Straying from organizational values is a slow fade.
Too often, senior leadership is so disassociated with how their people reflect corporate values outside of the organization, the brand is severely tarnished long before it’s noticed and damage control is initiated just after the nick of time.
It’s refreshing when a leader recognizes the culture is changing – or has changed – and jumps on an opportunity to address it and get the organization back on track.
Disclaimer: While Bill McRaven is a friend, we have exactly one Aggie and zero Longhorns in our firm.
What a breath of fresh air to have the University of Texas System Chancellor remind the System’s senior leaders that leading by example isn’t an option, and their example should be a good one.
In short, Chancellor McRaven (aka retired Admiral Bill McRaven who oversaw the bin Laden raid) wrote a letter to all UT System presidents and athletic directors reminding them that the US flag and national anthem still mean something and deserve respect. He adds that because young athletes learn so much of their behavior from adult athletes, UT athletes and staff would do well to demonstrate respect for the flag as a positive example for others.
So a man who understands service before self and the sacrifices made to keep this nation free asks, “… encourage your coaching staff and your players to stand up straight when the National Anthem is played; to face the flag and place their hand over their heart as a sign of respect to the nation.”Isn’t that what we all learned as kids?
Culture starts at the top, and the top of the UT System knows it. Well done, Bill. You’re this month’s Triangle Performance Leadership Leader.
Leadership Milquetoast
Xerox. A lifetime of “just after the nick of time.”
The company could have—should have—owned the whole damned computer industry. Bigger than Microsoft, bigger than Apple, bigger than IBM. It was theirs for the losing. And they just keep on losing it… their corporate tagline should be, “Xerox—just after the nick of time.”
Xerox built and programmed the first GUI (graphical user interface), before Apple, before Microsoft. Your mouse could point a cursor to information on a screen. It was connected to other computers via this thing they invented called Ethernet. In a nutshell, Xerox invented the PC. Way cool stuff.
Alas, the powers in Xerox believed it was a fad, and support for it would lessen support for their buggy whips paper copiers. Later, Xerox tried to get on board with their own line of PCs… just after the nick of time.
Xerox understood and engineered inkjet printers in the late 90’s. Delaying for further analysis and power struggles (after all, printers were not buggy whips copiers), they waited until HP’s inkjet division was larger than all of Xerox; then they launched an inkjet division… just after the nick of time.
IBM sold their PC business a decade ago; HP a few years ago. In the midst of this intense industry focusing, Xerox buys a service company to complement its buggy whips copiers, now surprisingly, must split it off… just after the nick of time.
If this company would ever get out of its own way, it could crush an industry. Unfortunately, it can’t, so won’t. Revenue in 2015 was almost 5% less than in 1999.Hate to lay all of this on Burns, but to modify the Polish idiom, “Your circus, your monkeys.” Our February Leader Milquetoast.
Leadership Laggard
It was all we could do to pass over Martin Shkreli, the much-reviled ex-CEO of Turing Pharmaceuticals, KaloBios Pharmaceuticals and Retrophin, as a Leadership Laggard since we started the newsletter segment last September. His buffoonery may have reached apogee with his latest stunt, amazingly not related to the three companies he’s nearly ruined.
He could have easily made it any month for his narcissistic profiteering on drugs at the expense of sick people. If you’ll recall, last summer he raised the price for a drug used by HIV patients by more than 5,000% for no reason except greed. Thankfully, he failed in his attempt to do the same thing in November with a drug to fight another parasitic – this time hoping to garner a price a thousand times higher than today’s cost.
And who could have argued the Laggard label when he was indicted in December for defrauding investors in his hedge fund Ponzi scheme at MSMB Capital [mis]Management and pillaging the Retrophin coffers to cover his tracks.
That’s right, Shkreli owns the only copy of the latest Wu-Tang Clan album, and is threatening to erase Dennis Coles’ (aka Ghostface Killah) contribution to the recording because he didn’t like Coles’ criticism of the drug profiteering.
If Shkreli didn’t like what Coles had to say, he probably wouldn’t be happy about me calling him a spoiled, 5th grade bully who clearly doesn’t care who gets hurt – financially and physically – along the way, as long as it’s all about Martin Shkreli. As if I care about his happiness.
He’s classic Laggard who, thankfully, finds himself without a leadership position to screw up this month.
There clearly are several significant workplace trends looming in front of us that we would do well to recognize. I’ve mentioned many of them here in this blog. Additionally, other authors, consultants, and practitioners have also done a good job of trying to predict the future.
As with all pseudo-science, however, some of it is pure bunk.
