Finding Flow (review)

© 2000, Coert Visser

`What is a good life?', is basically the question addressed by Finding Flow: The Psychology of Engagement with Everyday Life by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. Well, isn't a good life just about being happy? Ok, but that is not the complete answer. For how do we become and stay happy? Not by watching TV, eating, or relaxing all day! In small doses these things are good and improve your daily life, but the effects are not additive. In other words: a point of diminishing returns is quickly reached. Also you don't become happy by having to do nothing. Csikszentmihalyi's research shows that both intrinsic motivation (wanting to do something) and extrinsic motivation (having to do something) are preferable to not having any kind of goal to focus your attention.

Csikszentmihalyi argues that a life filled with `flow activities' is more worth living than one spent consuming passive entertainment. He says, the point is to be happy while doing things that stretch your goals and skills that help you grow and fulfil your potential. In other words: the content of your experiences over a lifetime determines the quality of your life. Then what exactly ìs `flow'? Is it just some vague new New Age concept? Not at all! It is precisely defined and well-researched. The experience if flow is the sense of effortless action we feel in moments that we see as the best in our lives. In order to have flow experiences you need clear goals/demands, immediate and relevant feedback and a balance between your skills and the demands. Then your attention becomes ordered and fully invested. Because of the total demand on you psychic energy you become completely focused, your self-consciousness disappears, as does your sense of time, yet you feel strong and competent. When in flow, you are not exactly happy, because you are not focused on your inner states (that would take away your attention from the task at hand). But looking back you are happy. Having flow experiences leads to growth and learning and improving your life becomes a question of making flow as much as possible a constant part of your everyday experience.

Csikszentmihalyi describes how you can find flow in several important life domains. One domain is work. Often we short-sightedly spend a lot of energy to take the easy way and cut corners, trying to do as little as possible in our jobs. If we would spend the same amount of energy trying to accomplish more we would probably enjoy our work more and be more successful as well. To improve your work you can try to take the whole context of your job into account. Doing this you can better understand your contribution to the whole and understand and value your role more. This enables you to invest more energy and withdraw more meaning from your work. Further, to use flow at work you can try to establish a situation in which your job (an other people's jobs) provides clear goals, unambiguous feedback, a sense of control, few distractions and challenges that match your skills. Just as much as in work you can create flow in your family and other relationships according to Csikszentmihalyi. He says it is particularly important to give attention to building harmony between participant's goals and to find ways to balance the meaningfulness of the rewards you get from work and relationships.

This book is definitely worth reading. Csikszentmihalyi's answer to the question `What is a good life?' is practical and convincing.

Luxury Fever (review)

© 2000, Coert Visser

This fascinating book describes how a new virus, the luxury fever has Americans seemingly inescapably in its grip: people spend a larger and larger proportion of our money on luxury goods. And, because for most people incomes have remained static or have even declined (in the US and the UK), this extra spending was financed by lower savings and higher debts, making the economy weaker and more vulnerable.

Further, most people work longer and tend to spend less time on important activities such as vacations, being with family, sleeping exercising, etc. To make things worse: Americans spend less on vital public services which leads to a deteriorating infrastructure, to higher crime, to dirty streets and parks, to water pollution, to a deteriorating education system, etc.

And what about health? 40 million Americans currently lack health insurance.... This book explains how there is a competition 1) between different forms of private spending (do we buy luxury or do we spend our money differently?) and 2) between private and public spending. To expand on the latter point: a growing share of the US national income is spent on consumption and spending on vital publics services is increasingly threatened.

Frank explains (on the basis of well-being research and the adaptation-level theory) that the main reason we buy luxury goods is to demonstrate to others that we can afford to thereby trying to distinguish ourselves from them. In doing so we try to achieve happiness by improving our relative status.

The irony is, however, this absolutely doesn't work! The satisfaction we get from luxury spending, which Frank calls conspicuous spending, depends largely on context. The satisfaction we get from luxury spending lasts only shortly.

Two examples:

1. If we buy an expensive car, this distinguishes us from our neighbour and we feel happy. If, however, next month our neighbour buys an even fancier one, our satisfaction will be largely gone. You can see how this leads to an escalation, an arms race, with no winners.
2. The satisfaction we get from luxury goods tends to decline steeply over time. We tend to get used quickly to what we have and the favourable features of the luxury good tend to fade into the background rapidly: we no longer notice the fancy features of our expensive car and our satisfaction diminishes.
   
   

Bottom line: this increasing conspicuous spending does more harm than good. We have to discourage conspicuous consumption in favour of inconspicuous consumption. Frank explains that no individual or family alone can solve this problem. It has to be solved at a higher level. He proposes a simple but effective measure to discourage conspicuous consumption, a progressive consumption tax levied on consumption rather than income. Frank claims this tax can stimulate radical changes in the ways we lead our lives. Contrary to the believe of many, he convincingly argues, this progressive consumption tax would not cripple the economy but invigorate it. A fascinating book also highly relevant for European countries I think.

The Goals Continuum

Helping, negotiating, directing

© 2006, Coert Visser and Gwenda Schlundt Bodien

The goals continuum is a model reflecting in which situation you can apply which skill. The extreme left of the continuum describes situations in which the goals of the employee are the center of the discussion. In these situations helping (coaching) is the most suitable approach. The extreme right is about situations in which the goals of the manager are central. Between the two extremes on this continuum are situations that require negotiation.

Managing people is not always an easy thing to do. Take a look at this example:

A manager told us recently: “One of the people in my team, Bert, does not perform well. Time and again he does not meet the deadlines. As a consequence the delivery to our customers is frequently delayed. This has to stop! But no matter how much I try to help him, I can’t seem to get through to him. He gets irritated, he tries to avoid me and he dismisses my suggestions. What am I to do?”

Use the right skills in the right situation
In order to constructively achieve your goals as a manager it is important to apply the right skills at the right time. In the above example this did not happen. The manager tries to solve a problem by helping the employee. However, directing the employee is in order in the above example. Therefore, helping or coaching does not work. It seems like the manager and the subordinate are on a different wave length which causes nothing to change.

The goals continuum

The goals continuum is a model which describes which skills to apply in which circumstances. The extreme left of the continuum describes situations in which the goals of the employee are prevails. In these situations, helping (coaching) is the most suitable approach. The extreme right represent situations in which the goals of the manager prevail. Between the two extremes on this continuum are situations that require negotiation. The figure below represents the continuum.

1. Extreme left of the continuum: Helping

On the extreme left of the continuum, the goals of the employee are leading. This is the case when the manager does not feel the need to change the behavior of the employee. In these situations, the employee wants to change something and the manager is all right with these changes and goals. This can be the case for example when the employee is performing well and is looking for new work challenges. Another example is a situation in which an employee is performing well at work and asks his manager for help regarding a personal problem. In help-requiring situations, the manager can use the solution-focused approach about which we have written several articles (see here, here, here and here).

2. Extreme right of the continuum: Directing

On the extreme right of the continuum, the goals of the manager (and the organization) prevail. The right side of the continuum describes situations in which the manager wants to change something in the behavior of the employee. This can involve two kinds of change:

1. Imposing limits / correcting: when the employee’s behavior is unacceptable because it is harmful to others or to the organization, it is necessary for the manager to draw boundaries and clarify to the employee that the particular behavior has to stop and change.
2. Clarifying performance expectations: when the employee does not show the minimally required performance, and the manager has to take action to stimulate the employee to perform up to standard.

As a manager it is to be recommended you prepare your conversation with an employee properly. In your preparation you can come up with answers (preferably in writing) to the following questions:

1. What do I want the employee to do differently? What does he have to start doing or what does he have to stop doing?
2. To what end do I expect this of him? What are the advantages of what I expect him to do? To whom and from what perspective are these behaviors useful?

