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Sometimes the Flavour of the Month is Chocolate. And It’s Good.

February 5, 2016Blog, , , , , , , , , , , , ,

flavour2

If you work for anyone other than yourself, you have probably lived this phrase in some way:

“Ugh – this new initiative is nothing other than the new flavour of the month. It’ll never stick and next year they’ll roll out something else.”

Sound familiar? These words have probably assaulted your ears (or crossed your lips), when the organization is trying with best intentions to make a change or an improvement. The person who is responsible for the change is excited about the initiative, and is frustrated beyond believe with this blasé response from the team.

So why do people say it?

First, a little Change Management theory for you – we know from Dr. Elisabeth Kubler-Ross‘ work that people experience grief in an emotional roller coaster. When Kubler-Ross pioneered the concept of the 5 Stages of Grief, people became aware that grief impacts us all the same way and yet differently too.

In other words, we all go through the stages of Grief (Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, and Acceptance), but we may go through them differently. Some may linger in one stage or another, and some may fly through a stage so quickly as to appear to bypass it. The way in which we go through these stages is greatly impacted by our personal resilience, the amount of stress we are dealing with at the moment, and our experiences with grief in the past.

The same is true with change. In fact, Kubler-Ross’ model has been adapted to create the Change Curve, used by Change Management experts, teachers, and coaches. There are several different variations of the curve itself, and we like this one the best:

change curve

You can see the similarity to the 5 Stages of Grief – in this model we have Denial, Anger, Exploration, and Acceptance.

Imagine then, an employee who is not only experiencing change at work, but also at home (spouse has been demoted, child has moved out, parent is ill). This employee, we’ll call him Rob, has been a good worker and has been around for about 15 years. You are Rob’s manager, and very excited about a new program to create a more efficient process for doing the work of Rob and the entire team. When you meet to discuss it, Rob breaks open the “Flavour of the Month” remark, and the team snickers.

This is because Rob has been around for a couple of business cycles. He’s seen change implemented, re-implemented, de-implemented, and implemented again. He’s tired and his resilience is low – he feels that change is a pendulum, and that people should just make up their damn minds and stick with something.

Well, here’s the thing…

The United States’ National Bureau of Economic Research states that since 1945 the average business cycle has been just less than six years. That length of time may also be impacted by your industry, budget issues, technology advancement, and general business trends.

So in other words, every few years the business world changes. And in order to be relevant in that world, an organization must change with it. The change the organization is implementing is probably the right thing, for right now. In a few years it may no longer be the right thing. So yeah. It might well be the flavour of the month, and there’s nothing wrong with that (unless an organization is making change for change’s sake – and that’s a whole different discussion.)

The trick is to implement the “new flavour” carefully, using change management best practices from the outset and communicating the “why and why now” message in the most effective way for the team.

If that’s all done correctly, then the answer to Rob is as easy as, “Yes Rob, it IS the flavour of the month. It’s chocolate. And it’s good.”

Until next time,

Ruth.

 

How to use process tools for anything. Even moving!

January 28, 2016Blog, , , , , , , ,

Moving is a Process.

Think of your last move. You and your spouse/partner giggling hysterically while you pack boxes.  Flirtatiously throwing bubble wrap at one another while you pack? Then after a smooth experience with your moving company, arriving at your new home, giddy with excitement, settling into at least 10 glasses of champagne next to a cozy fire.

If you just snorted or guffawed- you aren’t alone.

What does a living hell look like?download

The first thing I did when we bought our new house was open a bottle of wine (it wasn’t going to open itself was it?).  Then, being the process geek I am, I began to map the current state of moving that I had experienced in the past. I won’t bore you with the VISIO document. But it sort of went something like this:

Step 1. Buy House

Step 2. Start Packing random stuff.

Step 3. Stop packing for a while because have run out of Cardboard Boxes (so has nearby grocery store).

Step 4. Unpack most of things packed in Step 2 because I needed them.

