It's Getting Hot in Here: Avoiding the Frog's Fate (2 of 2)
In the Marine Corps, there's an expression: A commander can be forgiven for being defeated but never for being surprised.
~Jake Auchincloss
This is the second installment of strategies leaders can use to keep themselves from becoming boiled frogs.
I outlined why and how leaders get boiled here.
For leaders who find the thought of getting slowly cooked unappealing, I offer six approaches for staying out of the pot:
- Meet with the Front Line
- Go to the Biggest Problem
- Demonstrate a Love of Bad News
- Flatten the Hierarchy...without Restructuring
- Ignore the Cheers
- Establish Operating Mechanisms to Increase the Chances of Getting Critical Information
I covered #1-3 here. This article will cover #4-6.
Flatten the Hierarchy...Without Restructuring. In my popular post questioning the value of 1-1s, I described how more and more leaders are flattening their hierarchies and increasing the number of direct reports, which makes having regular 1-1s harder. Leaders are doing this for a number of reasons, but one of them is clearly to remove the information filters.
The 55 direct reports that Jensen Huang has is not practical for most, but in his book on the The Nvidia Way, Huang describes other ways to flatten the hierarchy.
"Strategy isn't what I say. It's what they do," Jensen Huang says. "So it's really important that I understand what everybody is doing." He operationalized this by asking for "Top 5 Things" (T5T) emails...from everyone.
That's right, Jensen asks every employee in NVIDIA, at all levels, to send a weekly T5T email. He wants them to describe the top five things they're working on or what they've recently observed in the market - things like customer pain points, what competitors are doing, any kind of new development in technology, if there are any project delays, etc.
He doesn't want information that has already made its way through layers of management. "What I want is information from the edge."
But beyond getting unfiltered information, He is looking for the next billion dollar market, a frontier that has not been explored because it barely exists, but one day could be a thing.
"It's easy to pick up on the strong signals, but I want to intercept them when they are weak."
One of the weak signals that he intercepted years ago was a wonky but exciting development in machine learning that kept popping up in T5T emails. Jensen decided that NVIDIA needed to invest more in tools for accelerating workloads on its GPUs. This is why they're a $3 trillion company today.
Ignore the Cheers. I mentioned previously that teams tend to drown their bosses in flattery and I shared what Home Depot CEO Bernie Marcus told his successor Frank Blake about all the laughs he would get from his team: "Remember, you're not that funny."
That's a good reminder that some of the things your team says to you are pure flattery, not the truth. It's sycophancy, "strategic sucking up" as my colleague Gordy Curphy likes to say.
But this "ignore the cheers" suggestion is counsel for times when the flattery is actually true.
Roger Rosenblatt tells the story of Bill Russell, the great Boston Celtics center who led his Celtics to eleven N.B.A. championships. Despite his absolute dominance at the position, he was booed, every night, by the racist Boston crowd.
One day, his daughter said to him, “Daddy, how can you stand all that booing?”
He replied, “I don’t hear the boos because I don’t hear the cheers.”
Rosenblatt says, "one makes a great mistake believing the grand things said about him or her, even if those things are true... especially if they’re true.
The important thing, at any age, is to do the work. The work is far more satisfying than a truckload of compliments."
Nikola Jokic, Denver's star center, one of the most dominant players currently in the NBA gets asked game after record-setting game what he thinks about his accomplishments. He says the games will be fun to think about and watch after he retires.
He doesn't care about the accolades, even though it is completely deserved. He's focused on right now and the work that he needs to do.
What Schwarzman heard that morning had to do with the ridiculous over development of housing in Spain which turned out to be the first inklings of the 2007 collapse of the housing bubble.
Establish Operating Mechanisms to Increase the Chances of Getting Particularly Critical Pieces of Information. Obviously, some information is more critical than others. There are three areas in particular you should never lose the pulse of: customers, the external market environment, and how effective your leadership is and how it is perceived.
Customers. What are the customer listening posts? When is this information systematically evaluated for trends?
One of the most successful companies in the world, Haier, has a concept called "Zero Distance from the Customer" and it uses that close connection to spin off micro businesses to pursue market/business opportunities based on what it learns from unmet customer needs.
They gather the information continuously, have a rhythm for reviewing it, and a rhythm for making decisions about spinning off new businesses. It is baked into their operating calendar.
Environment. How often do you and your team do environmental scans?
One popular approach is known as a PESTLE scan (Political, Economic, Sociological, Technological, Legal and Environmental). It is typically done annually as part of the strategic planning process.
But many business environments are changing too rapidly for an annual environmental scan to be enough. Some leaders have operationalized a weekly PESTLE scans.
Consider the approach used by Steven Schwarzman to build Blackstone, the financial colossus.
