Diamonds to You

HI:

What a wonderfully cool summer this is turning out to be.  When in New York last week, the weather was mild – indeed cool – and perfect.  My business there went very well and some of the conversations I had about scaling up will be the basis for one of the articles in this issue. 

Being in New York was pure pleasure.  I got to enjoy the city I love, visit with family I adore, and even see an incredible play – which I recommend strongly to one and all.  When you can, see Spring Awakening.

The weather here has been relatively cool as well.  This is one of the milder summers in a long while and I am enjoying it.  I don’t do well in heat.

While you are reading this I will be in another cool area – the UK.  I’m going on a combination of business and pleasure.  

All of this “Cool” travel has limited my time this summer.  So, we are going to combine the July and August newsletter into one.  This is it.

Retainers & Consortiums

I thought I’d remind you that in addition to contracting with me for daily or hourly services, there are two ways you can save money.,

• A monthly retainer, of at least 10 hours per month, allows for extra hours, thereby creating a discount in your hourly rate.

• You can gather colleagues, friends, business associates and create a consortium – and I can meet with your group regularly at  a group rate, thereby costing each member of the consortium considerably less in consulting fees.

I really thrive on your referrals to me.  Keep them coming!

Scaling UP

While discussing some of my consulting projects with a colleague, he remarked that one of the times when I am of the most value to my clients is when they are scaling up.  I agree.

When in startup mode, companies are fun, friendly, and everyone feels fulfilled.  Each member of the team has been carefully hand-selected and because of their shared values, friendship, and goals, each will pitch in and do whatever work is needed to get the job done and meet their combined goals.

As they grow, they bring in new people, and now comes the time to create a structure that will be informative, helpful, and flexible.  It can’t be too tight, or it will stifle initiative and creativity.  It can’t be too loose because that causes confusion, lack of cohesion and chaos.

Scaling up requires the development of corporate vision, mission and values.  The corporate culture and values need to be determined, taught, rewarded, and people need to be frequently reminded of them.  Cultures develop whether you carefully design them, or default.  You may as well define those you wish to see carried out.

Managers need to be trained, rewards and recognitions designed so that you get the best ideas, performance, internal and external customer service, motivation, morale, loyalty and longevity.  These don’t come about by accident.

The issue of job descriptions and job requirements needs to be re-visited.Hiring managers and Human Resource people need to be re-trained to get away from what I think of as a laundry list of requirements and come to realize they are seeking talent – talent of all kinds.  These candidates might come from “the worst schools” instead of only “the best.”   B and even C students are sometimes better and more talented employees than the A folk, who are sometimes too dedicated to winning and being perfect.  4 ½ years experience might be just as effective as “a minimum of 5 years experience.” 

Diversity becomes a critical issue.  Can your hiring managers see past the cultures in which they were raised to find the talented people available from those cultures that look and behave differently?

Hiring managers and recruiters/interviewers from HR need to work together to sort through resumes so that the best come to the top – not the most mediocre and conventional.

Policy, procedures, process improvement, even the filing system needs to be evaluated and improved so that the company can indeed scale up successfully.

All of this takes re-thinking. 

This is the time for planned Organizational Development.

Project Management:  Process Improvement-Streamlining-Re-engineering and Decision-Making

What follows comes from some of the handouts I use in some of my management training courses.

Parameters, Values and Priorities

One of my favorite tools to use when trying to decide these issues is DeBono’s Six Thinking Hats.  It helps keep the focus on one area at a time.  Here’s one example of areas needing to be evaluated and weighted.

Cost-benefit analysis is only one element in decision-making.  Other elements might include: 

• employee growth, development and motivation,
• quality (are we building a BMW, Cadillac, Oldsmobile, Chevrolet, Volkswagen, etc.?)
• community and/or consumer buy-in,
• aesthetics,
• feasibility,
• safety/security, and
• other options which can be determined at the outset of the project strategic design.

Process Improvement – Streamlining – Re-Engineering

• In order to be successful, buy-in is needed at several levels within the organization.  Committee chairs should meet with the CEO and other top executives before proceeding further.

• Get assistance in picking the right people for the committee.  Use other people – not on the committee – as specific content experts when you need them.

• Parameters for engagement need to be established.  What is the proper purview of the committee?  What can it and what can it not tackle?

• The committee needs a Mission Statement, approved by upper management.

• Sell-it.  Meet with various levels of management.  Make presentations at the staff meetings of division heads, department heads, etc.  Get buy-in from many levels in the organization in addition to the top.

• When selecting your committee try to select from all departments and many layers of the organization.  Select those who are able to see the value of the process, the theory and the details.  You need some decision-makers in this group. 

• Do some team building designed specifically to get your team members to accept each other as being helpful to the process.  During this process, give them permission to cross turf lines, be informal and make suggestions.  This is often times the most important and the most difficult part of the process.

• Create large charts showing the values and parameters so that all decisions can be made within them.  It makes the decision making process much easier.

• Majority rule is not the most effective tool to use for decisions of this nature.  Allow for plenty of discussion and really work to build consensus.

• Always tackle the simple things first.  Negotiation almost always begins with those issues easy to solve.  This creates a warmer atmosphere, a commitment to stay with the process and goodwill.

• Don’t add to the mess.  Reduce it.  Think about eliminating unnecessary forms, procedures, paper-work, in-basket loss of time and redundancy.

• CYA is not a good enough reason for a particular extraneous process.

• Remember the 80-20 rule.  Don’t make a procedure just to protect the one in a thousand eventuality.

