Horizon Point Consulting

Category: Beyond Work

Beyond Work is our line of resources for people and community leaders looking for something new and innovative outside, be it a new job, career change, or personal development outside of work.

  • Creating a Teaching Culture

    Creating a Teaching Culture

    My twelve-year-old son had his first experience with interviewing this week. He is applying to a special program for high school and as part of the application process he had to participate in a panel interview with members of the program administration. Naturally, he was nervous. Luckily the interview was scheduled on very short notice so he didn’t have too much time to overthink it.

    As I sat in the waiting area with him and his best friend before their interviews, I put on my recruiter hat and gave them some basic interviewing advice. They were both very receptive to what I said and I think they both took my advice to heart during their interviews. (We find out if they both made it in to the program in a few weeks, so fingers crossed!)

    As I went over the basics with them (eye contact, open posture, speak clearly, don’t fidget), I heard another mother say to her child “you know how to interview.”

    My first thought was “how does a twelve-year-old know how to interview when so many adults struggle with it?” Then I started to think about the deeper impact of her statement.

    How often do we as leaders assume that those we lead already know what we want or need them to know? And how many of us get frustrated when we find out they don’t know it, often only after they tried on their own and made a mistake?

    By making that statement to her child, that mother was assuming he had the knowledge and didn’t help to ensure her child was set up for success. Same with leaders and their employees. If you set an expectation for your employee with the assumption that they know how to meet that expectation, you may be setting them up for failure or at a minimum, added stress when they struggle on their own to get it right.

    According to a study published in 2015 by Willis Towers-Watson, over 70% of high-retention-risk employee said they would leave their companies to advance their careers.

    I recently held a workshop for one of my clients in which I asked employees to tell me where they thought the company needed to make improvements. One of the top themes that I saw in their feedback was training and providing employees with the knowledge they need to be as successful as they can be.

    It’s human nature to want to succeed.  

    Providing employees with the opportunity to grow in their roles is a great way to ensure that they will want to stay with the organization. And it’s a great opportunity to strengthen your organization’s succession plan.

    Studies show that most on the job training happens in the form of informal learning. I have challenged the leaders at the client mentioned above to ask themselves each week to pinpoint one thing that they taught someone. I’ve also challenged them to think before they perform a task “is there someone who would benefit from knowing how to do this?” If the answer is yes, I encourage them to pull that person aside and show them when the opportunity presents itself (just like I did with my son and his friend).

    The interview skills I presented to the boys were very basic, but also very important skills to know for the future. My hope is that when they are old enough in a few years to start interviewing for their first job, those tips will pop into their heads and help them to have a successful interview.

    The growth and development of people is the highest calling of leadership. -Harvey S. Firestone

    Are you living up to your calling as a leader?

  • 4 Ways to State Your Intentions in Order to Drive the Best Outcomes

    4 Ways to State Your Intentions in Order to Drive the Best Outcomes

    I’m preparing to take my kids into Target, Lord help me. I just need to get some necessities.  I park the car, turn and look them in the eye and tell them, “We are not going to the toy section.  We are here to get milk, a card for someone, and some toilet paper. You will both walk beside me and the cart.  You will not run, and you will not ask if you can go look at toys, okay?”

    I get “yes ma’am”.  And then ask them to repeat back to me what I just said and what they are going to do.

    I silently hope for mostly compliance. 

    Shoot, I should have also added, “No asking for any gum, candy or any type of anything in the checkout aisle,” before going into the store.

    If I’m thinking clearly, I’ve learned to set our intention- both why we are going to into some place and the expectations for their behavior- before we walk into a place. I’ve learned this the hard way. In other words, I’ve had my fair share of public place visits that have involved running through the aisles (the kids, not me), spending 30 minutes in the toy section and breakdowns in the checkout line over “having to have” some strange egg thing that has both chocolate and a toy in it. Oh, how I wish I’d come up with these eggs.

    It’s funny how just telling them what we are going to do and why we are going to do it actually helps. 

    And it’s no different for us as individuals and for us working as groups at work. It’s simply intention setting to regulate behavior and therefore outcomes.

    As a research article in Frontiers in Human Neuroscience states:

    ….Effective strategy to reduce this intention–behavior gap is the formation of implementation intentions that specify when, where, and how to act on a given goal in an if-then format (“If I encounter situation Y, then I will initiate action Z!”). It has been proposed that implementation intentions render the mental representation of the situation highly accessible and establish a strong associative link between the mental representations of the situation and the action. 

