The Bamboo Project

Some Thoughts on "Managing People"

I've been thinking lately about our focus on "managing" people. I spend a lot of time with front-line supervisors in various capacities and they are obssessed with how to control people's behavior.

The discussions are of two basic types--How do you get staff to do the things you want them to do? How do you STOP staff from doing things you DON'T want them to do? There are variations, of course, but only in the details. Mostly we are talking about carrots and sticks and, for me at least, the conversations devolve into a sort of "how do we herd the cats?" kind of thing. It's animal husbandry, not working with people. 

There's a lot of frustration in these conversations--on both sides. The supervisors are frustrated that they can't control people's actions. And I'm frustrated that they are so focused on control. 

Here's the thing. Anytime we are focused on "managing" something, we are really talking about controlling it.  We want to control the outcome AND how people get there. We often want to control people's reactions, too. Not only should they do what we want them to do, they should like it, no matter how ridiculous the expectation. 

But no one likes to feel controlled. I think it's something innately human. The reason we talk about "the Terrible Twos" is because even children resist our attempts to control their behavior. Children resist by kicking and screaming. Adults tend to resist in less obvious, more passive/aggressive ways. But they are still resisting. 

This is why. Control is about power. When we "manage" people, we are exerting our power over them, but pretending we are not. People know this. They are not stupid. They know they are being manipulated and they don't like it. 

There was a time when employees were more willing to accept this kind of arrangement, when they felt like they got something from the deal--"If I submit to your "management" of me, in return I will receive a paycheck and some meaningful guarantee of ongoing employment." But that contract is broken now. It becomes harder to submit to control when you know that it's really a form of servitude, not a choice you've made to exchange your independence for a paycheck.

I think that people are becoming harder to "manage," not because they are spoiled or entitled (as I've heard many managers say), but because on some fundamental level, they know that they are getting the raw end of this deal and they aren't happy about it. Employees are afraid to resist in more overt ways (they still, at least, want that paycheck), but deep down they know that the contract has been irrevocably altered and they are not interested in such one-sided exchanges. 

 How to get out of this impasse? 

I think that we must first understand and accept that "management" is another word for "control." While I can control inanimate objects--financial and physical resources--I can't control people. I can try, but in the end I won't get what I want. And I'll exhaust myself in the process. 

We have to give up the notion of control and accept that we live in a world where many things are uncontrollable--especially those things that have to do with other people.  We can become resilient and able to deal with what life throws at us, but we cannot control how and when the ball comes over the plate. To believe otherwise is to live in a world of illusion. 

To work effectively with people, we need to take a different approach. We cannot manage them, but we can create space for them to do their own work. We can help them tap into their own innate motivation by helping them find autonomy, mastery and purpose in the work that they do. 

I also think that we have to bring humanity back to work, understanding and accepting that we are working with PEOPLE, not machines and that people have feelings and baggage that they can't just check at the door.

We don't want emotions at work, because they are messy and sticky and, well, uncontrollable. So we tell people to be "professional," which really means, "Keep your emotions to yourself, please, because I already feel like the world is uncontrollable so the last thing I need is you adding to that burden." But what we create, then, is a culture of repression and when we repress our emotions, they are going to come out somewhere, usually where we least want that to happen. 

Ultimately, I think that this post is a plea for us to remember that we are working with people, that our institutions (including our workplaces) should exist to serve us, not the other way around. We want work to be this antiseptic, controllable place, devoid of human messiness. But it is not. It is a reflection of our very human selves that we should embrace, not resist. 

What bothers me most about these issues of control is that they divide us from one another, creating an "us vs. them" culture. It's sad. And also unnecessary. 

What I think is this: If we worked harder to understand and embrace our humanity at work, we might find that our concerns about control evaporated. If we worked harder at understanding and working with each other as human beings, not machines, we might find that we're all  in this together. 

But Do They Work?

One of the big questions I'm frequently asked about using social media is whether or not the tools "work."  Depending on the questioner, this can mean a variety of things, but underlying everything is one issue--will my department or organization improve if we use social media?

