Why fundamentals matter: The simpler the better

Monday, October 04, 2010

I trust that you’ve read the last two entries (1, 2) regarding the importance of building a list of absolute, non-negotiable, principles or objectives that everyone in your organization knows and practices. I have received some feedback that I will share with you shortly, but I am hoping to get more ideas from you, the reader, before providing a list. Please refer to the above links to review exactly what I’m looking for in your list.

Briefly, the case was made that we can’t rely on talent alone to achieve our business objectives. I used the Seattle Mariners to support this idea. Today, I’ll present you with an excellent example of obsessing over the right things, this time using the Seattle Seahawks as an example.

The Seattle Seahawks are not predicted to return to the playoffs anytime soon. They have far too many new players and very few positions, if any, held by anyone who is considered the best at their position. Nonetheless, their record to date is two wins and two losses.

The reason for their relative success is fairly simple: Pete Carroll realizes that he can’t match other teams, position for position. In fact, he realizes that having a team with so many new players and a lack of cohesion demands that he MUST boil down their objective to eliminate confusion and bring about a unified purpose… so that everyone GETS IT. So, instead of focusing on a complex set of principles, he has simplified the focus to one… Yes that’s right, ONE objective:

“Offense= Don’t give up the football; Defense= Get the football.”

That’s it. So, this entire year this Seahawks team will focus on their turnover ratio more than any other stat. Will they still make mistakes and turn over the football? Yes. Will they go to the playoffs? I don’t know. But will they have a more favorable turnover ratio than their opponents? I believe they will. My hunch is that Pete Carroll knows that having small, attainable objectives can bring a team of new comrades together to build something great.

And by the way, remember….as I write this, they are 2-2 and challenging for the top of their division.

Have you simplified your objectives?

Editor’s Note: This article was written by Dr. David Mashburn. Dave is a Clinical and Consulting Psychologist, Partner at Tidemark, Inc. and a regular contributor to WorkPuzzle. Comments or questions are welcome. If you’re an email subscriber, reply to this WorkPuzzle email. If you read the blog directly from the web, you can click the “comments” link below.

Why “Let’s Have Coffee” Is Vital To Success

Wednesday, September 29, 2010

In my last post I promised to begin building a list of vital business fundamentals that are non-negotiable–things that must be performed, measured, and in every way, insisted upon. I asked for your help in building this list and am eagerly awaiting ideas that you have derived from the best of your own experience. Keep in mind…there are no right or wrong answers here. The point of this exercise is to emphasize the importance of HAVING A LIST. And once you have a list, be diligent about setting expectations and measuring that list.

I opened this discussion yesterday by pointing to our very own Seattle Mariners as an example of a team that has great talent, yet very few wins. One of the problems this year began with the relationship between baseball legend and Hall of Fame bound Ken Griffey Jr., and the Mariner’s manager. Griffey was well liked by the majority of his teammates and was said to be an asset to team moral, cohesion and maturity. The problem was, that the manager hired to lead the Mariners, didn’t take the time to get to know and develop a relationship with Griffey.

I don’t know whether it was pride, intimidation, or a naïveté that led to this blunder, but because of this, there was little communication between the two. As a result, halfway through the season, Griffey spontaneously packed up his bags and drove home to his family in Florida with no press conference, no goodbye celebration, nothing…

The point is this: We can spend reams of time with the “hard” practices of our business, but the “soft” principles are equally, if not more important. One of these soft principles, relationship building, I like to refer to as “Let’s have Coffee.”

I can tell you unequivocally, that in my own experience–whether building my private practice, developing a partnership at Tidemark, or helping others with their success–all of these things have begun around meeting for coffee or lunch. In fact, 23 years ago, with only $3,000 in my bank account and two young boys, I moved to Seattle to begin my practice. And, although it was tough financially, I designated $1,500 of that money to inviting possible referral sources to lunch (this was before Starbucks was on every street corner). I did this nearly every day, for the first three months of my living in the Seattle area. This was the best money I ever spent.

“Making time for coffee” is not only important for building a business, but also for maintaining a business. It helps you to retain your best talent and really get to know what other talent is out there.

We can spend so much time building the right tools that we forget about building the right connections, and maintaining them. It often doesn’t matter what long-term outcome you’re after – Just showing that you actually want to build a connection can open multiple doors in the future and aid in keeping existing doors wide open.

A world famous business consultant recently said that 20-40% of your 300 lunches per year should be dedicated to these types of casual meetings.