Step 5.  Nearly murder partner/spouse because they have to date packed nothing.

Step 6.  Pack frantically and angrily for a number of days.

Step 7.  Stop packing.  Realize move is still 3 months away.

Step 8. Unpack 90% of Step 6 items while looking for yoga mat that have not used in 3 years but need for “Girls Yoga/Brunch” on Sunday.

Step 9.  Realized have not booked movers.  Panic.  Call first movers that appear on The Google after searching “Movers Toronto”.

Step 10. Begin frantically packing again. Rip 7 boxes because I overpack them and everything falls through the bottom.

Step 11. Stop packing because it is Les Mills Release week and I have to go to every gym class ever.

Step 12. Begin frantically packing.

Step 13. Cancel girls indoor rock climbing date because “I HAVE NO IDEA WHERE THE #&$^#% MY ROCK CLIMBING SHOES ARE.

Step 14-18.  Slight wine induced blur of packing, crying, fighting with spouse irrationally, and scramble packing.

Step 19. ARRIVE AT NEW HOUSE!! Look lovingly at spouse/partner and sip champagne for about 13 seconds.  Immediately proceed to next step.

Step 20. Unpack frantically trying to get house ready for guests.

Step 21. Repack 70% of items as realize new house does not have closet space.

Step 22. Frantically look for that black top for girls wine night. WHERE THE &#&^#^#^#^ is that TOP?????

Step 23. 6 months later feel settled and have shit together.

So pain. So pain.

So this time, older, wiser, armed with process tools out the wazoo I vowed that this time my move would be better.  So first I focused on what I felt were the key pain points  (or for us process geeks, two Lean Wastes) for me during this process:

lean

  • not being able to find one blasted thing before or after the move, causing packing and unpacking again (OVERPROCESSING)
  • running out of  boxes/ripping boxes due to overpacking and having dead time where I wasn’t doing anything. (INVENTORY/WAITING)

The first thing I did being the consultant I am – I outsourced.  I rented reusable, stackable boxes that come with little labels  from (no kickbacks or anything for me, I just found these guys awesome and fast). No running out of boxes. Check!

The next thing I did, was made some space in my garage, and I used huge post-it notes to label each major room in the house (Kitchen, Living Room, Master Bedroom, Master Bathroom etc.)

Next I started packing things that 100% would not be required (i.e. Summer clothes, clothes that no longer fit me yet I am very hopeful that one day I will look like I did when I was 22, shoes that I paid alot of money for however never wear because I work from home in workout wear 98% of the time).

I packed one to two boxes a day.  Every day I brought them down to the garage, put them beneath the room they were assigned to, and labelled the box K1 = Kitchen box 1.  I then quickly wrote on the post it note on the wall, K1= dehydrator, stand mixer, and baking supplies. This way – when I nonsensically needed to make jerky in a hurry or bake homemade bread for the first time before we moved, it would be simple to find which box it was in.

Champagne Wishes and Caviar Dreams.

 

Screen Shot 2016-01-28 at 3.03.53 PM

Fast Forward 3 months later this was me on moving day.  Ha. It was great.  The easiest move ever. Check me out with my feet up on moving day!

And then when we arrived at the new house and got ourselves settledd my husband turned to me and said – “Sweetheart, do you know which box the Apple tv is in?”. I gleefully pulled out the post-it notes I had collected from the garage, and promptly announced: “LR11!!” with a huge boastful/gloaty smile.  He replied: “Gosh you are an amazing woman!”.  We quickly connected to the internet (that I had arranged installation for weeks in advance)and were cozily catching up on our favourite documentary. *

We laughed and giggled, clinked our champagne glasses together, and smiled.  Life was good. **

Notes:

*I forgot to to order internet installation. So we didn’t have internet for about 3 days.  I’m the worst.

 

**Actually, I collected the post it notes from the garage and randomly jammed them into an ottoman as the movers were putting it into the truck.  I didn’t find the post-it notes until 3 days later.  When husband asked for them and I couldn’t find them he may have replied something along the lines of:  “You are a total bozo.”

