Archive for the ‘organizational assessments’ Category
Wednesday, February 3rd, 2010
By William Seidman
We’re working on several leadership programs right now, leading an organization through a transformation.
We have built decent best practices that are different from the usual. We’ve been emphasizing “authenticity.”
When we talk about deploying the best practices, though, we get stuck.
After a lot of conversation and thought, we realized that the leaders who most need enhanced leadership capabilities are executives most convinced they are already great leaders. This mindset is a good part of why they are powerfully resistant to considering their own need to grow and change.
Ironically, the best leaders are those who seek out — and are open to – growth opportunities. They’re easy to work with but don’t need the development.
How do you you engage “leaders” who are so resistant to learning from others?
Posted in best practices, business, company culture, leadership, management consulting, organizational assessments, organizational change, personal change | No Comments »
Saturday, January 23rd, 2010
By William Seidman
Ever wish your company had come with an instruction manual? Michael McCauley and I have written a book, Advantage Media has published it, and we’re excited. You can buy “Strategy to Action in 10 Days: Creating High Performance Organizations” directly from us, in bookstores, or on Amazon. There’s a Kindle edition, too.
Join our Facebook page and come with us as we travel to promote our book.
Ron Nakamoto, CEO of Strategic Financial, has praise: ”I recommend Strategy to Action in 10 Days to any person interested in creating a high performance organization. It clearly illustrates how to break from the status quo and create a truly sustainable change. It is as much a practical guide as it is a game changer.”
We’re as excited about our book as we are about the many people who are using it to create real, lasting, and positive change in their organizations.
Posted in best practices, business, captology, knowledge workers, leadership, management consulting, optimization, organizational assessments, organizational change, organizational culture, persuasive technology, positive deviance, positive deviants, positive leadership, training, wisdom discovery, wisdom transfer | No Comments »
Tuesday, December 22nd, 2009
By William Seidman
We’ll be presenting two papers at the International Society for Performance Improvement’s 2010 Annual Conference in San Francisco April 19-22, 2010.
ISPI is a good forum for people interested in learning how organizations can improve themselves, and its conferences bring in a wide ranging group of organizational development, training, and other professionals, both from inside organizations and as outside consultants.
The topics we’ll be discussing:
Persuasive Technology: A New Paradigm for Maximizing Organizational Performance — on the incorporation of the neuroscience of learning into technology and how this can lead to faster and more far-reaching organizational change on a larger scale than previously thought possible. Mike McCauley and I will present this paper.
The Importance of Courage in Leading Change: Creating Courageous Organizations — on the times and ways that leaders need to be courageous when leading a change effort, and how you can test for courageous leadership before you begin a change. Rick Grbavac and I will present this paper.
We hope many of you will be able to come to our sessions at the ISPI Conference in April.
Posted in best practices, getting change to "stick", leadership, organizational assessments, organizational change, organizational culture, persuasive technology | No Comments »
Monday, October 19th, 2009
By William Seidman
I’m currently working with graduate students at San Diego State University on one of my favorite topics: improving organizational performance.
We’re looking at non-training ways to improve performance.
Now a team in this class is going to study Cerebyte - you can find us on their website, which is a truly interesting place: “PINOT,” Performance Improvement Non-Training Solutions.
Washington, DC: I’ll present A Scientific Approach to Corporate Cultural Change (That Works-and How!) to the ISPI Potomac Chapter in Washington, DC, Nov 10, 2009 at 6:00 pm EST. Sign up here, and I’ll see you there!
Posted in best practices, captology, management consulting, organizational assessments, organizational change | No Comments »
Sunday, September 20th, 2009
By William Seidman
“Positive Deviance is based on the observation that in every community there are certain individuals or groups whose uncommon behaviors and strategies enable them to find better solutions to problems than their peers, while having access to the same resources and facing similar or worse challenges.” — The Positive Deviance Initiative
It’s such a pleasure to work with positive deviants: they have energy and great ideas, and are consistently positive about themselves, their clients, and their company. It’s an energetic optimism stemming not from a Pollyanna view, but from intelligence, creativity, and clear thinking.
Someone then asked me how positive deviants effect change in an organization:
* Their positive energy excites others
* Their customer-focus makes others more client-centric
* Their efficiency at managing their work sets a great example
* Their experiences in becoming so great are a path for others
Positive deviants really are the best resource for companies who want to improve. Are you listening to yours?
Posted in best practices, company culture, organizational assessments, organizational change, organizational culture | No Comments »
Wednesday, June 10th, 2009
By William Seidman
Organizations of all stripes are rightfully concerned about their cultures: the shared beliefs, values, attitudes, and and standards that define and guide them. Organizational culture has everything to do with goals and strategies and ultimate success or failure. Culture sets the underlying norms for functioning. Sometimes, culture needs to change.
Organizations as diverse as the Maryland prison system or the British National Health Service are thinking about their culture. Last week Martha Johnson, President Obama’s nominee for administrator of the General Services Administration (the GSA), named “an organizational culture of values and trust” as one of her highest priorities for the agency.
