Abstract: The CEO hired high performing individuals. The challenge was to let these individuals perform. Without his awareness, the CEO's leadership style was adversely affecting employee performance. Once aware of that impact, the CEO became a successful student of his staff. Having the Courage to Ask . . . It required considerable courage for this CEO and owner of a financial services company to ask his employees, "What can I do to improve my performance as Chief Executive Officer of this company?" This CEO listened as employees told him, "Empower your staff and improve teamwork." The company had experienced considerable growth over the past 5 years to include multiple locations and quadrupling the number of employees – the company was definitely on the technical fast track. Like a railroad track, there are two tracks inherent in an organization – a technical track and the people track – and both tracks require maintenance to ensure high performance. The CEO knew the technical track was being maintained as evidenced by the rapid growth – he thought the people track was likewise being maintained, as he prided himself in employing high-performing individuals and allowing them to perform. On a closer examination of his company, the CEO quickly realized that he, like so many other CEOs, concentrated on developing the necessary systems to monitor the technical growth and financial health of his company, but failed to do the same for the people track. The employees expressed considerable frustration and, without being fully aware, the CEO was strangling the organization with micro management practices. Though the CEO knew that his company's success depended on high-performing people, the employees expressed the fact that they were not allowed to perform. The CEO recognized that continued growth of his company was predicated on the need for him to remove all roadblocks to high performance. The first step in the process was to define the teamwork behaviors that were to serve as the glue to hold working relationships together. TeamWork Value Statement Employees throughout the company participated in writing the company's TeamWork Value Statement (TWVS), identifying the specific values and behaviors to be institutionalized throughout the company. Their TeamWork Value Statement reads as follows: Achieving professional excellence through teamwork, characterized by open communication, compassion, integrity, trust and respect, while exhibiting a positive attitude. Then, they defined the content of their TeamWork Value Statement: Professional Excellence - Our common goals are defined
- We understand our common goals
- We are held accountable to achieve our common goals
Teamwork - We understand what we need from each other
- We willingly work to meet each others' needs
- We provide the necessary feedback regarding the quality of meeting each other' needs
- We are flexible to do that which needs to be done
Open Communication - We encourage each other to openly express their ideas
- We are kept informed with the facts needed to complete our jobs
- We ask each other for assistance when needed
- We readily admit our mistakes
- We readily admit the limitations of our knowledge
Compassion - We are willing to "go the extra mile" to assist each other
- We enjoy each other's success
- We remain emotionally calm (patient) with each other
- We offer each other support through encouragement
Integrity - We competently complete our job responsibilities
- We do what is right, because it is right
- We consistently apply our policies and procedures
- We are receptive to finding a better way (change)
Trust - We are dependable and do what we agree upon
- We keep confidential information confidential
- We have the necessary authority to complete our job responsibilities
Respect - We ask each other for input
- We listen to understand that input
- We try to use that input whenever possible
- We are kept informed when our input was not used
- We accept each other as individuals
Positive Attitude - We look for the good in every situation
- We view mistakes as learning opportunities
- We create the personal environment in which others enjoy working with us
- We enjoy the camaraderie of each other's company
Putting Teamwork to Work The next step involved institutionalizing the teamwork behaviors into the day-to-day operations. To achieve this, the CEO incorporated the use of the MBC Software methodologies to measure the extent the teams were actually using the behaviors contained within their TWVS. The CEO realized the importance of measuring the people track in a manner similar to the system used for measuring the technical track. He also agreed that bottom-up commitment to improve teamwork within his company was created by top-down change. Thus, the teambuilding efforts began in earnest with the senior management team. Teams throughout the organization measured their use of the desired behaviors. Doing so identified each team's strengths and specific behaviors that needed improvement. Strategies were then defined to improve the measured weaknesses and each respective team measured their success to implement these strategies. The Owner Becomes the Student Top-down change creates bottom-up commitment and the CEO agreed to participate in a mentoring team that consisted of the company's president plus several financial planners and support staff. The primary objectives for the mentoring group were to offer suggestions to improve the CEO's behavior and then measure his performance. The mentoring team suggested that the CEO: - Define the level of authority for the down-line management staff
- Allow employees at all levels to use their authority
- Slow down to think through an issue before taking action
- Share the logic of his decisions with those affected
- Continue identifying tasks that can be delegated
The CEO's performance was impressive! He worked hard to make the necessary personal changes to successfully implement his improvement strategies and the measured perception showed immediate progress. His progress was shared throughout the organization to demonstrate his commitment to create an environment characterized by their TWVS. The mentoring team then turned their attention to measuring the president's behaviors and offered the following suggestions for his continued improvement: - Inform affected parties about computer system interruptions
- Inform affected parties when he makes a mistake
- Identify what was learned from mistakes made
- Be more receptive to feedback from others
- Take advantage of opportunities to be more visible to clients
- Walk around the office to be more visible to staff
After the CEOs remarkable turnaround, there was considerable pressure on the president to also meet this challenge. He had been recently elected to serve in this capacity as a result of the reorganization of the company's infrastructure and very willingly, he too accepted this challenge to improve his interpersonal performance and successfully implemented the suggestions offered by the mentoring group. Friction Eases The final step in the process was to improve working relationships between teams. The friction between the various teams at the beginning of the company's effort to improve teamwork was intense. The original plan was to measure the implementation of the TWVS between teams, then define and implement strategies to improve the measured weaknesses. As employees completed the effort to improve working relationships among members of the various teams and their team leaders, the working relationships between teams concomitantly improved. Cooperation and communication efforts increased, tensions eased, and inter-team performance improved. In Summary The CEO listened to his employees who were saying his leadership practices were not only stifling creativity, but also injected considerable frustration that served to reduce morale and adversely impacted performance. Fortunately, the CEO accepted the organizational truism that the perception held by others can have more of an impact upon the organization than his self-perception. He agreed with his employees and recognized the need to implement the company's TWVS, enabling his company to achieve higher levels of financial performance. Are You Ready To . . . - Convert your training, coaching and/or mentoring investments into skill application and behavior change?
- Know for sure that your employees are effectively applying training on the job?
- Increase accountability that your employees are receiving coaching and feedback to improve in the areas that matter most?
- Grow your company as your employees grow and change?
If you answered, "Yes" to these questions, then you are ready for an easy-to-use, proven performance support system to measure behavior change and/or skill application attributed to training, coaching and/or mentoring.
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