Creating Your Style

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Special Announcement

ECI Learning Systems is very excited to announce the publication of our new book, "The Engaged Manager: Make your team a success, and they'll make you a success."

To read more about the book or purchase your copy today, please visit: http://www.theengagedmanager.com/

Be sure to check out the Upcoming Events page to find out more about our "Amazon Day" scheduled for Monday, March 7, 2011...... where we hope to receive enough sales to qualify as an Amazon Best Seller!

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Creating Your Style
Have you ever wondered how some people developed their style of leadership? What inspired them to lead the way they do? Behave the way they do? Say the things they say?

Over the years I’ve worked for a wide variety of people, each individual in their own way. Each had their own personality and their own strengths, weaknesses, and methods for getting things done. Some were technically strong, while others focused more heavily on people. Some were loud and outspoken, while others were more thoughtful and quiet.

Some I liked. Some I didn’t.

As I developed my own style of leadership, I found myself pulling things from many of them to create something unique. One boss was particularly good at delegating. At first I thought he was trying to dump work off on others, but then I realized how much more was getting done because he wasn’t trying to do it himself. I realized that delegation was not about getting other people to do your work, but about being effective, efficient, and developing your team members.

Another boss was known for looking at the big picture. Even though we were in accounting, he was often sought out for advice from leaders in other parts of the organization. He could clearly see what was best for his department, but made decisions based on what was best for the business. I learned to think beyond my own boundaries and focus on what was best for the customer, not just what was best or easiest for me.

One boss had the ability to clearly identify the strengths of the people around him. He would then structure projects that allowed people to fully utilize these strengths while helping to stretch them in new ways. I found myself searching for the best in each employee and trying to find ways to utilize those skills.

While working in Dallas, I saw a boss face a moral dilemma. There was the easy answer to the problem at hand, one that no one would ever really question. Or, there was the right answer, which caused him more personal pain but allowed him to know he had done the correct thing. I watched him make the right choice and admit that I was proud to work for him. I knew that when I faced a similar choice I would make the right decision as well. He had taught me well.

Of course, I also learned some things not to do. More than one of my bosses fell into the “screamer” category. I learned from them that people really don’t work any harder when you scream at them, they just don’t tell you the truth so you THINK things are ok, even when they are not.

I worked for one boss who didn’t understand what we did. Didn’t care to understand what we did, and made no attempt to ever figure it out. Of course what I took away from that experience was how little people respect you when they know you just don’t care.

One thing I noticed about all of my “bad bosses” was how insecure they were; always looking over their shoulders, afraid to give honest praise, and how they would often not model the behaviors they would demand of others. I don’t know if they thought that no one noticed the inconsistency in their behavior, or if they themselves didn’t realize that they were not “walking the talk.” But I realized that my employees were watching me. And, whether I wanted to admit to it or not, they knew what I was good at and what I wasn’t good at.

The point is that you have likely learned your leadership style from a variety of sources. Of course, there is nothing wrong with that. But I would encourage you to take an inventory of your own leadership style and see if your behavior is consistent with your beliefs.

I’ll talk more about this in next week’s blog.

At ECI Learning Systems LLC, we are dedicated to helping companies get the greatest return from their most valuable asset: their employees. We work with you to align 3 key organizational factors:
• Your Company Culture
• The Leadership Styles of your key managers
• The Expectations of your Employees

When these 3 factors are aligned, you create an energy in your company that improves productivity, reduces absenteeism, increases creativity, and positively impacts your bottom line. Contact ECI Learning Systems LLC today to get your free Workplace Evaluation.


Until next time.....

Dave Meyer
ECI Learning Systems, LLC
http://www.ecilearning.com/

Are You Just Filling Out Forms?

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Special Announcement

ECI Learning Systems is very excited to announce the publication of our new book, "The Engaged Manager: Make your team a success, and they'll make you a success."

To read more about the book or purchase your copy today, please visit: http://www.theengagedmanager.com/

And, don't forget to check out the Upcoming Events page to find out more about our "Amazon Day" scheduled for Monday, March 7, 2011...... where we hope to receive enough sales to qualify as an Amazon Best Seller!

