Great reads & links - White Water Group

Don’t step on my Blue Suede Shoes (but don’t mind if I step on yours…)

François Moscovici — Wed, 12 Apr 2017 08:00:00 +0000

What do Wynonie Harris, Arthur Crudup and Willie Mae “Big Mama” Thornton have in common? – They all did the hard work but Elvis got the credit (and the royalties).

In the 50s, black american rock and blues music was segregated to the R&B charts. These served as test markets for new songs. The songs were then covered by white artists who would generate sales volumes. So Wynonie recorded Good Rocking Tonight, Arthur That’s All Right and Big Mama Hound Dog. In most cases the original performer withered or at least never made it to the level of their imitator.

There are countless parallels in the corporate world: if you Google “My Boss takes the credit” you will find dozens of business agony aunts dispensing advice to anguished, helpless or simply angry ‘victims’. Some organisations reinforce this type of behaviour: they see it as part of apprenticeship: “one day, you will be a Partner and you too will be allowed to steal ideas from your subordinates…” Obviously, this is not purely a corporate issue: “One day you will have Tenure and you will be able to steal ideas from your students (and you won’t even have to pay them)…”

From a leadership perspective, what should be done about this situation? I see this as a two questions:

(i) is giving credit desirable?

And (ii) if it is, how do you make it happen?

Both questions find their answer in good old Behavioural Psychology: Everything we know about reinforcement is that positive feedback, particularly public feedback is the most effective way to both motivate and develop people. So if you simply want to squeeze the lemon and not develop the person, then go ahead, keep the credit aligned with the hierarchy. A situation where it would be easy to do would be any form of internship for example. However, in the ongoing War for Talent, development is the key to retention.

Only the rarefied salaries at companies like Goldman Sachs can hope to compete using money as the sole motivator. And money is only one of 9 key career motivators, so you would be wrong about 88% of the time! For the rest of us, development and credit are key to building a healthy talent pool. So how do you stop a bad habit? Again, Behavioural Psychology provides the answer: ruthlessly reward the ‘right’ behaviour and consistently punish its absence. Do it often enough and everybody will get the message. Gold stars and red cards should not be limited to the classroom or the football pitch. Our advice to our client is to design an appropriatebehavioural programme, including hard metrics for senior people such as linking their bonus to desirable behaviours. For them too, positive reinforcement just works!

The post Don’t step on my Blue Suede Shoes (but don’t mind if I step on yours…) appeared first on White Water Group.

Blackberries or Crème de Mure? iPhone or iSpy?

Averil Leimon — Wed, 10 Aug 2016 23:00:00 +0000

It is the holiday season and the debate continues. Should you or should you not check your e-mails while you are on holiday? Aren’t you meant to be ‘getting away from it all’? The Mail on line ran a story about managers returning even more stressed from holiday because:

They claim that ‘Of the third of those polled who work while on holiday, 80 per cent ‘frequently’ respond to emails, nearly 50 per cent take phone calls and 10 per cent go into the office.’ One argument is that presentee-ism is at an all time high as people fear further job losses. As a result they work longer hours, restrict how much holiday they take and keep in constant contact with the office when they do go away. Good leaders have to know that this can’t be good for performance and productivity in the long run. People burn out. While their bodies are in attendance their brains are not, just at the time when your people may form the only competitive advantage you have. Make sure they replenish themselves when they take a break. Stress is not inevitable- it is a choice. Even when the pressure is running high, there is much that you can do to stay resilient. It can start with the way you see life As an incorrigible optimist, I tend to assume that e-mails will contain surprises and delights. I am the same with the post. Early training on birthday cards, valentines and pen pal letters has not been eroded by decades of tax bills, letters about sewage because of the White Water name or generally very boring correspondence. I can’t wait to open all my mail when I get home from a trip and now with the convenience of technology I can keep track of any goodies that come my way wherever I am. Not everyone thinks the same and now many people nag us to leave it all behind and chill. No doubt it depends on what you do, your personal style, how engaged you are with what you do and what level you are at in the organisation but here are a few suggestions:

