Tag Archive: employee engagement

Even Coaches Need Coaches

July 8, 2016BlogCoaching, communication, consultant, consulting, decision making, employee engagement, leadership, management, whiteboard consultingRuth Henderson

If you’ve been reading our blogs for a while, or have noticed our recent “Whiteboard Pro-Tip Videos,” you know that we are HUGE fans of effective coaching conversations as a means of increasing employee engagement and building strong teams. (Read our article on “Being a Great Coach in the Office” which was published in the Huffington Post last year.)

Our workshops have helped scores of people improve their coaching skills, and our one-on-one coaching sessions have helped individuals figure out how to become “unstuck” with whatever roadblock is preventing them from getting where they want to go.

But what if you’re already a pretty good, even fantastic, coach? You get it, you’re good at it, you practice it, your team is highly engaged and successful, and in fact you’ve been training others to grow their own coaching skills.

Do you need a coach if you’re already a coach?

Just about any professional needs their own services from time to time, and we know that they can’t (or shouldn’t) treat themselves and expect great results. Think about it:

Doctors need to see other doctors for physicals and prescriptions.
Personal trainers have personal trainers to spot them when they lift weight, and push them when they get tired.
Physiotherapists see other physiotherapists to manipulate and treat musculoskeletal issues.
Lawyers hire other lawyers to represent them (except on TV, where they are VERY good at representing themselves).
Therapists get advice and counselling from other therapists.
Ministers, Priests, Rabbis, and Imams seek spiritual guidance from others.

And so it goes with coaching.

Even expert coaches need someone else to help them self-discover solutions to problems they are facing. Here are three possible scenarios in which it would be critical for a coach to get coaching from someone else:

Edgar has been coaching for 15 years, and is known for his openness, strength, and amazing leadership style. He thought he had seen it all until one of his peers lashed out at him in a leadership meeting, embarrassing him and creating a stressful atmosphere. Edgar knows he has to talk to this person, and is trying to prepare his approach. He’s just not sure how to open the conversation and would like to bounce some ideas off someone.
Natasha has to coach a young member of her team who is fresh out of college, eager, keen, smart, and… obnoxious. She’s pretty sure how she will handle it, and would love to role play the possible outcomes. After all, Natasha is a Baby Boomer, and needs to sound helpful and encouraging, not “old” and “out of date.”
Salome is a senior leader with plenty of coaching experience who feels disengaged and even a little bored at work. She’s not sure what to do and would like some objective guidance.

No matter how much experience we have, we can always use some coaching to help us out. And remember, coaching isn’t the same has having coffee with a friend (although that’s always helpful too!) Friends are encouraging and supportive listeners, and can often be biased towards a specific solution.

Coaches are also encouraging and supportive, and have NO bias. Therefore, the solution you come up with is 100% yours, and was probably hiding deep down inside your brain somewhere all along.

If you need a coach, check out our coaching services by clicking here, or email us at info@whiteboardconsulting.ca. We’d be glad to help you, and our 15-minute telephone strategy session is FREE! How can you go wrong? (You can’t.)

Until next time,

Ruth.

Process Mapping? I’d rather be Napping.

June 17, 2016Blogbusiness process improvement, business processes, consistency, consultant, consulting, continuous improvement, culture shift, data, efficiency, employee engagement, goals, process, Process Improvement, process improvement methodology, process map, process mapping, process mapping tools, swimlane diagrams, training, whiteboard consultingNicole North

So I’ve heard a lot of people say they are so fascinated by what I do in the process improvement world, and how great they think it is , but how “it’s not for them”. Using my coaching skills, I usually say something like, “Oh yeah? Tell me about why it isn’t for you”.