Moral being – there is ALWAYS room for more process improvement – in ANY process.  Just imagine using this in a more formal way at the office and you can only imagine the reduction in stress, overtime, and rework!

Tell us about your favourite day-to-day process improvements especially moving @Whiteboardcons #movingisaprocess!

Until next time,

Nicole

The Same Only Different

January 22, 2016Blog, , , , , , , , , ,

imp vs

Have you ever heard people use terms interchangeably that are really quite different? Does it make you cringe inside?

It’s like nails on a chalkboard when I hear people say “performance management” or “mentoring” when they mean “coaching.” Or when they say they need someone to “facilitate” when they actually mean they need someone to “train.” And one of my favourites: “leading” vs. “managing.”

Another, and the topic of today’s blog, is Innovation vs. Improvement. This mix-up, while seemingly innocuous, can lead to real organizational design issues, confused roles & responsibilities, and broken down processes.

Potato Po-tah-to?

The thing is, these groups of terms aren’t the same at all (although they can be related,) and yet people seem to use them as if they are synonyms. I’m not sure why, although I suspect it has to do with business culture that loves to invent words (incent, for instance), create catch phrases and buzz words (like Dashboard or Viewability), and even completely misuse words (like Key Performance Indicator for every single metric in an organization. Ummm… “Key” means “most important,” not “all encompassing.”)

In our course The Process of Coaching, we spend some time discussing what it means to coach vs. mentor. I hear the two phrases used jointly all the time:

  • “You need some coaching and mentoring.”
  • “Do you have a coach or mentor?”
  • “Let’s set up a coaching/mentoring program.”

The same is true of Innovation and Improvement.

  • “We have a great Innovation and Improvement department.”
  • “What we need to do to at this company is improve and innovate.”
  • “I’m the Innovation/Improvement manager.”

My Dad had a great phrase, and I think it helps here:

“ All crows are blackbirds, but not all blackbirds are crows.”

So all (or almost all) Innovation is Improvement, but not all Improvement is Innovation. The following diagram shows what I mean more clearly:

imp

Why is this important?

Some of you may be thinking, “Oh come on. It’s just semantics.” Well, actually, no. It’s not.

Lets take a look at what makes these terms different:

  • Improvement, or process improvement, refers to looking at how something is done – the steps, roles, and materials used – and making it more effective and efficient (Side note: effective and efficient are two more terms that are often used interchangeably. Effective means doing something with high quality. Efficient means doing something in a way that makes the best use of required resources – either the company’s or the customer’s.) This could be something like boarding planes by zone instead of rows, bankers lines instead of individual lines, or even something simple like improved signage in busy places.
  • Innovation means doing or creating something that is new in order to grow, keep up with competition, or be groundbreaking industry leaders. It can be a new process (for instance, the ability to tap your credit card at many stores), a new product that changes the way we live (smart phones), or a new business model that changes the way we interact with organizations (online shopping). You can see that the new process of paying by tap is also an improvement to how you pay today, whereas online shopping was an entirely new model, never conceived of before. Does it improve things? Some would debate that! But it certainly changes things.

In “Coaching for Improved Work Performance,” Ferdinand Fournies said that the biggest reason for people not doing what they are supposed to do is that they don’t know what they are supposed to do.

Sounds so simple!

If we fail to distinguish between Innovation and Improvement, we fail to be clear in our message of expectations to our employees. Is an Innovation & Improvement team supposed to increase efficiency or lead groundbreaking change? A manager with skills and background that is heavier in one area than another could influence the direction of the team greatly.

In fact, the two goals are different enough that they could be at odds if not managed correctly. Imagine asking for project approval – which one gets higher priority in the budget? Or, think about what would happen if you hired a bunch of Process Improvement experts and asked them to be creative and innovative as well? I would argue these are very different (although not mutually exclusive) skillsets.

