, Mac Kinsey Quarterly

The boss of the bosses # 1

2011-08-10T08:28:00.000-07:00

If you are lucky as I am, then you have your CEO supporting your transformation journey... and this is a big hit ! Research and experiences show that four key functions collectively define a successful role for the CEO in a transformation:

1. Making the transformation meaningful. People will go to extraordinary lengths for causes they believe in, and a powerful transformation story will create and reinforce their commitment. The ultimate impact of the story depends on the CEO’s willingness to make the transformation personal, to engage others openly, and to spotlight successes as they emerge.

2. Role-modeling desired mind-sets and behavior. Successful CEOs typically embark on their own personal transformation journey. Their actions encourage employees to support and practice the new types of behavior.

3. Building a strong and committed top team. To harness the transformative power of the top team, CEOs must make tough decisions about who has the ability and motivation to make the journey.

4. Relentlessly pursuing impact. There is no substitute for CEOs rolling up their sleeves and getting personally involved when significant financial and symbolic value is at stake.

Everyone has a role to play in a performance transformation. The role of CEOs is unique in that they stand at the top of the pyramid and all the other members of the organization take cues from them. CEOs who give only lip service to a transformation will find everyone else doing the same. Those who fail to model the desired mind-sets and behavior or who opt out of vital initiatives risk seeing the transformation lose focus. Only the boss of all bosses can ensure that the right people spend the right amount of time driving the necessary changes.

Source : Mc Kinsey Quaterly

SAY NO TO NO

2011-06-01T09:20:00.000-07:00

Dear Readers,
It has been a while since I did not post anything...To be honest, I was busy fighting a big ennemy of mine : Negativity.
Here is a thought that keeps me inspired in those difficult days when you have to face some adversity..

Isn’t it high time someone got negative about negativity ?

Yes it is.

Look around. The worls is full of things, that, according to nay-sayers, should never have happened.
“Impossible”
“Impractical"
“No”

And yet “yes”.

Yes, continents have been found.

Yes, men have played golf on the moon.

Yes, genetic save lives.

Yes, Yes, Yes.

What does it take to turn no into yes ?

Curiosity. An open mind. A willingness to take risks.
And, when the problem seems most insoluble, when the challenge is hardest, when everyone else is shaking their heads, to say: let’s go.

Inspired from the excellent text : www.shell.com/realenergy

Photo Flickr Gerry Visco

Using Consultants in Change Programm

2011-01-20T14:35:00.000-08:00

Consultant have been working with companies since the early post World war II era, when McKinsey and Boston Group Consulting Group began offering strategic planning advice to corporate executives...

Considering today's pressure on cost, it is important to understand how consultants can help you and how you an make the most of their services.

Here is the help a consultant can bring you for your change initiative:

Diagnostic : a team of junior consutants gathers information both inside and outside the organisation with the goal of :

determining where the company stands in terms of some measure of organisation performance
the company problem's and the root causes with respect to that performance measure

Capabilities assesment : the capabilities of the companies human and physical resources are assessed
Strategy developement : working with management, the consulting team developes a strategy for reaching the desire level of performance.Depending on the situation, that strategy mai include various doses of employee training , process reengineering, organizational restructuring, and even some new information technologies.
Implementation : consultant team provide training and work with employees team to plan the change programm and operationalize the strategy.

As you move throught agenda, consultants should gradually assume background roles. Thus, the best appraoch to using consultants is bound to be heavily situational. If the goal is restructuring, change consultants can and should play a major role. They have very specialized knowledge and experience for these rare events. But if the change involves changing how people work, put your own people in change and use consultants as facilitators.

Sources : Surviving Change, Harvard Business press

Employees See Death When You Change Their Routines

2010-12-08T13:42:00.000-08:00

Dear Readers,

Today I would like to share this excellent article written by James R. Bailey and Jonathan Raelin*... a bit pushy but very interesting ...Let's see your reactions..

You may have had this experience: You alter an employee's routine or change the way he's evaluated, and you get a reaction that's far bigger and more negative than anything you expected.

