Alliance for Leadership Acceleration

Lynda Silsbee will be presenting at THRIVE 2017 for the second year in a row. Join her workshop at the conference and learn how to Crack the Code on Employee Disengagement.

May 11, 2017
​10:40 a.m. - 12:15 p.m.

High levels of employee engagement translate into increased customer satisfaction and bring other competitive advantages.

​During this workshop, you'll receive actionable and innovative instruction on:

* The #1 reason for disengagement
* The downward spiral of disengagement and reduced productivity and morale
* How to develop your leadership skills to encourage an engaged culture change
* 4 steps to take right away to re-engage a languishing workforce
* And much more.

​SAVE $100 off registration
http://store.blr.com/thrive-annual-conference
Use Lynda's exclusive discount code: SILSBEE

During our 1/2 Day Team Alignment Workshop, teams to step out of their day-to-day together, get to know each other, identify similarities and differences and explore tough conversations, and then learn how they can work together to be more effective -- ultimately driving to higher performance.

​Here are the top three measured changes that participants collectively report after the workshop:

• 30% increase in individual's ability to participate as a ONE Team member
• 15% increase in individual's ability to set aside personal agendas in favor of team success
• 18.3% increase in belief that team members are bought-in and fully committed to important decisions

Do you see how these changes lead a team to higher performance?

A high performance team is a self-managing, multifunctional group of people organized around a whole process and empowered with full authority for their success. Characteristics include:

• A shared mission or purpose that motivates and inspires members
• Autonomy and authority for task performance
• Interdependence and shared leadership
• Broadly-defined jobs and many responsibilities
• Meaningful participation in decision making
• Higher performance than individuals not organized into teams

Although all high performing teams share certain characteristics in common, there are also some important distinctions between them.  Organizations need to recognize these distinctions. If you take a ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach to teams, you very likely will experience some problems such as:

• Poor performance as team members try to use a structure that doesn’t fit with the nature of their work processes.
• Frustration at the difficulty of working together productively.
• Disillusionment with the team concept as relationships grow difficult and people thing fondly of the “good old days before those nuts in management put us into this crazy team.”

​For example, these are four very different types of teams. Each type is differentiated by their need for specialization and coordination.

​Key Points for each Type:

Type 1 – Swim Team: high specialization and low coordination. Work is divided between various specialties. Each specialty consists of a distinctive set of skills. There is little coordination needed between specialties.  Examples:  Geriatrics team providing care for elderly, High School Teachers.

Type 2 – Football Team: Made up of people from different disciplines. Requires a high degree of coordination. Examples: Product Development Teams, Hospital E.R., Executive Leadership Team.

Type 3 – Bowling Team: Low in both specialization and coordination. Team members share same skill set but have little need to coordinate or communicate. Examples: Telephone operators, Bill Collectors, Bank Tellers.

Type 4 – Volleyball Team: Members share common skills. High need for coordination. Generally organized around completing a “whole task” and cross-trained to do one another’s jobs.
​

What about the other teams that you interact with? Are they the same, or different? How might the way you approach each differ?

Are you part of a team that needs alignment? Ask us about our 1/2 Day Team Alignment Workshop.

As an organizational leader, you can consider yourself to be a “cultural architect.” It is your job to create and sustain culture in an organization. Yet shaping the culture can, at times, be a heavy burden to carry.

Your organization’s culture is the foundation upon which your results sit. A weak, dysfunctional or misaligned culture will usually yield poor results. A strong, high-functioning, well-aligned culture, on the other hand, will typically bind people together to produce amazing results.

Organizational culture is generally defined as the values, beliefs, symbols and norms people follow in the execution of an organization’s day-to-day business transactions. It shows up in behaviors that are considered acceptable and unacceptable — behaviors that begin and end with the attitudes and actions of leadership.

