Welcome to Diamonds To You

Today’s global workforce consists of people from many countries of all ages and beliefs. They are mostly an educated and highly independent workforce. Leading and managing them require skills far beyond what was needed in a more manufacturing and homogeneous workforce.

Working with individuals and organizations of all ages, sizes, and shapes allows me to consult to leaders such as yourself as to how to best manage, motivate, retain and get the most creative and consistently productive results from this diverse group of people—some of whom are located far, far away from you.

This column will offer tips and techniques that address your workplace challenges. I will share with you some of what I’ve learned in my thirty years of consulting experience, and will answer your questions. Please write me and I will answer as many as the column can handle.

As one of my clients said, “As an executive committed to growing world-class teams, I consider ArLyne one of my most cherished ‘secret weapons’ in my toolbox for success.” If you let me, I can be one of your secret weapons as well.

Leaders like yourself are becoming more aware of the need to have managers they can promote who have the skills to deal with people. As one client said, “In spite of their education, which in many cases includes MBA’s, we have difficulty promoting these men and women into positions of management when we identify that they lacked some of the essential ‘soft skills’ required for enhanced responsibilities.”

During my years leading the CEO Leadership Roundtable, I learned that many of my CEO’s had questions about their own style of leadership, which almost always consisted of issues pertaining to people—soft skill issues.

What are soft skills? Funny term, isn’t it? It is used to differentiate between math and science and liberal arts. For me, what I teach can best be described by quoting my client again:

Included in her highly interactive workshops were topics that dealt with diversity, working in a global economy, communication skills, presentation, image, managing meetings, working with your boss, motivating and holding people accountable, persuasion as a tool of project management, styles of learning, management types, and dozens of other topics.

The C level executives interviewed for my book on managing creativity reminded me that there was a huge need in the workplace for good ideas, which they hoped would bubble to the surface. Instead, the ideas were being stifled at the mid-management level. I will discuss this, and strategies for overcoming the problem in future newsletters.

How can I help you? Let me count the ways!

I invite you to use me as a resource. Not only will I briefly answer some of your questions in the newsletter, I will probably answer you in depth by email, or will refer you to articles I’ve written. Recent consulting projects have included:

• Managing in dotted line relationships, such as Project Management Teams. I am currently completing a major article on management by persuasion, and have offered some workshops on this topic.
• Successful communication, accountability, expectations, and trust when managing distant teams. This is especially difficult when dealing with people from several countries. Many of the questions clients ask during my management training relate to this topic.
• Compliance issues such as sexual harassment, discrimination, and diversity. Today’s educated workforce does not want to be browbeaten, but offered this training with respect for them. I don’t believe the typical legal training is as valuable as the highly interactive “what should I do if” type of workshops I offer my clients. They learn why certain things offend certain groups of people—not just that “the law says” or “the lawsuits result in …”
• Managing up the corporate ladder. Even if you are CEO, you are answerable to those above you (your shareholders and your board). How do you best communicate with those who are your boss?
• Board of directors training. During my many years of training boards of all sizes and levels of sophistication, I know that interpersonal skills are profoundly important. The tyranny of pleasantness (another almost-finished article) is taking over teams and the board room. So anxious are we to be thought of as a team player that we fail to speak up when we know something is amiss. Bad decisions are often made in the interest of friendly consensus.

Those of you who know me well, know that I’ve published a few books, and written well over a hundred articles. Some of them are on my website, others can be found by Googling ArLyne Diamond. From time to time I will quote myself and share the link to the article itself for your ease of reference.

Recent publications

• “Managing Sexual Harassment Risks in Government Agencies”
• “Succession Planning” (look for it in the February issue)
• “A Flexible Approach to ADA Compliance” (published in www.thompson.com)
• “What's Creating All the Conflict, and What Can We Do about It?”
• “Marketing And Selling Professional Services Requires Reducing The Decision-Making Risk”

So, how can I help you?

Let me again quote a client:

ArLyne is completely qualified to serve as confidant and mentor for senior, mid-level, and professionally degreed individuals. Her breadth of understanding people, conflicts, motivation, and the business cycle have rather uniquely enabled her to add insight and valuable input into many aspects of driving an organization forward in a fast-paced environment.

Let me be your Aufin—your advisor to Kings.

ArLyne Diamond, Ph.D
ArLyne@DiamondAssociates.net