What did you do wrong? Probably nothing except underestimate his fear of death.

Sounds strange, but a fascinating field of research known as terror management theory has shed light on the connection between people's reactions to change and their awareness of the big change that awaits us all.

The basic idea is that people go to great lengths to repress awareness of mortality. Studies show that we create three existential buffers to protect us from this knowledge: Consistency allows us to see the world as orderly, predictable, familiar, and safe. Standards of justice allow us to establish and enforce a code of what's good and fair. Culture imbues us with the sense that we have contributed to, and are participating in, a larger and enduring system of beliefs.
Anything that threatens these buffers exposes us to the looming reality of death. Change an employee's routine, and you've undermined the consistency barrier. Tell a salesperson he'll no longer be evaluated on the basis of revenue and now must hit certain cross-selling and teamwork targets, and you've attacked his standard of justice. Alter the company's mission, and you've pierced the culture buffer by requiring him to reconstruct his worldview.
Faced with any of these changes, an employee is likely to feel deeply threatened. The more people feel threatened, the more they dig in — or try to escape. One of us (Bailey) took the latter route when the university where he was working as a young professor merged its separate business schools. Faced with the prospect of new colleagues, new students, new campuses — and, most distressing, new promotion committees — he left the job within months.
Fortunately, there's a lot leaders can do to ease employees' unconscious fear of death. Be consistent — make sure employees are informed about, and trained in, new operational procedures well in advance of any change, allowing them to acclimate. If there are to be changes in performance measurement, painstakingly explain the shifts to illustrate their implications. If there's to be a rethinking of culture, create a detailed and nuanced justification for why beliefs and values need to change — culture shift is less threatening if it's honestly framed as a needed adaptation. And leaders should acknowledge that change equals loss. Otherwise they'll appear clueless.

Change is necessary, but so is an understanding of how it invades people's critical bulwarks against the awareness of mortality. We can't stave off death forever, but good leadership can temper the debilitating effects of being reminded of it at work.

*James R. Bailey is the Ave Tucker Professor of Leadership and chair of the Department of Management at the School of Business, George Washington University. Jonathan Raelin is an assistant professor at the University of Bath in the UK.

Image : Flirk from Stefan, Jean Le squelette

Engaging Employees

2010-11-11T10:48:00.000-08:00

Successful implementation is greatly facilitated when the people carrying out the change are engaged in the process and buy in to the strategy and tactics.

Ideally, this should involve:

• Acceptance

• Understanding

• Willing participation

• Enthusiasm

Achieving this requires two-way communication: not just top-down dissemination of instructions and information, but also soliciting and listening to workforce questions, concerns, and suggestions. Attention should also be paid to building motivation and incentives into the change process, such as recognition and reward programs and links to compensation.
Finally, critical to the success of any change initiative is follow-up during and after implementation to evaluate the new processes and modify them if they are not having the intended impact on departments or individuals.

Employee Engagement Tools : Be open, and invite employee participation and communication.

1. Communicate (in multiple directions):
• Convey strategic goals, rationale, and overall direction of change.
• Communicate constantly about what is different and how it affects people
• Communicate about links to corporate culture and other systems.
• Solicit feedback.
• Use multiple communication methods: Web sites, newsletters, focus groups, town hall meetings, information centers, and the like.

2. Think globally:
• Conduct surveys and interviews to determine employee views and needs.
• Obtain early input about impact on employees and their roles and functions.

3. Act locally:
• Facilitate effectiveness of local leaders and build trust within units.
• Create employee-driven teams.
• Reorganize work assignments effectively and equitably.

4. Provide motivation and incentives:
• Link implementation to objectives, compensation, HR practices.
• Establish recognition and reward systems.
• Empower employees in the change process.

5. Follow-up:

• Conduct surveys to assess successes, hurdles, and employee engagement.

• Respond to employee suggestions and concerns.

Source: The conference Board

Image Flickr

Tips for identifying Change Agents...

