Ron’s Short Review: My generation had “What color is your parachute?” This is a great book for today’s creative, entrepreneurial environment. Figuring out where you want to head along the way and designing your life to enhance your possibilities. I can easily recommend this book.
Is your fingerprint unique or is it just like everyone else’s? Without even know you I know what your answer will be. Why would the FBI keep a database of fingerprints if they were not unique enough to identify every person on the planet?
One of the books I’ve read recently is Idiot Brain by Dean Burnett and one statement in there struck this chord with me. If we assume and accept the concept that we each have a unique fingerprint that’s simply made up of a few swirls, curves and lines, why would we think that two brains that are infinitely more complex than a fingerprint reach the same conclusion or see things in exactly the same way or start with a common set of beliefs and assumptions. That’s ridiculous.
We are complex, messy human beings. Our backgrounds and experiences are all different. And if we are complex, messy human beings, how much more so is a team of people.
I remember working with one team when the first day of a three-day team building session was a disaster. I couldn’t sleep at all that night. All night I kept running through the issues and looking for the cause of their inability to come together as a team. I would think to myself, they’re smart, they’re experienced, they’re well intentioned, what’s the problem. Smart, experienced, well intentioned… Smart, experienced, well intentioned… Finally, about 4am it hit me. They’re smart! That was the issue. For every problem that hit the table, they could almost instantly come up with a list of variables that was overwhelming. And then, because they were smart, they would be totally convinced that they’re personal view of the issue was the only correct view. After all, they were smart.
We are complex, messy people who make up even more complex and messy teams. So how do we cope?
Aristotle in his four levels of happiness describes level 4 (the highest level of happiness) happens when there is Truth, Love, Beauty and Unity.
In a team we must have great respect for each person’s perspective. We’re complex, messy people. Each of us has a perspective that is true as far as we can see. Honoring the fact that each person has a perspective that should be understood and valued is the first step.
The concept being used today that would most closely parallels what Aristotle was implying is Psychological Safety. When the team environment is psychologically safe, there is great respect for each other, confrontation of ideas is often and easy, everyone takes responsibility for group decisions, the team talks openly about mistakes and problems, not just successes and above all, there is a lot of humor and laughter.
The word used here refers to elegance and simplicity. Smart people tend to make things more complex. Wise people tend to simplify.
After hearing everyone’s perspective on an issue, demonstrating the patience and kindness it takes to fully understand and integrate those perspectives and then simplifying the issue down to the basic core, unity has a much better chance of being accomplished. Teams that build great unity are the happiest (and most productive).
We’re complex, messy people. It takes a great process to get at the “truth”, great love to appreciate and understand each person’s perspective, a great effort to simplify things to their most elegant form (a lot more energy and brain power than it does to make things complex) and a great desire to move forward in unity. But it also provides great happiness.
My grandkids always loved that game where they search for the prize and are directed by words of “warmer” if they’re headed toward the hidden prize or “colder” if they are moving farther away.
Through the years I’ve met and worked with hundreds of executives in my consulting work. Some of them I seem to gain almost an instant connection with while others seem to take much longer and many times doesn’t develop into a close relationship. None of that has to do with respect or competence. I have great respect for many of them but have not necessarily developed close relationships.
It does however have to do with warmth.
One exercise that I’ve run through the years demonstrates this and always surprises me and others with the results. I’ll show a list of characteristic of a person they have not met but can assume are valid. They include words like skillful, determined, intelligent, warm, practical and a few others.
I show a slightly different list to each half of the room (without the other half seeing the list) and then ask them to rate the individual on traits they might expect from that person. These traits are always presented in pairs such as: reliable – unreliable, ruthless – humane, dishonest – honest. The list is reasonable long and you can see the pattern.
When we finish the exercise one half of the room will give the nod to the more positive descriptors such as wise, happy, humorous, reliable, honest, unselfish while the other half of the room tends to give higher scores on the negative descriptors such as ungenerous, shrewd, irritable, unpopular and dishonest.
Why the difference? You’re getting warmer. Each half of the room received an identical list of characteristics with the exception of one word. One list contains the word warm, while the other list contains the word cold. Is the person seen as warm or cold? That was the only difference between the lists. Those with the word warm assumed the person had the positive traits listed above. Those with the world cold assumed the negative traits.
