A631.6.4.RB_HallMike

After watching the video, I see direct parallels from them to topics in our text - both of them focused on changing culture to create a better organization.  With the first video, Gallery Furniture had taken a huge hit and decided that they needed to revamp the organization in order to survive the housing market crash.  Originally, their focus was on new home furniture so their sales force did not have to go out and seek people, the customer came to them.  When the market changed, this was no longer the case.  Now the salespeople needed to reengage with customers that might leave the store (an action called prospecting) and as a result, they needed to get the customer’s contact information prior to leaving.  Many employees were against this because they felt like this was extra work – it went against their moderate culture.  Because the change was incompatible with existing change, McIngvale went about changing the culture by sharing the vision.  He did this by using 6 sources of influence (2 of which were not described) that manifested themselves by creating the following things within the organization: prospecting (as discussed earlier), coaching (helping weaker personnel out by showing them better sales techniques), enablers (providing tech savvy personnel to assist less tech savvy personnel with the implementation of new technology – specifically iPads to aid in gathering customer information), incentive pay (their original commission program was ineffective at increasing motivation), feedback (they created a feedback system for both the employees and the customers), and recognition (recognizing good employees).  These 6 items easily fit into the sharing the vision discussion within the text.  An aggressive training program was implemented to ensure employees received the necessary skills, focus was placed on employee health and wellness (something that increased moral while cutting health costs), a programs were implemented to limit rework (thus increasing customer satisfaction – another goal was to create customers for life).  With that being said, when looking at fig 15.5, I am not able to determine which block of the matrix he went with.  Their needed to be a culture/strategy change and the change was not compatible with existing culture – none of the blocks really fit this scenario.

GEN McChrystal’s lecture was incredibly informative and full of nuggets of wisdom that I am no kidding going to start using immediately.  His discussion was focused almost entirely on creating strong culture within organizations through listening and caring.  When looking at fig 15.5, I would say his discussion focused on managing change and reinforcing the culture.  His multiple stories described how the Army develops their personnel to share a common bond and knowledge that everyone is looking out for everyone else (i.e. culture).  This team unity (shared purpose) is essential – with a sense of security, much more focus can be placed on accomplishing the task at hand.  He also discussed how modern times have led to new challenges for leaders, specifically inversion of expertise.  Older people might not be as well versed with new technology as younger people.  As a result, a leader must be willing to listen to subordinates and be reversed mentored to get the leader up to speed.  Finally, he stressed that leaders must be willing to watch out for his followers, and the followers must know that their leader has their backs. 

As mentioned, there are several quotes that I am going to start spreading.  First, “A leader can let you fail but not let you be a failure” – failing is an important part of the learning process, however often people get caught up with the singular failure and lose sight of the big picture.  A leader must be able to allow someone to learn through their mistakes but keep them focused on the big picture.  The second quote: “A leader isn’t good because they are right; they are good because they are willing to learn and to trust.”  Finally, “if you are a leader the people you have counted on will help you out and if you are a leader the people who count on you need you on your feet.”  Absolutely fantastic quotes about leadership!

A631.5.4.RB_HallMike

Leadership is something that is so extraordinary in the way that it can get people to do great things.  Just as the blog question states, people do not come into a position of leadership by happenstance – it is often the culmination of years of hard work in both a technical and personnel sense.  This very reason is why leadership is such an amazing trait.  Many people have interpersonal skills but have the technical skills of the pencil sitting in front of me.  Likewise, there are many an engineer that is brilliant in the technical sense yet have the personality of the afore mentioned pencil.  Leadership requires such an interesting skill set in order to be effective at it and sometimes, the traits exhibited to get into a position of leadership might not be compatible with effective leadership traits. 

I think one of the big reasons the armed services in general and the Navy in particular is having such a hard time with leadership right now is related to this problem.  As a naval officer progresses, the responsibility he has increases.  This trend continues until he commands a ship however there is a significant difference between the management and leadership skills required of a CO versus a Department Head.  A department head can get results by displaying marginal management skills only. 