So, as leaders, you can choose to either build a high-performance culture or allow a variety of destructive forces to tear down your culture. If we look at the raising up of an effective culture as a construction project, here are six phases of the job that you’ll need to complete:

1. Goal setting: The building plans. Every construction project begins with a plan, right? In the same vein, leaders must set specific goals to drive success and point people in the right direction. Goals can be thought of as the overall plan for what needs to be accomplished during a given period in order to achieve key organizational objectives.
To ensure buy-in and line-of-sight, be sure to allow employees plenty of input in establishing their own short- and long-term goals. In addition, ensure objectives are put in writing using the “SMART” criteria (Specific, Measurable, Actionable, Realistic and Time-bound), prioritized and regularly evaluated.

2. Expectation setting: The pre-project meeting. Before most construction projects, the contractor sits down with his project manager and workers and goes over the building plans. Why? Because putting something down on paper isn’t enough — expectations must be established. Clarify items such as:

• The roles employees will play in each given project,
  
• Specific behavioral expectations (what’s acceptable/unacceptable),
  
• What resources are available and where to find them,
  
• How the work/project is important to the organization, and
  
• How to communicate about progress, changes and obstacles.
  

Clear expectations are as important as the goals you set. In fact, research has shown that a lack of clear expectations is often the root cause of poor performance. Expectations can be thought of as the “means” or how one achieves his or her goals. Expectations set the boundaries of behavior so people can “play big” and “play fair” as they work to achieve their goals.

3. Continuous feedback and coaching: “The barking foreman.” When many of us think of a construction project in progress, we might think of workers clambering about a half-built structure, pounding hammers and carrying different building elements. But we may also picture a foreman or project manager walking around, barking orders to the hardworking crew.

Now the barking part isn’t advisable in most work environments. But your busy workers do need effective systems in place for determining whether they’re making progress and meeting stated goals and expectations. A few ideas might be:

• Simple scorecards to denote “gains,” “wins” and “losses” toward an outcome,
  
• Budgets and profit and loss statements for financially related activities,
  
• Customer feedback forms for customer-facing employees, and
  
• Weekly, monthly or quarterly production data for suitable employees.
  

Other key factors are verbal feedback and an open, two-way dialogue.

Leaders must create a feedback-rich environment where employees know where they stand. Course-correction feedback (when an employee has drifted too far from the goal) and acknowledgment and praise (for progress and momentum in achieving the goal) are equally important. In fact, studies have shown that a 5:1 ratio of positive interactions/feedback to negative promotes the most effective self-development and performance.

In short, communication is critical to creating and maintaining a high-performance culture. Leaders are visible, caring individuals who provide “state of the organization” information regularly and don’t shield employees from bad news. They share expectations, provide feedback and acknowledge strengths. High-performing cultures manage to strike a balance of both quality and quantity of information communicated.

4. Development: Raising the roof. As a construction project nears its finish, the roof — either literally or figuratively — is raised. The property is being developed into something new, useful and exciting.

So should it be with employees. Leaders need to create and execute an ongoing process to develop staff members in their areas of strength and interest. The best managers/leaders find ways to make every day a “development day” for their people. Specific ideas include:

• Stretch projects or strategic assignments,
  
• Discussing development areas during 1:1 meetings,
  
• Providing current and future job-related training opportunities,
  
• Succession planning,
  
• Internal advancement ideas, and
  
• General career planning.
  

Leaders have these and many other methods at their disposal to grow, shape and engage employees while improving organizational performance.

5. Performance appraisals: The punch list. At the very end of a project, most contractors must complete a “punch list.” This is an itemized document reflecting precisely what needs to be finished to truly complete the project. Similarly, performance appraisals provide a summary at the end of a given term that lets employees know how well they’re meeting expectations and progressing toward their goals.

In terms of driving performance, however, an annual appraisal is your least effective tool. People want to know how they’re doing in the here and now, yet such appraisals focus largely on the past.

Performance comprises both results (what) and behavior (how). So, to do an appraisal right, you need to address both the “what” and the “how.” Set up appraisals on regular cycles and, of course, follow the golden rule: There should be no surprises! Always step in immediately when problems arise — don’t wait until the next appraisal.

6. Recognition and reward: Celebrating completion. The successful end of a construction project is generally referred to as “completion.” It’s something that contractors strive to reach efficiently and profitably. And, at least for large projects, they often celebrate when they get there successfully.