Also, it is useful to ponder the following questions: Do I have a mandate to direct the employee in this way? What exactly is my mandate? Do I have the authority to ask this? When it becomes clear that you can’t answer these questions affirmatively maybe it is better to check this first with your manager. If you find out that you don’t have the required authority you can try to enlarge your mandate by starting a discussion about the topic with your colleagues or superiors.

In the conversation itself you can provide direction in a solution-focused way by being clear and friendly at the same time. You can be both firm and inviting by using questions while you lead. A format for questions which often work well is:

1. How can you ensure that …… (what you expect from the employee)
2. so that …… (the advantage of the behavior you expect)

In this article you can read more about how to do this and also about how you can respond to different ways in which employees might respond to your attempt to direct them. The interesting thing about this way of directing is that an authoritative or bossy tone can almost always be avoided - making it much less likely that employees will resist your attempt to direct them.

3. Middle part of the continuum: Negotiating

In the center of the continuum, between Helping and Directing, there is negotiating. The center of the continuum describes situations in which the manager has goals and wants to exercise some influence. But you realize it is not an all or nothing situation. You are prepared to give and take a bit with respect to the moment in which the change has to be realized and in the amount of change that has to be made. You may want to use an “if you do this, I’ll do that” approach.

Preparation is also very useful when you want to negotiate. Questions that can be helpful are: What goals do you minimally want to achieve? What is your negotiating space? What do the both of you agree on?

Experiences

We have trained many managers to use the Goals Continuum. In a group of managers in a large hospital many of them were satisfied with the model because it helped them to prepare much better for difficult conversations. It also helped them to approach the conversations with employees with confidence. In another organization, we trained all management-levels in this solution-focused approach. The advantage they experience is felt both on an individual level and on a group level. They are pleased to have found a shared way of managing people which helps them to achieve their goals more easily and which the employees generally find pleasant.

We end this article with an example on the right side of the continuum

Steve, a manager in a factory department, had to engage in a difficult conversation with Richard, an employee who had several times shown intimidating behavior towards his colleagues. A few colleagues had already said they were afraid of him. Steve had once before said to Richard that he would not accept physically aggressive behavior. Richard had responded evasively and had said:”It is very hard for me to control my temper because I was mistreated as a child myself”. This conversation between Steve and Richard did not lead to a clear understanding and agreement. Recently, there had been a new situation of Richard intimidating a co-worker and Steve wanted to talk about it with him. This time, Steve had prepared well for the conversation. He had written down what he expected of Richard and why. In the conversation he said: “Richard, you are a much appreciated person in this department because of your commitment and your readiness to help others. No wonder we would very much like to keep you around. For that, it will be necessary for you to restrain yourself at all times when you feel angry so that your colleagues can feel safe around you at all times. How can you that care of this?” After a few seconds, Richard responded like this: “I understand you ask this of me but it is very hard for me to control my anger when I feel challenged. Steve responded understandingly but firmly “I can imagine that after what you have told me recently. And given that is hard for you …. How can you still take care of it so that people will feel safe and we can keep on employing you here?” During the conversation Steve kept on coming back to the HOW-question. The conversation proceeded constructively and Richard and Steve made an agreement that Richard would at all times control himself when angry. Richard has since found a way to do this.

The Not-Knowing Posture

© 2006, Coert Visser and Insoo Kim Berg

This article presents some thoughts about the not-knowing posture. Is it easy? Is it valuable? Is it ethical to charge money for your services while assuming a not-knowing posture? Does the not-knowing posture mean you have to completely discard expertise?

Many who are new to the Solution-Focused practice principles seem to get confused by the concept taking a “not-knowing” posture when facing their clients. The not-knowing posture (Anderson and Goolishian, 1992) means that as practitioners we work from the assumption that each case is different. Therefore we do not know exactly what the situation of the client is and what he should think or do. This is why in order to arrive at a more satisfying outcome, solution-focused practitioners ask lots of what seem like strange questions that activate their minds.

We did not realize for a long time that the “not-knowing posture” was creating some confusion among the newly learning therapists, coaches, consultants, trainers, educators and managers. Several questions are raised by confusion.

1. Does “not-knowing” imply that it’s easy and that anyone can do this work without training and a solid grasp of the philosophy behind it?
2. If we take a “not-knowing” posture, how can we ethically charge money for our services?
3. How can I prove to our clients how valuable my service is to them if I don’t know?
4. I went through years of education and post-graduate training in order to be an expert and now you are saying I should forget everything I learned?

These are some of the most pressing questions we have come across. Let’s have a look and each of these important questions.

Is it easy?

The phrase ‘not-knowing posture’ might suggest that this is very easy to do and that anyone can do this without much effort. Quite the opposite is true. Taking a not-knowing posture is much more difficult than it might seem, because it seems counter-intuitive at first glance. Both as professionals and human beings we have all kinds of experiences, views and opinions. Actively setting these ideas, knowledge, and skills aside by assuming a “not-knowing” posture is demanding and requires great discipline. Furthermore, applying the solution-building model is a specific expertise in itself. We are not expert in knowing what caused the client’s problem and what he or she should do to solve it. Instead, we are experts on “solution-building conversation,” a process by which clients discover their own most effective ways of achieving their goals. Again, this is not easy: It requires both attention and skills that are quire different from problem analysis.

Is it ethical to charge money for it?

The mere fact that taking a “not-knowing posture” is hard, is not enough justification in itself to charge money for it. Taking a not-knowing posture engages clients in their own solution-building process, thus reading his/her goals much quicker, and with confidence. There is an important difference between telling clients what they should do and helping them to find out for themselves what they should do, instead, clients discover what works for them. Traditional tell-sell approaches to coaching and consultancy are wide-spread but can be problematic. Clients might wonder whether the solution offered by the expert will work in his specific situation. Also, they may wonder whether they will be able to execute the solution effectively without spending additional time and expense. Since the solution-focused approach builds on what has already worked for clients it will therefore not create resistance but energy and confidence. This is probably the main reason why the solution-focused approach works well and efficiently (Gingerich & Eisenhart, 2000; Visser & Butter, 2006). This efficiency and effectiveness adds value for the client.

How will clients accept the not-knowing posture?

Taking a not-knowing posture is demanding and valuable but how will clients be able to recognize and understand this? After all, clients may expect you as a consultant, coach or therapist to tell them what to do and think. So, what will they think of you when you will instead start asking a lot of questions? From our careful observations of client response to our thoughtful questions many clients report how our questions are because they help them to form goals and discover strengths, they usually find this very helpful. There is nothing like a personal experience to discover the benefits of the “not-knowing” posture as be activated and energized to make further progress.

For example, a colleague of ours, Steve Langer was interviewed for a job as a consultant for a prison population. The Director of the prison who interviewed him asked him many questions, and Steve found himself describing what he might do as a consultant to difficult prisoners who are hostile, angry, and uncooperative. Instead of continuing to explain to the Director, he said to the director, he knows his prison population very well and would he mind playing one of the difficult prison that Steve might work with. The Director took on the challenge and played a very tough prisoner who was causing a great deal of difficulty for the staff. Of course Steve used all the solution-building practices and took the “not-knowing” posture and asked many questions. The Director was so impressed with Steve that he got hired immediately on the spot.

Some clients may be confused, however. After all, they may have some experiences with other professionals which use a quite different approach. Sometimes it may be helpful to explain it. A manager who was talking with her coach, suddenly smiled and asked: “You do ask a lot of questions, don’t you?” The coach replied: “That’s right, it helps me to understand your situation better.” The manager responded: “Okay, I did not quite expect that but I think it’s very useful.” On another occasion a client explicitly asked for tips from his coach. The coach replied by answering: “Alright, I will give you some tips. Is it alright if I first ask some questions so that I can focus my tips on your specific situation?” The client said: “Of course, you first need to know more about my situation, I understand. I can see that you are very careful with your suggestions, and I like that.”

What about my expertise?

