Sandy Schwan at Evolving Strategies, LLC

Yesterday? Nah. Tomorrow? Nope. Today? Let Us Begin!

"Yesterday is gone. Tomorrow has not yet come. We have only today. Let us begin."  Mother Teresa (1910–1997), Catholic nun, Nobel Peace Prize winner

I spoke with someone today who is busy going through some personal changes. His way of 'beginning today' to deal with these changes to propel him into the future was to 'purge' some physical baggage from his past. Of course, his physical baggage also represents emotional baggage.

I applauded his beginning today, as his past is gone. His is a soulful past, but it is his past. He is busy trying to live his future now, which seems to be bringing about its own set of stresses.

But...he has today. And he did what he could today to move beyond his past and into the future: he made a simple phone call to have someone remove some baggage, some past memories. Cheers. Congratulations. He began. He did something.

For organizational change, sometimes beginning today to change is the only option. Leaders develop plans for the future - and they should - but no one should lose sight of what can be done today.

Is there something you can do today - however small it may seem - that will impact today and possibly move you into the direction of you and/or your organization's future? If so, then have at it!

The Importance of Being On Time...But According to Whom?

Chronemics is the study of the use of time in nonverbal communication. How we perceive time, structure our time and react to time is a powerful communication tool, and helps set the stage for the communication process. Across cultures, time perception plays a large role in the nonverbal communication process. Time perceptions include punctuality, willingness to wait, and interactions. The use of time can affect lifestyles, daily agendas, speed of speech, movements and how long people are willing to listen.

Mike McGlinn, a senior vice president at The Northern Trust and adviser extraordinaire (see May 22, 2008, entry on biting your tongue), and I were talking about his important guidelines for leading teams. One guideline is stressing the importance of starting and ending meetings on time - punctuality overall. I agree and see this as a sign of respect for the time of the other people participating in the meeting. Does that mean Mike and I are monochronics?

Monochronic and Polychronic time systems are two systems commonly used to reference time and its influence on society.

• Monochronic: Things are done one at a time and time is segmented into precise, small units. Under this system time is scheduled, arranged and managed. Think North American and Western European cultures.
• Polychronic: Several things can be done at once, and a more fluid approach is taken to scheduling time. Think Latin American and Arabic cultures.

The statement “When in Rome, do as the Romans do” holds true with chronemics if you are undergoing an organization change or transformation, forming a new team, merging companies, working with a global team etc. Assess the situation and respond accordingly:

• Even though you are a timely person, you may have to deal with someone who is not as timely as you are. As appropriate, adapt your communication to their needs. These adaptations can vary depending on the position of the person you are dealing with, as well as the cultural background of that person.
• Although you will sometimes have to adapt to others, there will be times that things would be more positively balanced if the other parties adapted to your concept of time.
• Other assumptions: Consider main country location of the company, origin / influences of person you are meeting with, topic to be considered, time on year.

Adapted from Wikipedia

Measure Twice. Ask a Few Questions. Measure Again. Cut Once.

"The correct solution to any problem depends principally on a true understanding of what the problem is." Arthur Mellen Wellington

Have you ever seen people rallying around a solution, putting money and other resources towards building that solutions, only to eventually see that solution as an amazing non-solution? I have.

Confirmation bias: a tendency to search for or interpret new information in a way that confirms one's preconceptions and avoids information and interpretations which contradict prior beliefs.

Lots of interesting words, but what does it all mean? It means:

o        We think we understand the problem.

o        We think we have the answer(s) even though we may not fully understand the problem.

o        We will find information to support our understanding and ignore information that doesn’t support our line of thinking.

o        We may dig in our heels to support our point of view, ignoring new, factual information for any number of reasons (pride, not liking the message deliverer, not having the time to explore alternatives).

Pay attention to your confirmation biases the next time you are looking for the best solution to a problem. These biases are there – your challenge is to bring them to light. Your opportunity is the creation of spot on solutions. Ah – a win-win for all.

2008 U.S. City of the Year: Chicago

Here's to my city, Chicago, a city of constant change, just named Fast Company's 2008 U.S. City of the Year.

Wanna Change? Don't Forget to Plan

"The majority of people meet with failure because of their lack of persistence in creating new plans to take the place of those which fail." - Napoleon Hill

“Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” – Albert Einstein

Growing up professionally at Accenture, I learned to:

Plan your work and work your plan.