Here are some of the responses I get:

“Snore. Processes are super boring. My company is really intuitive, and we just know exactly what to do and we fix it.” – my super annoying friend

“Processes, who needs it? I already know my team is garbage and as soon as I can replace them, things will turn around”. – a client who later realized her team was great because process mapping revealed a culture issue

“Ugh. Sounds bureaucratic. I’m an entrepreneur. There is nothing corporate about he way I run my business, and to be honest we don’t need it.” – my sister-in-law

3 Signs You Need Process Mapping STAT!

Something is wrong and you “think” know exactly how to fix it. How do you know what’s wrong? What leads you to believe that? What is the expected outcome if you make the change? You might be right. Intuition is super important. Why not validate those gut feelings with some evidence in a process map? It’s a great way to get buy in from your stakeholders and employees!
You “think” your employees are the problem. They suck. While this is the first place many people look for solutions, it’s usually something else. Why do you think they suck? What tells you that? What could be inhibiting them? Have you asked them? Research shows that if you take great people and put them in a bad process, the process will win every time. Process mapping sometimes uncovers secrets that are hiding within a bad process.
You “think” process is too rigorous. Well, it can be, but it doesn’t have to be. The right people, the right style, and the right moment can take you from being a fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants entrepreneur to a being a strategic one. Why not set the stage so you can pass the tasks that aren’t worth your time (or you aren’t great at) to someone who can actually add value (so you can go and be amazing). Process mapping identifies those tasks and lets you properly divide them up.

If you’re not a “process person,” or even if you are but don’t have a lot of time, we can help you. We are expert at coming in, talking with you and your team, and uncovering the hidden opportunities to improve your business.

Even better – why not build process improvement and process mapping capacity on your team? We offer public workshops that are fun, interactive, and relevant. Check them out by clicking here, and contact us if you want to know more.

#whiteboardworskhops #theyredifferent

Until Next Time,

Nicole

Should you follow the pack or go rogue?

June 2, 2016Blogconsistency, customer satisfaction, data, deadlines, defect, efficiency, employee engagement, error, follow the pack, go rogue, habits, human nature, Lean, process, productivity, reinforcement learning, Six Sigma, social conformityNicole North

I’ve been thinking lately about our human tendency to follow the pack and my newfound tendency of “going rogue.” I’m a trusting person and easily influenceable. If you tell me this is the BEST HAND CREAM EVER, I will buy it. If you tell me you tried a new workout and it was THE HARDEST WORKOUT EVER, I will go and try it tomorrow. Ask me to smell this milk because it is the MOST EXPIRED MILK EVER, I will get my nose right in there.

So it’s a newfound habit for me to say, “That’s awesome that it is working for you. Right now I’m doing this, and it is really working for me too. Yay us!”

But Everyone Says So!

People (and probably some science reports too) say that we MUST eat breakfast; doing so helps us consume fewer calories later in the day and maintain a healthy weight and may even improve our concentration and productivity. They also say we shouldn’t weigh ourselves every day because it could case us to become over fixated on what may be natural fluctuations rather than indications of weight gain or loss.

“They” say we shouldn’t look at our phones first thing in the morning – it can distract us from our morning routine and can decrease our productivity by focusing on external priorities rather than our own.

And we mustn’t work out every day, because our bodies won’t have adequate time to recover and we won’t get results.

Don’t get me wrong, I realize there are studies and science that may back these statements up with statistical significance. But here’s the thing: all of the “pack ideas” I talked about above don’t work for me.

When I eat breakfast, I’m starving all day and (after testing this theory out by tracking and monitoring the data) I consume more calories than are necessary for me to maintain my weight. So do I keep doing it because everyone else is telling me that is the right thing?

Similarly, weighing myself every day keeps me on top of fluctuations that could otherwise be more dramatic after a week.

And I LOVE working out. Provided I balance my workouts, it is my stress relief and my time that makes me happy. So why should I be unhappy, provided I am being safe and taking care of my body, when my way works for me?

And finally, if I don’t check my phone before bed AND first thing – guaranteed I will miss a meeting, or miss a cancellation of a meeting and make an unnecessary trip.

Now statistically speaking these “rules” might be great for the majority of people, and the majority of people will see better results following these rules. But, as we know, there is a great deal of human variation. I am a sparkly unicorn and I am different. These rules do not work for me.

The thing is, it’s easy to follow the pack. It’s part of our human nature.

…social conformity is based on mechanisms that comply with reinforcement learning and is reinforced by the neural error-monitoring activity which signals what is probably the most fundamental social mistake – that of being too different from others

Read more: http://news.softpedia.com/news/039-Follow-the-Crowd-039-Tendency-Finally-Explained-102066.shtml#ixzz4ASKrOwCW

Follow The Pack? Or, Go Rogue!

