Black Belt Dojo

Can I give you some feedback?

Are these the most chilling words in the English vocabulary for you? Or do you relish the opportunity to learn and develop from hearing someone’s different perspective?

It’s that time of year again. School report time. And my son has just come home with a 5-page report with some really useful comments to take on to secondary school. In light of last week’s news that the official UK SATs exam results have been delayed, probably just as well.

The most important aspect is that the feedback is balanced – some good comments, a few positively glowing (that’s my boy) and some pointers for improvement, with good suggestions to take forward. And the comments are not generic – they are very specific and I definitely recognise that they’re about my son! The report is supported by a face to face discussion and everybody gets to put their view across – teachers, pupils, parents alike.

Last month, I came across my own old dusty school reports. What a contrast! The one-line comments that I read from each teacher bore no relation to my own experience or what I recall about what was said to me in class. If you can’t relate to the feedback – positive or negative - you learn to discount it.

Getting used to giving and receiving feedback is key to building teams and forming relationships – inside and outside the work environment. Although we’re getting better at it, my past experience is that it’s not particularly in our British culture to do this instinctively well!

So we have systems in place to make sure that the feedback gets through – but, let’s be honest, how much of it do we allow to get through? Performance and bonus appraisals; one to one meetings to discuss progress with managers; 360 degree feedback; team meetings; project meetings; employee surveys; focus groups.

It’s very easy to ignore feedback and in the past I’ve spent far too long chasing managers for actions, as a result of running an employee survey. “I’m too busy.” “I’ve got a business to run.” “I’ll look at it later.” “I don’t want my team to be distracted.” Thanks to changing attitudes, few managers would openly get away with similar behaviour in today’s environment. No time for complacency, though. As the report card says, “still room for improvement” in this area.

For me, the value lies in having an ongoing discussion and choosing to do something differently as a result. Ongoing is the keyword here – it’s not enough to review feedback once. As we know, it takes time and effort to change behaviour. Over the years, I’ve learnt to accept feedback for what it is – an opportunity to hear a different perspective and learn from the insight. And it’s about choice, too. To do something differently or to continue to do the same – your own perspective is still a valid one. Learning from the experience moves you on. I hope it’s taught me how to give feedback in a constructive way, too.

At 16, my performance was summed up in two sentences. “Rosemary gives the impression that at the moment she is too much of a perfectionist to succeed. She should remember the proverb that the man who never made a mistake, never made anything.”

I can’t recall now whether I felt the comment was valid or not, but maybe I did take on board the feedback, after all – I’ve certainly made the mistakes to prove it. So please give me your feedback - just don’t call me Rosemary!

Rosie

Living and learning

Today we ran a session on learning styles for a group of communicators. Great fun.  The theorists told us why they loved models and hated 'but what's the point?' exercises. The activists protested that any kind of activity where they got to play and didn't have to listen to long explanations was just fine with them. The reflectors wanted more time to think about it what worked for them. And the pragmatists wanted to know how they could actually apply all this in the workplace.

If you've never done Peter Honey's Learning Styles questionnaire, it's well worth giving it a try. Basically, you answer a series of questions and it tells you how you prefer to learn, and what types of learning are likely to drive you mad or stress you out.

As one participant said today, suddenly it all makes sense why two people can come out of the same activity with one person thinking it was fantastic and the other thinking it was pointless and badly managed. It also helps you realise some people learn better by staying quiet. They're listening, thinking, processing.  They won't thank you for helpfully dragging them into the limelight and insisting that you KNOW they have some fantastic examples to share - right now. Ask them later when they've had time to form an opinion.

Liam and I have different styles (surprise!). Liam's an activist and a theorist. I'm a reflector and a pragmatist. I barely register as having any preference at all for active learning. Back when I was doing my coaching training, the words I absolutely dreaded were 'tag coaching'. One person would sit in the middle of the group, someone would be picked to start coaching them, and then others would be picked at random to run in, tag the current coach and take over. Hmm. Stick me in front of 25 people and make me attempt to use a skill I don't yet possess, with absolutely no chance to prepare. My favourite. I hated it with a passion and practically had to be tipped off my chair to make me do it.

