Energy Consumers: Beware the Office Vampire

I am a big believer that having a firm command of your own physical, intellectual and emotional energy is imperative for everyone’s success.  As a leader, you need to make certain your team has positive emotional energy.  With that in mind, I thought I would share something interesting from April 9th’s Chicago Tribune.  I read Rex Huppke’s always amusing column “I Just Work Here”.  The column’s focus is the book Emotional Vampires by Al Bernstein, a Portland, Oregon-based clinical psychologist.  The book came out in 2000, but it is timeless – just like vampires. 

The premise of the book is there are people in the workplace whose actions and emotions suck the life out of fellow workers.  Instead of creating emotional energy, they are voracious consumers of it.  Bernstein sorts them into the following “vampire” types:

•  Anti-social vampires:  the rules are for suckers (no pun intended), not them.
•  Histrionic vampires:  no amount of unnecessary drama is too much.
•  Narcissistic vampires:  it is all about them, even when it is not.
•  Obsessive-compulsive vampires:  perfectionist who cannot see the forest for the trees.
•  Paranoid vampires:  positive they are right and everyone else is wrong.

These archetypes are exaggerations to make a point.  However, the negative effect they can have is not exaggerated at all.  Al Bernstein provides an “antidote” for each, but these are to be used by co-workers.  As the leader, your role is different. 

You need to maintain your leadership brand.  It must be consistent.  Your role is to keep returning everyone’s focus to the goal in a way that energizes you and the team.  To this end, be sure to praise in public and critique in private—it keeps the team cohesive.

I will be covering Team Dynamics more in the coming blogs.  Watch this space.

Keeping it Simple---Simplicity is a Competitive Weapon

Business leaders often talk about the need to simplify.  Complexity can be like a mutant cell reproducing rapidly and absorbing everything in its path.   Things get so complicated that dense power point slide presentations, exceedingly long meetings, and complex vocabulary proliferate.

Of course, at the deepest level, complexity exists in everything around us.  Even single celled amoebas, some of the most basic life forms, are rather complex critters.   However, when most of us learned about them in elementary school, we didn’t need to comprehend their every physical process to explain what made them so unique.  While sitting in biology class and bored out of my mind, I even took notice of the teacher’s simple message:  “amoebas are single cell animals that reproduce without sex.  Now that’s memorable!

In today’s business environment, it’s become more difficult to “get to the point” amid the onslaught of complex ideas and concepts. 

What to do?  

Business leaders must impress upon their people that simplification is a way of life; it is an expectation.  This requires instilling core beliefs like, ‘simple isn’t dumber, it’s smarter.”  Most importantly, senior leaders must “walk the talk” by demonstrating this skill themselves. 

Simplicity creates velocity.  

Simple ideas can be communicated and acted on more quickly.  They are less prone to misinterpretation and encourage inclusion by ensuring more people comprehend the idea.  Simplicity creates more passion, commitment, and achievement. 

Executives that value simplicity can be heard saying things like:

“What is your key point in one or two sentences?

“No more PowerPoint, tell me in one or two typed pages!”

“How would you describe this concept to a child?"

Simplicity is a competitive weapon.  

Companies that value simplicity move faster than those that don’t.  

Embrace simplicity and great business results will follow.

Please join in on this "discussion topic" on my Executive Challenge Group on Linked In: PowerPoint slide decks are the dominate medium most company executives use to communicate plans, strategies, etc. What is the downside? What would happen if your company cut PP use by 50%?

Getting Past the "But We Already Tried That" Response - my comment to a post by John Kotter on his Blog on HBR.com (Harvard Business Review)

Getting Past the "But We Already Tried That" response is fantastic piece by John Kotter on the Harvard Business Review HR Blog this month and (this is how I commented directly to him on the blog on10.14.10) this is a great example of how execution can get bogged down.  

Another variation of this "block" is to say, "great idea lets study this issue in more depth and get Joe, Bill, and Mary's opinion. Then you can bring it back to us and we can discuss it again."  This delay strategy often has the same effect as an outright block and can be harder to counter because it is disguised as prudent and thoughtful.  

In either case, it can be effective to  immediately establish what YOU AND THIS GENTLEMAN BOTH AGREE ON.  Then, invest some time offline to resolve the issue. This reduces defensiveness, establishes common values, and protects what might be fragile egos.  

It might go something like this:  "Joe, thanks for your thoughts.  They are really helpful.  Do you agree that it made sense to at least explore this idea because of its potential to drive productivity?  Okay, so I would really appreciate the opportunity to meet with you after this meeting to discuss the issue further.  Are you open to investing some time?  Great, I know we both want to improve this business."  

Now if Joe doesn't agree with the basic need to vet this idea, try another more general outcome, like, " I know we both want to see this business improve."  There are times when a little diplomacy can go a long way.

John Kotter  - HBR BLOG
On:Leadership,Managing People,Change Management

Getting Past the "But We Already Tried That" Response

10:23 AM Thursday October 14, 2010  | Comments (9) (I am one of them as above).

You and your team have been wrestling with the problem of increasing efficiencies without a big budget to make it happen. You've been authorized to look at every aspect of the process. One particularly enterprising young woman on your team has found that a complicated safety inspection procedure that was put in place fifteen years ago is no longer necessary because the parts that required inspection no longer exist in the product now being produced. And yet workers are holding up the production for the required amount of time in order to get sign-offs anyway.  Great! Simple! We get rid of this inspection process for parts that don't exist and increase productivity by 15%!

Not so fast. When you bring this insight to the management committee, one grizzled fellow says, "That won't work. We tried that five years ago and the lawyers wouldn't let us take it out of the subcontract." Now, this particular grizzled fellow is used to having his words taken as law. Everyone defers to him because he has been around a long time, is in a position of power, and knows a lot about the ins and outs of the critical and complicated production paths.

What do you do?

Certainly you could try to argue your point, but you don't have all the facts of what actually happened five years ago and past experience has shown that arguing with this fellow can be a dangerous activity.

The basic comeback for "We tried that already and it didn't work" is to say something like: "That's a good point, but that was then and this is today. You know, things change. They always do, for all companies everywhere. We don't make the exact same products. Our customers are changing" [or other basic, clear, facts that illustrate how things have changed]. "I'll make a call to the lawyers today, just to be safe" [if you haven't already done so, which you may have] "and if there's a problem with doing this now, we'll try to solve it and get right back to you. But we need the 15%, right? So unless the lawyers scream, why don't we agree now to go forward with the plan. I mean, it really is a terrific idea."

You must never get sucked into the black hole of "what happened 5 years ago." He may have more facts than you do, and make you look as if you didn't do your homework. (Of course it's always a good idea, as part of your preparation, to learn about earlier similar efforts and why they didn't work out.) The real danger, though, is getting drawn into a distracting conversation that goes on to the point where the idea is put aside because you've run out of time on the agenda. Or that the ensuing discussion either bores or confuses people so that they give up and lose interest.

"We already tried that" is one of the familiar attacks I've seen many times over the years. Be prepared for it, and mold your response to your own particular situation. What are some of the variations on this attack that you have seen?

John Kotter