Goals of KPIs? Why Your Culture Needs Both

I think this may be my most anticipated book of the year so far. Culture Works: How to

Create Happiness in the Workplace, by Kris Boesch, is for every CEO and HR Director out there. You CANNOT have ultimate success without a great culture. I know. I've worked at places that don't have it. I'm sure you have also. Kris gives you concepts, tools, and real examples to put into motion, a culture that help your employees and business grow. All of the usual barriers, and more, are discussed and planned out. Even one of the most missed opportunities - continued learning - is addressed. So if you want to take it a step further, there's a workbook and book club available also. This book launches today, and is available on her website, but will be available on Amazon on May 15th. I suggest you pre-order. To wet your whistle a bit, Kris Boesch is my guest blogger today. Enjoy.

Goals or KPIs? Why Your Culture Needs Both.

I’ve seen many organizations make the cultural mistake of either collapsing goals and key performance indicators (KPIs), or focusing on just one.

You need both.  If you just have goals, you’re missing daily motivating momentum and focus.  If you have only key performance indicators, you’re missing inspiring strategic progress. Goals are aspirational, strategically taking on inspiring opportunities or problem solving breakout challenges.  KPIs measure the health and success of each position through weekly, and in same cases daily, metrics.

• For example, in a bakery goals could include:
• Purchase a new oven by March 31st
• Add cinnamon raisin bread to our line by October 1st
• Open a new location by July 4, 2018

While KPIs could include:

•          Ratio of number of loaves baked to number sold
•           Scrap ratio – number of loaves burned or rejected
•           Batch cycle time

Hopefully you’re well on your way to making progress on your second quarter 2017 goals – having funneled clarity from big picture organizational goals to team goals to individual goals. If you’re not well on your way, don’t despair, make a goal to get it done!

This culture tip focuses on developing KPIs for each position in your organization.  KPIs are one of the many tools that support an extraordinary workplace culture.  Think about it–as an employee it’s incredibly empowering to know both where to focus my efforts and where I stand in relationship to expectations.  Similar to goals, KPIs should funnel from the organization to the team to each position.

How to Create Meaningful KPIs:

•          Should answer – how do we know this position (vs person) is accomplishing the mission critical work and is being successful?
•          Set weekly measurable expectations for each performance indicator. What reasonable number or range would indicate success and healthy on pace progress?  Sometimes the KPI is measured by a simple yes or no.
•          Employees have to have (almost) complete control over the number being measured – in some cases you may need to focus on LEAD indicators (actions, efforts, number of calls) rather than LAG indicators (results).
•          The KPI has to be KEY. There should be no more than three KPIs for each position.  When you find yourself wanting to create four, ask which of these is truly the END measurement?

Have employees self-report their numbers each week in a shared spreadsheet. This simple dashboard should quickly reflect the health of the organization.  You may even want to color code measurements red/yellow/green.  High-five greens.  Seek to understand and address the challenges behind yellow or red.  It’s not enough to measure, you have to witness and care about what you measure and then align next steps.

This is an ongoing process. If you find your dashboard is primarily green, but the organization is struggling, reevaluate what you’re measuring.  Uncover more pertinent key indicators and replace the prior ones.

***

Kris Boesch is the CEO and founder of Choose People, a company that transforms company cultures, increases employee happiness and boosts the bottom line. Her new book, Culture Works, and accompanying workbook are available now on her website and will be available on Amazon around May 15.

Plan Every Day in Advance

What a fantastic guest blogger I have today. Brian Tracy has been a huge influence to so

many people in achieving personal and business goals. His 3rd edition (out this week) of Eat That Frog is just one part of that mold. Here's a great book that's going to help you to stop that procrastinating. Admit it. We all do it. With Brian's book, with 2 new chapters, you'll learn that you don't need to do everything to be successful and that in trying to you lose focus and begin to drop the ball. Share this book with your entire team.

Plan Every Day in Advance

By Brian Tracy

The following post is an excerpt from chapter 2 of Eat That Frog.