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Are You Just Filling Out Forms?
When an opening exists in your organization, there are basically two places that you can go to look for a replacement. You can look at your existing employees inside of the organization, or you can look outside for new talent and ideas. I’ve always believed that it is better to promote from within than to go outside for key hires, including management positions. Hiring from inside your organization sends a message to your team that growth is both expected and encouraged. It provides a career path for key employees, and is a tremendous boost for morale. Now, we all know that there are times when promoting from within just isn’t possible; perhaps a fresh perspective is needed or the talents and skills required just don’t exist within the current staff. But you can always learn a lot by interviewing your own staff for promotions, even if you do eventually hire from the outside.

Several years back, one of my key managers received a significant promotion to another part of the organization. I have to admit that I was quite proud of her, having trained and groomed her for several years. She was quite intelligent, curious, good with people, and a creative thinker. I knew that she would excel in her new job.

But, I now had to replace her as the manager.

We sat down and talked about possible promotions from within her team. Her team had been performing well and I was sure that we would find several qualified candidates in that group. As we reviewed the list, we found ourselves eliminating candidates for a number of good reasons. But we decided that we had two strong internal candidates that had good management potential.

During the interviews I asked the candidates about the role of the manager and how they would fill that role. One candidate assured me that he would be the best manager I had ever hired. He understood the role of the manager perfectly, he told me. He was confident he would excel as the manager. I liked his confidence until I asked him what exactly he thought managers did.

“They fill out forms” was the reply. “I fill out forms every day and I’ve been watching the manager, and she fills out forms just like I do. I know I can fill out those forms correctly.”

This was coming from a good employee; a model employee in fact. He had won awards for productivity and creative thinking. But his close examination of managers over the last 6 years had convinced him that the role of the manager was to fill out forms.

As I sat and pondered his response to what he thought managers did, it made me think about how some people perceive their managers. Does your team view you as an active manager, someone leading the way, improving the process, creating change, mentoring your staff?

Or are you just “filling out forms?”

At ECI Learning Systems LLC, we are dedicated to helping companies get the greatest return from their most valuable asset: their employees. We work with you to align 3 key organizational factors:
• Your Company Culture
• The Leadership Styles of your key managers
• The Expectations of your Employees

When these 3 factors are aligned, you create an energy in your company that improves productivity, reduces absenteeism, increases creativity, and positively impacts your bottom line. Contact ECI Learning Systems LLC today to get your free Workplace Evaluation.


Until next time.....

Dave Meyer
ECI Learning Systems, LLC
http://www.ecilearning.com/

Cost or Contributor?

I recently got a call from someone who wanted to be a client. He was having “employee issues” and he had heard that I’m really good at “fixing” those kinds of problems. His team was “unmotivated” and even “lazy.” Worse yet, he said his business was struggling and “staff costs were killing him.” As soon as our conversation started, alarms began going off in my head. The words he used bothered me, but the tone he used bothered me even more. In his business, employees were the key to his success. Yet it was clear to me that he didn’t see it that way at all.

So often in business we focus on things or tasks that need to be accomplished and, in the process of doing so, forget the people side of the business. We need a new marketing plan, we’re looking to develop new products, there are issues in the warehouse, or the production numbers are down. These are the types of items that tend to get the attention of the leadership team. They are important decisions, without doubt. But they are task based issues in a world where your biggest expense is most often your people.

Take a look at your organization’s budget. You see things like:

• Communications expense
• Advertising and Marketing
• Supplies
• Travel
• Legal expense
• Rent
• And so on…

Of course, in 90% of all organizations the biggest line item in your budget is payroll; the cost of your employees. And when you add in the cost of benefits and training, those numbers get even larger. It’s no secret to management that salary and the associated benefit costs are the biggest items in the budget. It’s the exact reason that they look at headcount first when times are lean. Logically speaking, the biggest item in your budget should get the biggest reduction when it’s time to cut costs. So they look to reduce costs by cutting people.

I mean, that just makes sense, doesn’t it?

Let me offer a different perspective on the issue of your biggest cost. Because I would tell you that, while the cost of your people is the single biggest item in your budget, it’s probably the most underutilized aspect of your budget as well.

Your purchasing department is constantly on the lookout for ways to reduce the costs of supplies and materials. They analyze where the dollars are going and check out alternative supplies, or how changing the specs might reduce your supply costs. The accountants scrutinize the travel dollars making recommendations on airlines, hotels, and rental cars. And your Real Estate department is not afraid to renegotiate a lease when there is a downturn, knowing that your landlord would rather rent to you at a lesser price than have the facility go empty.

But who is scrutinizing your people to make sure that you get the very best out of them? Who is making recommendations on how to improve their performance, increase their productivity, and maximize their value to the company?