Navy FITREPS (your effectiveness) are mostly an objective form that shows your accomplishments (in rather frilly language at times) so that you can be ranked against your peers.  What this form fails to capture is your personality/the intangibles associated with leadership.  A slave driver (substituted here for a marginal department head) can accomplish similar feats that a leader can, however the morale, wellbeing, and general effectiveness of the command is going to be completely different.  Due to the inability of the FITREP to accurately capture this, people that produce results but are poor leaders are promoted to positions where the skill set changes.  The CO of the ship isn’t just a producer of results; he is the main individual that is responsible for the general wellbeing of the ship.  They fail to grasp that yelling, abuse, and micromanaging are ineffective ways to manage groups of people and as a result, the ship suffers.  Low retention rates, poor morale, and lacksidasical attitudes throughout the ship are key indicators that the CO is in over their head.  In my short time in the Navy, I have one specific example of this.  During my qualifications, I rode another ship that had just been cleared of a CO that produced explicit results (i.e. he got the ship out of the yard on time and through sea trials) however every officer on the ship was leaving the Navy due to his personality (or lack thereof).  Included in these officers was a 14 year nuclear engineer and the highest rated Navigator in the squadron.  This CO had left the ship about 3 weeks before I showed up, and he had been replaced by an outstanding officer.  The new CO was firm but personable.  He had patience with the crew, punished them when appropriate, and rewarded them likewise.  Everything we did on that underway had a purpose that was explained.  In the 4 months I was on board, the aura of the ship went from dark and gloomy to bright and cheery, all because the cancer had left.

So what do I think is required of a successful leader?  First off, I think they must unequivocally stand by their morals – they should be a beacon for you to live up to.  Secondly, they must have technical skills – nothing shakes confidence in a leader like watching one flop and twitch in a situation they should know about.  Thirdly(and probably most importantly), they must genuinely care about the people below them – I was fortunate to be part of a command that made you truly feel like you were part of a team and a team that looked out for one another.  Fourthly, they must have a vision for where they want the team to go.  Fifthly, they must be an excellent communicator – you can’t accomplish the vision unless you can effectively tell people what the vision is.  Sixthly, a leader must have patience – things will not go according to plan, yelling about it will not accomplish a thing other than driving solutions away.  Finally, the must be open to criticism and feedback – there is nothing more frustrating than being asked for your input, you put time and effort into providing it, only to find out that it was completely blown off.

A631.4.4.RB_HallMike

Self-Managing Work Teams (SMWT) are something that I am rather skeptical of as I think they only apply to certain very specific situations.  My experience in the Navy has shown that supervision is required in even the most mundane of situations and leadership is very handy at all levels.  From the video, the speaker describes SMWT as a group of highly skilled individuals that often have years of experience doing their jobs.  I see this as drawback statement number 1 – you have to have a skilled and disciplined group of workers in order for this to be feasible, something that companies would have a hard time finding (or at least I would imagine) and is the reason why organizations tend to apply this method to specific areas vice entire organizations.  This also creates an advantage – if you have such a work force, all you need to do is give them the end and let them figure out the means.  Their collective experience allows them to perform the job in the manner in which they see fit, which is probably more efficient and effective compared to what a manager might order.  The flatter organizational structure I would imagine saves companies salaries of management but it also limits the opportunities for advancement as there are limited positions available.  I think the major advantage to these teams is the morale boost one would get from being in the team due to an increased level of meeting the core job dimensions and job enrichment.  They are more involved with the product they are making, receive perks for doing a good job, control their lives to a much greater extent, and allows for growth as a person.  I also see a disadvantage as having to deal with team decision making processes.

If the situation warranted, the proper work force was available, and the SMWT was properly applied, I think I would enjoy being part of a SMWT, as long as I myself had the necessary skills to be part of the team.  However, I could also see how I would not enjoy being in an environment without clearly defined leadership (for lack of better words).  I don’t think that a group of people can exist together in an environment where decisions have to be made without someone moving to the forefront and becoming at the very least an impromptu leader.  I understand that there are internal team leaders that can be elected or appointed, however these guys/gals aren’t getting paid any differently than other team members.  As such, I see SMWT as a savvy way for businesses to eliminate higher paying management jobs and pushing the responsibilities to people that are not getting paid to do them.

