Do more transnational companies mean an end to future war?

In the research paper, Death of the Global Manager, by Julia Hanna, Harvard Business School professor emeritus Christopher A. Bartlett says. "How does it (a transnational company) move beyond its role as an economic entity and recognize itself as a key player in the sociopolitical environment in which it has responsibility as well as power?"

As we move toward a working environment where many people interact with others across the globe, will there come a time when citizens will prevent (democratically-elected) governments from attacking their coworkers' home countries? In the US, large corporations have tremendous influence over government actions; as organizations grow, will they increase their influence over other governments? As marketers and designers and managers gain understanding of consumers and employees in other countries, could that understanding lead to enhanced relationships among the countries' leaders?

I can hope, right?

confidence without competence a dangerous thing

"difficulty builds mental muscle, while ease often builds only confidence"*

And then what do we do with that confidence? We act on it. But we haven't built the brain muscle to act appropriately. Self-esteem is good but it seems sometimes we put the cart before the horse when we give people (and ourselves) easy tasks so that they can succeed and feel good about themselves. We've done no one any service when we promote someone who isn't really capable, applaud mediocre work, hand out awards to those who showed up rather than holding them accountable to difficult goals.

Would you expect to be able to run a marathon because you can run around the corner without getting out of breath?

What can we do to encourage others, and ourselves and our children to try the difficult challenges, yes, maybe fail, and applaud the effort while encouraging them/us to try again?

*From: Come On, I Thought I Knew That! By Benedict Carey (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/19/health/19mind.html?pagewanted=1)

Eliminate time wasting activities

Now, as for the tasks that you're engaged in that are neither important nor urgent, well, it's time to ask yourself, "why am I doing this?" Listen, everyone needs a little Angry Birds time in his day. But not every day and not for more than 10 minutes -- especially if you also need a little Facebook time and a little Twitter time and a little . . . . well, you get the idea.

Pick one timewaster per day and set your computer's timer or alarm system to go off after 10 minutes. That's about all any of us needs to spend in the fourth quadrant.

Eliminate time spent searching for documents

Do you spend too much time at the start of a task searching for critical documents? One quick trick: when you put the task on your calendar, also write in the notes section where the document is filed. For example, let's say I set up a marketing meeting regarding Project X in another state with a resource working on a small but critical part of the project for 2 months from today. I know when I set up the meeting that we'll need to discuss the marketing results up to that time and the plans going forward. He may also want some information on the vendors.

When I put the meeting on my calendar 2 months ago, I write in the notes section, "F:/project x/marketing & F:/vendors; bring results & plans".

Now when it's time to pack for my trip, I know exactly where to go to get the several different files I'll need. I also try to match the names on my paper files to the names on my computer files. That way, if I need to grab something that is printed out, I'll know to also get that same file from my cabinet.

Hope this helps!

Eliminate time wasting interruptions

To open up time in our day for the truly important things -- discussions, reading, and research that enable us to learn new concepts, coaching sessions with our direct reports that facilitate their development and commitment and improve our department's productivity, planning and communications that facilitate the smooth-running of our projects -- we have to eliminate time wasters.

Time wasters include: interruptions on issues that are not relevant to us or our organizations, time spent searching for documents or materials that are not where we first expected them, and time spent on activities that we think relax us but only add to our stress (such as reality television).

How do you handle people who pop into your office for a chat that neither builds your relationship (which is important as good team relationships facilitate work completion) nor supports your work?

Learn to triage all interruptions. After a brief welcome, help people get to their point by asking, "how can I help you today?" Based on their response, determine quickly if the discussion will be about something urgent or not urgent. If not urgent, you can politely say, "I'd love to talk with you about that. Let's meet for coffee, say around 2?" Put it on your calendar and send the chatter on his way. It's okay, you need to take a walk at 2 anyway.

You can preempt some of these interruptions by instituting "quiet time": post a notice on your door (or chair if you have no private space) that says, "quiet hours: M - F 10 - 11 and 2 - 3" (or whatever time might work for you).

Let people know you are available for emergencies, but for non-emergencies they should please stop by another time.

Any other solutions out there?