Too often that answer is “the first line manager.” The same manager that is worried about managing the budget, researching the new product requirements, taking calls from angry customers, and attending 15 hours of meetings each week. And let’s not forget that this same manager has never been trained on how to truly develop people.

In short, the biggest and most expensive part of your company’s budget is routinely neglected or mismanaged by well intentioned, but undertrained managers. Is it any wonder that your productivity is down?

Let’s go back to this “would be” client. In our discussions it was crystal clear that he viewed his employees as a cost of doing business and not as something that contributed to the company. He wanted to “fix” his employees when they really weren’t the problem. After all, there really aren’t that many bad teams out there. But there are a lot of bad leaders.

At ECI Learning Systems LLC, we are dedicated to helping companies get the greatest return from their most valuable asset: their employees. We work with you to align 3 key organizational factors:
• Your Company Culture
• The Leadership Styles of your key managers
• The Expectations of your Employees

 

When these 3 factors are aligned, you create an energy in your company that improves productivity, reduces absenteeism, increases creativity, and positively impacts your bottom line. Contact ECI Learning Systems LLC today to get your free Workplace Evaluation.

 

 

Until next time....

 

Dave Meyer

ECI Learning Systems, LLC

http://www.ecilearning.com/

 

It’s Time to Stop Waiting for Consensus

Until last week, I had never really considered the difference between consensus and buy-in. I mean, both represent a team’s commitment to the task or project or situation at hand, right? So, perhaps they are not all that different….

Well, last week, reading Patrick Lencioni’s “The Five Dysfunctions of a Team” showed me how these two concepts are not the same. In fact, they are far from the same.

Lencioni points out that true consensus, where everyone on the team or in the situation completely agrees with the decision or direction, is rare. Instead, he states that “consensus becomes an attempt to please everyone.” Attempting to reach consensus within a group actually slows down the process and will likely lead to most everyone being displeased with some aspect or another of the situation.

Buy-in on the other hand, is a unique form of commitment. An individual may not agree completely with the decision or direction, but they have agreed to get on board and make the necessary actions happen. Getting buy-in can, obviously, be tricky. But you can go a long way toward getting buy-in simply by listening to your employees and/or the other members of your team and acknowledging their concerns. You see, before people commit to something that they think is questionable, they want to know that their concerns have been considered and responded to. If you give them a chance to air those concerns, show them that you have considered the impacts, and honestly discuss how and why it’s best to proceed, most people will be satisfied and will make a commitment to you and the team.

I remember working on a particularly large software development project. The senior management team tried and tried to get consensus on the project schedule. When they could not, they simply gave up and forced the development schedule on the engineers. Most of the engineers did not agree with the schedule and they too simply gave up, realizing the amount of overtime they would have to work over the next several months to make it happen. One particular software developer who did not agree with the schedule became a thorn in the side of senior management because he never worked an hour of overtime during the entire project! Was he a bad developer? No….he was one of the best and brightest engineers they had. Did he slack during the hours that he did put in? No….he worked hard and produced some of the best code on the program. However, he was not willing to sacrifice his personal and family life for a project schedule that he had never bought-in to. Needless to say, given the lack of commitment from the engineers, performance lagged and this program continually struggled to meet milestones and deadlines.

Now, imagine how well this program could have performed had senior management worked to get buy-in from the engineers on the development schedule. Instead of wasting precious time trying to get consensus, they could have spent that same time listening to the team’s concerns, considering their suggestions for schedule improvements, and responding to their inputs. In doing so, senior management could have tapped into the knowledge, experience, passion, and buy-in of the engineers, rather, than leaving them demoralized, unengaged, and under-performing.

When you look around your organization, what do you see? Are your teams spinning their wheels and wasting precious time trying to achieve consensus? What happens when they fail to reach consensus? How do they proceed? Do the force-fit decisions or do they simply get stuck and give up? Are your employees under-performing because they did not buy-in to the direction that you are going?

Working to gain buy-in versus reach consensus is a huge shift in perspective and can take time to achieve, but offers a huge payback in the end.

At ECI Learning Systems LLC, we are dedicated to helping companies get the greatest return from their most valuable asset: their employees. We work with you to align 3 key organizational factors:
• Your Company Culture
• The Leadership Styles of your key managers
• The Expectations of your Employees

When these 3 factors are aligned, you create an energy in your company that improves productivity, reduces absenteeism, increases creativity, and positively impacts your bottom line. Contact ECI Learning Systems LLC today to get your free Workplace Evaluation.