The not-knowing posture does not mean that you know nothing and that you have no expertise. Being able to conduct a solution-focused conversation requires expertise in itself, in addition to others you have, and keep all the other skills you have acquired over the years and continue to learn. While continuing to engage in solution-building conversations, you take a “not-knowing” posture and you postpone your judgments for a while and approach the client’s situation with great curiosity. Many experienced practitioners find time and again that their curiosity has been more than rewarded. One reason for this is that the client will feel he’s taken very seriously and respect for their own expertise. Another reason is that it will create a conversation in which client and solution-focused practitioner will be able to find tailor-made solutions that will fit perfectly to the situation.

We are not alone in arguing for a not-knowing posture when helping clients. Peter Drucker, the famous management guru, once said: “My greatest strength as a consultant is to be ignorant and ask a few questions."

References

1. Anderson, H. (1990) Then and now: From knowing to not-knowing. Contemporary Family Therapy Journal. 12:193-198.


2. Anderson, H. & Goolishian, H. (1992) The client is the expert: A not-knowing approach to therapy. In. S. McNamee & K. Gergen (Eds.). Social Construction and the Therapeutic Process. Newbury Park, CA: Sage.


3. Berg, I.K. & Dolan, Y. (2001). Tales of Solutions. WW. Norton & Company, Inc., New York


4. Gingerich WJ, Eisengart S: Solution-focused brief therapy: A review of the outcome research. Family Process 39:477-498, 2000


5. Visser, C.F. & Butter, R. (2006). What works in coaching and consultancy? www.m-cc.nl/solution-focusedchange.htm

Organizational Resilience in Times of Crisis

Does the people centered management philosophy still work during crisis?

© 2005, Coert Visser

Summary - Researchers like Kim Cameron and Wayne Cascio have said for years that a strategy of laying-off people in many cases does not work, and may even backfire, in times of crisis. The situation in the American airline industry after the terrorist attacks of 9/11 was an almost unparalleled crisis. An excellent chance to take the test. Which companies proved to be most resilient and why?

“We are willing to suffer some damage, even to our stock price, to protect the jobs of our people.”

- Jim Parker, CEO of Southwest Airlines”, 8 OCTOBER, 2001

Crisis in the airline industry
Since 9/11 terrorist attacks, the world economy has suffered severely. The airline industry is one of the worst hit sectors. Passenger numbers fell back drastically, companies showed huge losses, and stock prices fell. Large numbers of employees lost their jobs. These traumatic events have confronted the sector with an ultimate test and have provided organizational scientists with a unique natural experiment. What different strategies have companies followed to handle this crisis and which strategies have proven most effective? These are the questions that researchers Jody Hoffer Gittell, Kim Cameron and Sandy Lim (2005) have formulated and answered.

What does research say on the use of downsizing?

For anyone who has followed the management literature of the last 20 years, this is an exciting study. Researchers like Kim Cameron (Cameron & Whetten, 1987; Cameron, 1994, Cameron, 1998) and Wayne Cascio (Cascio, Young & Morris, 1997; Cascio, 2002) have researched the effects of downsizing for many years. The central questions they have addressed were: does laying off personnel lead to a quick and lasting improvement of the financial position of companies? In brief, the conclusion of their research is: companies that use downsizing are not more profitable than companies who don’t downsize and often hurt themselves in the long term. As a result of the negative impact on relationships downsizings usually negatively impact organizational performance. Furthermore, starting a downsizing scenario often leads to repeated downsizings in the future.

But does this also apply in situations of crisis? Can lay-offs be avoided in these circumstances? Is that realistic? A majority of managers tend to see downsizing as a logical, useful and unavoidable tool in times of crisis. However, research by Kim Cameron (1998) shows that most of these companies are confronted with declining profits, product and service quality, and innovation and a deteriorating organization climate. Based on research findings, Cascio (2002) argues that it pays off to use lay-offs only as a last resort, even in a crisis situation. Is this statement confirmed in the airline industry crisis since 9/11?

How did Southwest Airlines stand the test?

One of the companies with an explicit no-lay-offs strategy is Southwest Airlines. This company has been described in many management books as an example of a company which has achieved extremely good financial results while advocating a very people-centered management philosophy which is very consistently implemented. Herbert Kelleher (see picture), the previous CEO of Southwest once made the following comment which summarizes the Southwest philosophy (O'Reilly & Pfeffer, 2000):

"Who comes first, the employee, customers, or shareholders? That’s never been an issue to me. The employees come first. If they’re happy satisfied, dedicated, and energetic, they’ll take real good care of the customers. When the customers are happy, they come back. And that makes the shareholders happy."

It is wonderful to read how Southwest Airlines has flourished in the good times before 9/111. But how did this company perform during the extremely tough times after 9/11? Did it have to own up and start laying off personnel? How did Southwest Airlines do compared to competitors in these challenging times? Below is a summary of the study by Gittell, Cameron, and Lim.

The research by Gittell, Cameron, and Lim

In the three years that followed 9/11, the researchers studied the ten largest U.S. airline companies: Alaska, American, American Trans Air, America West, Continental, Delta, Northwest, Southwest, United and US Airways. The most important variables they looked at were:

1. financial reserve: a) low debt position, b) high cash position
2. percentage lay-offs
3. recovery of stock prize

The researchers were particularly interested in finding out how relational and financial reserves could account for resilience. Based on the above described research by Cameron, Cascio and others the researchers hypothesized that a strategy of commitment to personnel, in which lay-offs would be seen as a last resort, would create relational reserves and would therefore contribute to a quick recovery. Financial reserves were defined as a low debt position and large amounts of cash on hand. The expectation was that strong financial reserves would muffle the blow of a crisis and that strong financial reserves would thus be associated with resilience. In other words, financial reserves would make it easier to realize a strategy of commitment to employees.

The results fitted the expectations perfectly. Financial reserves coupled with a strong commitment to employees turned out to be strongly associated with organizational resilience. In other words, the higher the financial reserves and the lower the percentage of lay-offs, the quicker the stock price recovered. I made the following table to illustrate the most important results. It ranks the companies on the most important variables (click to enlarge).

Conclusion
It is crystal clear: Southwest Airlines has stood the test brilliantly. Thanks to its excellent performance in the past it has built strong financial reserves. Isn’t it ironic? Analysts had often criticized Southwest for keeping these strong reserves saying they should have been used for acquiring other companies. But this crisis showed that the financial reserves played a crucial helping role. Southwest Airlines did not have to lay off any personnel. Because of this, the company could stick in word and deed to its strong commitment to personnel. Employees understood this message very well. All kinds of negative side–effects of downsizing could be avoided and the Southwest Airlines stock recovered faster than any of the competitors' stocks. Furthermore, Southwest was the only American airline company to make a profit in every single quarter of the period studied, while US Airways, which followed an almost completely opposite strategy (see table) showed a loss in every single quarter.

An airline analyst remarked the following about Southwest: “They are doing what they do best, which is to shine in the hours of trouble.”

1 In 1998 Jeffrey Pfeffer notes: "Southwest Airlines produced a stock market return of over 21,000 percent between 1972 and 1992 and has been profitable in each of the past twenty-four years, a record unmatched by any other airline in the world except Singapore Airlines." Further, he notes that Southwest has the lowest costs and the lowest fares in the American Airline industry. Pfeffer describes the people-centered management practices of Southwest as follows: "Southwest emphasizes training, selective recruiting, profit sharing and stock ownership and has never had a layoff or furlough in its history - all elements of high commitment work systems."

