Benchmarking better cultures? Don’t!

Posted on April 3, 2011 by barrymike1

Benchmarking cultures of other companies is like chasing mirages of watery oases in the desert: the vision motivates you to move toward it, but the reality gives you no idea of how to get there.

In a few weeks, I’m joining a professional group and doing a tour of the company, Zappos, after which we’ll hear from one of their executives about their remarkable, almost cult-like culture of customer focus.  It will no doubt be instructive.

But only to a limited degree.  Zappos is simply the new Southwest Airlines: the model culture for leaders from other companies to envy and to emulate.

And like those who have tried to turn their company into Southwest Airlines, the effort will undoubtedly be a frustrating experience, ultimately fruitless.  Think about it: After hundreds, if not thousands of corporate visitors studying the culture of Southwest Airlines, what company immediately comes to mind when asked “Name a company, other than Zappo’s, whose culture is just like that of Southwest Airlines?” I’ll be darned if I can think of one. Please, if you’ve got an obvious answer, I’m anxious to know.

Why is benchmarking the culture of Zappos or, for that matter, Southwest Airlines likely to be fruitless?  Simple: they were born that way.  You weren’t! Their cultures were built on the values and visions of their founders, and employees were either hired for those values or self-selected to stay with the company because of them.  Yours was built on the values and visions of your founder. Different visions, different values, different founders. Not better or worse. Just different.

That’s why the all-too-common result of trying to make your employees act like those of another company is a pale imitation of the real thing. Have you ever tried to become somebody else?

If you want to see what I mean, go to an Apple Store.  And then, go to an ATT or Verizon wireless store. Which founder is more in touch with the contemporary consumer experience: Apple’s Steve Jobs or 19th century inventor and Bell founder Alexander Graham Bell?  It’s no wonder that employees at the ATT and Verizon stores, despite their well-meaning efforts to be helpful, all too often wind up apologizing for less than stellar customer service by complaining about the bureaucratic procedures of their corporate parent.

So while “role models” like Zappos or Southwest Airlines may help expand your sense of the possible, there’s not much more they can do. Unlike you, they’ve never tried to dramatically change their culture, and they have no expertise at doing so. So enjoy the visit. But when you return, I suggest you spend some time finding the rare company that’s successfully transformed their culture, and benchmark it. It will be more sobering than fun. But also more useful. Having worked on and consulted to companies going through the process, I can tell you it’s a marathon, requiring patience, persistence, and long-term commitment. But it can be done.

That said, there’s still enough executives out there thirsting for the oasis of easy culture transformation that the halls of those “role model” companies will still be crowded with vision-inspired corporate travelers. But like must hallucinating travelers in a knowledge desert, they’ll end up empty-handed, thirstier than when they started.

Posted in Corporate Culture Change | Tagged , , , , | 3 Comments

It’s not what you say. It’s how you look!

Posted on April 1, 2011 by barrymike1

A number of years ago, an executive recruiter, perhaps a bit ahead of her time, suggested that we get to know each other with a face-to-face conversation, via videoconferencing.  The conversation took place at a Kinko’s (now FedEx Office) store in a cold backroom lit by harsh fluorescent lighting. We spoke across a television monitor that seemed to shrink her dimensions, and undoubtedly mine as well.  Maybe that explains why, though I was well-dressed, felt relaxed, and came across as friendly, I had something of an off day. I simply was not my sharpest, smartest self.

So imagine my surprise when the recruiter followed up the next day gushing with enthusiasm about how terrific I’d been, and how she couldn’t wait to present me to her client. An unexpected reaction, indeed. I never understood it… until now.

We live today in the videoconferencing era. With improved technology and much lower costs relative to travel, videoconferencing has become an absolutely acceptable and increasingly common substitute for face-to-face communication.  And when it comes to sharing knowledge, versus, say, building relationships, videoconferencing would certainly seem to be the equivalent of face-to-face. After all, whether in person or by video stream, the content is the same, so how big a difference can the media make?

More than you’d think, according to some very interesting research by Carlos Ferran of Penn State and Stephanie Watts of Boston University. They took advantage of a “natural experiment” – a series of medical seminars with both on-site and video audiences – to figure out whether the impact of the seminars differed between those who were “face-to-face”, that is, in the auditorium where the seminars were given, and those who watched it on video.

What they found seems counter-intuitive.  Those in the same room as the seminar presenter were most influenced by the quality of the speaker’s argument.  Those watching the same presentation with the same content at the same time on video feed were more likely to be influenced by the “likability” of the speaker, that is, those things about the speaker you’d expect to notice more at close quarters: dress, expression, gestures, etc.

Their explanation for these results derives from something called the “dual-process paradigm of human information processing.” (Don’t worry; it’s not something you need to know.) Put simply, it states that when it’s too hard to concentrate on thinking through and assessing content – because, for example, the distractions inherent in watching someone on a video conference monitor make it hard to concentrate on what they’re saying – we rely on automatic, mostly unconscious “cues” as to someone’s credibility and the quality of their content or argument.

“Cues” in this care are non-content-related things — attractiveness, tone of voice, non-verbal gestures, facial expressions, how well they dress — that academics summarize with the term “likability.”