For instance:
Baby-boomer retirement, and its purported “sucking sound” on available talent, is quite possibly much ado about nothing. Let’s look at it logically: The definition of a baby-boomer is someone born between 1947 and 1963 – spanning almost 2 decades. Couple that with the current trend of later retirement, and you have a group of people born over a 20-year timeframe, retiring individually 55-75 years later at various ages. At best, it’s a non-event; at worst, it’s generational in nature, and very specific to population demographics — for instance, it’s clearly more prevalent in the midwest than in either coast, or in the top 10 most populated metroplitan areas.
Organizations are realizing that generational issues are not materializing as expected. No big surprise, really. We’ve been dealing with diverse workforces for a hundred years, including race, gender, and age — “generational” differences aren’t any more significant, and merely require purposeful thought to overcome. Workers do not have to view society, the world, and the workplace equally to be productive. Frankly, I believe we’ll see more of employees just “coming to work to work,” and less senseless attention on those things that don’t directly effect their ability to be productive.
So, when futurists write columns and books, and read the tea leaves to determine where we’re headed, use your noodle and some common sense before blindly drinking the Kool-aid.
A big trend that does needs attention – there is clearly a growing dearth of leadership talent available. This isn’t as much a function of baby-boomers leaving as it is our desire for new, fresh leadership at a time when the leadership “bench strength” is at its weakest. Many hyper-performing employees don’t necessarily view management as a logical progression from their current assignment, and we haven’t done a good job of painting a favorable picture of becoming a leader (think SOX requirements, jail terms, bad publicity for poor performance, etc.). Further, many of those extended-career boomers don’t necessarily want to work that “extension” as a high-stress leader. We better start growing managers and leaders – and fast!
In short, many real trends, contrary to those consistently broadcast like chicken little’s falling sky, are as much a “movement” in the workplace as they are trends.
We’re going to give a short well-done to Archer Daniels Midland (ADM) for their handling of their internet troll employee who made an ass of himself on Christmas Eve.
Full disclosure: ADM is a client of ours.
ADM quickly concluded that Brad Shultz’s bigotry was eclipsed by his stupidity in linking his views to his employer on social media, and directed Brad to the nearest unemployment line.
ADM said, “…these remarks are unacceptable and do not reflect ADM’s values.” Works for us.
This is a culture issue, and leadership owns the culture. You don’t need toxic influences in your organization; when you discover them, get rid of them… immediately.
Reminds me of a T-shirt I wore a few years ago: “Dads Against Daughters Dating…Shoot the first one; word will spread.”
Nice shootin’, ADM. Word will spread. You’re this month’s Leadership Leader.
Leadership Milquetoast
It’s only been a couple of months since Twitter’s SVP of Engineering, Alex Roetter, was our Leadership Milquetoast for his empty rhetoric about diversity and his subsequent non-apology for being a crappy communicator. Not picking on Twitter, but it looks like they’ve missed another opportunity in the diversity department.
The diversity most important to an organization is diversity of thought. You need teams that can strategize, plan and approach problems from different perspectives. You get that from people with diverse backgrounds and experiences, independent of the color of their skin.
Diversity isn’t about affirmative action; it’s about making something great out of an often strange collection of people inspired to make something greater than themselves successful. And that takes leadership.
And so, Twitter missed the opportunity to make a bold statement about diversity when they brought in an old white guy as their new vice president for diversity and inclusion. While Jeffery Siminoff may be qualified for the job – some of us old white guys are actually all for diversity of thought – his hiring did nothing to close the disparity gap between the company and its users.
It shouldn’t matter that almost three quarters of Twitter’s leadership positions are held by whites, but obviously it does to their diversity critics. What should matter to Twitter is that their detractors seem to equate diversity with racial parity, and they seem to think that it would make things better if their employee demographics mirrored that of their users. If Twitter thinks they’re raising the bar on diversity and inclusion, they’re not listening.
Twitter missed a golden opportunity to do more than talk a good game. For that, they get this month’s nod for the Leadership Milquetoast.
Leadership Laggard
Something must be amiss in McDonald’s marketing machine. They just spent a pile-o-cash with at least seven ad agencies to update packaging for its “fun and modern brand.” Matt Biespiel, senior director of global marketing described it as “a progressive way to turn our packaging into art.”
As they sat around the McTable brainstorming, didn’t a single person think, “if we made better and more healthy food, would more people would buy it?” If so, why didn’t they bring it up? Even acknowledging the importance of employee loyalty, this is a classic case of group-think, and that’s a leadership failure.
We don’t deny McDonald’s made some good menu choices recently; they needed to – and not just to attract millennials. And hopefully their planned restaurant upgrade means the seats aren’t ergonomically designed to be uncomfortable.
