The Performance Improvement Blog

Experiential Leadership Training

Leadership development programs are a large and growing part of training in a wide variety of companies today. Bersin & Associates says leadership development is a 12.3 billion dollar market and continuing to expand. Although there is a large margin of error in this number, suffice it to say that corporations are making a huge investment in the improvement of leadership. And, according to BusinessWeek, experiential leadership events are a significant part of this investment. Companies are spending $1,000 to $10,000 per person to have their high performers learn the lessons of Civil War battlefields, ocean sailing, fire walking, Maasai tribal villages, acting in Shakespeare plays, Outward Bound adventures, the Allied invasion of Normandy, or horse whispering (See photo from BusinessWeek).

If intended to reward people for a job well done and keep them committed to their companies, then these unusual and challenging experiences probably are successful. And, for a few, self-awareness can be profound. Impact on workplace leadership, however, is another issue. Unless the intended leadership outcome is clear before they arrive and the link from the experience to leadership in their organizations is made clear during the program, and they are encouraged and supported in the application of that learning back on the job, actual behavior change will be elusive, impact will be minimal, and most of the corporate investment, including time away from the job and travel expenses, will be wasted in terms of leadership improvement in the workplace.

Knowledge Transfer

In my last blog post, Bye-Bye Boomer, I highlighted the concerns organizations have around the loss of the Boomer brain trust and that knowledge management systems are not adequately transferring their knowledge to the next generation of workers. A recent study by the Conference Board of New York argues that Generation X (Millenials) can’t be counted on to take up where Boomers leave off. A Conference Board summary of the study says:

As the Baby Boom generation of corporate leaders and experts approaches retirement, businesses in the U.S., Canada, and many European nations face the loss of experience and knowledge on an unprecedented scale," says Diane Piktialis, Mature Workforce Program Leader at The Conference Board and co-author of the report with Kent Greenes, Program Director, Learning & Knowledge Management Council, The Conference Board. "Younger workers can't be counted on to fill the void, as they lack the experience that builds deep expertise. They also tend to change jobs frequently, taking their technological savvy and any knowledge they've gained with them…The result can be a significant drain of business wisdom that decreases innovation, lowers growth capacity, and reduces efficiency in the organization.

I see this locally. The American auto industry is at enormous risk of having the bodies but not the talent it needs to compete on the global stage. Because of the pressure to downsize, buyouts at Ford, GM, and Chrysler are leaving them without the experience and brainpower they need to succeed. This talent gap will be addressed in part through a highly educated and innovative younger workforce and, as has happened in the past, by hiring back some of the best people in part-time and temporary positions. But I doubt that this will be sufficient to fill the knowledge void in these organizations.

What is your organization doing to address this problem?

Bye-Bye Boomer

With retirements, layoffs, and buyouts looming large for the Baby Boomer generation, many executives must be quite concerned about what will be the impact on their organizations. It’s like watching your hard drive walk out the door and knowing you have no backup. ASTD’s Learning Executives Briefing highlights this concern in the August issue. In an interview with Linda Osgood of the U.S. General Services Administration, she said:

“…my biggest concern is the knowledge transfer between the new people and those who are going out the door. Most of our staff is either under the age of 28 or over the age of 55. So we have a large knowledge gap. We need to capture the legacy of the people who are leaving. How do we avoid the mistakes? How do we avoid going back to ways or methods that were not successful for us?”

Knowledge management systems were supposed to address this concern. The thinking was that if we could just get everyone, especially those people who are planning to leave the organization soon, to put key information into a database, we can archive all of that knowledge and make it accessible to everyone else in the organization now and in the future. While I think there is value in having this kind of repository of information, as an active learning tool, these systems fall short. Managers have little incentive to pass on everything they know to the next generation of employees, especially if they are close to walking out the door. And new employees have little incentive to consider what the people before them have done before they show-off what they know for their bosses. Also, it’s not the way many people think and work. They might talk to someone informally about a work problem, but they are not going to use a database to find a solution. A knowledge management system is one of those things that makes perfect sense on paper (or computer) but doesn’t work as well as we had hoped in practice. Successful organizations still rely on the memory, thinking processes, and problem-solving capabilities of experienced people.