2010-09-29T13:05:00.000-07:00

After we spoke about change resister, it is fair enough to discover Change Agent ...

Find out who people listen to. Change agents lead with the power of their ideas. But be warned : these may not be employees with formal authority to lead.
Be alert to people who think 'otherwise'. Change Agent are not satisfayed with things 'as they are'.
Take a close look at new employees who have come from outside the circle of traditional competitors. They may not be infected with the same mindset as everyone else.
Look for people with unsual training or experience. Chance are she sees the world through a different lens.

Who are the Change resisters... and how to identify them ?

2010-09-27T12:44:00.000-07:00

The Change resisters will either drag their feet or actively attempt to undermine your effort...

You can identify potentiel resisters by undermining where and how change will create pain or loss in the organisation. Once you have identify them, there are several things you can do to neutralize their resistance or make them active participants. These includes : explaining the urgent need to change, describing how change will produce benefits for them, and finding new ways in which they can contribute. People who do not respond to these efforts should should be moved out of your unit...

Photo -TazX - Flickr

Change readiness : Self Diagnosis

2010-09-27T11:58:00.000-07:00

Do a little assesment of your own organization.

Consider how it has approach change in the past and how it is approaching any current activities.

Then score it using the brief diagnostic test, using a 1-5 scale ( 1= strongly disagree, 5 strongly agree).

Our organization...

Mobilise Energy and Commitment to change through joint diagnosis of business problems
Develop a shared vision of how to organise and manage for competitiveness
Identifies leadership
Focuses on results, not on activities
Spread changes to other units without pushing it from the top
Institutionalizes success through formal policies, systems, and structures
Monitor and adjust startegies in response to problems in the change process

How does your organisation fare on these parameters? A score of 3 or less in any category points to serious weakness that you'll want to identify and correct.

Source: Surviving change, Harvard Business press - Photo Dasha_K, Flickr

Meet the Ninja : managing changes...

2010-08-27T13:46:00.000-07:00

Dear readers,

Change management is a structured approach to transitioning individuals, teams and organisations from a current state to a desired future state. As one of the most exciting challenges leaders will face, Padraig Hyland explains how getting change management right is critical to leadership success.

In this program, you will find out:

* What the different kinds of change management transformations are

* Why change management is so critical

* How to manage change successfully

Enjoy !! Funny and very accurate ...

As ever, I am intererested in your comments !

2010-06-08T13:09:00.000-07:00

Dear Readers,

Today, I will focus on the preparation of the communication activities.

Action 1. Perform a stakeholder analysis

First of all, your change team will have to prepare a stakeholder survey. It will help you to understand and manage stakeholder expectations, assess ownership and commitment to the change journey at various point of the project life cycle, influence attitudes as much as possible to maximise the chances of the success of the project, validate and check that ownership commitment levels are aligned with where the project is in the life cycle, manage the approved change initiatives and incentives at the project level.

Practically, you need to do the following:

Create a questionnaire ( if you need examples, just ask me)
Plan questionnaire administration cycles, tool to be used and population targeted
Launch the questionnaire and analyse feedback. This will be your basic to go to next steps
Organise workshops with the management to dicuss main result and identify corresponding action plan.

2010-05-19T14:50:00.000-07:00

Dear readers,

In the coming post I will focus on Communication during Change project. As a matter of fact, during this period, it is very important to develop a specific communication.
As you may know, large-scale changes impact people in a different way... and create a drop in performance.

The implementation of a new project often sees a drop in business and individual performance

Depending on how you manage the change process, will determine how deep your organisation will dip into the "valley of despairs"

It is possible to minimize the time it takes to navigate through the changes and return to productivity-but it requires a comprehensic change programme
By successfully managing the changes you can accelerate the delivery of business benefits and optimize overall business performance

Change Management in 3 phases !

2010-04-07T04:40:00.000-07:00

Managing Change follows a simple 3 step process. Here are the different you need to follow:

Phase 1: Preparing for Change
- Define your change Management strategy
- Set up your Change Management team
- Develop your sponsorship model

Phase 2 : Managing Change
- Develop Change Management Plan
- Take actions and implement Plan

Phase 3: Evaluating and reinforcing Change
- Collect and analyse feedback
- Analyse Gap
- Manage resistance
- Implement corrective action
- Celebrate success!