Is this something you are doing? Do you consider it to be important? If it is, should you be measuring it?

I think I have inspired myself into a corner. I guess, I better start doing the same…

Why fundamentals are more important than talent: Obsess about the right things

Monday, September 27, 2010

I am, unfortunately right now…a Seattle Mariners fan. Those of you who follow baseball can guess that I haven’t had much to be excited about these last couple of years. The Mariners have had two terrible seasons in a row, despite acquiring some impressive talent. “What’s their problem?” you may ask.

In my opinion, the factors that led to these dismal years for the Mariners are the very same factors that lead to the collapse of most organizations…failure to remember and practice the fundamentals, and at times, an obsession with acquiring great talent while ignoring the fundamentals of execution.

Let me be clear. I am not saying that talent is not important. It can be incredibly helpful, if the fundamentals aren’t lost in the process. But, several teams over the course of sports history have proven that talent without a focus on the fundamentals, is essentially worthless.

The Mariners present a prime example of this: There are two players on their roster who continue to out-perform their competing peers, despite the Mariner’s overall record. Ichiro just put up a record 10th consecutive year of over 200 hits in a season. Additionally, ace pitcher, Felix Hernandez, is so talented that he is stirring up one the most difficult votes for the Cy Young Award in the history of baseball. He has managed to out-pace all personal stats among his peers, while having the lowest wins, by far, among the contenders for the award. In essence this means that his performance was stellar, but had no run support.

So what went wrong? How can we have such great talent and such poor performance? In the case of the Mariners, it is my belief that ownership was more obsessed with talent on the field than talent in management. The manager, although a decent human being, turned out to not be a great manager. He made several mistakes that were eventually reflected in the win/loss columns, and eventually led to his dismissal.

I have some definite ideas regarding what specifically went wrong with the Mariners, but they are not alone…I’ve witnessed some of the same mistakes in other organizations. I won’t address them yet, because I want to hear from you first. I want to build a helpful and informative list – not a definitive list, but a list based on good knowledge and experience; One that we can look back on and build on. I want this list to not only be a ho-hum list of basics, but a list that really speaks to us and calls us to action- when it comes to sourcing, recruiting, managing talent, and overall good business. Ben’s recent article on developing and sticking with a definitive message is a great start.

Over the course of the next few weeks, I will set out to research this subject in a way that hopefully will present the most foundational, most urgent, most vital principle fundamentals of successful organizations. There has never been a time where this has been more needed than now. The tide is out, and we’re seeing who is wearing a decent bathing suit…

What I would like from you readers is your personal list of favorite fundamentals. If you are uncomfortable listing this publicly, please write me personally by email.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Building Consistency and Linkage Into Your Recruiting Message

Thursday, September 23, 2010

Earlier this week, I encouraged you to develop a believable recruiting message and then stick to it—even under the pressure of competitors who are touting discounts and shortcuts. Recruiting guru, Peter Weddle, weighed in on this topic a couple of months ago. I think his perspective is worth sharing:

“Consistency involves the creation of a single message that is used in every candidate channel. It could be your employment brand or a more aggressive ‘sales pitch’ to ramp up your hiring for a new product launch or facility opening. Whatever it is, the central idea you convey and even the choice of words you use must be the same in every single channel.

Such consistency is difficult to achieve in any of a number of different situations. But despite those challenges, it is critical that your organization achieve and maintain this goal. Differing messages or different expressions of the same message across multiple channels will confuse candidates and diminish your ability to influence their behavior. In the past, we told ourselves that we only got one chance to make a good first impression; today, we have hundreds of chances to make one good impression, and it’s just as important that we do.”

Any idea what he is referring to in that last sentence? It is an acknowledgement that because people are exposed to so many different media channels, there is a chance that a person may see your messages from many different angles. When there are inconsistencies, your candidates become confused about who you really are.

What makes the State Farm billboard I referenced yesterday so damaging is that I viewed a commercial in my hotel room just ten minutes earlier featuring a man with a deep voice reassuring me that “like a good neighbor” State Farm would be there for me if I got into trouble. I walk outside, and the State Farm rep is shouting “Discount!” When the messages collide like this, something doesn’t feel right. I don’t believe either message.

Likewise, your candidates won’t believe you if you’re not consistent in your messaging. How do you keep this sort of mixed messaging from occuring in your organization? You create what media experts call linkage.

“The propensity of candidates to move among [media] channels presents us with a choice. We can accept that such movement exists and simply react to it, or we can endeavor to exert some control over that movement so that it better serves our purpose. Linkage is the way you accomplish the latter goal. You create ‘stepping stones’ among the various channels to make it easy for candidates to follow a path you have laid out.