If you don't yet know your preferred learning style, here's a chance to learn something new about yourself. Let us know how you get on.

Sue

PS I have been given the bridal suite in our conference centre! I have a whirlpool bath, fluffy cream chairs, leopard print throws, a gold cupid hanging above my rather large bed, and ... wait for it ... bride and groom teddy bears to keep me company!! Unfortunately somebody seems to have made a start on the champagne in the fridge, but hey, you can't have everything ...

Know your place

I've been spending a very happy weekend watching Glastonbury on the TV.  I've decided two things..:

1) Lily Allen can't sing and really is annoying

2) I'm going next time despite the mud

However, in between embarassing the kids by asking the name of every second artist on the telly I have been working quite hard (well I did get out on the bike as well - you've got to get the miles in...)

One of the good things about the work that Sue and I do is that it actually makes me keep reading – something I know I’d be lax about if it weren’t for the real deadlines that come with a promised development programme for a client.

Right now, I’m working on a unit on consulting skills for IC managers because we keep being asked what people need to know if they want to expand from implementers to advisors (it’s all part of the competency model)…

And as part of the process you have to look around to see what new is being said on the subject or track down data and case studies.

One of my real finds is a book by Alan Weiss called “Organizational consulting – how to be an effective internal change agent”.  And what I like is the fact that it underlines the point that was drummed into me when I worked for a project management consultancy – be clear about the roles of the different players in any given situation.

In project management they make a big deal about knowing the difference between a client and an end user.  When projects go wrong it’s often because these roles have been confused or left ill-defined.

And in consulting you have to be very clear about who is the client and who is merely an interested party.  Weiss talks about defining your “Economic Buyer” – the person who holds the budget, who specifies the required results and who will take ultimate accountability for the project not working.

He says you shouldn’t confuse an Economic Buyer with general stakeholders – people with something to gain or lose but no final accountability for the success of the project.

In a workshop the other day one of the team I was working with bemoaned the fact that in his organisation there seems to be an endless round of approvals and authorisations for the tiniest thing – a problem that is pretty familiar to most of us!  We’ve all suffered from our plan being tinkered with by every Tom, Dick and Harriet – but it never seems to become a better plan in the process for some reason.

Weiss has some thoughts on that and our unit will need to explore when you try different styles when dealing with different situations.

However I also think the good old fashioned RACI is a solid discipline to be applied in these situations.  At the start of a project identify the steps involved and for each stem decide who is ultimately Accountable (i.e. where the buck will ultimately stop is the task fails to happen or is poorly performed), who is Responsible (i.e. will be expected to help make it all happen), who needs to be Consulted and who simply needs to be Informed. (The acronym therefore stands for Responsible, Accountable, Consulted and Informed – I guess that although you’d naturally start you list with accountable, the resulting acronym isn’t that charming!).

So, now I’m off to Amazon to buy the novels of someone who was at the workshop this week!

Liam

And on the subject of knowing your place...http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SjxY9rZwNGU

Small is beautiful

This week I was at a speed networking event at the CIPR in London, sponsored by  recruiters VMA.  I have to thank Charlotte for the photos.

Two things to report - a very funny conversation with Charlotte talking about social networking sites like Melcrum's Communicators Network.  We both admitted that we want to have more friends than anyone else and she promised faithfully that she'd be my friend and NOT SUE's on the site (that's the last time I trust you Butler!).  And when I got home I discovered that Sue's got two more mates than me (although we're both miles behind Angela Sinickas - she really does know everyone!).  So if you've ever vaguely met me, do say hello on the network.  I couldn't bear Miss 'oh no I don't do sport' Dewhurst getting all triumphant about it...

Secondly, speaking to an Australian about development and she said that she thought she'd been lucky starting her career in a small company doing everything.  Her thought was that although you don't get the career opportunities or really massive projects you do get to dabble in lots of things giving you experience in a range of disciplines.  Given that she now worked for one of the biggest investment banks in London there was some truth in what she said.

Liam

Ever afraid you'll get found out?