Do you think I have missed out any Phases? Is there a pre-step or a fourth step? I would be interested to here your thoughts on this.

Image: Flickr, Change, Gilad Benari

Are your managers able to become Change Agent ?

2010-01-18T11:34:00.000-08:00

Managers are important allies in times of change. They have the proximity to and relationships with employees that are critical for building support and navigating resistance in times of change.

But many managers are not being provided the skills and tools they need to become change agent. As a matter of fact being a great manager and being a great change leader are two different things. Managers must first be on board with a change before they can lead their direct reports through the change.

Here are some tips to develop your manager as Change Agent:

1. Get them on board - managers have to go through their own change process before supporting their direct reports.
2. Explain them clearly what you expect from them.
3. Build competencies - "leading change" is a competency that can be developed
4. Provide tools - including change methodology, impact assessment template, roles description..
5. Provide support - help managers succeed at leading change

Image : Flickr Time for change, David Reece

Change resistance? Understand why …

2010-01-04T14:15:00.000-08:00

Resistance is an inevitable response to any major change. Individuals naturally rush to defend the status quo if they feel their security or statuses are threatened.

Here are the major reasons why managers and employees resist change…

The top-reasons for managers’ resistance
- Lost of power
- Overload
- Lack awareness of need
- Unprepared to operate in the future state
- Fear of uncertainty

The top-reasons for employees’ resistance
- Lack awareness of need
- Fear of job loss
- Lack of the required skills or knowledge
- Comfort with Status quo
- Must do more with less

So, before any change action, think about why your people would resist to change.. and prepare your action plan!

Sources: Thanks to Isabelle & Guillaume

Image: Flickr, alshepmcr

Want some Change ? Be Disruptive !

2009-12-13T01:50:00.000-08:00

Some managers believe there is no way to guide the innovation journey, because innovation is just random and unpredictable. If innovation is indeed a black box, the best company can do is let a thousand flowers bloom, in the hope that one of them sprouts into a substantial growth business. This is a bit like releasing thousands of monkeys into a room full of word processor end hoping they will produce Shakespeare….

Disruptive ideas provide management alternatives that, if spread, can completely transform the way the organisation works without the need for a massive ‘change management programme’. Each of them in its own right has the potential to create significant change, but the compound benefit of a few of them is a real engine of change and business transformation.

Disruptive Ideas:

are simple
have a total disproportion between their simplicity and the significant impact in the life of organizations

can be implemented now

have zero cost or are cheap to implement

are most likely to be contrarian

are most likely to be counterintuitive
have a high risk of being trivialised or dismissed

can spread virally very easily, as soon as some people implement them

As a conclusion, I would add the following principle : Good Enough can be Great ! Disruptors win by playing the innovation game differently. Disruption are all about trade-offs…. Think about it !

Sources :
- Leandro Herrero, 2008
- Innovator’s Guide to Growth, Putting Disruptive Innovation to work (ScottD. Anthony, Mark W. Jonhson, Josef V. Sinfield, Elisabeth J. Altman)

- Image Flickr, seretuaccidente

Change: managing the process

2009-07-27T13:00:00.000-07:00

Because Change is inevitable and unpredictable in its consequences doesn’t mean that it can’t be manage as a process.
These are the stages in managing change:

1. Tell them why: Change is better accepted when people are given a compelling business reason.

2. Make it manageable: Even when people accept what needs to be done, change may just be too big for anyone to handle. Breaking it down into manageable bits can help overcome this.

3. Take a shared approach: involve people early, asking them to join you in managing change.

4. Reward success early: flag up successes as quicly as possible. Don’t wait for year-end or the appraisal cycle.

5. Expect resistance

6. Recognize that change takes longer than expected. Remember the 6 stages that people go through when experiencing change and hence the process takes so long. The stages are: immobilization or shock, disbelief, depression, acceptance of reality, testing out the new situation, rationalizing why it’s happening and then final acceptance.