References

1. Cameron, K.S. & D.A. Whetten (1987). Organizational effects of decline and turbilence. Administrative Science Quarterly, 32: 222-240.
2. Cameron, K.S. (1994). Strategies for successful organizational downsizing. Human Resource Management Journal, 33: 189-212.
3. Cameron, K.S. (1998). “Strategic organizational downsizing: An extreme case.” Research in Organizational Behavior, 20: 185-229.
4. Cascio, W.F., Young, C.E. & Morris, J. (1997). financial consequences of employment change decisions in major US corporations. Academy of Management Journal, 40. 1175-1189.
5. Cascio, W.F. (2002). Responsible restructuring: Creative and Profitable Alternatives to Layoffs. Berrett-Koehler Publishers
6. Conlin, M. (2001). Where Layoffs Are a Last Resort. Treating them as unthinkable can have big benefits. BusinessWeek online, October, 2001
7. Gittell, J., Cameron, K. & Lim, S. (2005). Relationships, Layoffs, and organizational Resilience: Airline Industry Responses to September 11th. Berrett-Koehler Publishers.
8. O'Reilly, C. & Peffer, J. (2000). Hidden Value. How great companies achieve ordinary results with ordinary people. Harvard Business School Press
9. Peffer, J. (1998). The Human Equation. Building profits by putting people first. Harvard Business School Press

Constructive and Activating Management Techniques

© 2005, Coert Visser and Gwenda Schlundt Bodien

Managers frequently say that directing people can be a challenging task. There can be hard situations in conversations when managers try to direct people. What should you do when an employee reacts defensively and does not acknowledge the point you are trying to make? Or what about an employee who raises all kinds of different subjects and one who complains utterly? This article describes a tool for leading in a constructive and activating manner and for dealing effectively with different kinds of responses by employees.

You are a sales manager responsible for leading a team of salespeople. Mike is a senior salesman with outspoken opinions which he is not shy to share. He does not have a high opinion of Pascal, a junior salesman in the team. Yesterday, there was an incident between Mike and Pascal. Another salesperson has told you that Mike called Pascal a “loser who will never become a good salesman”. The incident is the talk of the day. Pascal has reported sick. This situation is not acceptable to you and you decide to have a talk with Mike.

1. Preparation: What about? What? Why?

You know that this is not a situation which lends itself to a coaching approach. Coaching is a useful approach for helping people solve their problems in cases in which you don’t have an opinion about and a stake in what should happen. In this case you do require a specific outcome and that is why this situation lends itself more for providing direction. Because you notice feeling slightly irritated and you don’t want this conversation to lead to accusations and reproaches you decide to prepare it specifically and constructively. In your preparation you avoid heavy-laden and accusative words while making no concession whatsoever regarding your goal. You phrase this goal as much as you can in terms of desired positive results. By doing that, you maximize the chance the conversation will lead to a positive result. You complete the following sentences:

1. I have noticed that …..

2. How can you accomplish that …… so that …….

Through the first sentence (I have noticed that …) you determine the topic of the conversation (WHAT ABOUT). The first part of the second sentence helps you to make clear WHAT you expect from the employee and the second part helps you to explain WHY you expect this. Through the use of the word ‘how’ you activate the employee to determine the way in which the results will be achieved. You make clear that this is his responsibility. After thinking about it for a minute you write down:

Mike, I have noticed that there is some rumor about an incident between you and Pascal. You appear to have said that Pascal is not suited for his job. To perform well as a team it is necessary that we treat each other respectfully and help each other to achieve good results. How can you ensure that Pascal knows that you respect him and accept him as a colleague, so that the two of you can achieve good results together and contribute to a positive work atmosphere in the team and to good team results?

2. Different types of responses to your direction

Employees can respond in different ways. We distinguish between visitor-typical responses, complainer-typical responses and customer-typical responses (DeJong & Berg, 2001). It is useful to recognize the employee’s type of response so that you can deal with it adequately. Below, the case is elaborated in three ways.

a) Visitor-typical responses are responses in which the employee does not see the usefulness and importance of the conversation with you. In the case of Mike, he would respond in a visitor-typical way when he would say: “What’s the fuss about? Surely, we have better things to do than talk about this kind of trifle?” A good way of responding is:

• Repeat the nature, the reason and the topic of the conversation
• Stress the importance: It is important that you … so that ….
• Activate the employee by repeating: How can you accomplish … so that …
• Keep on repeating and stressing these elements as long as the employee keeps on responding visitor-typically. Let the power of repetition work for you.

Mike: What’s the fuss about? Surely, we have better things to do than talk about this kind of trifle?

Manager: It is really necessary to talk about it now. It is important that we treat each other respectfully and help each other to achieve good results. How can you make sure that Pascal knows that you respect him and accept him as a colleague, so that the two of you can achieve good results together and contribute to a positive work atmosphere in the team and good team results?

b) Complainer-typical responses are responses in which the employee does see the importance of the conversation and the topic but also complains and/or behaves helpless. Mike would respond complainer-typical when he would say: “Yes, I regret what happened between Pascal and me but he performs so badly that I thought it was time for the truth to be told. He makes so many mistakes!” When confronted with a complainer-typical response it is important to stay patient while sticking to the topic. A good response would be:

• Show understanding for the perception and the behavior of the employee: Aha, I understand that you …. (You don’t have to agree with what he says!)
• Activate the employee by repeating: Given that this is the case ……how can you accomplish … so that …
• Keep on repeating and stressing these elements as long as the employee keeps on responding complainer-typically. Let the power of repetition work for you.

Mike: Yes, I regret what happened between Pascal and me but he performs so badly that I thought it was time for the truth to be told. He makes so many mistakes!

Manager: “Aha, I understand you thought the truth needed to be told because you see Pascal’s mistakes. I can imagine this makes it bit harder to stay respectful. Given that this is so, how can you ensure that Pascal knows that you respect him and accept him as a colleague, so that the two of you can achieve good results together and contribute to a positive work atmosphere in the team and good team results?

c) Customer-typical responses are responses which show the employee sees the importance of the conversation and the topic and wants to live up to the expectations. Mike’s response would be customer-typical when he would say: “Yes, I did not treat him with due respect and I should change that. But he gets on my nerves so much that I don’t know how to control myself. Do you have any tips?” A good way of responding is to start coaching. Mike acknowledges the problem, sees the usefulness and the importance of what you ask of him and asks for your help. To provide help is now the most constructive way of proceeding.

Mike: Yes, I did not treat him with due respect and I should change that. But he gets on my nerves so much that I don’t know how to control myself. Do you have any tips?

Manager: I am glad to hear that you see you did not treat Pascal with due respect and that you want to do something about it. I’d be pleased to help you with that.

When confronted with customer-typical responses, it usually works very well to keep on activating the other person to find his own solutions. It is beyond the scope of this article to describe a complete coaching method. On this site you can find some articles with more information.

Finish the conversation with specific agreements on the results to be accomplished. If you can’t reach that in one conversation, make a new appointment and continue in that conversation until a clear agreement is reached.

Applications and limitations of this approach

The tools in this article can help you to effectively provide direction to employees. We realize this method oversimplifies reality a bit and that management conversations will not always be a piece of cake. This approach can not guarantee success in 100 percent of your difficult conversations. No method can promise that. Many managers, however, have experienced that this approach helps them to lead clearly and constructively and to keep the responsibility for achieving results with the employee. It turns out, clarity and friendliness very often can go hand in hand.

References

• DeJong, P. & Berg, I.K (2001). Interviewing for solutions. Wadsworth Publishing; 2nd edition.
• www.solutionfocusedchange.com

Circles of Change

© 2005, Arnoud Huibers and Coert Visser

The solution-focused approach has brought forward a simple technique which can help to make meetings about organizational change stimulating and effective.

Organizational change
Organizations, departments, and people in organizations work are practically permanently going through large and small changes. Those changes can encompass structural aspects like a change in the business process, merging departments, implementing systems, or changes in the management structure. They can also be about cultural changes like improving customer satisfaction, improving co-operation, raising productivity, and so forth.

