April 2011
Commitment
Company leaders are becoming more aware of the importance of their employees’ organizational commitment to achieving business goals. Not only are committed employees more engaged in their work, more productive, and more likely to get along well with their peers; they also contribute to good relationships with customers and vendors and increase appeal to potential customers. Furthermore, organizational commitment helps promote high levels of retention, keeping key employees and their knowledge and skills within the organization while reducing the need for – and the costs of –recruitment, hiring and termination, and new employee orientation and training.
Some of the most important elements in encouraging employee commitment are:
• Fairness. The sense that everyone in the workplace is being treated equally is highly correlated with an individual’s commitment to the organization. A perception of being treated unfairly, or of preference being given to others without sufficient justification, is highly detrimental to employee commitment.
• Reciprocity. Management requests high performance and quality work from all employees, and in return management must commit to supportive and worker-oriented policies, such as promoting family time and work-life balance, forgoing raises and bonuses for themselves, or giving high priority to job security and avoiding layoffs.
• Involvement. For employees who possess the proper skills and choose to do so, commitment to the organization is encouraged when they are allowed to participate in business processes and decision making and to interface with management, customers, and vendors.
• Appropriate hiring and placement. Selecting the right person for each job at every level, so that autonomy and responsibility can be maximized as much as possible, encourages feelings of confidence, security, and commitment.
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April 2011
Critical Thinking
Decisions are made every day in the workplace, often several times a day. However, it is human nature for decisions to be guided or shaped by personal biases, distortions, prejudices, or partiality. As a result, high-quality decisions must involve a process known as critical thinking. Critical thinking is self-directed, self-guided process that uses a high level of information gathering, solid evidence, and intellectual reasoning to think objectively and analyze an issue to consider a variety of variables and possible scenarios (Safi & Burrell, 2007).
Critical thinkers are aware of the flawed nature of human thinking, and they know they can always improve their reasoning abilities by objectively examining every aspect of the situation, including the problem, assumptions, concepts, empirical grounding, reasoning, implications and consequences, objections from alternative viewpoints, and the frame of reference. High-quality critical thinking therefore may involve scientific thinking, mathematical thinking, historical thinking, anthropological thinking, economic thinking, moral thinking, and philosophical thinking (“Defining critical thinking,” 2009). Good decision makers will also seek out external input to challenge their personal biases and encourage discussion, dissention, and debate (Whitehead et. al, 2009).
Effective critical thinking includes a number of factors, such as (“Defining critical thinking,” 2009):
• Inquiry – raising vital questions and framing them clearly.
• Information gathering – soliciting data, solid evidence, and opinions from a wide range of sources.
• Analysis – examining the information issue from all sides in an objective manner.
• Reaching well-reasoned solutions – synthesizing information, forming judgments, and testing them against standards.
• Communicating – establishing a dialogue with others to consider alternative standards of thought (Paul & Elder, 2005) and settle on a course of action.
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November 2011
Focus on Quality
A strong focus on quality within the workforce helps align company goals with outcomes, increases engagement and ownership of work, and ensures that standards are being met. For many companies, quality orientation starts by prioritizing quality results alongside financial and market-driven results; specific quality standards are then defined and communicated throughout the organization.
Individuals at all levels can develop their quality orientation by developing perception and analytic skills, focusing on detail, seeing the big-picture impact of their work, accepting responsibility for outcomes, and using communication skills to ensure all stakeholders understand and accept expectations. Those who wish to better focus on quality must also learn to minimize distractions and adhere to priorities. Quality orientation is most effective when it is embedded in the workplace culture and processes instead of being used as a tool for criticism or damage control.
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April 2011
Foresight
The future will bring change – in technology, in market structure, in social trends, and in the regulatory environment. Changes that are external to the organization and beyond its control may account for as much as half of the variability in corporate earnings, so the value of anticipating change is high (Schoemaker & van der Heijden, 1993).
Forecasting is an attempt to predict events and trends with the greatest possible accuracy, usually in the near-term. In contrast, the term foresight refers to a different kind of previewing, one that assumes a variety of futures are possible. Foresight activities envision hypothetical futures and consider an organization’s ability to adapt to new circumstances. Learning from foresight supports robust strategic planning and may provoke discovery of new products or markets (Tsoukas & Shepherd, 2004).
Describing the foresight process at Royal Dutch/Shell, Schoemaker and van der Heijden (1993) say its purpose is “preparing the institutional mind.” Preparation is necessary because organizations learn slowly, hanging on to ideas that brought success in the past. Lulled by decades of dominance, IBM failed to recognize a market shift in mainframe services during the 1990’s, while Mattel saw sales decline but did not understand how social change had made Barbie vulnerable to sassier rivals. At the same time, Apple and others did foresee how deregulation and fast-evolving technology would transform the business of telephones. In foresight activities, leaders confront a future that is different from today’s comfortable certainties. As a result, they are more open-minded when change arrives, whatever form it may take.
