It’s Christmas time again and the spirit of giving is upon me!  First, painfully, this means my wife Laura and I have been frequenting too many retail and online establishments chasing down this year’s assortment of cute – and often annoying – toys for our boys.  Paxon does not read this column (he is only 5 years old) so I can tell you the spoiler:  he is getting a guitar!  Good thing we have a basement to contain the joyful noises he will make.  Parker is not yet 2 and thus will be more than happy with just about anything.  Please don’t get me wrong – I understand that giving is about far more than simply offering money or gifts.

In fact, as I think about giving in an organizational or professional context, I think of at least four things.

• Monetary gifts:  Yes, money.  People love the stuff.  Lots of firms in lots of industries are hurting right now, thus using money as a “thank you” will be more difficult than usual.  Good.  What most leaders fail to realize is that money is best viewed as a secondary motivator.  On to the more important views of giving…
• The gift of helping.  In terms of both morale and productivity, one of the most important behaviors at work is helping others.  That is, not you doing your job, but proactively reaching out here and there when time allows to help others do their job.  This is a simple and wonderful cornerstone of positive relations at work.  In addition to directly contributing to productivity, it helps build trust and good will.  Given how challenging conflict and negative emotions at work can sometimes be, couldn’t we use a bit more trust and good will?
• The gift of being nice!  A little related to the idea of “helping” but unique enough to warrant a quick thought.  Guess what happens at work when people show emotions?  Positive or negative, they tend to rub off on others.  In fact, they rub off very easily and can either help or hinder productivity.  Negative emotions spread like a virus.  Positive emotions like a fresh breeze.  By the way, if you’re a leader, take notice:  the number one reason people leave jobs is poor “boss” relationships.  Try being nice!
• The gift of self improvement.  I’ll end by talking about you giving to yourself.  My wish for you is that you will take your 2009 New Year’s Resolution seriously!  Real leaders do not simply strive to reach goals set for them by others – they actively develop their own personal worthwhile goals.  Nothing is as satisfying as setting your sights on a meaningful goal, working hard and reaching the finish line.  The more you embrace the goal setting mentality, the more you will control time instead of allowing time to control you.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to you and yours!

Ok, here comes an unpleasant dose of reality – the average, or typical, leader is a “micromanager.”  Micromanaging is defined as excessive and unproductive hovering, monitoring or interfering with employee work.  Every leader does it – the only question is how much, a little or a lot.  Great leaders use this type of behavior very sparingly and only when absolutely needed.  Less than successful leaders overindulge on a regular basis.  In which direction do many leaders lean?  Unfortunately many err on micromanaging a lot.  In short, you need to know why we fall prey to micromanaging, what problems this creates and how to avoid it.

The prime reasons we micromanage include:

• The belief you are smarter than the other person/group
• The belief “they” are not skilled enough to be successful
• A general need for control over work which reflects on you
• A desire for a specific outcome when multiple are possible
• A lack of understanding or appreciation of the need to develop others

The problems micromanaging creates:

• Lower productivity for you since you spend less time working on your tasks.
• Lower productivity for the person or group being micromanaged – since they are dealing with you.
• A long-term resentment that develops since almost no employee likes to be micromanaged.

How to avoid micromanaging:

• Manage outcomes not process.  This is one of the golden rules of leadership.  Anytime you lead others you must define expectations – including meaningful goals, milestones and metrics.  You only begin micromanaging a little when the outcomes you receive are not acceptable.  Stated differently, don’t much around in the process unless the process is clearly not creating the outcomes you need.  You can stop in, offer support, try to help or provide resources – but don’t micromanage.
• Get good feedback.  This applies to the tendency to micromanage and in general to one’s leadership ability.  Find one or two unbiased and honest resources and ask them to give you honest and candid feedback.  Ask about how others perceive you on a spectrum ranging from “granting lots of autonomy” to “crazy micromanager” and actually listen to what they say.
• Stay away from their cube!  Many people took the MBWA (“management by walking around”) mantra too seriously.  When in doubt – don’t go bother them, wait and evaluate the outcomes first!  If you can’t stand it, break the work up into meaningful milestones up front when planning and assigning work.  This way you will receive updates or mini outcomes along the way without having to hover and harass.  If the mini outcomes look problematic (not simply “different than how you would have done it,” but actually problematic) then step into the process in an attempt to help – but don’t micromanage!

