You will catch more flies with honey than vinegar – but be careful!

You may have heard the truism, ‘You catch more flies with honey than vinegar’ and many of us will have experienced the delights(!) of working with or for someone who just doesn’t get it. They think the way to motivate people is to use a larger stick!

That style of management may have worked once upon a time, but for many in this day and age it is very unproductive. It may even lead to a run-in with the HR department.

That kind of conduct is becoming even more of an issue with younger members of staff, as many more appropriately skilled advisers than I could tell you.

At the other end of the scale, the ‘ask rather than tell’ style of management fits very well with the style expected by these younger people.

But there is a danger with this style. It can be misinterpreted either accidentally or deliberately as a sign of weakness.

There are some who will decide to ignore the ‘request’ you’ve made, knowing full well that it’s a command in disguise. They are testing to see if you are serious – do you really mean it? – or is it just a polite request.

Let me illustrate this. I’m running an engineering business these days and, as part of our quality requirements and our health & safety policy, all drinks in the workshop and assembly areas must be consumed in non-spill containers. We provide suitable containers to all members of staff, of course.

A couple of the older hands have decided that they prefer to drink tea from their own favourite mugs. However, these mugs are not spill-proof – and covering the steaming tea with a piece of paper or card (!) doesn’t comply with company requirements.

When challenged on this infringement, the response is something along the lines of, ‘I’ve been doing this for 40 years’.

The polite request hasn’t worked. I could go as far as instigating disciplinary action – this is a clear breach of company policy – but these guys have worked for the company for a very long time and are also very good at their skilled manual jobs.

My preferred route in this situation is to offer a little bit of sarcasm. There’s a cartoon going up in the canteen showing a mug of tea with a paper lid over it and a message beneath it saying, ‘This isn’t good enough’.

What’s the use of knowing how to find true north?

Over the years, as we live, we also learn. We hear about events from news announcements, from friends and acquaintances and even, occasionally, from someone’s marketing material. All these sources of information add to our store of knowledge. 

Much of that knowledge won’t be relevant to your situation and you will unconsciously file it away. Memory experts tell us that we don’t forget things – we are just not very good at recalling them. 

Sometimes you are reminded of information you first gathered years ago – but at that time you didn’t have a use for it. 

Many years ago, I worked with a client who was using a knowledge transfer partnership (KTP) project to enhance the sum of knowledge in his business. I hadn’t heard about knowledge transfer partnerships, so I took the time to find out about them. I didn’t have a use for that piece of knowledge for decades. 

More recently, research and development tax credits have become very popular. In my present role,  I receive two or three calls or emails per week from people offering to help with them. We’re already claiming – and have done so for years. I have also helped many other clients lodge successful claims. 

I was reminded of the KTP scheme by a notification on LinkedIn a few weeks ago. It wasn’t an explanation of the scheme, just a news item about one of my connections. That triggered something in my memory and I realised we could probably use the scheme to solve a problem. We’re already in the process of selecting a university partner and the reaction to our outline of the project has been very positive. 

So, what do you have locked away in your memory vault that could help you with a challenge you are facing today? 

What do your team know – but it’s locked away in their memories or they have not volunteered the information? 

What are the challenges you need to solve – and does everyone know what they are? 

Perhaps one day you’ll be lost in the wilderness – then you will want to know how to find true north. 

Conflicts of interest

Everyone looks to the leader in the business and measures his or her performance.  They are watching and waiting for signs, whether good or bad. They aren’t just waiting for the leader to fail, but they do want their leader to show who they really are – and demonstrate success.

As the leader, everything you do is being closely observed.

What the team observes, and how they interpret what they see, will shape your reputation.

Perception is reality.

It doesn’t matter what you think – what matters is how your team perceives you.

One situation where this can really come back to bite you is when there’s a perceived conflict of interest.

This could relate to a preferred supplier – someone you get on with really well – where the team simply sees poor performance. Not only does that supplier get a bad reputation (they only got the job because of their friendship with you) but so do you – you’re giving work to your mates.

It could be that there’s someone you like in the business and you have a friendship with them. The word will spread – you can’t keep that secret – and the rest of the team may think you’re giving your friend special treatment.

In family-owned businesses, it could be that a family member has been taken on. Are they there because they’re good at their job, or just because they’re a family member?

  • You can’t help having friends in the business.
  • It may make sense to employ a family member.
  • You might form a friendship with that supplier.

So what can you do?  The solution is to be transparent.

You can’t help the perception people have of you, but the more transparent you are the better things will be.

If it’s an employee who is your friend, perhaps have them report to a different manager.

If you’re going to employ a family member, make it abundantly clear to the rest of the team that this employee is there because he or she is a family member! That way, expectations will be low, but the results may surprise everyone in the team.

The mission comes first

You have a set of tasks to complete, a to-do list that just seems to get longer and longer. And there’s a horde of people waiting to speak to you.

The phone never stops ringing.

The email keeps pinging, demanding your attention.

There’s yet another meeting, just around the corner.