But above all : Enjoy changes !

Top talents? High PO? Are companies mistaken?

2009-07-12T02:03:00.000-07:00

Target talent at all levels

Following my MBA course this week, I have worked on market segmentation. Well, I am convinced that Talents should also be segmented.

Organizations can’t afford to neglect the contributions of other employees. Several authors in recent years have emphasized the valuable contributions of B players: capable, steady performers who make up the majority of any workforce. Research on social capital has also highlighted the importance of inclusiveness: top talent is more effective when it operates in vibrant internal networks with a range of employees. Performance suffers when such social networks are absent or withdrawn. Our experience has even shown that strong networks help retain young Gen Y professionals.

Companies must therefore address the needs of talent at all levels of the organization: frontline staff, technical specialists, even the indirect workforce, such as people who work for suppliers, contractors, and joint-venture partners—are often as critical to overall success as A players. Experience suggests that an exclusive focus on top players can damage the morale of the rest of the organization and, as a result, overall performance.

**A more inclusive approach involves thinking of the workforce as a collection of talent segments that actively create or apply knowledge.**

Image:

http://www.counterpoint-music.com/specialties/images/talentshow.jpg

Keep your staff mobilized… Some good ideas found on the web….

2009-05-06T14:24:00.000-07:00

- Show your people that you have a plan.
- Communicate face to face.
- Involve your people.
- Show your compassion.
- Redefine success.
- Offer recognition.
- Keep on celebrating. Applaud every small success.

Do say: 'We will be honest and open with our people, and show them the way forward, but we will also be realistic about our prospects during this downturn.'
Don't say: 'We're all doomed.'

Image Flickr

2009-04-20T12:51:00.001-07:00

"Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect."

Mark Twain

Talent is Worthless, Performance is Priceless

2009-04-09T11:45:00.000-07:00

How Do Star Performers Work?

The key to converting average or mediocre people to star status lies, first, in determining their competencies and, second, in coaching them in the application of those competencies. The Bell Lab study identified nine strategies star performers use to get their work done.

They are as follows:

Taking initiative: Star performers don't just inform someone of an error, they correct the error. The mediocre don't.

Networking: Star performers anticipate their needs and solicit outside input prior to beginning a project. The mediocre wait until there's a need and then look for help.

Self-management: Stars know that self-management goes beyond time management and includes management of effort and knowledge. The mediocre feel time management is all that's needed.

Teamwork effectiveness: Star performers are comfortable being followers or leaders. The mediocre tend to push too hard for leadership roles.

Leadership: Star performers know small leadership roles are as important as bigger, more visible ones. The mediocre often are disappointed with smaller, less viable leadership assignments and, as a result, perform at a level expressing their displeasure.

Followership: Star performers are aware of the value of following, as well as leading, and understand the need to contribute to the leader and the team's performance. The mediocre often are difficult in a team setting and more focused on getting individual credit.

Perspective: Superior performers understand how their immediate work fits into the "big picture." The star performer is invested in taking on other viewpoints, such as those of the customer, manager or other team members. The mediocre often see a world defined by the length of their reach. They tend to have difficulty accepting others' thoughts and ideas.

Show-and-tell: Star performers are master presenters. The mediocre are PowerPoint specialists.

Organizational savvy: Star performers understand how they contribute to the overall performance of the organization and are capable of navigating through an organization's competing interests. The mediocre often are perplexed with organization politics and hide behind the mantra of not being a "political person."

Understanding these strategies and defining them for the workforce is a powerful tool and is necessary to convert mediocre workers into star performers. It is not easy, but it is worth it. In these difficult times, adding the equivalent of seven average performers to the workforce by converting just one to star status is a strategy that addresses the pressing need to do more with less.

Image Flickr

When job seekers invade Facebook

2009-03-08T05:27:00.000-07:00

The increasing popularity of online social networking is changing not only the way people manage their careers but social networking itself.

