Formium Development

Author: Formium

  • Ensuring performance improvement: a review of Learning Transfer at Work by Paul Matthews

    Ensuring performance improvement: a review of Learning Transfer at Work by Paul Matthews

    How do you ensure that learning and development activities generate the performance change you want? This question is at the heart of Paul Matthews’ readable and engaging book. A strength of the book is that the messages are equally appropriate for line managers supporting their team members to develop as they are for L&D professionals wanting to improve their value to the organisation.

    Paul Matthews gets to the heart of the matter – how do you ensure that learning is enacted in the workplace, and that this change in meaningful, lasting and effective? From this flow a range of other questions and ideas, with a common theme of learning and development as part of a workflow, in which a formal training workshop is one of many elements. This requires a strong and active partnership between staff member, line manager and L&D team throughout the learning intervention.

    The author adopts an unusual structure, the first 90 pages covering the theory and ideas in a traditional structure. He challenges why learning transfer activity is not undertaken, and explores elements of learning theory and behaviour change, including how memories form and how behaviours are triggered and adapted.

    The second 130 pages are structured as bullet points and short paragraphs – asking direct questions, providing external examples/contributions and presenting previously established ideas in a different format. This theory first, application/engagement second approach mirrors the flipped classroom approach he espouses.

    Key messages addressed include:

    Is training the right answer?

    Paul argues the importance of ‘performance consultancy’ – ensuring that all other opportunities to improve performance have been explored, and that the business benefits and sought outcomes are clearly articulated before a L&D solution is commissioned.

    You need a coalition

    To ensure successful behaviour change and performance improvement you need the involvement of line and senior managers before, during and after the intervention. You need to support and develop an organisational/team culture that supports development, mentorship and invests time in learning transfer activities such as coaching, reflection, on-the-job practice. You can gain buy-in through clarity around the exact business improvements that the programme will generate.

    It is a 4-day programme, not a workshop plus pre/post work

    Each workflow element is important and necessary in its own right, not an optional extra to the workshop. This message is as important for line managers as for the participants as it sets out the expectations that they will need to be involved in designing/supporting activities to embed the learning in the workplace, such as practising the new skills/behaviours in a safe setting.

    Begin with the end in mind

    What is the sought outcome of the learning activity? How will you know it has been successful? Paul Matthews challenges the attitude that successful L&D delivery is a well-attended workshop with positive feedback sheets, instead arguing that measurement of outcomes in terms of participant behaviour and business impact is fundamental to proving intervention effectiveness, as well as return on investment and value for the organisation.

    Workshop attendance does not equal behaviour change

    Exploration of how we learn, how we respond to triggers and form new habits is fundamental to designing a programme to generate the sought business outcomes. The exploration of Dr Ina Weinbauer-Heidel’s 12 Levers of Transfer Effectiveness provides readers with a clear framework to consider how far their L&D interventions support learning transfer.

    Paul Matthews’ selection and effective presentation of fascinating insights from a wide range of psychology and neuroscience research is at the heart of this book, and provides practitioners with a range of mechanisms to ensure that learning is embedded and enacted in the world outside the classroom.

    Buy the book from Amazon UK or Amazon USA

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  • It’s good to talk…

    It’s good to talk…

    “Meetings are the bane of everyone’s life. No-one likes meetings. Nothing ever gets done”

    This appears to be the mantra of many a corporate warrior, and it is always interesting to see how different companies and industries try to break this view. So I particularly enjoyed an article in The Guardian newspaper about team meetings and the weird and wonderful ideas that are being used to keep them relevant and on-track.

    While some of these ideas look like they could only really exist in Silicon Valley, there is a consistent message – how do you make your meetings productive, relevant, engaging and on-time? And while this question has been kicking around forever – probably since the first cave-people sat down to work out how they were going to kill a woolly mammoth – it is even more relevant in today’s world of remote teams, flexible work patterns, video and phone conferences.

    I do a lot of work helping teams with their performance, and in my career have sat through my fair share of meetings. I will share with you my simple formula for successful meetings – plan,clarify, facilitate, support.

    1. Plan

    Whether you’re leading the meeting or not, time spent planning pays dividends. What are you going to get out of the meeting? Are you going to share information, for ideas, for decisions, to build team spirit, or to observe your team’s performance? What do you need to make it run smoothly? Who needs to be there and what role will each participant play?

    2. Clarify

    Make sure you and everyone in the meeting knows the purpose:

    • Why are we here? What is the purpose of the meeting as a whole, and each of the items on the agenda? Make sure everyone knows what is going on – having clear goals gives you structure, keeps everyone on track, and stops people going off on cross-purposes.
    • Why am I here? So often people switch off because they don’t think what is being discussed is relevant to them, or they don’t see the bigger picture. Take time to ensure each item is presented so that everyone feels involved and buys into the conversation.