Maybe your competition uses a certain process improvement methodology (like Lean or Six Sigma), or a particular sales tool, or social media strategy and you want to implement it to keep up with the trends. But what if it just doesn’t work for YOU (and your team, and customers, and stakeholders)?

Does it feel natural to do what the pack is doing? Sure, good habits take time and consistency, but if the process is so difficult that you can’t get the habit to stick, maybe it isn’t the right strategy for you.
Have you experienced errors, defects, or problems using the pack’s idea? If you notice missed deadlines, faulty products, decreased employee engagement, or increased customer complaints – maybe you need to re-examine your plan.
Have you tried and tested any other options? If you haven’t tested and tried out alternatives, how do you know that this is the best for you? How can you make a decision with out data – numbers or experience? Reflect on the past – was there a time that you were doing really well? What were you doing? Should you align with the pack, or “go rogue”.

Let us know how you follow the pack or go rogue @whiteboardcons #gorogue or #followthepack!

Until Next Time,

Nicole

Crush Your Next Interview

May 6, 2016BlogChange Management, communication, communication styles, consistency, employee engagement, interviews, leadership, managementwhiteboardconsulting

The image above shows all the classic things we’ve learned to do before an important meeting or interview.

Dress appropriately. Not only does that mean not “under dressing,” but it also means not “over dressing!” Do your research and then dress one level up.
Arrive in good time. Well, duh.
Body language. Be aware! Assume an open and interested position (arms resting in your lap or on the arms of your chair), don’t check your watch or (heaven forbid) your phone, and above all else, don’t interrupt!
Expect the unexpected. Yup. What if you’re kept waiting 30 minutes? What if you have to do a presentation on the spot? What if it’s super hot in the interview room? Plan to keep your cool in all situations.
Ask questions. For sure. And don’t ask “when will you make your decision,” as if you already have the job. A great one is “what will the most challenging thing be for the successful applicant?”

But those are the standard things. The things you can learn if you google “interview prep” or ask your friend how they got their job.

Secrets to Crushing Any Interview

Use “I” not “we.” Yes, that’s right. Talk about yourself. As someone who has interviewed hundreds of people, I can tell you that when you are asked to “tell me about a time when you led a complicated project with a diverse team,” then I want to know what YOU did specifically. Not what your whole team did. Now is not the time to “share the credit.” For example:
- Bad answer: I was the project lead for Project X, and we worked together to create SMART goals, communicate effectively, and follow project management principles.
- Good answer: I was the project lead for Project X, and early on I established the team guidelines. I facilitated the team agreement on goals, coordinated and moderated regular updates, and developed job shadowing practices so that people could fill in for each other during crunch times.
Use action words. In the example above the words “established,” “facilitated,” “coordinated,” “moderated,” and “developed” are all action words. Example: “Tell me about the work you did in your most favourite job?”
- Bad answer: I loved my job two years ago because I was responsible for team engagement and new employee onboarding and it was very rewarding.
- Good answer: I loved my job two years ago because I championed team engagement by leading quarterly brainstorming sessions, developing and implementing engagement programs like Job Shadowing for new employees, and facilitating bi-annual engagement feedback sessions with the VP. It was really rewarding to see engagement scores increase and to get positive feedback from the team.
Tell stories. Many interviewers will start a question with “describe a time when you…” Others will start with, “have you ever…” And still others will say things like, “what’s your greatest or worst skill?” Each of these is a chance to tell a story. It will be tempting to answer quickly, but what you want to do is answer in a way they will visualize and remember. Example: “OK, you’ve been telling me about all these things that you do so well, but we all have weaknesses or opportunities to improve. What’s one of yours?
- Bad answer: I actually don’t have any weaknesses because I have been honing my skills for years. (I’m not kidding. That’s a real answer I got once.)
- Alternate bad answer: A weakness? Oh. Well, I guess I can get flustered some times when timelines shift quickly, but I am really good at re-configuring my plans so everything comes out ok.
- Good answer: On a recent project the timelines shifted a few times, as they often do on large projects. By the third time shift I realized that I should be using a different milestone chart that is more adaptable when there are changes. By implementing that, I was able to reduce the frustration I can feel if things shift too frequently.