Research suggests that many people at work do not live up to their creative potential.  Shocking, huh?  I personally think the vast majority do reach their potential.  Creativity is the fuel that drives the innovation engine.  Without it companies stagnate and die.  It is true that people have different amounts of creative thinking ability – so what!  Your goal as a leader is not to make people more creative but to lead in such a way that people come as close as possible to their creative potential.  To that end, there are several serious issues organizations must contend with, the most pressing include the need to:

Stop the rhetoric gap

• Far too often there is a huge difference between what a company says they value and what they actually value.  There is no shortage of organizations with creativity and innovation in their vision statements who nonetheless swiftly stomp out attempts at creativity when they emerge.  This not only fails to foster creativity and innovation – it makes it less likely to emerge as more and more employees sense this “gap.”

Set expectations and goals

• You can set goals for creativity, even though most managers think it is impossible.  You won’t make people inherently more creative, but you will move them closer to their potential – that is the focusing power of goals.  They direct attention and when you direct attention towards creativity (at least on certain tasks at particular times), people are in fact more likely to be creative.

Reward successes

• In the name of promoting creativity at work, relentlessly advertise internally using mini case studies and examples of individuals and teams whose hard work and risk taking is paying off.  If you have brave men and women walking out on a limb in the name of positive change you must leverage their efforts and allow them to inspire others.

Reward efforts too

• It usually takes hundreds or thousands of ideas to get to a really good one.  By definition this means you must start rewarding creative efforts, not just outcomes.  If you can’t embrace these “bumps in the road” you’re simply back to using rhetoric.  99.9% of all great ideas started out “half baked.”  If you fail to embrace this simple reality, people will quickly learn that taking risks is not worth it.

Provide training

• There are two types for creativity.  First, the hard side.  There are known tools that help groups diverge and converge as needed to facilitate creative work products.  From simple brainstorming to more advanced methods – try giving your team a real chance to be creative.  Second, there is a lot to know about the soft side of managing creativity – how and when to give feedback, set goals, etc.

Include creativity in employee evaluations

• Yes, measuring this in an evaluation is difficult – but do it.  Skip it and your people will focus their efforts elsewhere.  See the rant on goals above.

Hire for creativity

Normally, if someone seems qualified but too creative – they somehow don’t fit the prototype for the organization – they don’t make the cut.  Bad move.  This is a common syndrome and over time it creates a homogenous culture with reduced creative capacity.  You need at least a couple square pegs in round holes!

When leaders show genuine respect for their followers and actually get down in the trenches and work right along with them – that’s motivating.  For classic examples consider Herb Kelleher during his days with Southwest Airlines helping check in luggage or Steve Jobs famously taking only $1 in salary.  This speaks to showing respect and appreciation – and walking the talk – and it is one of the five key ways to motivate employees.  Want to motivate the troops?  Consider these:

• Model quality behaviors and walk the talk.  The cliché is true – kinda.  You can’t simply do what you say.  It works only when what you say is good.  Assuming that is true, you would be amazed at how your “example” influences those around you.  Vicarious learning is powerful.
• Get contingent.  Never give out praise or other rewards unless they are clearly contingent on excellent performance.  This is violated regularly and it merely upsets your strongest performers while setting false expectations for your “B” players.
• Get personal.  Stop giving “employee of the week” certificates and start thinking about what makes each recipient unique.  Make the reward individualized and watch its impact multiply in size.
• Offer choice.  One size does not fit all.  To the extent possible offer an array of rewards so that your employees can exercise some amount of control over the process.  Not everyone likes the company catalogue.

And finally…

Realize money is usually not the best answer.  While all employees value compensation, it usually is not top of the list.  The most prized motivators?  Being valued, feeling like the work matters, being “in the loop” and other such “soft” issues.  The biggest determinant of morale and productivity is the quality of daily work relationships – the “boss” relationship being by far the most important.