Set a limit If you dread going away because of the sheer volume of e-mails that will await you on your return, then perhaps it is worth scanning on a daily or every now and then basis to ensure there are no nasty surprises on your return but set a time and a limit if you feel the pressure might get to you. The Institute of Leadership and Management says if workers insist on checking their emails on holiday, they should limit themselves to once or twice a day.
Develop others It would of course be better to tackle the issue long before your holiday, asking questions such as: Who could be screening and dealing with my e-mails in my absence? Start delegating and coaching now for a bit of peace next year.
Leave a good out of office message. I recently sent an e-mail to someone not knowing they were on vacation. Instead of the usual boring o.o.o response, the automated message told me that she was indeed out of office, that she would not, under any circumstances, be reading her e-mails and that as I had already been foolish enough to send her an e mail it would be destroyed forthwith. (not in exactly those words but in harsh admin speak) That left me either having to note in my diary to contact her again on her return from her holiday idyll or forget all about her in future and go to someone else. I did the latter. So tell them nicely how much you want to respond on your refreshed return and they probably will wait- especially if you promise not to show them all your holiday snaps
Make choices dependent on the nature of the trip. Recently, speaking to a Lloyd’s broker client, she described her recent marriage and honeymoon (a second for both of them) being marked out as very different because they both agreed to not just leave e-mails unattended, but to leave the Blackberries at home altogether. For their next holiday to the Caribbean in September they will check their mail but the honeymoon was marked out as extra special.
Ensure that the technology doesn’t get in the way of intimacy ( see point 4) When people spend a great deal of time at work the re-entry into family life can be tricky. As a result, you can quite commonly see all the members of a family intently tapping away on their iPhones at foreign restaurant tables. Put the phones down and talk about the big stuff- life, love and the pursuit of happiness would be a good start. Politics and religion might be tricky until you are all more relaxed. . .
Work out what works best for you and make deliberate choices in agreement with your fellow travellers and above all – enjoy your holiday!

The Mail article: Stressed then don’t go on holiday

The post Blackberries or Crème de Mure? iPhone or iSpy? appeared first on White Water Group.

Super read: Career & Happiness

Natasha Lancaster — Wed, 30 Mar 2016 23:00:00 +0000

Averil Leimon gives you one piece of advice to feel happier in life. We hope this will give you a nudge to boost both your career and personal satisfaction.

The post Super read: Career & Happiness appeared first on White Water Group.