Hands up if you ever feel a fraud. Ever get that nagging feeling you're not as good as other people think you are? You've kind of got where you are by luck. You're not really an internal comms expert - half the time you make it up and hope for the best. You might look good in your company, but standards aren't high. Put you somewhere else and who knows ...

A very senior, extremely competent and highly-regarded friend told me recently that she often worries about getting 'found out' and daren't move companies in case she can't cut it anywhere else. It reminded me of a McKinsey consultant who told me everyone there thinks they're the ONE person HR let slip through the net. Screwed up the recruitment process. At any moment, they could be exposed as 'the dud' in McKinseys.

I found out today this has a name. It's called the Imposter Syndrome. Psychologists have researched it. People have written books about it. Apparently it most often affects successful women. Here's an article about it by imposterful writer Simran Bhargava.

I often see signs of it on Black Belt. People tell me they don't really know what they're doing and they're just waiting to be found out. They hold back from doing major presentations or projects in case someone notices. I see them in action on the course and end up trying to catch them in breaks, buttonhole them before they leave or email or call them afterwards to say 'Clearly NOT true! Please tell me you don't really think that about yourself!'

If this is you, what can you do about it? Here are some things I've found helpful in my imposterful moments:

1. Find yourself a champion. Championing is a coaching skill I learnt. It means standing up for people when they question their abilities. Not in an insincere or 'I'm just being nice to you because you're my friend' way. In a pointing out the reality and setting out people's strengths way. Liam is great at this. When I'm having a doubting Thomas moment he calls or emails and says 'let me tell you again why you're fantastic' and reels off a list.
2. Email a few close colleagues or friends with a list of questions. My first coach made me do this. I had to ask things like 'what three words would you use to describe me?' 'What do you most value about me?' 'What do you think I most underestimate about myself?' I felt a bit stupid doing it but I got some lovely things back and I've kept all of them.
3. One for five minutes at the end of a team meeting. Give everyone a piece of paper and get them to write their name on the top. Pass it to the next person, who writes something they most value about that team member, folds it over and passes it on, until the sheet has been around the whole team and gets back to the original person ... who unravels it and basks in a wave of compliments! My ntl one was stuck up above my phone until the day I left.
4. Keep emails or cards with thank yous or compliments people have sent you. I've got a big noticeboard above my desk (bearing in mind I work from home so the whole world doesn't see it!). It has photos of my favourite times in various jobs, coupled with leaving cards, cards from flowers, emails from leaders, project managers, team members, and yes, Black Belt people.

Some of those will feel horribly soft and fluffy for those rational Myers Briggs T types amongst you, but they're all just about holding up a mirror to say 'hang on, what's the reality here.'  Any other suggestions or observations welcome ...

Sue

 

Getting the balance right

So, next week is my first four day working week.  On Monday I start reading with kids in my local school through Volunteer Reading Help. 

As a serial workaholic, I have to put something in my diary that will actually stop me from working if I'm serious about getting a life. So every Monday morning from now on is school time and Monday afternoons are 'finally write my children's book' time.

Add to that the fact that I'm taking 4 holidays this year (compared with none last year) and am in the middle of a run of 9 weekends staying with friends/having friends to stay (which means NO work!), and I'm in danger of getting a life! Thanks to those who have cajoled me, reasoned with me, tried to scare the hell out of me, bullied me or persistently and patiently nagged me into getting a better balance. You know who you are.

I was interested to hear from Chapple about a global survey of recruitment consultants.  A quarter of consultants surveyed said work/life balance is now more important to job applicants than increased salary, and six out of ten said both are equally important.

If you want to do some thinking about whether you've got a healthy balance between work and not-work, try the wheel of life - used by life coaches the world over.  Here's a PDF version I found on Mary McNeil's Create a Space site.

You just look at each category on the wheel and rate how satisfied you are with each area of your life by giving it a score from 1 to 10. It soon shows up where the problem areas are, and then it's up to you whether you want to do something about them ..

Sue   

The easy option?