It is amazing to me how many little things drive us nuts every single day and put a dent in our morale and productivity.  Case in point:  email!  It is supposed to enhance communication, but often has the opposite effect.  Learning how to manage email is a huge part of overall productivity for most professionals.  Many of us, however, tend to let the email manage us instead of the other way around.  To take control of this potentially useful communication channel, consider the following:

Send less, receive less

• Send out fewer emails and you will receive fewer.  Wait until you see someone if possible, and talk to them – skip the email.  In addition, be very conservative when deciding who to copy on the note.  The more people you copy, the more you create future emails to process.

Say less to say more

• Choose your words wisely and err on few instead of many.  Yes, that might mean at least one ounce of thought and editing before sending the note.  Resist the temptation to spill out a million background details.  You need to be efficient.  Besides – with email, the more you say the higher the likelihood you will be misinterpreted (text on a computer screen never conveys as much accurate information as higher forms of communication such as face-to-face).

Sort them using the 80/20

• All emails are not created equal!  Think 80/20.  The 20% is very urgent – i.e., it is highly relevant to your long-term success (and your team’s).  The 80% goes into a “later” or “travel” folder to be read while at home or in the elevator, cab or plane.

Ask to opt out of some lists

• If you think you are powerful or important to the extent that you are copied on many emails, you are deluded – and wasting important time if reading or responding to all of them.  There is no doubt that a large minority of emails you receive you do not actually need to receive.  Reach out politely and positively and tell the sender to stop copying you on certain emails.

Mange your email time explicitly

• Most professionals make the mistake of leaving themselves constantly tethered to their email either via the office pc or smart phone.  This causes all manner of distractions while you are working, in meetings, etc.  Instead, try one of two strategies.  One, only allow yourself to check at certain intervals (e.g., once per hour).  Two, dedicate a certain chunk of time each day to processing the majority of the emails. To spread it out all day long is to dilute your mental ability to focus on the task at hand.

Put the burden on them

• Don’t be afraid to simply reply and ask that they call you on the telephone at a particular time.  First, phone or face-to-face is far more effective than email.  Second, it puts the communication burden on them – they have to call you or explain why their need is worthy of your immediate attention.

When in doubt, save!

• Computer space is cheap, and a record of things can be priceless.  To properly manage impressions, remember not to “cc” or “bcc” people unnecessarily – but when in doubt, do save a record of the interaction.  Do not allow this “CYA” move trick you into using email too much – but when email is appropriate, a copy is a good think to have.

We seem to be obsessed with it.  It is a result of our fixation on how little time we have to accomplish whatever it is we are working on.  It is a result of our love of efficiency.  It is part of our bias against thinking.  Yes, many cube dwellers have a strong bias against thinking!  Our foe:  multitasking, and it often kills effectiveness.  Multitasking – or any attempt to proactively manage one’s time – can always be taken too far.  Multitasking in particular can be very problematic for two main reasons.

• It reduces your cognitive capacity dedicated to any one task.  This means you’d better be working on very routine tasks or you risk increased mistakes.  Even for routine tasks, you’ll reduce your ability to critically think about them – and thus you miss out on creative insights about how to improve the way you work.
• It sends bad signals to anyone interacting with you.  People often multitask when dealing with others.  This is not a recipe for building positive working relationships.  They are far more likely to think you’re not paying attention and don’t value their time as opposed to thinking about how super productive you are.

I’ve met more than a few managers who think it is cool to work on emails while talking to someone in their office.  I’ve even seen a few talk to business colleagues on the phone while writing notes back and forth with a person sitting in their office.  In all cases, the communication wasn’t optimal.  In some cases it is even comical.  The ultimate issue then is whether or not you sacrifice effectiveness for efficiency when you multitask.  Usually the answer is yes.  This much we know with great confidence – you limit your creativity and typically send unintended and/or bad signals to others.  Stop multitasking – step away from the email and focus on one person or task at a time.  I admit, it’s not always bad.  My advice:  many of you who know me can see this one coming – first, think through the 80/20.  If a task is really important, it should not be part of your multitasking.  Second, is the timeline very small?  If it is not yet in the danger zone, don’ multitask.  Does this project require any real creativity or novel thinking?  If so, you sure as heck better not multitask!