    3. Facilitate, don’t dictate

    It is a team meeting, not your meeting. If you take more of a back seat you can encourage:

    • Ownership and personal development by having your team members take ‘meeting management’ roles such as chairing the meeting, time keeping or taking minutes.
    • Accountability by having the focus of the meeting on team members reporting back on their performance, on the agenda items, on their issues.
    • Group accountability by encouraging all members to ask questions of each other. A team meeting is not a series of conversations between you and your team members.

    4. Support each other

    You might need first to do some team building or thinking about how to structure the meeting for this to work, especially if you have a really competitive team! Think about how you can build the meeting around getting support from:

    • You as the team leader
    • Each other
    • The organisation (e.g. training or feeding upwards on changes to policy / practice)

    Focusing on support in this way helps you keep the meeting focused on positive solutions, not complaints and negativity.

    The missing factors

    There’s also another really important point that I think some of the ideas and attitudes in the article are missing. They focus so much on ensuring the meeting is not wasting time, there is a risk that this is overplayed to the detriment of social interaction. Especially with dispersed teams or infrequent meetings, don’t neglect the social side.

    What could you do to help your team members get to know and trust each other?

    • Always be in the room 5 minutes early to have a quick chat
    • Occasionally add in a team building exercise: quick quiz, craft challenge, presentation from each member on a non-work topic.

    And it’s not just a loss of social interaction. If project team meetings adopt the extreme position of ‘leave if it is not relevant to you’ you miss out the chance for innovative thinking or learning from each other. Or your meeting could come up with a great idea which falls apart immediately another department looks at it.

    Help is at hand

    If you want to know more about developing teams, I’m leading a session hosted by the Chartered Management Institute in London, on 19th November. I’ll share the techniques, models and ideas that I’ve used to help managers build high-performing teams. You don’t have to be a CMI member to attend, just follow the link: Developing Successful Teams

    For an engaging and practical guide on team effectiveness and collaboration, I’d recommend starting with Patrick Lencioni’s Overcoming the Five Dysfunctions of a Team [Amazon UK affiliate link]

    If you want bespoke help on effective team meetings and building strong teams, then click here to see how you can work with me and the coaches and facilitators at Formium Development.

    FREE STUFF !

    Our Positive Team Meeting checklist has really helpful guidance that is easy-to-use and practical.

    If you’re interested in team building, then check out our 10 Actions to build a strong team – top tips for helping you use a strengths approach to build better teams.

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  • Avoiding the stuffed anteater: striving for authenticity

    Avoiding the stuffed anteater: striving for authenticity

    In recent times we’ve grown used to the idea of ‘fake news’ and doctored photos, and even been warned about technological advances enabling ‘fake video’ – but the story a while ago of a photographer accused of using a stuffed anteater in a competition entry was sadly amusing. It was followed up by a couple of articles about the cheats regularly used in wildlife photography… like the bizarre practice of putting ants in the freezer. And all this is in contrast to – and possibly the reason for – the demand for authenticity that is current in brands, politics and a host of leadership and management books (and a fair few blog posts, too).

    And this poses a dilemma for many people. We’re pretty good at looking at other people and weighing up how authentic they are. But how do you ensure that you’re being authentic, and not inadvertently being, to paraphrase Holden Caulfield, a phony? How do we remain authentic whilst operating within the parameters of corporate polices, or when the responsibilities of our role means we have to step away from our usual habits? I’m thinking about those disciplinary meetings, difficult conversations, and other situations where as a manager you might have to act in a certain way that doesn’t come naturally – ‘feeling the fear and doing it anyway’ as Susan Jeffers said.

    In short, as managers and leaders we don’t always act naturally, but we should always act authentically. One of the ways in which I help leaders to do this is through using your strength, not just those things you are good at, but which energise and fulfill you. This is the key difference between strengths and skills (your ability to do something well). If you are using your strengths you will be ‘going with the grain’ – by working with what comes naturally to you, you will be authentic.

    You might ask what does this mean in practice? If I have strengths of Perspective, Hope or Prudence, how is that going to get me through a team meeting, or performance review? In his recent interview with me for People and Purpose – the Positive Leadership Journal, Ryan Niemiec of the VIA institute described how you can look at each task you have to complete from the position of your top five signature strengths, and planning out how you could actively use your strengths as you complete your tasks. Here’s a very basic example of using Curiosity and Kindness strengths:

    The great thing about using strengths is for those situations where you are less confident, where you have to step outside of your comfort zone. Sit down and plan ahead – how can I use what I’m good at to help me in this situation. This means that you will be authentic even if you are having to ‘play a role’ of manager.

    The other thing you can do is work with the strengths of your team. If you’re getting them to align what they do with their strengths, then they will experience that sense of fulfillment for themselves. So not just increasing productivity, but reducing the likelihood that you’ll come in one day and find they’ve used a stuffed anteater…

     

    Here’s some further things you can do:

     

    Watch

    See Ryan Niemiec’s interview in People and Purpose – the Positive Leadership Journal for more about how you can harness strengths.