A word about frogs… It has been said that if the first thing you do each morning is to eat a live frog, you can go through the day with the satisfaction of knowing that that is probably the worst thing that is going to happen to you all day long. Your “frog” is your biggest, most important task, the one you are most likely to procrastinate on if you don’t do something about it. It is also the one task that can have the greatest positive impact on your life and results at the moment.

Plan Every Day in Advance

You have heard the old question, “How do you eat an elephant?” The answer is “One bite at a time!”

How do you eat your biggest, ugliest frog? The same way: you break it down into specific step-by-step activities and then you start on the first one.

Your mind, your ability to think, plan, and decide, is your most powerful tool for overcoming procrastination and increasing your productivity. Your ability to set goals, make plans, and take action on them determines the course of your life. The very act of thinking and planning unlocks your mental powers, triggers your creativity, and increases your mental and physical energies.

Conversely, as Alec Mackenzie wrote, “Taking action without thinking things through is a prime source of problems.”

Your ability to make good plans before you act is a measure of your overall competence. The better the plan you have, the easier it is for you to overcome procrastination, to get started, to eat your frog, and then to keep going.

One of your top goals at work should be to get the highest possible return on your investment of your mental, emotional, and physical energy. The good news is that every minute spent in planning saves as many as ten minutes in execution. It takes only about 10 to 12 minutes for you to plan your day, but this small investment of time will save you up to two hours (100 to 120 minutes) in wasted time and diffuse effort throughout the day.

You may have heard of the Six-P Formula. It says, “Proper Prior Planning Prevents Poor Performance.”

When you consider how helpful planning can be in increasing your productivity and performance, it is amazing how few people practice it every single day. And planning is really quite simple to do. All you need is a piece of paper and a pen. The most sophisticated Outlook system, computer app, or time planner is based on the same principle. It is based on your sitting down and making a list of everything you have to do before you begin.

One of the most important rules of personal effectiveness is the 10/90 Rule. This rule says that the first 10 percent of time that you spend planning and organizing your work before you begin will save you as much as 90 percent of the time in getting the job done once you get started. You only have to try this rule once to prove it to yourself.

When you plan each day in advance, you will find it much easier to get going and to keep going. The work will go faster and smoother than ever before. You will feel more powerful and competent. You will get more done faster than you thought possible. Eventually, you will become unstoppable.

Brian Tracy is one of the top business speakers in the world today. He has designed and presented seminars for more than 1,000 large companies and more than 10,000 small and medium- sized enterprises in 75 countries on the subjects of Leadership, Management, Professional Selling, Business Model Reinvention, and Profit Improvement. He has addressed more than 5,000,000 people in more than 5,000 talks and presentations worldwide. He currently speaks to 250,000 people per year. His fast-moving, entertaining video-based training programs are taught in 38 countries.

In addition to Eat That Frog, Brian has written more than 80 books that have been translated into 42 languages, including Kiss That Frog!, Find Your Balance Point, Goals!, Flight Plan, Maximum Achievement, No Excuses!, Advanced Selling Strategies, and How the Best Leaders Lead. He is happily married, with four children and five grandchildren. He is the president of Brian Tracy International and lives in Solana Beach, California. He can be reached at briantracy@briantracy.com.

Got Leaders?

So who's an author whose books I most look out for? Mark Miller is right about the top of

the list. His new book, Leaders Made Here, was just released and I happen to be hosting his blog this week.

So many leadership books talk about theories . . . sorry, dozed off there for a second. Mark writes in a way that keeps your interest and makes it easier to sink in. Want to learn quickly? Tell stories. That's exactly what Mark does. Through parables, he tells leadership stories that strike a cord. Here, we learn about building leaders - not one at a time or as needed - so there's always a leadership pipeline . . . a real culture of successful leadership.

My favorite quote from the book sums it up and goes like this: "A leadership culture exists when leaders are routinely and systematically developed, AND when you have a surplus of leaders."

Got Leaders?