But really… no one cares about the brown bag it comes in. That’s just the lipstick on the pig. The bags end up in the back floorboard of the car or on the side of the road, anyway.
McDonald’s says the new packaging reflects the leadership of new CEO Steve Easterbrook – simple yet bold. Describe it anyway you want, we think Biespiel and his yes-men saw a way to impress his boss, and his boss let them.
Easterbrook is new – and arguably doing a pretty good job. This month’s Leadership Laggard is Matt Biespiel for letting his team waste so much McMoney and McTime on something customers don’t care about in the first place.
Should we use 360-degree evaluations to determine how well our managers are “managing?”
My answer will be brief, followed by some applicable humor (well, it’s funny to me anyway…)
Management efficacy should be evaluated by measurement, not popularity. Don’t ask the question if the answers aren’t actionable. In other words, if the manager is kicking butt on all measurable fronts, what would you have him or her change if a survey came back with suggestions?
The right answer, of course, is nothing.
Having said that…
What would you like to hear them say?
Three friends of Thibodeaux’s from the local Cajun congregation were asked, “When you’re in your casket, and friends and congregation members are mourning over you, what would you like dem to say?
“Jacque said: “I would like dem to say I was a wonderful husband, a fine spiritual leader, and a great family man.
Ovide commented: “I would like dem to say I was a wonderful teacher and servant of God who made a huge difference in people’s lives.
“Then it was Boudreaux’s turn to said somethon: “I’d like dem to say, “Look at dat!!!!, he’s moving!”
Measure managers by results, not popularity or wishful thinking.
“Teamwork” has forever been a buzzword in our business world. It seems that the importance of having employees work as a team has been promoted in every available piece of management literature. Nevertheless, we at the top have routinely had a hard time “playing well together,” despite the fact that the need is more pronounced now than ever before.
I used to work for a CEO who believed that the definition of a “team” was a group of people doing things his way. It’d be funnier if it didn’t apply so well to so many…
Who cares?? Why does it matter, as long as I do my job and am good at it?? Some arguments for executive teamwork:
External Demands. Worldwide competition and changing financial markets make it necessary for the organization to be on the alert at all times – the pressure to innovate, apart from the company’s organizational health, is no longer the CEO’s sole purview.
Internal Demands. Diversifying businesses require differently-skilled managers to lead varied business units. We can no longer be “all things to all people.”
Succession.An executive team is usually – and naturally – the best selection pool for future executives, as individual members would have first-hand knowledge of the essential competencies of a potential top leader within our current organization.
Exemplary Behavior. In addition, top executives working well together sends a potent signal down the line. ‘Nuff said.
So why, then, if we understand the need, do top executives often fail to form a team?
Consider the source: Managers who have climbed the ladder’s upper rungs aretypically strong-willed, ambitious, and experts in their own right. These characteristics, though obviously allowing them to successfully rise within an organization, may also pave the way for an unwillingness to show weakness, overprotective behavior for their functions, and viewing other executives as “competition” in their quest for the Holy Grail: The CEO’s chair.
Personality and behaviors can be difficult to change once they are really entrenched, so forming a true executive team becomes a difficult undertaking.
Ultimately, the CEO must establish a climate that is favorable to developing an executive team. S/He can do this by:
Selecting discriminately. Normally, “upper management” can be a big group, consisting of the CEO, COO, CFO, various heads of important functional areas, and other political savvy or otherwise valuable individuals. Limiting the number of members to 8-10 enables all to develop healthier relationships, to say nothing of the success of subsequent meetings.
Communicating unequivocally. The CEO must ensure that all executive team members understand the vision, mission, strategies, and goals of the organization in no uncertain terms. There can be no “highway” option here.
Ensuring Commitment. If there is no involvement, there is no commitment.
Clarifying Roles. The CEO must clearly set the mandate for each executive team member. This involves defining strategic responsibilities (not operational), areas of cooperation, interdependence, information-sharing, and decision-making processes.
Ensuring safety. Establishing an atmosphere where members can show their weaknesses, disagree, and express their opinions openly without fear of losing face and authority can induce team creativity. It also promotes increased trust among the members.
Emphasizing Shared Accountability. Rewarding solely individual performance undermines the formation of a cohesive executive team whose performance is supposed to be assessed collectively. Collective measures of profitability and other gains are crucial.
Having Courage to weed out non-performers. It’s perfect, of course, if all executives would deliver on their responsibilities – but, nobody’s perfect. If an executive hinders the team’s progress or is disrupting the team’s process, then it might be time to let that member go. Make that decision as certain as it would be if s/he were functionally incompetent.