    There’s a video and we’ve also written up a summary to help you.

     

     

     

    Read

    For practical information and guidance about helping your team find and harness their strengths, we’d recommend the Strength-Focused Guide to Leadership by Mike Roarty and Kathy Toogood.

    You can read the summary of the key ideas on our website to see if you’d like it.

     

     

    Investigate

    If you want help in finding your strengths, there are a number of different tools available, which use a series of questions to identify your relative strengths.

    To simplify thing, we’ve summarised five of these tools: Investigate strengths models

     

     

     

     

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  • Levelling the Playing Field

    Levelling the Playing Field

    My eye was caught some time ago by an article in The Atlantic lauding tech company Slack for its diversity. In a sector that is traditionally white and male they have reached unprecedented levels of female and ethnic staff members. This is good news; all research studies show that more diverse workforces have better performance and innovation, and any steps in the right direction should be applauded. But I was surprised to see that many of their ground-breaking solutions were techniques that anyone in the UK public sector for the last 20 years would have recognised. Yes, Slack had discovered the benefits of competencies, levelling the playing field (e.g. anonymous code review), asking candidates the same questions and providing training for their interviewers.

    The article is also interesting because it repositions these known techniques within the new language and thinking on unconscious bias. As a trainer I’ve gone from delivering courses on “Equal Opportunities” to “Diversity”, “Diversity and Inclusion” and now “Unconscious Bias”, reflecting the development of ideas and theories. I remember that the reaction of many participants to courses on “Equal opportunities” was on the lines of ‘I’m not a racist – so everything’s already okay’ or discussion about myths of political correctness such as town councils ‘replacing’ Christmas with Winterval.

    The reactions I get nowadays from course participants on Unconscious Bias is a lot more thoughtful. People are really interested that despite their intention to be non-discriminatory, they have complex and varied assumptions that they may not be aware of. The brain’s use of heuristics and short-cuts has received a lot more attention in recent years, popularised by writers such as Daniel Kahneman. The training I deliver nowadays focuses on learning how to respond, not to react – slowing down so that our rational System 2 thinking can kick in and take over from our System 1 emotional responses. It is about tapping into reality, not your own baggage and preconceptions.

    So ideas such as asking everyone the same interview questions, or using anonymous assessments can now be seen in a new light. Previously it was about levelling the playing field to avoid active discrimination – now it is about using a level playing field to prevent our unconscious biases from coming into effect.

    For more reading and thinking…

    Thinking Fast and Slow [Amazon UK affiliate link]

    If you want to know more about the science behind unconscious bias, then this really is the best place to start. Daniel Kahneman’s 2012 book is a fascinating introduction into System 1 and System 2 thinking, the mental shortcuts we take, and how we are more influenced by unconscious thinking than we would like to admit.

     

    Gold Standard Recruitment & Selection

    For tools and methods to ensure fair recruitment, there is a great article by diversity specialist Fiona McPhail in People and Purpose – the Positive Leadership journal. Fiona takes you through the recruitment process, building in fairness and equality all the way.

     

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  • 5 of the best… Strengths Tools

    5 of the best… Strengths Tools

    If you want to find out your strengths, your best bet is to use one of these five strength assessment tools. They differ greatly in the number/categories of strengths, what you get for your money, and options for follow-up work, such as bespoke development programmes. We think that each assessment has value and can appeal to a different audience, so spend some time on their websites to make sure you choose the right one for your needs.

    Information is accurate at time of press (summer 2018), but the models and the reports offered continue to be refined.

     

     

     

     

     

     

    Finding your strengths is the first step to accessing the enhanced performance, motivation, engagement and commitment that comes when you are harnessing your strengths in your work and life. At Formium Development we can help you with all aspects of finding and harnessing your strengths, through training, coaching and assistance. If you’d like our help, please get in touch.

     

     

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  • Appreciative Inquiry: Strength-based organisational influence

    Appreciative Inquiry: Strength-based organisational influence

    We’ve all been there. You are tasked with delivering a significant change to processes, products or ways of working. Before you even start you are told by colleagues or staff that this will never happen, it’s impossible to do and all you feel is push-back.

    Leading change can feel like pushing a boulder up a hill with the risk that it will roll right back down at any moment.

    I’m sure this sounds familiar, as it is derived from two commonplace issues – that people often fear change and resist it, and that most organisations introduce changes by focussing on existing problems and shortcomings, such as John Kotter’s famous ‘melting iceberg’.

    But what comes of this approach? A negative atmosphere as everyone tries to dodge responsibility, and you impose a top-down change that will hopefully fix the problem. And how many times do you fix one problem only to find that you’ve now created another? Or find that people resist adopting your solution at all?

    If you think about how we apply the idea of strengths for a person – that you can deliver better change and growth by harnessing strengths rather than focussing on weaknesses – then you can imagine there is a similar approach for teams and organisations.