If you’re not careful, you’ll get sucked into day-to-day activities.

Add a few big projects to the list – getting ready for that exhibition, developing that new product line, working on a new marketing campaign – and, before you know it, you’ll be wondering where the years have gone!

It’s easy to lose sight of the overall objective of the business.

It’s easy to spend time looking at all the mundane things that cross your desk. It’s even easier to get caught up with projects that are exciting and demanding.

If this is what’s happening to you, what’s happening to the people who work for you and with you? Their situation will be even worse.

I’ve often used the simple question ‘Why?’ when considering different activities in a business. Why are we having this meeting? Why are you doing that? Why are we going to this exhibition?

Controversially, I’ve also been known to ask, ‘Why does this job exist?’

Mostly, the answers can be summarised as, ‘We’ve always done it that way’.

If you can make time to ask the questions and dig through the initial, rather facile answers, you then need to make time to absorb the real answer.

You may find that individuals have forgotten the real answer. They’ve forgotten the real mission of the company.

It’s worth taking a step back to remind everyone why the business exists: What’s our purpose? What’s our mission?  Then make sure every activity is directed towards the fulfilment of that mission.

Are you afraid of the voters?

Politics is in turmoil. Some really divisive issues and equally divisive politicians are making headlines around the world.

Much of the recent press coverage refers to a lack of trust, while some politicians are telling us they don’t trust journalists. Fake news, anyone?

This lack of trust leads to politicians avoiding disclosure, fearing censure from voters. They get caught hiding things, so voters trust them even less. The voters think politicians have their own agenda and undisclosed motives; the politicians think voters and the media are out to ‘get them’.

This destroys any chance of cross-party cooperation. Anyone who crosses the line will be branded as a traitor, no matter how important the matter may be. Major issues such as healthcare or gun law in the US and, of course, Brexit in the UK are all topics where politicians of different parties hold similar views but can’t or won’t cooperate with one another.

This same theme of trust – or the lack of it – can be seen in businesses, everywhere.

Many businesses suffer from the ‘silo syndrome’, where functions and departments don’t cooperate but follow their own agendas. That can lead to conflicting messages being delivered to customers and suppliers!

Equally common is the division between ‘them’ and ‘us’, with management on one side of the fence and the workforce on the other.

Symptoms of a ‘them and us’ culture operating become apparent when there is a workforce that seems disengaged, a lack of innovation in the business, and often a clock-watching culture in place.

The good news is that, with a little bit of bravery being shown by the leaders of the business, these challenges can be dealt with.

The starting point is communication. If you, as leader, explain your decisions and, even better, share your objectives for the business with the workforce, you can remove the barrier. It won’t come down all at once, and it will take continuous effort to keep it down. But, if you communicate and do these things, you’ll get a workforce that’s engaged and can take your business to another level.

Don’t be afraid of the voters.

What does success look like?

For some people, success means having a fancy car or a big house.  For others, it might be finding a perfect balance between work and home life.  For yet others, it might mean being able to afford exotic holidays.

People are different and are motivated by different rewards.

When you’re leading a team, one huge challenge  is identifying what motivates the different individuals within that team.

A bigger challenge is being able to communicate clearly how an individual will know what success means for their job or area of responsibility.

Many years ago, I surveyed the staff of a somewhat dysfunctional organisation.  One of my questions was, ‘When doing your job, how would you know when you’ve been successful?’

Most could not answer this. They had not thought about the real purpose of their role, why their job existed, or how the company would benefit from employing them.

There needs to be a reason for the existence of every role in a company and there needs to be an expected outcome for each role. That’s how success can be measured – that’s where the company receives its return for the wages and salaries it’s investing.

A useful exercise that’s often set for people in start-ups or small businesses aiming to grow is to get them to draw the organisation chart they feel will be appropriate to their business in (say) 5 years’ time. This exercise helps business leaders define the roles a business needs to foster growth – rather than simply hiring someone else to do more of the same.

What’s more difficult, but probably even more valuable, is to apply a similar discipline to existing businesses. Break the business down and look at each area:  Why does this function exist? What’s the purpose of this role? What does success look like in this job?

That can easily lead to a realisation that an organisation is shaped around the skills and personalities within it. How the organisation has developed is not the culmination of premeditated design but the result of happenstance and unplanned growth.

Those same factors could well explain what’s preventing further growth. That’s why it’s important to ask defining questions – identify goals for each role and what success in achieving them looks like, then consider how they align with the goals of the organisation as a whole.

Annihilate your ego!

One characteristic that seems to be common to leaders who get the best from their teams is their apparent lack of ego. There are leaders who undoubtedly have giant-size egos, but don’t confuse showmanship and pizazz with egoism. There are many who play the showman but, underneath all the showbiz, they are focused on leading and promoting teams.

If you don’t watch out for the ego, it can trip you up.

Allow your ego to get in the way and you will claim more credit than is due to you. That in turn diminishes the efforts of the team and will be demotivating for them.

