A631.6.4.RB - Transformational Strategies

General Stanley McChrystal, a West Point graduate, four-star army general and Green Beret, has a fascinating and incredible performance record of achievements including creating a revolution in warfare that integrated intelligence and operations. He is credited with leading the US and international forces in Afghanistan and the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) which in 2003 captured Saddam Husein. McChrystal is respected for his candor. Some of the key points he shares and discusses in the TED.com video include what he learned about leadership over his decades in the military. How do you build a sense of shared purpose among people with many skill sets and ages? By listening and learning and addressing the possibility of failure. Some of his key points include: 1. If your people do everything you taught them to do, and they do those things properly, you led them well. People follow leaders. 2. Leaders can let you fail, and yet not let you be a failure. 3. Leaders build confidence and trust in their people. Those you are leading have to have failth and trust in the leader. Leaders have to build faith, trust and confidence. 4. In failure, the leader must reach out to his force and rebuild trust and confidence. Rebuilt confidence in the force, leader and in the seniors of the leader and the force. 5. A leader must build consensus and a sense of shared purpose with his force. 6. How does a leader stay credible and legitimate when they haven't done what the people their leading are doing? Leaders must be more transparent and willing to listen. 7. Keep your promises and live up to your obligations to subordinates, peers and superiors. Be ready to support them when they need you most. 8. A leader isn't good because he is right. They're good because their willing to learn, and to trust. If you are a leader, the people, you've counted on will help you out. If you're a leader, the people who count on you need you on your feet. What is the Ranger creed? It says "I'll never leave a fallen comrade to fall into the hands of the enemy." It's not a saying or poem. It's a promise. Every Ranger promises every other Ranger, "No matter what happens, no matter what it costs me, if you need me, I'm coming." And every Ranger gets that same promise from every other Ranger. Think about it. It's extraordinarily powerful. It's probably more powerful than marriage vows. And they've lived up to it, which gives it special power. And so the organizational relationship that bonds them is just amazing. I was raised to believe that soldiers were strong and wise and brave and faithful; they didn't lie, cheat, steal or abandon their comrades. (McChrystal, Mar 2011) As Brown states, "Organization transformation is more revolution than evolution." Transformations focus for organizational survival in a competitive environment. In General McChrystal's example, the relative strength of the corporate culture (army and Ranger) is strong culture as the member commitment to values and number of members sharing values are both high. As far as the strategy-culture mix, he managed the change because there was a high need for strategic change (including creating a revolution in warfare that integrated intelligence and operations) with a high need for compatibility of change within existing culture. He shared and implemented the vision. (Brown, 2011) Gallery Furniture in Houston, Texas is a national leader in sales among independent furniture retailers. Gallery Furniture prides itself on furniture delivery the same day a customer purchases. The "today" philosophy includes all aspects of the business from the customer shopping experience to deep-rooted community service commitments. As the housing real estate market expanded over the last thirty years, Gallery Furniture experienced years of profits and business growth. However, the 2007 and 2008 burst impacted sales hard for the furniture retailer. There was a big decline in the customer base and according to Jim "Mattress Mack" McIngvale, owner of Gallery Furniture, "in order to grow during the recession, we had to innovate or else we were going to evaporate." In other words, they had to do something revolutionary. It was this need to innovate and take a larger share of the declining furniture market that caused McIngvale to go looking for a model to change behavior at his 150 employee business. He was looking for a process that would motivate his employees to want to change their behavior and act in ways that give the customers what they're looking for. He did not want to pursue Theory X techniques including directives, yelling and screaming. (Gallery Furniture, 2014) The solution was to use an organizational change model from Influencer Training including six different initiatives to innovate the way they do business: revamping their sales approach, reducing delivery reworks, improving safety and employee wellness and reducing inventory. There were two vital behaviors the sales team needed to adopt: 1. They needed to not change their demeanor from "Can I help you?" to "I'm disappointed you're not going to buy" when a customer was not ready to purchase. 2. Becoming prospectors rather than salespeople the moment a customer wanted to leave and getting the customer's contact information so they could follow up. The change plan included six different sources of influence with the following examples: personal motivation, personal ability, social motivation and structural ability (iPad). The bottom line results was that all six of the influencer initiatives have contributed to tremendous results for Gallery Furniture. (Gallery Furniture, 2014) As Brown states, "Organization transformation is more revolution than evolution." Transformations focus for organizational survival in a competitive environment. In Gallery Furniture example, the relative strength of the corporate culture is moderate culture (stable) as the member commitment to values was average and number of members sharing values is high. As far as the strategy-culture mix, he managed the change because there was a high need for strategic change (including creating a revolution due to the decline in housing market) with a high need for compatibility of change within existing culture. He shared and implemented the vision. (Brown, 2011) References Brown, Donald R. (2011). An Experiential Approach to Organization Development (8th ed.). Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson Education, Inc. Gallery Furniture (2014). Retrieved from https://www.vitalsmarts.com/casestudies/gallery-furniture/ McChrystal, Stanley: Listen, learn ... then lead (Mar 2011) (TED Talks: Ideas worth spreading). Retrieved from http://www.ted.com/talks/stanley_mcchrysta

