Common mindset: How to unify your team and show appreciation to your employees

(November 24, 2003) Let’s look at some simple tools and practices that can help you manage your team better. We’ll start with alignment and culture: How can you encourage your employees to share a positive culture and act in a unified way? 1. Dave Ulrich and Norm Smallwood, in Why The Bottom Line Isn’t! (Wiley), […]

By Harvey Schachter | November 24, 2003 | Last updated on November 24, 2003
3 min read
  • What did we do right?
  • What did we do wrong?
  • How can we do better next time?

One company I work with has found this very useful for patting themselves on the back or kicking themselves you-know-where.

Speaking of patting your team on the back, a friend of mine used to end every meeting he chaired with appreciations. The idea is for everyone to thank other people for their contribution to the meeting or for their effort recently.

It’s awkward at first, going against the societal grain to complain or protect ourselves by not complimenting somebody who might later disappoint us. But it’s amazing how it can lead people to leave the meeting in a cheerful, united frame of mind.

Together, the various tools will help you create a more effective team, providing a sense of unity and common goals, as well as lift spirits while striving for those goals.

• • •

To view archived Advisor’s Edge articles or for subscription information, please click here.

• • •

Harvey Schachter is a contributing editor of Advisor’s Edge.

(11/24/03)

Harvey Schachter

(November 24, 2003) Let’s look at some simple tools and practices that can help you manage your team better.

We’ll start with alignment and culture: How can you encourage your employees to share a positive culture and act in a unified way?

1. Dave Ulrich and Norm Smallwood, in Why The Bottom Line Isn’t! (Wiley), suggest gathering your team and asking each person to write out the three things your practice wants to be known for by its best clients. For an advisor with three other staff members, this will bring forth 12 items, which should be sorted into common categories. For example, three answers saying “service,” two saying “value” and two saying “good advice” with a lot of other lone possibilities.

Add up the number of responses in the top three categories (in this example, seven) and divide by the total number of answers (12) to get a rough measure of the shared mindset (in this case, 58%).

Talk about the themes that have been presented, what they mean and why they are important. Work toward a greater consensus and then redo the exercise to see if you can hit 80% agreement, which would indicate your staff shares the same mindset.

After reaching consensus, turn the theme of the same exercise into words that resonate with clients. The authors did this with the top executives of Domino’s Pizza in the early 1990s, coming up with themes around quality, service and talent. That led to the following desired mindset: hot, fresh, tasty pizza delivered on time by friendly people who drive safely. It’s clear and motivating, particularly when developed by the individuals who must share the mindset on a daily basis.

2. Another excellent way to appraise effort — be it on major initiatives or your daily agenda — is Stephen Covey’s grid based on urgency and importance. Those two factors lead to four possible allocations: not urgent and not important; urgent but not important; important but not urgent; and urgent and important.

Most of us spend far too much time doing things that are urgent but not important. You want to cut that back and will probably also need to shift some of your time spent on urgent and important matters to increase the percentage of effort on the neglected sector: not urgent but important.

It’s also a wonderful tool for assessing meetings, by the way.

3. A few years ago my friend Dan Richards, now the CEO of Cartier Partners, mentioned a terrific tool an advisor told him about for assessing performance. When meeting with your team, ask these questions to help reflect on a specific event or the past week in general:

  • What did we do right?
  • What did we do wrong?
  • How can we do better next time?

One company I work with has found this very useful for patting themselves on the back or kicking themselves you-know-where.

Speaking of patting your team on the back, a friend of mine used to end every meeting he chaired with appreciations. The idea is for everyone to thank other people for their contribution to the meeting or for their effort recently.

It’s awkward at first, going against the societal grain to complain or protect ourselves by not complimenting somebody who might later disappoint us. But it’s amazing how it can lead people to leave the meeting in a cheerful, united frame of mind.

Together, the various tools will help you create a more effective team, providing a sense of unity and common goals, as well as lift spirits while striving for those goals.

• • •

To view archived Advisor’s Edge articles or for subscription information, please click here.

• • •

Harvey Schachter is a contributing editor of Advisor’s Edge.

(11/24/03)

(November 24, 2003) Let’s look at some simple tools and practices that can help you manage your team better.

We’ll start with alignment and culture: How can you encourage your employees to share a positive culture and act in a unified way?

1. Dave Ulrich and Norm Smallwood, in Why The Bottom Line Isn’t! (Wiley), suggest gathering your team and asking each person to write out the three things your practice wants to be known for by its best clients. For an advisor with three other staff members, this will bring forth 12 items, which should be sorted into common categories. For example, three answers saying “service,” two saying “value” and two saying “good advice” with a lot of other lone possibilities.

Add up the number of responses in the top three categories (in this example, seven) and divide by the total number of answers (12) to get a rough measure of the shared mindset (in this case, 58%).

Talk about the themes that have been presented, what they mean and why they are important. Work toward a greater consensus and then redo the exercise to see if you can hit 80% agreement, which would indicate your staff shares the same mindset.

After reaching consensus, turn the theme of the same exercise into words that resonate with clients. The authors did this with the top executives of Domino’s Pizza in the early 1990s, coming up with themes around quality, service and talent. That led to the following desired mindset: hot, fresh, tasty pizza delivered on time by friendly people who drive safely. It’s clear and motivating, particularly when developed by the individuals who must share the mindset on a daily basis.

2. Another excellent way to appraise effort — be it on major initiatives or your daily agenda — is Stephen Covey’s grid based on urgency and importance. Those two factors lead to four possible allocations: not urgent and not important; urgent but not important; important but not urgent; and urgent and important.

Most of us spend far too much time doing things that are urgent but not important. You want to cut that back and will probably also need to shift some of your time spent on urgent and important matters to increase the percentage of effort on the neglected sector: not urgent but important.

It’s also a wonderful tool for assessing meetings, by the way.

3. A few years ago my friend Dan Richards, now the CEO of Cartier Partners, mentioned a terrific tool an advisor told him about for assessing performance. When meeting with your team, ask these questions to help reflect on a specific event or the past week in general:

  • What did we do right?
  • What did we do wrong?
  • How can we do better next time?

One company I work with has found this very useful for patting themselves on the back or kicking themselves you-know-where.

Speaking of patting your team on the back, a friend of mine used to end every meeting he chaired with appreciations. The idea is for everyone to thank other people for their contribution to the meeting or for their effort recently.

It’s awkward at first, going against the societal grain to complain or protect ourselves by not complimenting somebody who might later disappoint us. But it’s amazing how it can lead people to leave the meeting in a cheerful, united frame of mind.

Together, the various tools will help you create a more effective team, providing a sense of unity and common goals, as well as lift spirits while striving for those goals.

• • •

To view archived Advisor’s Edge articles or for subscription information, please click here.

• • •

Harvey Schachter is a contributing editor of Advisor’s Edge.

(11/24/03)