Mark Miller - originally published on GreatLeadersServe.com

What do you talk about at work? Recently, I’ve come to appreciate how many conversations I have every week about leadership issues… dozens, scores – probably thousands of these discussions over the past decade.

What do you believe about a leadership pipeline? Do you think this is something only big companies do? Do you wonder why you don’t have one? Do you want to know the secret to creating a never-ending supply of qualified leaders? Keep reading…

I’m more convinced than ever when it comes to leadership, an organization has only two real choices: Hire leaders or grow leaders. And, over the long haul, I believe the right answer is a combination of the two.

I want to address the more challenging and probably more productive method – Grow your own.  Here are a few questions for your consideration if your current pipeline is not producing enough leaders to satisfy demand.

How do you define leadership? This is the most common mistake I see in organizations struggling to develop leaders. Without an agreed upon operational definition of leadership, creating a pipeline is virtually impossible. What do you want your leaders to be able to do? What character traits are you looking for in leaders? These are non-trivial questions! They represent the foundation for any legitimate attempt to systematically grow leaders.

Who are your emerging leaders? You cannot, nor should you, invest equally in the development of all your people. Targeted and strategic investments will pay the greatest dividends. Where do you place your bet? Emerging leaders. Before you can move forward with this approach, you must know who they are.

What stretch assignments can you give them? After you’ve identified emerging leaders, you can begin to shape their development. One powerful approach is to match individuals with appropriate stretch assignments. If selected carefully, these can be opportunities to test and strengthen future leaders.

What experiences do you want emerging leaders to have? When we think about developing leaders, our first thought is often about the skills of leadership. This is important. However, experiences can add depth to a leader’s resume and contribute greatly to his or her confidence. Experiences can include such diverse situations as working in a union environment, turning around a struggling division, launching a start-up, and more. You decide.

Who can you ask to mentor or coach emerging leaders? I am a fan of mentoring and coaching. There is something that happens in the context of a relationship that rarely happens when we attempt to go it alone. When done well, coaching and mentoring can unlock vast reserves of untapped potential in people. I realize you may not be able to afford external coaching for all your people, but you can assign an internal mentor to guide, challenge and encourage emerging leaders. You’ll be glad you did. Oh, before I finish here, I did promise you the secret to a successful leadership pipeline…Leadership.

You will never find a successful leadership pipeline without leadership. A vibrant process for developing leaders will not emerge spontaneously. When leaders decide to make leadership a competitive advantage and invest accordingly, that’s the day the construction of your pipeline begins.

How strong is your process for growing leaders?

Mark Miller is the best-selling author of 6 books, an in-demand speaker and the Vice President of High-Performance Leadership at Chick-fil-A. His latest book, Leaders Made Here, describes how to nurture leaders throughout the organization, from the front lines to the executive ranks and outlines a clear and replicable approach to creating the leadership bench every organization needs.

Who Are Your Employees Playing For?

This week, we're celebrating the paperback release of the 2014 best-seller, Why

Motivating People Doesn't Work...and What Does, by Susan Fowler. I liked it so much when it first came out that I just got done reading it again. The "traditional" ways of motivation just don't cut it anymore. Through real life examples and process Susan shows us how to understand the reasons people are motivated and to capitalize on them.

Today, I have the honor of hosting Susan Fowlers blog post, Who Are Your Employees Playing For? I know you'll get as much out of it as I did.


Who Are Your Employees Playing For? by Susan Fowler

As the young man ducked his head getting into the elevator, I recognized him immediately as a new face on my favorite pro basketball team. I don’t seek out celebrity sightings and have never asked for an autograph, but like most people, I think it’s fun to see someone in person that you’ve watched on television.

I couldn’t help but ask him about the dismal circumstances of his team. “You must have been thrilled to be drafted by such a legendary franchise to play with the most winning coach in history,” I began. “But what’s it like now that he’s been replaced with a different coach, to have a losing record, and to learn this week that your teammate, who was known as the heart of the squad, has been traded to a conference rival?”

