DDI’s Talent Management Intelligence

Networking Green Eggs and Ham

By Ryan Heinl

My son is two years old and one of his favorite books right now is the  Dr. Seuss classic, Green Eggs and Ham. He likes to read it in box, he likes to read it with a fox…you get the idea. I’ve recently moved my family to Atlanta after living in Toronto for five years, and as I was reading this story to my son for probably the hundredth time it occurred to me that this was especially relevant for my situation. Even though a move like this represents an ocean of stressful change and adjustment it also represented a tremendous amount of opportunity in terms of trying new things, especially in networking.

I’ve been working for DDI for more than 10 years now and while that gives me a tremendous depth of knowledge it also puts me in danger of not focusing in a very deliberate way on expanding my business network, and that could not be a bigger mistake given this recent change. Let me hit just a few points on why:

• The danger is that I’ll just assume that my current network will serve me just as well in this new role as it has in my old one, which is likely not true
• It’s a huge opportunity to expand my network and I’ve got something interesting to say about why I might be reaching out to people (Don’t have to manufacture a reason)
• It’s a great opportunity to do a little internal marketing and educate people on my new role

Sometimes networking is perceived as a  lot of “grinning and gripping” to borrow a phrase from a colleague of mine, but really it’s about expanding your knowledge base through people. You can’t know it all, and so you need to think about who will bring you valuable information and how you can also provide valuable knowledge back to them.  Changing my perspective about the purpose of networking allowed me to break down who I should network with into three categories:

1. Personal – These are close mentors and advisors who help to guide you in your career or role, and potentially help you to navigate organizational politics.
2. Operational – These are the folks who help you to get things done on a day to day basis and probably represent the biggest group in your network.
3. Strategic – These are the industry luminaries and other visionary thinkers who challenge and expand your thinking.

This is a great way to audit your people network and to ensure that your connections are providing you with a well balanced diet of information.  So if you are going into a new role or even taking on just a few new responsibilities, (whether you are in a box, with a fox, in a house, or with a mouse,) don’t pass up the opportunity to expand your network, because chances are that the people you know today won’t be the ones who help you to get the job done tomorrow.

Ryan Heinl is a Senior Consultant at Development Dimensions International (DDI).

Is your HR initiative a Sinking Ship?

By Verity Bissett-Powell

I am fascinated by a recent story which emerged from the granddaughter of Titanic’s Second Officer. Louise Patten has declared that confusion about steering orders was responsible for the ship’s sinking.

According to Mrs Patten, the tragedy occurred due to a change in shipping communications from sail to steam. Two steering systems were in operation at that time and they were the complete opposite of one another. Rather crucially, a command to turn ‘hard a-starboard’ meant turn the wheel right under one system and left under the other. The result of which was a helmsman turning Titanic towards the iceberg, with tragic results. The transition from Rudder Orders (steam ships) to Tiller Orders (sailing ships) had not been executed and communicated effectively.

Of course this is a very extreme example, but I started to wonder - how many times has a change been poorly implemented and had cruel consequences? My friend put petrol in his diesel car because the owner’s manual has “one size fits all” ambiguous text. A hotel worker taking several reservations before being told that the system was out of date and new software was being launched shortly. I was without an ATM card for a month because my bank was merged with another and the admin staff was overwhelmed. Just think, how many times have you personally experienced a poorly executed change?

None of you need to read another blog talking about the tough economic years we’re recently “enjoyed”, and I am sure you’re all encountering the knock-on effects…work smarter, do more with less, etc. Whatever the slogan, it all means changes to the talent within your organisation. If you are the one executing such transformations, just take a few minutes and ask yourself: Is your change implementation smooth sailing or a sinking ship?

Okay. Now take a deep breath and read on. Here are 5 recommendations for smoothly and successfully implementing a new talent management initiative:

1. Communication. Plan in advance how the initiative be communicated and consider how to sustain interest. How can you involve key stakeholders? How will you get the message down to the front-line in a personal way?
2. Accountability. Clearly identify roles and accountabilities for all key stakeholders. This means defining what each individual is accountable for, establishing measures of success, and creating a plan to cascade the accountabilities down to those who will be expected to make things happen.
3. Skills. Develop the skills of each key player in the implementation.  Realization often falls short because those who are accountable for execution don’t have the skills for implementation.
4. Alignment. Ally existing processes and systems to reinforce the desired outputs of your change. Is there a development or training system in place to support the initiative? What systems are in place to recognise and reward people during the life cycle of the change?
5. Measurement. Consider why you are doing this in the first place. How will you know that you were successful? Provide clear lead and lag measures on the desired outputs of the change.