A reader informed me that at his place of work there is a new rule – no playing video games on your computers!  This wasn’t a simple comment from one particular member of the leadership team.  It was a new formal policy introduced with much fanfare.  Wow.  It’s interesting that some managers still view playing games (or other things that don’t fit the traditional notion of workplace behavior) as odd or problematic or just plain wrong.  Corporate America has been waking up to a new view of productivity at work for the better part of three decades – but old ways of thinking are hard to shake.  In the face of many successful companies who aggressively advocate play at work there is still resistance.  Even though play of different types is a stress reliever (thus potentially lowering health care costs) and a stimulus to creative thinking (supporting innovation) it still receives a bum rap.

Here is the crucial question progressive leaders must ask:  is this person (or group) achieving what they are supposed to be achieving?  The question speaks to the need to manage outcomes, not processes.  The goal is always to manage outcomes (monitoring what is expected of the employee or group – the deliverables, the goals, the metrics) and not the process (the specific ways they use their time to accomplish their goals).  When you manage outcomes and avoid micro-managing the process you signal to employees that you trust them.  Boy do we need more trust in organizations!  In return, employees who feel this type of autonomy typically respond by showing more responsibility for their work and by espousing the value of their work to others.  I understand that not all employees should be given a lot of freedom and autonomy.  Fine.  The rule is to give as much as is reasonable given their ability and the requirements of the task at hand (e.g., when is the deadline, how important is the task for the unit’s overall performance).  The point is, if you are actually using adequate goals and holding people accountable, providing autonomy is an amazing boost to positive working relationships.

Guess what?  Reasonable doses of not working while at work actually facilitate better work for many people – play is not all bad.  If you see excessive playing and there has been a pattern of outcomes that are not what they are supposed to be – intervene.  Until then, let them play whatever it is they are playing.  It just might lead them to the next great idea for your company.  Think of it like this, most people can’t work at 100% of their potential all day.  “Playing” is frowned upon so most employees simply fall into a trance like state half the time while trying to complete their work.  This results in the average employee performing at about 65% of their potential.  If we let them “play” for 5 -10% of their time, I promise the remainder of their effort will be at 90% or higher.  What would you rather have?  Employees consistently at 65% all the time or employees at 90%+ of their potential 90% of the time.  That’s what I thought.  Let them finish that game of Sudoko.

Any time you disagree with a person or group at work there is potential for conflict.  It is a common situation and one that is not typically handled effectively.  You only have a few options.  To choose the best one you must ask these two fundamental questions:

• How important is the issue?  Use the old 80/20 rule.  All people matter, but – hate to say it – at work some matter more than others.  Same with issues and tasks at work.  Is this one vital to your future success or your groups?  That’s the 20% and it might be time to speak up.
• How much social capital do you have and how much are you willing to spend?  Everyone has some amount of social latitude to speak their minds, some very little, some a ton.  Given the current situation, how much do you have?  Here’s a hint – most of us overestimate how much we have, at least a little.

If you think through these two issues and decide to say nothing, fine.  It might be in the 80%, if not fairly trivial.  Not worth your time.  It is true that you must pick your battles.  If, however, you decide to speak up, one of two things typically happens – you either say something that is ultimately productive or say something that is ultimately destructive – even though you did not intend to make things worse.  Here are the five key things to consider when trying to state your view constructively:

• Validate their views.  No matter how difficult this feels, no matter how much creativity is required, find a part of their view genuinely worth supporting – and tell them you support it.
• Check the emotions.  Never get into a conversation of this nature if you are aware that you are experiencing elevated emotions (e.g., anger, resentment, anxiety about a decision you would not want to support).
• Be specific, avoid opinions.  What you “think” and “feel” is of little use in a conversation of this sort.  Stick to what you know:  the concrete facts and statistics.
• Own up, don’t drop names.  If you disagree, take credit for it, don’t say that you know so and so (some influential player in the organization) who also shares this view, thus we should consider it.  Stick to the merits and own your position (“I” statements).
• Don’t position your view as somehow “right” or “correct.”  Instead, position it as one legitimate possibility to consider and you’ll be less likely to offend and more likely to find a reasonable response.