Via Shel Holtz and Workplace Learning Today comes yet another "yes," to that question. Shel cites a brief published by the Aberdeen Group, titled Web 2.0, Talent Management, and Employee Engagement (a PDF file) that finds:

• 52% of organizations that adopt blogs, wikis, and social networking tools (among others) achieved best-in-class performance levels compared to 5% for those that didn’t.

• The same tools were used within organizations that achieved an 18% year-over-year improvement in employee engagement. Companies that didn’t use these tools grew engagement by a mere 1%. (An aside--not sure how "employee engagement" was measured).

• A 45% increase in spending on “software that links to networking site (e.g. Facebook or LinkedIn) or other communities of practice” as part of the recruiting process will increase internal recruiters’ ability to connect with potential recruits. These tools also let employees post messages to “lend a voice to the market on the work culture at a particular company.”

• Social networking is being used to connect newly-hired employees with mentors and coaches as well as build relationships with other employees. “In addition,” the brief notes, “blogs and wikis are also used as a means for a new employee to provide content/commentary on a topic at which he/she is an expert where others within the organization are struggling.” (Note--see my post last week on Lisa Johnson's keynote and the need to engage Millenials at work. This is what we're talking about here. I heard the same thing from the Gen Y folks at my Social Media Game workshop)

• 38% of organizations surveyed for an upcoming study from Aberdeen said the biggest growth in learning and development over the next year will come from “informal learning.” The investment these companies will make in blogs, social networks, and communities will “stimulate peer-to-peer learning and ideation, as well as facilitate communities of practice in which organizations can leverage the collective knowledge of their employees."

These findings echo what we saw in the eLearning Guild's 360 Report on eLearning 2.0 (webinar today, by the way). Those organizations that were making the greatest use of Web 2.0 technologies reported the strongest benefits, particularly in accommodating learner needs, increasing access to information and improving dissemination of information. As a result these organizations were increasing their investments in these technologies more than those organizations that had less experience with social media.

Pretty quickly the question isn't going to be "will the tools work?" but "how can we make them work for us?" Throwing up a wiki or a blog and hoping for the best isn't going to cut it. But doing it right can make some significant improvements to organizational effectiveness.

New Report, "Ready to Lead?," Offers Criticism and Advice for the Nonprofit Sector

For the past couple of days I've been digesting the latest report on hiring and succession planning in the nonprofit sector, Ready to Lead? Next Generation Leaders Speak Out. Prepared through a partnership of the CompassPoint Nonprofit Services, the Annie E. Casey Foundation, the Meyer Foundation and Idealist.org, the report shares the findings of a survey of over 6,000 nonprofit sector employees conducted this past September. It sheds further light on issues that have been plaguing the sector for years:

• 69% of respondents feel they are underpaid for the work they do and a significant number question whether or not they can afford to stay in a sector that doesn't allow them to support their families or prepare for retirement.

• Younger workers are frustrated by the lack of career opportunities within their organizations. While 65% of for-profits look internally for their senior talent, only 1/3 of nonprofits find their leaders inside the organization. And in many nonprofits there are few opportunities to advance even if the organization was willing to look inside.

• Many talented employees aren't sure that they want Executive Director positions. They've seen the career burnout and heavy fundraising demands that go with top-level positions and for many, this is a major barrier to considering advancement within the sector.

• Even for those who are interested in moving up, there's little support or mentoring available to help them learn the ropes and gain the work experience that might prepare them for higher-level positions. Only 4% of respondents reported receiving any kind of structured preparation for future leadership positions in their organizations.

On the plus side, there are many educated, dedicated people filling the potential leadership pipeline and a significant number of those who aspire to the Executive Director ranks are people of color. This means that there are bright talented people available if only the right support structures and work environment were in place.

Ready to Lead is a meaty report with some great suggestions for addressing these challenges to the future of leadership in the sector. There's a particular emphasis on providing the appropriate supports and resources to help future leaders prepare for new positions, including supporting mentoring and coaching and ensuring that staff have access to fresh, relevant skills training that will specifically prepare them for the Executive Director role.

The greatest challenge to addressing the issues identified in Ready to Lead may lie in the need for a serious culture change. Low pay, long hours, few opportunities for advancement and lack of support for professional development--these are all long-standing problems in the sector that continue to exist because they are embedded in the culture of nonprofits. Maybe it's because of the scarcity mentality that grips so many NPOs. Maybe it's because people who've been around for awhile think like they do in the military--"These kids today are too soft. They don't know what rough IS."