I've been reading an article in my mum's Sainsbury's magazine called 'Can a book change your life?'  It has four people reviewing self-help books 'to see if they really work'. Each review followed a general pattern:

1. "I can't believe how blindingly obvious the content is. I already know I should be doing all that"
2. "But here are 101 reasons why all those things are too difficult. So I'm not doing them."
3. "Pretty useless book really. Makes sense, but where's the v.easy and miraculous solution that doesn't involve any effort on my part? Pah. Some hotshot self help guru THIS is."

I think it must be human nature or something. We do it in IC too. I reckon sometimes the reason people stand up at conferences and describe apparent miracles, as Fiona said last week, is because they know that's what we're secretly hoping to find. A hundred people looking up at you expectantly, waiting for you to deliver the Eureka moment. No pressure!

Yes, we trawl conferences, read case studies, listen to webinars looking for THE thing that's finally going to solve our problems. But it's the same old stuff about linking comms to the business agenda, setting objectives, knowing your audience, measuring, blah blah blah. We know all that. Where's the innovative new solution?  What's the BEST practice that we can just take back and copy?

We might 'know all that', but are we doing it?  Or do we decide, half the time, that there are 101 reasons why we CAN'T segment our audiences/ test things/measure results/ use techniques that get people to have a dialogue and learn for themselves instead of just sending things out and telling/selling as hard as we can?

Sometimes, you do either need a miracle or a ticket out of the organisation to somewhere else that appreciates you. A lot of other times, the 'stuff we know already' will work - not miraculously, and not without some huffing and puffing, a fair bit of patience and a sense of humour - but it will definitely make a difference.  For me, what the books/conferences/webinars do is

• remind you of what we already know
• inspire you to actually act on some of it when you see how well it's worked somewhere else
• give practical ideas or different perspectives about how other people have done it that make it easier to take the first step or give you food for thought.

Where do you get your ideas from? Anyone got any examples of things you learned from other people/organisations that have worked for you? (simple ones - although if you happen to have a miracle up your sleeve, Fiona's still waiting to hear that they actually exist ...)

Sue

 

The Melting Pot

Apparently I'm unique. And not just because one of my feet is two shoe sizes bigger than the other. (Yes, really. Yes, I do have to buy two pairs. And yes, it is expensive.)

I'm unique because if ever someone asks people at an internal comms event to raise their hand if they actually started their career in internal comms, I'm inevitably the only person that puts their hand up.  My CV looks quite beautifully planned, even if it's more by luck than judgement.

Mostly, people come from other places. HR, Marketing, PR, Engineering, Dentistry, you name it.  Personally I don't think it matters where people start out. Internal comms is largely common sense. You can learn the technical skills and knowledge and build up the experience. What really counts is the right attitude.

I once practically begged a PR person to take a job in my team. She was obviously fantastic at building relationships, motivated, bright and positive ... but she wouldn't take the role because she was worried she didn't have enough experience in IC. I'd spent all day seeing experienced internal comms people and I wasn't about to recruit any of them. I was gutted that I lost her.

Actually, I think it's a very GOOD thing that people come from other places, because we can learn a lot from them.

• PR people are fantastic at messaging. They're trained to hone in on three messages and boil them down into something short and memorable. I think they're much sharper than IC people on that front. 
• Marketers are great at segmentation. They think harder about knowing audiences and connecting emotionally with them, and they're often data junkies. Most IC people I know think of research and measurement as some kind of nasty-tasting medicine. They know they should do it, but they don't like it. Marketers know the power of data and use it well to make informed decisions.
• HR people - I suppose it depends which part of HR. I did a brief stint in learning & development. Just long enough to do my stage one IPD (as it was then), train as a career coach, become a pretty good competence-based assessor and get familiar with learning styles and planning and running training programmes. All of which have come in very handy.
• People with business-based backgrounds think like business people and talk business language. They have instant credibility with business leaders and they remind us what we're doing here. It's interesting when we have business people on black belt that are just moving into IC roles. They're the ones that can instantly answer the quiz questions about financials.

I'm generalising of course, but I do think we gain a lot from people joining the profession from such different backgrounds. There are not many cookie cutter IC managers.  Everyone brings their own experience and their own perspective. 

