Creating Patterns for Innovation
Next week I am giving a speech on the Patterns of Innovation
in Indianapolis, which is such an interesting concept. There’s a great deal
written about it and at least four models to apply innovation to organizations.
And yet it doesn’t happen. We’re all so ‘heads down’ just trying to get the
work done, but how do we know it’s the work that moves us forward?
I recently spoke to a group, who wanted to learn to work
from a more innovative perspective. There was one engineer who was completely
unable to get the ideas. He felt it was necessary to criticize everything
presented as not being peer reviewed. The irony was that they were all peer
reviewed models from research, all offering slightly different ways to create
true innovation. His mind was already closed so he didn’t recognize that.
The problem is that they took him too far out of is comfort
zone, which threatened him. However, that is exactly what innovation does. Innovation
involves intuition and all sorts of feelings.
It involves embracing high levels of ambiguity, uncertainty and willingness to
fail. It involves opening ourselves to the unthinkable and attempting the
impossible.
Operating from a Values-Based perspective offers increased
sense of safety, as there is a sense of respect and integrity inherent within
the way the group operates. This is very important as we reach past the known-
as we risk failure. It allows innovation to flourish.
Many would consider opening up as the equivalent of
organizational suicide. It is in most organizations.
This seems to be the biggest obstacle to innovation in
organizations - the risk of putting your head up and standing out. We can
become the target of all sorts of aggressive and passive-aggressive behavior by
those who are threatened.
That pattern can be changed.
There are ways to create an Innovation Track within an
organization- a way that allows for differences and increases safety for those
willing to take a risk and step out of the traditional work process.
It’s worth the risk, because how else can we move out of our
current level of thinking if we are not willing to step out and step up? It is
in taking those risks we gain the opportunity to create something that could
make a difference.
-Jan
VBL in Indy: Aligning minds for powerful leadership
Something really remarkable happened at Brother’s Bar in Indianapolis.
I participated in a United Way Group Sourcing event. The purpose for the gathering was to offer ideas to solve a social problem facing Indianapolis residents. The problem was figuring out how to make available accessible and affordable childcare to everyone that specifically met the needs for child development and school readiness.
I was one on a team with other members of Greater Indy Innovation Roundtable (GIIRT). Together, our team constructed one of the innovative solutions selected as a finalist.
What’s this got to do with Values Based Leadership (VBL)? My definition of leadership is the alignment, influence and motivation toward a common good. VBL is about alignment to values, not who the boss is or the structure of the leadership.
At this event, there were at least 40 to 50 people and they were all there aligning their ideas to the greater good of the community. That’s VBL in action.
Clearly that was occurring with multiple leaders and multiple voices. It was fun – and powerful to see all the ideas blending together- creating an idea that no one could create by themselves.
That’s what could happen on a regular basis in every organization with the mindset of VBL.
-Jan
Leadership strength is reflected in employee behavior
You have an employee that is not responding to client e-mails in a timely manner. The last event took them two weeks to respond and the job was no longer up for bid by the time the e-mail request was sent to the person to quote it. Your company lost a big contract.
Values determine behavior. This is not a new psychological finding; it’s been around for thousands of years. What we forget is that what we do is automatically aligned with our values whether we like what we did or not. Our actions reveal our values.
This is what companies forget.
You look out into your business and you see what is happening – like missed opportunities. That will show you the values embedded in your leadership.
I can hear you now, “No, I didn’t make them do that. In fact, I told them to be more responsive.” However, what are you doing to change the situation? What are you doing to align and motivate their behavior? You can’t just walk away, because when you do, their actions are the acceptable behaviors that are left behind.
Yeah, you said something, but there was no consequence – no redirecting or shaping of the behavior. Rest assured; it will happen again.
Does leadership take time? Yes.
Does it take attention? Yes.
However, the cost to not giving time and attention is too high. The strength it gives your organization is priceless.
-Jan
Strengthen your leadership through true humility
True humility is based in acceptance. Because you have a
clear vision, you can accept who you are. It is okay if you’re not perfect – no
one is. Looking through the lens of true humility broadens your view of
yourself and the organization.
With self-acceptance you manage yourself better. The impact
is that if you can accept yourself, you are more accepting of everyone. If you
are more accepting you have a clearer picture, you can then orchestrate the
strengths within the organization.
True acceptance allows for learning;
It allows for failure;
It allows for growth.
Leaders that give their people the ability to learn, fail
and grow allow them to be creative, successful and powerful. It holds the
environment for employees to become innovative and self-directing; the kind
that generate momentum throughout an organization.