    Some intention-setting ideas to consider in your workplace include:

    1.    For the love, have a meeting agenda and send it out ahead of time.  In other words, before you get out of the car with your kids at Target, not once you get in the store.  This should specify, when, where, how and who.

    2.    The same thing is true for post-meeting intentions.  Debrief action items post meeting- the what, when, where, how and who- verbally and then send a written follow-up with these action items.

    3.    Have an intention pep talk with yourself before you go into a difficult discussion or situation.  For example, before I got out of the car (man, I’m in my car a lot setting intentions) before going into what I knew could be an uncomfortable situation last week, I asked myself, “What do I want to get out of this?”   The answer was an opportunity to build relationships instead of destroying them. In other words, we aren’t here to look at toys, we are here to get toilet paper.

    Setting this simple intention led to me keeping my mouth shut more than once when I really wanted to say something because I knew I was right. Opening my mouth would most likely have led to my intention being destroyed. This is like the adult version of going into Target and coming out with $100 of stuff you don’t need or can’t afford when you went in to only get said toilet paper.

    4.    If your intention is really just to get toilet paper, a card and some milk, eliminate the things that keep you from doing that.  I can’t totally eliminate my kids nor do I want to, but I can find a better time through more proactive planning to schedule a trip to the store without them.  Or, I could be smart and simply order drive-up pickup.  Oftentimes we have to regroup and set unnecessary intentions because we got so far down the rabbit hole of not setting intentions in the first place. 

    How good are you at setting intentions to regulate your behavior and outcomes?

    If you like this post, you may also like:

    How Neuroscience Is and Will Revolutionize HR

    5 Questions to End the Slow Painful Death of Death by Meetings

    A Simple Goal Setting Method

  • The Office Design that Promotes Productivity, Collaboration, and Cost Savings

    The Office Design that Promotes Productivity, Collaboration, and Cost Savings

    Much has been said about the open office floor plan.  The concept arose out of Silicon Valley and became a popular way to supposedly create “collaborative” work environments where innovation happens.  Oh, and as an added bonus, companies saved a lot of money designing office spaces as open.  I’m not sure which came first, the chicken or the egg- the realization that money could be saved this way, or that “collaboration” and therefore innovation would thrive in this type of design.  

    But in many studies, including this one: The impact of the ‘open’ workspace on human collaboration, it was found that “Contrary to common belief, the volume of face-to-face interaction decreased significantly (approx.70%)” in examining two different corporate headquarters transitioning to more open office spaces. The electronic interaction increased, leading to what would be contrary to what you would think would happen. People in this type of environment socially withdrew from co-workers instead of increasing their interaction.

    In addition, the lost productivity of open office spaces has been cited empirically to reduce productivity. “An Exeter University study showed they actually create a 32% drop in “workers well-being” and a 15% reduction in productivity.” The loss of productivity eliminates any financial gain that decreased square footage provides in an open office design.

    So, what do you do? Ditch the open office? And in favor of what? Back to the cubicle farm?  The answer would be “no”.  As a recent Inc. Magazine article suggests,  working from home is one good option.  It enhances the cost savings for companies even more. In addition, the article also cites how work from home arrangements make people more productive and happier.

    We have no office at Horizon Point. We work from home and at client sites and at the local coffee shop- on our own as well as in group meetings. As we grow, I’ve considered the need to rent or purchase office space. The last time I mentioned it to my team, one person looked at me like if you make me come into an office and do all my work from there and I will quit. And when I think about it, I might quit too. 

    The truth of the matter is asking, where does the best work gets done? And the answer isn’t any one type of office arrangement. Different environments breed different results depending on the work or task at hand.

    As cited in the February cover story of FastCompany, “’People have different needs throughout their day and throughout their life. They might need to focus at a certain point and talk to someone at another point.’”

    With this reality at hand, it makes sense that the best office space is not one at all, but many. And the key is for leaders to manage in a way that gives employees the empowerment to match the type of work they need to accomplish with the environment that best suits it.