    Appreciative Inquiry (AI) is that approach – it focuses on finding out what already works, and how to leverage those successes and strengths. It is a collaborative approach, because unless you have everyone involved, you can’t effectively incorporate the multiplicity of perspectives. By co-creating a vision as well as the approach together, you’ll reduce resistance to change and have a more effective and lasting solution.

    The theory and research underpinning Appreciative Inquiry (AI) is extensive, as is the track record of AI being used effectively in a whole host of settings across industries, countries and sectors.

    The Appreciative Inquiry process starts with a positively stated topic choice or inquiry question, such as: “How can we deliver maximum value for our customers within our existing resources?” or “Creating innovation through collaboration with other departments or organisations” or “Becoming a high performing and fun team.” Its power comes from the combination of focusing on what works and approaching changes with an open, enquiring mind.

    The AI process then uses a simple 4D model to address the topic – Discover – Dream – Design – Deliver

    This may not seem that different from a range of other such models, until you look at what happens in each phase.

    Traditionally managers would use root cause analysis to try and understand problems. In Appreciative Inquiry, this phase is about looking positively at what is already working, helping us identify the key ingredients of success for this team or organisation. It embraces the positive traditions and stories that they have about themselves.

    Looking at existing success helps engagement and creativity and generates confidence for the next stage. You may find those existing examples of collaboration or of innovation that can act as the template for wider improvements.

    Rather than the narrow focus on solving problems with the minimum effort in the minimum time, this visioning phase is about using the positivity so everyone feels safe in challenging the status quo, in thinking about the big picture, and creating a vision that reaches into the future.

    We ask questions like “How does our version of excellence on a budget look, and crucially why does it matter?”

    When you’re grounded in what’s worked, and because you’re involving everyone, you can build a compelling dream that generates commitment to action.

    The Appreciative Inquiry approach is to focus on bridging the gap to your dream, while making sure there is alignment with values, strategy, structures and processes.

    Co-creation means working with all involved, which ensures that you don’t ‘rob Peter to pay Paul,’ and generates crucial buy-in and joint-ownership of change.

    This stage is when you work together to translate the vision into action plans and share roles and responsibilities in making it happen.

    You’ll need to maintain the momentum – keep talking together, challenging each other, reaffirming commitment to change.

    Agree how you will hold each participant accountable for delivering their commitments, but don’t fall back into negativity and top-down power.

    Reflect back on what you’ve learned about the traditions and stories people tell about themselves, and use them to overcome any obstacles. Continue to celebrate successes.

    Appreciative Inquiry is effective

    As an external facilitator who has used an Appreciative Inquiry approach with many teams, I can tell you that it works. So many top-down change programmes fail because of the fear, resistance or lack of ownership. With AI, that initial focus on ‘what works already’ gives people security, helps them understand that their particular perspective is valued. This enables them to be creative, to see the big picture and to consider what they individually need to do for the team to reach their compelling vision.

    While Appreciative Inquiry works exceptionally well on large-scale change or organisational development programmes, it is not just about externally-driven change or solving specific challenges. Some of my best experiences have been using AI approaches in team away-days to help them reflect, define their own vision and agree how they will act differently in the future, all based on what they were already great at.

    Many of my clients use an external facilitator because it helps create a level playing field for all participants, and because we can more easily ask the big questions and identify the ‘we’ve always done it like that’ assumptions. But any manager can learn how to use an AI approach – there’s a wealth of accessible resources to help you – books, websites, videos, webinars.

    Eszter Molnar Mills is a strength-based leadership and organisation development specialist.

    She helps organisations and individuals reach enhanced performance by reflecting on what works, and by developing skills and strategies for improvement.

    Through Formium Development, Eszter supports organisations, teams and individuals through consultancy, executive and team coaching, and facilitation.

    If you’d like help or advice on implementing the Appreciative Inquiry approach, then please get in touch.

     

     

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  • Review: The Strengths-Focused Guide to Leadership

    Review: The Strengths-Focused Guide to Leadership

    If you want a practical manual to understanding how to harness strengths, for you and your team, this book is a great place to start, as it:

    • introduces the key concepts of strengths
      • provides the research base for more inquisitive readers
      • illustrates with narratives
    • prompts you with a range of exercises and action points
    • explains how to weave strengths into your practice as a leader.

     

    What really sets this book apart is the emphasis on practicality. Numerous exercises help you engage with the ideas. There are questions, forms and questionnaires for you to use. The book looks at embedding strengths in all your work, including coaching, team meetings, recruitment and appraisals. So even if you know the value of using strengths, this is still a worthwhile read.

    A further great feature is the use of dialogues, showing the ideas in action (e.g. a coaching session transcript) or as two alternative ‘scripts’ – one using strengths, the other weakness. These stories keep you grounded in reality.

     

    The whys, whats and hows of using strengths

    The authors define strengths as something that:

    They show the advantage of working with strengths: that you are doing more of what you are best at. They set out the alignment between using strengths and increased sense of authenticity and purpose, increasing satisfaction and engagement. This naturally leads into a more productive cycle, with faster and better results.