Where were you before you found IC?  How do you think it's shaped your approach? What have you learned from people that have come via different routes?

Sue

By association

On Wednesday I'm off to Lisbon to chair a two day conference on behalf of CIPR Inside - the Chartered Institute of Public relations' Internal Communications group previously called the Internal Communications Alliance.

All credit to new Chairman Paul Massie and Lee Smith for giving the group a new lease of life and putting in place a great programme of activity for the year ahead focused on internal reputation management and change. It takes energy and persistance to be on the committee for a professional association. Liam and I were members of the ICA committee for years before work committments got the better of us and we became so embarrassed at the amount of consecutive weeks we could never make the conference calls that we decided to call it a day.

Fortunately, now we're joining CIPR Inside's new panel of 'expert advisors', which means we get to be nosy and opinionated about everything that's planned and go along to events to hear what's new in the world of IC, but without the responsibility of being committee members. Excellent!

Professional associations - why the lack of enthusiasm?

In the research we've just done about how IC people are developing themselves, joining a professional association came very low on people's priority lists. Anyone shed any light about why?

We try to keep our links with all three professional associations for IC people. We're judging some of the awards for the CiB this year and Darren Crozier keeps us in touch with goings on as president of the CiB in Scotland.  And I think Jacqui Hitt has put on a really good programme of events for the IABC's UK Chapter as VP of Development for the past twelve months, which we catch up about over lunch, dinner or long phone chats now and again. 

Jacqui and Darren have both written pieces for our soon-to-be-published report about development for internal comms people giving their views about the benefits to be had from being part of professional associations, including:

• A formal programme of events & workshops
• Networking & sharing ideas & best practice
• Validation & confidence that you're doing the right thing from award programme feedback
• A sense that you're not alone when you realise other people are struggling with the same issues
• Personal development through being a committee member and organising, chairing or speaking at events

I'm hoping Lee Smith will also be able to write about the benefits he's seen from being part of the CIPR's continuous professional development scheme.

I've certainly got a lot to thank CIPR Inside for. It's where I first started to build a network, realised I was interested in the whole IC development agenda, got involved in writing the Intercomm matrix and was forced up on stage to speak at conferences.  I even have them to thank for first introducing me to Liam. (At least, I THINK I should be thanking them!)

Anyone want to share what you've got from being a member of a professional association, or explain why you can't see the attraction?

Sue

Con - fidence

As part of the research Liam and I did recently, we asked people what most helped them develop. High on the list was being stretched to do more challenging work.

Self-help books (I've read them all. I am Bridget Jones incarnate.) tell you to 'do one thing a day that scares you'. But I seem to have had quite a few conversations with people recently who just aren't convinced they've got the confidence to take the risk.

Years ago, I read somewhere that the word confidence starts with a 'con'.  As long as you act as if you're confident, nobody knows you're a quivering jelly underneath.

Now I'm probably one of the least confident people you know. They used to have competitions at school to see who could make me blush the most. But ever since I read that book, I found that having an air of self assurance will get me through just about any work-related situation. And nobody seems to notice if I'm feeling totally jittery inside. 

A few years ago I presented at my first major conference. I was absolutely petrified. I'd rehearsed it so many times in my mind I was literally reciting it in my head as I walked from the tube to the hotel. I got the highest feedback scores of anyone at the conference (including Bill Quirke!) and I met a delegate on the tube afterwards who said 'I wish I could be that confident about speaking in public. But I guess you must do this kind of thing all the time.' SO not true. I'd been so nervous I daren't have a coffee in case anyone saw my hands shaking.

In my experience, if you only do the things you're scared of once, you'll still be scared of them afterwards. I find I have to do them over and over again within a fairly short time, until it starts to dawn on me that it doesn't feel so bad any more and I actually seem to be doing it quite well.

I think taking risks is one of the best ways to learn. I've got two things in my work diary in the next couple of months that I'm having palpitations about. I still hate the 'this is like going to the dentist' feeling that I have in the run up. But in the back of my mind, I know it will all be OK, and afterwards that will be another thing I didn't think I could do ... but now I know I can.

So .. what's coming up in YOUR schedule?

Sue