Please note: these are not “nice to have” considerations, they are essential items which should appear on every planning agenda, for every change initiative, in every organisation. Don’t let poor change execution tarnish, what should be, a fantastic journey.

For more information on the Titanic revelation, click HERE.

 

Verity Bissett-Powell is a Business Development Executive in DDI UK.

The Competitive Advantage You Probably Overlook

By Victor L. Magdaraog

Once again, the strategic planning season is upon a majority of companies. It’s time to dust off those planning manuals and scorecards. As has been practiced for years, companies will look at the market, customers, competition and some of the usual suspects that might just jump in and grab market share.

After reviewing these external factors, companies craft their strategies, build new scorecards and plan for resources they require including that other resource called talent. In the process they continue to search for that ever elusive competitive advantage. That single element which will provide the firm the unique advantage in the market.

Unfortunately, this external view of strategy is not the best approach that will give an organization its strongest competitive strategy. In my view, the best place to begin with strategy formulation is to look internally and look intensely at the firm’s talent. Talent is the best source of competitive advantage. Jay Barney and Delwyn Clark in their book Resource-based Theory, refers to characteristics that are “imperfectly imitable” as a source of sustained competitive advantage. A talent view of strategy and the firm guarantees that the company will discover that “imperfectly imitable” dimension. To paraphrase John F. Kennedy, the talent of which I refer to is not a set of competencies, but rather a mix of individual talent – leaders, value creators and individual performers who all contribute to realize the company’s aspirations. It is this mix of talent that is imperfectly imitable.

Just how does one start with strategy formulation using talent as source of its competitive advantage? Every individual talent has his or her own unique markers in a manner of speaking. These markers are represented by the individual’s success profile – competencies, experiences, knowledge and personal attributes. These markers form the individual’s talent DNA. With detailed understanding of these success profiles, one can then understand the value that individuals are capable of creating. Paul Romer, an economist, posits that the new factors of economic growth are people, ideas and things. People develop ideas which in turn are converted into things – products, services, intellectual property. These individuals then with their unique success profiles create ideas which a firm can convert to products, services or intellectual capital.

As these individual success profiles are consolidated across the firm, the organization’s DNA appears in the shape of intellectual assets, capabilities, structural assets and relational assets. Intellectual assets are knowledge developed by individuals that the firm is able to patent or claim exclusive rights over.

Capabilities are organizational competencies that individual members have designed. Structural assets are processes and methodologies developed by employees , while relational assets are customer relationships, connections and networks established by associates over time. Relational assets include corporate culture as well.

It is this unique set of assets, assets which are the consolidation of individual success profiles that are the best source of that unique competitive advantage.

It is best to start your strategic planning process with a talent audit. A process to appraise the talent mix (leaders, value creators and individual performers) who all constitute the firm. These individuals have contributed to the firm’s accumulated wealth represented by the four assets – intellectual, capabilities, structural and relational. It is this wealth that is the source of that rare and imperfectly imitable competitive advantage.

When was the last time you took stock of your organization’s talent mix and the wealth they have accumulated? Before jumping into an external scan, take a long look at what you have inside the firm. You will be surprised with the wealth of talent that surrounds you.

Victor L. Magdaraog is a Vice President with Development Dimensions International (DDI) in the Philippines

Cast Your Vote at the Office

By Mike Hoban

Election season is here in the U.S. and candidates for local, state and national offices are out stumping for votes. So if the democracy thing is such a great idea, why not elect our bosses at work? And why not vote for our most senior organizational leaders? 

Preposterous? Perhaps. Impractical? Way so. But it’s also a provocative question which can lead to interesting conversations at the neighborhood barbecue gathering about what we would value in our leaders if we could indeed vote them in or out of their positions. 

And before being too dismissive, let’s recall that there are some quasi-democratic traditions in the workplace. In Germany, there is a law which provides for the arrangement called “co-determination” (Mitbestimmung), in which worker representatives are elected to the Board for all companies with more than 500 employees. Other European countries have Works Councils with similar employee representation. Closer to home, in many Employee Stock Ownership Plans (ESOPs) in which the company shares are owned by the employees, there are provisions for elected employee advisory boards.  And then-UAW head Douglas Fraser served on the Board of Chrysler Corp. in the early 1980s as a union representative.  

Voting of leaders also comes into play with professional or affinity associations, co-ops and unions. With publicly traded companies, the Board of Directors is elected by shareholders in a balloting process. And let’s not forget that most athletic teams elect team captains from the peer group and in a few organizations with empowered teams, peers elect their team leaders. 