When you’re dealing with your boss, the same logic applies, with one huge caveat.  Since there is an important power differential in play, you must err on the side of showing deference towards their view.  Yes, some people have strong positive relationships with their superiors defined by open debate and questioning – but not many.  For most employees, disagreeing with the boss has real costs.  Some say “when in doubt, keep your mouth shut.”  I disagree.  Ask yourself if this is the 20% or the 80% and ask yourself how many social chips you’re willing to cash in.  Good luck!

Hiring represents one the most vital functions in the organization.  It is the all important filter that affords you the best opportunity to build great teams and great organizations.  Unfortunately, hiring is often treated as an afterthought, almost begrudgingly, as something that must simply be done to “fill a hole” in the organization.  Leaders do not appreciated the strategic importance of hiring, thus the need to spend more, not less, time on the process.  Done correctly, life is good.  Treated haphazardly, your organization becomes saddled with mediocre employees – or worse, bad employees.  There are many high quality best practices to consider.  Depending on whether you are with a small firm or a large firm, some of these might mean more to you than others.  My bet is that most firms need to pay attention to all of them.

• Use tools.  There is no shortage of useful screening tools from various types of cognitive ability tests to personality assessments to more targeted skill-based tests.  Find them and use them.  Bringing someone on board is far easier than letting them go, thus more data trumps less data.  Conversely, don’t use bad tools.  Any screening devices must be defensible in the legal sense and valid in the scientific sense.  For less than a pile of money, both can be ensured.  The one thing you do not want to use – though they are very common – is any home grown tests.  If you are using any internally generated tests, they very likely lack legal defensibility and/or validity.  Stop that!

• Get applied.  Interviews (done correctly) are great, so are various tests and assessments, but nothing trumps watching someone in action.  If they are to be an engineer, give them one of your widgets and make them do something with it.  If they are to be a customer service manager, tell them a real client problem you are currently facing and ask them to craft a strategy to address it.  Whatever they are being considered for, attempt to have them actually work with it – and make sure multiple pairs of eyes watch the effort.

• Involve more people.  Who should be involved?  Several, including:  the leader who will be over the person, appropriate HR personnel, key colleagues, subordinates who will report to the new person, and potentially key suppliers or customers who will work with the person.  To include them is to gain possible new insights.  To not include them is to not only fail to gain useful insights but to create the risk of upsetting parties who would have rather had a voice in the decision.

• Don’t settle.  Yes, that hole in the team hurts.  No employee likes increased workloads due to positions remaining unfilled.  So what.  Filling those spots too quickly with less than ideal employees hurts far more.  If a search rolls on for months and months, isn’t that acceptable given that the person, once hired, could remain with the organization for many years?  Of course.

• Shake things up.  Believe it or not, organizations hire people who “fit” the prototype of other successful people in the organization too much.  When this is done too often the diversity of thought and the diversity of skills in the organization actually shrink.  You need a solid minority who do not fit the mold.  They offer great smarts and great efforts, but they do not fit the organizational stereotype of the common employee.  These people represent one of the biggest hedges against lazy thinking and they spur innovative efforts – if your culture is hospitable to them.

Hiring can be complex and time consuming, but it is worth it when done correctly.  Start by keeping these five issues in mind and you will be treating the hiring process with the strategic reverence it deserves.

It may seem cliché, but change is the only constant – at least when it comes to skill building and staying fresh in your area.  Continuous learning is a must, but does everyone always keep up?  Of course not, and helping others successfully face this issue is a part of every leader’s job.  When it is clear a colleague or group needs to build new skills, ask yourself the following question.  Are they able to make the change successfully?  If you believe the answer is yes, there are two steps to follow.  First, consider the best avenue for achieving this change.  Second, tread the chosen path lightly and positively!