    For any readers averse to leaving a weakness-focussed approach, the authors provide both the evidence for focussing on strengths, and also how to address weaknesses with a positive mindset.

     

    The MORE model

     

    My strengths: To identify your own strengths, the authors offer five different methods: strength spotting, weakness spotting, a 5 steps strengths map, 360 degree feedback and online strengths assessments. They provide the exercises, questions and examples to help you through whichever of these methods you prefer to use.

    Roarty and Toogood suggest 8 ways to develop your strengths:

     

    They also provide 6 ways to manage your weaknesses. To align your goals and strengths, they suggest usual SMART objectives should rather be SMARTIE – adding Important and Energising.

    Others’ strengths: The book suggests approaches to introduce strengths as a concept and to support your team in identifying their strengths.

    Regular conversations: To embed strengths into daily practice, the authors provide checklists and questions which embody the three principles that will help you develop a strengths mindset:

    • start with an outcome focus
    • focus on what’s working
    • manage weakness from strength

    They advise how to use this mindset in one-to-one conversations, development planning, team meetings and coaching: interventions where a strengths-focus has great rewards.

    Employee processes: Roarty and Toogood provide specific advice for a strength-based approach for performance appraisals, development discussions and recruitment. Particularly interesting is their approach for adapting to institutional reality: that while you may be required to use certain forms, competencies or expected approaches, you can still use a strengths mindset and techniques to provide a better outcome.

    Leadership and teams

    The book ends by providing the advice, evidence and resources to use strengths in two key challenges: creating a high-performing team, and in leading change. While specific examples are given, the advice reflects the key messages delivered previously, as detailed above.

     

    You can buy The Strengths-focused guide to leadership, by Mike Roarty and Kathy Toogood, on Amazon UK or Amazon USA

     

     

    Eszter Molnar Mills is a strength-based leadership and organisation development specialist.

    She helps organisations and individuals reach enhanced performance by reflecting on what works, and by developing skills and strategies for improvement.

    If you’d like help or advice on using strengths – such as implementing the MORE model, helping you find or use your strengths, or adopt a coaching approach, then please get in touch.

     

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  • Coaching 101: Myths busted and advice for using a coaching approach

    Coaching 101: Myths busted and advice for using a coaching approach

    Coaching 101: Myths busted and advice for using a coaching approach

    Do you want to help your team members improve their performance? Do your one-to-one meetings often end up with you giving all the answers and telling them what to do? Do you want your team to be more self-sufficient and empowered?

    If the answer to any of the above is yes, then I suggest you learn how to coach. Increasingly seen as an essential management tool, coaching supports people to give their very best regardless of their current performance level. Coaching is focussed on helping them find solutions themselves, rather than the manager providing direction or advice. As a coach, and a trainer of coaches, I’m going to share with you some of my key ideas on why all managers and leaders should be coaching.

     coacHing_cmi1. Coaching myths

    We’ll cover aspects of how to coach later, but first, let’s look at some of the reasons why managers don’t coach, and debunk these myths.

    Myth 1: “It takes too long; it takes less time if I just tell them the answer or what to do.”

    You may worry that coaching is too time consuming, but it takes no more time overall than many other management practices. Crucially coaching builds capacity in your team to resolve their own issues – or to come to you with solutions, rather than questions. This saves you time in the medium to long run

    Myth 2: “I’m not a professional coach, surely an external person needs to do this work?”

    While there is real value in independent coaching, anyone can add a coaching approach to their management toolkit. I’ve trained hundreds in coaching skills, and you’d be surprised how quickly people can take it on board. David Rock defines coaching as ‘the art and science of facilitating positive change’ – and if you think about it, that’s what good managers are all about. The aim of coaching, and the skills you need, are aligned with being a positive and supportive manager: meeting people where they are, then helping them build on their skills, strengths and experiences, addressing shortcomings, finding solutions and identifying strategies to meet agreed targets.

    Myth 3: “I’m the manager, I have the right answers, I should always share them.”

    You should if there is only one right answer. But allowing your colleagues to maintain ownership, think issues through and work out their own solutions helps to get the best from your people. If you focus on goals and outcomes, your team can be more creative. Sir John Whitmore argues that coaching encourages acceptance of responsibility, which results in a commitment, in turn optimising employees’ performance.

    A coaching approach helps establish boundaries around their responsibility for delivering outcomes and resolving issues. Your role is to work with people not for them – helping them work towards solutions rather than micro-managing. It helps when people own their goals.

    Telling people the right answers isn’t always effective. Think about training sessions: a significant U.S. study found that the application of learning following a training course was around 22%. The majority simply didn’t put anything into practice. But when training was combined with coaching or some sort of a follow-up, it really helped people put their learning into practise. Suddenly, application went up to 90% – so with an approach of coaching rather than telling you could generate a much better return on your time investment.