These three tips will help you stand out (in a good way) and increase your likelihood of winning the competition. Have you used any of these before? Let us know on Twitter (@whiteboardcons) using #InterviewPrep!

Until next time,

Ruth.

PS – did you know we offer coaching for interview prep? It’s true. Click here and read all about it.

The Office Version of Vitamin D

January 16, 2015Blogcontinuous improvement, employee engagement, goals, leadership, Lists, Process Improvement, Recognition, Vitamin DRuth Henderson

As I write this, it is a rare sunny winter day in Toronto, with blue sky and small fluffy snowflakes floating from the few clouds I can see. And because of this, I have altered my working location from my comfortable but dark basement office to my bright dining room table.

Why? Because I need sunshine. As much as I also enjoy the winter months, I crave sunshine! It lifts my mood and my spirits and my outlook and just makes everything better.

It occurred to me this morning that many of you do not have the luxury of working in your sunny dining room, and instead are holed up in your windowless office or cubicle. You may or may not have the opportunity to get outside and hold your face up to that sunshine, and you’ll go home after it’s dark, counting the days until spring.

And we wonder why we feel grumpy, edgy, or anxious this time of year.

There’s a reason for it, actually. Research shows a strong link between exposure to the sun, Vitamin D levels, and the incidence of Seasonal Affective Disorder (or SAD). Just a few minutes a day of unprotected (i.e. no sunscreen) exposure to sunshine are enough to maintain adequate levels of Vitamin D, boost levels of the “happy hormones” seratonin and dopamine, and thus ward off the symptoms of SAD.

Sounds easy enough.

What if you can’t get natural sunlight?

If you live in climates with a lot of winter cloud, decreased daylight hours, and frigid temperatures, it can be a real challenge to get yourself outside and bask in what little sunlight there may be. So what do you do?

Well, aside from taking a Vitamin D supplement, there are other things you can do at work (and at home, for that matter) to trick your brain into increasing its production of those “happy hormones.”

And guess what? The tricks involve process improvement and leadership – YAY! Our favourite topics.

5 Ways to Get Your Office Version of Vitamin D

Create some goals that will really make you happy to achieve, and then attack them in small bites. January is a great time for process improvement projects! When we achieve goals and cross things off a list, we create a little celebration in our brain that releases dopamine. The trick here is to make sure it’s a goal that will make you feel good, like fixing something you’ve always wanted to fix, and then actually celebrating, even if it’s just with a fancy latte or a glass of wine after work.
Break your “To Do” list into little tasks that are easily crossed off so you can achieve #1 above! It’s a lot harder to cross off “Fix The Widget Process” than it is to cross these things off: (and P.S. – the items below could be broken down even further)
- Define improvement opportunity
- Engage team
- Collect data
- Draw the current process
- Brainstorm opportunities
- Test ideas
- Implement solution
Think about continuous improvement vs. one-time improvement initiatives. If you know what your next goal is before you finish your current one, you can smooth out the dopamine “hits” into a flow.
Recognize the accomplishments of your team (in the way they want to be recognized). As we teach in our leadership courses, people are very individualistic in the way they prefer to be recognized, and as long as you consider the individual, then each thing that you do – email, bonus, quick word of thanks – will give THEM a dopamine hit.
Remember things that went well. Interestingly, the brain has trouble telling the difference between what you’re achieving now and what you’ve achieved in the past. In either case, it produces seratonin! So if you’re having a crappy day, or if one of your team members is feeling down, talk together about when things went well, and build on that.

So when you’re down because it’s another grey day and it feels like spring will never get here and you wish that those stupid ads for southern vacations would go away because you can’t take one this year and you just want to put your head down on your desk and take a nap…

Try making a list of little tasks and just crossing off a few. You’ll start to feel better in no time!

Until next time,

Ruth

Sources:

Business Process What Now?

November 14, 2014Blogbusiness process improvement, business processes, employee engagement, leadership, process, Process Improvement, Six Sigma, whiteboard consultingRuth Henderson

Picture a business networking dinner, wherein each participant gives an overview of their business, including target market, main products/services, and current concerns. You’ve been listening to some of the dozen or so professionals give concise overviews, and are taking notes – keenly interested in connecting with one or two (using Nicole’s Networking Advice), and thinking you might have some good feedback for a few others. Then it’s your turn, and you stand and give the “elevator pitch” you’ve honed to a thing of beauty. And… people look at you like you have two heads.