If you want both Innovation and Improvement, make sure that the team or teams are clear in what their goals and responsibilities are. And if both Innovation and Improvement are under the accountability of the same person, make sure he or she has a clear and balanced plan for each.

It’s not just semantics. It’s important.

Until next time,

Ruth.

What Gets Measured Gets Done. Or Does It?

April 9, 2015Blog, , , , , , , , , ,

measured

It’s an old cliché: “What gets measured gets done.” The origin of the statement is up for debate (click here if you want to geek out a bit on that – some say it goes back to Rheticus in the 1500’s!), and it seems that the original phrase was actually “If you can measure it, you can manage it.”

Regardless of the origin or the wording, the message is clear: measuring something gives you the information you need in order to make sure you actually achieve what you set out to do.

But what does that mean, exactly? How does measuring weight ensure weight loss? How does tracking monthly revenue actually bring in the money?

Two Ways Measurement Leads to Goal Achievement

  1. How often have you heard (or said) “it’s not on my performance objectives, so it’s not a priority for me.” For many people, the simple act of measurement increases motivation to perform. The term “eustress” refers to “good stress,” or the opposite of distress, and captures that healthy response to stress we have when something is attainable, but almost too far out of research. Research shows that the desire to win is heightened when rivalry and time pressure coincide, and the simple act of measuring something sparks that sense of rivalry in many people. Of course that rivalry doesn’t need to be with others, it can be with one’s own self as a sort of “competition” to see whether you can beat a goal. Without a measure, there is no way to determine whether you have won, and therefore, less motivation to get something done.
  2. There’s a small matter of accountability. When we set goals and measure performance against that goal we have the ability to hold ourselves (and others) accountable for the resulting success or failure. We actually have concrete data that shows us what we did or didn’t do, what the impact was, and what we need to do differently. Without accountability we can’t coach people towards success and growth, and we have a heck of a time meeting our overall targets.

So is that all we have to do? Measure something and it will magically happen?

Of course not. In addition to things like  project planning, project management, and change management, there is this little matter of measuring the right things.

Business Intelligence, Not Barfing Numbers on a Page

Have you ever been the recipient of an Excel spreadsheet that is masquerading as a report of some kind? Columns and rows of data and boxes and percentages and bolded numbers and you have no idea where to look? Unless you are really familiar with the information, you’re probably going to file that report in some never-to-be-looked at folder in your inbox. Sadly, you won’t be able to refer to it later and sound super smart either.

There are a few things that you can do to make your reports interesting, helpful, and meaningful. If you are someone who is responsible for business analytics, consider the following:

  1. Understand the difference between a measure and a metric.
    • A measure is one quantitative number that counts something. e.g. We made $100,000 profit last quarter.
    • A metric gives you more information because it compares the measure to some other baseline. e.g. We made $100,000 profit last quarter, $50,000 more than the same quarter last year.
  2. Understand the difference between an Outcome metric and a Performance metric.
    • An outcome metric tells you the result of something. It’s a “lag measure,” because once you have the measure it’s done. Over. Too late to do anything with. e.g. We made $100,000 profit last quarter, $50,000 more than the same quarter last year.
    • A performance metric tells you how well the activities are performing that have been determined as the most likely to positively impact the outcome. These are “lead measures,” because they are driving the outcome in advance of the measurement of that outcome. e.g. For the last three weeks we have averaged 10 sales calls per week, which is above our target of 8 sales calls per week.
  3. Figure out what you want to know before you start measuring things. Often times reports are a dumping ground for all the data that’s available, whether it’s useful or not. These types of reports do NOT contain the motivational metrics and measures that create eustress and increase performance.
  4. Design your report to tell a story. Once the right data is measured and collected, the report should contain eye-catching information to lead the reader to the most important points. Make it visual, interesting, and helpful, and you will become the “go-to person” for people who want to know what’s going on.