Regardless of the causes, though, what remains is the fact that these are serious issues that require ongoing discussion and action planning. This is a problem that won't go away on its own.

For more information, also check out Rosetta Thurman's post on the report and a follow-up on a Washington Post discussion around Ready to Lead and low salaries in the sector.

Do You Set Your Priorities to Add Value or To Avoid Pain?

LaDonna Coy and I ended up in an interesting email conversation over the weekend that got me thinking about how we set priorities for ourselves, both as individuals and as organizations. We were discussing that working from home gave us more flexibility and time for continuous learning and then LaDonna mentioned that a friend of hers was going to be spending Saturday in the office, "catching up on paperwork." I have to say, that set me off a little as I began to think about how some of the least value-add activities can end up taking up most of our time.

One of the major reasons for not engaging in continuous learning that I hear from individual people as well as the organizations that they work for is lack of time. I understand and sympathize with this, but I also have to wonder if it's really lack of time or if it's about how we prioritize what we're doing--or about the priorities our employers seem to be setting for us.

Essentially what I see all too often is that things like paperwork and lengthy meetings of questionable relevance take precedence in most organizations over spending time on learning. It's like what happens in a lot of marriages, where everything but the couple's relationship is a priority and then the next thing you know, you're in divorce court.

Even though ongoing learning is critical for the success of most workers and their organizations, learning is usually where we spend the least amount of time. Few supervisors will call us into the office if we stop learning, but if we fail to attend a meeting?  Then we'll hear about it. Even though what was discussed in the meeting could actually have been posted to the company blog or wiki, taking up 5 minutes of our time rather than 55 minutes.

I also see this in individual choices, where people will make time for an hour of American Idol, but not for an hour of professional development in their off-time. The thinking seems to be, "If they aren't going to pay me for it, then why should I learn?" Unless you're independently wealthy, this is a dangerous attitude to have.

What I think happens for many of us is that we set priorities based on "avoiding immediate pain" rather than on what adds the most value. I'll spend time on paperwork because I don't want the pain of being called on the carpet but I won't engage in continuous learning activities because not learning doesn't cause me immediate pain. This happens on an organizational level, too--we'll engage in endless crisis management meetings, but it will "take too much time" to have meetings that might help us avoid the crisis in the first place, so we don't have them.

There are obvious problems with this approach. If you think about it, "avoiding pain" is a pretty negative and short-sighted criterion to use in deciding how we spend our days. It  tends to put us into a cycle that creates even more pain because we aren't focusing on the kinds of activities that build us up (individually or organizationally), but on the things that constrain us. If you believe that you get what you focus on (which I do), then focusing on pain is just a way to keep inviting it back into your life.

Ultimately what happens when we use the pain avoidance approach to setting priorities is that our lives become a sequence of short-term activities that feel limiting (because they are) and meaningless. Avoiding pain isn't a strategy for having impact. It's simply a way to get through the days.

I think a good question to start asking ourselves is if an activity is something we're doing to avoid pain or if it's something that will really add value, for ourselves or for our organizations. Sometimes we'll still have to do the things that help us avoid pain--it's part of the human condition, I'm afraid. But maybe by evaluating what we do in this light, we can also start making the things that add value--like learning--more of a priority.

How do you set your priorities? Do you think that you set them to add value or do you find that you're doing more things to avoid pain? And how does this make you feel about what you do each day?

Photo via The Rocketeer

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No Excuses Leadership

Katya Andresen has a GREAT post on operating your organization with no excuses. Apparently she recently did a presentation on tweaking your marketing messages, where she was told by her audience that her suggestions weren't possible because:

1. I don’t have the budget to do that.
2. I don’t have the staff to do that.
3. I don’t have the time to do that.
4. I don’t have the internal support to do that.
5. I don’t have the expertise to do that.

Katya goes on to take each of these "constraints" and turn them into possibilities, urging us to think in terms of what we CAN do, not what we can't.