Talking about progress
In large-scale change projects, it is very important to keep communicating about the goals of and the progress in the change process. Our observation is that meetings about organizational change often focus on two topics: 1) what goes wrong? and 2) What will we do about that? When people focus attention on these two questions, the result often disappoints. Participants in the meeting can get discouraged of everything that goes wrong and everything that has yet to be done.

The circle technique
The solution-focused approach to change has brought forward a technique that often helps to make meetings about organizational change simulating: the circle technique. It works like this. The facilitator of the meeting draws two circles on a large board or sheet, an inner circle, and an outer circle. In the inner circle, he writes down everything that has already been achieved and in the outer circle, he writes down what has yet to be achieved. It is also useful to divide the circle in two parts. Topics that refer to the department are written on the left side; topics that refer to the whole organization are written down on the right side (see figure 1).

Way of working
You can apply the circle technique quite broadly and flexibly. You can use it in one-on-one situations, in small groups and in large groups. When applied in small groups a serial approach often works well. The process facilitator asks one person after the other which results have already been achieved and which things have yet to be achieved. In larger groups, a parallel approach might work better. All participants can mention examples of achievements and goals. Splitting up the group into subgroups might also work well. Each subgroup is asked to draw their won circles and write down achievements and goals. Of course, after that, these subgroup circles can be discussed and integrated.

Positive terms
The circle technique works best when the words in the circles are phrased as concrete and positive as possible. In finding the most constructive words, the facilitator plays a crucial role. When participants at first phrase a goal in terms of a complaint (“the managers never gives us feedback”) the facilitator may help them to rephrase this complaint into a goal (“helpful management feedback”). De complaint is rephrased in terms of the presence of something positive instead of in terms of the absence of something.

A department manager did the circle exercise together with his team and came to the following achievements and goals (figure 2).

GoalsWhen the circles are filled, the facilitator focuses on the outer circle. First, he asks participants to prioritize the goals mentioned. Often it is wise to limit the number of goals to two or three. Then some attention may be paid to how the goals may be achieved. For this, the scaling technique may be used. More information about this technique can be found here.

AdvantagesUsing the circle technique has several advantages. First, it is very simple and goal oriented. It forces people to focus on the essence: making progress in the desired direction. Secondly, we often notice how participants in meetings are positively surprised by what everything that has already been achieved. This strengthens their confidence, pride and faith. Thirdly, it is very pleasant that people leave the room with some very concrete goals.

Using the circle technique can provide a useful impulse in the change process. We hope you like it and try it out. When you try it, do let us know how it worked!

Looking at the Other Side of the Coin

© 2005, Insoo Kim Berg and Coert Visser

When we, as managers, change how we view a person, we can generate much simpler and easier solutions to them so that we can focus our attention on more difficult and time consuming issues.

Managing people takes more than clear black and white views. Even though it certainly is important to make expectations and rules of conduct clear, it is not as simple as it is described in textbooks. Many good managers have discovered that managing people is an art rather than a science, and all artistic skills take time to develop and become good at. Many competent managers discover this reality by trial and error.


Sometimes this art is described as practice wisdom. By trial and error, good managers have learned that bringing out the best in their workers is the best strategy to motivate, encourage, and teach their workers without “teaching”. Many wise managers have learned that when it is the worker’s idea to change, they will change as much as they can, for as long as they can. On the other hand, when workers are forced to change, they change as little as they can, for as short period as possible.

The most important tool that managers can have is their ability to see both sides of a same coin. Human beings are so complex and multi-faceted that a single, one-dimensional view of a worker is not adequate to describe the whole person, yet we often hear one-sided comments from managers about their workers. “George is unmotivated,” “Linda doesn’t know how to be tactful,” “Mark is a loudmouth,” and so on. It is easy to reduce a worker into a simple description because it saves time and we come to the point.

The problem with this approach is that it does not offer managers better ways to “manage” the difficulty they have with their workers. On the contrary, it reduces the manager’s options. For example, if the problem is one is “unmotivated”, then the logical solution to that is to lecture George about his lack of motivation. You can easily imagine the conversation that might follow which in turn proves to the manager that indeed George is unmotivated. This sets off a chain reaction to “do something about the problem” and leads to further “problem talk” with George. This rarely works in the long run. Pretty soon the manager may find herself repeating the warning, threat, reprimand, and nagging again and again without lasting desired outcome.

On the other hand, suppose the manager saw George as “distracted” instead. One can easily imagine what the manager might do to bring the attention of George back to getting his task done. And reminding and helping George to refocus on his task is much more pleasant for the manager and George than to be nagged at. Seeing George as “unmotivated” may be quite accurate, and so may his being “distracted” and losing his focus be. But framing it in a constructive way offers much more flexible ways to solve the manager’s problem.

The same thing happens with Mark’s “loudmouth” When we label someone as “loudmouth” then our solution to it is to suggest to Mark to be quiet or soft spoken, be more careful when he opens his mouth. It is improbable that Mark will agree with this definition. He is more likely to be defensive and offended, and become angry. Reframing Mark’s behavior as his “outspoken style” will lead to a greater chance to change his tendency to blurt things out. Changing his style is much easier to do than to change his personality. Linda’s lack of tactfulness can be easily viewed as her open and honest style. Again, one can more easily and subtly help them to change the style of communication than offering them communication training.

We believe that most of the time, all of us mean well and generally we just like to be valued and recognized for that. The same goes for George, Mark and Linda. That is why it not so strange they feel hurt and offended when spoken to offensively. It is only understandable they will get defensive. It is only logical that a more constructive approach will make them feel more valued for their good intentions and will make them more open for suggestions and more ready to make some changes.

When we, as managers, change how we view a person, we can generate much simpler and easier solutions to them so that we can focus our attention on more difficult and time consuming issues.

Five Tips for Sustaining Change

© 2005, Coert Visser

Change processes can sometimes stagnate and old problems can turn up again. Often this leads to disappointwiment and pessimism. But in many cases the change process can be revitalized by very simple means. The five tips mentioned in this article have time and again proven their usefulness.

A department was trying to implement a culture change in which more discipline and sticking better to agreements were important goals. The change process had started and had at first led to promising results. After about one and a half year, it became obvious that the change process was no longer proceeding well. Several old problems reappeared and there were no clear signs of progress.

With long lasting change processes in organizations managers sometimes worry about the possibility that at a certain moment stagnation or a set-back might happen. After a promising start the change process can lose its momentum. The energy disappears, the progress in the direction of the goal seems to be gone, people seem to go back to business as usual, old problems come back, and cynicism about the desired change turns up. To worry about these things is understandable because it is not uncommon that periods of stagnation and set-backs happen in change programs. The solution-focused approach to organizational change offers some practical tips for managers to deal with these phenomena.

Tip 1: Don’t focus on stagnation when it is not yet a problem
Many change managers begin to warn about stagnation, set-backs, and cynicism when it is not yet happening. But by doing this they focus the attention on something that does not necessarily have to occur. People involved in the change process could become pessimistic through such warnings or they could get discouraged. They can even feel they are being underestimated. Talking about stagnation that might occur could easily become a self-fulfilling prophecy. But major stagnation and set-backs certainly do not always happen! Solution-focused change practitioners use the principle:

“If it ain’t broken, don’t fix it”.

They don’t try to solve problems of stagnation and set-backs in advance but only when they occur, if they occur at all…

Tip 2: Look for signs that indicate that change will be maintainedSometimes people think it is important to take measure to prevent stagnation and set-backs. If youti decide to do that the way you do it is important. Steve De Shazer, the solution-focused pioneer from Milwaukee, says:

“People are trained to look for signs of a set-back. But we train people to look for signs that indicate that with this change there will be no set-back.”

By focusing attention on signs that the change will continue the people involved will get a better sight on the factors that help the change so that they can use these. The question of De Shazer is an example of question which is often used in the solution-focused approach: what reasons for optimism do you see? This type of question often works very well because it strengthens optimism and the confidence needed for change.