We are teaching a course in Toronto on the basics of Performance Measurement. It’s a two-day course on May 26th and May 27th, and if you’re interested in knowing more about how to move your organization towards one of data-based decision-making, then click here and register today.

Until next time,

Ruth.

Happy Birthday to Us!

March 27, 2015Blog, , , , , , , , ,

3

That’s right, as of March 28th Whiteboard Consulting is 3 years old!

Both Nicole and I are breathing a sigh of relief that we made it out of the Terrible Two’s, which, though not truly “terrible,” did provide us with our fair share of lessons.

Three Things We Learned in Our Third Year

  1. We thought we would be doing all Process Improvement, all the time. We were wrong. Instead, we have been doing more and more training and facilitation as the months have gone by. Why is this? Two reasons: first, most organizations don’t know that they need process improvement. They don’t come to us, hat in hand, and say, “Please Ruth & Nicole, will you fix our processes?” Instead, they express concern over a symptom, or ask for information on how to improve a specific aspect of their business. This almost always leads to some kind of facilitated work and/or training, and sometimes also to true process improvement work. The second reason is that, without intending to boast, we are excellent trainers, and word gets around.
  2. Network. All the Time. In the first half of 2014 we were extremely busy, and spent little to no time networking and generating new business. It seemed natural for the work to come to us, so imagine our surprise when the pipeline dried up in late summer and it took several months to get it moving again.
  3. Do what you love. We love to train and write. Our courses for both the general public and our private sector clients, as well as the courses we teach for the Government of Ontario, are received with wonderful feedback, and our blogs are being picked up by the Huffington Post more and more frequently. (Look for them in Forbes soon if all goes well.) We really enjoy process improvement work, and when teaching and writing are thrown in, we are very happy campers.

In Our Fourth Year We Are…

  • the Queens of networking and business development, taking Whiteboard into a year of growth.
  • following Sean Covey’s Four Disciplines of Execution and taking a page out of our own book too – this means we are focused on the activities that act as lead measures and will drive our ultimate goal of revenue generation. We have weekly accountability meetings and have laser-focus on the activities we need to achieve to be successful.
  • finding ways to say yes. If clients ask us to do work that conflicts with something else in the schedule, we figure out a way to make it happen. If that means Nicole does one event and I do another, so be it. Hard for us to let go of each other’s apron strings, but that’s what it means when you’re a toddler instead of a two-year-old.
  • training. A lot. Our next two public courses are:
    1. Lean Six Sigma for Service Delivery, a 3-day course in May in Toronto. (Click here)
    2. Performance Measurement 101, a 2-day course in April and May in Toronto. (Click here)

Thank you for your engagement, your comments, your “Likes,” “Shares,” “Favourites,” and “Retweets.”  We look forward to even more of those in the coming year!

Until next week,

Ruth.

Sames, Woes, & Whoas: Building Relationships

March 20, 2015Blog

Happy Friday everyone.  During our course, “Can I Tell You Something?” last week we talked about networking and building rapport with others. One tool that we taught was creating sameness.  Namely, if we can find the things that are the same about us and the person we are interacting with, we will likely build rapport.  Sameness can be attire, vocal tone, posture, gesture, speed of speech, volume of speech, shared experience, you name it.  WE also talked about how different people interact, and one way that I’ve seen many women interact (and I’ve done it myself), is the “I love your ______, where did you get it?”. I know.  So basic. So uninspiring.  But I cannot tell you how many relatimages (3)ionships (superficial and deep) have been formed through this very sentence.

Earlier this week, I ran into a friend and we had lunch together, and we started talking about this very same topic.  She, very eloquently said that many people like to connect through “woes”.  Either you are commiserating about the terrible networking event you just went to, or lamenting about how your husband/spouse/spousal equivalent ALSO leaves dishes all over the kitchen.  And as she was so eloquently describing this, my mind wandered a bit, and I started to think about how interesting this friend of mine was, and how I appreciated her ability to talk about these ideas in such a holistic way.  And I started to appreciate what characteristics and traits she had, that I didn’t.  And I just keptimages (2) thinking how amazing that was. WHOA.