That has happened to both Nicole and me in recent weeks, and we were quite taken off guard! We thought we had worked hard to describe what we do (business process improvement) in a way that is easy to “get.” And we have, for the most part – just not in the elevator pitch (2-3 sentences) format that is crucial in networking events and casual conversation.

Clearly it’s something we need to work on.

One of the things that is so interesting to us, and has been since we started this business, is the varying degree of understanding (or lack thereof) of what “business process improvement” is. Being a process geek myself, I assume everyone is constantly thinking how they would improve things, and therefore inherently “gets” what business process improvement is. Not so!

Let’s start by defining a couple of terms:

process1 A process can be defined as a series of actions or steps that are undertaken in order to achieve a particular outcome. Some common examples that may resonate with you – think of the steps that are involved in each:

going through security screening at the airport
filling out your year-end tax forms
getting ready to leave the house each morning
making a martini or a latte
grocery shopping

When we say “business” process, we are referring to processes that happen every day at work in order to achieve a specific outcome. Do these sound familiar?

recruitment
performance evaluations
business expense claims
invoicing
customer service
production
strategic planning
approvals
scheduling

Each of these (and dozens of others) happens every single day in most businesses, and if you’re lucky, they are smooth and efficient and wonderful and everything goes well all of the time and all your employees and customers are happy with them.

No? Well then.

If one of your business processes is somewhat less than perfect and causes you grief, if you go home on Friday night and think, “if only we didn’t have to do THAT thing,” if you get feedback from your customers that they are sick of having to do the same thing over and over with the same (unsatisfactory) results – well then my friend, you have a business process problem that needs improving.

Or, if you have an outcome or metric that is not performing as well as it should be, most likely there is a broken business process in there somewhere, and you need to figure out which one it is, uncover it, and fix it without adversely affecting any of the other processes that it impacts.

There are many ways to approach business process improvement – ours is one that focuses on engagement and leadership skills as a means of making improvements “stick.” It’s different than other more rigid methodologies, yet it uses elements from several of the most popular, including Six Sigma, Lean, Appreciative Inquiry, and Methods Time Measurement. We like to be professional and fun at the same time, and show people what business process improvement is, how it works, and how it can make their organizations better, faster, and cheaper.

Got it? Excellent. Now we just need to get that into an elevator pitch. Any suggestions? Tell us in the comments below!

Until next time,

Ruth.

Guest Blog Post – OMG! Emotions in the Office!

October 24, 2014Blogbusiness process improvement, business processes, change, Change Management, continuous improvement, culture shift, customer satisfaction, emotional intelligence, employee engagement, Process ImprovementRuth Henderson

Linda Hills is a seasoned Learning & Organizational Development practitioner whose mission is to help leaders, teams and organizations create emotionally intelligent transformational change. Over the past 20 years, she has designed, developed and delivered learning and organizational development interventions while working in software, financial services and the not-for-profit sector. Linda has a Master’s degree in Adult Learning and is a certified Emotional Intelligence, and Vital Signs Assessor with Six Seconds, a certified Change Practitioner through Connor Partners CIBC program, and is also certified as a Strengths Deployment Inventory (SDI) Facilitator/Coach. She is currently an Executive Director in the not-for profit sector, leading her organization through an emotionally intelligent transformational change.

Linda will be offering The Six Seconds Emotional Intelligence Assessment (SEI™) at our upcoming course, Leading Process Change, in Toronto Nov 5 & 6. Find out more about that and about Linda HERE.

Linda over to you:

OMG! Emotions in the Office!

I’m with Linda North on this one: Process isn’t my favourite thing. But there are two other words in the title of Ruth and Nicole’s upcoming course (Leading Process Change) that strike a chord with me: leading and change. Why? Because both of these concepts are deeply rooted in human emotion, and helping people build emotional intelligence is my “raison d’etre”.

We first heard the term “emotional intelligence” in 1995, when Daniel Goleman wrote his groundbreaking book of the same name. Since then, much has been written, many versions of it have come along, and yet it remains largely conceptual, if not absent, in most organizations. Emotions are still seen as soft and disruptive, and are unwelcome in a professional environment.