As the downturn continues, millions of corporate managers are rushing to join online social networks in a scramble to build their social capital. The popularity of sites such as LinkedIn is soaring: less than a year ago the site had little brand profile and was seen mostly as a venue for corporate suits trolling for professional contacts while plotting their next career move. Facebook, by contrast, has largely attracted individuals seeking a compelling site for fun social networking.
Today LinkedIn’s year-on-year growth is up nearly 200 percent in the United States and it now has more than 35 million members—many of whom were formerly employed within the hard-hit financial sector. And it’s just one of the many sites to which recession-struck managers are flocking…

This surging popularity of online social networking is transforming the nature of business networking, with profound implications for the way business people manage their careers. But it also augurs profound change for social networking itself.

With so many people stampeding into Web-based social networks, the line between social and business networking is becoming increasingly blurred. An important question is whether the values and codes of conduct specific to the virtual world will come into conflict with real-world values and norms. Facebook, where the idea of a “friend” is directly embedded in the interface, is increasingly cluttered with self-promoters, career artists, and marketing entrepreneurs.

What happens as this trend intensifies and those using Facebook exclusively for career networking invade ?

There are, of course, powerful economic reasons behind the trend. As sociologist Nan Lin puts it in his book, Social Capital,1 “Individuals engage in interactions and networking in order to produce profits.” These profits are based upon information, influence, social credentials, and recognition. The accumulated social capital, meanwhile, helps individuals to gain competitive advantages in the labor market as a result of privileged access to “resources” located on the social networks.

It’s a safe bet that if the economic downturn grinds on, we will witness further conflict between the nonrational instinct to connect socially and the rational calculation to build social capital for professional reasons. If so, it may put further strain on the notion of an online friend. We may find ourselves asking more frequently that age-old question, “What are friends for?”

About the Authors
Professor Soumitra Dutta is the Roland Berger Chaired Professor of Business and Technology at INSEAD, where Dr. Matthew Fraser is a senior research fellow. Their book, Throwing Sheep in the Boardroom: How Online Social Networking Will Change Your Life, Work and World, was published by Wiley in December 2008.

Making talent a strategic priority

2009-02-18T09:24:00.000-08:00

Companies like to promote the idea that employees are their biggest source of competitive advantage. Yet the astonishing reality is that most of them are as unprepared for the challenge of finding, motivating, and retaining capable workers as they were a decade ago.

Too many organizations still dismiss talent management as a short-term, tactical problem rather than an integral part of a long-term business strategy, requiring the attention of top-level management and substantial resources. Everyone spends time on today’s business—and attribute very little value to doing anything else.

Senior executives frequently acknowledge their failure (and that of their line managers) to pay enough attention to these issues. Researches have highlighted the obstacles that executives face, including short-term mind-sets, minimal collaboration and talent sharing among business units, ineffective line management, and confusion about the role of HR professionals (Exhibit 1).

To manage talent successfully, executives must recognize that their talent strategies cannot focus solely on the top performers; that different things make people of different genders, ages, and nationalities want to work for (and remain at) a company; and that HR requires additional capabilities and encouragement to develop effective solutions. Only in this way will talent management establish itself at the heart of business strategy.

2009-02-15T09:12:00.001-08:00

Insanity: Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results."

Albert

Driving radical change

2009-02-02T13:05:00.000-08:00

Transforming an organization requires clearly articulated aspirations, as well as the ability to generate energy and new ideas.

Ideas
The power of the big idea is implicit in the aspiration. Less well appreciated is the way each theme and the initiatives underlying it depend on a flow of good ideas. Leaders should guard against common pitfalls. The first is the common misapprehension that generating ideas is an esoteric art requiring unusual levels of personal creativity or the teachings of the latest innovation guru.
Another misapprehension is the willingness to be satisfied with ideas that are merely good enough, which cannot be energizing, because such ideas don’t stretch an organization and its people. Established orthodoxies must be broken and innovation encouraged, so don’t let unconventional ideas fall victim to hierarchy, bureaucracy, or silos (or all three).
Leaders can avoid these traps by clarifying their expectations right from the start and reinforcing those expectations throughout the transformation. They should emphasize that practical, small-scale solutions can be as useful as big, groundbreaking ideas and take care to provide guidance on what needs improving and where orthodoxy and conventional thinking are best challenged.