In effect, no matter where a candidate goes, they are led back to the one place online where you have the best opportunity to sell them on your organization. That’s the purpose of linkage-to amplify the impact of your message by eliminating or at least lowering the randomness of how candidates will see it. We can’t, of course, stop them from moving around, but we can try and move them to where we can make our best impression on them, and it’s important that we do that, as well.

A consistent and well linked pattern of messages enables you to create a clear and more impactful portrait of your organization. Its repetition across multiple channels ensures that everyone sees the organization in the same way and sees it everywhere they look.”

Do the recruiting messages you’re presenting to the public have this kind of linkage? If not, you need to rethink your approach — you’re not getting the maximum benefit for your advertising, and the end result is a less powerful impact on potential candidates…

Also, remember that the recruiting process doesn’t end with marketing – once a candidate agrees to an interview, the hiring manager should be supporting and reiterating the marketing message to which the candidate responded. The most successful recruiting companies create a link from beginning to end.

Editor’s Note: This article was written by Ben Hess. Ben is the Founding Partner and Managing Director of Tidemark, Inc. and a regular contributor to WorkPuzzle. Comments or questions are welcome. If you’re an email subscriber, reply to this WorkPuzzle email. If you read the blog directly from the web, you can click the “comments” link below.

Recruiting Messaging and Branding: Are Your Competitors Causing You to Act Stupidly?

Tuesday, September 21, 2010

A couple of weeks ago, I spent some time with a client in Richmond, VA. My meetings did not begin until late morning, so I had the opportunity to go for a run before my day started. The hotel where I stayed was on a frontage road, just off one of the major interstates in Richmond.

This frontage road contains a number of billboards that are visible from the main road. One of these billboards caught my eye and I couldn’t help but snap a picture. (If you’re not able to read the text on this picture, click on the image to enlarge it. If you’re an email subscriber, you may need to click through to the WorkPuzzle site to see the image.)

As I read this billboard, I couldn’t help but think that this poor guy has been driven to distraction by his low cost competitors. I think the “15 minutes could save you 15% or more in car insurance…” must be what he hears when goes to sleep at night! To combat this messaging, he does the marketing equivalent of standing in a crowded room and yelling “Discount! Discount! Discount…!” And while he is yelling, the rest of us are wondering what creative thing the little gecko is going to do next.

Before we get too critical, we have to give Geico and some of the other low-cost insurance companies credit for running effective marketing campaigns – They are good competitors. But, to try to compete in such a reactionary way does not seem very effective. Most people perceive State Farm as a full service insurance company that is able to offer their customers a higher level of service. This is not a bad position to have in the marketplace—pay a little more and receive an outstanding level of service. From a branding perspective, it would be more effective to reinforce their core strengths than to blatantly publish a “me too” message in response to their low-cost competitors.

We’re all great armchair quarterbacks when it comes to evaluating someone else’s problems, but does this type of thing happen in the real estate industry? When it comes to recruiting, it happens every day. Many of the most prominent real estate companies in the country are competing for agents against companies who have low cost or alternate business models. When the competitors start to have even limited success, it is amazing how quickly even successful companies will succumb to the temptation of watering down their recruiting message (and sometimes even their business model) to compete.

How do you keep from making this mistake in your company? Here are some guidelines that will help:

Make Sure Your Branding/Message is Believable. What is the value proposition that you offer the candidates who interface with your organization? You should be able to articulate this in several sentences. Now ask yourself: Would you be engaged by this proposition if you were a candidate? Would you encourage one of your kids to accept this proposition for their career? If not, you need to adjust your message until it passes this test. If you do change your message, do so based on what candidates think, not what competitors are pushing you towards.
Stick to Your Core Message. Why does everyone know the Geico marketing proposition? Because it has been repeated so many times that it is ingrained in all of our minds. You don’t have to run an enormous, multi-year marketing campaign to take advantage of this principle. For example, we have one client who has boiled down their recruiting message to the following: “We’ll take you by the hand and show you how to do it.” They repeat this message many times during the recruiting process, especially when they face objections.
Be Willing to Say No to Some Candidates. When you know who you are and what you stand for, you are going to find some people at odds with your message. When this happens, don’t be afraid to say, “You may not be a good fit for our organization,” and then suggest they go see one of your competitors. By doing this, you’ll not only avoid making some bad hires, but you’ll also cause the most talented candidates to respect your position. Some of those candidates will be intrigued by your clarity and reengage. Others will remember who they can trust to tell them the truth when their low-cost alternative lets them down.