Now, in the case of managing change and leading change, alter the above-stated mantra to:

Change your work and work your change; or

Plan your change ... and plan to change your plan!

Can you last longer than 17 seconds? Bite your tongue!

"Listening looks easy, but it's not simple. Every head is a world." — Cuban Proverb

"Big egos have little ears." — Robert Schuller

So you say you want to listen longer without interrupting and better tune into what your colleagues are saying? Well, bite your tongue...for 17 seconds.

Unpacking mental models [Oh, I can just see John Bausch rolling his eyes at that terminology] - or taking the new information that you just heard and fitting it into the existing stuff in your head - can take 17 seconds or longer.

I further practiced being quiet for 17 second intervals this month. If I wanted to say something, I stopped and continued listening. [One of the effective change leaders I work with, Mike McGlinn, calls this RTUTS - Resist The Urge To Speak.]

The result? I can give you quality measures, not quantity measures, of employing this tactic:

• A higher performing team
• Deeper employee engagement
• Demonstrated leadership commitment
• More harmony amongst the change leaders*
• People across all stakeholder groups feeling 'heard'*

Not bad results to report for an organizational change. And, because of these results, our more quantitative program metrics increased significantly as well.

*I realize that the last two bullet points may be perceived by some as a bit sappy, but it usually takes sap vs. smarts to glue a team, a group, a department, an organization together.

ACTION: Shush for 17 seconds and listen! And have a nice day.

Courage, Cowboys, Chunking, Changing

"Courage is being scared to death, and saddling up anyway." John Wayne (1907-1979), American actor

Maybe it is my southern roots that causes my visceral reaction to this quote. It is just so easy for me to remember being frightened to saddle up on Old Paint, but my father made sure that I would still jump up and ride anyway. There was no turning back after my family drove out to the horse farm. And, my only other option was to hang out with those stinky old men with smelly stuff under their bottom lip.

Have you ever wanted to throw in the towel, not wanting to face an organizational change or personal change that is greeting you as your eyes flutter open in the morning?

APPLICATION: Chunking

One of my favorite leaders - who also happened to be my manager - early in my career always used to remind us at the beginning of each large-scale organizational change project that 'You can eat an elephant, but you can only do so one bite at a time.' Translation: try chunking, a more flexible learning style allowing you to absorb change and information and keep your momentum going.

Try breaking down your challenge / change / opportunity / elephant into smaller 'chunks' or bites. Use whatever element works best as your 'bite,' such as time, task or person:

1. Take an overwhelming project and break it down to the year, then the month, week, day, hour. Whatever it takes to get you through that overwhelming feeling. Try planning a day by the hour, or just decide to get yourself through to the lunch hour; then, allow yourself time to re-group and keep going
2. Focus on one task only - completing one section of that strategic plan - then re-group after you've completed that section to schedule tackling the next section
3. Handle the outstanding crucial conversations and attention that one person is needing before moving onto the next person

As hard as it may seem at the moment, remember that moments pass. Sometimes you just have to keep on keeping on. Even though you may not know exactly where the answer(s) will come from, know they will come. This is a great employee engagement technique as well. Model this behavior for your team while encouraging them to do the same. All of the great energy will certainly propel you as a high performing team.

Keep going. Go ride 'em, cowboys and cowgirls!

Struggle and Beauty

"One day in retrospect the years of struggle will strike you as the most beautiful."

Sigmund Freud (1856-1939), Austrian psychoanalyst

More later. For now, welcome Sienna Marie!

Surrounding Yourself With The Best - The Northern Trust Corporation

Kudos to one of my clients, The Northern Trust Corporation, for being named one of America's 500 best companies by Barron's. I am quite proud to serve and partner with such an esteemed organization!

http://webreprints.djreprints.com/1946660711156.html

Do as I Do and as I Say

"Model first, teach second." Dennis C. Kinslaw

Ah, such clarity and simplicity in this quote. What a great way to think about introducing new behaviors you want others to demonstrate. This can be difficult to do during an organizatonal change, but try it anyway. The payoff is grand, including an increased level of respect and perspective others will have of you as a leader. Better yet - you will likely trust yourself more as a leader.