How Are You Valued: Are You Using the Right Criteria?

Posted on March 30, 2016March 30, 2016 by Myron Beard, PhD

When asking individuals about their work, and their value to an organization, it is common to hear about the volume of emails they receive or the number of meetings they attend as evidence of their importance. In fact, it has become a badge of honor for people to complain (disingenuously) about having a full voice mailbox, hours of emails to answer, and a schedule full of meetings. To be stressed is considered proof positive to many that they are important, even indispensable, to their company. Somehow, we have adopted busy-ness as a sure sign of our worth to our companies. Unfortunately, this is akin to the young soccer player getting a trophy just for participating, with his/her parents “high-fiving” them simply for their participation, not their contribution to the team or their team’s accomplishments. It is a false measure! This false valuation becomes a trap in terms of how we promote ourselves to others and, ultimately, how we value ourselves. By using these false criteria to value ourselves, we are essentially sub-optimizing our worth to the organization.

To further substantiate this assertion, a recent survey by Adobe Systems (2015) revealed that employees typically use email six hours a day, or more than 30 hours a week! This includes checking both business and personal emails at work. That is the equivalent of nearly three full workdays a week spent checking email. This happens in spite of the fact that 24% of employees understand they are using email “way too much.” Many are on the receiving end of “blast emails”—emails for which their input is not relevant to the issue, a common organizational CYA tactic (“They were included on the email”). Nevertheless, employees often read these irrelevant emails and reply unnecessarily (to the group, of course, in order to show that they have been attentive). This is a classic example of Stephen Covey’s observation that “the urgent undermines the important.” What is of high urgency to someone else may not be of high importance to you. Time can get away from you when responding to emails or attending meetings that are of low or no value to you. Although few would dispute that email and electronic communication are valuable assets in communicating business concerns, there is often a downside to such modes of interaction.

Citing statistics from various sources, a 2013 article in MeetingKing (October 21) reported that 37% of employee time is spent in meetings. This translates to about 15 hours per week in meetings, or an average of three hours per day. In addition, findings showed that managers attend more than 60 meetings per month. If this weren’t bad enough, 47% of employees considered too many meetings a waste of time, 39% of meeting participants admitted to dozing off during a meeting, and 70% brought other work to meetings. Unproductive meetings were a result of not having agendas, including the wrong people or too many people, no meeting outcomes or assignments, and no follow-up or accountability. Furthermore, attending excessive meetings contributed to employee fatigue and lowered employee morale.

The excessive use of emails and meetings, both communication tools, is ironic in that the single most concerning issue shared by individuals about their businesses is poor communication. In survey after survey, employees complain that the biggest problem in their day-to-day work is poor communication across the organization. How perplexing it is to find that two of the largest wastes of time in a company are related to communication! Just think of how productive companies could be if emails were more effectively managed and meetings were more productive. At the center of this perplexing problem is the degree to which individuals actually perpetuate the problem by automatically sending and responding to low-importance emails and attending meetings that do not add value. This behavior becomes mechanical and done without much reflection. It is similar to a moth’s attraction to light without differentiating between daylight and the light from a fire, ultimately culminating in its flaming demise. The result of this kind of robotic behavior could include your career stalling and your contribution to the organization diminishing. The root of this problem lies in having lost your sense of unique giftedness. In order to make the largest impact on an organization, and positively influence your career along the way, you must first change the way you see yourself. This requires reclaiming who you are—your skills and capabilities—and determining how you can best impact the organization. It requires going back to understand why, among all of the candidates for your position, you were hired (or promoted). What was it that your manager saw in you that set you apart from other candidates?

It would be difficult to argue that being a hard worker is a bad thing. It is equally difficult to argue that networking within an organization is detrimental. However, neither of these activities alone is sufficient for sustained success or maximum impact. In the extreme, hard workers can be less productive due to their inability to set priorities. They can mistake activity for productivity. Similarly, well-networked people can be seen as socializing and interfering rather than influencing or making an impact. In other words, being busy is not a hallmark of being effective! It is the intentional exercise of your gifts that makes a difference for you and for your organization.

In a recent Forbes article, Kevin Kruse (January 2016) interviewed 200 successful people and discovered that they check their emails only a few times a day. In addition, they avoid meetings at all costs, noting that meetings are notorious time-killers. Not everyone can check their emails only infrequently, or are in a position to turn down most meetings. However, there is hope. To get from where you are to where you want to be, consider the following ways to reclaim yourself as a capable professional.