I worked with the CEO of a large services company. A VP member of his senior staff was a brilliant P&L manager — but entirely destructive to the team. We coached, cajoled, taught, pleaded, and begged. This senior manager would not be swayed — he was clearly “on the dark side,” and wanted to stay. He wielded his P&L performance as a Kevlar vest.
The CEO fired him, and you could hear the air being sucked out of all the collective guts of the senior team. The boss was serious, and now the team was, too.
Creating a synergetic team of top leaders in an organization is tough work. Selecting, managing personalities and relationships, establishing and enforcing norms, and developingexecutive team members is a complex process – but it can be done.
The payback is huge. You know that, of course, if you took the time to read this whole posting. Stop looking for a magic bullet — it takes effort and commitment, and in all likelihood, some tough decisions.
Let me know if I can help.
Executive Leadership Consulting That Works
Triangle Performance, LLC is a solutions-focused management consulting firm specializing in executive improvement, leadership development, and organizational effectiveness. Contact us today to get started on your journey to improving your leadership skills.
Disclaimer: there is actually a Steeler fan in our firm. Background checks and drug screens aren’t foolproof…
Showing vulnerability and admitting you need help are a couple of leadership traits that sound Pollyanna-ish, especially in the rough-and-tough, real world corporate arena. Certainly not something you’d expect to see in professional sports.
Say what you want about the Pittsburgh Steelers’ quarterback Ben Roethlisberger, but by taking himself out of the Nov 29th game against Seattle for “concussion-like symptoms,” he took a stand that probably appeared weak to many who were watching. I’m sure there were certainly a lot of younger QBs paying attention.
As it turned out, he did have a concussion, and at least one of us is glad he’s better this week.
More remarkably, he admitted he needed help. Even though his reputation as the team’s leader might suffer, he knew the risk of continuing on a path that could have more severe consequences. If you can’t see a corporate leadership version of this lesson, you must be new to the C-level.
What Ben said to other – younger and less experienced – leaders who are in trouble but hate to let their teams down: it’s okay to admit you’re only human. What more senior corporate leaders need to share with their younger and less experienced leaders: sometimes you have to ask for help.
Showing vulnerability to your team builds trust. It’s not the same as showing a lack of confidence; it means you’re paying attention to your team’s needs, and you recognize you need help in meeting them.
Thanks for the reminder, Ben. You’re this month’s pick as our Leadership Leader.
Leadership Milquetoast
Mark Zuckerberg of facebook fame is receiving a lot of positive press for announcing his give-away… seems the birth of his daughter Max spurred him to tell the world that he’ll give away 99% of his facebook wealth—some $40+ BILLION.
Making such an announcement was impressive, and he could have been a philanthropic standard-bearer of epic proportions. Could have been.
The reality is, he’s simply transferring that money to a for-profit LLC, where he’ll have complete control of how every nickel is spent. Further, he’s made no commitment that the money will even go to non-profits; in fact, he included a statement that any profits made will be funneled back into the LLC for future investments. So, there will be potential profits. Doesn’t sound charitable to me.
Look, it’s his money, he can do whatever he likes. I mean that sincerely. But to publish this letter to his child, saying “We will give 99% of our Facebook shares… during our lives to advance this mission,” implies clearly that he will be giving. In reality, he’s actually keeping, and intends to invest entirely as he sees fit.
Again, his money, his decision. He owes no one anything. But if you say “give,” you should give. Investment bankers don’t give, they invest. Private equity firms don’t give, they buy. Words matter, and Zuckerberg’s words don’t match up. It’s not a bad thing, just not necessarily a good thing.
Congratulations for the giving-that-isn’t, Mark. It won you this month’s Leadership Milquetoast.
Leadership Laggard
I’m a veteran. As are the others working with me at Triangle Performance. As such, we have a special place in our hearts for veterans. You would think that an agency named “Veterans Affairs” would feel the same way.
These performance-driven bonuses were paid to such superstars as:
The execs leading the Denver construction goat-rope, more than $1B over budget (just a rounding error, eh?), including $5 grand to the manager specifically named in the investigation;
The doc in Wisconsin, dubbed the “Candy Man” because of his prolific over-prescribing, received a bonus, as did his pharmacy supervisor.
In Augusta, Georgia, the VA awarded some bonus bucks to a dude who quit after drinking and driving a government vehicle (one fatality), but was rehired a year later.
Accountability is one-deep; VA Secretary dafsRobert McDonald (perhaps RONALD McDonald would be more appropriate?) says the VA is all better, fixed, and would improve even more if he could just get a bigger budget with fewer restrictions on how to spend it. Wait… what??
Congratulations to you, Ronald Robert, as this month’s Leadership Laggard.