Katya's experience is something I get all the time, particularly when it comes to suggesting that staff change how they are currently operating. It seems that it's easier to spend time making excuses for why things can't change, rather than trying to figure out how they can change.

I suspect that this goes back to how scarcity thinking seems to rule in most organizations. Even though there's a lot of evidence to suggest that creativity actually does better when constraints exist, most people persist in the belief that constraints hold us back, rather than giving us a framework within which we can find solutions to our problems.

I'm doing a lot of thinking lately about leadership in organizations and Katya's post underscores the point that leadership is about making solutions, not excuses.  It's about recognizing where there may be some constraints and then using those constraints to propel you forward.

One of my favorite leadership books of all time, Good to Great, talks about how the great companies use The Stockdale Paradox:

                  
                                                                          

The Stockdale Paradox
Retain faith that you will prevail in the end, regardless of the difficulties.	AND at the same time	Confront the most brutal facts of  your current reality, whatever they might be.

Many companies have failed because they are unwilling to confront the brutal facts, but I suspect that in the nonprofit sector, the bigger problem is going beyond the brutal facts to create something different. There seems to be a pervasive mindset that a lack of resources means an inability to change or have impact. From what I've observed, however, it's often not the lack of resources that is the problem. It is how the resources are being allocated and used that is the issue. In Katya's post, for example, she points out that instead of thinking "I don't have enough time to tweak my marketing messages," the answer should be "My time is better spent fixing a bad message rather than sending out more bad messages."  It isn't about the lack of time as much as how the time is being used.

In so many cases, it seems that organizations just sort of give up and give in to their excuses. This, to me, is one of the most profound failures of leadership. It's impossible to have any kind of vision if your sight is clouded by all that you can't do. Vision, by it's nature, is about seeing the possibilities, not the limitations. It's about seeing what CAN happen, not what isn't working. Excuses don't create change. They maintain the status quo, something that presumably many organizations are trying to change.

It also seems like this kind of "excuses only" leadership could become one of the primary reasons that  many nonprofits may find themselves becoming irrelevant. In a recent post, Seth Godin talks about the death of direct mail and how he he's worried about the ability of the largest nonprofits to change:

I'll start with the bad news: I despair for most of the top 50 non-profits in the US. These are the big guys, and they're stuck. Unlike the Fortune 100, not known for being cutting edge in themselves, the top charities rarely change... if you're big, you're used to being big and you expect to stay big. That means that generation after generation of staff has been hired to keep doing what's working. Big risks and crazy schemes are certainly frowned upon.

What I see here is the potential for more "excuses only" leadership--"We can't change because we've already invested so much into doing what we've been doing" (a constraint), rather than "The rules of the game are changing, so how can we keep up?" (a possibility).

What Katya's post opens up for me is a call to "No Excuses Leadership" that individuals and organizations must learn to heed. If they don't, then they'll get left behind.

Photo via vandy.

How to NOT Run a Meeting

This is a great video from "Working for the Man" on what often happens in the infamous "brainstorming session." Much of this may seem oddly familiar.

Check out the entire post for some other meeting no-nos. A few I'd add to the list:

• Not reading any of the meeting materials ahead of time, even when they've been supplied well in advance, so that much of the meeting is taken up with repeating what could have been read earlier. 

• Not identifying someone to take notes in the meeting (particularly about action steps) so that much of the next meeting can be taken up with arguing about who should have followed up on what from the previous meeting.

• Having a meeting with only a vague idea of its purpose, as if the act of getting together will magically make something happen, although no one is sure what should happen or why.

Any of these sound familiar? What are your meeting pet peeves?

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Do You Start Your New Employees Out Right?

My worst job ever was the one where they forgot that it was my first day. When your new company can't be bothered to remember that you'll be starting work, it's all kind of downhill from there.

I thought of this when I saw that Ray Sims has a great summary post with tips on New Hire Orientations or what they're now calling "onboarding." Can't say that I like the term too much--conjures up visions of boarding a plane and those generally haven't been my most pleasant experiences. Be that as it may, Ray's post has some good info worth checking out.

A couple of key points I'd highlight:

• Orientation is a process, not an event. It takes awhile for people to get up to speed, so use a process approach when acclimating new hires.