1. Value Yourself

Take a close look at why you have been successful up to this point. This exercise may require soliciting input from trusted advisors or close associates.

What are some of the key competencies and capabilities you possess?
Why were you selected for your position over other candidates?
What difference were you expected to make in your position?
In what way have you compromised your sense of self on behalf of being, or appearing, “busy?”

2. Maximize Your Impact

Once you begin to reclaim your unique giftedness, consider how you can claim lost time to refocus your capabilities on more important issues.

Time Management
- Emails—Insist that you be included only on emails that either directly affect you now or in the future, emails involving matters about which you can make a difference, or emails that include critical information regarding the business. Unsubscribe liberally and respond cautiously. Do not send out blast emails yourself. Limit the time you spend on emails and find a specific time during the day that you will respond to them. Very few emails require an immediate response!
- Meetings—Only attend meetings at which you can make a difference and where your attendance would be additive. Insist that every meeting you attend have an agenda and conclude with tasks, owners, and follow-up. Whenever possible, delegate meeting attendance to others—this will free up your time and could be a development opportunity for them. Do not schedule meetings when a phone call or two would suffice and do not include people in meetings whose value to the meeting is not critical.
Priority Management—Consider the following ways to avoid reactively mistaking activity for productivity and allowing the urgent to sabotage the important:
- Differentiation and calibration—Set aside the same time each day to review everything in which you are engaged. Take an honest look at triaging all of the activities into the following categories:
  - Urgent vs. important
  - Short-term vs. long-term
  - Essential to do myself
  - Can be delegated
  - Can be left undone altogether
- Focused attention—Begin focusing your attention, and your giftedness, on those items that are important, have far-reaching impact, and can only be completed by you.
- Execution—For all your prioritization above, set personal objectives with regard to the timeliness, quality, and resources needed to execute the item. Enlist a colleague to both review your priorities and hold you accountable. Work diligently to become intentional about your behavior, instead of mechanical or unthinking.

Keep in mind that the ultimate goal is to become intentional in the use of your talents and capabilities on behalf of the organization. Your value to the organization is directly related to your impact, not your busy-ness!

Executive Fitness: Is It Really That Important?

Posted on March 16, 2016 by Myron Beard, PhD

I had the unique opportunity to work with a project management team making a large, innovative addition to a power plant. Because the project included new technology to clean up emissions and was a joint venture with a foreign company, it received significant scrutiny from all parties involved. For the project management team, this was either the largest or most innovative project they had ever worked on. Under the pressure to perform and hit scheduling, quality, and financial targets, the project team faced high and constant levels of stress.

As my work with the project team continued into its fourth month, it became apparent that the team had unhealthy diets and poor exercise habits. With few exceptions, team members reported very low levels of physical activity with the common excuse of not having enough time or energy at the end of the day to work out. In addition, many of them believed they got sufficient exercise on-site during the day to fulfill any exercise regimen. I systematically poked holes in their excuses and, in the end, they all agreed that more exercise would be beneficial. I threw down the gauntlet and challenged them to work out daily over the next 30 days, and also agreed to complete the challenge myself. Each challenge participant had to either complete some form of workout or walk 10,000 steps a day, and all had apps on their smartphones to monitor their activity. I provided the team with a 30-day spreadsheet to track our progress, and our work began.

I wondered if my challenge would really help them cope with their stress or just add yet another task to their already busy schedules. The mood-boosting benefits of exercise were clear in the results of a research study conducted at Princeton University (Journal of Neuroscience, May 2014). The researchers found that, when people are stressed, exercise changes the part of the brain that regulates anxiety and calms excitatory circuits that lead to anxiety. Findings from other studies have determined that exercise increases the brain’s level of dopamine, the neurotransmitter responsible for a feeling of contentment. Finally, scientists at the University of Illinois (Nature, July 1999) found that exercise improves the brain’s ability to focus and concentrate and enhances overall brain cognition. Taken collectively, during a period of prolonged stress, exercise can help reduce anxiety and increase contentment, concentration, and focus. I was confident completing the challenge would pay off.

At the end of the 30-day challenge, our group convened to review how we did. Every team member had a positive experience and said they felt more productive and less stressed. Participating in the challenge made them more aware of the amount they exercised, which motivated them to increase their activity level. One team member increased how much he walked his dog each day and found that both he and his dog had lost weight! The project team noted other benefits, as well. Thanks to team members encouraging one another in their efforts, camaraderie and teamwork improved.