    2. When to use a coaching approach

    PWC’s Global Coaching Study for the International Coach Federation found that coaching creates improvements in areas such as self-confidence, relationships, communication skills, work-life balance, work performance, business management and team effectiveness.

    So, is there any occasion when you would not want your team to have those benefits? I’d encourage you to make coaching part of your daily management skills – but especially when there are high stakes pieces of work, big projects, or issues where you’re carrying an awful lot of responsibility.

    Coaching can be delivered just in time; you can talk about a project just as it arises. Coaching is targeted, it can be specific to your organisation and the type of work or individual that you are talking to. It can build on their experience, knowledge, and skills while addressing their specific challenges.

    By adding a coaching approach to your practice you can look forward to reaping its many personal and organisational benefits.

    3. What a coaching approach looks like

    Now we’re going to consider how you would start coaching. You can coach anytime, anywhere. Your coaching conversations don’t need to be formal or take more than a few minutes. It is however distinguished from other management activity by two key points:

    • it is solution-focussed
    • it leaves ownership and accountability with the staff member or coachee.

    To achieve this, coaching involves asking insightful questions and providing reflection without giving advice or direction.

    3.1 Start with the outcome

    Start conversations with ‘what do we want to achieve?’, ‘what do you need?’. Encourage your staff member to articulate where they are aspiring to be or what an ideal outcome would look like.

    Then you look at the current situation: ‘This is our goal, and this is where we are at the moment. Let’s talk about how we bridge that gap.’

    Next, encourage the coachee to come up with potential solutions or options. Rather than providing advice, ask questions to help them work issues out for themselves: ‘What options do you have?’ ‘What do we need to do to make this project a success?’ ‘How are you going to marshal your skills, experience, and resources to achieve it?’ and the magic coaching question: ‘What else?’ Aim for as many options as they can gather – I often find that the really innovative solutions only emerge once I’ve exhausted all the obvious ideas.

    Ensure that there is a specific set of outcomes or actions from the coaching conversation. The coachee needs to choose and commit to their own next step to draw real benefit from this approach.

    This basic process I’ve described has been worked up into a number of coaching models. There’s not much difference between them beyond which acronym you prefer.

    3.2 It is not about you – ownership and accountability belong with the coachee

    In coaching the question is always, ‘what are you going to do’, and then ‘what support might you need to succeed’? Accountability and ownership rests with the coachee or individual whose job or project you are discussing.

    Your role is to facilitate their thinking, not to solve the team member’s issues, or do their job for them. Understanding this distinction is remarkably freeing and allows for better quality conversations. It will be tough at first, but try hard not to be directive.

    Listen to the other person, rather than your thoughts about how you might respond. What is really important to them? What are their challenges? What opportunities are they seeing? What next steps do they want to take?

    When encouraged to come up with our own solutions, we maintain ownership and accountability, and feel much more motivated to follow through than when we are told what to do.

    3.3 Provide support and challenge

    Provide support and help where it is needed. Ask your team member to articulate what they see as the main challenge in a particular project and how you can support them in overcoming it.

    Encourage them to identify the resources available to them; or similar situations or tasks where they have previously been successful.

    Praise people for difficulties they’ve chosen to tackle, for taking ownership and accountability or for doing a great job of resolving their own issues.

    Also provide constructive challenge. If you hear ‘We can never do that because…’ ask them, ‘Are you sure? Can you tell me what it would take for us to actually be able to do it? Could we do something differently to enable us to achieve this?’ Challenging is often a crucial part of coaching conversations.

    4. Coaching is a crucial management skill that you should have

    So you can see that coaching has wide-ranging benefits for your team and you – and is a great return on your time invested.

    There’s no reason why you can’t go ahead and put into practice the ideas I’ve shown you in your next one-to-one or team meeting. If you’re interested, and would like some support in how to coach effectively, then I’d suggest two options. You could learn by being coached yourself, or you could find some training on coaching skills.

    If you want to get the most from your people, if you want to help them develop, then coaching is a great skill to use – as after all, personal growth takes place at the intersection of ownership, accountability, support and challenge – and that is what a good coach provides.

     

    Eszter Molnar Mills is a highly experienced and qualified leadership coach, and has taught coaching skills to hundreds of managers. Eszter and her team at Formium Development provide training and support to managers so they can get the best out of themselves, their teams and their organisations.

    How we can help you

    Coaching: if you’re looking for someone to help you to find solutions for your goals, we have a number of coaches available for phone/video conference coaching. Click here for more details.

    Training: if you want more help on using a coaching approach as part of your management toolkit, then get in touch about our in-house workshops on Coaching Skills for Managers.

    Webinar: People who join up to our newsletter get access to a bunch of helpful information and resources. This includes periodic access to our webinar on Coaching.

     

    Do you want more articles like this?