Your ego can also get in the way when you make a mistake. We all make mistakes – as the old saying goes, the person who never made a mistake never made anything – but your ego can prevent you from recognising a mistake. This can mean the consequences of the mistake become more serious: let’s say you took a wrong turn, but instead of realising the direction you had taken was wrong straight away, you continued down the wrong path, eventually seeing your mistake and having to retrace your steps a great distance.

That same ego will make the team hesitate to suggest you might be wrong!

The ego is also at work when things go wrong – it will be somebody else’s fault, not yours.

But what happens if you annihilate your ego?

You’ll praise the efforts of your team – not just to their faces, but publicly.

You’ll spot those mistakes faster.

Your team will find you more approachable and they’ll make more suggestions.

So how do you get started? Simply try saying ‘we’ and ‘us’ at every opportunity. Every time you say ‘I’ you’re in danger of letting the ego take over again. The only time you should use ‘I’ is when you’re taking the blame or assuming ownership of a mistake or failure.

The results will be noticeable: you’ll find that you get given more credit – both by your team and by your customers. You’ll be basking in reflected glory!

 

It’s not what you think

Almost every day I’m reminded that what I think is not important. It matters more what other people think.

This applies in so many ways.

For example, it could be that you’re talking to your children about their school work and how important it is to achieve good grades.  But if your kids don’t think it’s important they won’t make the necessary extra effort!

Or perhaps you’re dealing with a supplier. You’ve given them a due date but they’re thinking, ‘Oh well, last time we were a couple of weeks late and they didn’t mind, so it won’t matter if we’re late this time’.

Or you might be having difficulty with a member of the team who is failing to follow a routine or procedure. They don’t think the routine is important, so it slips their mind sometimes. Timesheets, expense reports, customer visit reports – these can all fall into the ‘unimportant’ category.

Take another example –  you’re working with a customer on a development project. You think you’re making great progress, but the customer doesn’t see it that way.  Perhaps this is because you are focusing on elements of the project they don’t see as critical?

There’s a link between all these different scenarios of course. It’s all about communication.

I believe I‘ve quoted the great writer, George Bernard Shaw, in this space previously. He said –

‘The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place.’

Communication is a two-way process. Putting an announcement on the noticeboard, or even sending an email, is not communication. These only become communication when the announcement or the email are read (and understood) by others.

You need to enter into a dialogue with the other party to confirm that your message has not only been received, but understood.

If all you do is broadcast you’re only halfway there.

 

There’s no smoke without fire

‘There’s no smoke without fire’ is a phrase I remember from my childhood, but these days it seems to have fallen into disuse – or at least into much less frequent use.

 

If you have a wood-burning stove at home, as I do, you can observe the truth of this statement quite literally. If the ashes from the previous fire are still producing smoke, you can make a new fire by adding more fuel.

 

In business, you need to follow the smoke trail to its source. You need to find the ashes. If they are smouldering, fan them into flame or put them out. Don’t just leave them!

 

Fires, from a business perspective, can be good or bad! One trail of smoke might be an increase in customer complaints. If you don’t measure this, or worse, if you are measuring the levels of complaint but not getting the message they’re telling you, you will have a fire on your hands. And that could be destructive!

 

If you don’t find the ashes and make sure they have been put out, you are kidding yourself about their potential to re-ignite.

 

Continuing with this metaphor, another example can be found when good people leave the business. Exit interviews will often shed light on situations, events or people, but if you don’t utilise the feedback this provides, you’ll be wasting the time spent in the interview.

 

More difficult to spot are the trails of smoke that lead to ashes you want to fan into life. These could be process improvements or innovative ideas that haven’t been fully formed and presented. That’s when you must encourage, coax and cajole the embers to leap into life.

 

Take the time to spot and follow the smoke trails.

 

Easy and right may not be the same thing

In life and in business you may find yourself having to make a choice between doing the easy thing and doing the right thing.

Doing the easy thing is having that second biscuit, or not saying anything when a colleague steps over the line. Or it might be agreeing with the customer – when you know they’re making a poor choice.

It’s more difficult to decline the extra biscuit and get some exercise.

It’s more difficult to confront the colleague and deal with their poor behaviour.

It’s more difficult to disagree with the customer and help them make a better choice.

The difficulty with all these examples is that they require a degree of confrontation. We see confrontation as a prelude to conflict.

Most of us don’t like conflict and go out of our way to avoid it!

Taking the easy way out offers short-term gain but may well lead to long-term pain.

The colleague who steps over the line once is likely to do so again. It could be that the rest of the team see this and, almost by default, the line is moved – what was previously considered unacceptable behaviour now becomes acceptable.

The customer who makes a poor choice is going to regret it. That regret will probably lead to resentment – it’s your fault, so you get the blame.

That biscuit goes straight to your waistline and stays there!

It’s much better for you and for your business if you focus on doing the right thing, not just the easy thing.

Over time, your colleagues will respect you and your customers will value your frank opinion. You will develop a reputation for integrity and honesty.

Businesses that have that kind of reputation find it easier to sell their products or services. They always know the difference between ‘easy’ and ‘right’.