Now here’s the scary part. We judge a person as being warm or cold in the first 15 seconds of an exchange. Now that’s not confined to the first time you meet a person. It relates to the first 15 seconds of every exchange. I’ve often heard people say, “As soon as Dave walks in the door I know what kind of day it’s going to be.” That first 15 seconds.
Kids look for the prize of the game be getting warmer and warmer. You’ll also collect the brass ring if you work at getting warmer and warmer. Greet people so they know you’re genuinely glad to see them. Be warm in that first moment. You’ll tend to gain the benefit of the doubt throughout the day.
Long, long ago in a land far, far away I was summoned to the Court of the Farthing Orderer, better known as the office of the CFO.
Upon responding to the summons, the CFO looked at me long and hard for several minutes. Finally speaking he said, “You dress funny. All of us wear court garments of green and white but you are dressed in a strange combination of maize and blue.” But that’s another story to be revisited after the fall jousting season.
Now this CFO was a bit portly and slightly balding, not a particularly striking figure. However, he seemed to be very wise, was very good at ciphering and the other people of his court enjoyed working under his guidance.
“For what need have you summoned me?” I asked.
“One of my Knights,” the CFO responded. “I’m having a great difficulty understanding his speech.”
“Is he from a foreign land?” I asked.
“No,” responded the CFO. “He grew up in a court much like ours but in a smaller kingdom.”
“Is he performing poorly or not exhibiting the integrity of a Knight?” I probed.
“Quite the opposite,” said the CFO. “He has performed extremely well over the few years he’s been here and the King is very pleased with his work.”
Humbly bowing to the CFO I said, “I’m sorry for my ignorance, sir, but I really don’t understand the problem.”
“The problem is,” responded the CFO. “I never know where he is or what dragon he is slaying or how that slaying is going to further protect the Kingdom. I need better information to tell the King when he asks about the Knights exploits.”
“Alright, I need to talk with this Knight, where shall I find him?”
The CFO looked at me blankly and said, “Have you been listening to anything I’ve said?”
“Never mind,” I said. “I’ll find him.”
When I found our knight, I decided to take the direct route and said, “The CFO never knows where you are or what you’re doing, you need to communicate more.”
The Knight looked at me dumbfounded and said, “You’ve got to be jesting me! I talk to the CFO all the time.”
I talk with him all the time. How could he need any more communication?”
And in that moment I saw the problem. Long ago I learned from a certain seer from the land of MBTI that two particular types of people often have a difficult time communicating. It seems that the CFO was an IS and the Knight was an EN. Hmmm…. I thought, how can I get this IS and EN to better understand each other?
I suggested to our EN (Extraverted iNtuitive) Knight that he nail a one-page outline of his weeks slayings to the CFO’s door every Monday morning.
“But that’s so restrictive,” said the knight. “How could I possibly convey all that’s going on in a one-page outline?”
“Humor me,” I said.
Three weeks later I asked the IS (Introverted Sensing) CFO, how are things going?
“Splendid!” were his words. “I know exactly where our Knight is and what dragon he’s slaying. The King and I are both very pleased.”
The moral of the story? Even if you grew up and work in the same court together, don’t assume your communication is being understood. Know enough about all of the “languages” being spoken and heard to assure good understanding and communication.
A certain amount of chaos is necessary because “quality” chaos stimulates creativity. Organizations that do not create some space for creative chaos run the risk of experiencing staleness, loss, and even death.
“Life exists at the edge of chaos,” writes Stuart Kauffman, author of At Home in the Universe: The Search for the Laws of Self-Organization and Complexity. “I suspect that the fate of all complex adapting systems in the biosphere—from single cells to economies—is to evolve to a natural state between order and chaos, a grand compromise between structure and surprise.”
If a leader fears the creative tension caused by chaos, trouble is often not far away. Leaders need to understand that creativity comes out of chaos, and even what has been created needs to be exposed to chaos just to make sure it is still viable and working. Even the new creation may need the chaos of re-creation to survive in a highly competitive world.