  • Book Review: The Positive Organization by Robert E Quinn

    Book Review: The Positive Organization by Robert E Quinn

    So many business books leave you wondering “…but how does that work in reality?” That’s not a problem with The Positive Organization – this short book (less than 160 pages from cover to cover) is packed with ideas, examples, case studies and practical exercises, written in an engaging and straightforward style.

    Throughout, Quinn challenges us to consider a different way of thinking, and to think about how we can effectively participate in building a positive organisation. A key strength of the book is that it has actionable lessons for all, regardless of job role or responsibility, from board room to shop floor. Each chapter concludes with a tool to use with teams in self-assessment and development, as well as questions to encourage the reader to reflect and set aspirations, to deepen learning.

    The central premise of the book is that building a positive organisation requires accountability and authenticity, that for it to be successful it has to be emergent and self-generating. This approach is built on listening, consultation and empowerment at all levels.

    What marks this book apart from many others is both the effectiveness of Quinn’s model, as well as the Positive Organization Generator – over 100 real-life examples of how organisations have successfully increased their positivity.

    Mental Maps and bilingualism

    Quinn suggests that the culture of an organisation can be summarised in a mental map – an indication of what a company believes and assumes, covering domains such as Motivation, Status and Change. Most organisations, and most leaders, operate using what Quinn calls a Conventional Mental Map, a top-down, traditional hierarchy. He contrasts this with the more complex Positive Mental Map, focused more on networks and relationships, and a focus on the common good and authentic communication.

    However, this is not a binary state – Quinn suggests a successful leader needs to be ‘bilingual’ able to speak the language of both maps depending on the need of the people they are working with, to find the right tools for the right occasion.

    A question of balance

    Quinn provides us with a further analysis of organisational culture – the Framework of Organizational Tensions. Quinn groups organisational characteristics into two opposing lists, for example Individual Accountability and Cohesive Teamwork. If taken to extremes either of these positive characteristics could be negative – conflict on the one hand or group-think on the other. To illustrate the need to maintain balance between these positive forces, Quinn separates each pair on opposing sides of a disc, with an outer ring of negative forces that may arise if the positive force is over-developed.

    This idea of tension and balance is crucial to Quinn – organisations are not static, they are dynamic, and to effect positive change we have to consider the whole system, that positives can turn into negatives.

    A call to action

    Having developed these models, Quinn turns to a number of key issues in developing a positive organisation, in chapters that focus on how to drive organisations forward by developing and promoting authenticity, creating a sense of purpose, fostering bottom-up change and collaborative development. He uses a range of interesting and relevant examples, referring back to the models at every stage.

    In these sections he is challenging and insightful on the role of the individual, on our willingness to work for the common good, our ability to leave our ego and control behind when trying to develop an organisation that thrives. He is also realistic about human nature, and how difficult meaningful change and personal authenticity may be, but makes clear the benefits of developing leadership capabilities and organisational positivity.

    Over to you

    Quinn concludes by sharing with the reader his Positive Organization Generator. Designed to confront sceptics and resistance, he provides 100 examples of where an organisation has made positive change (from a range of industries, and with links to further articles on each of them). This is an amazing resource that gives readers a real opportunity to understand “how it works in reality”. Rather than just adopting these ideas, his instruction to readers is to re-invent them – to be inspired by the examples, extract the principle and re-imagine it for your own context, moulding and adapting to fit.

    Robert E. Quinn’s website www.bob-quinn.com provides you with the resources from the book, including the Positive Organization Generator.

    Or you can buy the book from Amazon UK or Amazon USA.

    For more ideas you can also follow his daily blog: www.thepositiveorganization.wordpress.com

     

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    Formium Development helps individuals and organisations to harness their strengths and improve their performance and culture. We know change can be hard, so we can bring our expertise to help you with organisational development – such as implementing the ideas in The Positive Organization.

    Click here if you’d like more information on how we can help you and your team analyse, assess, challenge, innovate, communicate and develop.

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  • You only win when you’re singing

    You only win when you’re singing

     

    In Britain, football crowds have songs for every occasion. If your team overturns a losing position, to taunt the opposition fans now sitting in crestfallen silence, you bellow at them: “You only sing when you’re winning” (improbably to the tune of a traditional Cuban song, Guatanamera).

    But have the fans got this the wrong way round? Some recent research highlighted on the informative website The Conversation suggests that you only win when you’re singing. Having studied the 2016 European championship, the academics Slater, Haslam and Steffens reckon you can predict the result of an international football match by how passionately the teams sing their national anthem (regardless of how good the team is perceived to be).

    So, apart from giving you a fun game to try at home during this World Cup, what impact could this study have for you as a manager or leader?

    1. The best results are achieved by the most passionate

    This aligns with a key concept of positive psychology, that we do our best work when we are doing something we are really engaged with. We’re not saying you need to come into your office singing everyday, but that you need to find a role or tasks that you believe in, that positively challenge you, that gives you the opportunity to reach a state of ‘flow.’

