Management Craft

Cranky Middle Manager and Me - A discussion about relevancy. Others. Hip and sage, baby!

I had the pleasure of being a guest on the Cranky Middle Manager podcast - my 4th time. This time we talked about what it means to have a relevant mindset (hip and sage). It turned out quite well, I think, so please check it out here. Thanks, Wayne!

Thanks also to Dwayne over at Genuine Curiosity for his review of Hip and Sage. Here is a snippet:

If you work with younger people, being Hip can be a game changer (and becoming Hip can be fun).  Lisa provides a set of techniques and philosophies to help you enlist the help of younger mentors in a way that will tap into their knowledge and excitement, and (I believe) make them want to help you get up to speed.

And check out this interview I did with Vince Thompson on the SmartPlanet website. Here is a snippet:

Do Hip and Sage people fair better when in comes to facing layoffs?

If you are someone who has 20 years of experience you are a valuable person…but if you don’t come into an interview and demonstrate that you not only understand but also know how to use technology to power teams you’ll be at distinct disadvantage.

How do you demonstrate that?

You need to show in your resume....

Aahh, I am such a tease.

BTW - here are the cities I will be traveling to over the next couple of months. Let me know if you would like me to come speak to your company or organization, or do some management training magic (I do believe that the best training feels magical). You can send me an email at lhaneberg AT managementperformance DOT com.

Cleveland, OH
Chicago Area (Milwaukee, too)
LA, soCal
Portland
Seattle
Wash DC/Alexandria VA
Jacksonville, FL
Memphis/Nashville, TN area

Raj Setty's Th!nkTweet Book - Very Cool, Very Now

Fellow blogger and writer Raj Sett has a new book out called Th!nkTweet: Bite Sized Lessons for a Fast Paced World. This is a great read and written in a very cool way - you see, the book is made up of 140 wonderfully saturated and salient points - just the essence, just the best stuff.

Even the Foreword by Guy Kawasaki is written in a 140 character Th!nkTweet.

I like the concept for this book and it would make for a wonderful pre-meeting team read. Or a great summer reading club book at work. You can pick up a copy of the book here (use discount code "ADD12" to get a great deal).

I love Raj's Blog and link to it often. And I regard Raj as a brilliant thinker - these Th!nkTweets are very provocative and helpful. Check it out.

Review of Hip and Sage

Fellow blogger and speaker Alexandra Levit wrote a review of Hip and Sage - and the general topic of generations in the workplace on her blog, Water Cooler Wisdom. Check it out!

I have been getting lots of interesting feedback about Hip and Sage because it taps into a couple common situations:

• I am an "experienced" professional and I want to continue to be relevant - but all the technology changes, and resulting communication practices, are overwhelming! How do I begin? How can I maintain balance? How will online networking and communicating affect my life?
• I work for/know/care about some one who is sage but has stopped learning. How do I help them? Why don't they see the connection between how we communicate and how we work?

Over on Management Central, I had a brief exchange about this notion of stopping learning. Here are the comments back and forth:

MC Member: I'm still reading Hip and Sage. While I'm learning how to communicate with the "hip" I'm also able to see those that came before me more clearly. I can almost see the point in which they gave up learning....


Me: Wow, that is very interesting. I wonder how they see things? I wonder if they feel as though they have stopped learning?


MC Member: I would have to say they believe they've stopped learning about new technology. A manager I know refuses to get a PDA and uses his cell phone only for calls.... Because he doesn't feel the need to move forward. Unfortunately, he's always slightly behind whatever the movement is at the moment. Interestingly - he's supposed to be a leader....


Me: And that was really one of the key points I guess I hope Hip and Sage makes - you cannot be a leader and not keep up. You might be able to be a pontificating sage, but most of our organizations need active leaders. I have a friend who is in marketing and she is also strident in her resistance to not learning Web 2.0 technologies. For her, I fear, this will be a career breaker because she is out looking for a job and she will not be able to compete with the candidates who care enough to stay current and understand how to use new technologies to build marketing campaigns.

What is Communication - Wee Snippet from Hip and Sage

Although my latest book, Hip and Sage: How to Staying Smart, Cool, and Competitive in the Workplace is generally targeted at professionals and entrepreneurs 40-something and older, there are many parts that I think apply to everyone. This snippet shares a bit from one of these sections - it is about communication, or rather how we define communication and what our standard ought to be.

COMMUNICATE

An overused term if there ever was one, the word communicate can mean many different things. At work, inadequate communication gets blamed for cultural ills and project failures. Managers attend $99 one-day training sessions touted as teaching communication skills. Communication is included on many performance evaluation forms, although the definition of what communication is varies on these forms and is often absent and left up to each manager and subordinate to figure out.