What New Year Resolutions teach us about Leadership

François Moscovici — Sun, 13 Jan 2013 00:00:00 +0000

New Year Resolutions – Are we there yet? So it is the 13th day of the year (or perhaps the 14th if you pick this up on Monday) and about 50% of us will have made formal New Year Resolutions. Depending on which study you read, 60-90% will fail within six months, with the first problems occurring typically after two weeks… So why is the failure rate so high and why do we keep making promises? Can anything be done about it? What are the leadership lessons? Mind your language Most resolutions are expressed in terms of becoming a better person (e.g. a healthier me) as opposed to objectives or behaviours. This imprecise language has several consequences: it accesses our ‘fairy tale me’ – the one that will never really exist outside our imagination; it doesn’t translate into specific objectives and associated behaviours; and it gives us a ‘get out of jail’ card. This is not very different from companies that want to be ‘the leading competitor’ in this or that widget. To quote our colleague Michael Harper: Hope is Not a Method. SMART objectives work for the rest of us too. Failure as a marker for success A one-off failure to keep a resolution or associated behaviour is called backsliding. It is as old as the world itself (or at least the Bible) and is erroneously seen a weakness of willpower. What psychology teaches us is that it is the interpretation of the backsliding event is crucial: “I am still learning a new language twice a week, I just happened to skip one lesson” is a very different interpretation from “I can’t stick to anything, why bother?” When our strategies fail, the biggest danger is all-or-nothing thinking. Just get back in the saddle – backsliding is a universal experience and a test of our commitment to a course of action. Most behaviours are driven by existing habits To some degree, resolutions and desires can create good new habits, and this is what we try to install with each New Year resolution or Strategic Change Programme. What most of us don’t realise is that we spend an awful lot of time each day in habitual, unconscious behaviour. From the way we eat breakfast to the way we run meetings, we experience deeply ingrained behaviours that are hard to change because we are not even aware of their existence. The more a behaviour is habitual (e.g. under-estimating a time needed for a project), the harder it is to deliver against it: “I always start with good intentions but, no matter how hard I try, I always end-up over budget”. This explains why change management is so hard: you have to bring both individual and corporate habits to the surface, change them and then ‘drop them back’ at the habitual and unconscious level. Change your context, and stick with it… So what can we do? Ideally, we need to rigorously analyse habits in order to find the unconscious triggers that drive certain behaviours, and then somehow short-circuit undesirable processes. We do this with our clients all the time, but it may not be that easy for a simple New Year resolution. So here are two tips: 1) Change your context. We know that triggers are highly contextualised. For example smokers often report that it’s the drinking in their usual pub that will trigger the urge to smoke. If stopping drinking temporarily is too hard to contemplate, then changing bars for a few weeks will make a big difference. If you want to experience a different level of creativity, change the time at which you run your sessions, or the room, or the people. Even if you don’t have the skills or time to carefully analyse your habits, you can try and disrupt them until you see some results. 2) Stick with it. Forget about the 30 day this or 21 day that. Habits take time, because they need to become unconscious. Remember how long it took to drive on ‘autopilot’ after your first lesson? We consider that nine weeks is a minimum for reasonably complex habits. So be patient and don’t forget to reward yourself (or your team) along the way. A quarter of resolution makers quit by February – or within two months of launching a change initiative. Let us know how you get on and how you overcome backsliding.

The post What New Year Resolutions teach us about Leadership appeared first on White Water Group.

What New Year Resolutions teach us about Leadership

François Moscovici — Sun, 13 Jan 2013 00:00:00 +0000

The post What New Year Resolutions teach us about Leadership appeared first on White Water Group.