• Three real paths are clear:  informal persuasion from their immediate supervisor, the use of formal structures (e.g., incentives and employee evaluation systems), and informal persuasion from their peer.

• Which one is the best?  Usually the peer approach.  Norms are powerful.  When a big enough group or powerful and respected enough individual holds people accountable for certain behaviors and outcomes, change can happen, even in the absence of burdensome formal structures.

• With your approach path chosen, always begin the discussion with the positives – especially aspects of their performance worth applauding.

• Transition to a talk about change by discussing the shared need for everyone – including yourself – to continually refresh their skill set.

• Next, you must be very specific about the skills you feel they need to attend to.  Do not assume they understand exactly what you are talking about.

• Finally, be prepared to help them in any way you can by pointing out useful resources – and don’t forget to mention what new skills you are working on so they will believe you when you talk about the shared need to continuously improve.

Here is the good news:  the more you work to make this type of conversation normal, the more others will begin to engage the skill rebuilding process without a conversation about it!

Leadership is about supporting and building employee morale and productivity.  Ultimately, these explain organizational success.  Each year we see hundreds of new leadership-related books and thousands of leadership-related articles.  But how much of what is new is really new?  After reading much of what is available, I have concluded that there are a small number of things going on that explain the essence of leadership.  In fact, all of the thousands of leadership ideas, tricks and tactics that have been discussed really boil down to three simple ideas.  To maintain and build high performance work relationships you must focus on three core ideas:  reduce ambiguity, be fair and stay positive.

Reduce Ambiguity

People hate the unknown, the unclear and the unnecessarily complex.  Thus, an overriding goal is to be clear and specific, cogent and understood.  Think through the many forms of communication you have with your team on a regular basis.  Each is an opportunity to send ambiguous and misunderstood signals.  When someone receives a 2.3% raise instead of the 5% they expected, do they really understand why?  What about when they do not receive the promotion or that spot they really wanted on the new project team?  To the extent that they do not fully understand the cause of these outcomes, they will do the one thing you do not want them doing:  they will make assumptions.  These assumptions are rarely correct.  Typically, they are negative and self-serving.  All of this is time not spent working productively because you failed to go the extra few steps required to really reduce ambiguity.

With a solid focus on two things, you can greatly reduce ambiguity.  The first is clear interpersonal communication.  This refers to communication that is very specific (e.g., liberal use of facts, dates, examples), genuine (honest, otherwise the vast majority of people sense the truth), confirmed (never assume they understood what you said, verify it) and timely (e.g., delivered as quickly as possible).  The second part is effective goal setting.  This involves establishing performance goals for individuals and the team, milestones and metrics that will be used to evaluate progress, hold people accountable and reward performance.  With great communication and clear performance goals you will go a long way towards reducing unnecessary employee ambiguity.

Be Fair

This does not mean treating people the same.  You only want to treat people identically in terms of creating an environment where expectations are clear and opportunities are open to everyone.  Beyond that, your goal must be to use rewards and recognition depending on performance.  To be fair also means to be transparent.  Operate above board, avoid playing politics, avoid playing favorites and be sure that people are always clear as to how you made your decisions.  Your employees should never be surprised by something you do at work.

One vital key to not only being fair, but being perceived as fair, is to allow people a voice in shaping decisions that affect them.  Sometimes this is not possible and you must make decisions very quickly or you must make decisions that are not appropriate to discuss with subordinates.  In these cases, you still need to be absolutely transparent.  Explain yourself or they will draw their own conclusions (and they will not be accurate).  The ideal, however, is participation – giving people real ownership.  When there is time, seek input and take it seriously.  Why?  When people feel they have actually had a voice in the process they are willing to accept unfavorable outcomes far more than when they do not believe they have had a voice.  That is a massively powerful incentive to strive for participation.