We could declare that communication is any message we impart—in any medium (verbal, e-mail, signs, books, you name it). Using this definition, a leader who sends out lots of messages, talks a lot at meetings, and buys and hands out flavor-of-the-month management books like candy canes at Christmas would be considered a big communicator. And with this general definition, managers could call themselves hip if they sent lots of e-mails to younger workers. Don’t scoff, this is a common strategy in organizations—send more e-mail messages! Fill the inboxes! I don’t favor this definition of communication because it focuses solely on the act of sending information out and does not address how messages ought to be received. This is 50-yard-line communication, to use a football metaphor, because while you might have taken your message down your side of the field, you have not penetrated into the other person’s territory and you are only halfway to your goal.

I hold communication to a higher standard and assert that it does not exist unless and until the message is received by receiving party as it is intended by the sender. Using this definition, e-mail is only communication if the person reading it understands the information and interprets the tone and tenor as the author intended. If you send a vague message, it’s not communication. If you send a message written in the wrong language for the receiver, it is not communication. If you write a ten-page report that no one reads or comprehends, you have not communicated. If you send an e-mail that ruffles a few feathers because the receiver thought you were angry when you were not, you have not communicated. Using this definition of communication, how many of the messages you send are received as communication?

Compound this communication hurdle by adding a thirty-year difference in age between the sender and receiver, and communication becomes more challenging to accomplish because preferred methods and natural language patterns are likely dissimilar. As it relates to hipness, then, we communicate when messages are received by younger professionals in ways that they understand—when we come across as we intend to. This is an important distinction, and one that places the onus on us to find and use the best communication methods for our audience. Communication is the first of the three Cs of hipness and it is the bare minimum we should expect of ourselves in the work-place or in any professional setting.

Your thoughts?

Amazon is now shipping Hip and Sage - Yippee!

Pick yours up here - I think you will like it! Thanks for your support. Amazon still lists the old cover and subtitle, but no worries, it is the same book. Groovy cover, eh?

Upbeat by Raj Setty

Raj Setty, who I have mentioned and linked to several times on this blog, has a great new book out called Upbeat: Cultivating the Right Attitude to Thrive in Tough Times. It is exactly the right message at the right time and Raj is the perfect person to share it with you because he is an excellent role model of what he writes. Even if things are hunky-dory with you right now, Raj's powerful perspective and suggestions will help propel you further.

Raj is a successful serial entrepreneur - he knows how to get things going and muster the perseverance to make things work. He excels at making things happen - something we all would love to get better at, I am sure. Raj blogs at Life Beyond Code and his posts are provocative, helpful and wise.

Upbeat is organized into the following sections: The Trap, The Discipline, The Network, The Strategy, and The Action. Each section is short and to the point. I would call this book elegantly simple. It is no longer than it needs to be, but long enough to offer clear and salient points.

The vibe of this book is what I love the most. It is warm and direct - gentle and hard hitting - it is the most pleasant knock on the head you will receive this year.

Pick up a copy of Upbeat for you and your team members.

Steve Farber - Greater Than Yourself

Here is a guest post from Steve Farber, author of Greater Than Yourself. I had this book on my much ignored to-be-read stack (due to moving chaos) for some time but finally took it with me on a recent trip. The thing about parable books, which this is, is that you can't skim the content and figure things out because it is a story and the lessons/points are IN THERE. They typically are not bolded, bulleted, or put into a lovely graph. Many - millions - love the parable books for just this reason, they don't resemble traditional business books. I like the book - it is a kick in the butt that delivers a message about what leadership can be used for, and ought to be used for - helping improve the world and developing others. It is not about US after all, our leadership is something we can use to become much greater than ourselves.

Check out this podcast with Steve Farber from my pal, Wayne, the Cranky Middle Manager.

And here is Steve's guest post. Enjoy.

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The New Gold Standard of Leadership: A Counterintuitive Approach to Rising from Adversity

By Steve Farber, Author of Greater Than Yourself: The Ultimate Lesson of True Leadership

A while back, I received a distressed email from Ken, a young manager at a high-tech company.

Ken and I had never met, but he had read my first two books and had done his best to apply the ideas and practices of Extreme Leadership to the way he'd led his team.  To their culture, their work ethic, their camaraderie.  When necessary, Ken told me, they would band together and work hard -- 10 to 20 hours a day at times -- to solve a problem or meet a pressing need.  Ken's wife would cook food for everyone and bring it to the office. They felt like a family, he said, committed to doing great work and devoted to one another's success.  No one ever complained, least of all Ken. At one point, he'd even forgone his bonus so his employees could collect theirs.