Encouragement and celebration in every organization are critical. Leaders must recognize progress as well as accomplishment of a goal, so employees know they’re on the right track and will keep striving for success. Recognition doesn’t have to be expensive. In fact, what distinguishes recognition from rewards is the use of “I” words that create “intrinsic” rewards, which tend to last longer and be more meaningful to employees than monetary or “extrinsic” rewards. Intrinsic rewards include things such as:

• Assignments of more interesting work,
  
• Involvement in key projects or decisions,
  
• Opportunities to work independently, and
  
• Sharing information.
  

Another good approach might be to share success stories during staff meetings or events or in company e-mails or a newsletter (if you have one). Oral or written praise delivered in this manner can serve as a real morale booster to recipients.

Whereas recognition tends to be intangible, rewards are generally tangible. They include statues, company merchandise or plaques. Of course, rewards may also be financial — such as spot bonuses, merit raises or other monetary incentives. Remember, the more timely the recognition/reward is given, the stronger the connection to performance.

e’ve listed above the six phases of building a positive culture. But what about the behaviors that can tear one down? These are just as important to identify when trying to make productive changes to your organization. As you endeavor to raise up your organization’s culture, watch out for the demolition crew:

Flawed character. Dishonesty, intentionally poor communication and blame can sabotage any culture.

Fear. Organizations that refuse to take any risks and that avoid problems and tough decisions typically don’t get far.

Unchecked power. If leaders have or need complete control over others, a culture won’t thrive. Employees will feel that collaboration is pointless.

Arrogance. Anyone with too much pride, who is unable to admit mistakes, ask for help or recognize the value of others, is more than likely a liability. These individuals can poison even the best-intentioned culture.

Ineffective coaches. At the end of every season, no matter what the sport, a number of coaches (or, in baseball, managers) are usually fired. Most of these individuals may not have been bad employees, per se. But, in their employers’ opinions, they failed to develop a winning environment for their players. This dilemma can apply to any type of organization — which doesn’t necessarily mean you should fire a bad coach, but he or she may need additional training or, in worst cases, reassignment.

Leaders play a key role in the process of creating a positive, high-performing culture. You are, in fact, the architect. Your behavior, attitude, language or jargon, style of dress, decision-making process, everyday work practices and strategic direction create the cultural blueprint for not only your employees, but also clients, suppliers and anyone else who comes in contact with your organization.

Thus, as a leader and architect, you’ve got to recognize the boundary lines of your existing culture, align your strategies accordingly and always be on the lookout for ways to improve it. For help assessing your culture, determining whether your leadership style/habits are aligned with your organization’s strategic objectives, and targeting effective improvements for the future, please contact us.

Marketing gurus always tout that you get far more bang for your buck by developing existing customers than trying to find new ones. The same value and resulting higher benefit applies to developing talent internally rather than sourcing it externally. However, so many executives have experienced first-hand, the myriad of failed leadership development investments. That doesn't mean there isn't a good solution.

In fact, leadership development solutions that work are well documented.  The requirements include the right balance of: assessment data, skill building, 1:1 coaching, peer solution development, real-world application, time, and accountability. But there are very few programs available to bring in-house, that integrate all of these areas, are proven, measurable, adaptable, and scalable.

The best organizations want development of leaders to happen internally, across teams, so they can work within their culture and learn from employees as they transform from manager to leader. But developing custom curriculum takes time and is somewhat unproven--ultimately a risky and hefty investment in today's agile, fast-moving corporate environment. The question is no longer "should we build or buy?" when it comes to strong leaders and middle management; the question is, "how do we build leaders in a cost effective way and show measurable results?"

This is the reason we're suddenly seeing so much adoption of the LEAP University approach. While LEAP has historically been a "public" offering allowing organizations to send one or two leaders to be developed, we're seeing a significant uptick in organizations that are bringing the program in-house to develop a broader cross-section of their leaders from within.