Stay Positive

Positive emotions (just like negative emotions) are infectious.  Leaders have an opportunity with each and every issue they face to frame it as positive or negative, as an opportunity or threat.  Research tells us that how an issue is framed dramatically affects how people react.  The implication for leadership?  The glass is half full!  I do not mean to imply that you are to avoid conflict or avoid providing needed critical feedback.  Simply make sure that you are positive when doing it and that you balance all critical and developmental feedback with a good dose of honest praise.  This does not make people enjoy difficult feedback, but it puts them in a better mental position to actually accept and consider what you have to say.

Next, realize that to be a leader is to be a cheerleader.  Sports metaphors have their limits, but this one really fits.  Leaders must find specific instances of individual and group performance to single out and applaud.  The leader sets the ceiling for positive emotion so take this role seriously.  Do cheerleaders only cheer when their team does something great?  No.  They console the guy who missed the winning shot too.  So should leaders.  If your goal is to help them learn and continue striving, you have to praise the positive and help put the negative in perspective.  The next time you want to blame, yell or otherwise explode and point your finger at work, remember, leaders have a choice.  Great leaders choose to find the positive in every situation.

“Barry!  I guess I will take that $4500 dollars out of your next pay check!”

The target of this tirade was a young engineer name Barry.  Barry made a mistake on an order that caused an ugly manufacturing delay for a key customer.  He tried to solve a particular problem in a novel way and it failed.  The customer called the head of the organization to complain.  He threatened to stop using them as a vendor.  The boss made the assurances necessary to keep the customer happy.  When he hung up the phone, he stormed out into the office and headed straight for Barry.  People could see it coming.  Some had overheard the heated telephone conversation.  Other could simply tell something was wrong by noticing his clenched fists and the scowl on his face.  The boss did not stop until he was looming over the young engineer.  He let loose the tirade and then walked off shaking his head.  Cubicleland was silent.

This is the same boss who hired me to help his organization understand creativity – how to “think outside the box.”  He was displaying a classic problem:  the creativity rhetoric gap.  Most of the time there is a difference, a gap, between what the top brass and the company literature say about creativity and innovation and what the average person in the organization does with regard to these ideas.  On the one hand a CEO might say that creativity is the lifeblood of the organization.  He or she might list creativity or similar notions in the company’s annual report, or mission statement or among the corporate values.  It makes for great copy.  However, whether or not the rest of the leadership structure lives out these ideas every day is another matter entirely.  In the case above, I was told on day one by the client president that they needed more initiative, more creativity.  He told me, “I ask and I ask, but nothing, they just won’t respond.”  After watching Barry get humiliated in front of all of his colleagues I understood why.

An incident like this has both direct and indirect effects.  Both types are very damaging.  The direct effects include:

• Damaging Barry’s ego

• Making Barry more “gun shy” in the future

• Causing Barry to loose respect for you (i.e., “the boss”)

• Causing Barry to dwell on the issue, hurting his productivity

The indirect effects may be even worse.  When the boss did this, he did it publicly.  This was a huge violation of the age old rule “praise in public, punish in private.”  He did not merely harm Barry.  He caused problems with each and every employee in ear shot.  First, how they view Barry might change, depending on the severity of the incident.  Others may begin behaving towards Barry as if he has lost some amount of social status.  Worse still, they will learn from an incident like this, but it is not the type of learning you want.  They learned that making mistakes is costly and embarrassing.  They learned that if you upset the boss, there is hell to pay.  Likely, without even knowing it, they learned that creativity and the risks involved are not worth it.

Creativity is inventing.  It is coming up with something new.  A new product, service, an improvement, a process tweak.  It is a new and useful idea.  Innovation is the more protracted process of attempting to derive value from creative ideas.  Throughout the entire process, the number one issue is risk.  I am not referring to the normal definition of risk that experts use when discussing the risk of innovation.  They typically refer to a financial risk (not a trivial issue).  I am referring to the experience of psychological risk by employees and leaders at different levels as they choose to engage creativity and innovation.