Working from true humility, you are able to orchestrate strengths
without being blindsided by limitations.
-Jan
True humility clarifies vision for leaders
In my reading, I recently came across the concept of “true
humility.”
After reading and learning more about it, I realize that to
me it is one of the legs on the table that is Values Based Leadership.
When I think of humility, I immediately begin to think of my
weaknesses and being clear on those things which I consider my limitations –
and this is a part of true humility. However, it is a sub-component. Weaknesses
take up only a part of who you are. The essence of true humility is your power,
which means owning your strengths as well. Both contribute to the whole of your
Being.
So yes, you do have to be aware of your limitations. But focusing
only on your limitations breeds weakness. You continually look for and find
limitations. Weaknesses become the filter through which you see and approach
everything. If you ask the question, “What’s wrong with me?” your brain fills
in the blank. If you are thinking weakness, that’s what shows up in the answer.
The same is true if you focus only on your strengths. That
perceived reality becomes the lens through which you see and act.
Both views skew our perception of reality. How much baggage
– good and bad - you have between you and the facts and data is revealed in
reality testing. And reality testing is
absolutely defined as one of the top five requirements for senior level leaders
to be successful. Without a clear vision of reality, leaders cannot respond
effectively.
True humility has you owning your power without arrogance
and your weaknesses without fear. It clears your vision.
-Jan
What’s the temperature of your organization? Do you need to adjust the thermostat?
Holding the environment is one of the primary roles for a
leader to accomplish. What does that
mean? With an aligned environment, you
have more power to direct your business. It is that power that is inherent in
leadership.
The power of a simple idea, with a clear message and
following can change the world. It was
Margaret Mead who said that it is in fact the only thing that ever has. Leaders
have a unique critical point within an organization to hold the conditions that
are the environment.
Environment is invisible. If it’s perfect, we don’t notice
it. When it’s not, we quickly become uncomfortable. It’s like the temperature
or the air in the room.
It’s easiest to understand if we use water as an analogy. Below
32 degrees, water
becomes ice, expanding and taking up more space. Then, as temperature rises,
the ice returns to water. Above boiling, the water becomes steam and then vapor.
All of them are completely different, but all are still H2O
The difference between ice, water, steam and vapor is the
environmental temperature. As conditions change, the water changes, just like
employees’ behavior changes under different conditions.
Holding the environment means holding the conditions for
what you want to appear. If you hold freezing temperatures, you get ice. You
can’t have water below 32 degrees. Likewise, a hostile environment, you can’t
have a productive workplace. You can’t have high performance with fear and
hostility.
Many leaders ask me, “Why is this happening?” and there can
only be one reason: because it is the environment they are holding.
This is the part leaders don’t like to hear:
Yes, you can have one employee that doesn’t fit in the
organization or one incident that was a fluke – an isolated event. However, if
you have 120 employees that don’t fit and the constant feeling that you’re
trying to push or pull your employees along with you, you have to own the
environment.
What’s the temperature in your organization? Awareness is
the first step in change.
-Jan
What’s the temperature of your organization? Do you need to adjust the thermostat?
Holding the environment is one of the primary roles for a
leader to accomplish. What does that
mean? With an aligned environment, you
have more power to direct your business. It is that power that is inherent in
leadership.
The power of a simple idea, with a clear message and
following can change the world. It was
Margaret Mead who said that it is in fact the only thing that ever has. Leaders
have a unique critical point within an organization to hold the conditions that
are the environment.
Environment is invisible. If it’s perfect, we don’t notice
it. When it’s not, we quickly become uncomfortable. It’s like the temperature
or the air in the room.
It’s easiest to understand if we use water as an analogy. Below
32 degrees, water
becomes ice, expanding and taking up more space. Then, as temperature rises,
the ice returns to water. Above boiling, the water becomes steam and then vapor.
All of them are completely different, but all are still H2O
The difference between ice, water, steam and vapor is the
environmental temperature. As conditions change, the water changes, just like
employees’ behavior changes under different conditions.
Holding the environment means holding the conditions for
what you want to appear. If you hold freezing temperatures, you get ice. You
can’t have water below 32 degrees. Likewise, a hostile environment, you can’t
have a productive workplace. You can’t have high performance with fear and
hostility.
Many leaders ask me, “Why is this happening?” and there can
only be one reason: because it is the environment they are holding.
This is the part leaders don’t like to hear:
Yes, you can have one employee that doesn’t fit in the
organization or one incident that was a fluke – an isolated event. However, if
you have 120 employees that don’t fit and the constant feeling that you’re
trying to push or pull your employees along with you, you have to own the
environment.