Dictator Bosses: Corrupted Absolutely

Are bosses who manage by fear and intimidation and occasional acts of cruelty shaped by innate characteristics or is there something about the leadership position that causes them to behave this way? Toni Bowers, in her blog "View from the Cubicle," asks this question. She sites the classic 1971 Stanford Prison Experiment as evidence of the power corrupting. In this simulation of a prison, college students, who are given the role of prison guards, very quickly degenerate into highly controling and abusive leaders. Phillip Zimbardo's famous pychology experiment provides evidence that bad organizations triumph over good people. Despite citing this research, Bowers is reluctant to believe that all people have the potential, given the right circumstances, to behave in cruel ways. She wrote:

I’m inclined to think that there was a preexisting weakness in the character of those people who become corrupted by authority — something a psychological test couldn’t have detected. I do think leadership changes people, but I really can’t believe that inside all of us is some seed of cruelty that is germinated by power.

I believe that having power can have a profound negative impact on individual behavior. We have many real world examples: "good soldiers" abusing prisoners in the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq; Jews who were given authority positions tormenting other Jews in Nazi deathcamps; once popular and highly respected governors, mayors, and congressional leaders using their power in illicit and unethical ways; CEOs increasing their political and financial control of their organizations at the expense of everyone else. Of course, not everyone in positions of power becomes corrupt, but clearly bad systems can interact with individual characteristics to bring out the worst in people.

More Workplace Problems

What are employees most concerned about at work? The answer to this question could help managers create more productive work places. BusinessWeek polled its readers for the answers to this question. I think the most interesting aspect of this study is the six themes that the editors decided were the most important:

1. Work-Life Balance
2. Staying Creative
3. Toxic Bosses
4. Rigid Bureaucracy
5. Generation Gaps
6. Time Management

Given the readership of BusinessWeek and my scan of the featured comments, the respondents to the survey appear to be skewed toward relatively high paid, knowledge workers, who are confident enough to exert control over their work situations. They talked about things like flexible schedules and being rewarded for productivity, not for number of hours worked, and managing email and text messages. Not all office workers are faced with these issues. Regardless, I think the six themes are worth any organization examining as a way towards continuous improvement.

Leadership Training Results

Marshall Goldsmith in his blog post, “Practicing Leadership”, reminds us of the myth held by many training programs, but especially leadership development programs, that “if they understand, they will do.” If this was true of learning, I would be exceptionally fit, a scratch golfer, and a world-class piano player. It’s just not true (sadly, for me)! However, organizations continue to spend millions of dollars on programs that are intended to achieve understanding, not business results. Goldsmith has done a considerable amount of research to try to understand leadership development and, after finding that there is little correlation between change in behavior and understanding, liking, and seeing the value of a training program, he concludes:

Our research paints a compelling picture. People don’t get better because they go to “programs”. They don’t get better because they listen to motivational speeches. They only get better if they pick something important to improve, involve the people around them and follow up in a disciplined way. Long-term change in leadership effectiveness takes time, follow-up and discipline – not just understanding.

Some training programs are having a significant impact on leadership effectiveness and business results. Tim Mooney and Robert O. Brinkerhoff in their new book, Courageous Training, describe how a few organizations have learned how to turn individual understanding of leadership (and other abilities) into behavior change and business results. These organizations don’t leave impact to chance; they design it into the training and learning process. We know how to do high impact leadership training. Now it’s a matter of courage and will.

Career Moves: Smart and Not So Smart Tips

How do you prepare yourself to leave your current job to do the job you would much rather be doing? Not everyone should stay in their current job, even if it’s a well-paying, enjoyable job. For some it’s not a good fit given their talent and temperament, some want their dream job, and for others it’s time to move on to the next stage of their careers. Many “baby boomers”, who have invested 30 or more years in one career want a change but are not ready to retire (See: Retire Retirement by Tamara Erickson) and, with good planning, do not need to retire.

