February 22nd, 2010
Another piece of research, published by Good practice Ltd (www.goodpractice.com) explores how managers learn and stresses the strong link between learning and performance. It reveals that most learning is informal on-the-job learning, very much about how to get better at doing the job.
This supports what we have always stressed, that the best medium of learning is the work to be done. Indeed the meta-levels of such learning are about re-focusing the work to be done to better meet it’s purpose and then evolving the purpose itself – raising the game!
We see this phenomenon in competitive sports (witness the winter Olympics) where people learn to perform and then learn to be among the leaders before, just possibly breaking new ground and learning to take things to a new level. Everyone has a quest to be as good as they can be and therefore has an appetite for learning.
Not all learning is of the same kind. We need first to learn how to do a job and then how we need to learn to change in ourselves, in order to do it better. Finally we enable the whole process to become more fit for the world. In hierarchical control and command organisations, these three levels of learning are often divided. Those low in the hierarchy are expected to just do as directed. Middle level people have the job of getting people to get better results. Only the top folk occasionally think about the name of the game. This division fails to tap into the creative potential of the vast majority of people. How much better that senior people devolve all three learnings throughout the organisation. The work of leadership is to lead learning.
So how does this happen? If leaders are not leading learning, what are they doing? How can people be encouraged to have an appetite for learning and meta-learning?
Tags: high performance, leadership, leadership research, learning, levels of learning, meta-learning
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February 15th, 2010
A recent survey by ACE, Scala and Salans of 550 senior HR professionals across 17 countries, suggests that the recession has given organisations the motivation to strengthen their existing leadership. This means that, as the economy recovers, those organisations are going be well placed to succeed.
Scala Group’s founder, Janice Caplan, comments on leadership’s: “critical role in creating shared vision, values and understanding for the organisation. … providing strategic leadership through their … direct reports… will emphasise the issues of communication, coaching and training.”
After the unrestrained greed and gluttony of the boom years, when leadership hardly seemed to matter, recession has given us a wake-up call. Old ideas of leadership no longer fit the bill. Organisations are made of people, along with their structures, systems and processes. Without effective leadership we have no means of engaging people in working together for their common good.
Leadership is not reserved to top management (where too often it is disconnected from action) but is present in every human interaction in the organisation. Leadership promotes the flow of information and knowledge to where it is most effective, by setting higher energies over lower ones. This evolutionary idea of leadership runs counter to the mechanistic model of organisation, that imagines that people need to be manipulated to make them work. Invoke authentic leadership and you will not be able to stop people giving of their best. If you are not already working on devolving authentic leadership at every level from the boardroom to the shop floor then now is the time to act.
If this all sounds strange to you, and even if it does not, then we should talk.
Posted in Authentic Leadership, Creativity and Innovation, Culture Change | No Comments »
January 15th, 2010
The start of a new decade may not command the razzmatazz of a new millennium (only a decade ago) but it is worth noting nevertheless. What have we in store?
We read that the Chartered Management Institute’s Future Forecast survey suggests that business leaders recognise the importance of looking inwards and that putting staff back at the heart of their organisations will enhance their chances of a speedy post-recession recovery. We also hear the Work Foundation has proven a link between outstanding company performance and people-centred leadership.
Here is confirmation of what we have long believed. There is little doubt that organisations are shaking off the vestiges of the scientific management paradigm and seeking something more sustainable and wholesome. That means involving and engaging people rather than treating them as assets to be managed. It means we need a new kind of leadership – leadership throughout an organisation not just figurehead leadership. It means changing how people see and value their diversity and how we bring them together in creative relationship. It means helping people to appreciate the value of their unique contributions and to discover ways to serve the greater good. It means breaking free from past dysfunctional systems (e.g. bonus culture) and inventing something better.
People are at the heart of organisations and organisations serve people, so organisations need to organise themselves around their value-adding stream. The start of a new decade and emergence from recession give us all wonderful opportunities to re-think, re-conceptualise and re-invent your organisations nearer to your heart’s desire and nearer to what works.
Here at CMC we are developing the threefold nature of our business to better serve you, our customers.
We can offer you our deep experience in facilitation, designing and running bespoke processes to help you develop the leadership, the teams and the strategies to engage people and keep you abreast of change.
Our High Trenhouse ‘innovation centre’ provides the ideal venue and ambience to develop your strategic teamwork.
LogoVisual technology provides facilitation, training and the processes and tools to help you embrace the new decade’s shifting priorities.
Call us and we will be glad to meet with you to explore what matters to you, what concerns you currently and how our processes can help ensure you keep ahead of the game.
Posted in Authentic Leadership, Culture Change, Teamwork | No Comments »
January 14th, 2010
Where does creativity come from – how can we get more of it when its needed?
Tapping Creativity is something we all want to do but it has its associated risks. How do we tap creativity in our organisations and for what? Is creativity anything other than the ability to pro-actively change with the times?
Creativity is sometimes seen narrowly as producing novelty for its own sake but truly it underpins how leadership helps us all as individuals, groups and organisations, to maintain our grip on life.
Read the article Tapping Creativity here
Posted in Creativity and Innovation | No Comments »
January 4th, 2010
Having lived and worked these last thirty years at relatively high altitude and with a severe climate, I have learned to cope. For instance, we have a policy of keeping cars in the valley so we can get out and about, even when the worst winter weather comes. Its odd, then, to see city tourists dicing with disaster as they enjoy the scenery, risking their expensive motors on snow-bound single track roads with no turning spaces. Apart from the nuisance to essential travellers, it usually results in abandoned vehicles, unless they are fortunate enough to be rescued by a local farmer with a tractor.
It strikes me that there are parallels with the financial crisis. Our bankers are like the tourists, enjoying their adrenalin rush and expecting to be bailed out if things take a turn for the worse. Wise financiers would anticipate the ups and downs and plan accordingly and no doubt some will do so. There is little sympathy for the myopic people whose selfish reward system has cost us all dearly. When the thaw comes will anyone be any wiser? The signs are that they will not. The whole rotten system is un-responsive to feedback and needs to be reconstructed.
The rest of us can get some benefit from our lost investment by learning how to apply these lessons to our own situation. In our own organisations, are we seeing the wider picture (for instance how well are we prepared for the impact global warming?). What are we doing to broaden our perspective and ensure we are prepared to ride the coming storms?
See article on Resilience – How to Survive in Tough Times
Tags: behaviour, experience, leadership, lessons, survival
Posted in Authentic Leadership | No Comments »