Skills that an external leader would have to have are many.  Communication would be first and foremost in my book.  Being able to communicate inspiration, teaching, and facilitating team meetings would be crucial for the leader.  Additionally, being able to track the progress of different teams doing potentially a wide variety of different things would be quite the challenge.  Along that same line, having the technical knowledge to be able to advise and mentor the many different functions the SMWT have within them would require tons of learning.  As the book clearly states, the external leader often takes the role of a practitioner using process interventions.  I would imagine that many external leaders are promoted team members so they have more technical knowledge than management knowledge.  This would lead to the practitioner aspect of the role being incredibly challenging.

A631.3.4.RB_HallMike

Feedback and goal setting is something that I would have thought pretty much everyone that is successful does.  Without goals, you essentially wander aimlessly going from one point to another, dealing with things that strike your fancy.  On the other hand, if you have goals, your waste of our most precious resource – time – will be limited.  In my personal life, I have goals set for both the long term and short term in both my private and professional life and they are what drive me day to day.  Feedback is something else that I must have in order to accomplish things to my standards.  From a professional standpoint, I strive to produce deliverables that are essentially error free and ready to be immediately used pending a quick review from my superiors.  I don’t want my supervisors to have to spend hours adjusting my work; after all, that is generally why they delegated the task to me in the first place (to take it off their plate so they can focus on more pressing matters).  In order to ensure this, I am constantly asking for feedback to better my work processes and methods.  If I can learn what my boss wants to see, I can eliminate the rework for the both of us by doing it right the first time.  From an operational standpoint, feedback is also crucial.  I became a very good Officer of the Deck (OOD) by always inviting feedback from my superiors.  I would think out loud so they could hear my thought processes and critique them, and I would also ask how they would have done things differently to obtain their perspective.

From the research on feedback and goal setting I conducted, I was both surprised and not surprised by some of the findings.  It is not surprising that when feedback and goals are intertwined, the performance level of personnel increases.  What was surprising was that positive feedback contributes little to this phenomenon.  According to studies, positive feedback can lead to levels of complacency and lack of aggressive pursuit of goals.  To me this was initially counter-intuitive but after some thought, I figured out where my misunderstanding was.  My first thoughts of positive feedback would be a coach saying good job after making a great play, or your boss saying that the report you turned in was outstanding.  I would be glad to hear it but on the other hand, I know that my work isn’t perfect and without me knowing what I did wrong, I can’t fix it.  The same thing applied to sports when I thought about it – even my best swims during my career had aspects that I could improve on and my coach was sure to tell me about them after congratulating me on a good swim.  Sometimes they were big fixes, sometimes small, but the only way to pursue perfection is to constantly look for ways to better yourself (through goals) and you can’t do this without having feedback provided to you.

Given that my experience in the work force is with a younger than average age group (the CO is the oldest guy on the boat in his early 40s), I can’t really speak for the generational gap in feedback.  I can say that in my limited experience in a small community, feedback is both highly encouraged and sought after.  As I described above, you can’t get better unless you know what you are doing wrong, and that is the purpose of feedback (learning after the fact as opposed to teaching – learning that is done prior to the fact).  I generally like to receive feedback as long as it is constructive but I will admit sometimes I don’t like it in the moment (operationally speaking).  This was especially true in my early days on the sub when my engineer would pick me to pieces during drills (he would get me on the small things that I would overlook) - it would drive me nuts during the evolution but once I cooled off I greatly appreciated the help and applied the lessons learned.  I can honestly say that my attention to detail is a direct result of him picking at me for the 30 months that he did.  As far as giving feedback, it really depends on my comfort level with both the person and the evolution/task.  If I feel very comfortable with the material, I will probably offer feedback; if I am very comfortable with the person, the feedback will probably be unsolicited if it is appropriate.  The way I usually approach feedback is from a discussion point of view – I ask them why they did something in the manner in which they did it (this often allows them to realize their own mistakes as they hear themselves say something wrong) and then explain why what they did was wrong or inefficient.  This worked out really well on my first sub and is something that I will use again once I get back out to sea. 

With respect to the final portion of this blog, clearly I think that feedback is a crucial aspect of being a professional.  If you are not constantly attempting to better yourself, you are regressing.  Goals and feedback are tools to help you ensure that you achieve all that you can.  I firmly believe that feedback is an essential tool in the work place and one that should be stressed at all levels.  I can attribute much of my success to both the goals that I have set for myself and the goals that others have set for me, as well as feedback that I have received over my career.