Dan Erwin

GEN-Y SKILL: MAKING MORE OUT OF POSITIVE FEEDBACK

Feedback comes to employees and managers in one of three different forms:  positive, critical or toxic, but rarely constructive.  I've found that you can get just as much developmental insight and organizational value out of the occasional positive feedback as you can out of structured critical feedback situations.  It's easy, however, to miss out on those opportunities because positive feedback is usually unexpected when it comes.  

FYI: Research consistently reveals that two factors are necessary for the development of expertise:  consistent and persistent practice, and regular feedback or coaching.  Even when the organizational environment is highly motivational, it's often difficult to get feedback, much less useful developmental feedback.

As a result, skills for getting more out of feedback, no matter its genre, are a developmental imperative. Furthermore, the research on self-awareness and knowledge of one's performance makes clear that without feedback we won't understand ourselves, our strengths or our weaknesses.  Without this information, it's nearly impossible for singificant growth. 

Typically positive feedback comes in what I refer to as a generic stroke:  "Gee, Kris, you did a fine job with that new client.  We got the project.  We really appreciate your work."  Or, "Mark, your first experience as a project manager was just outstanding.  Keep up the good work."  Even a superficial analysis of those two common statements reveals nothing that you can use for future development.

So how do you make the most of positive feedback?

The value of positive feedback is not only that it gives you a window into what your boss values, but it can also provide you with added insight to skills, tactics or strategies  that are transferable to other settings.  You'll want to take the following steps:

• Express thanks for the feedback
• Ask for permission to talk about the positives
• Clarify the feedback concretely.
• Explain briefly the skills you used.
• On some occasions, ask what you could have done still better.
• Make certain you're clear on the importance or context of your performance.
• Express thanks once again.

Then, debrief feedback conversations to yourself. A key question to keep in the front lobes for use after all performance input is this:  "What did I learn from this?"  Keep track of those gains.  They can be very useful for your future.

I'm currently working on an e-book on how to receive feedback that will deal with all the feedback genre, and also provide concrete protocols and scripts for managing those situations.  Watch for it.

What did I miss?  What questions do you have?

NEW MANAGER SKILLS: PROTECTING YOUR COMPANY'S REPUTATION

In Monday's Slacker Manager blog, Phil Gerbyshak responded to a question from a reader who had been fired for going public with her organizational complaints on the net.  Phil handled the question superbly from the perspective of a tech manager who also happens to be a well-known blogger.

I want to add to Phil's blog, but from a different perspective, that of new manager skills.  Protecting your company's strategy, processes and reputation is one of those managerial responsibilities you don't learn about until there's a need for it.  It's actually an act of street smarts or social intelligence, but since there is no handbook on either, it takes time to learn and recognize its importance. 

Though they rarely use this language, executives tend to view certain recurring complaints by employees as a form of organizational and personal attack.  Most execs have little patience for complainers and readily assign them to the never-never land of whiners who refuse to grow up.  That puts a  permanent ceiling on their future and may result in termination, given the opportunity. 

FYI:  Although complaint or whining is not punishable by death, termination may be the consequence under any number of organizational guises.  Mergers and acquistions, strategic alignment, plummeting revenue and outsourcing all provide legitimate means for organizations to relieve themselves of these workers.  Obviously, they may never learn the reason for lay-off, but duplicity is not a rare act for companies liable to suit for dismissal without cause.  Rahm Emmanuel's comment fits these needs perfectly: 

"You never want a serious crisis to go to waste. And what I mean by that is an opportunity to do things you think you could not do before."

Aside from personal non-business unhappiness, I've found that complaints have four different sources: 

• Recent grads sometimes bring processes and expectations from their college background, expecting that their employer will accept their recommendatation willy nilly.  The uninitiated avoid the hierarchy and go straight to senior management.  Inevitably (and it is inevitable), senior management rejects both the approach of these grads and their ideas.
• Recent hires who are experienced employees bring process notions and attitudes from their previous firm, not understanding that their recommendations won't fit the current firm's culture.  (Although hired for their task skills, studies show that employees from other firms often bring unwelcome behaviors and attitudes.)
• Over time most firms develop processes to fit their product and customer needs.  The rationale for such processes is not usually explained as a part of new employee assimilation, leaving the worker in a knowledge limbo.
• Better firms align their operations to specific  business strategies.  Few employees understand business strategy until they achieve director or group manager level.  Since strategy is rarely obvious at lower levels, it may result in a failure to make sense of organizational processes.

