I had my first virtual reality experience at MIT recently. The program was called The Enemy and the point was to introduce us to three pairs of enemies, get up close and personal, and hear them talk about their beliefs and experiences. The three conflicts were in Israel/Palestine, the Congo, and El Salvador. As I expected, all six wanted peace and better lives for their children. And all six grew up in circumstances, mostly desperate, that defined the enemy and, seemingly, limited their options. Across the board, their actions were violent, heartfelt, and contextually defensible, if misguided. I walked out as I walked in, wishing for a better world and wondering how you get people to step out of their circumstances long enough to find common ground and peaceful alternatives that lift all people. My wishes extend to all three of these conflicts, as well as to today’s USA and beyond. Imagine a world governed by civil, rational, collaborative problem-solving! We could have left feeling pensive, I believe, but that didn’t happen. Instead, the MIT crew ushering us through this experience tainted the experience by breaking one of my cardinal rules:
From 37 floors up, Sarajevo is beautiful, nestled in the mountains with a river running through it. You can spot the quaint, almost Turkish, old town immediately adjacent to the grand palaces built while the city was a fashionable spot in the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The diversity continues to impress with minarets, an Eastern Orthodox church, a Cathedral, and a Synagogue all within blocks of each other. Zoom in to street level and the evidence of fighting amongst those factions during the 1990s is obvious. Bullet scars still mar prominent buildings right downtown. Mortar blooms still mark the pavement. Ravaged buildings are still awaiting repair or demolition. But from the tower, only those who know where to look can spot the damage.
Confirmation bias is the tendency to interpret new information as confirmation of one’s existing beliefs and theories. And it is the only way to explain how Trump’s speech to the Boy Scouts can simultaneously be seen as breaking every Boy Scout rule and upholding the values of the Boy Scouts. We hear what we want to hear. Regardless of your own beliefs, you can’t listen to the daily and starkly opposing interpretations of every political news story and not be impressed with the incredible power of confirmation bias. Of course, you might conclude that only the idiots on the opposite side of each issue are guilty of confirmation bias. You might be quite sure that your interpretation is the only rational and fact-based reaction. You’d be wrong.
When my parents died, their wills suggested an onerous process for dividing belongings among 5 siblings. But at least they provided a process! They also indicated we were welcome to come up with a better process, if we so desired. My parents, who probably had something to do with my clarity(!), clearly knew the importance of having a process! As executrix, I gladly proposed a better process. Being me, I’m pretty sure I would have done so regardless of whether or not it was my responsibility. So I wrote up a simple process, explained it to all siblings, asked for opinions, and then got their signatures to confirm agreement before anyone began claiming anything. The process worked smoothly. Success depended only on the thought invested by each sibling into their desires and needs. Everyone left with a combination of cherished and practical items. There was one opportunity for dissension, however.
If you increase clarity, you absolutely will increase productivity. You will also increase engagement, commitment, and determination. You will make smarter decisions, better plans, and solve problems more readily. It’s true and I can prove it. Furthermore, the potential gains are enormous. However, you can’t improve anything if you can’t see it. Thus, in November I proposed the 1st Quarterly Clarity Week and my first suggestion for exposing opportunities to increase productivity with clarity. If you participated, your team consciously kept their eyes out for bandaids and workarounds over the course of the week. This should have been relatively easy since bandaids and workarounds are familiar concepts. I hope you found some great opportunities for improvement. Now it is time for the 2nd Quarterly Clarity Week. This time my goal is to raise awareness of a far less familiar, but incredibly important, opportunity. Here is what you do. At the beginning of each meeting in the week ahead:
American companies spend billions on employee training and development each year and most of it is wasted. The hoped for changes just don’t materialize. Why? Here are eight reasons: 1. Training isn’t what employees need. Training develops skills. At the end of a training course, employees should be able to do something they couldn’t do or couldn’t do well before the class. If you don’t know what skill your employees need that they don’t have, you are wasting your money. 2. You are training the wrong people. Too often one employee screws up and the solution is to train everyone rather than deal with the miscreant. If-he-needs-it, they-probably-all-need-it thinking leads to training lots of employees who already know what to do and have been performing acceptably.
The purpose of annual reviews is ostensibly to improve performance, right? Then why don’t they? Why do managers and employees alike dread them? And why on earth do they happen only once a year? I can think of only one performance review I ever had in decades working in Corporate America that actually helped me improve. That taught me something about myself that I didn’t know. That accomplished something other than:
Process trumps power. It also squelches politics and individual habits, quirks, and dysfunctions. What would happen if you were playing a common, well-known game like Go Fish or Crazy Eights and someone skipped your turn? You’d speak up, right? You’d say something like “Wait a minute, it’s my turn.” Or suppose someone tried to change suits with a seven instead of an eight. Would you let them? No way!
When I was hitting tennis balls this weekend, I noticed quite a few people out running. Ugh! I’d much rather chase a ball, a frisbee, or a hockey puck. I also enjoy honing a tennis stroke or carving the perfect turn on the ski slopes. But running? No thanks. I get bored. For me, there is no challenge in putting one foot in front of the other over and over again; I mastered that a long time ago. When I convince myself to run, my brain quickly conjures umpteen pressing tasks, articles to write, and alternative activities that are actually fun. My husband is different He likes to run. He gets in the zone. Mile after mile after mile. The lesson here?
The leader’s lament goes something like this: Why don’t more people step up and take ownership — real ownership? Why don’t they show more initiative and follow-up more carefully? Why do I always have to be the one to make things happen? Now let me tell you about Leo and the answer will become obvious.