A631.5.4.RB - Leading System Wide Change

"Think different" was an advertising slogan for Apple in 1997. "Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently. They’re not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you can’t do is ignore them. Because they change things. They push the human race forward. And while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do." (Apple - Think Different, 1997) The one-minute commercial featured black-and-white footage of 17 legendary iconic 20th century personalities. In order of appearance they were: Albert Einstein, Bob Dylan, Martin Luther King, Jr., Richard Branson, John Lennon (with Yoko Ono), Buckminster Fuller, Thomas Edison, Muhammad Ali, Ted Turner, Maria Callas, Mahatma Gandhi, Amelia Earhart, Alfred Hitchcock, Martha Graham, Jim Henson (with Kermit the Frog), Frank Lloyd Wright and Pablo Picasso. The commercial ends with an image of a young girl opening her closed eyes, as if making a wish. The final clip is taken from the All Around The World version of the "Sweet Lullaby" music video, directed by Tarsem Singh; the young girl is Shaan Sahota, Singh's niece. (Apple - Think Different, 1997) Apple's CEO Steve Jobs ordered the creation of a campaign that reflected the philosophy he thought had to be reinforced within the company he once co-founded, but which was struggling at the time he came back: Steve Jobs said the following in an interview for PBS ' 'One Last Thing' documentary, 1994: "When you grow up you tend to get told the world is the way it is and your life is just to live your life inside the world. Try not to bash into the walls too much. Try to have a nice family life, have fun, save a little money." "That’s a very limited life. Life can be much broader once you discover one simple fact, and that is - everything around you that you call life, was made up by people that were no smarter than you. And you can change it, you can influence it, you can build your own things that other people can use." "The minute that you understand that you can poke life and actually something will, you know if you push in, something will pop out the other side, that you can change it, you can mold it. That’s maybe the most important thing. It’s to shake off this erroneous notion that life is there and you’re just gonna live in it, versus embrace it, change it, improve it, make your mark upon it." "I think that’s very important and however you learn that, once you learn it, you’ll want to change life and make it better, cause it’s kind of messed up, in a lot of ways. Once you learn that, you’ll never be the same again." (Think different, 2014) What is required for a leader to be successful? Steve Jobs was a leader determined to "change the world" starting with Apple. Based on the Apple "Think Different" campaign with (17) examples and some research, there are (12) ways to think differently to be successful: 1. Being a revolutionary - not accepting the status quo and challenging old and present ways to do stuff. 2. Being an innovator - developing and implementing creative, new and powerful ways to do stuff. 3. Being a creative - incubating new and powerful ideas. 4. Being a performer - expand boundaries and comfort zones in new ways for enhanced results. 5. Being a seeker - gaining a deeper and better understanding of people and the world. 6. Being a visionary - having an expanded vision of ideas, what is possible and worthwhile. 7. Being an independent - thinking creative and independently. 8. Being wise - gaining a different and expanded perspective. 9. Being a leader - being courageous to discover and present your individual uniqueness. 10. Being a change agent - leading people and teams through change. 11. Being committed - make a commitment to make a difference. 12. Being authentic - discovering who you are and being courageous to bring your true self to the world. (Mackinnon, 2011) References Apple - Think Different (1997) (YouTube). Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nmwXdGm89Tk Brown, Donald R. (2011). An Experiential Approach to Organization Development (8th ed.). Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson Education, Inc. Mackinnon, Dr. Lauchlan A. K. (April 21, 2011). Think Differently! Stand Out From The Crowd. What Can We Learn About Thinking Differently From Studying Apple’s 1997 ‘Think Different’ Advertising Campaign? Retrieved from http://www.think-differently.org/2011/04/what-can-we-learn-about-thinking/ Think different (2014). Retrieved from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Think_different