And then something happened. A downturn, a re-org, a shift in the management structure -- we all know the drill.  Ken still had a job, but his position was eliminated.  New management full of old ideas came in to oversee the department's function and the emotional fibers that connected Ken's team to each other and to their work unraveled.

"Now," Ken wrote, "for the last 4 weeks I sat at my cubicle, web surfing for 8 hours a day at the same company where I once worked 39 hours straight with my team to make things right, never going home.

"I'm not a quitter; I don't want to leave.  But -- just or unjust -- I feel stripped of everything we've done" he said. "So the advice I'm looking for is this:

"How do you get back up?"

Even though I've spent the last 20 years coaching leaders and consulting to management teams, I was still loath to respond.  After all, I had only the sketchiest of details about Ken's situation, and it was just presumptuous of me to assume I could help him with a few pithy words of advice. Nonetheless, I did have an idea for him, and I instinctively felt that it could make a huge, positive difference in Ken's life -- and in the life of those he worked with.

And it wasn't the kind of management or leadership advice you'd expect.

It's already become a cliché to say that we live in unprecedented, challenging times.  We all know it.  But the truth is, the world of work is always challenging.  That's why they call it "work."

No matter the industry, market, or type of company you work in, you've had to deal with some combination of the classic work-place obstacles, issues, and barriers to a successful leadership experience.

At some time or another, for example, you've reported to bosses or people in positions of "greater authority" who were self-centered at best, and idiotically egotistical at worst.  They took all the credit and none of the blame and could care less whether or not you succeeded or failed.  Or worse, they preferred that you'd fail, and took great pleasure in your struggles because they felt it made them look stronger.

Or perhaps you worked in a company that, even though populated by terrific human beings, was so obsessed with the bottom line and shareholder value that you were forced to make strategic decisions that compromised your own employees' abilities to serve the customer.  And as your employees grew more frustrated, the customer sat levels plunged, which made you and your employees more frustrated.  And so on.

You may have been in an environment that was hyper-competitive to the point of paranoid, risk-averse to the point of stifling, or so political that it made you consider running for local office just to get some relief.

We've all experienced some combination of these themes with varying levels of intensity.  And we've all spent some amount of time and energy navigating our way through the challenges that come from trying to lead in those conditions. It's just the price we pay for being managers.  And human beings.

Now, add to that the current, sucking implosion in the economy, and it's easy to see why, with all our efforts to be positive, productive leaders, we still get knocked down from time to time.  Sometimes way down.

Our knee-jerk reaction in times of crisis is to hold on tighter, to be more cautious in our actions, and more protective of our resources.  We think that our way out -- or up -- will come by virtue of shoring up and hoarding what we have.

There is, however, a much more powerful course of action, which -- though counterintuitive in these hyper-competitive times -- is based on a timeless reality of true leadership:

Your own greatness as a leader lies, paradoxically, in your ability to cause others to be greater than yourself.

Said another way, your (and my) best way out of a leadership challenge or crisis is not to focus on your own peril or rut, but, instead, to reach out and try to boost someone else over your head.

The idea should sound familiar.  It's really just a variation on the "do unto others" sentiment of the Golden Rule, a philosophy that exists in virtually all religions, schools of thought, and philosophies on the planet. And in none of those versions -- not one -- will you find a footnote saying, "Does not apply Monday through Friday between the hours of 9 to 5 or in any situation where a paycheck is involved."
So the solution I offered to Ken was this:

Instead of wallowing in your own despair, pick someone at work to invest in, with the intent of making that person greater than you are.  Be a coach, guide, or mentor in the truest, most personal sense of the words by choosing someone to be your GTY (Greater Than Yourself) project, and see what that does to your own predicament, your own state of mind.

Maybe it was out of desperation, but as surprised as he was by the curve ball I'd thrown him, Ken took my advice and agreed to the challenge.

Two weeks later, Ken wrote to say that he'd thought deeply about our conversation and had come to realize that before he could lift someone else up by sharing his knowledge and experience, he needed to be sure that he had learned the right lessons from the recent team trauma.  So he'd met with his boss, and asked for feedback on how he could have acted differently, what he may have done to contribute to the problem, and how he could be a better leader in the future.  "The 30 minute meeting turned into a 2 hour confessional," said Ken, which resulted in him learning some hard, "gold lessons" about himself.

"Now," he continued, "I've already started to work with a tech on my team who wants to be a manager.  And I'm taking a vow," he said, "to make the people around me better -- as I continue to grow myself.  I'm going to teach my children about this, too."  Ken, it seems, has gotten his energy back, and he's well on his way to getting back up -- by lifting someone else.