    If this doesn’t sound like you, then you could analyse your strengths (e.g. using the VIA survey) and see if you can more closely align your work with your strengths – a short-cut to working with passion.

    2. It has to be real

    One of the interesting findings was that there was no benefit when the players were instructed to sing up (as England players were memorably asked in 2014). The passion of the singing is a direct result of the underlying camaraderie and team spirit.

    So think about your team development – what could you do to create the conditions in which your team can organically grow?

    • Create opportunities for natural social interaction – e.g. a drinks break in a team meeting
    • Assign two team members to work on a task together, to build familiarity and trust
    • Establish collectively a clear team goal, with everyone understanding their role
    • Use an Appreciative Inquiry approach to help each team member understand the input, perspective and value of each other

    3. Don’t ignore a bad team spirit

    I’ve met many managers who are happy to treat their team as a group of individual performers, not bothering if there is antagonism in the team, providing the work gets done. Slater et al’s study suggests they’re wrong – that how a team interacts really does impact on performance. It may be hard work, but addressing team conflict and proactively encouraging a better team spirit will pay dividends in the long run.

    4. Actions speak as loud as words

    The study indicated that body language and non-verbal cues were important, not just singing. The challenge for you as a manager is to keep your eyes open – be sensitive to how your team members interact, not just what they say to each other.

    Help is at hand

    If you want advice or help in building your team, Formium Development can help with guidance, facilitation, executive and team coaching,.

    Check out our resources on teams:

    10 actions to build a strong team
    Checklist for a Positive Team Meeting

    Eszter Molnar Mills is a strength-based leadership and organisation development specialist and founder of Formium Development. A qualified executive and team coach, she helps organisations and individuals reach enhanced performance by reflecting on what works, and developing skills and strategies for improvement. Through team coaching and facilitation Eszter also helps organisations and teams work together to develop positive and productive cultures.

  • The future of learning and development?

    The future of learning and development?

    The days are numbered for sheep-dip, classroom-based training courses, chosen by the L&D team, and often forgotten by the following week.

    Well, maybe not numbered, but the recent CIPD/ Towards Maturity report – Driving Performance and Productivity provides evidence that companies relying on old-fashioned models of learning and development are being outstripped by those embracing a learning approach that is more collaborative, multi-channel, integrated and accountable.

    The report’s message is that the top 10% of companies, for performance and productivity, are benefiting from using these modern methods – sometimes 3 times as much as the average, and massively above those in the lowest 25%.

    Here’s a few key findings:

    • 76% of the ‘Top Deck’ (highest performing 10%) are confident in incorporating the use of new media in learning design (33% average, 14% bottom quartile)
    • 62% routinely collect information on the extent to which learning points have been understood (30% average, 5% bottom quartile)
    • 71% collect information from learners on the extent to which learning points have been applied at work (24% average, 2% bottom quartile)
    • 73% involve learners in the design of the most appropriate learning solution (25% average, 1% bottom quartile)

    So the challenge to L&D teams is – how can you harness these approaches so that your company benefits? How can you incorporate these ideas into your strategies, and how to shift the culture towards collaboration, individual accountability for learning, and greater integration into strategic and operational needs?

    The report provides compelling ROI evidence that I’m sure will help those arguing for greater resources or the input from colleagues. But the important takeaway for me is the change management and strategic thinking that will be required to embed these ideas. It is about changing the perception of learning and development from a top-down obligation to a more bottom-up opportunity to thrive.

     

    Eszter Molnar Mills is a strength-based leadership and organisation development specialist and founder of Formium Development. She helps organisations and individuals reach enhanced performance by reflecting on what works, and developing skills and strategies for improvement. Eszter leads our learning partnership work; contact us to discuss how we can support your learning and development strategy.

  • 7 questions for impactful leadership

    7 questions for impactful leadership

    Review of the Coaching Habit by Michael Bungay Stanier

    Your team sometimes just need a bit of support to shine. You can provide this support through changing your leadership approach to coaching.

    Helping people to find their own solutions is more impactful than giving advice, providing rules or direction. You can coach anytime, anywhere, and with the 7 simple questions that Michael Bungay Stanier suggests for supporting your team, your session will be both easy and effective.

    The Coaching Habit is a lean, inspiring and practical book. In the first few chapters you can learn about habit building and change in order to make the move from the directive habit of a lifetime. The book then outlines the benefits of coaching before you get the tools, the questions and ways of putting them into practice.

    The following seven chapters are about the seven essential question you should ask in order to help your colleague to identify and solve their own difficulties. Bungay Stanier added exercises between the questions to help leaders master asking them effectively.

    Michael Bungay Stanier’s book is a practical, engaging read encouraging immediate application. It is packed with useful resources and exercises, and should have a place on every leaders’ bookshelf.

    We had the privilege of interviewing Michael on the coaching habit, so you can also hear him talk about the habit changing process and how to do more great work.

    The Coaching Habit is available on amazon.co.uk and amazon.com.