Tip 3: Normalize it when it happensWhen stagnation and set-backs happen it is often useful to apply the technique of normalizing. This means that you help people to see that what happens is normal. This helps to keep people from getting discouraged and losing confidence in the feasibility of the change. One manager applies normalizing by making a comparison with the stock market.

“If you look at stock price bdevelopment from a distance you see a steadily growing line. But if you look closer you see many fluctuations, some large some small. It is like that with organizational change. Overall it goes up but from day to day there may be set-backs and disappointments, sometimes small, sometimes larger. That is only normal. This is why every now and then you have to take a step back in order to keep sight on the steadily growing line that you can only see when looking from a distance.”

Tip 4: Focus on what has been achieved so farAt moments when things don’t seem to go well in a change process it is often useful to focus closely on what has been achieved, how that was done and what advantages it has brought. By doing this people usually come to realize that more things have gone right than they had thought and they usually find new confidence, optimism and focus. Furthermore, they find new ideas to get the change going again and to start making progress.

Tip 5: Apply again what worked beforeWhen a set-back happens people can sometimes wonder how to progress forward. But there is a simple answer that is often very useful. Many times, set-backs are caused by attention slipping away and by forgetting to apply effective solutions. In many cases we see that simply starting to apply again what has worked before will bring new life to the change process. This is similar to the Rose of Jericho.

The Rose of Jericho is a plant from the desert of Mexico. When it does not get water it dries out and becomes grey and breakable. It can stay like this for a surprisingly long time. But when it receives water again it gets its natural green color back and it starts to flourish again. This can be repeated over and over.

Bringing new life to stagnating change
Of course change processes can stagnate and of course old problems can turn up again. And often this leads to disappointment and pessimism. But just as often the change process can be revitalized by very simple means. The five tips mentioned in this article have proven their use many times. The department manager from the case at the beginning of this article applied them.

The department manager called for a meeting about the change process. He emphasized that it was normal to be confronted with a set-back and invited all to make a list of everything that had been achieved since the start of the change process. About every thing they mentioned he asked what its advantages were and how they had managed to achieve it. This inquiry led to an impressive amount of material and the spirit of the meeting changed remarkably. The enthusiasm for the change goals grew and people regained their pride and hope. Next, the manager invited every participant to formulate which concrete results they wanted to achieve for the coming period and which small steps they would take in order to achieve them. This led to a very nice list of small goals and steps. The energy for change had been low for a period but after this session it was back without a doubt.

Staying Focused on Results

© Insoo Kim Berg and Coert Visser

We are often struck by how results oriented many people in business are. It seems to come naturally to many of them to constantly keep an eye on the outcomes they want to achieve. It seems fair to say that business conversations are essentially goal driven conversations. However, in situations of adversity both managers and employees seem to lose that focus.



Whenever there are obstacles, when there is delay, when people don’t perform like intended, it seems only natural to become more directive, more outspoken and to generate pressure in order to speed up the process of getting results. A patient, soft spoken, thoughtful, style of management seems to be the last thing that is asked for. Rather, such a style is viewed as conflicting with a results focus and should be avoided. After all, how can you create sense urgency when you act patiently and understanding?

In such cases the drive for results is usually still there but it somehow does not translate into real progress toward the goal. Instead, people seem to get sidetracked by starting to focus more on what they want to do then on what they want to achieve. For instance, they may take disagreement as a personal affront and only seem to want to get their anger out and ‘tell it like it is’ to their colleagues. Or they may turn to a highly directive and authoritative approach in order to motivate an employee.

However logical these behaviors may appear, they will nearly always have an adverse impact. Telling it like it is, getting mad, getting overly bossy will most likely bring achievement of the goal further out of sight. People will probably respond defensive, hurt, or angry when confronted with these behaviors. Or they may comply against their will and grow less committed to their work and organizations because of that.

Do tough situations mainly require tough talk? No. We say quite the opposite. We have often seen that a direct, authoritative approach creates obstacles to achieving goals rather than that it is helpful. To become truly outcome focused in these challenging situations we argue for a very deliberate approach which squarely puts the desired results central. We suggest to pause for a second and ask yourself some of the following questions:

What is the outcome I want? What do I want to achieve from this conversation? Is my priority to just to feel better here and now or do I want to get the job done? What can this person contribute to achieving the goal? How do we get there together? What worked well with this person before?

This kind of conversation makes it much easier for the other person to feel understood and appreciated and will make it therefore much likelier that he will join you in trying to improve the situation. Although this approach is much friendlier and more likable than the authoritative one, that is not the primary reason to do it like that. We believe business is not being friendly and about liking each other. Instead we are convinced that a critical task for anyone in business is delivering results. We don’t only mean financial results; results can be anything that contributes to achieving the purpose of the organization.

Do we deny the importance of feelings and of the quality of relationships? Not in the least. The paradox is that being effective as a team in the sense that it delivers results may be on of the most important prerequisites of having a good time together and liking and appreciating each other. The opposite goes too. It is almost impossible to keep on liking and enjoying each others company when results keep on lacking.

Don’t get angry, impatient or bossy. Instead focus on desired results and how you and the other person (people) can co-operate to make progress. It is not necessarily easy to do this. Research has shown that in stressful situations people tend to start thinking in simple terms and rely more on directive approaches. But deliberately choosing the attitude we propagate helps and makes the task feasible. Once you experience the advantages more and more it will become easier to keep on choosing it.

Managing Strengths in Three Steps

© Coert Visser

Hide not your talents, they for use were made. What's a sun-dial in the shade?
- Benjamin Franklin

Excellent performance is based on strengths

This article is a follow up of Effective managers pay attention to strengths. That article explained how excellent performance is primarily based on identifying, applying and developing strengths. The statement is supported by solid research by Gallup. However, in everyday practice most (HR) managers seem to take strengths for granted and focus first and foremost on identifying and eliminating weaknesses and deficits.

Large-scale international research by Marcus Buckingham and Donald O' Clifton (2001) has shown that effective manager do not emphasize weaknesses and limitations but strengths. From their research it has become clear that effective managers are led by the convictions that everyone’s talents are lasting and unique and that the greatest opportunity for development for each person lies in the area of their greatest strengths.

Strengths are talents + skills + knowledge

The authors define strengths as a talents completed with skills and knowledge. Skills and knowledge can be developed very well providing talent is there but talent itself can not, or hardly, be developed. Strengths can thus be developed by identifying talents and completing them with skills and knowledge. Of course, weaknesses and limitations don’t have to be denied or ignored. After all, eliminating impeding limitations can be a necessary requirement of good performance too.

Step 1: Identifying talents

Talents are not only recognizable in good performance but also in things like interests, affinities, gratification, and speed of learning. Below you will find some examples of questions you can ask to identify talents and strengths of employees (Visser & Thissen, 2002).

Clues and example questions

1. Performance

When does the employee perform exceptionally well? An indication of a talent is often consistent good performance. One thing is important to point out: even if the employee does not perform to well on the whole you can focus on strengths by identifying those situations in which the performance did exceed expectations.

2. Fast learning

What kinds of new knowledge and skills does the employee acquire with above average speed?

3. Interest

Which activities does the employee love to do?

4. Gratification

Which activities and tasks give the employee the most gratification? When does the employee talk with great enthusiasm about his or her work? What accomplishments is the employee most proud of? What made these so special?

Step 2: Applying and using Strengths

Identifying talents is only a first step. After that you can start to really manage base don strengths. Managers often say that they are motivated to do so but don’t know how. A manager in a technical company said:

“I would love to contribute to the development of the strengths of my employees. But how exactly do you do that? In appraisal conversations I often can’t think of anything else to say about strengths … than that they are strengths. And then the conversation again focuses on weaknesses and problems.”

Here are some suggestions about what to do with strengths. These suggestions can be used both by the managers and by the employee.