Although most employees are not perturbed by such situations, a small percentage will readily complain about the organization.  On the one hand, some of these employees may become exceedingly valuable to an organization because of their insights and commitments. 

On the other hand, some employee insights and complaints have negative implications.  In those settings it's a manager's role to create work expectations, draw behavioral parameters and deal constructively with complainers.  Verbal complaining may need to be dealt with much the way you deal with verbal harassment.  Although employees have been educated regarding harassment, they also need to be educated about the morale issues of complaining.  And, you will need to help them problem solve their issue, or even recommend that an employee might be happier in another firm.

With awareness, managers can become especially useful to their employees, circumventing much potential frustration through the educational process.  However, it is important to move fast when you learn of complaints to keep them from festering. 

The fact of the matter is that many employees are grossly unaware of the cultural rules about complaining.  Street smarts is developed over time.  It's not innate.  And so these settings are a natural for teaching employees to bring their complaints--with recommendations--to their manager.  Failure to deal with complaints early on can make employees far more difficult to deal with once their ideas have been personally institutionalized.  

This may sound tough and insensitive but it's more reality than most want to admit. 

I'm sure some of you  will disagree, but I'm very curious about your attitude and questions toward these issues.

GEN-Y HAS A NEW YORK TIMES COLUMNIST

This month the New York Times anointed the youngest regular columnist in its history, 29 year old Ross Douthat.  A Harvard grad of 2002, he usually takes a libertarian position.  You'll also notice from the published comments on his blogs that he has not the slightest need for plaudits and will readily publish intelligent controversy.

Douthat is a film critic and contributing editor to National Review. He first gained recognition as a columnist and senior editor at The Atlantic, and his work has since appeared in The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, Slate, The Weekly Standard, The New Republic and GQ. He is also the author of "Grand New Party: How Republicans Can Win the Working Class and Save the American Dream" with Reihan Salam (Doubleday, 2008) and "Privilege: Harvard and the Education of the Ruling Class" (Hyperion, 2005). [From Editor and Publisher,4/28/09]

Like David Brooks (U Chicago), he's the kind of writer you love to agree and disagree with.  Always thoughtful, well-documented, leading edge and just plain young smart.  You can pick up some of his blogs from the Atlantic (along with plenty of comments) by googling his name.

The Times has the smartest columnist line-up in the news world, from the progressive left to the progressive right.  The Wall Street Journal, in contrast, has failed to give the intelligent reader a broad spectrum.  Instead, you get one progressive, Thomas Frank, and a bunch of right-wing capitalists.  Don't misread my bias, I've been a closet capitalist for a good 40 years.  It's just that with WSJ, everything is predictable. . . same sampling of facts, same inferences, same conclusions, same political perspectives.

I'll say this for WSJ.  They do a superb job with careers (Alexandra Levit, et al) and career development, the arts, science, occasional book reviews and is not hesitant to print columns from a broad spectrum that might include both Dick Cheney and Robert Reich.

 

 

GOOD NEWS ON THE JOB FRONT

In a survey just completed this month, Watson Wyatt, the global HR firm found that cost-cutting plans have slowed.  "While some companies are still adopting measures such as salary and workweek reductions, cost-cutting plans have been scaled back across the board."

The survey included 141 broad-based U.S. companies.  89% indicated there would be no further salary reductions, while 53% indicated there would be no further layoffs. 

Good news for those in job search mode:  67% indicated there would be no further hiring freezes.

JOB LISTINGS? DON'T PAY A DIME FOR THE SERVICE

Alison Doyle, a very knowledgeable blogger on job search and job sites has an excellent blog on job sites.  She writes that "it's important for job seekers to know that they can find all the job listings they need without paying a dime."  To back that up she provides a listing of free sites.