So there are many successful examples – Mitbestimmung has been in place for over 35 years - of how the voting process is used for electing organizational or team leaders.  However – and this is a big “however” – none of those examples are about electing someone’s day-to-day manager and all of the dynamics that go with it, such as positional power, decision making authority and accountability. With all of the elected representative examples above, it is about representation, which focuses on policy and organizational choice-making.  Peoples’ direct supervisors or company leaders are not elected in those organizations.  And the team captain role on athletic teams is largely an honorary or ceremonial role with no true decision making authority. 

But for just a few blog-minutes, let’s play that fun game called “What If?” What if we could elect our bosses, what kind of a person would you vote for to be your manager or to lead the company?  With public office elections, voters sometimes describe their ideal candidate in rich detail but then behind a closed curtain punch the ticket for someone else who might not be so ideal, but someone who can represent their personal interests more effectively.

So how would those personal interests and preferences play out at the workplace ballot box for you? How would you balance your personal preferences in a boss with what might be best for the overall company?  Would you re-elect the boss you have if he/she were up for election? Of course, it also depends on who else is running and whether negative campaign ads were permitted. 

It’s an interesting and provocative question and young newbie employees without much workplace context would likely tend to have very different ideas about who they would elect as a boss. Ask some young ‘uns that question and listen to what they say about it.Many would probably like the possibilities of voting for one’s boss as it aligns with their “open source” and free-to-act generational value system.       

Finally, check out this blog, which raises a similar question – who in your company besides your boss would you like to work for. It makes you think about identifying effective leaders in your organization.

Mike Hoban is a senior consultant for Development Dimensions International (DDI).  

Today’s Leader – A View from the World Business Forum

By Mark Dembo

At the World Business Forum yesterday, one of the ongoing mantras from speakers ranging from Jim Collins to Jack Welch to Charlene Li to Joseph Grenny was that the nature of leadership today is different.  Shifts in the global economy, changes in technology, and generational shifts require a much more open and transparent leadership style than the “command and control” era of days gone by.

One of the best examples of this changing shift was highlighted by Charlene Li, one of the world’s foremost authorities on social media and author of the books “Groundswell” and “Open Leadership.”  While her talk was not about leadership per se, her discussion about how social media is changing the business landscape provides many clues about how leaders need to change and evolve in today’s world.

What exactly is the connection between social media and leadership, you ask?   As Li describes, many organizations and CEOs are scared to death of social media – afraid that if they get involved, or let their employees get involved with Twitter, Facebook, and the like, they will lose control. She says there’s a prevailing “mindset that says “‘I’ve got to control everything in order to get things done – the resources, the messages, the people.’ But the reality is that we do business today in a very interconnected world. Even inside a company you have to collaborate and coordinate with people who don’t necessarily report to you.  To do this efficiently, you’re much better off opening up all those channels and silos that have traditionally held power, and having smooth information sharing back and forth across the organization.”

Wow – that rings a bell that goes far beyond just how to embrace social media. >It gets at the very fabric of what leaders need to do to create “Great Organizations” as Jim Collins talks about.

Openness, transparency, authenticity, and collaboration – all themes that loomed large today at the World Business Forum.   That’s how work gets done, and how great companies are made.

Joseph Grenny, author of “Influencer” further echoed this point when he said that strategy is WHAT an organization is going to do, and Influence is HOW leaders need to get things done. Influence is not about using a carrot or a stick – it’s about understanding the behaviors that lead people to act in a particular way, and then tapping into personal, social, and structural sources of motivation to guide people to new or different behaviors.If leaders learn to become better influencers they are far better able to affect change in their organizations.

Ah, then so if I’m good at influencing people, then I can “motivate” people, right?  Well, not exactly.  As Jim Collins discussed at the HR Masters lunch, “great leaders don’t spend time motivating people – they spend time hiring self-motivating people.”

If you look at these varied remarks this start to paint a picture of 21^st Century Leadership – open, transparent, influencers who understand the rapidly changing world around them, and who possess a nimbleness to keep changing and evolving to new shifts in economies, technologies, and complexities.

Stay tuned for more updates as the World Business Forum unfolds, and follow our live twitter feeds throughout the day. 

Mark Dembo is a manager for Development Dimensions International (DDI).

