Inclusion and Diversity

The title of this blog post is not hyperbole. These two words have become the key company employment driver and target marketing. Just watch any Netflix or Amazon production and commercial television ads; they contain many diverse couples.

Ironically, there is actually a risk of alienation, when diversity and inclusion are not fully defined. I recently reviewed a company’s "team". The 55 members did reveal ethnic diversity, but I could not detect anyone over 40. Is this considered inclusive or diverse? From a marketing perspective, Millennials rule, but GenX and Baby Boomers are still in the workforce and GenZ is now joining the workforce.

The question: Should inclusion and diversity go beyond sexual orientation and ethnicity and include all generations?

Team vs. Individual Structure

Below is a simple diagram of the difference between a team based department or organization verses letting the associates drive the structure. I have witness both environments. Team is not a corporate buzzword, it is a key ingredient to successful company growth. Large teams consist of teams within a team.

Team Based	Individual Based
Develop Leaders	Anarchy
Staff Growth	Power Struggles
Member Contributions	High Turnover
Self-sustaining	Stagnant

Why Teams Fail

Lack of Management Support

Wrong member make up

Lack of correct tools to succeed

These elements are tried and true team based analysis and experience. Let me focus on the Team based structure, as the Individual based structure is counter-productive.

Teams can be functional or cross-functional:

• Functional - Specific expertise
• Cross-functional - Project driven areas

The goal of both teams is goal setting, process improvement, trends sharing, and subject matter collaboration. This list is by no means inclusive of all team elements.

The Key Performance Indicator (KPI) is streamlined operations or process efficiencies. Remember the profit equation contains two sides revenue and expenses. Although a department may not be revenue generating, it can add to the bottom line with performance efficiencies by having less overhead costs, i.e. fewer associates required output the current workload, or handling more workload, contributing to the revenue side of the profit equation.

I hope this blog entry will encourage you to recognize the benefits of a team base structure or review your current teams’ structure.

Break the Routine and See What Happens

Occasionally, I come across an article that speaks to my management philosophy and compelled to share on my blog. The article below is from the Smashing Magazine Editor, Vitaly, and can be found here.

[Article Start]

Daily routine is wonderful — predictable, efficient and comfortable. But when we need to find that one spark of a genius idea, breaking out of the regular schedule can do wonders. In a way, that’s also because we’re used to following patterns in our lives. It’s perfectly reasonable to go to a cinema on a Friday night, but it seems to be a bit off to go on a Monday morning. It may seem fine to be burning the midnight oil, just to realize the next morning how terrible the output of the work was. Last but surely not least, it often feels strange to take off early on a Tuesday, as it’s the beginning of the work week. It doesn’t have to be.

Some of the most profound ideas that I have discovered for my work and life stem took place whenever I broke my daily routine and got away from the hustle bustle of everyday life. I often felt that I have to beat the entire world by working more and working harder, and sometimes even felt awkward when I took a few more days off. However, every now and again we need to step away to see the big picture, so that we can recharge when diving into fine details and keep ourselves going. It’s outside of the comfortable day-work-time when wonderful ideas emerge.

So, what about a little experiment? What if you asked your team members to do something that makes them happy on a Thursday morning? What if you gave them a few extra vacation days, or asked them to work outside of the office on Wednesdays? Or perhaps consider introducing ‘no-meetings-on-Fridays’ or ‘do-what-you-love-Wednesdays’?

But most importantly, perhaps take a bit of time off. You are smart, helpful, and hard-working — so take at least a day or two to step away, and maybe do something kind to yourself and to people around you, or the people you’ve never met. And guess what: the world will keep spinning, and you might finally catch that idea you’ve been chasing in vain all these years.

[Article End]

Here is a practical application example: During a client challenge, which required very long days for the team and accompanying stress, I bought a case of silly string. I literally "forced" the team out of the building, into the parking lot, and spray away! A great tension break and any pent up energy release.

Now, it's your turn.

FOCUS

Are you inundated with communication? Emails, IMs, meetings, and if it still exists, phone calls. On any given day, I receive 30 emails an hour, averaging 1 every two minutes, a meeting every hour, sometimes every half hour and lately every 15 minutes, lastly a constant flow of IMs. I’m exhausted just writing about it. Maybe your day is not as bad, but I bet it can still be filled with over communication.

This blog post compliments my tagline, "People plus Process plus Technology." All three elements must blend to be successful at anything, manager, project management, educator, builder, everything. We must learn to balance them. I put the elements in order of importance, so don’t let today’s communication technology override the most important element - People.

Here are few of my communication rules:

• Emails – all cc’s do not require my response and may not even get read
• IMs – you really need a response now or used for multi-tasking (listening in a meeting, but not participating)
• I may, or may not, answer based on my role above
• Meetings (Skype or live) – require an agenda to determine priority and/or attendance
• Phone – if someone calls me, it is definitely a priority (and a preference)

Roll all these communication rules into one theme – FOCUS

Only a Super Human can satisfy every communication received, during the day.

Now, a message to management – consolidate information.

• Plan to send out your communication once a day, at a regular time would be best,  every morning or end of day even better to cover routine items, like process
• Advise your reports to prioritize their communications
• Assign specific areas of expertise to qualified associate(s) to reduce irrelevant communications to everyone (focus your team)

In the long term, productivity will increase. I promise.

It's All About People

The title of my website displays the convergence of People, Process and Technology, but nothing can occur without people.

Process and technology cannot function separate from people. People write and follow the process. People write and execute code. People communicate with people to achieve a goal. Teams cannot exist without people. Customers are comprised of people, whether internal or external of the organization. People are the key to any successful project. 

People skills should be the highest valued acumen, in any successful organization.

Leadership’s Role in Lateral Conflict

There is always a vertical manager hierarchy in every organization. Some companies this hierarchy is short, others can be quite layered. When it comes to problem solving protocol, there are typically rules to follow. One well known rule is you never leap frog your direct reporting manager. This is proven political and career ending suicide. I want to address a lessor known, or possibly not practiced, management protocol regarding lateral conflict resolution.

When conflict arises between intradepartmental team members, it’s leaderships’ role to resolve it, while retaining the team member’s relationship.

Here are the steps that have worked in my experiences:

1. One or both of the conflicting team members contacts their direct manager and explains the situation
2. The direct manager contacts the non-direct member’s manager
3. The two, or more, managers involved in the situation discuss resolution, independent of the team members (this does not exclude input from the team member)
4. These managers explain the resolution to their direct reports

The benefit from this conflict resolution approach preserves the day-to-day working relationship of the team members.

This protocol can be effective at any level of management. I would hope the higher up the leadership chain the conflict rises, the quicker the solution, based on all the factors contributing to this level’s position. Too often, conflict resolution is restricted to the team member and reporting manager. This eliminates the other parties involved in the conflict and reduces resolution success, at least in the long term.