And then we had a 2 glasses of wine induced epiphany (okay it was 1.5 glasses, but who’s counting).  The final, and most advanced mechanism for going beyond “sameness” and “woes” in a relationship -was “WHOAS”.  That moment where you recognize the person you are engaging with is not only similar to you in many ways, but also very different. And you say “Whoa. You are incredible”.  And to move even beyond that, you are amazed at this difference and appreciate it. Whoa.

That’s what we said.

3 Steps to Building Relationships

  1. Establish rapport through sameness.  Match postures, gestures, speed, vocal tone, and volume with the person you want to connect with.  Use open ended questions (ones that end in something other than yes or no) to discover things about the person that you may be able to establish a greater degree of sameness.
  2. Some of the sameness established above, may turn into a bit of kvetching about a shared crappy experience. Share and understand each others WOES. This is okay.  Don’t let this become the centre of the conversation, but use it to leap into step 3.
  3. Whoa.  Discover now what is unique and amazing about that person.  The key here is to celebrate it.  There is a gap between your “sames” and your whoas. And that gap and understanding of that gap is where a true relationship flourishes.

I’ll let you take this little piece of genius with you today. Tell us what you find out about yourself and your relationships @whiteboardcons #sameswoeswhoas.

 

Until next time,

Nicole

Why Managers Need to Understand “The Dress” Controversy

February 27, 2015Blog

The internet is a funny thing, as I’m sure you’ll agree. Lately it’s been buzzing on whether a dress is white & gold or blue & black, creating two firmly opposed teams, taunting each other with the ridiculousness of their “clearly incorrect” choice.

Here’s the image of the dress:

dress

At first I thought it was just a silly thing, and those saying blue & black were doing so just to be difficult and to feed the social media beast. I didn’t get it. It’s so obviously white and gold.

Then I did some research, and came across an interesting article from Wired.com. (It appears there is actually science to it!) Apparently, it is actually blue & black (!!), and the reason some people see it differently has to do with the context and the way their brain is wired to choose between the two by discounting “irrelevant” light. (You can read the full article here.)

So, in essence, it depends on your perspective, doesn’t it.

Isn’t that true of everything?

Why This Is Important to Managers

Yesterday I taught a course on The Essentials of Management for the Centre for Leadership & Learning in the Ontario Public Service. One of the things we talk about is the importance of perspective, or context, when managing people. Your job as a manager is to ensure that YOUR context is not incorrectly influencing the way that others will hear a message or interpret instructions.

Every manager has had that moment of shock when he/she realizes that they just said or did something that had the complete opposite effect from what was intended. They thought this “thing” was white & gold, and their team interpreted “blue & black.” The results were disastrous, and it took some finesse and time to recover.

There are a couple of basic areas that we all need to be highly sensitive to when trying to be most effective and impactful with our employees:

  • When communicating, remember that the words that come out of your mouth are highly influenced by your own personal context, or your experience, your cultural norms, your mood, and even your gender. The receiver, on the other hand, interprets those words based on THEIR experience, cultural norms, mood, and gender. As the communicator, it is your job to ensure that the differences in context are accounted for, and that the words clarify your intent. This is especially important in eMail when it is so easy to read tone when none was intended! Think about how your words might be mis-interpreted based on what you know about your audience, and clarify accordingly. If you don’t, you could say “white & gold,” and they might hear “blue & black.”communication
  • When introducing a change to your team, consider each individual’s perspective. You may think you’re about to announce the world’s most exciting change, and that everyone will love you for it. Perhaps most people will! There may also be a handful of people who with think the sky has fallen, because their context, or experience of change, is much different. They may have a lot of change impacting them at home that you don’t know about, or this specific change may introduce a world of complications for them. You think it’s all white & gold, and they will see it as blue & black. Your job is not to shove white & gold at them and talk about how awesome everything is, but to be aware that there will be contextual differences, and to allow people time to reflect, ask questions of you, and to get your support.

