American Ingenuity

The theme for this year’s National Book Festival is American Ingenuity. Sponsored by the Library of Congress and held in Washington, DC, the Festival was originally held outdoors on the National Mall. In 2014 it moved to the Washington Convention Center. Among the reasons for that move was protection from both heat and rain for festival goers. Barbara and I can relate to that reason. One year, we stood in line on an oppressively hot, humid day to meet David McCullough. Despite the weather, the experience was superb. 

It should be no surprise that the 2020 Festival will make another move to a virtual format necessitated by the COVID-19 crisis. Ironically, the theme of American Ingenuity now takes on a whole new meaning. As reported by the Washington Post on May 28, 2020, American Ingenuity is “a quality that will be required to effectively reimagine the event in a new virtual format.” A silver lining growing out of this pandemic is that the Festival can now reach a wider, global audience and “demonstrate how authors and their stories help to connect and illuminate the world.” Mark the dates—this year’s Festival will be held the weekend of September 25-27.

Ingenuity and creativity can grow out of crisis. The world of books and book publishing, where Barbara and I spend a great deal of time, is no exception.

BookBaby is a firm that helps authors partner with professionals to ease the process of self-publishing. We met their president, Steven Spatz, at a Writer’s Digest Conference and have been following the company ever since. They offer a wide array of services to authors and turn out quality products, all the things we were looking for in a publishing partner. Now, as we get closer to self-publishing our next book, we are more excited about working with them. Here’s why.

BookBaby and its sister company, Disc Makers, which serves independent musicians much the same way BookBaby serves independent authors, joined the battle against the COVID-19 virus.  Recognizing the urgent need for protective face shields, manufacturing engineers and operations pros came up with a prototype within two days. Supplies were ordered, specs were finalized, and workstations were set up on a Monday. Manufacturing started the next day. Employees from both companies—folks who work behind the scenes in production, packaging, and administration roles—became part of the effort and joined the production process. Instead of worrying about surviving and saving jobs, at the height of production, the companies began to worry if they had enough staff to fill the demand for the face shields. As Tony van Veen, CEO of Disc Makers said in a video, “it’s the first time in our 74-year history that we are literally saving lives with the products we make.” Talk about American Ingenuity.  

Speaking of BookBaby, Barbara and I will be working with them to get our next book, They Did What? Unbelievable Tales from the Workplace, self-published. We’ve introduced you to Maryanne, the main character, with some stories over the past months. The book is coming out later this year. We’ll keep you updated on our progress.

Find Your Own Way

Frank Sinatra sang about doing it “My Way.” Finding your own way to do things is important—

important for setting strategy for your organization or setting strategy for your career.  That doesn’t mean you can’t learn lessons from others.  When I first started consulting, someone told me, “Listen to other people’s ideas, try things out, but keep in mind that what works for someone else, may not work for you.  If it doesn’t, alter it or try something different.”

I read something interesting recently in a blog by Steven Spatz, President of BookBaby. He wrote, “Now, you can find all sorts of advice and read the success stories of independent and traditionally published authors. Unfortunately, there’s no one-size-fits-all solution, or we’d all be using it and congratulating each other on our mutual good fortune. My advice? Any time you hear a success story, study it, parse it, and pick the elements of the story that resonate and seem applicable to your life and aspirations as an author. Your path won’t look exactly like anyone else’s, but you can take good ideas from a lot of different sources and create your own.”  Sounds an awful lot like the advice I received about consulting.  Bottom line is that we all have to find our own way to success.

In The Manager’s Answer Book we have a section on Creating Your Personal Brand. On page 113 we talk about the importance of being a courageous manager. A courageous manager is comfortable speaking up, especially if they think a mistake is about to be made or the organization may be heading in the wrong direction. They confront situations they think can be improved, and they present alternative options. They advocate for new ideas.  That doesn’t mean they dismiss an option that’s being presented. Rather they approach it in the way that Steven Spatz advises: they study and parse it, take good ideas and use them to shape a path for the organization. 

The same strategy can be applied to managing your career. Talk to other people who’ve been successful managers in your organization, and others, find out what they’ve done. Seek their advice, but don’t assume you have to do everything they did. Their circumstances may have been much different. Study it. Parse it. Pick the elements of their success story that may apply to your journey.

Speaking of finding your own way, Barbara and I are finding ours in the publishing world. We will be self-publishing our next book, They Did What? Unbelievable Tales from the Workplace. We’ve introduced you to Maryanne, the main character, with some stories over the past months. The book is coming out later this year, and we are working with BookBaby to get it printed and distributed. We’ll let you know how things progress.

Freedom

During these unprecedented times, what does freedom mean to each of us individually and collectively? It’s a question worth contemplating this week as we celebrate July 4^th in ways that will be different from prior year celebrations.

I started thinking about this blog over a month ago. In that time, so much has changed. This may be a good time to reflect on recent events and freedom.