Her recommendations for analyzing a job site are especially useful.  In short, don't pay for job postings or listings.  If you're looking for a job, she's a primary resource.

HOW TO AVOID A PINK SLIP

Tyler Cowen of Money Magazine has an astute recommendation for workers who think that a pink slip is a strong possibility.  In the May Issue (link not available, yet) he suggests you go for the jugular, and I suspect he's correct. 

What's your best strategy to keep your job? 

You could quantify your accomplishments or praise some of your boss's recent acomplishments.  But right now, that probably won't cut the mustard.  Employers looking to cut personnel costs have two options:  lay people off or lower their wages.  For most firms that's a no-brainer.  Firms will lay people off because they fear morale problems or even sabotage (according to Truman Bewley at Yale).  I don't buy the sabotage conclusion.  The employees I know understand that one of the most important relationship rules is never burn a bridge.  Sabotage is a stretch and that's an action that would quickly get noticed. 

Bewley is spot-on in his recommendation regarding morale problems.  So if you'd rather have less money than no money, take the elephant by the ears and let your boss know you'd prefer a salary cut.  Bewley's conversational openers are pretty smart.  "I don't consider salary a final measue of my self-worth."  Or, "My friend Peter stayed on at his job at lower pay to help keep his company afloat.  I really admire that."

Admittedly, this is a risky strategy, but it's a far sight better than no strategy and a victim perspective.

I'll add a strategy that over the long run is far more important than any of these last ditch efforts.  Make managing your boss a key strategy.  I don't mean brown-nosing or sucking up.  Unless a firm lays off by tenure, bosses inevitably keep their most valuable players.  If you really understand your boss's objectives and needs and stay on top of them, you're on the road to being a valued long-term player, and among the more recession-proof employees. 

Here are three posts about managing your boss:

New Manager Skills: Managing Up

Managing Your Boss (Part 2) 

How to Get a Better Boss  

THE RACE TO PARSE THE SWINE VIRUS

Janet Napolitano, the new Director of Homeland Security, moved quickly with the Centers for Disease Control to declare a public health emergency to deal with the emerging new swine flu.  Current reports state that the flu virus may have killed more than 80 people in Mexico and sickened hundreds more.

Usually, a swine flu passes from pigs to humans, but not from person to person.  What's novel about this strain of virus is that it is made up of material from pig, avian and human viruses.  In addition, this virus is sickening the young and the healthy.  Scientists indicate that such bugs are notorious for their ability to evolve  from mild to severe, but they are not yet able to address its lethality.  Napolitano moved quickly because of the novel nature of the virus--a crucial condition for starting a pandemic flu.

Two locations for further information are Science Base and a brief by Gautam Naik and Betsy McKay in Monday's Wall Street Journal. 

THE FINE ART OF RECEIVING FEEDBACK

The Millenial Generation expects, even demands feedback.  As a result, many managers are beginning to treat Gen-Yers as a different animal and, for my money, that's all to the good.  After all, developmental feedback is an imperative for growth. 

Asking for or delivering feedback are two skills that require a great deal of smarts, but receiving feedback is even more difficult for most of us.  In coaching execs and C-Officers I learned years ago how to get them to receive feedback successfully--and grow from it.

Recent commentary in Business Week revealed that some coaches believe that pure narcissism is the reason professionals won't accept and use feedback.  Narcissism is the uniquely American disease in which we present ourselves as always in control, competent, respectable and exuding authority.  

I disagree strongly with that rationale.

The core of my business is getting and giving feedback which impacts executives in such a way that they actually absorb it to make needed changes.  I've found that the biggest reason for the rejection of feedback is an abject lack of training.  In other words, most people are going to reject feedback when they haven't been trained to deal constructively with it. 

As part of my developmental program, I interview 12 - 20 colleagues of the client in one-on-one sessions.  Then I collate the feedback and perform a content analysis on those verbatims.  Content analysis is an in-depth method for analyzing interview material that focuses on a number of questions:  who's saying what, why, to what extent and for what purpose?  With the answers to those questions, I can draw highly relevant conclusions about an execs strengths and strategic needs. 