• Orientation is not just "what to know" but "WHO to know." Make sure that new employees are introduced to key people in the organization and that they get a chance to spend some time with the experts and information providers, both within your organization and at other organizations.

And a few tips I'd add to the list:

• Think about ways to begin the orientation process before the new hire starts work. I think that Netvibes or a similar tool is a cool option.

• Make sure you hook a new hire up at lunchtime. I'm sorry, but THE loneliest thing in the world is starting a new job and when lunchtime rolls around, you're on your own. Please don't do that to new people. Seriously. It's rude and speaks volumes about how your organization REALLY feels about its people.

• Try having staff build the orientation process based on their own experiences as new hires. What questions did they have? What do they wish they'd known sooner? Who do they wish they'd spent time with? Staff could be a gold mine of information in pulling something together.

• Don't forget the fun factor. Having been the victim of some really awful orientations,  I'd like to plead for putting some fun into the process. Make some jokes, be interactive--whatever you do, don't lock people in a room for 8 hours with your organization's most boring talking heads. You want to KEEP new people, not make them start working on their resumes by the end of day one.

• Build in opportunities for regular dialog with the new employee--I say do check-ins after the first day, the first week and the first month. Plus have an open door policy. Make sure that the new hire is comfortable with how things are progressing and that there are no questions or issues brewing.

Oh--and one final thing. Please remember when a new employee is starting. If you don't, it really is downhill from there.

How does your organization handle New Hire Orientations?

Flickr photo via awcole72

Jobs of the Future--Or Maybe For Today

Here's an interesting post from Ray Jimenez on the types of jobs he can see emerging as organizations begin to make greater use of Web 2.0 tools. At a minimum, these seem like functions that should be incorporated into someone's job description.

Some of the standouts for me included:

• PLE Assistants - Personal Learning Environments (PLE) - Downes, Sims and Kareer talk about the need of the connected learners to learn to work with the technologies to advance personal learning - easily said, but difficult for some to execute. The assistants coach learners on the possible choices and options on PLE decisions.

• Social Media Specialist - converts content into short, enticing, provocative, rapid, instant media with the likes of YouTube, e.g. CommonCrafts presentation and Institute of Social Research. (multimedia developers, audio and video developers, graphics and concept developers).

• Online Coach – uses video and audio conferencing, Instant Messaging, Twitter, tracking to support coaching roles. Learning coaches can help their clients by using Web 2.0 tools to continue communications and support. Twitter for example, helps in sharing small updates by using cell phones or PDAs.

• Social Network Catalyst – promotes, educates, processes, and nurtures the growth of networks - if you are one of those people that are adept or have the passion to help others improve relationships with Web 2.0 relations, you can be a catalyst. Catalysts grow, nurture, support and cajole networks to yield productive values.

• Social Network Analyst – is involved in metrics and research on performance of networks, learning and performance, using Web 2.0 to communicate the strengths and weaknesses of social networks and provide solutions. See Raytheon Professional Services.

Anybody seeing any of these jobs in their organizations? Is anyone thinking deliberately about building toward these kinds of functions or if they exist do they tend to evolve by accident? Do you see them as necessary?

UPDATE--In comments Marianne points us to a post she did on "personal information trainers" in libraries. Sounds like one to add to the list--or maybe it's a combo type position.

Flickr photo via tychay (I love those Moo cards)

Watch Out Boomers--This is How Gen Y Gets It Done

A few months ago I wrote a post entitled, Note to the Next Generation of Leaders: Don't Wait for Baby Boomers to Hand Over the Reins. In it, I suggested some strategies for Gen X and Y leaders to develop themselves. One of my thoughts was to get "disruptive"--start your own organization to do it better, rather than trying to get your foot in the door of an existing one.

Now I see,  via Guy Kawasaki,  a great profile on Matt and Jessica Flannery, the 20-something founders of Kiva, which in a few short years has become a powerhouse of micro-lending:

What makes Kiva different from other microlenders? “If you have $10,000 to lend, you have many options,” says Matt, ’00, MA ’01. “If you have $25 to lend, this is the only option.”