We're all human, just like Ken.  And just like him, we all get bashed down from time to time.  Next time, try to resist the temptation to pull yourself up by the proverbial bootstraps, and reach out to pull someone else up, instead.  Go find someone to be your GTY project, and ask them to do the same.

And don't be surprised if -- through your example -- your whole organization, company, or team rises to establish itself as the new gold standard of leadership.

Copyright  © 2009 Steve Farber author of Greater Than Yourself: The Ultimate Lesson of True Leadership

Author Bio
Steve Farber, author of Greater Than Yourself: The Ultimate Lesson of True Leadership, the president of Extreme Leadership, is a leadership consultant and speaker, and the author of the national bestseller The Radical Leap, and The Radical Edge. He lives in San Diego, California.

Tim Ferris - On TED - Unlocking Learning and Building Excellence

Check out this TED video of Tim Ferris (author of the 4-hour Workweek). I like it because he is a good role model for learning. The difference between success and failure is often who shows up and who sticks with it (and figures out how to do things more simply and directly).

Makes me want to try another approach for getting back to my Spanish - I have 1/2 learned it only about a million times, but am still not fluent. I endeavor to be fluent by the end of the year.

What about at work? Can we apply a different approach to helping people grow and learn at work? Sure, we can. What's the key, the construct, the context, the concept, the model that unlocks understanding? We will never know unless we search and experiment.

Virtual and Global Team Excellence - Where in the world is my team?

First, an admission. I am behind on my book reading. WAY behind. So if you sent me a book (that I said I was interested in receiving) and wonder what's up, please stick with me. The gradual move to my temp apartment in Cincinnati and the new gig have thrown my reading schedule off.

One such book - and this is one I was really looking forward to reading - is Where in the World is My Team? by Terence Brake. This is a well done and much needed book for anyone dealing with the challenges of a geographically dispersed team.

OK, that is most everyone these days. Even if you work at a manufacturing plant, chances are you are regularly working with design engineers, sales or marketing people or vendors or call centers at other locations. This book will help you if your team is separated by a few miles or thousands of miles (it focuses on global team strategies, which all seem quite applicable to mildly dispersed teams).

And here is the bottom line. Terry offers up a simple but elegant model that will help you, dear managers, make sure you are not forgetting or inadvertently ignoring the basic practices that enhance global team performance.

Terry highlights three challenges facing dispersed teams: isolation, fragmentation, an confusion. I have seen these signs with teams separated by two floors! To combat these challenges, teams need to have high engagement, cohesion, and clarity. Yes, these are the right and important elements!

Then Terry drills down on these elements and offers specific and actionable advice for creating a culture that enables team excellence. These are broken into several categories like cooperation, convergence, coordination, capability, communication and cultural intelligence.

The model is simple - it is very clear - but it also covers a lot of ground. And it is evident that Terry knows his stuff by the examples and the specific suggestions he offers. he offers several drawings and pictures that help turn concepts into models and show the linkages between actions and results. If I could have had one wish, I would have liked to have seen even more drawings - hey, I am a simple girl and I like pictures. The books is a highly manageable 220 pages and has a nice synopsis and glossary at the end for people who like executive summaries and definitions.

If you manage teams, get this book. I think you will like it.

And BTW, as I was reading it, I could not help but think that this book PLUS Hip and Sage, would be a great double package to give every manager over the age of 40 who manages teams. If they read both books, and apply 1/10 of the suggestions found in each, they will be SO hip and SO effective as a manager in this new work world.

Fireside Chat With Jeffrey Kluger - Simplexity

Why is it that less talented teams sometimes outperform others that have more skill and experience? Check out this podcast!

During this 34 minute podcast, I chat with Jeffrey Kluger, author Simplexity: Why Simple Things Become Complex (And How Complex Things Can Be Made Simple). Jeffrey is a senior editor and writer at Time magazine, principally covering science and social issues.

If you are like me - interested in how things work and complexity science particular - you will love this podcast. It SOOOO relates to how we manage our businesses, manage people and make decisions. Jeffrey offers up some great stories (including some from the Apollo mission - he co-wrote the best selling book Apollo 13 with Astronaut James Lovell, based on which the movie was made). We talk about guppies and a logic that would conclude telemarketers ought to get paid more than CEOs. Yes, you will want to listen to this one!

You can listen to my podcast with the Jeffrey Kluger by clicking here:

You can also download an MP3 version of the podcast here.

And just a reminder.....

Here is the Podcast Feed for the entire Fireside Chat podcast series:

To see the complete list of podcasts in this series, select the Podcasts and Webcasts category on this blog or see the list on my main website here.

You can also find this series on iTunes (and several other podcast sites), just search under my last name for Fireside Chat.