Tag: Results

Silence from the Black Box

Jason ScrivenLeave a comment

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It’s easier to remain silent.

We learn this  in our earliest and most foundational relationships:

  • Don’t talk back to your father (child/parent)
  • Don’t talk in class (student/teacher)
  • It’s my way or the highway (athlete/coach)

This socialization, combined with the wiring in our brains that makes us highly tuned to how other people feel about us, make it easier to remain silent.  More so in hierarchical environments, like the workplace, where many people feel vulnerable to the whims of their boss or team leader.  Despite their experience and training, the default is usually acquiescence.  After all, no one ever got fired for staying silent.

But what if you worked somewhere that silence could lead to death?  Like in the cockpit of an airplane.  The recent news of Boeing 737 crashes has reminded me that silence, deference or deafness in the cockpit is a leading cause of preventable airline crashes.  In this article from 2018, a retired airline captain reviews some of the crashes that lead to the creation of Crew Resource Management (CRM), a set of training procedures for use in environments where human error can have a devastating effect.

Learn more about Crew Resource Management

In describing two crashes from the late 1970’s he states “Neither accident should have happened because some of the crewmembers knew things were going wrong but could not persuade the captain.”  Now CRM, is a major component of every airline safety program.

Every pilot is taught the skills of leadership, followership and effective communication

Followership might not be a word in the English dictionary that we are familiar with, but it should be a skill that every manager tries to master.  It starts by giving a voice to everyone on the team and communicating with them in a style that works for them.  Some are extroverts, comfortable in large groups and are OK talking over each other in a meeting.  Others will need time to think, consider the options and craft a complete and thorough response.  It’s a manager’s job to hear them all and eliminate the silence that kills.

We are all working to the same goal – whether that be landing a plane safely, completing an open heart surgery or making our revenue targets – and everyone is responsible for that goal. If we learn from the CRM playbook, we can still be the captains of our team at the same time we are being responsible to the concerns and needs of our fellow crewmembers.

If you’d like to discuss your followership, click here to Pick My Brain for free.

 

 

From People Manager to Results Coach Using ROWE

Jason ScrivenLeave a comment

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In the past week, I have begun receiving updates from 30hourjobs.com and enjoyed their recent link to this article on ROWE, or Results Only Work Environment.  In summary, it’s an organizational philosophy that is not concerned how, or where the work gets done, as long as it gets done.

ROWE gives everyone 100 percent autonomy and 100 percent accountability –  no results, no job.

That’s pretty scary if you are a manager as it sounds like it eliminates a large part of your job.  You no longer have to organize when people arrive, leave, take vacations, go for lunch, or attend meetings.  You don’t have to give direction.  They will do all those things on their own around the requirement to get the job done.  It blows up the traditional source of a manager’s power.  What does a manager manage if they don’t manage people?

Results.

What I like about a ROWE environment is that the traditional manager becomes a results coach, and I think most managers would like that better, too.

And when it’s all about results, you get a highly motivated team.  The drivers of motivation that Susan Fowler describes – Autonomy, Relatedness, and Competency – are off the charts in ROWE.  We would all be motivated to work for a company that:

  • Did not tell us how, but rather expected us to choose how to get the job done (Autonomy)
  • Did not care who worked the most hours or had the bigger office, but was full of people all focused on results (Relatedness)
  • Did not reward tenure or attendance, but instead recognized performance (Competence)

I think it can apply to any work environment, too. Taking the bus in Vancouver last week, I observed many drivers who knew their passengers by name, were helpful with new riders and drove skillfully and smoothly through big city traffic to arrive safely on time at each stop.  In an environment where they could just be counting the hours, driving in silence, ignoring the passengers and other drivers, they took ownership of the results.  It was their bus, their passengers and they were 100% accountable for arriving on time.

A ROWE is a serious thing when it comes to the consequences of not delivering the results you promised. If that bus driver is frequently late getting to stops or gets into accidents, what happens?  In a ROWE, that driver would lose their job.  Brunt and brutal?  Sure, but what if they agreed to those terms ahead of time?  Now it’s not brutal, it’s just about performance.

If you’d like to Pick My Brain on being more Results Oriented in your current role, click here to book a free call with me.