Optimistic Grit

François Moscovici — Tue, 11 Sep 2012 23:00:00 +0000

We are entering the last quarter of the year – typically the most intense one. We continue to present 12 strong ideas on the 12th day of each month. Let’s see if our perspective can help us all make it to Christmas in good shape… To paraphrase Gordon Gekko in Wall Street, “Grit is Good”. The Paralympics in particular have illustrated that there is no shortcut to the top, no matter what your (dis)ability. Have a look either at this superb clip from Samsung or even at Boris Johnson’s very funny Parade speech. Now grit is particularly useful in the current business context: many of us have been running hard since 2008, and the London 2012 athletes can provide useful wisdom to help us continue performing at a high level until we reach our elusive targets… However, open-ended grit can be hard work if it is not mixed with hope for the future and an ability to bounce back. We call this Optimistic Grit. Beyond the obvious on dedication and delayed gratification, this is what we can learn from the last seven weeks: 1) Post-traumatic growth as a model to rebuild lives and careers Sitting-volleyball Paralympian Martine Wright lost her legs in the 7/7 London bombings. “There’s definitely something. I don’t know whether it’s spiritual or it’s fate, but I really truly believe that I was meant to do this journey,” she says. Martine’s story fits the definition of PTG: a positive psychological change as a result of highly challenging circumstances. The growth doesn’t come from the trauma itself but from the experience of dealing with its consequences. It is not simply a return to normal but a heightened level of achievement based on a greater appreciation of life and a changed sense of priorities. Many companies have been deeply wounded by the current recession – no matter who is to blame. As leaders we need to accept the situation thrust on us and then provide a supportive environment where team members can grieve as needed, rebuild new aspirations, focus on what is under their control and find a new meaning to their professional life. 2) Home Advantage everywhere The zest and drive of Olympians is sustained by knowing that thousands of people believe in you unconditionally. In every major event the home team tends to do well, even in apparently unconnected events. Witness the Greek football team winning the Euros in 2004, a month before the Olympics opened in Athens. The impact in London was significant: both gold and total medals up 50% compared to Beijing. Research shows that flourishing teams use positive/reinforcing communications as opposed to criticism by a ratio of 3:1 and reap the financial rewards. Yet most organisations are largely set up to provide a criticising environment. What can we do to provide the same sort of Home Advantage to our teams? To make them feel that they “can’t let down all those who believe in us?” How can we create the internal belief that our teams are made of real champions? 3) Pushing yourself to the limit, then becoming smarter Most of our clients work incredibly hard but don’t know their limits: many are just on the wrong side of stress and lose sight of when their performance starts to deteriorate and decision-making becomes impaired. Coaching helps to restore sanity. Top athletes on the other hand have clear awareness of what the ‘entry ticket’ to top performance is: for Mo Farah it is 120 miles (200km) of hard running every week. No longer can a Mark Spitz win seven gold medals simply by putting in an extra half-hour in the swimming pool every day: natural limits of workloads have been reached. So they have to work with their coaches to become smarter, to identify the little thing that will make a big difference. Witness Wheelchair racer David Weir who trains alongside professional cyclists to understand the dynamics of using the slipstream of a pack as well as positioning for the last lap of a race. What is your equivalent of working smarter? What is the area of focus that will make a difference time after time? Can you find it in your company’s culture – for instance Apple’s being at the crossroads between aesthetics, technology and perfectionism – or do you need to invent your own? What behaviours do you and your team need to learn as a result? Who can help you think through it? 4) Failure as feedback, because you’re in control Both in sport and management we find two types of motivation: those who have enormous self-belief and want to exploit it, and those who are simply terrified to fail. These two characteristics however are poor predictors of success: we all know footballers whose self-perception is clearly beyond their competence, and colleagues who are petrified by doubt. Independently of confidence, a characteristic of real champions seems to be the ability to control one’s life – what psychologists call internal locus of control. The reasons athletes respond to failure is that they can draw useful information from it: Five-times judo world champion Teddy Riner has clinched gold in London after a surprise defeat in Beijing: “it wasn’t a true failure; I was still a junior; this has allowed me to evolve, rebuild, learn from my mistakes and generally grow-up”. Contrast this with corporate environments where failure is not only punished but actively used to define success: “if nobody is criticising you, you are probably doing a good job”. Our challenge is therefore two-fold: to coach our teams in increasing their confidence about being in control – a form of managed optimism, as well as providing space for failure and gathering useful feedback. Interestingly, this is also what our research on Balanced Leadership shows. In some industries it is called Rapid Cycle Testing; we call it optimistic feedback.

The post Optimistic Grit appeared first on White Water Group.

