The first shows our tendency to put on armour and let our egos slug it out when we feel threatened, and how this gets in the way of service. The second shows the way we can collude to de-risk the language of change. The third shows how hard it can be to see things differently when our thinking keeps us “getting what we’ve always got”, even when we desperately want change. The last image shows what can happen when leaders and employees are willing to step outside their own comfort zones and have more adult-to-adult relationships.

The clash of egos

This picture was inspired by hearing a recent client talking about the behaviour of some senior leaders when faced with the need to create change in the organisation. When change is scary and brings up fear, it’s natural to deny or avoid this feeling and defend against it. The ego needs to be certain and right and on familiar ground. But to adapt to change we need to risk letting go of what we’re sure about to move towards something new. If we’re going to lead change, and genuinely serve people, there’s no place for ego. We need to be willing to drop the defences and to go first into the unknown…

Do you see this happing in your organisation? What would you like to do about it?

The Language Neutraliser

The way change is communicated has a significant impact on employees. We often hear corporate-speak that sounds like it has been through some kind of machine for squeezing out risk. Unfortunately, this also has the effect of squeezing out most of the meaning too.

It may be difficult to be honest with employees but, unless you are, they will see right through your words and become more cynical and distrustful. To gain trust and engagement, a leader needs to demonstrate the courage to to be honest about what is happening. No more euphemisms, no more de-risked expressions – just the simplest, most direct words possible.

What words or expressions have been through the “Neutraliser” in your organisation?

Do what you’ve always done and you’ll get
what you’ve always got

Einstein once said “problems cannot be solved by the same level of thinking that created them”. Faced with unprecendented pressure to change, this seems more relevant today than it has ever been, with organisations under huge pressure to perform better with less resources. For many people, this just means working longer and harder but even when they do, little seems to change. Why is that? It’s because most organisations are still doing what they’ve always done and getting what they’ve always got.

How can you make sense of what you don’t yet know? That’s the question. We think that the secret to change is when a leader is willing to imagine that the way forward lies outside of their current way of thinking about things. It takes real courage to ask “what is it that I’m not seeing here?”

Do you recognise this situation? Do your leaders have time and space to step back enough to look at it?

How can you engage a workforce when the organisation has to cut 25% of its combined workforce?

As a leader, you can engage the workforce with this difficult and painful issue through your willingness to get into an honest dialogue about it. The most important thing you could do is to use this situation to create a shift in understanding about what’s happening and why and what it means to each individual.

That means both the leadership and the workforce being invited to explore and question its familiar points of view.  For leadership, these might include “we can’t tell the truth about this, we can’t be wrong, we can’t NOT know…” while for the workforce they might be “we don’t understand the bigger picture, can’t see beyond the detail, it’s them versus us…”

The aim of this dialogue is to bring each side away from its familiar position towards common ground. It can only work if each side is willing to experience some discomfort in order to gain fresh understanding and shared purpose. Because of this discomfort, it also requires external facilitation to make sure that old defensive habits don’t reassert themselves when things get difficult.

What do you think is the answer?

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I divide my officers into four classes; the clever, the lazy, the industrious, and the stupid. Most often two of these qualities come together. The officers who are clever and industrious are fitted for the highest staff appointments. Those who are stupid and lazy make up around 90% of every army in the world, and they can be used for routine work. The man who is clever and lazy however is for the very highest command; he has the temperament and nerves to deal with all situations. But whoever is stupid and industrious is a menace and must be removed immediately!

The quote comes from a manual on military command written in 1933.  If Hammerstein-Equord was a modern day consultant he would have immediately sensed a two-by-two matrix, so we have indulged ourselves and mapped it out.  We’ve found this picture generates some very interesting conversations!

If this diagram tickles you, you might want to follow up by reading Venkat Rao’s trail of posts on “The Gervais Principle” (starting here), which follows a similar idea.  This series has attracted a lot of attention and for good reason.  Be warned – as with all Venkat’s writing, it’s more like reading chapters in a book than reading blog posts.  Worth the effort though.

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We are currently in the process of creating a new pre-packaged Visual Dialogue “session-in-a-box” to help programme teams discuss and resolve common issues.  This picture is one of several we’ve created to help get people talking.  They draw on our own experiences of difficult situations as well as those of our associates and clients.  If this is something you’d be interested in contributing to, please do get in touch.

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This picture was originally one of a series we have produced to visualise the key themes from Bill Isaacs’ Dialogue model, one of several dialogue models we’ve played with over the years.  This picture speaks to the theme of “Voicing”.  Here’s Isaacs’ description:

To speak to your voice is perhaps one of the most challenging aspects of genuine dialogue.  Speaking your voice has to do with revealing what is true for you regardless of other influences that might be brought to bear.

To say it’s challenging strikes us as a massive understatement!  Most organisational cultures seem to conspire to ensure that the really difficult issues remain unspoken.  This helps preserve the safety of the status quo, but creates an enormous barrier to change.

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Last week, we went to an event entitled, ‘Employee Engagement: Communication Matters’ which was jointly held by AIM Research, the CMI and the Institute of Business Consulting. We heard from many eminent speakers during the evening, but what we were most struck by was the disparity between the subject matter and the media through which it was being communicated. Are ‘talking-heads’ with slides on stage, with the audience sitting in silence most of the time,  really the most effective way to  make the point that employee engagement requires quality two-way communication?

At Delta7 we believe that dialogues with employees are a great way to truly engage with them. It gives a chance for all parties to give their point of view, not just those who are deemed to be the experts. We’d love to be involved in  an engagement event that provides the same sort of environment for its participants that it’s advocating they provide for their employees.

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I was at a conference last month, organised by  CIPD on Employee Engagement. In a discussion around some of the Kingston Consortium research findings I heard someone say “What is the key to unlocking potential?”

So what does a successful employee engagement strategy look like?  What’s your experience?

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