No, Sir, I Have a Results Problem

April 22, 2009

I had the privilege of hearing Gen. David Patraeus interviewed about leadership yesterday at Harvard Kennedy’s School’s Institute of Politics Forum. I expected a politicized discussion about the torture memo, but the crowd was there to find out who this man is and what leadership means in the context of a modern battlefield.

We learned the most from the opening remarks and examples of Maura Sullivan and Seth Moulton, both veterans of the Iraq War now getting joint degrees in business and government. Moulton pushed off his degree for an extra year to serve a fourth tour in Iraq as a Special Assistant to Patraeus. His words were heavy with respect and affection, and they had nothing on the weight of his choices. The crowd got it immediately.

My overwhelming response was that we’re lucky to have the general at the front of the line. He was visibly uncomfortable taking credit for anything, and the leadership themes he stressed were the importance of teams, service and staying connected to reality.

He told the Harvard crowd that they may walk into rooms where they think can do anyone’s job better, but they certainly can’t do everyone’s job better, and so this leadership thing matters. He identified a shift in mental models towards the Iraqi people – a shift towards service and living and working together – as a key reason for the current progress. He talked about how much he learns from direct communications with all levels of his team, and how he made one of the war’s most critical strategic pivots while on a casual run with lower-ranking soldiers.

His most memorable story was about receiving congressional delegations in Iraq that would inevitably pull him aside and tell him that he had a “messaging problem.” “No, sir,” he would say, “I have a results problem. When I get the results, the messaging will take care of itself.”


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Posted by Anne Morriss

Mental Models Towards Problems

February 4, 2009

Learn from your mistakes.  It sounds so nice in theory, but it often breaks down it practice, particularly for Type A personalities. An intermediary step that’s usually missing is first learning how to honor the missteps, as odd as that may sound.  Most of us treat mistakes as toxic, to be avoided at all costs, minimized with good planning and prudent choices. But well-intentioned mistakes are vital ingredients in the improvement process, and they must be honored as invaluable assets. This often requires a big shift in our mental models towards being wrong.

I often hear managers tell employees not to “bring me problems unless you have the solution.”  It’s meant to foster self-reliance and proactive problem-solving, values we like to celebrate here in America, but the attitude can be poisonous to an organization.  If we only solve problems that are co-located with solutions – or put any other diminishing effect on the surfacing of problems – we are dampening our ability to learn and improve.  Surfacing problems can be a solo sport, but addressing problems of consequence usually requires a team.  It is the obligation of leaders to set the tone for employees – to create a culture where problems are viewed as a path to competitive advantage, as a way to learn and innovate at a faster rate than competitors. Leaders must make it crystal clear that embracing mistakes is not an invitation to fail — it’s a radical  prescription to thrive.

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Posted by Frances Frei

Fix the Copier

January 22, 2009

This same type of “calcification,” as you call it, can also creep into attitudes towards employees. Early in my career I worked at a company where there was minimal trust between employees and managers. Someone low in the organizational hierarchy ripped out an ad from a magazine that said, “It’s the Magical Thing About Business – Start Treating People Like Your Most Important Assets and Suddenly That’s What They Become.” She made a copy on the always-broken copy machine and put it up outside her depressing orange cubicle, and it really rocked the culture. It was so clear to all of us that this particular mental model was not one of the organization’s basic assumptions. The magic at work in this place was closer to “treat adults like children and watch time reverse itself.” I left because I started to hate the petty, negative person I was when I came to work everyday.

One reason I’ve always liked working in professional services is that it’s so culturally explicit in most firms that they’re competing on the talent of the people they hire.  This belief guides everything, from the distribution of decision rights (decentralized) to the innovation process (employee-driven) and, yes, even to the choice in copier (always working). Why waste such a precious asset’s time on jammed paper?

This type of culture gives everyone a reason to show up and step up. I think the biggest lost opportunity in most organizations is the unrealized potential of the people clocking in everyday, at least the fraction that’s profoundly bored. The majority of us are desperate to be engaged, and since most organizations aren’t inviting that level of engagement, all that unused capacity is now on Facebook at 10:30 in the morning – unless it’s troubleshooting with the IT department.

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Posted by Anne Morriss

Improvement at Toyota

January 1, 2009

An article on Toyota recently caught my attention. The article discussed how even non-US auto manufactures were cutting back production in the US, and the notable part to me was not the decrease in consumer demand but what Toyota was doing with its newly idle workforce. An accompanying picture showed a makeshift training room set up inside an assembly plant. The article described the training topics, ranging from how to handle tools safely to how to get along better with colleagues of varying backgrounds. Toyota is well known for many management practices – the humility with which it reacts to opportunity for improvement is my favorite. Not only does the company try to surface problems wherever it can (through its “andon cord” on the assembly line), but it also understands that idle time today can be leveraged for improvement tomorrow.  A lesson for all organizations, not just its US counterparts.

And then there’s the topics of its training session. Handling tools safely is unsurprising, but I was struck by working more effectively in an increasingly diverse environment.  It’s another sign of the humility inherent in the organization.  It is designed to systematically understand the obstacles to improvement and to as systemically address them in order to unlock future performance.

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Posted by Frances Frei

Improvement at Toyota: Response

January 1, 2009

I was encouraged that managing workforce diversity found itself sandwiched on a list of training topics, somewhere between improved ergonomics and quality control. It was refreshing to see a company casually dignify the challenge as an operational reality and driver of future performance, not a historic wrong that must be righted while also making fuel-efficient cars. As some of your colleagues at HBS have argued gracefully, including Robin Ely and David Thomas, separating diversity from the central challenge of running a business can be counterproductive.

In my own experience, when a diverse, integrated workforce is treated as a company’s social responsibility, at best, it makes people feel good.  At worst, it fosters resentment and insecurity. But when diversity is treated as a competitive advantage, it becomes just that — now more than ever, as the markets for customers and talent become increasingly global. Toyota’s signaling was clear: diversity is as important and unemotional as reducing dashboard defects.


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Posted by Anne Morriss

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