Four types of ideas are particularly important:

Why change? In a turnaround, the overall reason for a transformation is usually obvious. But leaders trying to, say, globalize an already profitable company need to explain carefully what they want to achieve. Ideas for articulating the “why” are essential—both for the overall transformation and for a small part of its implementation, such as a local alteration to the work flow of a single product line.

What to change? Leaders must encourage the organization to take a hard look at which functions, geographies, or product lines to change. Which processes need streamlining? What aspects of operations are outdated? What new market opportunities can be tapped? Project teams will inspire new ideas by drawing on people from different, and seemingly unrelated, parts of the organization.

Whom to change? Transformations are about changing not only things but also people. Leaders must identify key roles that will have to be adapted to support the objectives of the transformation. In addition, they must select teams of change agents to drive it at all levels of the organization. Crucially, they need to agree on how they will change themselves to “live the change.”

How to change? Practical and specific solutions that demonstrate how to reach financial or operational targets are especially valuable. Will reducing waste by installing a new process help to achieve the goal for a particular plant, for example, or should the shop floor be reconfigured? Ideas on the processes for instilling change and building new skills and on fresh ways to engage people are always needed as well.

Wise leaders establish disciplined processes for generating and developing ideas. The first phase of every initiative, for instance, should allow time and space for creativity. Incentives should encourage people not only to come up with ideas but also to share them widely.

The McKinsey Quarterly, the business journal of McKinsey & Company.

Harnessing the power of informal employee networks

2009-01-26T12:27:00.000-08:00

Formalizing a company’s ad hoc peer groups can spur collaboration and unlock value

Personal social networks, both within and outside of companies, increase the value of collaboration by reducing the search and coordination costs of connecting parties who have related knowledge and interests. They don’t necessarily fit into the organizational chart. Consider the case of an energy company staffer we call Cole (Exhibit 1). Although he sits relatively far down in the formal company structure, he acts as the hub in an informal network because he has knowledge that others find valuable. Without him, the production group would be cut off from the rest of the organization. His boss Jones, the unit’s senior vice president, is connected in the informal network to only two people, both in exploration.

This is increasingly typical in today’s large, sprawling corporations. Informal networks, slipping through the back channels, cross the lines of geography, products, customer groups, and functions—where the action is—and even through the thick silo walls of vertically oriented organizations.

Why Millennials Matter to You

2009-01-25T07:15:00.000-08:00

Sure, you’re going to need millennials simply to put butts in seats, but ...

...But these workers are also change agents who may force you to rethink and improve your methods of recruiting, training, and management — the lifeblood elements of your company. They’re accustomed to working away from their desks, using everything from library computers to smartphones and laptops. They got intense and individualized mentoring from teachers and coaches, and they were never told that their elders should intimidate them. “The world is a flat hierarchy to these kids,” says Peter Johnson, director of admissions at the University of California at Berkeley’s Haas School of Business. “Whether you think it’s a good or bad thing doesn’t really matter. It’s a market condition.”
Many companies have realized they need to change with the times: UPS has begun to abandon its training manuals for hands-on learning in staged neighborhoods; Deloitte empowers its middle managers to offer flexible scheduling to their team members, and Google bypasses corporate hierarchy by making its brightest new millennials managers and granting them direct access to the company’s co-founders, Larry Page and Sergey Brin.

Upgrading talent

2009-01-14T00:16:00.000-08:00

A downturn can give smart companies a chance to upgrade their talent.

Downturns place companies’ talent strategies at risk. As deteriorating performance forces increasingly aggressive head count reductions, it’s easy to lose valuable contributors inadvertently, damage morale or the company’s external reputation among potential employees, or drop the ball on important training and staff-development programs.