Actions and explanation

1. Apply the strength consciously

Help employees to use their strengths. This may seem like forcing an open door but many people often leave their strengths unused. Help the employee to see that it is wise to use strengths consciously. Applying strengths when they are unasked for is a waste of your talents and can be annoying to others. What is often seen as a weakness is actually a strength in a situation or at a time that does not ask for it. The question thus is: when is the time right to use your strengths?

2. Develop the strength

Help employees to complete their talents with knowledge and skills. Some ways to do this are practicing with others, doing a training, and teaming up with experienced colleagues.

3. Challenge the strength by applying it on a higher level

Help employees to learn to stretch their strengths step by step by applying strengths on a slightly higher level (a bit more complex, a bit more challenging).

4. Apply the strength more broadly

Help employees to find new applications for their strengths (in which other situations might the strength be useful too?

Step 3: Managing Weaknesses

As mentioned before, it is really not necessary to ignore or deny weaknesses and limitations. Not only would that be asking too much of people, it can also be just plainly useful to acknowledge problems and to take away hindering factors like weaknesses and limitations. But the way you do that is important. Don’t try to turn real weaknesses into real strengths. This will most likely be a complete waste of time and lead to frustration both with you and the employee. How to do it more effectively? Here are some suggestions.

Action Explanation

1. Improve just a bit

When an employee clearly displays a weakness (for instance, he is consistently doing things wrong) demand from him to improve the skill in question to an acceptable level.

2. Use resources

Help employees to utilize circumstances, procedures, tools, and systems to compensate their weaknesses.

3. Make weaknesses irrelevant

Help employees to make their weakness though their strengths: develop them to such a level that clients, colleagues, etc don’t mind about your weaknesses anymore.

4. Find a partner

Help employees to find people that complement them. Their weaknesses can be compensated by strengths of others. In addition to this: help employees develop attention to and appreciation for diversity and strengths of others and help them to see how other peoples strengths help to compensate their own weaknesses.

5. Stop doing it

When employees are weak in something it can be an option to just stop doing the task. This can imply that the employee must switch jobs but in most cases this will not be necessary. Often, it will be possible to assign tasks in such a way that people can focus largely on things they like to do and do well. The main reason this is possible is that people differ a lot in talents and interests.

Management and self management

Hopefully you like these tips and see their use in you job as a (HR) manager. The suggestions are intended principally to be of use for you in your management responsibility. But they may also be useful for the way you manage yourself. After all, you own performance is also served best with a strengths-based approach.

Literature

1. Buckingham, M. & Clifton, D. (2001). Now, discover your strengths. Simon & Schuster
2. Visser, CF & Thissen, M.J. (2002). Effective managers pay attention to strengths.

Making Meetings More Useful

© Coert Visser and Gwenda Schlundt Bodien (2005)

“We have so many meetings in this organization but they lead to nothing but frustration. The wrong topics are on the agenda and even those topics aren’t handled properly. Meetings always start too late and are always drawn out. I am sick and tired of it!”

– A manager in a large organization

Meetings can be more useful!

Inefficient meetings are a pain to many managers and employees. Recent research by Microsoft among 38.000 respondents in 200 countries showed that employees are in meetings on average for 5,6 hours a week and according to them no less than 69 percent of this time leads to nothing at all. So it is no wonder that meetings often take away participants’ energy and are seen as useless. By using a success-focused approach in meetings they can be much more effective and less frustrating. The success perspective focuses constantly on making and keeping meetings useful for all participants. This works by posing a special kind of question, which we call useful-questions.

Useful-questions

By asking useful-questions you can constantly help people to focus on what they want to get out of the meeting. You help them to remember what they want to achieve and how this session can help them with that. Instead of telling them how the session is useful for them you ask them. The advantage is that they can judge for themselves and are really activated. You help them to imagine and to visualize how they can apply this session in their own situation. When they verbalize this for themselves it becomes much more likely that this will fit exactly to their goals and circumstances.

The next checklist contains examples of useful-questions that you can apply before, during and after meetings. It is not our suggestions to use all these questions. After all, too much of a thing is good for nothing. What we do intend is to provide you with some suggestions of questions that you may use in different phases of the meeting. Asking some of these questions at well-chosen moment can make meetings much more productive.

CHECKLIST USEFULNESS-QUESTIONS IN MEETINGS

Before and/or at the beginning of the meeting you may ask the following questions:

• What topic(s) should be discussed to make it a useful session for you?
• How will you know after the session has ended it will have been useful for you? What will be different?
• What small thing can you do to get as much as possible from this meeting?

During the meeting you may ask the following questions:

• Is/was this useful for you?
• If yes, how is it useful?
• If no, how could we make it more useful?
• How can we use the remaining time as well as possible?

After or at the end of the meeting you may ask the following questions:

• Has this meeting been useful for you?
• What has been most useful for you?
• How can you apply this?
• Which small step can you take tomorrow?

Keeping participants involved constantly

Asking useful-questions at the beginning helps to involve everyone actively in the process. Furthermore, it can help to really improve the agenda of the meeting. Asking useful-questions during the meeting can be very handy too, especially when a topic is ended. It also helps to keep people actively involved. They can decide for themselves and explain in their own words whether and how the topic is useful for them and if it is not what should happen to make it more useful. Sometimes you notice as a chairman you may doubt whether the participants see a topic or discussion as useful. For instance, you may get nonverbal cues that something is wrong or that something occupies others. They may frown, look at their watches or lean backwards for instance. These moments are typically suited for useful-questions. The interesting thing about these questions is that they are very much directed towards success while problems or complaints can always be addressed. The essence of the approach can be used in many types of conversations ranging from one-on-one conversations like coaching sessions and appraisal conversations to various types of group meetings like trainings and department meetings but also more large-scale events like organization-wide conferences.

Meeting rules that work here and now

In addition to the checklist with useful-questions it is good to point out that it is often wise to work with meeting rules. But be careful with generic rules you read about in books. Each organization and team will need a specific set of rules that will work best there. Therefore it is good to formulate, preferably together with your team, your own set of meeting rules. To give you an impression of what those rules might look like, here are a few examples. We know an organization how uses an 80% attendance rule, which means that team members have to attend 80% of the meetings and be on time for those. Not attending a maximum of 20% of the meetings is accepted. Here is another example. A rule that seems to work well in many places is to work with strict starting and ending times. When you use this rule it often works well to ask the following question 15 minutes before closing time: ‘How can we make the best use of the remaining 15 minutes?’

Experiment with this

Our invitation to you is to experiment a bit with this approach. It is certainly not necessary to apply all these suggestions at once. It will probably be wiser to start small and give yourself and your employees some time to get used to this way of improving the usefulness of your meetings.

Also read this related article: The solution-focused reflecting management team – Visser & Norman (2004)

Tips for Intelligent Group Decisions

© Coert Visser (2005)

The basis of all cooperative activity is integrated diversity.- Mary Parker Follett (1924)

The Madness of Groups

Many people distrust the behavior and decisions of people in groups. That is very understandable. Consider for instance how a group of football fans can behave. Especially in groups, people can sometimes get completely out of control. An example on a larger scale is the collective madness of many people in Germany before and in World War II. Collective madness has been known for a long time. In 1841 the Scotsman Charles Mackay wrote a book about it called: Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds.

More recently Irving Janis presented his theory of groupthink. Janis described how teams often so strongly desire unanimity that strong pressure is put on individual members to conform. The quality of decisions suffers seriously because of this because individual team members will be less and less inclined to bring forward their own knowledge based on their own experiences. Instead, they will start to echo and imitate others. This can lead to disastrous decisions.