Study after study has demonstrated the health benefits of exercise. However, more emphasis should be given to the benefits of exercise during highly stressful periods of work life. In fact, because the responsibility of managing large projects and people is so critical to both business success and the well-being of those involved, managers and executives should maximize the tools available to them to perform at their best. Regular exercise is an essential part of optimizing health to better manage work life.

Likability: The Most Common Hiring Mistake

Posted on March 2, 2016 by Myron Beard, PhD

When looking for the ideal candidate to fill a key position, it is common for hiring managers to identify a list of attributes they consider essential to being successful in the role. In addition to the technical skills required, this list of additional management and interpersonal characteristics is often so lengthy that no one, including the hiring manager, could possibly meet the minimum qualifications for the job. I often joke with hiring managers that if God herself walked through the door, she would not be able to meet the qualifications!

Having faced such stringent qualifications, why then do new hires often fail to meet the expectations of the hiring manager? It happens because, in the hiring process, the hiring manager becomes distracted by the candidate’s interpersonal skills or overall attractiveness. The candidate’s charm, wit, or quickness to respond in an engaging manner sidetracks the hiring manager or team from focusing on the candidate’s ability to do the job. In fact, candidates are often hired primarily on the basis of their likability and not on their ability to do the job.

In a previous article, “Making Decisions: Take This Principle to the Bank,” I argued for the importance of trusting one’s initial judgments, or “thin-slicing,” when making decisions. Thin-slicing is the ability to make judgments based on scant data, and it can be a very effective decision-making tool for routine business matters or issues. However, hiring decisions at senior levels are out of the ordinary, infrequent, and often more complex than routine business decisions. It is critical during the hiring process to avoid letting interpersonal engagement and congeniality trump capabilities and competencies. Remember that hiring decisions are less about the likability of candidates and more about their ability to get the job done. In Jim Collins’ book Good to Great, he observes that the most effective CEOs and leaders are often mild-mannered and humble. In fact, he states that some very engaging leaders need a “charisma-ectomy,” because their interpersonal attractiveness, charm, and magnetism can mask their lack of training, experience, or other critical skills necessary to be successful in the job.

In the case of hiring for significant senior roles in an organization, it is critically important for hiring managers to go beyond the interpersonal acumen of candidates to a deeper understanding of their competencies and aptitudes. This is not to say that having effective interpersonal and communication skills is not important. Rather, interpersonal acumen is only one of many data points to consider. In fact, because hiring managers can easily overlook the actual capabilities individuals bring to their candidacy as a result of their appeal, it is important for these managers to take an even more stringent look at those to whom they are immediately attracted. According to Dr. Gordon Patzer, who has conducted three decades of research on physical attractiveness, human beings are hardwired to respond more favorably to attractive people. There is a bias that attractive people are generally more talented, kind, honest, and intelligent than those who are less attractive.

On the many occasions I have evaluated competing candidates for senior positions, the hiring managers frequently want to hire the candidate they find most interpersonally appealing. When we discuss the interviews, assessment results, job requirements, and organizational fit, we often find that the most likable candidate does not always have the capabilities necessary for long-term success. This attractiveness bias can prevent managers from looking beyond their initial impressions of likability to more lasting and important facets of candidates’ capabilities and skills.

In summary, trusting one’s instincts and thin-slicing can be effective tools for making decisions that are routine and uncomplicated. However, when hiring for high-level or critical positions, hiring managers must consider more than their initial impressions, recognize their unconscious biases, and take a deeper dive into understanding those competencies most critical to the success of the position. Doing so will help produce better outcomes for all involved.

Women in Leadership: Isn’t It About Time?

Posted on June 24, 2015June 25, 2015 by Myron Beard, PhD

At the Academy Awards ceremony, Patricia Arquette gave a controversial thank you speech after winning the Oscar for best supporting actress. Arquette thanked the appropriate people and went on to say, “To every woman who gave birth, to every taxpayer and citizen of this nation, we have fought for everybody else’s equal rights. It’s our time to have wage equality, once and for all, and equal rights for women in the United States of America.” She received both support and criticism for politicizing the moment. But, was she right? After all, it was fifty years ago that President Kennedy signed the Equal Pay Act into law. What do the data say?