Meg Wheatley writes in her book Leadership and the New Science,
“The things we fear most in organizations—fluctuations, disturbances, imbalances—are also the primary sources of creativity.”
The question is, how do leaders get people from the scary, agonizing, and anxiety-filled feelings of chaos to the liberating place of creativity, change, and steadiness?
Before we answer that question, we do need to look at creativity and chaos. The reality of today’s world is that millions of ideas for innovation, change, and improvement lie within any factory, distribution center, high-tech office, retail storefront, or operations center. You can also multiply that number by millions (or so it seems) when you bring people together in a team setting and allow them the freedom to create, innovate, and change. In many organizations this causes chaos and uncertainty.
Leaders, then, who understand the positive side of chaos can begin leading people through the confusing maze that creativity causes. They can help people understand that disruptions are opportunities. They can focus their attention on a building a culture that understands change and brings teams together, creating synergy among the members. These leaders explain how necessary it is for a company to respond to change in order to remain competitive.
Leaders help their employees understand the chaos going on around them by making meaning out of it. It is not easy, but it is so very necessary. “Leaders must have the ability to make something happen under circumstances of extreme uncertainty and urgency. In fact leadership is needed more during times of uncertainty than in times of stability: when confusion over ends and means abounds, leadership is essential.”
I’m continuing my series on an in-depth look at a wonderful little book that’s twenty years old this year. The title is Management of the Absurd by Richard Farson. You may want to consider dropping back and reading the previous posts about ABSURD! I think it will put each new one in great context.
In Communication, Form is More Important Then Content
I often find myself working with teams on difficult issues.
Our author of Management of the Absurd makes a couple of key observations:
When we witness a red-faced executive shouting, “Who’s excited? I’m not excited!” we realize that the feeling is much more important than the words. That’s why in all communication it’s crucial to listen to the music as well as the lyrics, the feeling behind the words as well as the words themselves.
And
In all of life, the metamessage tends to be more powerful than the message itself.
I think we all know that on an intellectual basis. But what do we do about it? I’ve found one simple adjustment that makes a profound difference…. remove the table!
Yup, that’s the one thing that I have experienced that helps me deal with difficult issues, remove the table. As soon as I set a team down in a circle with nothing but chairs, the mood immediately changes. I often get those nervous comments like “Boy, are we in trouble now.” Or “This certainly makes me feel a little vulnerable (or naked).” People seem to immediately know that this is different. The table offers us a shield. Position at the table has connotations. I can slip my phone over the edge of the table and no one will know I’m checking email (Ha!). Sitting in open chairs levels the playing field. It exposes all of our body language. We can’t hide. We need to be REAL with each other.
I’ve experienced some of the deepest sharing and resolution of many deep issues when we work without the net of a table between us. All of a sudden people are listening more with an intent to understand rather than respond. I will often hear comments like “Now I understand”, “I never knew that” or “I can see why you would believe that.”
Our author closes this section with the statement “All of this teaches us that we may be so concerned about the content of what we say or write that we often forget the form. When they are taken into account, it is possible to send metamessages that are consonant with the intended message and reinforce rather than undermine it.”
The metamessage counts more than the content. Take the table away. Even in a figuratively sense. When you’re dealing with difficult issues and send that email or leave that voicemail, leave the metamessage, not just the content.
So, how do you remove the table when the team meeting is being conducted via a phone or video conference? Sorry, that one will have to wait for a future blog.
I’m continuing my series on an in-depth look at a wonderful little book that’s twenty years old this year. The title is “Management of the Absurd” by Richard Farson. You may want to consider dropping back and reading the previous blogs about ABSURD! I think it will put each new one in great context.
“The notion that people need to communicate more is perhaps the most widely accepted idea in management, indeed in all human relationships. Whether it’s called counseling, team building, conflict resolution, or negotiating, it boils down to one idea – that if we talk it over, things will get better.”
I just finished another Culture Survey’s with a client. (Actually I dealt with three client surveys over the last six weeks.) There are a couple of items that always get low scores on every company’s survey and one of them is the need for more communication.