World Business Forum - Day One

By Mark Dembo

Jim Collins kicked off the World Business Forum today, (over 4000 people attending from 65 countries) discussing the four phases of organizational decline from greatness, while discussing the “antitheses” of these factors. At the heart of his message: becoming great, and sustaining greatness comes down to one thing: Leadership – and that even if you stray from the path, it’s (almost) never too late to turn things around – if you can break away from the hubris and unbridled personal ambition that often derail. A real message of hope – and a welcome start to the conference. In my mind, a great signal that the mood of business is shifting.

One of the key take-aways from his talk was a to-do list – a top-ten list if you will, for surviving and thriving.  These are some great take-aways, regardless of rank, title or level in an organization.

1.    Do your diagnostics – assess where you are on the “Good to Great” journey – a free tool can be found on his website.

2.    Focus on Building pockets of greatness, don't focus on career. If you build those pockets of greatness, career success (and organizational success) will follow. 

3.    Ask “what percentage of key seats are filled with the right people?” And, “what are your plans to get as close to 100% that you can?”

4.    Double your questions to statements ratio.

5.    Ask yourself: “How is the world changing and what are the brutal facts?” Do a brutal facts inventory.”

6.    Turn off your electronic gadgets - create white space for deep thinking and analysis at least once every two weeks.

7.    Decide what to Stop Doing: We can only manage our time - not our work, and what we choose to spend our time on is one of the most important decisions we can make. 

8.    Make commitment to get inside your own personal hedgehog.  Collins talks about finding the “sweet spot” of doing what you’re passionate about, what you’re good at (or “genetically encoded to do”), and that can make a difference in the world.

9.    Stop doing "titles" – don’t focus on a “job”, rather focus on responsibilities.

10.    Set a “Big Hairy Audacious Goal” for 15-20 years in future based on your “hedgehog.”  Focus on being useful, not successful. 

Follow our live tweets from the WBF and stay tuned here for more updates on trends and observations over the next two days.

Mark Dembo is a manager for Development Dimensions International (DDI).

Rescuing the 'Accidental Manager'

By Kris Routch

The Washington Post’s leadership blog “Post Leadership” published a piece about the accidental manager—individuals who were promoted into mid-level leadership positions without preparation—and even interest—in the job and the additional responsibility.

We’ve seen a lot of research on this topic this year—and the blog post referenced DDI’s own research conducted this year on mid-level leadership—and how this management population has been impacted by the economic events of the last several years.   

Perhaps the biggest thing impacting this group and the roles that they have assumed can be summed up in one word; complexity.  Just think for a moment of the levels of complexity faced by today’s business leaders;  systems complexity, organizational complexity, global complexity, partnership complexity, supply chain complexity, not to mention our  increasingly  complex personal and professional networks. few.  In fact, in a recent IBM study of 1500 CEO’s, complexity was cited as the biggest challenge that today’s CEO’s and their companies are facing.

If CEO’s are worrying about complexity, imagine where that leaves our mid-level leaders who live in the middle of this maelstrom. It reminds me of a  time when my grandfather and I could open the hood of a car  and easily see how everything worked inside, how every issue could be easily diagnosed and fixed, and how everything could be put back together again just the way that we found it. But then engine technology changed and one day I opened the hood of my new car and my grandfather stared blankly at the confusing, complex, computer-controlled, hi-tech engine that lay in front of him and sadly looked at me and let me know that there was nothing he could do to help me anymore. 

I think of this story as we talk to more and more mid-level leaders who have found themselves staring into that proverbial engine that represents their current role in the organization and wondering how it ever got so complicated that they are having trouble figuring out where they start to try to unravel the complexity in front of them. To make matters worse, when they turn to their senior leaders for help, too many times their senior leaders stare back at them with that same look my grandfather once gave me as they realize that the mid-level role they once had wasn’t nearly as complex as today’s role.  

Our research has shown that most organizations continue to struggle with finding ways to effectively address the challenges facing their mid-level leaders and, as a result, these “accidental managers” continue to drift in their sea of complexity yearning for the good old days when it was far easier to make sense of it all.

Kris Routch is an executive consultant with Development Dimensions International (DDI).

HR: There’s an App for That

By Bradford Thomas

Greetings from the 13th Annual HR Technology conference in Chicago.

What a difference a few years makes. Three years ago I was walking through McCormick Place searching for cell coverage.  This year I'm on the floor of the conference trying to use the tiny keyboard on my Droid to write this blog.

What I'm seeing at the conference this year is the beginning of a technology shift within HR—one that will definitely make the life of HR practitioners much easier. Social media and smart phone applications are driving this shift . . .

Read the entire post on Brad's guest blog on SmartBlog on Workforce.

Bradford Thomas is a manager at Development Dimensions International (DDI).