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, in 2010, the female-to-male earning ratio for full-time year-round (FTYR) employees was 0.81. Women earn 81 cents on the dollar compared to their male counterparts. The 2012 Catalyst Fortune 500 Census stated that nearly half of the U.S. workforce is made up of women. According to USA Today, the ratio of women to men graduating from college is 60 to 40 (Fortune, March 2013). Yet women hold only 16.6% of board seats and only 14.3% of executive officer positions of the Fortune 500. Women have the education, the presence in the workforce, and the skill set, but are dramatically underrepresented in executive positions—and are significantly underpaid in general.

Is there something fundamentally missing in the female psyche that prevents them from being capable to rise to senior positions in business and earn equal pay? This is not true according to a research study conducted at Spring Arbor University.¹ Researchers used a 360-degree feedback tool to examine how 1,546 male and 721 female leaders from 204 for-profits, non-profits, and large and small organizations perceived themselves and were perceived by colleagues, supervisor, employees, and peers. Participants were rated on 10 relational behaviors (including trust, communication, and coaching) and 10 task-oriented behaviors (such as goal setting, planning, strategy, and decisiveness). Female leaders were rated significantly higher than males on most of the skills. Really?!

Women have been successful at leading whole countries (Golda Meir/Israel; Angela Merkel/Germany; Indira Gandhi/India; Margaret Thatcher/United Kingdom and 18 other current female heads of state) and companies (Meg Whitman/Hewlett Packard; Mary Barra/General Motors; Virginia Rometty/IBM and 23 other female CEOs in the Fortune 500). Why are women so underrepresented in leadership positions? Why is there such a widespread discrepancy between men and women in pay and opportunity?

There are several anecdotal reasons given for this underrepresentation in senior executive positions. Many women drop out of the workforce before having the chance to be promoted. Women would rather raise their families than work. Women are less mobile than men. Women do not want the responsibility that goes with these positions. Women are less assertive in asking for raises and promotions. And on and on. There may be a grain of truth to any of these arguments, but, taken as a whole, women would need another 33% representation on board seats and another 35% representation in senior positions to even reach 50%! In any case, there is no way that these reasons account for women being underpaid by 19%.

I subscribe to the hypothesis that there is a bias in the workforce against women moving into senior positions. This bias is evident in how women are characterized. A strong demanding man is referred to as tough. The same behaviors in women are referred to as bitchy. An expressive man is seen as assertive. An expressive woman is seen as overly emotional. Men who demonstrate interest in their employees are compassionate, while women are viewed as soft. A man is considered organized, while a woman is seen as controlling. This bias has become so much a part of the cultural psyche that it is now often accepted as truth and unchallenged, at least not publicly.

The enlightened leader will hire, promote, and compensate on the basis of performance and put biases aside. The enlightened leader will be intentional about a process of self-examination to understand where these biases originate and how to be proactive in dealing with them. As long as there are limits on what women are paid and what they can achieve, we are limiting the potential of our companies, our communities, and, ultimately, our country. We need to be better than that. Don’t you think?

^1. Reported in Monitor on Psychology, September 2015 (from Performance Improvement Quarterly, April/May/June 2014).

Developing High-Performing Teams: Best Practices

Posted on May 27, 2015 by Myron Beard, PhD

As we all know, the most recent recession in the United States had a lasting impact on both employees and employers. Although the unemployment rate has inched lower since then, employers are still being cautious about rehiring. Instead, they are relying on their smaller remaining workforce to do the work done by a much larger workforce before the recession. This requires employees to fundamentally change how they work in order to do more in the same amount of time. At no time in recent history has the development of high-performing teams been more important than it is today. To get high-quality results and maintain a high level of productivity with a smaller workforce requires a different way of thinking about team efficiency and team effectiveness. In our work and research with a wide variety of companies, we have identified the following best practices that employers are using to address this gap.

1. Individual or Team

Companies have identified that a significant time-waster is having more than one person do the job of one person. There has been more scrutiny on redefining job specifications to ensure that, regarding manpower, 1 + 1 does not equal less than 2. Becoming clearer about what outcomes are essential, as opposed to “nice to have,” requires companies to develop a sharper sense of how jobs are done and to look for more efficient ways to do them. Now, companies find that they are able to get the same or better outcomes with fewer people or only one individual on a task. The takeaway is this: rather than immediately jumping to a group, determine whether the task, project, or initiative really requires the involvement of more than a single individual.