LEAP University is scalable to fit organizations in two ways:

CERTIFY INTERNAL RESOURCES. Certify and develop internal experts to coach, facilitate, and manage unlimited LEAP cohorts internally, across the organization, gives you maximum flexibility and scalability. Additional benefits include:

1. Stickiness. The program isn't an event that happens, but a culture of leadership learning that is being developed.
2. Acceleration. Having internal resources who understand the existing culture and are available to members and leaders alike, helps accelerate the transformation of both individuals and the organization for lasting improvement, not short-term gains.
   
3. Transformation. In addition to transforming managers into leaders who collaborate, improve productivity, and develop high-performing teams, the organization has a growing pool of highly skilled leaders where change initiatives and strategies are more easily integrated into the business for strong results.
   

ENGAGE AN EXTERNAL EXPERT. Sometimes, culture, quest for external knowledge, or availability of resources call for bringing in a third party professional. In this scenario, organizations contract with our LEAP Certified Coach/Facilitators to organize, assess, facilitate, and coach through the transformation. Benefits of bringing in an external resource include:

1. Leveraged Resources. No need to allocate internal resources  who don't have the time or the required expertise.
   
2. Expertise. LEAP coaches and facilitators are experts with a wealth of knowledge who have completed rigorous certification and have a track record of leadership and achievement in their own right. Their "outsider" experience provides credibility and examples that contribute to accelerated learning and support learners with their specific challenges.
   
3. Acceleration. Detachment from internal politics and confidentiality can mean more willingness and openness during the transformation/journey -- ultimately accelerating the right changes in the individual or team. 
   

Buying talent is expensive and risky because ultimately you don't know what you will get. Building your existing talent is less risky and pays much bigger dividends to the business. Which pathway is right for your organization? There's no one right way, it's a decision best determined by honest reflection of your organization's needs, culture, and resources.

If you own a consulting/coaching business, chances are, your business is you. And there’s only so much one person can do! Even though I’ve been running a successful consulting business since 1999, I still have peaks and valleys. And, I work with a lot of really impressive coaches and I see them struggling with the same challenges. After some reflection, I’ve boiled it down to three main struggles:

When I created LEAP® the Leadership Acceleration Program it was to fill a gap in leadership development offerings. What I didn’t realize was that having a packaged leadership development offering that targeted high-potential non-executives, also helped me with these three business challenges.

If you’ve been looking for something to help you grow but retain your sanity, LEAP might be the perfect program. We recently added 5 additional LEAP Certified Coaches in Washington (now we’re at 12) and we’re looking to expand the reach of LEAP in new markets outside of the Pacific Northwest. I would love to talk with you!

Our LEAP Coach Certifications happen 2-3 times per year. Learn more about the business model that makes this such an attractive program for coaches and consultants.

Delegating effectively is as much about getting more done as it is about empowering others and creating a high-performance organization. Delegating is often misunderstood and before we talk about the six steps to delegating effectively it is first important to understand what delegating is and what it is not.

Delegating is about sharing work, sharing authority, and providing employee development. Delegating is not about dumping your workload on someone else, letting go of all responsibility, or assigning work and checking the box done - never checking back to ensure it was done and done well.

Once you have defined what you need to delegate, then you can follow these 6 steps to delegate effectively:

1. Provide CLARITY about what you want done:  be specific and provide needed instruction.
   
2. MATCH the right task to the right individual.
3. Establish LEVELS of authority and autonomy – don’t hesitate to provide challenging assignments.
4. Determine RESOURCES and support for the individual.
5. Give clear DEADLINES for completion and discuss how & when you will check-in for follow-up.
6. Provide FEEDBACK on performance when assignment is complete.

Delegating effectively is one of the top 5 most consistently self-reported challenges that leaders struggle with. If you would like to know more about how LEAP the Leadership Acceleration Program can help you (or someone you know) become more effective at delegating, join us for an upcoming webinar.

LEAP is a 12-month, cohort-based leadership acceleration program that guides members in solving real-world problems and applying learning in the real environment every month. LEAP transforms managers into leaders capable of guiding teams to move their organization to the next level.


LEAP is measurable and documents the change in leadership confidence and competence over the course of the member's LEAP journey. Since the first cohort graduation in 2003, LEAP has proven so effective that it has been accredited for Masters Level College Credits.