Happiness

Averil Leimon — Mon, 23 Jul 2012 23:00:00 +0000

Averil was talking on BBC Radio 5 Live this morning about Happiness . . . .for several seconds! The Office of Statistics brings out a new report today about well being and health. Questions they have asked before include: How satisfied are you with your life nowadays? 76% of people said – 7 or more out of 10. How happy did you feel yesterday? 76% -7 or more out of 10 How anxious did you feel yesterday? More than 50% rated -4 or less out of 10 To what extent do you feel the things you do in your life are worthwhile? 73% -7 or more out of 10 Even amongst people experiencing big problems 57% enjoyed yesterday So, happiness is our natural state. It is good for our well being and worth cultivating. Chronic unhappiness harms us and has a corrosive effect. At White Water we are seeing higher rates of anxiety, depression and fatigue at work. People need resilience to get through and happiness is a key component, so is worth cultivating. Here’s what you can do to increase your happiness – or subjective well -being as psychologists and the Office of National Statistics call it: 1) Experience positive emotions- focus on what is going right. In some cultures this is regarded with suspicion, and negativity and cynicism are regarded as more intellectually worthy. Go against the tide. Work at finding the most positive emotions in what you do, what you have and all that is around you 2) Engage – many people are disengaged from their jobs, sleep walking to work. Start by recognising what strengths you have, what you enjoy doing and find a way of using this knowledge at work to make each day more enjoyable and worthwhile. 3) Build a strong network of friends or relations. They immunise you against the vagaries of life. It is all too easy to work hard, feel knackered and not get around to phoning or seeing friends or family and then being too embarrassed to call. No-one died of embarrassment so just do it. It will feel like an effort but will pay off in the end. 4) Find meaning in what you do – ask yourself what mark, however small , are you making on the world? Being part of something bigger than yourself is great for your happiness. Make a difference – to the economy in your job, to a colleague at work that you encourage or to an Olympic tourist that you are helpful to! 5) Accomplishment – master something new or work on a skill you have already. Hard work and achievement make you happier, while watching TV of an evening depresses your mood. All this takes time and determination but the pay off isn’t just greater happiness but also better health, longer life, more fulfilling relationships and success in what you do. So don’t wait for life to make you happy, start changing now.

The post Happiness appeared first on White Water Group.

Happiness

Averil Leimon — Mon, 23 Jul 2012 23:00:00 +0000

Averil was talking on BBC Radio 5 Live this morning about Happiness…. for several seconds! The Office of Statistics brings out a new report today about well being and health. Questions they have asked before include: How satisfied are you with your life nowadays? 76% of people said – 7 or more out of 10. How happy did you feel yesterday? 76% -7 or more out of 10 How anxious did you feel yesterday? More than 50% rated -4 or less out of 10 To what extent do you feel the things you do in your life are worthwhile? 73% -7 or more out of 10 Even amongst people experiencing big problems 57% enjoyed yesterday So, happiness is our natural state. It is good for our well being and worth cultivating. Chronic unhappiness harms us and has a corrosive effect. At White Water we are seeing higher rates of anxiety, depression and fatigue at work. People need resilience to get through and happiness is a key component, so is worth cultivating. Here’s what you can do to increase your happiness – or subjective well -being as psychologists and the Office of National Statistics call it: 1) Experience positive emotions- focus on what is going right. In some cultures this is regarded with suspicion, and negativity and cynicism are regarded as more intellectually worthy. Go against the tide. Work at finding the most positive emotions in what you do, what you have and all that is around you 2) Engage – many people are disengaged from their jobs, sleep walking to work. Start by recognising what strengths you have, what you enjoy doing and find a way of using this knowledge at work to make each day more enjoyable and worthwhile. 3) Build a strong network of friends or relations. They immunise you against the vagaries of life. It is all too easy to work hard, feel knackered and not get around to phoning or seeing friends or family and then being too embarrassed to call. No-one died of embarrassment so just do it. It will feel like an effort but will pay off in the end. 4) Find meaning in what you do – ask yourself what mark, however small , are you making on the world? Being part of something bigger than yourself is great for your happiness. Make a difference – to the economy in your job, to a colleague at work that you encourage or to an Olympic tourist that you are helpful to! 5) Accomplishment – master something new or work on a skill you have already. Hard work and achievement make you happier, while watching TV of an evening depresses your mood. All this takes time and determination but the pay off isn’t just greater happiness but also better health, longer life, more fulfilling relationships and success in what you do. So don’t wait for life to make you happy, start changing now.

The post Happiness appeared first on White Water Group.

ROI: Choosing the best Executive Coach for you

François Moscovici — Tue, 19 Jun 2012 23:00:00 +0000

Back to basics: How to choose the best Executive Coach for you?