And yet therein lies a critical misunderstanding about emotions. In a work setting the word conjures up images of someone losing their temper and yelling at colleagues, or storming out of a meeting. These are perfect examples of emotions that have not been managed, and that fuel the aversion to them. So in the business world, we prefer to “leave emotions out of it”.

This couldn’t be more wrong! Emotions are assets. They give us information and energy¹. Not to mention they are automatic and pretty hard to hide² (even when you think you are doing so masterfully, that twitching eyebrow gives you away :). Think about fear for a moment. It is seen as a negative emotion, but what is it telling you? If you guessed that it’s telling you that so Emotional Intelligence Image mething could go wrong, you’d be right. And how might that be a good thing? It can protect you from dangerous situations.

So what is emotional intelligence? The model I use was developed by Six Seconds, so named after the amount of time it takes for the chemical reaction in our brains to settle down after we react to something. The model comprises eight competencies that allow us to use thinking AND feeling to make optimal decisions. These eight competencies are divided into three main categories:

Know Yourself: This is about awareness. It’s being aware of your emotions, and recognizing the patterns of behaviour that they produce
Choose yourself: This is about management. It’s navigating your emotions, thinking about the consequences of your actions and behaviours, exercising optimism and engaging internal (vs. external) motivation.
Give yourself: This is about direction. It’s developing empathy for others, and pursuing a “noble goal” – a purpose greater than yourself.

These are easier said than done! It takes reflection and effort to build these competencies, but they can all be learned!

If you aren’t sold on emotional intelligence, consider this:

Harvard Business Review called it the “key to professional success”³
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella says that “…in the long-run, EQ trumps IQ…”⁴
At the US Army Training Centre, the saying is that “…Leadership is a lifelong journey of just 18 inches – from head to heart…”⁵

And if that isn’t enough, take a look at the bottom line stats: when leaders practice emotional intelligence the impact on outcomes is clear; it is predictive of⁶:

46% of Customer Service
28% of Performance
45% of Retention

With the last Gallup Engagement survey (2013) showing that 63% of employees worldwide are not engaged, and 24% actively disengaged⁷, it’s time for leaders to up their game. And that means developing EQ to (at a minimum!) match their IQ.

Looking forward to seeing you on November 6^th!

Linda

References

¹At the Heart of Leadership: How to Get Results with Emotional Intelligence, Joshua Freedman, Six Seconds, San Mateo, California, 2007

²Vital Organization Field Guide, Joshua Freedman and Massimiliano Ghini, September 2014

³ HBR “Breakthrough Ideas for Tomorrow’s Business Agenda,” April 2003

⁴Times of India, “Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella tells students, fall in love with what you do,” October 1, 2014

⁵ The Vital Organization Field Guide, Joshua Freedman and Massimiliano Ghini, September 2014

⁶At the Heart of Leadership: How to Get Results with Emotional Intelligence, Joshua Freedman, Six Seconds, San Mateo, California, 2007.

⁷http://www.gallup.com/poll/165269/worldwide-employees-engaged-work.aspx, retrieved October 22, 2014.

You Should Come to This Course. Yes, You.

October 7, 2014Blogbusiness process improvement, business processes, change, Change Management, communication, continuous improvement, culture shift, decision making, efficiency, employee engagement, leadership, process, Process Improvement, Six Sigma, the whiteboard way, trainingRuth Henderson

Our regular readers will know by now that Nicole and I are upbeat, positive people and we get excited about a lot of things. So, when I tell you that we are SUPER EXCITED about our upcoming course in November, please trust that it is not hyperbole.

Why are we so over-the-top and ridiculously excited?

Well, because we believe this course is innovative, and innovation is a good, positive, wonderful thing.

You’ve heard us talk about The Whiteboard Way© before (click here or here). We believe that our method of Process Improvement is what organizations need in order to take the first step into a Process Improvement culture. Often organizations hear about the buzz words – continuous improvement, process improvement, Six Sigma, Lean Six Sigma, TQM, etc – and they go bananas implementing a new program.

And so many of them fail. I’ve seen it happen in three major organizations in both the private and the public sectors.