People are lining up. In fact, Kiva has so many lenders—more than 123,000 extending $12.4 million to some 18,000 entrepreneurs in 39 countries—that it recently limited each participant to $25 per business, “so that everyone has a chance to make a Kiva loan.” After two years in operation, Kiva attracts $1.5 million a month, Matt says. The impact is bigger than it looks, notes Jessica, MBA ’07, because “each loan is touching 15 people, whether it’s other workers in the business, or family.”

A great story, but what really caught my attention was this:

Significantly, the 16 full-time employees at Kiva’s offices in San Francisco’s Mission district are mostly in their 20s and 30s. (The organization has some 250 active volunteers.) This generation’s idealism tends to be more global, more strategic, more entrepreneurial than previous generations, with a good deal of media/marketing savvy. Matt says his contemporaries are “not looking to make a lot of money, retire and give it away. We’re looking to live our whole life in an integrated way. It’s not a binary approach.”

Seems like those Gen X and Gen Y folks are figuring out that they don't necessarily need to "pay their dues" or wait their turn. They're seizing their own opportunities. And doing a lot of good in the process.

I think it's something for existing organizations to consider--aren't Matt and Jessica exactly the kinds of people you would have wanted working for you? The bigger question is are you creating the kind of environment that appeals to young people with this kind of initiative and talent?

Does Blogging Replace Action? Sometimes It IS the Action!

An interesting post over at Tactical Philanthropy from Perla Ni, founder of the Stanford Social Innovation Review.  She says,

Does blogging substitute real action?

I get asked about this a lot because I blog.   Why are all these people blogging?   Why aren’t they out there in the real world doing something?

Especially in the nonprofit world – where there’s so much need and most ED’s I know are busy enough running their programs, fundraising, doing the jobs of 4 people – blogging about nonprofits or philanthropy seems quite a luxury in navel-gazing.  There’s so much work that needs to be done in the real world, why waste time blogging?

Perla goes on to write that she's of two minds on this and that if disseminating ideas is part of the core mission of nonprofits, then blogs seem to be a perfect vehicle for doing this:

The ideas and values at the heart of our nonprofit work – whether it be providing after school programs, cleaning up local streams, providing battered women shelter – need to be spread and supported even more widely if we want systemic change. That’s where blogging can matter. 

Blogging is not the only means – but one easy and efficient channel for you to spread your ideas far and wide. 

I have to agree with Perla. Part of most nonprofit missions is to persuade others to join their causes and blogging creates a great vehicle for doing this. But I'd take it one step further and say that in many cases blogging can BECOME the action--it can be the service or activity that needs to take place in order to support the organization in various aspects of its work. It's not something that you do INSTEAD of working--it's something you're doing because it's work that achieves your organization's mission.

Some examples that come to mind:

• Blogging as professional development. Every organization needs trained staff. Blogging can be a powerful strategy for creating and nurturing a learning climate that ensures staff have the skills and knowledge to perform their jobs. Blogs can become training tools that keep employees learning on an ongoing basis.
  

• Blogging as a service--As a medium that encourages the dissemination of ideas and information and that fosters 2-way communication, blogs provide a great vehicle for constituent services for many organizations. I think, for example, of Blog Cascadia (which also includes some great podcasts) or Acronym, two association blogs.  Through these blogs, both associations are able to offer daily information to their members--and information is a key service associations are supposed to provide as part of their missions.
  

• Blogging as the mission. Blog for a Cure was started by Jill Midthun "to make life a little bit easier for cancer survivors by providing a free personal web publishing service for them and continuing to develop and upgrade this service to be the best it can be for its users." In this case, blogging is the reason for being.

Of course it's possible to get so hung up on blogging that you lose sight of other activities that will further your mission as an organization. But that's true of virtually anything your organization does. Raise your hand if you work for an organization that is totally focused on fundraising to the exclusion of many other activities, including actually providing services to consituents.

Blogging is a tool, and to my mind a pretty great one that's deserving of time and attention for a variety of reasons. Like all tools, the trick is knowing when to use it.

In response to Perla's original question though--Blogging doesn't replace action. But sometimes it can BE the action.

Photo via  Fuyoh!
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Note to my American Readers--Happy Thanksgiving!

And to ALL my readers--Thank you for being such a wonderful and supportive community. I've learned so much from all of you and I'm grateful for all the support.