Excessive Trust in Individual Decision Makers

It is often believed that a good remedy against the madness of groups is to give much power to extraordinary individuals. People who are aware that they cannot fully understand complex problems often believe that there are other people, more intelligent, knowledgeable and strong than they are, who do posses the answers to these problems. They are quite prepared to follow and depend on these leaders, people who do seem and or pretend to know the answers to pressing complex problems. But is this wise? No! Inspired leaders can of course be very useful to organizations. But the number of great leaders who have led their organizations astray is great. It is also unwise to give to much power to experts. Expertise can be a very useful addition to the knowledge that is already available but the value of experts and expertise is often overestimated. A clue for this can be found in the fact that in many knowledge domains the leading experts often disagree about the core aspects of their field of expertise, let alone about the details.

Intelligent Groups

The book The Wisdom of Crowds (2004) by James Surowiecki provides an answer to this issue. The author fights the idea that group decisions can only be mad and lead to misery and that extraordinary individuals should therefore solve pressing problems. He says that the potential of groups is underestimated and the value of expertise overestimated:

“... the more power you give a single individual in the face of complexity and uncertainty, the more likely it is that bad decisions will get made”.

If the circumstances are right groups can behave highly intelligent, often more intelligent than even the most intelligent individuals. Under those circumstances, groups are better at solving problems, making predictions, assessing situations accurately and deciding wisely.

Conditions for Intelligent Group Decisions

The right circumstances for collective wisdom are:

1. Diversity: when arguments, views and opinions do not differ from each other they don’t add anything to one another. Diversity guarantees that multiple perspectives are brought into the decision-making process and that a broader range of information is included.
2. Independence: when individual group members are strongly influenced by arguments, information, experiences and onions of others this will suppress the diversity of input into the decision-making process. This increases the likelihood of groupthink.
3. Decentralization: the chance to achieve collective wisdom is greatest when individuals get a chance to bring their own information and experience into the process. Surowiecki calls this ‘local experience’.
4. Aggregation: a mechanism and a process to come to an integration of the different views and opinions. It is very important to prevent that there will be too much interaction before each other to strongly so that the pressure to conform may get too strong and any deviating opinions will be suppressed.

An intelligent group does not ask of its individual members to conform to the dominant view. Instead, it has created a mechanism that resembles a democracy or a market. Individual group members get the opportunity to bring in their own information and opinions and are not forced to change their views. Their independence is explicitly protected.

A Few Tips to Improve Decision Making

The ideas in The Wisdom of Crowds can be easily translated into suggestions for improving group decision making in organizations:

1. Make sure that people with different backgrounds, positions, experiences and opinions are included in the process so that a richness of perspectives can be used.
2. Involve a considerable number of people. The more people can participate the greater the chance will be that different perspectives will be included.
3. Make sure that each participant to the decision-making process prepares very well to the decisions that need to be taken.
4. Prevent long discussions. Start early in the process with inviting people to bring forward their information and views in order to keep them from surrendering to group pressure.
5. Gather information and views simultaneously. A handy tool may be an electronic decision-making system. This helps to gather input simultaneously and anonymously (if needed). People who have worked with these kinds of systems are usually both satisfied with the process and with the outcome of the decision-making process.

Literature

1. Janis, I. (1972). Victims of groupthink. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.
2. Mackay, C. (1841). Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds. Wordsworth Reference.
3. Parker Follett, M. (1924). Creative Experience.
4. Surowiecki, J. (2004). The Wisdom of Crowds. Doubleday.

Purposeful Change in Seven Steps

© Coert Visser (2005)

Benjamin Disraeli, the nineteenth century British statesman, once said: ‘Change is inevitable’. That is quite right. Change happens constantly, whether we drive it deliberately or not. The seven-step-method, which is described in this article, is about purposeful change. The method can be compared to a recipe. All ingredients and steps have their specific function and can add to the taste. But the recipe allows you to determine the order and quantities in which the ingredients are used. The seven steps are:


The seven step method
1. Clarifying the desire for change
2. Defining the desired state
3. Determining the platform
4. Analyzing past success
5. One small step forward
6. Monitoring progress
7. Determining the further desire for change

Below follows a description of the situation of Frank, a team manager who needs help improving the financial performance of his team.

1. Clarifying the desire for change
When people have a desire for change there is always something evoking that change. This may be the presence of something negative or the absence of something positive. Clarifying the desire for change is often a useful first step towards effective change. Acknowledging problems by clarifying how they form a problem is often the key to making the desire for change understood.

2. Defining the desired state
As soon as it has become clear why change is desired, we proceed by defining the desired state. This is done by describing concretely and positively what we want the situation to be like. This step is about answering the question: “How do you want things to be different?” With this step it is particularly important to be very specific: how precisely will things be different and how will that be an advantage to whom?

3. Determining the platform
The third step is determining the platform. The platform is the current situation, the state from which you start or proceed to make progress in the direction of the desired state. The key to determining the platform is to answer questions like: “What have we already achieved?” “What is already there?” and “What has brought us to where already are?” These questions are formulated very constructively. When determining the platform when investigate how full the glass already is and how it became this full. It helps to recognize that some things have already been achieved and how that happened. This helps to strengthen our trust, optimism and hope.

4. Analyzing past success
The next step is to begin to look for situations in which the desired state has already, to some extent, happened. Often, these situations are called exceptions to the problem, or ‘positive exceptions’. These can be situations in which the problem happened less intensely or in which the desired results were already there in some extent. With this step these situations are identified and analysed. How did these exceptions take place? What made them possible and what did you do different to make them happen? A very specific ‘picture’ is painted of anything that might have been helpful to make the past success happen. After you have identified and analyzed one ‘past success’ situation you may choose to do another one. You can analyse as many past success situations as you wish.

5. One small step forwardThem as a next step, try to build on past success. First, look at how past successes are relevant for the current situation. Then, think of a small step forward. This is sometimes called ‘ building a bridge between past success and future success. This small step is based on what we have just learned by analyzing the past success situation. The small step can be seen as an experiment. We never know for sure if the step will lead to success. After all, the current situation will never be completely identical to the past situation.

6. Monitoring progressAs a next step it is important to monitor progress. This can be done by answering the following question: “What goes better?” The purpose of this question is to become more aware of the progress that has been made and to identify what has worked. When is has become clear what has helped to make progress it will be clear how to make further progress: by doing more of what works. Monitoring progress strengthens trust in the feasibility of the goal.

7. Determining the further desire for changeThe next step is to determine whether there exists a desire for futher change or not. If so, then you can return to steps 1, 2, 3, or 4 and follow them from there. If there is no further desire for change the deliberate change process is terminated. Each time the desire for change re-emerges the process can be restarted at once.

Use the method flexiblyThe seven-step method is a descriptive, not a prescriptive method. It reflects how effective change often happens but it does not claim effective change should always happen like this. Often, not all of the seven steps will be relevant and the order in which the steps are used can vary from situation to situation. In other words: don’t take this model to strictly and rigidly. Nearly always the method will be applied iteratively. For instance: after step 7 you go back to a previous step and restart from there.

An Example of how this can work:Frank is a team manager who asks for the help of a management coach to improve the financial results of his team. First they think about why exactly it is important to change: if his team will not succeed in making the budget people may lose there jobs and Frank can surely forget about promotion within the company. Next, with the help of his coach, Frank defines de desired state: within three months he wants to have his team performing on target again so that everybody will be able to see that they are on the right track again. This would mean more security for the team and better career prospects for Frank. Then, Frank and his coach identify where the team stands now and what has already been achieved: a good cost control, satisfied customers and some good-performing team members. Through this, Frank realizes that there is a reason for optimism. Then he analyzes past successes. He remembers a situation in which he has managed to turn a disappointing team result into a better one: he informed the team fully about the situation and mentioned his worries without detailedly instructing team members what to do. Instead he asked them for ideas which led to some great ideas and initiatives and collaborations. He decides to try out this approach again. Soon there are some promising results. Frank gets complimented by the business unit manager. The thread is out of the air and Frank begins to believe again in the possibility of a promotion.