They fail because they haven’t set themselves up to succeed – they have not considered the importance of change management, culture shift, and stakeholder engagement. It’s as bad as if someone all of a sudden decided they want to be a farmer, and so they bought a big field and started sticking seeds in the ground, without tilling the soil, removing rocks, adding fertilizer, and ensuring the earth is rich and ready to receive the seeds.

Enough of the analogy. You get what I’m saying, and hopefully many of you are nodding your heads and saying, “yup – been there, done that.”

Our new course, Leading Process Change, offered Nov 5 & 6 in Toronto, examines the intersection of Process Improvement and Leadership Principles and enables the learner to influence change and develop a process-based culture. Everyone can benefit from this course, especially if they are responsible for, or thinking about, process improvement in their organization. (Click to Tweet)

You need to come to this course. Yes, you.

What? You don’t think you’re at the right level in your organization to attend? To that I say, respectfully, PFFT.

Whether you are an employee on a team in an organization who wishes you knew how to influence change so people would listen to your ideas, or a VP trying to figure out why you can’t make process improvements stick, (or somewhere in between), this course is for you.

We have designed the course in two modules, so that people can come to one or both.

Module 1 – is all about The Whiteboard Way©, and focuses on the basics of Process Improvement without getting all fancy shmancy and needing expensive software or textbooks.
Module 2 – examines essential skills in making sure that change sticks. We have expert speakers on how to communicate & promote your change initiative, how to work process improvement into your strategic planning, and how to be aware of your own emotional intelligence and its impacts on others.

More information is here in this link. I encourage you to read it, and then sign up and bring anyone else who needs to be there (which is everyone, so…). We have discounts for Earlybirds (before October 18th), former students, members of BNI or Verity, and employees of the OPS. And discounts can be combined!

I hope to see you at our course. I promise it will be fun – our past students have rated our training consistently in the top box! (Oh, and the lunch will be fantastic!)

Ruth.

PS – if you have any questions, just shoot us an email at info@whiteboardconsulting.ca/staging.

Two Things I Learned This Week From Students

September 12, 2014BlogChange Management, culture shift, efficiency, employee engagement, leadership, management behavior, process, Process Improvement, process improvement methodology, trainingRuth Henderson

This week I taught a two-day course on behalf of the Centre for Leadership and Learning in the Ontario Public Service (OPS). It’s called “Management Essentials,” and is for non-managers who want to either learn more about how management is expected to perform within the values and objectives of the OPS, or to understand what it takes to become a manager – thus being able to assess their own skills gaps and build them up accordingly.

This is a great course, and I enjoy teaching it so much not only because the materials are current and relevant, but because the people who attend generally WANT to be there (vs. being “told” to take a course in presentation skills, or “how to write a briefing note”). Teachers reading this will agree that when people attend because they want to, they are generally much more engaged and the class has more energy.

This was true this week – a great class filled with 35 interesting people from many different areas of the OPS, with differing levels of experience and terrific stories to bring life to the material.

As I drove home I reflected on a couple of standout things that I learned from the class, and thought I’d share them with you in this week’s blog:

One: We need to remind people, over and over again, that THEY are responsible for their careers and their professional development.

Situational Leadership Model

One of the conversations we had (a couple of times) relates to the last blog post I wrote (Does Your Manager Like People). We had just finished discussion on the Situational Leadership model of applying directive vs. supportive leadership techniques. This tool is a BIG hit with people – while complex at first, it is extremely helpful for new managers when they need to accept and learn that their natural, or comfortable, style of learning may not be appropriate in all situations. It helps them assess, adapt, and communicate in a more effective way.

A student approached me at the break and said, “this is AMAZING. I think my manager missed this subject when she was promoted and attended manager training.”

“Ah, bless your heart,” I thought.

I made sure to share with the class that in most organizations, there is no training to become a manager. (As an aside, I may enjoy a little too much dropping those bombs and watching the reactions.) The conversation that followed was an important one, as people realized that it is up to them to learn how to be a good leader.

A great manager should be encouraging their teams to learn and grow, develop career goals and job shadow, take courses, or broaden their perspectives. In the absence of a great manager, many people flounder and future talent may be lost.

Two: There are employees out there who want to innovate, change, and improve, and we need to find and harness that energy more effectively.

After the “manager training is up to you” conversation, there was a slight shift in energy, with more questions aimed at the application of the course material in a practical way to help people apply for and win new jobs.