However, on several occasions prior to the feedback experience, I prepare the client for the feedback experience with very concrete training.  My client understands that I'm reporting and not judging.  He also knows that I report all the feedback I've received except that which might compromise an interviewee.  Ninety-nine times out of a hundred, after 20 minutes of interviewing most colleagues respond to the affect of "Ahhh.  Let him (or her) know all of this.  It'll be for his own good."         

At the first feedback session, I tell the client that I'm only aware of three possible responses to the information: accept it, reject it, or be surprised by it.  I don't care which response he has, I just want him to let me know his response.  Giving feedback is an open-ended conversation, much like a free-for-all.  One of the reasons I'm hired is for my reputation for gaining feedback, and so I have a willing subject, albeit a nervous one.

Analyzing three to five pages of verbatim feedback takes my client and me from two to four hours, usually in two sessions.  Typically, at least one of the surprises is a strength which is an indication of how little we know or understand ourselves.  It's rare for a client to be surprised by a weakness.  But clients do want to understand the details, and learn what to do about that weakness.

After two sessions of  feedback, we lay out a developmental program, get his boss's buy-in, and decide who else to involve in the process.  Almost all my clients want to share the feedback and development program with their bosses.  Inevitably, that is a productive experience.

Professionals need to be trained to receive, absorb and activate that feedback.  Once they realize how to deal with feedback, it’s a straight-forward process with little tension.  With support and training, feedback can be a highly effective development opportunity. 

Growing out of these experiences is a particularly powerful storyline emphasizing to the client that “your success is my success, so you can be damned sure that I'll be occasionally pushy.”  The story line clarifies the client relationship, puts achievement at the center of the relationship and emphasizes accountabilities in a humorous way.  Its unique power to resolve concerns or interpersonal fears is nearly phenomenal. 

However, it's rarely necessary for me to get tough, because these are fast-track managers, extremely ambitious and desirous of success who understand the importance of my concerns for their well-being.

The difficulty of receiving feedback is a simple matter of training, not a psychological or narcissistic problem.  

In the next few days, I'll be posting another blog on how to accept feedback when you don't have a coach to support you or walk you through the process.  What questions would you like me to consider?

THE PROFOUND SIMILARITY BETWEEN BILL BUCKLEY AND BILL CLINTON

Whatever your political leaning, leftie or rightie, Democrat or Republican, there's one thing you'll have to admit about William F. Buckley and William J. Clinton.  The Bills don't have a boring bone in their bodies.  Some of you have read and heard all you'll ever want to know about Bill J., from white stained dress to . . . well, who knows?  And for Bill Buckley, the lasting impression is not quite as clear, except for that brilliant vocabulary and snobbish accent that reveled us on Firing LIne.

Indeed, you may not know what absolutely fascinating, charismatic and complicated creatures William F. Buckley and his beautiful wife were.  The opportunity has arrived, and Matt Bai in his usual inciteful, tell-all is making the most of the situation--a review of son, Christopher Buckley's about to be published book on his father and mother.  

Check out Matt Bai's NY Times take on that fascinating family, the Buckleys. 

JACK WELCH AND THE ECONOMY

When are things going to get better?  "Sometime in 2010.  Maybe,"  says Jack Welch in an intriguing BusinessWeek summary of the economy.  In the May 4th magazine, Welch writes that he believes the economy has reached some sort of bottom. 

He ticks off four additional beliefs:

• Because of inventory reductions, an uptick in demand will yield a quick response from the economy.
• The banking system is stabilizing with credit starting to flow.
• Americans are "generally feeling better."
• The president's budget assumptions are too high. 

A swell un-Welchlike summation:  "Finally, we don't have any idea when the economy is going to turn around."

Whatever you think of Welch's beliefs, it's important for young professionals to note the areas that he watches.  Welch looks at the issues from the standpoint of the manufacturing business, not as an economist.  Getting that perspective can also be valuable.

In the context of this recession, if you keep tabs on unemployment and watch the above issues, you'll know as much as the next guy.  Even more.  You can check out the article with my link.