Thanks for reading,

Laurie Valaer
ECI Learning Systems, LLC
http://www.ecilearning.com/

Your Employees Are Quitting You – Part 3

Over the last couple of weeks, I have been writing about how employees are leaving their jobs under the guise of “more money” or “better opportunity,” when they are really quitting on you or your first line managers.

About 87% of the people who claim that they are leaving their job for money or a better opportunity are not after more money but, none the less, leave your organization creating a hole that cannot easily be filled. Depending on the level of the person leaving, cost estimates of replacing a person range from 100% to 500% of their annual salary. And these are just the hard costs of finding and replacing a valuable team member. They don’t account for the lost knowledge, history, or customer goodwill that your employee has built up over time.

When customers routinely interact with specific members of your organization bonds of trust are formed. These bonds of trust are built over time and are critical when something goes wrong. When I know and trust someone at Acme Corporation and my order has a problem, I’m confident that it will be worked out quickly and efficiently. When I don’t know anyone there or worse, when the person I know and trust is suddenly not there, my level of confidence drops dramatically and I am suddenly much more alert and ready to jump on any problem, regardless of how minor it might appear.

Think of the difference this could make to your bottom line. If you are losing mid-level employees where the cost of replacing them is approximately 300% of their salaries, you could add hundreds of thousands of dollars of profit to your bottom line each year with a modest reduction in the number of employees who left your organization. If 5 less mid-level employees making $40K left each year you could improve your bottom line by over $600K annually. By way of comparison, if you operate at a 5% net margin (not unusual for many businesses) you would need an addition $12 million in sales to add $600K to your bottom line.

Pretty startling, isn’t it.

How can you reduce turnover? How can you ensure that 5 mid-level employees will want to stay and work in your organization rather than leave for another job or worse, go across the street to a competitor?

The best way is to invest some time and energy in training your management team at all levels. Too many organizations focus on developing their top level people and ignore the training of their front line managers. Yet, the front line managers have much more interaction with the employees AND the customers than upper level executives do. Front line managers are the people that most employees and customers associate with your organization. They are the people who inspire trust and create suspicion, build bridges and dig chasms, develop loyalty and loathing inside your organization. At the same time, they tend to get the least amount of development and are the most likely to fail.

It might be time for a hard look in the mirror. Where has your organization been spending their developmental dollars and resources? Who has the biggest impact on what happens in your organization every day?

It’s time to start thinking about how to create front line managers who can actually help, not hinder, your organization’s growth.

At ECI Learning Systems LLC, we are dedicated to helping companies get the greatest return from their most valuable asset: their employees. We work with you to align 3 key organizational factors:
• Your Company Culture
• The Leadership Styles of your key managers
• The Expectations of your Employees

When these 3 factors are aligned, you create an energy in your company that improves productivity, reduces absenteeism, increases creativity, and positively impacts your bottom line. Contact ECI Learning Systems LLC today to get your free Workplace Evaluation.


Until next time....

Dave Meyer
ECI Learning Systems, LLC
http://www.ecilearning.com/

Your Employees Are Quitting You - Part 2

In my last entry, I noted the fact that 90% of the people who leave an organization say they are leaving for more money or a better opportunity. Yet, when contacted by an independent agent, 78% of them cite reasons other than money or opportunity as their reasons for leaving. In other words, 78% of the people who leave your organization (more than 3 out of 4) are relatively happy with their pay and opportunity, but still decide to risk the unknown and take a job elsewhere.

This is especially surprising when you consider that nearly 80% of Americans are risk averse when it comes to their jobs and lives. That’s right, nearly 80% of Americans will live with some sort of pain or problem rather than change things to try and fix it. Yet, here they are leaving your company; taking with them knowledge, experience, and customer relationships, rather than trying to resolve whatever issue they perceive in your organization.

Why would they do that? Why do they risk the great unknown of a new job and new company when money and opportunity are not the driving force?

It’s simple. They are trying to get away from you. Or at least get away from your front line managers.

When 78% of the people leave a job for something other than money or opportunity, they are not fleeing toward something specific. Instead, they are running away from their current situation. By going to a new job or a new company they are not necessarily moving toward something that they know is better, but they believe that it certainly can’t be any worse. They are fleeing with the blind belief that wherever they end up can’t be any worse than where they are now.

It depresses me to even write those words!