A631.4.4.RB - INSEAD Reflection

According to Paul Tesluk, Associate Professor of Management and Organization at the Robert H. Smith School of Business at the University of Maryland, "Self-managing teams are not as rare a phenomenon as what they used to be. By definition, a self-managing team is a team that has formal responsibility and authority for making their own decisions about how they organize their work and how they decide on how they're going to get their work done." Tesluk also includes that instead of having a formal supervisor with that responsibility, "it's up to the team to decide how they structure themselves and how they go about organizing their work flow and process." Self-managing teams can be found especially in flatter organization structures where teams are focused to be more independent. However, some type of leadership still needs to be in place. This type of leadership is different from that of the traditional team with a leader at the top. Tesluk states, "the leadership style within a self-managing team is far less directive, but more inspirational and visionary." "Here the leader develops team capabilities to be able to make decisions, understands how to best organize and structure team workflow, and figures out how to manage roles and responsibilities." To get to this advanced stage, an element of team formation is required and the importance of finding an effective leader is emphasized. (Self-managing teams: debunking the leadership paradox by INSEAD (YouTube), 2008) Tesluk states leaders have to balance the "authority balance beam act" for self-managing teams. "You have to walk that carefully and delicately, and use careful judgment as to when to intervene and when to back off and allow the team ... even to make some mistakes that they can learn from and continue to develop." He emphasizes self-managing teams are not for every organization. This structure works best in teams that have high levels of knowledge, skills, abilities and expertise within them along with the ability to organize their own work. It would be counterproductive to have a supervisor tell the team how to go about doing things, develop a strategy, manage budgets, analyze performance data, learn from mistakes and improve as a team. The team would be able to do that themselves including developing guiding operating principles of how the team will operate, function and interact. Supervisors must be able to provide the latitude for the team itself to decide about how to best do its work. There would be several examples of when it would be appropriate and required for a supervisor to step in and intervene: emergency situation and major interruption, bottleneck and constraint to workflow such as a production assembly line stoppage. (Self-managing teams: debunking the leadership paradox by INSEAD (YouTube), 2008) In my present position as an industrial engineer at Boeing, I am the "captain" of our self-directed high performance team. Several years ago we started our journey to greatness and matured progressed from formation, development, collaboration and now to self-directed. We are an autonomous, empowered and engaged operating team and have our own team charter with guiding operating principles of how we run and operate as a team. We set our own team goals including metrics, training and back-up process for coverage and have daily team huddles. Our manager is a coach and usually only intervenes gets involved if there is a "people personnel issue" or high level strategic issue. He does not micromanage or control the team. Self-directed means there is less management control and more empowerment. In addition, we mentor other lower level teams and participate in corporate citizenship community events including Books & Backpacks. Our biggest team strength is enhanced performance (team synergy) and being a role model for other teams and leadership. References Brown, Donald R. (2011). An Experiential Approach to Organization Development (8th ed.). Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson Education, Inc. Self-managing teams: debunking the leadership paradox by INSEAD (YouTube) (2008). Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBnR00qgGgM

A631.3.4.RB - Feedback and Goals

According to Brown, the combination of goals with feedback on performance has a positive impact on performance. However, providing feedback without proper goals is counterproductive and does not lead to enhanced performance. Timely feedback (after the task activity is completed) between manager leader and employee is important too because all the details, information, facts and data are fresh in everyone's mind and documented. (Brown, 2011) Everyone wants feedback, input and coaching on goals. Employees want to know how they are performing and what improvements such as new work skills, problem-solving, computer skills etc. are necessary in order to become a high performer and team player. Most employees prefer to be coached by a senior level manager leader who is a subject matter expert (SME) in a specific field, e.g., industrial and systems engineering. The preferred process is 1:1 face to face instead of telephone or e-mail feedback. The preferred schedule is weekly, monthly and informally after completing a project assignment. (Deal, 2006) Employers face a huge challenge, opportunity and paradigm shift: to lead a diverse workforce of all ages and backgrounds. For the first time in US history, five different generations populate the workforce. The change will includes five different generations of employees working together on the same team. This will include: Traditionalists (born before 1946), Baby Boomers (1946-1964), Generation X (1965-1976), Millennials (1977-1997) and Generation 2020. As work becomes more complex and technical, skills including data analysis, problem-solving, relationship building and teaming with other workers and teams will be required. Personal and team goals along with collaboration and communication will be required for the diverse workforce including managers leaders providing feedback on goals and performance. everyone is different too with skills, goals and experiences. (Meister & Willyerd, 2010) Leaders managers and sometimes organizations tend to believe that knowledge, skills and abilities are the only factors affecting employees goals and performance. However, there are several additional factors and dynamics that impact and influence employee's performance capacity. These are: management and co-worker support and follow-up, allocation of resources and sometimes luck. Contrary to the common belief and paradigm that the playing field is balanced, it is anything but this due these factors and dynamics. This demonstrates the importance of closed-loop communication between manager leader and employee. It is leaderships role and responsibility to have an open culture for all employees to be a team player and high performer. (Kaplan and Donovan, 2013) From my personal experience, it is important to develop, establish and strengthen trust and respect with your team including manager by developing and building on goals (yearly). This can also include a plan of the tasks to do this and continuous improvement. I use several communication and "connecting" tools to do this. The first is bi-weekly 1:1 coaching meetings with my manager. Our team uses a standard 4-panel chart summary including: goals, status, constraints and schedule in a stop light chart format (green - complete or on schedule, yellow - potential constraints issues, and red - behind schedule). We review projects I am working on including progress to date, constraints and anything I need assistance on. Other issues include teaming within other shifts, training, skills and education. Secondly, our team has daily "Huddles" with team. For example, have a daily 15 minute huddle to exercise stretch, review roles and responsibilities for the day and week, review metrics and share and help each other out for problems, issues and back-up coverage. We share and discuss new ideas and learning experiences from training classes. Third, we use customer feedback surveys to our goals and use both qualitative and quantitative tools for analysis. These communication and "connecting" tools leads to greater engagement, empowerment, performance and customer focus and satisfaction. References Brown, Donald R. (2011). An Experiential Approach to Organization Development (8th ed.). Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson Education, Inc. Deal, Jennifer J. (2006). Retiring the Generation Gap: How Employees Young & Old Can Find Common Ground. Hoboken, New Jersey: Jossey-Bass. Kaplan, Mark and Donovan, Mason (2013). The Inclusion Dividend: Why Investing in Diversity & Inclusion Pays Off. Austin, Texas: Bibliomotion. Meister, Jeanne C. and Willyerd, Karie (2010). The 2020 Workplace: How Innovative Companies Attract, Develop, and Keep Tomorrow's Employees Today. New York City: HarperCollins Publishers.