Mint.edu, a blog for mint.com, offers nine tips for people who want to change careers. These tips are titled:

1. Diversify your income sources
2. Develop passive income streams
3. Pay yourself first
4. Avoid debt and high interest rates
5. Live like a millionaire (i.e., Mimic the frugal habits of self-made millionaires)
6. Invest wisely and regularly
7. Stay married
8. Track your finances
9. Borrow carefully

Tips three through nine are good advice for anyone at any time. One and two, however, sound like late-night infomercials for how easy it is to become rich in your spare time. It’s not that easy. The first “tip” is about moonlighting or starting a freelance or consulting business while continuing to work at your current job. The second “tip” is about earning money for something that doesn’t require your labor (e.g., royalties from books). A small number of people might be able to do a full-time job well and grow another business (e.g., write best sellers) in the off hours. But this takes considerable discipline, time management, and talent, and many end up not doing either job well. I’ve seen many professionals who are physically present for one job while on the phone conducting business for another job. It doesn’t work. Would you want your employees distracted by outside professional work? Would you want them trying to serve your customers while text-messaging a business partner about the next big deal? Working at a full-time job and starting a business on the side is possible but, for many people, a very bad choice.

Community of Practice; Practicing Community

A "community of practice" is an excellent vehicle for learning and should be promoted more for the development of both internal and external professionals. Beth Stoner, in her blog, DeltaPossibilities, talks about her experience in a community of practice for organization development (OD) professionals called "Community of Learners" that meets monthly in Troy, Michigan. Stoner has found this to be a powerful learning experience for her own professional growth and that of the others in the group.

Etienne Wenger defines community of practice as "...people who share a concern or a passion for something they do and learn how to do it better as they interact regularly." According to Wenger, these groups have a "...shared domain of interest" and a shared competence in that domain. They engage in discussion and activities together and provide mutual support, although they often work alone. They are practitioners who, over time, share their tools and methods with each other.

Since I became an independent consultant 15 years ago, I have been a member of several different communities of practice. All have provided extremely valuable learning experiences for me. Most powerful, is the inquiry that goes on in these groups. As I bring up a topic, often client related, that is important to me, my community-of-practice colleagues ask questions that help me clarify my thinking so that I can be clear about what I need from them. They offer alternative ways of looking at the situation which gives me greater insight about my own thoughts and feelings and what I might do to be more effective in the situation. It's a wonderful, if a bit unsettling, way to learn.

Upturn, Downturn

It’s hard to look at the proverbial glass as half full when the news is so bad: rising unemployment; poor earnings reports from Fortune 500 companies; a hibernating bear market; a housing market in the tank; and oil too expensive for the tank. An article by Asaf Farashuddin in the Booz & Company publication, Strategy+Business, argues that this is the time to get ready for better days. As if to say, “Quit your whining and start doing something,” the author wrote:

All industrial corporations face downturns and periods of retrenchment. Successful strategists promote upturn thinking even during the deepest downturns. Techniques such as crafting an upturn SWAT team, implementing long-term strategic planning, and requiring upturn thinking during restructuring help companies develop their own Marshall Plan to stay one step ahead of competitors when better times return.

Of course, Booz & Company would take this position - strategy is their bread and butter. However, they’re partly right. The U.S. economy will bounce back; it’s just that nobody knows how long it will take. And even now some companies and some sectors, large and small, are making money and growing. Exxon recently set the record for most profit in a quarter. Small, fuel efficient cars are selling like hotcakes (Hotcakes must be a growth industry, too.).

What Booz & Company, and all of the other share price-oriented, strategy companies fail to take into account is the cost and value of knowledge. Their focus is new markets, new products, and new partners. They should also be thinking about new knowledge and retaining the knowledge that is walking out the door. Through layoffs, buyouts, and downsizing, many industrial corporations are getting dumber, not smarter. If they want to be ready for the inevitable upturn, they need people who have the skills, knowledge, attitudes, and beliefs that are the platform for creativity and innovation. They need “talent” with the ability to make continuous improvements in R&D, marketing and sales, production, and operations. They need a culture that supports risk-taking and is prepared for the permanent white water of our economy.