Maintaining a consistent message and staying true to your recruitment brand takes courage–especially in today’s economic climate. But, it’s an investment that will produce a return and help you maintain your dignity. Without this focus, you could be the next person figuratively shouting “Discount!” in a crowded room.

Converting Conference Excitement Into Long-Term Habits

Thursday, September 16, 2010

Many of us have experienced the emotional high that results from a well run motivational sales conference. Unfortunately, not many of us successfully convert that flash of energy into long-term change that impacts our business.

What’s missing? We are not using that temporary moment of motivation to begin the process of replacing old habits with new ones.

Successful people understand that their success, in part, is derived from a consistent pattern of converting emotional “ah-ha” experiences into sustainable long-term habits and rituals. Without the habits and rituals, we keep doing what we did before, and those “ah-ha” catalyst moments are forever lost.

If you are naturally gifted at converting these short-term energy bursts into the hard work of developing and sustaining long-term habits, then chances are, you have built a successful life. That is what successful people do.

What might come as a surprise to you is that most people don’t do this. It may even frustrate you that people under your management don’t do the things that you do so automatically. It’s critical for managers to understand that they need to expand their role to include teaching others the formula for forming new habits. It’s also imperative for managers to develop systems to help this become part of the overall culture.

A recent survey of 10,000 real estate professionals outlines what agents expect from their company. Look at what came in number 2 and 3:

Respect, honesty and trust
Leadership, guidance
Accountability / career coaching

According to the second two expectations, agents are expecting you to hold them accountable. This desire opens the “I give you permission” door to teaching and building what I am about to describe.

To accomplish the above you must become an expert at habit change, as well as an educator, facilitator and creative strategist in building venues around sustaining these changes. So, let me help you get started on becoming an expert on change…

People resist change. Period. For most people change must be understood, taught and aided toward and through implementation. Habits are not formed by emotion (although this is the initial catalyst). Change comes through a very predictable formula.

So, what does create change? People say will power is the primary ingredient, and that is true to some extent. But, will power without action, doesn’t work.

Let me use an example that is relevant at this very moment. Millions of five-year-olds are starting school for the first time this month. I live on what is referred to as “Education Hill” in Redmond, Washington. There are five schools, three of which are elementary schools, within 1.3 miles of my home. My commute is heaven in the summer and horrible in the fall. Why? Because all of these new-to-school children are being dropped off by their parents to ease the transition into this new habit of leaving home daily and going to school.

The first few days, there are tears, tantrums and resistance to this intrusive new habit of leaving donuts, Barney, Lego’s, and Sesame Street at home, and instead being expected to sit quietly without mom or dad, for three to six hours at a time, with a teacher who wants them to concentrate on what she’s teaching them. Yuck.

A month into this process, most children will have converted this whole new process into a habit that they’ve learned to enjoy and sustain. This serves as a great example of the fundamentals of habit change.

So here are the steps made simple – A habit will become part of your typical day if you do these things:

Start it now. New habits must begin when the emotional surge or temporary insight is available and fresh. You, as a manager, must be prepared to help new agents and experienced agents returning from a conference, implement new habits, and get rid of old ones immediately.
Do it early in the day. Any new habit is much more likely to be sustained if it is initiated in the morning hours, if not first thing in the morning. Once behaviors become habits they can be moved around throughout the day. For example, when I first started working out 24 years ago, I had to do it in the morning. Now that I can’t imagine life without it, I can move it around the day, knowing I’ll get to it.
Don’t deviate. This is key. You must maintain the new behavior or task for at least 45 days if it is being practiced daily, and up to 4 months if it is weekly, to begin to feel like it is a habit. Anyone who attempts to reward themselves with old habits while trying to build new ones, is usually doomed to failure.
Set up accountability. This is where you come in. There must be systems developed to help the agents keep themselves accountable. This is usually done in one-on-ones, groups, or both. There is a reason why AA is so popular.

One of our most successful clients has a manager or two who have developed groups that meet in the mornings on a regular basis, specifically to build new habits. One manager even began a walking group that meets in the mornings for a two-mile walk, three times weekly.

The point is, as a manager, this is your job. Your agents want it. Become experts at delivering it. If you’re too busy to do the above, then you may need to find others to put out the fires so that you can spend more time doing what really impacts the business— and the lives of those entrusting their livelihood to you.