Unfortunately, most corporate leaders respond to the noted lack of communication with more information. Seldom do people want more information. Every organization and person I know, including myself is overrun with information. We carry around the knowledge (and information) of man in our hand in a device we ludicrously call a phone when it uses about 0.001% of its capability to provide phone service. What we don’t carry around with us is the wisdom of man.
People don’t want more information; they want more meaning. What does this mean? How should we interpret these numbers? Give us meaning. Tell us stories. Help us understand.
Our author says:
“Almost all of this information is quantitative rather than qualitative and is of little use to top managers, who are dealing with predicaments that seldom yield to logical analysis. What these executives require is more likely to come from the advice of their colleagues than from comprehensive displays of data.”
Simon Sinek notes that great leaders inspire action by starting with Why! If you haven’t seen his video check out YouTube for “Why, How, What” or Simon Sinek below. Why starts with meaning. People are seldom interested in what you do but they are often interested in why you’re doing it.
The more we communicate, the less we communicate. The more with inspire with meaning and helping people understand why, the more we communicate.
I received an email the other day that was single spaced, over 1.5 pages long with almost no punctuation. Normally I would simply drop it in the waste basket or at the least drop it into the archives. However, in this case the email was from someone and on a topic that I thought was important for me to read, so I jumped in. I found that I had to spend time organizing the email into some sort of structure before I could gain any value from the contents.
I would only make that effort with less than one percent of the emails I receive. Which once again sends me to the topic of emails and how to use them effectively.
I use a service called Boomerang with my Gmail account that allows me to delay send emails (and I’m sure many other things that I haven’t even discovered yet). They send out periodic emails on what they are learning from how their many subscribers use the service. One analysis in particular caught my eye. The title of their year-end review is “Secrets of writing the perfect email”. They based their research on how many emails received a response. Here are a few of their secrets.
Emails that get the greatest number of responses are 50-125 words long. KISS: Keep is simple stupid. Keep your emails to a single topic with a limited number of points. People don’t and won’t take time to sort through multiple points in a given email and even if they did how do they respond? An email with multiple responses or individual emails for each of the response. Don’t force them into that choice.
3 and 4 word subjects had a slight edge over 2 and 5 word subjects but a much larger edge over 2 and 6 word subjects. The more important issue to me is to make your subject specific and let your receiver know the purpose.
3rd Grade! Really? 3rd grade reading level gets the best response? But we’re writing to people with MBA’s and higher. Why would we need to “dumb” it down to a 3rd grade level? The article explains that,
“The main components of reading grade level are the number of syllables in your words and the number of words in your sentences. So try using shorter sentences and simpler words.”
KISS again.
Email works best when we’re using it to perform very simple and straight forward tasks and writing it such that the purpose is abundantly clear and easy to make a response.
Winston Churchill once said “Golf is a game whose aim is to hit a very small ball into an ever smaller hole, with weapons singularly ill-designed for the purpose.” Email is a weapon singularly ill-designed to do anything other than share information and request simple straight forward answers. Use it only for its intended purpose.
It often amazes me how much people read into emails.
A number of times I’ve had clients send me an email that someone has written to them and say to me “See, this is what I’m talking about. Can you believe the attitude of this person?” Then when I read the email I may think that it’s a bit too long or I’m not quite sure what the point is or more often I’m thinking they should simply pick up the phone and talk to this person. However, I seldom see what the person is talking about.
Email has become one of the largest stumbling blocks to clear understanding among colleagues. (Click to Tweet)
I’m not suggesting that we eliminate email because it is a fabulous tool and is very useful in many, many instances but I’ve also seen it misused and abused.
Consider these two traits:
BUT, because of these two traits we are using it for tasks that are ill suited for email. It’s not well suited for dealing with arguments, or making difficult decisions, or carrying on a meaningful dialogue. It’s best suited for short, quick, meaningful exchanges of information.
I subscribe to a gmail service called Boomerang. I use Boomerang mostly for its delayed send feature, but occasionally they’ll send me an analysis of how I’m using the service and they also share some overall analytics from their entire data base of users. The most recent one reached some conclusions that were affirming on one hand and surprising on the other.
Here are a few of their findings:
Message Length: Emails with a message length of 75-100 words receive the highest level of response. That one was not surprising to me. Long detailed emails put me to sleep faster than a boring novel. I’m constantly thinking; get to the point, what is your point, why are you writing me this epistle?