Yet we keep looking for the easy solutions

"difficulty builds mental muscle, while ease often builds only confidence"*

I teach an engaging interactive class. Students love being in the environment and report learning a great deal. When I can keep class size to 15, students report that they have to work hard to keep up with the discussion, they can't hide. Bigger than that, and I know there are some folks who, while they are listening and learning, they're not pushing themselves hard to build those mental muscles.

Those who do push themselves build those mental muscles. It's clear in their work products and in-class comments.

Yet, other instructors and often students assume that because they're having fun, the class must be easy. Students seem to feel betrayed when they earn a B or C -- their work floats above the surface, they're not digging deep, and they've earned the grade they've earned. And administrators and other instructors overlook the grade distribution noticing only that students like the class so it must be easy.

What a weird position to be in: I can get people working their brains hard and reward those who dig in and do well, but because they work their brains hard in a way that's engaging, everyone assumes the class is "light". If I stood there and talked at them -- which I think would be a far easier class as I spoon feed them ideas -- everyone would think the class is challenging.



*From: Come On, I Thought I Knew That! By Benedict Carey (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/19/health/19mind.html?pagewanted=1)

Step two: evaluate time management matrix

Now you have the data you need to complete Covey's time management matrix:

	Urgent	Not Urgent
Important	Crises Pressing Problems Deadline-driven projects	Prevention, PC activities Relationship building Recognizing new opportunities Planning, recreation
Not Important	Interruptions, some calls some mail, some reports Some meetings Proximate, pressing matters Popular activities	Trivia, busy work Some mail/email Some phone calls Time wasters Pleasant activities
* PC = production capacity
P = production
Source: 7 Habits of Highly Effective People

What percent of an average day to you spend in each quadrant? Is the greatest percent in the second quadrant -- important and not urgent? If not, what we want to work on is moving tasks from the 3rd quadrant -- not important but urgent -- to that quadrant and on eliminating items in quadrant 4 -- not important and not urgent.

More in the next posting.

Step one: keep a daily diary

Want to get a handle on your to-do lists to ensure you spend less time fighting fires and more time discovering opportunities, coaching your team for future success, and accomplishing more important tasks? The first step is to write down everything you do in a day, and do so for several days.

After you've written it all down, code each item:
1) interrruption -- trivial
2) interruption - important and urgent
3) interruption -- important and not urgent
4) interruption -- urgent but not really important
5) task - urgent and important
6) task - urgent but not really important
7) task - important but not urgent
8) task - trivial

Then sort the items and add up the amount of time spent on each item. Now you have a picture of where your time is going.

In the next posting, I'll share what to do with that information.

Time management training helps people complete important tasks

Of the 73% of planned tasks that an average R&D Engineer completes in a day, less-important tasks are somewhat more likely to be completed than more-important tasks according to Things to Do Today . . . : A Daily Diary Study on Task Completion at Work by Brigitte J.C. Claessens, Wendelien van Eerde, Christel G. Rutte, and Robert A. Roe.

After all these years of Steven Covey telling managers (in 7 Habits of Highly Effective People) to focus on" important but not urgent tasks", for most of us, "tasks that are both important and urgent are more likely to be performed, but tasks that are only important and not urgent are unlikely to be completed."

The authors write that "respondents who were more conscientious and emotionally stable had completed a higher percentage of the planned tasks. Also, those who had participated in a time management program prior to this study completed more of their planned work."

What are some of the things you do to ensure you complete important tasks to prevent the firefighting that accompanies completing urgent-and-important-tasks?

Risks of a narcissistic work force

Narcissims is defined as: a personality marked by self-love and self-absorption; unrealistic views about your own qualities and little regard for others.
narcissistic personality

According to new research from Appalachian State University (http://jme.sagepub.com/content/early/2011/05/12/1052562911408097), today's college students have "significantly higher levels of narcissism than college students of the past, business students possess significantly higher levels of narcissism than psychology students."

Why? Why would this generation have less realistic self-perceptions and less concern for others? (I blame reality tv, which seems remarkably un-real to me, but then, I'm very old). What do you think?

And why do business students in particular have higher degrees of narcissism? Is it in the self-selection for the career -- you have to think highly of yourself to survive in the dog-eat-dog world of business? Or is it in the way we're educating these students? -- is there too much coddling and have the standards relaxed so much that everyone assumes his A means he's tops?