After a pause, where he must have been considering the risks of being honest, he told me, “It’s hard. You tell yourself it’s just a game and have fun. But, it’s also a business and my life and livelihood. My family depends on me.”

“How do you keep up the physical and mental energy needed to be a professional athlete under these circumstances?”

As the elevator stopped at the lobby, he shook his head as he ducked getting out, and said, “To tell you the truth, you stop playing for the name on the front of your jersey and you play for the name on your back.”

Of course, on the front of the jersey is the team’s name. On the back of the jersey is your own name.  I often think of that promising young player, caught in a situation he couldn’t navigate effectively. Currently, he’s playing on teams overseas, unable to take advantage of his untapped potential in the NBA.

I was reminded of this chance encounter again last week. I was on a coaching call, listening to an employee describe changes going on in her organization and how her sales territory is being rearranged and her clients being parceled out among other reps. I asked how she was handling her frustration, and she said, “I’m just playing for the name on the back of my jersey, not the front.”

My heart sank. I could hear the anguish in her voice. It is in our human nature to thrive through meaningful work in concert with like-minded people. Feeling alienated or unable to trust her tribe was threatening her sense of well-being.

As leaders, we need to help employees understand the reasons for their anguish. Then, we need to help them satisfy their psychological needs for autonomy, relatedness, and competence. Employees can’t thrive when their psychological needs are thwarted at work. When employees don’t thrive, they suffer–and so does the organization. Disengaged employees, who are so overwhelmed by circumstances that they simply give up and begin looking after their own best interests, are costing organizations billions of dollars every year.

As our coaching call continued, three lessons emerged that might help you deal with a disenfranchised employee.

1. This employee’s sense of autonomy was nonexistent. She felt she had no control over the changes “being done to” her. My question to her was, “What do you have control over?” We identified three areas of her role where her choices would make a difference in the quality of her experience.
2. She felt her sense of relatedness with the organization was compromised. She didn’t trust her company or the reasons for the changes being made. When I asked her why, she replied, “The changes are unfair.” Nothing erodes an employee’s psychological need for relatedness like injustice. My question to her was, “Have you discussed why the changes are taking place with your manager? Have you asked for a rationale so you can understand the reasons for the changes?” She admitted she had not. Should her leader have provided the rationale for change? Sure. But, even the best-intentioned leaders usually share an organizational perspective. People need a personal rationale–they need to understand why the changes are “being done to” them, their job, role, and world. I encouraged her to be a self-leader and seek out the answers she needed. With information in hand, she could then determine if the reasons for the changes were unjust or just unclear.
3. The employee’s sense of competence was diminished because she didn’t know how to navigate through ambiguity and uncertainty. But, she realized that identifying ways to refocus her autonomy and relatedness needs already made her feel more confident about moving forward.

I will continue tracking her progress. My hope is to hear about the success and flourishing that both she and her organization experience as she plays for more than the name on the back of her jersey.

*****

Susan Fowler implores leaders to stop trying to motivate people. In her latest bestselling book, she explains WHY MOTIVATING PEOPLE DOESN’T WORK… AND WHAT DOES: The New Science of Leading, Engaging, and Energizing. She is the author of by-lined articles, peer-reviewed research, and six books, including the bestselling Self Leadership and the One Minute Manager with Ken Blanchard. Tens of thousands of people worldwide have learned from her ideas through training programs such as the Situational Self Leadership and Optimal Motivation product lines. For more resources, including a free Motivational Outlook Assessment with immediate results, visit www.susanfowler.com.

Surprise Me!

Chip Bell has done it again! I so anticipate getting his newest book releases in the mail

and his newest, Kaleidoscope: Delivering Innovative Service That Sparkles, was worth waiting for. Chip's writing style of giving us inspiring stories of actual people and organizations getting customer service right makes reading interesting and thought-provoking. Even if you're not in the customer service industry, you'll find this book worth a good read.

Today, I have the privilege of hosting a Chip Bell blog post.