Finally, let’s not forget that the best teams are made up of all kinds of different contexts. If you see white & gold and some of your team sees blue & black, isn’t that a good thing? Surround yourself with those who are different, and embrace and discuss that diversity! Your contextual awareness will expand, your awareness will be richer, and you will be a better manager.

Until next time,

Ruth.

The power of saying YES!

February 20, 2015Blog

Why so much “NO”?

Happy Freezing Friday.  This morning I am cuddled under a number of blankets and nursing ANOTHER cold.  images

This week Ruth and I were ruminating (#GoodWord) on why people find it so easy to say no. I was dealing with  a vendor and in addition to there being some huge gaps in the teams’ understanding of their roles and responsibilities, there was an awful lot of no-ing going on.   I heard these among others:

  • No, I can’t help you with that, you’ll have to call xyz….
  • No, we don’t do that, sorry.
  • No, sorry our system can’t do that.
  • No, sorry, I can’t do that.
  • No, you should have done xyz…

images (2) The list is endless.  In a business world driven on customer satisfaction, why are there so many people saying no to their customers all the time? It almost seems that we are predisposed to say no first!  No is easy. it’s fast It takes less work. It defers responsibility to someone else. It is less work. I’m not suggesting that business/individuals do things beyond their offerings or to risk their profitability.  I am talking about using language that is more helpful to your customer, and one that creates OPPORTUNITY.  Opportunity for future purchases, opportunity to build a reputation of strong customer service, and opportunity to continuously improve every day! I love the context of saying yes to the person and no to the task (read more here).  

How to say “Yes!”

  • That isn’t my area, however, I will contact xyz for you and have them call you back.
  • We don’t offer that exact service, but we offer something similar.  If this still doesn’t work I can refer you to xyz who does!
  • Our system doesn’t have that particular functionality, unfortunately.  Let me see how I can do that in a different way.
  • Our policies and procedures (attached here) don’t permit me to do that.  I understand you are frustrated, I can’t promise anything, but let me make a few calls and see if I can help make this right.
  • Next time might I recommend doing this, let me help you out in the meantime.

I like Peter Shankman’s idea here, to challenge yourself to say yes to three things this week.  See what opportunity comes of it! Let us know @whiteboardcons #justsayyes!

Until next time,

Nicole

 

Manager, Coach Thyself

February 13, 2015Blog

physicianA very old proverb, “Physician heal thyself“, reminds us to attend to our own affairs rather than criticizing the affairs of others. It popped into my head recently when I was telling someone about the “self talk” going on in my head during a challenging meeting I had.

First, let me explain that “self talk” is more than just muttering to yourself now and again. It’s actually a conversation that you have with your subconscious and is considered a subset of thinking. Experts agree that the way in which we “talk to ourselves,” whether out loud or in our heads, has an enormous impact on our performance, our confidence, and our mood. (There’s a great article from The Wall Street Journal here.)

You may remember the SNL skit where Stuart Smalley talks to himself in the mirror. That’s a bit more over-the top than what I’m talking about, but it does illustrate the idea. Stuart Smalley’s Famous Self Talk

Coaching Yourself

We may coach others every day as part of our jobs. We help people understand how they could have done better in a challenging situation and/or what they did right and should do more of. But have we ever thought about the advantages of coaching ourselves, right in the moment?

Remember that coaching is all about asking the right questions, helping people come to their own self-realizations and truths that will resonate and take hold more than you just “telling” them what to do. Self talk can be the same. Research shows that we should actually talk to ourselves by using our names or saying “you” instead of I.

I would add, talk to yourself in a coaching style, asking yourself questions. It’s much more likely to stick and change your behaviour in the moment.

So back to my challenging meeting.