The researchers go on to say that "narcissists expect to have significantly more career success in terms of ease of finding a job, salary, and promotions." What kind of shock have we set up for these students when they hit real life and all of its challenges? Will their strong sense of self-importance help them weather life challenges or will it lead to confusion or despair?

And most importantly, what do we do about it? For these current students and for our children?

Efficacious email #2 of 2

Emailing effectively & efficiently

So much time is wasted with inefficient emailing. How can you improve the efficacy of your emails?

(first of two podcasts)

A healthy diet plan -- for your brain?

This week I met with a highly educated, very dedicated group of attorneys. Several times throughout our meeting I heard one or another comment on their overwhelming quantity of work. Harvard Business Review has just published a blog by David Rock that states that so many people are overwhelmed that the problem has reached the danger level (http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2011/06/this_week_the_us_government.html)

Rock recommends a brain diet, similar to the revamped US government's food pyramid, now "choose my plate". Rock's "healthy mind platter" has us balancing focus time with play time and connecting time and so forth, much in the way Steven Covey's Seven Habits of Highly Effective People recommends we plan for all aspects of our lives, not just our work life.

All great advice, but what will help the group of overworked attorneys? Unless we reduce the work quantity, how can they allocate time to other aspects of their lives/brains? While I agree they would be more productive with, and less stressed about, their excessive work load if they took a walk at mid-day, regularly scheduled 10-minute calls with loved ones once a day, and got a good 7-8 hours of sleep each night, ultimately I believe that they'll have to set limits on work quantity.

They'll have to learn to say "yes, and", as in "yes, I can complete the first step in that process by Friday and meet your full request by two weeks from today." Or, "yes, I'd be happy to help you with that research. And if you'd review my other priorities with me, we can find which item could be delayed."

How do you accept work requests?

Interestingly, I know of many employees who are under-worked! When a team mate is producing less than others, the overworked folks not only feel overworked but also angry. Burnout is not due to excessive workload, it's due to negative feelings about the workload. Managers must coach all employees, and communicate about workload openly and honestly, to prevent burnout.

Your thoughts?

Who defines project goals: top management or implementers?

It matters. When top management defines a project they usually do so because they have information front-line employees don't have: a competitor's new market strategy will affect sales; a new technology will soon be available that may reduce costs; the cost of capital is going up/down which influences the ability to expand.

All good reasons. The risks of a top-defined project: top level managers often don't know enough about implementer constraints and resources: current employee skills do not match the project requirements; current technology can't support project needs; other projects and daily tasks are more critical or salient to the employees' success. Sometimes current employee evaluation, compensation and promotion systems lead employees to focus on goals that are at cross-purposes to the project goals. While this is something within top management control, they rarely acknowledge or even notice it, and therefore it goes unchanged.

When front line employees define project goals, they may do so because they see the need first hand: customer behavior changes, calling for a new service method; access to a supply changes, requiring substitutions; or there's a shift in the labor pool, requiring new training systems.

Again, good reasons. The risks of bottom-up defined project scope are that folks at the front don't have access to or understanding of corporate resources, and may ask for unreasonable funding or management attention. They don't see where the overall organization is headed, and may not realize that their project goals run counter to the strategic direction. And they don't have access to competitive analysis that might require them to speed up or slow down or drop their project.

Ultimately, when project requirements come from the top, the implementers complain that management is being unreasonable: "we can't possibly get this done in that amount of time!" When project requirements come from the bottom, senior managers don't value the outcome and therefore don't reward success and may not supply needed resources or champion-support.

Solution? Communication!

While ideas for projects should come from everywhere, project scope and resource allocation must be defined by a cross-level group. Senior people in the group must recognize that by their very title they may inhibit surfacing of critical information and must therefore make extra effort to create psychological safety within the group. Everyone should recognize what each member brings to the table.

With open communication and clear understanding of each person's limited vision, project goals will be defined more precisely, leading to greater success.

"Managers help people find and mine the gold that lies within them."

Edward Hallowell. Shine: Using Brain Science to Get the Best from Your People