Interested in making the LEAP from manager to leader? Join us for an informational webinar about LEAP® the Leadership Acceleration Program. Register at http://bit.ly/LEAPWebinar

Are you an experienced coach or consultant looking to add a proven leadership development program to your offerings? Join us for a live webinar to learn more. Register at http://www.leadership-acceleration.com/join-us-for-a-live-webinar.html

There’s a hidden gem in your organization. This person is working right there among your workforce and having a huge impact on your organization’s success. No, it’s not the owner or a top exec — who’s more than likely pretty high-profile in your local market and industry. And, no, we’re not necessarily referring to that hotshot salesperson who “makes it rain.”

The diamond in your midst is none other than your middle manager. That’s right; he or she is the shining hero whom you may inadvertently be undervaluing or simply not recognizing or developing adequately. Unless you keep your middle manager polished and bright through ongoing leadership development, this precious jewel will remain hidden and dulled. He or she may even slip from your grasp.

Indeed, middle managers are fast becoming a key cog in our national economy. According to a Bureau of Labor Statistics report released just a couple of years ago, there were about 10.8 million middle managers working in the United States. In a 2013 Wall Street Journal article, middle managers were described as making up “a growing share of the U.S. workforce.”

But this burgeoning population of professionals also faces great challenges. In the current era of “rock star” CEOs, middle managers are often ignored, viewed as easily replaceable or, in worst cases, left to take the blame when upper management’s strategic initiatives fail. And the increased use of specialized project teams has only exacerbated the tendency in many organizations to undervalue their middle managers.

The good news for your organization is that these issues create an opportunity. If you can change your view of middle managers, recognize the contributions of yours and then maximize the value of this underrecognized human asset, you’ll gain a competitive advantage.

For example, according to the 2013 Gallup study State of the American Workplace: Employee Engagement Insights for U.S. Business Leaders, organizations with a 9:1 ratio of engaged employees to disengaged employees reported 147% higher earnings per share than their competition during the study period.

Middle managers have a significant effect on employee turnover as well. In a recent Accenture study, 31% of respondents cited “They don’t like their boss” as their reason for quitting. Another 31% pointed to “a lack of empowerment.” Middle managers have a direct and lasting impact on both of these attitudes.

Research released in May 2014 by Bersin by Deloitte, an HR consultancy, found that leadership development spending rose by 14% in 2013 to an estimated $15.5 billion. Small businesses were, believe it or not, the biggest spenders — investing 23% more in leadership development during 2013 than they did during 2012. And the amount invested on average for middle managers was only $3,900 per person.

Priorities for organizations devoting time and money to leadership development include improving middle managers’ communication skills, of course, as well as enhancing their ability to identify and manage talent. But some of the major focuses of today’s leadership development programs may surprise you.

For instance, a survey of 800 global executives and senior talent development professionals by Harvard Business Publishing Corporate Learning found that 80% of respondents were targeting “change management capabilities” while developing their middle managers. Moreover, 77% of respondents were working to instill “a leadership mindset” in their middle managers.

Final question

One last question for you: What does your organization need to do right now to develop its middle-management leadership? Today’s top performers are already doing it, so you don’t want to get left behind.

We can help. Our LEAP® program was specifically designed to bring Fortune 100 leadership development to small to midsize organizations in an affordable package. LEAP identifies key areas for personal leadership improvement in both middle and upper-level managers — using professional assessment tools, individual coaching, real-world application and small peer-based learning groups.

LEAP® is a practical, fact-based, results-driven program designed for immediate practical application in your organization. We have cohort groups starting throughout the year. Now is the time to find your gems and really polish them so your organization will shine brighter than its competitors. To learn more visit http://www.leadership-acceleration.com/ or join us for an upcoming webinar (register at http://bit.ly/LEAPWebinar)

Are you a coach or consultant who is looking to add a new level of service for your clients? We are actively looking for affiliates to help us expand the reach of the LEAP program. Learn more about what it means to add LEAP to your coaching toolkit.