A631.2.5.RB - Cooperation and Competition

Once you have completed and turned in A631.2.4.LT, consider the process that you and your team went through in completing the Learning Team Charter. In a well-written reflection blog, answer the following questions: 1. What behaviors seemed to help your team successfully complete its task? Team 4 submitted and reviewed introductions for each team member for team formation. There was a high level of energy from members demonstrating behaviors including: initiative, perseverance, responsibility, accountability, participation, commitment and trust. The team did not struggle in any areas due to these demonstrated behaviors, e.g., we did not use finger pointing, blaming one another, skepticism etc. Ideas and information were shared freely and openly and learning to ask for help in an open communication forum, assistance and clarification became a norm. We demonstrated proactive and not reactive behaviors. 2. What factors inhibited decision-making or problem-solving? The biggest factor was lack of in person and face to face communication. If there were urgent issues and matters, telephone numbers were provided for more direct communication. Other factors were we did not know each other work and schedules which added to the wait and queue time for responses. There was very little conflict if any among team members and issues. 3. How much time was spent on decision-making and problem-solving? Consensus decision making was used for the schedule and assignments. There was minimal wait and queue time once a question issue was submitted on the discussion board and was usually within 24 hours. Other factors were we did not know each other work and schedules which added to the wait and queue time for responses. The rapid decision making process we used enabled us to complete and submit a high quality deliverable ahead of schedule. 4. How was information shared among team members? Differences between team members were value added. Ideas and information were shared freely and openly and learning to ask for help, assistance and clarification became a norm. If there were questions or issues on a posting, follow-up questions and answers clarifications were submitted and with appropriate responses inputs by the responsible party in a timely fashion. Team members gave and requested feedback. Diversity among members added to the quality of the charter deliverable. 5. How did issues of authority or power affect the team? Team 4 identified roles and responsibilities including team leader/facilitator and team members for the assignment. There was a volunteer for team leader/facilitator who posted a preliminary schedule with assignments. All team members provided feedback concurrence and provided feedback on anything that could be improved. We also reviewed sharing the team leader/facilitator role of the different assignments over the term to share responsibility, accountability and authority. The team leader/facilitator roles responsibilities include: assignments, schedule, rough drafts, and the final deliverable. The team leader/facilitator also provided several examples and alternatives to an issue to reduce wait and queue decision making time. 6. How did collaboration and competition influence the outcome? Team 4 demonstrated collaboration, "Working Together" and "synergy" on the assignment. Most of the communication within our team is nonverbal. We understood a shared vision so we didn't need spoken language to communicate. Our team developed a language of our own known as guiding operating principles which was part of our ultimate success. 7. Did team members make process interventions? Yes, if there was a better and improved way to do or state something, everyone was free to speak out. This is based on continuous improvement that if there is a better way to do something, then do it! For example, if someone had an additional input to an idea, then it was posted for team review for consensus decision making. References Brown, Donald R. (2011). An Experiential Approach to Organization Development (8th ed.). Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson Education, Inc.