But there is a better way. By emphasizing talent in cost-cutting efforts, employers can intelligently strengthen the value proposition they offer current and potential employees and position themselves strongly for growth when economic conditions improve.

Companies can maintain their attractiveness to internal and external talent by using cost-cutting efforts as an opportunity to redesign jobs so that they become more engaging for the people undertaking them. A job’s level of responsibility, degree of autonomy, and span of control all contribute to employee satisfaction. Head count reductions provide a powerful incentive to use existing resources better by breaking down silos and increasing the span of control for challenging managerial roles—thus improving the odds of engaging key talent in the redesigned jobs.

Matthew Guthridge, John R. McPherson, and William J. Wolf The McKinsey Quarterly is the business journal of McKinsey & Company.

2009-01-08T02:55:00.000-08:00

The Economist again.. so accurate!! :-)

Downsizing Survivors: Motivating the Employees Who Remain After Layoffs

2009-01-07T01:39:00.000-08:00

You can't open a newspaper or visit a news website without seeing notices of corporate layoffs. And layoffs create downsizing survivors, the people who remain in your company after the downsizing.

No matter your circumstances, you all have something in common during and after downsizing - layoff survivors, those “could be,” “should be,” lucky employees who made the cut during the layoffs and downsizing.Most organizations invest their efforts in helping the downsized employees move on. This is ethical, reasonable and positive. Plus, your survivors are watching.

To truly benefit from the layoffs and downsizing, however, you need to invest even more energy in the people who remain after downsizing and layoffs. You will aid recovery; fuel productivity; boost morale, despite the loss; and minimize the damage to workplace trust.

Demonstrate That You Value the Layoff Survivors After a Downsizing

If you are a manager, it is most important to reassure the people who report to you of their value to you and the organization. You need to talk with each of them individually to let them know why and how they are valued; tell them what you feel they contribute to your effective, continuously improving work environment. No matter how reassuring you or your executive leadership have been, believe me, on some level, after layoffs, trust has been injured. Employees need reassurance about their security.

They need reassurance about why the people who were let go in the downsizing were chosen. They need reassurance about their future….

What is love?

2009-01-04T22:07:00.000-08:00

Dec 17th 2008 From Economist.com
Google offers some insights into life's big questions

The oldest questions are still the most puzzling. According to Google's annual list of popular search terms, even in these times of economic crisis, people are most concerned with working out what love is. The nature of gout, an ailment most commonly associated with gentlemanly excess, has fallen off the list since 2007. With fewer expensive meals and bottles of wine on offer, it is likely to be less of a problem in these frugal times. Interest in the identity of the president-elect, Barack Obama, reached such a fever pitch that he has replaced God on the list. John McCain could perhaps take comfort from the fact that more interest was shown in him than in his running mate, Sarah Palin.

Time to pass the Torch...

2009-01-04T03:53:00.000-08:00

Reading The Economist this morning...and just want to share this excellent drawing with you...Time to pass the Torch...

I will no make any comment on this one :-)

KAL's cartoon
Dec 30th 2008
From The Economist print edition

2009-01-03T09:20:00.001-08:00

Happy Darwinian 2009 !

All my best wishes for 2009.
Appropriately enough, for a blog launching at the start of this year, it is the 150th anniversary of Darwin’s publication of Origin of the Species. A good reminder in these turbulent times that human life can be boiled down to a couple of basic essentials: survival and reproduction, as The Economist reminds us in its Christmas Issue.
Many companies and managers will be focusing on the first in 2009. I would suggest that history will remember those who keep their sights firmly focused on the second. There are already two reactions apparent in reaction to the crisis.
One is to hunker down, tighten all the screws, and reduce the team to the core individuals who have delivered past successes – then wait to see what happens before moving. The other is to use this opportunity to make massive, profound or innovative changes, adaptations and investments to ready for a new century, new rules and new realities.
I hope we are ambitious for more than just survival... Well speaking about me, it is a big Yes...

Happy Darwinian 2009!