COVID-19. Starting in March 2020 and into early May, much of the country was confined because of the virus.  Businesses closed. Stay at home and wear masks in public orders were issued. Some of these directives were met with verbal protests about restrictions of freedom and civil rights. 

One letter I read proclaimed that freedom is freedom no matter what we are facing and criticized the directives to wear masks declaring that somehow her freedom was being withdrawn.  Her letter was more a rant than a compelling, persuasive argument. Did the writer consider that along with freedom comes responsibility? One person’s freedom ends when it impinges on another’s right. The commentator’s choice not to wear a mask encroaches on other people’s right to be safe from a public health risk—one like we’ve never seen before. 

Black Lives Matter. How silly all of this rhetoric about restrictions of freedom and civil rights over wearing masks sounded a few short weeks later when George Floyd was killed on May 25, and the country erupted in protest over systemic discrimination against African American citizens.  The protesters represented a wide diversity of American citizens: diversity in age, race, ethnicity, socio-economic status, occupation, and the list goes on.  

Juneteenth, celebrated on June 19, commemorates the proclamation on June 19, 1865, that slaves in Texas were free. President Lincoln had officially outlawed slavery in Texas and the other states in rebellion against the Union almost two and a half years earlier. A little-known holiday likely until this year, it enjoyed nation-wide attention and celebration. A quote in one article I read said that for African Americans, Juneteenth was their independence day—they weren’t free on July 4, 1776. Now there is a call to make Juneteenth a national holiday.

LGBTQ+. Five days before Juneteenth, on June 15, 2020, the Supreme Court handed down a decision in Bostock v. Clayton County, Georgia, stating that: “An employer who fires an individual for being homosexual or transgender fires that person for traits or actions it would not have questioned in members of a different sex.” Employment discrimination against someone because of their sexual orientation or transgender status is a violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Law’s prohibition against discrimination because of sex.   

Will protests, demonstrations, national holidays, and Supreme Court decisions eliminate bias and discrimination?  No.  Have these events raised our collective awareness? I would like to think that we are finally realizing that the freedoms some of us enjoy are not, and have not been, equally enjoyed by all. This is a good week to reflect on that. Consider what you can do and what you will do.

Time to Listen...Now, More than Ever

To say we are in interesting times is probably the understatement of 2020. Most of us are confined to our homes and living with a great deal of uncertainty. As managers you have to find new ways to stay connected, ensure that your team is as productive and least stressed as humanly possible, all while handling your own anxieties. We’re grateful for the technology we have that allows us to see each other and hear each other’s voices.

I wish I had magic answers for you. I don’t, but what I do know that in your role as a manager, this is the time when you

• must be as empathetic as you’ve ever been in your life; 
• need to listen to your employees as closely as you can;
• have to be a clued-in leader as we wrote about last week.

The key to doing this is paying attention to your listening skills. When I talk about listening, I’m talking about doing more than just hearing the words they’re saying. You must be listening to and understanding what they’re not saying and closely watching body language. For example, when you’re on Zoom or another video platform, if you ask an employee how he is and he says, “I’m fine”, are you seeing downcast eyes? Do the words she’s saying fit the frown on her face?

Listening is hard work, even in the best of times—and we’re certainly not in the best of times right now. Listening takes concentration. Listening is NOT waiting until the other person is finished speaking so you can talk. Listening requires focus.

One way to ensure that you are hearing what your employee is saying is to paraphrase what you heard. This allows you and the employee to clear up any miscommunication before it becomes a problem. It’s easy to do. Say, “What I just heard you say is…” and repeat what you heard. To do this successfully, you have to listen carefully, which is half the battle.

During this time of uncertainty, careful listening will make managing your remote staff a bit easier. And, becoming a better listener will make you a better manager when the world returns to whatever the new normal becomes. Also, being a good listener will help you be a better friend, husband, wife, partner, son, daughter…in other words, a better person.

You may have some down time right now, so consider picking up a copy of our book, The Manager’s Answer Book. Check out the information on page 126 on improving your listening skills.

Clued-In Leaders

Doug Claffey wrote an article that appeared in The Albuquerque Journal on May 11, 2020 about the importance of strong communication during a crisis. He is the Founder of Energage, an organization that specializes in employee engagement and workplace improvement research.

He used a term in the article that caught my attention: Clued-In Leaders. Clued-in leadership is about upward feedback and employees feeling heard. It caught my attention because a related article that same day about top workplaces in New Mexico contained a quote from an employee at the top-ranked company, T-Mobile, in the large workplace category.  The employee said, “There is something to be said about a company that always has your back and listens to feedback from the front line all the way to the top.”

Claffey went on to explain what happens when organizations struggle with clued-in leadership. “When employees believe senior leaders are out of the loop, it’s harder for them to connect with the organization. And when leaders really aren’t clued in to what’s happening, they’re missing valuable insight from those closest to the customer: their employees.” He offered three ideas for keeping the lines of communication open:

• Communicating through the hierarchy. Ask employees to talk to their managers, and managers to talk to their managers, and finally talk to the senior leadership. This sounds like an open-door policy, but to be effective, it has to practiced, not simply something you put in an employee handbook. 