There is no shortage of risks employees will perceive when trying to decide whether to engage a discussion of a new idea or to work on a highly innovative project.  These include the risk of:

• looking silly or incompetent

• receiving negative feedback

• losing face, social capital, reputation

• having one’s workload increase

• hurting relationships (every new idea has the potential to obsolete some older idea or practice)

• being taken seriously only to see the idea not work or the project fail

One thing is required above all else in order to win at the creativity and innovation game.  You must manage and embrace the risk.  Step one, banish negativity.  Common sense and research are clear.  Negativity at work kills creativity and innovation.  If you are serious, it must be banished.  Across hundreds of studies, the number one predictor of employee creativity is being “supportive” and “encouraging.”  With small children, most of us immediately understand these notions.  When dealing with adults – at work – somehow they elude us.

Next, understand the “bumps in the road.”  This is a reminder that creativity is always the product of iterative attempts to improve over time and rarely, if ever, results from an instantaneous flash of insight.  Translated:  it takes a lot of less than wonderful ideas to get to the rare good ones that move the organization forward.  Each and every time you see one of the bumps, like the one Barry experienced, you have a choice.  You can scold him, be negative and fix the problem yourself.  Or, you can see it for what it is – one of the many bumps that are inevitable on the road to creativity and innovation.  “Failures” and “mistakes” only exist if you fail to learn from particular incidents.  If you learn from such an incident, it is another wonderful and invaluable bump in the road.  One more broken egg closer to a great omelet.  If you can learn to identify and embrace the bumps in the road, Barry might start speaking up again.  If not, you are full of hot air and the only thing you are doing is contributing to the rhetoric gap.

A client asked me a great one recently – what do you do with the person who is in charge of a group and has solid functional skills but no leadership skills? For better or worse, this is common since the typical promotion – especially at the lower levels of management – is based on task, or technical, skill, not leadership skills.

• First, make a subjective call – how bad is the damage?
• Second, ask yourself if what you’re seeing is better described as a discrete incident or a pattern of behavior.
• If the damage is bad and you honestly feel it is a pattern, it is likely the person is causing more pain than is justified by their contribution. You have to act fast and seriously consider removing this person from a position of power. Stop the bleeding sooner than later. If you have other viable alternatives, move.
• If you don’t or if you are on the fence and feel the individual can be salvaged as a leader – time to start coaching, mentoring and training. In this case, start setting specific goals in terms of changed behaviors, set a timeline, and provide feedback along the way. When the person has crystal clear expectations from you, a timeline and a belief that you’re serious about their need to improve – you’ll see change.
• Of course this assumes your performance management system allows you to actually hold people accountable – which is a post for another day!

How can you ask for help when new on the job without appearing too needy or inexperienced?  Great question – and it not only applies to young professionals but midcareer pros when they change jobs.  In either case, when trying to determine how to ask for help without being an unnecessary pain, consider the following:

• It is best to have done your homework before your start date so that you know the specific areas (e.g., client background, a particular software program) where you will face steep learning curves and who can help you with these areas on the job.
• It is also imperative to spend time early on working with the knowledge management system, if they have one.  Many firms electronically document many bits of knowledge that obviate the need to ask others for assistance.

When is it time to ask for help?

• When the stakes are high.  If the cost of a mistake or late deliverable is huge, risk the social friction and go ask for help.
• Sooner than later.  Assuming you’ve made a reasonable effort, don’t allow the clock to tick any longer than necessary.
• When you can build your network.  It’s not cliché – it’s true:  networking is vital to professional success.  As such, information gathering provides a great opportunity to expand your network and build positive professional relationships.

How do you successfully ask for help?

• Be specific.  Don’t ask for help with a contract – specify the specific issue, and do it in ten seconds or less.
• Be prepared.  If you know how to do part of the task – do it, and do it before you seek help.  Showing up with evidence of an honest effort goes a long way towards reducing any negative perceptions they might have of you.
• Show respect.  Demonstrate that you understand how busy they are.  Don’t barge in and ask for help on the fly.  Instead, ask them when they might be able to spare a few minutes.
• Return the favor.  Anytime someone scratches your back, you want to find a time to reciprocate.  It’s the right thing to do and it increases the chance they will be helpful to you the next time you’re in a bind.