People stop paying attention to an overload of changes at work – unless you take the time to debrief the progress of the change now and then. It begins to look like a swirl of pointless activity until someone says, “Hey! We cut our backlog in half!” Or, “We just saved X dollars on transportation and distribution!” Closure conversations are worth mastering.
People pay attention to people – and make lots of assessments and judgments. That’s natural. But it maybe not the best way for a manager to support high performance or reach an organization’s goals.
Resistance to change – or to anything – is only effective if you focus on producing a specific intended result + talk about it with people who can alter the path toward accomplishing it. Otherwise, take a deep breath and let it go.
We have explanations for why other people behave the way they do, but sometimes we can have a conversation that creates a new possibility for them. Connecting to a vision or goal can make all the difference.
Change – organizational or personal – requires a few basics. Commitment, of course. Respect, certainly. And closure – regular status checks to stay on track and support success. Takes a bit of extra time, but it is a good investment.
What happens when we ditch the negative or outdated parts of our lives? We make room for something new! Sometimes we know exactly what we want, and sometimes we just want to be lighter, more free and relaxed. Either way, something old may need to be given up to somebody else who will enjoy it.
There is much talk right now about Yahoo’s demise as an independent company. The Economist said the failure was due, first of all, to “a chronic lack of focus”, never deciding if it was a media company or a technology company. NPR’s “Morning Edition” said Ms. Mayer, the CEO, treated Yahoo more like a think-tank than […]
Reggie started with a serious performance problem in his department. He said his staff was “under-performing”, and he was insistent that I find out what the problem was and “fix it”. So I did. The problem was Reggie. He was a technical whiz, but not a very good manager. Here’s what I mean: He was […]
Dear Reggie, The “discussions” are working. Your people said that you are listening to them in a new way, and that should raise their performance. That was your original goal, wasn’t it? So here’s the next place to put your attention: your Step 3. I am hearing some confusion among your staff people – it’s […]
Sometimes cynicism is a symptom of a problem from the past. It’s worth fixing both the problem and the symptom.
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