    Tomorrow my office will be at the gym where I will read a business book while I’m running on the treadmill. The one I’m currently reading relates to a new presentation I’m working on about how to implement a values-based culture. Next, it will be in my car as I return a few calls after dropping my kids off at school. Then, on to the local coffee shop where I can have some background noise but a limited distraction to revise training content for a client and create verbiage for collateral pieces for our new business. Then, I’m on to a client site for lunch and a meeting in order to finalize some training content we will use with their team in the next week or two.

    Obviously, there is some work that doesn’t allow us to choose where we do it. If you are running a multi-million-dollar press making parts for a car, let’s say, it’s not likely you can do that from your own car or the café (yet).  

    However, when we don’t assume one trend or style fits all, we begin to mold a better office environment and work culture where people can do their best work.

    Where will you be getting your best work done today?

  • What does Culture have to do with a Job Fair?

    What does Culture have to do with a Job Fair?

    A friend of mine once shared with me a story of leaving a job to pursue one that seemed like a great opportunity. Soon after taking the new job, she discovered the culture was a nightmare. The company owner had terrible temper and was not necessarily following appropriate guidelines for the business they were in. Needless to say, it was not a culture fit for her and she moved on to find another job. When determining your next career move, culture should definitely be a considering factor.

    In the next few weeks, we will be talking about culture on The Point Blog. What do job fairs and culture have in common? More than you realize. Although it may be cliché to say it, but when you have an opportunity to interview or interact with a potential employer, you are sizing them up, just as they are you. Job fairs are one opportunity to determine culture fit.

    Here are a few do’s and don’ts to help prepare you for your next job fair (including factoring in culture fit):

    Do:

    • Research the company (including mission, values, products & services, available jobs and hiring managers). Check out company websites and hiring manager LinkedIn profiles to help you get started.
    • Bring copies of your resume.
    • Dress for success (and take a bath!)
    • Prepare an elevator pitch – Don’t have one? Check out Networking During the Holidays to help you develop one.
    • Ask questions – remember you’re not only there to find a job but to also determine culture fit.

    Don’t:

    • Bring your mom – unless she is applying too, leave parental units at home.
    • Forget to follow-up – that includes applying for the job you are interested in online and/or sending a thank you note when applicable.

    Read more of our culture related blogs here (& stay tuned for more blogs about culture!)

  • When striving for a culture of “collaboration” kills your business

    When striving for a culture of “collaboration” kills your business

    We conducted a focus group about a year ago with a group of business leaders around the idea of organizational values and culture.   In this focus group, we presented seven key values, based on research that defined organizational culture.   The goal was to see what these professionals thought about these seven values in the context of a broader assessment product.  And whether this values set could predict a company’s culture in order to match candidates to cultures that align with individual the candidates’ values.

    Often things like this come down to semantics, but one piece of feedback where there was agreement was that the value of “collaboration” is something all companies want. Is this really what we meant or did we need to change the name of this value to reflect more of something that could be seen on a continuum?  Many of the others values we presented were viewed as a continuum that didn’t lend the value to be seen as right or wrong, just different in different work environments.

    We haven’t changed the name of this value yet and maybe we will, but in reflecting on the feedback and on experience working with a variety of companies that try to promote a collaborative culture, I have seen the dark side of it.

    The dark side of a focus on collaboration comes in the form of it sabotaging organizational health.  It flows something like this from a behavioral perspective:

    1. In the name of collaboration, we have to have “everyone” involved in order to make a decision big or small.
    2. Because “everyone” has to be involved to make any decision, it takes forever.  Never mind that we already passed a budget that has built in decisions in it or adopted a strategy that everyone agreed upon, we still need to meet on the minutia of those efforts.  And, oh by the way, if you want to get everyone together in a meeting to decide on this minor detail, it will have to be in a month because everyone’s calendar is full from the other small decisions that it was decided needed everyone’s involvement that came up two months ago.
    3. People get frustrated because everything takes so long and they begin to feel like they have no control over what they were hired to do.  They don’t have any decision-making authority even if their job title warrants it.
    4. It looks like everyone needs to be involved in the decision-making process in the name of collaboration, but everyone still knows who makes the final decision or whose voice is heard the most.  So, a lot of political posturing takes place in preparation for those meetings that have to be scheduled for months out.

    In the end, what is couched as “collaboration” is actually the complete opposite of it.  And the results that the “collaboration” is designed to lead to ends up being missed opportunities and high turnover because of frustration and stalled decision making.

    When have you seen “collaboration” go bad?