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April 2011
Leading Strategically
There are many different types of leadership. Some people lead directly, managing subordinates face to face on a day-to-day basis. Others lead large organizations less directly, managing through staffs and managers via policies that are carried out by subordinates. Still others lead even more indirectly, creating goals, expectations, and plans of action for others to assimilate into their own activities (Milum Communications Group, 2010). This latter form of leadership is known as strategic leadership.
Leading strategically entails a global perspective; it focuses less on direct operations than on the pursuit of a goal or series of goals. Strategic leaders help set an organization’s course – for instance, establishing how resources should be directed in pursuit of goals. Leading strategically requires a focus on the future as well as the present.
Leading strategically requires professionals to carefully analyze the marketplace, understand all aspects of the business organization, and inspire others to adopt new ideas and follow different directions. Strategic leaders create ideas that are subject to interpretation (Finkelstein, Hambrick, & Cannella, 2008). They are therefore different –although invaluable – types of corporate leaders.
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October 2011
Meeting Management
In 2009, Microsoft conducted a Microsoft Office survey about meetings. The results showed that people across industries spend 5.6 hours every week in meetings, and close to 70 percent of respondents feel that meetings are not productive (Wachtel, 2009). Clearly, unproductive meetings are costly for businesses. As a result, it is essential for employees at all levels to understand how to organize and manage meetings. Meetings must be structured in a way that serves business objectives; meeting facilitators should design the introduction, stage setting, ground rules, agenda times, and closing to achieve those goals.
In addition, meeting facilitators should use an interpersonal style that is appropriate to the type of meeting being held, focusing in particular on people, preparation, and process. In some instances, meeting attendees may need to be encouraged to actively participate. In others, common obstacles may need to be addressed, including meeting hijackers, negative attitudes, social media distractions, overly large groups, and overwhelming content.
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July 2011
Recognizing Achievement
Recognizing achievement is an important but often overlooked component of a healthy workplace environment. Not only does it help to establish the specific behaviors and outcomes that are most valued by an organization, it also helps to increase employee motivation to maintain or improve upon their performance. However, leaders should be careful to use recognition to reinforce desired behaviors and not solely as an incentive to achieve a specific goal or outcome.
Recognition can take many forms: a public announcement, a private note, a promotion or increase in pay, or awarding of a top assignment. While nonmonetary rewards may be used frequently, they must be used with sincerity and should be accompanied with thanks, praise and exposure to upper management. Skilled managers may also look for ways to reward their best employees by keeping them stimulated with new learning opportunities and challenges.
Because employees seek a number of returns to justify the time, energy, and effort they put forth in the workplace, financial rewards are not always the most effective way to recognize achievement. Just as employees are tasked with meeting the needs of their organization, companies should also aim to meet the needs of employees in terms of self-esteem, creativity, professional growth and socialization. Recognizing achievement in areas such as client service, professional integrity, innovation or teamwork can help promote these values throughout the workplace. Additionally, in challenging times, an effective recognition program can help to retain top employees.
While employees should be recognized in ways that reflect the culture of the organization, expressing appreciation in a variety of ways helps to reinforce a positive workplace environment.
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April 2011
Sales Calls
The responsibilities of today’s sales professionals are ever expanding. Today, salespeople are both problem solvers and information gatherers, and they must frequently attend seminars to increase product knowledge. For customers, time is a precious commodity. Before they meet with a salesperson, they want to know that their time spent with the salesperson will be worthwhile.
With the above challenges in mind, the sales call is as important as ever in helping to maintain a company’s required sales levels. The salesperson must thoroughly prepare for a call and be able to clearly explain what the customer can gain from it. Otherwise, the call will be a waste of time. Salespeople should follow certain principles to make the calls more valuable to the customer and improve their chances of closing a deal.
• Prepare. Salespeople must mentally prepare before the sales call and be able to explain what the customer will potentially gain from the call.
• Position. Salespeople must know how to best position themselves during the sales call. They should not start the call by describing the product or service they are selling.
• Propose. Salespeople must collaborate with the customer to ensure that the plan they propose is developed with the customer’s point of view in mind.
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January 2011
Standing Alone
Competency Background
In a classic experiment, psychologist Solomon Asch asked people to look at a drawing with three lines and say which one was the same length as a fourth line. About 60 percent of participants gave an obviously wrong answer because they overheard six people before them give the same wrong answer. The six others were researchers pretending to take the questionnaire, and the experiment's results show how difficult it can be to set oneself apart when others are unanimous. In brain scans, the stress of expressing a contrary judgment causes emotion centers to light up (cited in Prentice, 2007).
The coercive power of groupthink is a problem for organizations that rely on team members for sound professional judgment. There are ethical implications as well, since people who believe "everyone does it" will tend to accept rather than report misconduct, including fraud. The good news is that wrong answers in the Asch experiment dropped 75 percent if even one of the overheard answers was different. In other words, one person standing apart can be enough to break the spell of groupthink.
The ability to stand alone is a valuable resource and should be cultivated. Moreover, individuals can cultivate this trait in themselves, even if they are not rebellious by nature, through self-awareness and a little practice. A supportive organization can help individuals speak up at decisive moments.
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