As I talk with managers about employee engagement and turnover, a couple of things become crystal clear to me. First of all, most managers don’t understand what employee turnover actually costs the organization. In fact, they often believe that turnover can be good for them from a budgetary perspective.

One manager described it to me this way. “I’m judged on how well I manage my budget. When an employee making $40K a year leaves my organization and it takes me two months to replace them, I’m actually saving $7000 in my budget because I’m not paying them. My bonus percentage is based on how many of my goals I make and last year I made my budget goal because employee turnover saved me money!”

From a very narrow perspective, this line of thinking actually makes sense. Of course the flaw in this logic lies in its micro view of the departmental budget versus the macro view of organizational profitability. But this manager beamed proudly at having saved the company money.

In a way, it’s a shame that this manager doesn’t have a line item on his departmental budget to capture the costs of HR having to advertise, interview, hire, and train his new employee. Those costs alone will more than eat up that $7000 in payroll savings, without regards to the knowledge and history lost when employees leave an organization. Of course, when I pointed out these costs to this manager he just smiled and shrugged.

“That’s not my problem” was his response.

Of course, at that moment the reason his employees were quitting him was really quite apparent. But, we’ll have more on that next week.

At ECI Learning Systems LLC, we are dedicated to helping companies get the greatest return from their most valuable asset: their employees. We work with you to align 3 key organizational factors:
• Your Company Culture
• The Leadership Styles of your key managers
• The Expectations of your Employees

When these 3 factors are aligned, you create an energy in your company that improves productivity, reduces absenteeism, increases creativity, and positively impacts your bottom line. Contact ECI Learning Systems LLC today to get your free Workplace Evaluation.


Until next time....

Dave Meyer
ECI Learning Systems, LLC
http://www.ecilearning.com/

Your Employees Are Quitting You

Would it surprise you to hear that 89% of managers believe that employees leave or stay based primarily on money? (Saratoga Institute 2003)

Would it surprise you to hear that nearly 90% of employee exit interviews cite either “more money” or “better opportunity” as the primary reason for employee turnover? (Saratoga Institute 2003)



Probably not too shocking, is it? People tell HR or their managers that they are leaving for more money and the managers believe them.

So, would it surprise you to hear that 88% of the people contacted independently stated that the primary reason they left their job was NOT for more money or a better opportunity? (Saratoga Institute 2003)

I don’t know what is more surprising to me about these three facts.

Am I the most surprised that, in spite of constant evidence to the contrary, managers still believe that people are primarily motivated by money?

Or, am I most surprised that 78% of the people leaving an organization (the 90% citing "more money" in their exit interview minus the 12% that independently cited "more money" as their real reason for leaving) are not honest with HR or their manager as to why they are leaving?

Maybe I’m most surprised that managers and HR have not figured out, or don’t seem to care, why their employees are actually leaving. Instead, they hear that someone is leaving for “more money” and they just accept it as a fact.

Employee turnover is costing your business massively every year. Estimates on the cost of employee turnover range from 1 times the employee’s annual salary to 5 or 6 times the annual salary, depending on the level and expertise of the person leaving. Depending on the size of your business, that means that you are easily losing tens of thousands to millions of dollars every year due to turnover.

Some would argue that turnover is just a part of doing business and that some turnover is even good for you. And I would agree with those statements, to an extent. But when 78% of your employees are not being honest as to why they are leaving, it’s time to open your eyes to what is really happening and do something about it. After all, if I told you that a process problem in your organization was costing you tens of thousands of dollars every year, you would jump on it to fix it. If I told you that a billing problem was costing you millions each year, you would put a whole team of people on solving your billing problem. Yet when business owners or executives hear that employee turnover is costing them tens of thousands to millions of dollars each year, they shrug their shoulders and move on to the next problem.

Why are companies overlooking such a major problem? What can be done to reduce or eliminate these unnecessary expenses?

We’ll talk about these issues in the next couple of blog entries.

At ECI Learning Systems LLC, we are dedicated to helping companies get the greatest return from their most valuable asset: their employees. We work with you to align 3 key organizational factors:
• Your Company Culture
• The Leadership Styles of your key managers
• The Expectations of your Employees

When these 3 factors are aligned, you create an energy in your company that improves productivity, reduces absenteeism, increases creativity, and positively impacts your bottom line. Contact ECI Learning Systems LLC today to get your free Workplace Evaluation.


Until next time....

Dave Meyer
ECI Learning Systems, LLC
http://www.ecilearning.com/