Subject Line: Subject lines that receive the best response are both meaningful and are 3-4 words long. Now, that’s often difficult to accomplish and it actually takes some thought and work to provide meaning in 3-4 words. But that’s the point. Put some thought and effort into it and it will be more meaningful to your receiver and elicit a better response.
Reading Level: Here’s the surprising finding, a 3rd Grade Reading level of writing generates the best response level. Now, before you jump to the conclusion that it’s because of all the people you write to are just stupid, understand that reading level is calculated based on the number of syllables in your words and the number of words in your sentences. By writing shorter emails using simpler words your email will be received with greater understanding. And that’s the point. If your emails are not understood or misunderstood, why are you wasting your time writing them?
Incorporate some of these tips in your email writing today!
Over the next few weeks, our Trust Me posts will explore the qualities of a caring leader. We explored the first quality – Understanding here. Then we took a look at the second quality – Concern. Today, we discuss the third quality of a caring leader – Communication.
The groundbreaking book In Search of Excellence stressed the concept known as MBWA, “management by walking around.” The concept is taken further in the book A Passion for Excellence:
How good are you? No better than your people and their commitment and participation in the business as full partners, and as business people. The fact that you get them all together to share whatever—results, experiences, recent small successes and the like—at least once every couple of weeks seems to us to be a small price indeed to pay for that commitment and sense of teamwork and family. The “return on investment” is probably far and away the best of any program in the organization.
MBWA stresses getting out of our individual comfort zones and getting to know other people. Whether you attend company-wide meetings or individual private sessions, the lesson is clear: Get out of your office and communicate with your people.
We tend to assume that communication is merely the process of delivering information from one person to another. However, it is much more than just good delivery. Pat Williams writes:
“Communication is a process by which we build relationships and trust, share meaning and values and feelings, and transcend the aloneness and isolation of being distinct, individual souls. Communication is not just a data dump. Communication is connection.”
Communication means being connected with your people. It means getting out of your office into their offices and workspaces. Go.
Ron’s Short Review: There is a lot in here for the professional blogger or journalist but with people from CEO’s to other corporate leaders writing blogs these days, there is a lot of practical advice for writing short. Worth a quick read and outline of what will improve your short writing.
Image source: Mathew Bedworth, Creative Commons
I’ve referred to that line, “High tech, high touch,” from Alvin Tofflers book Future Shock
His term “high tech, high touch” lead into his discussion of one of the antidotes to dealing with future shock and information overload. His point was that as we deal more and more with this intrusion of the globally connected, instant on, information overload, we must also make sure we increase the “high touch” right along with it. This high tech world will not work without high touch, trusting, and personal relationships.
Now another influential voice from the past is adding to the chorus. Ray Ozzie is the inventor of Lotus Notes. Lotus Notes was the first successful and commercially viable email system that Ray and Mitch Kapor brought to the marketplace in the mid to late 1980’s. Ray is the grandfather of email.
One of Ray’s latest ventures is “Talko” that is described as an app that combines text messaging, phone calls, voicemails, videos, and picture messaging.
Why does Ray want to combine all of this text, sound, and pictures? The stated goal is richer communication whether the team is around the world or next door. But one statement of Ray’s really strikes me:
“one of the things I’ve learned over the years about collaboration is that one of the most important elements is empathy.” (Emphasis added.)
Now I’m not going to discount Mr. Ozzie’s ability to come up with a technical solution to empathy. And quite honestly, I hope he makes a good run at it. But my guess is that it will take years of refinements (if at all) to be able to “understand and share the feelings of another” as one definition puts it.
I agree with Ray that empathy is one of the most important elements of collaboration and team building. I just don’t believe you can develop empathy while you’re working remotely on a project regardless of the technical capabilities. Even if “remotely” means you’re in the same building but conduct all of your communication electronically. I believe you have to spend time face-to-face being human beings, not human doings. Establish trust and understanding, then you can function remotely and or electronically and collaborate well. But like any muscle, trust and empathy atrophy over time and must be renewed on a regular basis.
Build trust—then collaborate well.