• Yes, the computer can simplify many processes, in theory eliminating the need for lots of forms and inter-departmental mail.  However, it can also be a complicated and confusing tool – as well as a very demanding mistress.  Find the balance.

More about this in the next issue.

Managing for Creativity – Part #2

At the risk of sounding like Dilbert, I’d like to suggest all executives look at the physical space they create and ask themselves whether working conditions for your employees are conducive to casual meetings, creativity, innovation, and comfort.

Most of the cubicle configurations in many of the larger offices I visit make me think of loneliness, hiding, prison cells, and the pretence of privacy.

The worst one I saw was here in Santa Clara at a very high-class and wealthy company.  Their design consisted of grey steel and grey plaid fabric.  It was cold and hard - with cubes in long rows with narrow corridors between them.  The tiny conference rooms had a design that looked like prison bars.  I would have hated to have to work there daily.

Years ago when consulting to the satellite sales office of an international semiconductor company, I saw another great example of space mis-used. 

The setting was a long narrow rectangular space with one window at the front of the narrower side of the rectangle.  The front door and reception area were on one side of this window.  The office manager had designed her space to be along the rest of the window, blocking the light from the remainder of the office area.

The administrative staff had desks in cubes lined up along one long wall.  Interestingly enough, people who needed to communicate with each other were not seated near each other.  They all had to get up to be observed by the office manager before they could have a face-to-face conversation with each other.

The office manager managed to foster an environment of coldness and distrust.  People were reluctant to get up to talk with each other, fearing she would think they were goofing off.  The space was dark and only desk lights lit the area for individual workers – another incentive to keep them at their desks.

Changing the configurations changed attitudes.

With corporate headquarter’s permission we changed the configuration, allowing the office manager to have a much larger space, but along the wall opposite the existing cubicles, opening up the window space to brighten everyone’s areas.

I’ve also helped clients  re-arrange cubicles so that there was a central meeting place between them which allowed people to talk with each other.
Bruno Bettleheim, a famous Psychologist wrote about children finding comfort when sitting in the “in between spaces.”  Specific rooms have specific functions, but hallways, staiwells, stairs, are all in between places where one can sit and dream.

In the business world we need more in between spaces for casual conversation, daydreaming, brainstorming, and “what ifing.”

At the Whitney-Hewett Museum in New York last week I saw a design for a circular seating area with high back chairs so that groups of people could meet together in a quite corner and have a private conversation.

When visiting an international design firm in New York, I saw with pleasure the new offices they created.  Desks were on the periphery, with low cubicle walls and lots of shared light.  In the center were large shared work spaces where teams of people could get together to talk or work on blueprints.

Think about the space you create!  Be sure you allow lots of room for casual conversation.

More about creativity in the next issue.

Book Recommendation

I don’t normally do this – but I finished a book that was so interesting and so well written that I am recommending it to everyone.  Read:  My Half of the Sky.  The author, Jana McBurney-Lin is an American woman married to a Chinese man.  She and her family lived in China and Singapore and she wrote about what she learned – through the eyes and experiences of a young woman coming into her own.

Mao told women they had to hold up their half of the sky.  This young woman tries and the book is an exquisite story about her transitioning from Communist China to a modicum of free choice; from her father’s dictates, to her own decisions.  It is truly well worth reading.

Prior Newsletters

Several people have asked for information about my prior newsletters.  Rather than list all the articles here, let me refer you to my website, where Pete has published them.  (Pete is my great computer guru.)  To find these newsletters please visit:  http://diamondassociates.net/articles/Newsletters.shtml

Recent Publications

Four of my articles have been published in dozens of e-magazines and newsletters.  These articles are being published so frequently that I can’t list all of the references.  Instead, I suggest you Google:  ArLyne Diamond.

• Real World Solutions: Hiding Disability Facts Leads To Misunderstandings, in Thompson’s ADA Compliance Guide, August 2007, Col. 18, #8.
• Team Buidling Strategies, in Outsourcing, WORDlabs MEDIA, Kuala Lumpur., June-July 2007.
  
  
• Building Trust in Distant Teams, in Management Issues Feb. 20, 2007.

• Workplace Conflict Resolution:  What’s Creating Workplace Conflict and 9 Easy Ways to Resolve it appeared in Impact Articles:  The Business and Coaching Network on January 26, 2007   With my permission, this article will also appear in a series of newsletters created and marketed by Haley Marketing Group to their staffing industry clients.

My two published books are available at www.ProductivePublications.com.

• Training Your Board of Directors:
  A Manual for the CEOs, Board Members, Administrators and Executives of Corporations, Associations, Non-Profit and Religious Organizations
• The “Please” and “Thank You” of Fundraising for Non-Profits:
  Fifteen Essential Ingredients for Success

So, how can I help you?

You spoke to your audience with great sensitivity and empathy and shared many excellent concepts.  Your dialogue with the various Pro-Match members was truly fabulous.  Not only did you come up with workable solutions for painful situations, but your advice was real and gul level, pertinent to their individual needs.           
Helen Gracon, Facilitator – ProMatch

Your degree of knowledge on the subject matter – Sexual Harassment, Myth vs. Facts – was extremely impressive and your delivery of the material equally skillful.  The feedback from our employees has been wonderful.  Thank you for making a subject that, in someone else’s hands, could have been very awkward. Not only was it not awkward, but I have actually received requests for additional training sessions, from those same employees who felt they didn’t need it in the first place. 
Ellen R. Fox, Personnel Director, Tichenor Media Systems, Inc.

 

 

Let me be your Aufin—your advisor to Kings.

 

ArLyne Diamond, Ph.D
ArLyne@DiamondAssociates.net