• Conducting town-hall or all-hands meetings. Whether in-person meetings (which will likely be on hold for a while) or virtual meetings, they are an effective way to communicate key messages and give your employees a voice. I once worked at a company that met with representatives of each department before all-hands meetings to gain insights into what was on employees minds so their concerns could be addressed at the larger meeting.

• Asking your employees for feedback. Claffey suggested pulse surveys as an efficient way to give your employees a voice, capture real-time data and deliver it to the leadership team quickly and directly. Of course if you do conduct any employee survey, you’ve got to commit to act on it and provide feedback to the employees about the survey’s results. Otherwise it becomes a paperwork exercise and can erode trust.

Leader’s communication skills are critical to the success of any organization, but more so during this time of crisis. Workplaces have been disrupted because of COVID-19 as more employees are working from home and dependent on technology—as are other family members. Communication is key during these times. Even if employees are beginning to return to the workplace, communication continues to be important. It’s better for managers to over-communicate with everyone on the team than to under-communicate.

Building Resilience

Life happens. Even in non-pandemic times, we face difficulties, and change of any kind can throw even the most adaptable of us. But this is different. Added to our usual life events, the changes required by the global pandemic have added a WOW factor that has shaken us all. I'm not sure about you, but I've discovered I need to be a bit more resilient.

The American Psychological Association defines resilience as "the process of adapting well in the face of adversity, tragedy, or significant sources of stress." Easier said than done, right? Here are some easy things we all can do:

• Have a strong support network of positive people who you can turn to for help -- even if it's just to listen to you on a Zoom call.

• Set life goals, then reward yourself when you reach them. Personal goal achievement builds self-confidence, which in turn builds resilience.

• Take care of yourself. When we're feeling stressed, many of us don't eat right or exercise. Do your best to keep your body strong, and don't overlook your mental health. Consider meditation, yoga, mindfulness, or prayer to keep centered.

• Do something for someone else. Not only will you be helping someone in need, you should get satisfaction from the experience, which will boost your overall well-being. 

• Look for ways to inject humor into your routine. Laughing is so good for us. It enhances oxygen intake, stimulating your heart, lungs and muscles, increases endorphins, cools down your stress response, and aids muscle relaxation. So remind yourself that enjoying a good chuckle can brighten your mood and help you deal with your challenges just a little better.

• Keep things in perspective and focus on the future as much as you can. Remember times when you faced a difficult situation and came through it.

First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, who faced a lot of adversity and exhibited tremendous resiliency, said, "You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, I lived through this horror, I can take the next thing that comes along."

And so can you.

What Do Top Workplaces Look Like?

Best workplace contests and surveys extend beyond Great Place to Work’s “World’s Best Workplaces.” Local surveys of workplaces likely take place in cities and states around the country, and New Mexico is no exception. The Albuquerque Journal partners with Energage of Philadelphia, PA to conduct an annual survey of top workplaces in the state. This year’s survey, which closed just before the first case of COVID-19 was reported in New Mexico, offers a unique insight from employee’s perspective. What makes an organization stand out in the eyes of its employees? No surprise to our readers – it’s being appreciated, challenged, coached, and invested in by their employer. These are qualities in an organization’s culture that management has to build authentically and deliberately. They are qualities that differentiate an organization. 

Doug Claffey, Founder of Energage, reported in a May 11, 2020 article in the Albuquerque Journal that “Energage has surveyed more than 20 million employees across 60,000 organizations over the past 14 years. We’ve learned that one of the things that matters most to employees — what truly motivates them — is feeling appreciated.” In the New Mexico survey, appreciation ranked only second to confidence in the direction that the organization was headed. 

Don’t be surprised to learn that appreciation far outranks pay, especially if you’re a manager. Claffey said pay is low on the list – and this has been trending for years. He suggests showing appreciation in the same way we do – offering a simple Thank You. “The simplest and sometimes the most effective form of appreciation is giving positive feedback or praise. “Thank you for your effort” or “You’re doing a really good job” goes a long way, whether delivered in person, electronically, or in a handwritten note.” As we say in The Manager’s Answer Book on page 91, a simple thank you may be all the recognition your employees need, and it’s cost effective as well.

There’s another point that Claffey makes that echoes our advice. “Managers are most familiar with their employees’ roles. Employees like to know their manager understands and values their contributions.” In The Manager’s Answer Book we talk about the importance of motivating employees. On page 89, we say, “Today’s workforce needs to know their work matters, so spend time with each staffer to educate them on the value their work brings to the organization.”

Recruitment and retention have important issues in organizations, and they are going to continue to be important. Employees and applicants will continue to look at the organization’s values and whether or not it demonstrates open-mindedness and innovation, their own ability to do meaningful work and make a contribution, and their own ability to develop and grow. Being a top workplace is more than how you rank in a survey. It’s how your organization’s culture and its climate impact your employees and your broader community.