One question came from a young man who likes his job very much, has been with the OPS for about five or six years with no complaints, and who is starting to feel frustrated. “I’m naturally inquisitive and process-oriented. I see people do the same things over and over with the same results, but no one takes the time to stop and fix the process so that things improve. Where are all the process jobs???”

Not an easy question to answer. Of course there are process jobs out there, and within the Ontario Government there are specific areas that are more process-focused than others. The trick is in finding those job descriptions and being able to read between the lines and know that certain phrases indicate a culture of process improvement more than others.

The real key is meeting the right people. This student was taking control and doing the right things – taking courses, asking questions, discussing his goals and dream job criteria with people, and being open to new opportunities. By doing so, he was exposing himself to more people who might be able to point him in the right direction.

I’d love to see the process-focused culture shift happen more quickly – not only in the OPS but in other private-sector organizations as well. Imagine if more job descriptions included a requirement for some type of Innovation Thinking, or the ability to demonstrate a process-improvement focus as part of regular job functions.

I may be biased, but I think that a process focus culture is the next big thing required in business today. If we could find these naturally process-oriented people and maximize their energy, we could shift our thinking from “process improvement or day job” to “day job through process improvement.” (Click to Tweet)

I teach again in a couple of weeks… can’t wait to see what my students teach me then!!

Until next time,

Ruth.

(Process) Rules Are Made to Be Broken

August 15, 2014Blogconsultant, consulting, employee engagement, Lean, process, Process Improvement, process improvement methodology, Six Sigma, the whiteboard way, whiteboard consultingRuth Henderson

It’s true. Rules are made to be broken. Even in the world of Process Improvement.

“Wait, what?” you ask. “But Ruth, process improvement is all about rules and statistics and doing things the same way every time, yada yada yada. You’re contradicting the very foundation of what Whiteboard teaches!”

Ah, nothing is so black and white, grasshopper. Hear me out.

Process Improvement is Changing

In my process career I have witnessed and/or been part of many process improvement initiatives – big, small, fully funded and supported, done “off the corner of a desk”, successful, and unsuccessful.

The two things that made the difference between success and failure – in addition to the usuals of effective communication, engagement, and senior management commitment – were:

Early evidence that the new methods work and are worth the effort, and
The ability to be flexible and change your mind.

And this last one, flexibility, seems to be growing in importance. In fact, it also influences the first one – “evidence of success.” flexible

Traditional and, dare I say it, soon to become “old school” methodologies like Six Sigma and to some extent Lean, are based on strict methodologies that work really well in some organizations – usually those in a manufacturing or highly repetitive/operational industry. In other industries, particularly serviced-based, these methods have a more difficult time taking root. It’s not impossible, and there are many very successful examples – but it is harder.

It’s OK to Change Your Mind – Just Don’t Squirrel

When Nicole and I teach The Whiteboard Way© to aspiring process-improvement practitioners, we are careful to point out the need to be flexible, and to change things along the way if they aren’t working. The ability to do this is refreshing to people who are often nervous about adopting a new method, or taking on “this process stuff.”

I recently did some strategic planning with a client – he was a little nervous about planning tactics for goals that were 12-24 months out. “Things can change, Ruth,” he said. And he was right. That’s why it’s important to have a plan and a process, and then if (when) things change you can make intentional decisions to veer away from or modify the plan. But – the modification is then intentional, not just because you saw a fun-looking squirrel and decided to run after it like the dog in the movie Up (love this clip: click here). Some people do this so frequently, that Nicole and I actually use “squirrelling” as a verb.

In the Four Disciplines of Execution, Sean Covey stresses the importance of using and tracking lead measures – those which you can influence and which drive the progress towards a goal – in the execution of a goal or strategy. His theory is that a “cadence of accountability” ensures that people develop the habit of reviewing their commitments and assessing whether those tactics (or lead measures) are making the progress they expected. If they’re not, then they change the tactics and the things they measure until it has the desired result. (Click to Tweet)

In the The Whiteboard Way© we teach the same principles. We combine traditional process improvement tools with modern theories about being flexible yet accountable, and we show how this approach generates increased engagement and better results.

Have you had success doing process improvement this way? Tell us about it!

Until next time,

Ruth.

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