2. Project Charter

Assuming the project or initiative to be accomplished requires only a small group, the next best practice is having a project charter. The more clear and articulable a project mission is, the more likely it is that the team will be successful. It is important that the purpose and expected outcome of the team are clearly understood prior to the selection of team members and well before the team’s first meeting. Clear goals and a vision become the foundation for the team’s work. It would be better not to have a team at all than to have a group of your finest without a clear mission. A clear charter includes a statement of what the problem is (and why it’s a problem) and what the expected outcomes are. It is important to build in accountabilities with regard to the quality, quantity, and timeliness of the project and to address what, if any, resources are required to accomplish the outcome. A team should have no more than three objectives, with one to two being ideal. Research has shown that the more objectives a team has, the less likely it will be to accomplish them. Likelihood of accomplishment drops precipitously once the objectives exceed three.

3. Team or Committee

What is often not asked in the undertaking of a task that rises above the level of the individual is whether a team or a committee is required. What is the difference? A committee is made up of individuals, with a strong central leader, who is in a position of discussing, deciding, and delegating. The committee is made up of each individual’s work products or reports that are delivered as part of a whole. As such, the committee typically reviews, provides oversight, and recommends. It is typically aligned with the organization’s mission. A committee can have a lifespan that is long and ongoing. The committee focus tends to be more routine and members rotate on and off over time.

A team is different in scope, governance, and tenure. Although a team has a leader, it has characteristics that are different from a committee, including:

A single and unified task or work product that members work on together
Projects that may be “one off,” new, and creative, or focused on issues that have proven to be roadblocks or impediments to organizational growth
More shared responsibilities (as opposed to the hierarchy of a committee)
An existence that is time-limited, has a specific goal, and disbands when the project is completed
Members who stay on for the duration of the project; at most, external experts can be called upon to provide input on an invitation basis

When identifying why you want a group of people to spend their valuable time on a project or an initiative, make the distinction between having a committee (working on routine and ongoing tasks or initiatives) versus a team (serving as a strike force on high-impact, out-of-the-ordinary projects). It is important to make this distinction so that productivity and impact will be maximized and downtime minimized.

4. Team Composition

If the initiative requires a team rather than a committee, involving the right people is fundamental to team success. Getting the right people has become even more important in a downsized environment. It used to be that teams were composed of volunteers, and people volunteered based on the “sexiness” of the project or because their friends, acquaintances, or colleagues were on the team. Having volunteers has a greater social impact than a business impact. Hand-selecting team members based on project requirements, having just the right number of members, having members in the right “seat” on the team, and aggressively deselecting non-performing members are critical to the success and effectiveness of the team.

Although a team has a shared leadership component, it still needs to have a strong leader who is selected by management (neither volunteered nor voted upon). In addition, a team requires a strong subject matter expert (or two, maximum) and a couple of very strong critical thinkers who are able to challenge the team (no shrinking violets). The team must tie their solutions to both the broader organization and the future of the organization, not simply routine or incremental changes.

For most initiatives, the maximum number on a team should be eight, with six being the ideal number. With more than six members, there becomes an inverse relationship between the number of members on the team and the team’s productiveness and impact. There should be a compelling reason for the selection of each team member. Keep the team a small but potent group.

5. Team Dynamics

Research on effective teams has found that the best teams have great energy, great engagement, and a rigorous problem-solving process that includes dialogue, debate, disagreement, and, ultimately, agreement. In order for a team to establish this kind of process, a significant amount of front-end time together is required to establish rapport, trust, and the ability of the members to challenge individual and group thinking without reprimand or reprisal.

High-performing teams are careful not to fall into the traps of:

Deferring to authority (team members are equal on the team—status and position are checked at the door)
Rushing to consensus as the push to completion nears
Under-valuing the unique expertise of members in favor of the much easier, but less impactful, knowledge shared by the group

In addition, members of highly effective teams spend time outside of formal meetings looking for alternative data or ideas to bring back to the team. This makes the process more rigorous and helps mitigate “group think.”

6. Conclusion

The research over the past few years has been clear about the importance of time and impact when putting key employees together to solve critical business problems. The time-value of employees is more important than ever. Identifying the importance of the project or initiative to the organization and assigning the fewest and best employees to tackle it will yield the best results in the most expedient manner. When facing the challenges of your organization, consideration of these Best Practices in creating and managing teams can give your organization the greatest opportunity for making sure each team is a high-performing team and each outcome is a high-impact outcome.