What’s the temperature in your organization? Awareness is
the first step in change.
-Jan
What’s the temperature of your organization? Do you need to adjust the thermostat?
Holding the environment is one of the primary roles for a
leader to accomplish. What does that
mean? With an aligned environment, you
have more power to direct your business. It is that power that is inherent in
leadership.
The power of a simple idea, with a clear message and
following can change the world. It was
Margaret Mead who said that it is in fact the only thing that ever has. Leaders
have a unique critical point within an organization to hold the conditions that
are the environment.
Environment is invisible. If it’s perfect, we don’t notice
it. When it’s not, we quickly become uncomfortable. It’s like the temperature
or the air in the room.
It’s easiest to understand if we use water as an analogy. Below
32 degrees, water
becomes ice, expanding and taking up more space. Then, as temperature rises,
the ice returns to water. Above boiling, the water becomes steam and then vapor.
All of them are completely different, but all are still H2O
The difference between ice, water, steam and vapor is the
environmental temperature. As conditions change, the water changes, just like
employees’ behavior changes under different conditions.
Holding the environment means holding the conditions for
what you want to appear. If you hold freezing temperatures, you get ice. You
can’t have water below 32 degrees. Likewise, a hostile environment, you can’t
have a productive workplace. You can’t have high performance with fear and
hostility.
Many leaders ask me, “Why is this happening?” and there can
only be one reason: because it is the environment they are holding.
This is the part leaders don’t like to hear:
Yes, you can have one employee that doesn’t fit in the
organization or one incident that was a fluke – an isolated event. However, if
you have 120 employees that don’t fit and the constant feeling that you’re
trying to push or pull your employees along with you, you have to own the
environment.
What’s the temperature in your organization? Awareness is
the first step in change.
-Jan
Customer service is the barometer of leadership
What’s it like to be your customer?
Do you see:
- Customers being told to “do it online” while
they stand in front of a worker who is at their computer? - Customers being given phone numbers to call another
department instead of service being offered? - Customers receiving huge bills for equipment
when it was already dropped off? - Employees hiding behind policy: “That’s the way
we do it.”
It’s more than one hand not knowing what the other is doing.
It’s like the customer has to do the work in order to give you their business.
Then, after the customer is gone, do you hear your employees
making fun of the customer’s request or being aggravated that they were
interrupted or even asked to help?
Is it too much work or an annoyance to take care of a
customer request or problem? If you have to think about that, maybe the culture
and actions taken by people in your business don’t actually align with what you
profess as your company values. Are your policies a shield for poor choices?
Daily decisions made within your business directly reflect
the environment, the attitude and the acceptable standards that exist in the
organization. Those thousands of tiny decisions make or break a business. The
leader is responsible to see that those decisions reflect the values of the
organization and hold the environment. That means leaders must shape and
motivate every employee to align with the appropriate vision.
The drip-drip-drip of repeated decisions and comments may
seem irrelevant and inconsequential. Because of that, a leader can be swept
into the stream of unaligned behavior not seeing the sand for the beach.
Awareness and a persistent focus on the big picture
including values and how they want the organization to function and grow, makes
leaders able to recognize the behaviors and attitudes that erode potential.
So, watch and listen. It’s easy to learn what it’s like to
be your customer.
-Jan
Leadership on difficult days
Your kids are throwing up. Your spouse just had surgery and
the dog has some sort of digestive ailment. And you have to go in to work and
help everyone else be aligned and motivated and get the work done.
How do you do it?
Leaders are both formal and informal. Who are your best
informal leaders and how do you empower them to carry the load so you can make
it through the challenges life brings?
We often underestimate the capacity of people with strengths
that are immediately available to us. If you’ve been listening and paying
attention, you know that Sam is dying to step up. Today is his day. You can use
your incapacity to develop Sam’s ability. His feeling of being valued carries
enthusiasm, which can make up for a lack of experience and may bring surprising
results.
There are often pockets of untapped resources that build
because we are so used to doing things in a certain way. Let difficult
circumstances create new pathways and the work keeps going.
If you do the work yourself when you are not up to it,
mistakes are highly likely. Mistakes may happen as well with Sam stepping up,
but his errors are more forgivable and you exhibit infinity more respect and
trust of your people, which is very motivating for the whole organization.
Learning how to use weaknesses to develop strengths is part
of the art of leadership. Developing your people is an on-going process, which
you have hopefully being doing since the day you started. You’re developing
these strengths so on those challenging days that strength and flexibility is
there.
-Jan
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