"There are many great aspects of our culture. Every Monday morning, for example, all of our investment teams gather to talk about their deals and their context. Starting at 830AM and running until early afternoon. We discuss the global economy, politics, conversations with our investors, media, any issue that might affect the business. Then we go through a list of our live deals, sharing our insights and activities from our different activities around the world. Anyone could attend. Those who had something relevant to say were encouraged to say it, whatever their age or rank within the firm. To this day, Monday mornings remain the clearest demonstration of our commitment to transparency, equality, and intellectual integrity." ~Steve Schwarzman, What It Takes
Do you think every Monday morning is overkill? Think this can't help you from getting slowly boiled? Read on.
"On Monday in the Fall of 2006, I settled into my chair. Colleagues filled every seat, even the benches along the wall. Video screens showed our colleagues, in London, Mumbai, and Hong Kong. We talked about politics, the macro economy, trends in our business. These meetings always gave me the sense of manning a mission control center, navigating Blackstone through a fast-changing, uncertain environment. What I heard that morning scared me."
That was from the chapter in his book aptly titled Listen for Discordant Notes.
What Schwarzman heard that morning had to do with the ridiculous over development of housing in Spain which turned out to be the first inklings of the 2007 collapse of the housing bubble.
And that early warning along with other triangulations that surfaced in subsequent Monday meetings enabled Blackstone to come through the financial crisis not only relatively unscathed, but with plenty of liquidity to invest in the distressed asset opportunities that were suddenly everywhere.
I don't know if you caught it in the story, but these Monday meetings helped Schwarzman stay out of the pot in two ways. First, he is getting timely environmental scans. Second, by opening the Monday meetings to all levels, he is also flattening the hierarchy.
Your Leadership Blind Spots. One of the most advanced technological marvels ever developed is the modern nuclear submarine.
Despite the astonishing technology, it turns out they have blind spots in their sonar coverage, directly behind the engines, known as the baffles. This area is difficult to monitor due to engine noise.
If technological marvels have blind spots, imagine the ones we mere mortals have.
"Russian [sub] captains sometimes turn suddenly to see if anyone's behind them. We call it "Crazy Ivan." ~Jonesy, The Hunt for Red October.
Maybe Ivan's not so crazy after all.
I mentioned here that the higher you go, the less personal feedback you get.
When was the last time you got real feedback on how you are perceived and how you are leading the team?
You say, "I ask for it all the time. I have an open door."
You can ask for feedback all you want, but it's a low probability that whatever you get is all that honest. There is too much at stake for those you are asking. I like to remind my clients contemplating giving feedback to the boss to remember It's Still a Tiger.
The well-known 360 feedback assessments or data from Employee surveys (that can be tied back to the manager) are better ways to get objective information on your leadership.
If you're a senior leader and it has been more than a couple years since you got any anonymous personal feedback, you're overdue.
If you have never gotten 360 feedback, prepare to be both pleasantly surprised and completely dismayed.
Most leaders think they have great, high-performing teams. Most leaders are kidding themselves.
While 360s are well-known, a less well-known but equally revealing "Crazy Ivan" is getting feedback from your team about how the team is working, how good its outputs are, and how well you are leading them.
A Team Assessment Survey (TAS) asks the team to provide perspective on Whats & How's across eight dimensions that are critical to team effectiveness.
Most leaders think they have great, high-performing teams. Most leaders have their heads in the sand.
I like the Team Assessment Survey in particular because there is nowhere to hide. First, it provides the teams' perspective across the eight dimensions and shows the leader the teams' ratings vs his/her own.
Second, for those leaders prone to finding ways to dismiss the views of the team, the TAS provides benchmark information on how the team's scores compare to leaders and teams in similar industries and at similar levels.
Many leaders find the feedback sobering. But when they are ready to face the music, they are equally pleased to have a roadmap for what they and the team need to work on to become a high-performing team.
You might be in denial, but your calendar isn't.
Not a Matter of Luck
I touched on this Nick Saban quote in Part 1:
"Average players want to be left alone. Good players want to be coached. Great players want to be told the truth." ~Nick Saban Hall of Fame College Football Coach
It's hubris to think that I could add anything to what the legendary Nick Saban has said, but that won't stop me.
My add would be "And the really great players make sure they create regular opportunities to get that truth."
Beyond the channels for less filtered information outlined in these two articles, I hope what comes through on all six of these suggestions is the need to operationalize a cadence around getting that truth.
Scheduled front line listening sessions. Explicitly defined company-wide meeting norms (the Amazon norm was "clear memos and messy discussions"). T5T emails every Friday to see how the strategy is being lived. An explicit cadence of Customer and Environmental scans, 360s and Team Assessment Surveys.
William Faulkner supposedly said, "I only write when i am inspired. Fortunately, I am inspired at 9 o'clock every morning."
You might be in denial, but your calendar isn't. Your defined operating norms, practices, and processes reveal the truth as well.
If you want the truth, then you need to get serious about defining the mechanisms and rhythm with which you'll get it.
Operationalize or get boiled. Your call.
Dennis Adsit, Ph.D. is an executive coach, organization consultant, and designer of The First 100 Days and Beyond, a consulting service that has helped hundreds of newly hired and promoted executives get great starts in challenging new jobs.