Superficial?  Yes. But, for the most part — not always, but for the most part — surprisingly accurate predictors of whether or not someone will be perceived as credible, and their content compelling.  To take one example, if you walk into a medical office, and there are two people standing there, one in a business suit, the other in torn jeans and a tee-shirt, are you going to spend a lot of time thinking about which person is the doctor?  Most people won’t, they’ll respond automatically to the available “cues,” in this case, dress, and they’ll address the person in the suit. And they’ll almost always be right.

The key point is simple: in the right circumstances, the right “cues” can have as much of an impact as the right ideas.  And videoconferencing is apparently one of those circumstances.

The implication for strategic leaders can be a frustrating one: for better or worse, you have to be at least as attentive, if not more so, to how you come across when doing a videoconference as to what it is you have to say. So: Dress like you’re going to a job interview.  Slow down your presentation. Reinforce your main points.

You may not be your sharpest, smartest self that day, but you will still get the job done. I know. I was well-dressed, relaxed, “likable”. And I not only got the job done…. I got the job.

Posted in Communication Media | Tagged , , , , | 2 Comments

Manage communication with the brain in mind.

Posted on March 31, 2011 by barrymike1

Micro-managers shut off creativity. The uncertainty of downsizing or outsourcing or other job-threatening actions undermines productivity. Executive bonuses seen as disproportionate to the general employee population generate resentment.

These results happen with almost predictable certainty. But far too many leaders ignore them — they don’t explain huge “retention bonuses,” they hire micro-managers, they take no steps to reduce uncertainty — assuming that employees will “get over it,” or that the consequences won’t last.

But what if these reactions run deeper and more powerfully than we think? Consider this perspective: employee perceptions of social situations — whether, for example, they feel they are being treated unfairly, or micromanaged, or even not fully appreciated — trigger threat or reward responses in their brains. Responses that show up loud and clear on functional MRIs.

The result is that, almost automatically, when leadership actions evoke a “threat,” employees will respond by getting into “fight or flight” mode, or simply shutting down, in effect, disengaging from work. With the attendant disastrous business results: productivity goes down the drain, passive resistance becomes the norm, creativity and innovation come to a dead stop.

On the other hand, if leaders evoke a “reward” response, good things happen in an organization: engagement, productivity, innovation, etc.

David Rock, a consultant, author, and social science “translator” – think of him as the as the Malcolm Gladwell of neuroscience research – builds on a broad spectrum of research to make this case, most popularly in his strategy + business article, “Managing with the Brain in Mind.”

Assuming this perspective to be true, there are at least two implications that immediately come to mind.  First, effective leaders must gauge the “threat or reward” impact of their messages and actions on employee perceptions. It’s a filter that can’t be ignored — doing so can clearly have negative business consequences.

Second, this perspective puts the management of employee perceptions at the heart of leadership effectiveness. Since communication is a primary tool of perception management, it can safely be said that there is no effective leadership without effective communication.

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Messaging inconsistency is the hobgoblin of ineffective leaders.

Posted on March 25, 2011 by barrymike1

I love the actual quote that underpins this discussion. It comes from the American essayist/philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson, and it’s a great one: “A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines.”

My take is that the key word here is the adjective “foolish”. When opinions, ideas, beliefs, etc. become clearly out of synch with changes in reality, then consistency becomes foolish, and ideas harden into ideology.

But that’s the exception, not the rule. How often does reality render strategy messages obsolete? Contrary to Emerson’s dictum, when it comes to organizational communication and persuasive messages, consistency and constancy are absolute necessities for effectiveness. Without a consistent framework for explaining strategy, market approach, values, etc., and a strategic message constantly communicated, leadership teams may be perceived as not knowing where they are going or what they are doing, putting leadership credibility at risk.

Consistent messages and message frameworks might have to evolve over time, but they shouldn’t be subject to constant change, and should only be abandoned when external reality — e.g., disruptive technology, threatening competitors, weakening economy — calls for changes in strategy.

Most senior leaders have MBAs. And all MBAs have taken marketing classes, and have had to hear that when it comes to reaching consumers, and achieving, at the least, “top of mind” awareness, it takes something like 3-10 repetitions of a message. Employees are no different than consumers: the more consistently and constantly you share a message, the more they’ll remember it, believe it, and just as importantly, believe that you believe it.

Message inconsistency is indeed the hobgoblin of ineffective leaders.

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Are “influencers” really that influential?

Posted on March 25, 2011 by barrymike1

Since Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point, it has become almost a given in marketing, and to some degree in communications, that if you want to influence some audience or target group, you only need to influence the influencers, that small group of ‘connectors,” “mavens,” and “salesmen” who will in turn influence everyone else. Seems compelling, and makes sense. But is it true?

Not according to Duncan Watts, a sociologist and expert in social networks. Writing a brief note in the Harvard Business Review, Watts alludes to research he has done that suggests greater complexity in process of social influence. In fact, he goes as far as saying that:

“I have found that influentials [read connectors, mavens and salesmen] have far less impact on social epidemics than is generally supposed. In fact, they don’t seem to be required at all.”

The key to success, according to Watts, lies as much with the context and audience as with the influencer. For Watts, no matter how many connectors, mavens or salesmen you have working with you, if the group you’re trying to influence and persuade doesn’t have “a critical mass of easily influenced people,” forget it. Success is independent of the influencers, “…just as the size of a forest fire has little to do with the spark that started it and lots to do with the state of the forest.”

Does this suggest abandoning the search for and work with influencers? Not at all. But it does suggest that like all persuasive communications, understanding the audience and context is a necessity for success, no matter how many influencers you can bring to bear.

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