Surprise Me! by: Chip R. Bell

How would you like receiving a birthday present without any wrapping or colorful bow...just a Post-it note on the present with handwritten: “Happy Birthday?”  What would an Easter egg hunt be like if the location of all the eggs were clearly marked with a red flag?  How exciting would a treasure hunt be if some else did if for you and just brought you the bounty?

Customers today live in an over-stimulated, highly entertained world and love surprise. Unfortunately, we have so automated, programmed and managed surprise that it is now assumed when it was once upon a time enchanting.  Remember a time when a front desk clerk, rental car agent, airline gate attendant, merchant or waiter enchanted us with an unanticipated value-added something.  It had a neighborly, old-fashioned feeling when we got an extra.  The mechanic fixed something broken while servicing our vehicle and wrote “no charge” on the invoice.  We heard words like, “It’s on the house” or “we’ll comp it!”

Then, the world of unexpected extras pretty much came to an end.  Easily blamed on the tough economy, the shift was more subtle.  Extras were not actually taken away, they were managed away.  The extremes of a “no variance” philosophy from TQM and Six Sigma got pushed way beyond its rank and pay grade requiring the frontline to hand over their spontaneous generosity to the computer.  Now, the computer, not the gate agent, decides if you get that first class seat upgrade based on your frequent flyer status and seat availability.  Getting upgraded to the concierge level at a hotel is a  computer-driven decision based solely on availability and affinity program status and not the judgment call of the desk clerk.

And, the customer, robbed of that Jack-in-the-box feeling of surprise, has simply built the expectation of an extra into their criteria for satisfaction much like the cleanliness of a hospital or the security of a bank.  Value-added has become value-assumed and no longer a loyalty-creating value at all.  Proof that it has become a given not an extra is how easily the customer is disappointed when he or she fails to get what was once presented as a true surprise.

It is time to bring back the trust and authority the frontline needs to be both generous and ingenious.  If the Ritz-Carlton can trust a housekeeper to responsibly spend up to $2000 to make sure a guest leaves happy, the waiter can be trusted with the decision to comp a dessert for a loyal customer. Employees who can successfully manage a family budget, juggle soccer, tutoring and baseball practice schedules, and shop for groceries can figure out ways to surprise customers without jeopardizing the unit standards or the bottom line. 

Turning ho-hum service into a compelling story customers are eager to share requires bringing back a setting lined in trust; a place filled with joyful innovation.  It takes leaders who are as courageous as they want their employees to be creative. It calls for leaders in search of invention, not obedience.

Chip R. Bell is a renowned keynote speaker and the author of several national best-selling books. His newest book is the just-released Kaleidoscope:  Delivering Innovative Service That Sparkles. He can be reached at chipbell.com. 

A Leadership Kick in the A**

Do leaders sometimes need a kick in the ass? You bet they do . . . even if they don’t think

so. I’m referring to the new book, A Leadership Kick in the Ass, by Bill Treasurer. It's been awhile since my last post but a perfect time to start up again. I’ve been waiting months to be able to read this book, and I was NOT disappointed.

Bill’s book should be a wake-up call and a learning experience for any leader. You’ll learn a lot about yourself and how to make much-needed corrections (kicks) to become the leader you were meant to be.

In addition to realizing that mistakes are GREAT opportunities to learn from and to improve, there are other things to look at. Case in point is Bill’s definitions of two types of leaders, Pigheads and Weaklings. We all know those people, and we probably fall into one or both categories at least on occasion. Sometimes we need a kick to get realigned. To fall into one of these categories causes damage to yourself, your team, and your organization. In addition to discussing all of the ins and outs of each, Bill gives us types of “butt kicks needed”.

Pigheads

• Kicks that shatter the oversized ego.
• Kicks that instigate humility.

Weaklings

• Kicks that expose the withheld potential.
• Kicks that inspire assertiveness.

This should be an eye-opener for some of you or people you work with. Realize what went wrong, fix it, learn from it, move on.

No matter where you are on the organizational ladder, this book WILL open your eyes. Do you have a book club where you work? This would be an excellent read to be able to share with others.