I had a networking session with someone in a similar line of business. I knew this person to be a tad passive aggressive, and I admit that one of the reasons I sought out the meeting was to bridge this awkwardness I felt every time we had an interaction. So, we sat down over coffee, and I started out as all good networkers do, by asking more about their work, how they fell into it, etc. (Read our blog on networking here.)

45 minutes into it, I realized not one question was directed my way. Not one. I started getting annoyed, and fortunately had enough self awareness to realize that this was likely showing up on my face. (I am cursed with a very expressive face. Many years ago a boss told me, “Ruth not only do we realize when you don’t like an idea, we can tell when you think someone is stupid.” OUCH!)

I began to coach myself using self talk, starting with Kindness & Curiosity (“Ruth, what kind of life is this person having, that they are so entirely focused on themselves?”) This person has A LOT of trials and tribulations going on. Does that make the self-centredness ok? No, but it makes it easier to react with kindness. Then I moved on to thinking about what I could actually learn, instead of being ticked off that it was a one-sided conversation. (“OK, so it’s annoying. Remember Ruth, there are things you can actually pick up and apply to your own business if you’d just listen. Stop wrinkling your forehead.)

I came away from the conversation much more relaxed than I might have. The self-talk helped me apply my own principles to my situation, and I picked up a few good pointers along the way.

What To Remember

  • You may coach others every day as part of your job. You also should coach yourself. Be aware of those situations in which you might over react or response from a place of frustration.
  • Always think of Kindness & Curiosity first. It helps you calm down and take personal responsibility out of the equation.
  • Use the questioning style of self-talk to remember your own coaching techniques.

It doesn’t really turn an annoying situation into a great one, but it does help you react with professionalism and grace. And that’s never a bad thing.

Until next time,

Ruth.

 

 

New Course: March 11, 2015

February 11, 2015Blog, Events, News

Are you someone who wants to be better at interacting with people at work? How are your networking skills? Do you take over conversations? Do you wish you could influence some of your peers or your boss more effectively? How do you handle feedback – both the giving and the getting?

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Can I Tell You Something?

We are excited to announce our newest workshop, entitled “Can I Tell You Something,” focused on influencing through questions and feedback in order to build stronger and more effective relationships at work.

You may be aware that we have a very popular “Process of Coaching” course, and this workshop builds off of that material. The difference is that this workshop is less “corporate,” and focuses less on Management skills and behaviours associated with coaching employees. Instead, it’s about you, the individual, at any level in any job, and how you can employ coaching techniques to improve your interactions with co-workers, bosses, heck – even your family and friends! (Shh! They won’t even know you’re doing it.)

We will spend the morning on theory, with a few quizzes and group exercises to get your brains firing. After lunch, an actor specialized in this type of simulation, will join us and play the role of a number of different types of people in different situations. You will get to interact with the actor and practice what you learned in the morning session.

Simulated learning is extremely effective. We wrote a blog about it here. It is also a lot of fun, and we promise you will take away a number of very helpful tools. Whether you learn by reading, listening, watching, or doing – our workshop has it all, and we believe you will find it of great value.

Details

Who Should Come?

If you, someone you work with, or someone you know wants to learn any of the following, then we would love to see you:

    • How to influence people through language that is inquisitive and open.
    • How to be a great (informal) mentor.
    • How to provide feedback to people in such a way that they actually figure out what you want to say before you say it.
    • How to accept feedback and act on it.
    • How to handle a confrontational situation more effectively.
    • How to be noticed and heard – in a good way!
    • How to be a better networker.

Where Is It?

This workshop will be held in the beautiful Toronto Room at the Verity Club. The address is 111d Queen Street East in Toronto, and is just east of Jarvis Street on the south side. (It’s an old chocolate factory!) Screen Shot 2015-02-11 at 4.35.41 PM

When Is It?

March 11, 2015, from 8:30am to 5pm.

How Much Is It?

$450 plus HST, including a light lunch and refreshments.

If you have any questions, please email us at info@whiteboardconsulting.ca/staging.

Click here to reserve your place.

Hope to see you there,

Nicole & Ruth

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