Regardless of the differences - in purpose and practices - every organization needs to talk about its culture, tweak what isn’t working, and continuously find ways to support and reinforce it.
Tags: Barack Obama, company culture, corporate culture, General Services Administration, GSA, Martha Johnson, organizational culture, prison culture
Posted in best practices, business, optimization, organizational assessments, organizational change | 1 Comment »
Tuesday, April 28th, 2009
By William Seidman
More on the International Society for Performance Improvement (ISPI)’s annual meeting earlier this month in Orlando, Florida: discussion in the multinational, multicultural session was particularly interesting because of the presenters’ culturally varied experiences. Paul Nieminen is responsible for United Parcel Service’s change programs in Europe and Asia, Al Pacheco is a consultant for IBM doing a cultural diversity program for the major accounts teams, and Karen Waterlander works in Finland for Kone, the fourth-largest manufacturer of - and service provider for - elevators in the world. There were many others — too many to mention. What a great group!
What was amazing was how many things we had in common. Everyone had encountered resistance from each country because of their perceived uniqueness and everyone struggled with having to engage people and sustain change over great distances. Our program seemed to interest many of them, particularly Cerebyte’s international work with Intel, because it solved these problems.
Tags: Al Pacheco, International Society for Performance Improvement, ISPI, Karen Waterlander, Kone, multiculturalism, Paul Nieminen, United Parcel Service, UPS
Posted in management consulting, optimization, organizational assessments, organizational change | No Comments »
Friday, January 16th, 2009
By William Seidman
Professor of Management and Labor Dr. Harry J. Martin has a good article, “Lessons Learned,” in the Wall Street Journal/MIT Sloan Review. His message is cogent and important: “The key to effective training isn’t necessarily what happens in the classroom. It’s what you do afterward.”
The benefits of change are clear: increased productivity, higher morale, cost savings, and improved communication. Enhanced problem-solving is an added plus.
Once the training is ended, though, and work resumes, several vitally important aspects of change must be in play in order for things to not backslide. According to Martin it’s essential to:
- Put It on Paper - write down the action plan, make an outline or a list.
- Measure Results - the all-important follow-up. Performance assessment is so important.
- Get Help from Peers - especially important in settings where management support for the training is deemed to be weak.
- Have Supportive Superiors - when a boss assumes the role of coach or mentor, employees are much more likely to apply what they learned in training. The leader sets the bar!
- Gain Access to Experts - trainees might need additional information. Companies can help, and reinforce change, by helping to provide technical support such as reference materials and access to experts. When good information is shared and promoted, organizations’ training programs gain from it.
Organizational change initiatives cost time and money. It’s great that there are measurable and predictable roads to successful change that “sticks.”
Tags: Harry J. Martin, performance assessment, training, Wall Street Journal/MIT Sloan Review
Posted in getting change to "stick", management consulting, organizational assessments, organizational change | No Comments »
Tuesday, October 7th, 2008
By William Seidman
It might seem impossible, at this moment in our financial history, to think about more than money. But recently I conducted wisdom discovery with some great people: Lee Brower and his team from Quadrant Living; Albert Perkins and Michelangelo “Miki” Domine from CNRG Corp, and Ron Nakamoto from Strategic Financial. Our focus was to develop a program to make Quadrant Living’s program available and accessible to a wide range of people.
Quadrant Living has been very good at getting people with money to think about more than just money, by guiding them to increase the value they place on family, education, and contributions to their community. Cerebyte and QL share a positive focus and both stress gaining value from assets you or your organization already has.
Tags: Albert Perkins, CNRG Corp., Lee Brower, Miki Domine, money, organizational change, positive thinking, Quadrant Living, Ron Nakamoto, Strategic Financial, wisdom discovery
Posted in best practices, financial crisis, organizational assessments, organizational change, wisdom discovery | No Comments »
Thursday, August 28th, 2008
By William Seidman
Organizational assessments are practically a given. Why wouldn’t you want to methodically inventory what works and what doesn’t and, then, what to do about it - planning how to get from “What Is” to “What We Want”?
The fundamental building block of neuroplasticity, the idea that “neurons that fire together wire together” is explored well by UCLA research psychiatrist Dr. Jeffrey Schwartz and science writer and Newsweek Senior Editor Sharon Begley, who suggest that organizational assessments may be counter-productive.
What’s wrong with organizational assessments?
- Emphasis is placed on what people in the organization are doing wrong
- Emphasis is placed on what the organization is doing wrong
- Neural pathways associated with undesirable behaviors and attitudes are reinforced, making them stronger and more difficult to overcome
- The fixes tend to be incremental rather than inspirational. There is no vision - just another “To Do” list.
What about a different approach - and one that is supported by good research? Focus exclusively on how to do things right. Who cares what people are currently doing? Let’s focus completely and intensely on the desired state. The most desirable pathways are stimulated and visonary change becomes possible.
It works.
Tags: Dr. Jeffrey Schwartz, neural pathways, organizational assessments, Sharon Begley, “neurons that fire together wire together”
Posted in neuroscience, organizational assessments, organizational change | 1 Comment »