Executive Coaching is a significant cash investment for organisations and time investment for individuals. Its scope has grown tremendously over the past 10 years because when it works, it works really well! Yet, there is a lot of pleasant and largely ineffectual coaching out there. If you work for a large organisation, you are likely to be asked to choose between proposed coaches through a so-called chemistry session. How can you tell the effective coach from simply somebody you will get on well with? How will you ensure your return on your investment? Specifically, how do you tell a coach who helps clients to get their results from somebody simply sharing their experience? How can you find somebody who is psychologically competent and who has a deep understanding of business issues? Think about the questions below, then watch the video. Questions to ask a prospective coach: • What process and models do you use in coaching? • How do you measure success and effectiveness? • How do you handle confidentiality? • What changes have you made in your own life? • What is your understanding of business issues? Then ask yourself: • How did the coach handle the questions – did I feel respected, were my feelings acknowledged and my views challenged? • Did I feel listened to in a way that was different from most other relationships in my life? • Can I work with this person? Simple enough right? – You’d be surprised how many Executives forget the basics when it comes to their coaching … To find out more about our Executive Coaching offering, including specialised programmes, visit this page. Watch this video for our key tips: Contact us now for a free consultation

The post ROI: Choosing the best Executive Coach for you appeared first on White Water Group.

The Queen versus Maslow: a Royal Lesson in Leadership

Averil Leimon — Mon, 11 Jun 2012 23:00:00 +0000

After a long weekend of Pomp and Circumstance, flotillas and fairy cakes, old rockers and royalty, Queen Elizabeth II emerged as a leader who had stayed true to herself and her values while also managing to change sufficiently with the times. Her promise 60 years ago was to commit herself to a life of service to her people. The respect given during the Jubilee celebrations, by her people, was for that promise, made and kept. The nation revelled in shared experience and pride in what we seem to be able to do well, even if we can’t always make the trains run on time or stop the rain falling. It didn’t matter. We were part of something bigger than ourselves. The more reserved British often look askance at outpourings of enthusiasm in the people but perhaps there is a lesson about our need for positive emotion in these dark days and for visible, trustworthy leadership. Post-banking and political crises, business leaders are in search of trust too. The Archbishop of Canterbury’s message, essentially reminded us that the Queen’s tenure had been a perfect illustration of the importance of the search for meaning and of creating a community. Both are essential building blocks of trust. Positive psychology research has demonstrated that a sense of meaning is critical to the experience of subjective wellbeing, i.e. happiness, and the good health, success and even longevity that accompany it. Maslow’s Theories of Motivation would have us believe that everyone has to climb the hierarchy of needs, establishing security and all the basic materialistic needs before searching for higher meaning and self actualisation. Current research turns that theory upside down. Wherever people are in life, they seek to find meaning and purpose. Ideally, they discover it in their life’s work. So, as a leader, how do you ensure that you give your people a sense of being part of something meaningful, something bigger than themselves? How do you help them create a lasting legacy? Because when it comes down to it, most people want to know they have made a difference. How do you also build good communities in the workplace? The recent economic challenges, coming on top of decades of ‘delayering’ have taken their toll of community spirit. All too often teams are just disparate groups of people. Goodwill has fallen to a low ebb and stress can flourish. Good communities are founded on generalised reciprocity – the altruistic helping of other people, knowing that there may not be anything in it for you in the short term but trusting that in the end it will have been worth it. A good leader will find ways to foster and encourage a sense of caring for the well being of others and for the business as a whole. A decade of research suggests that happiness at work — defined as positive emotion, engagement, good relationships, meaning and accomplishment — can improve revenue, profitability, staff retention, customer loyalty, and workplace safety and, above all, cause people and the organisation to flourish. Perhaps some of those not so old fashioned virtues of dedication, service, doing your duty and giving back to others hold the key to good organisations of the future.

The post The Queen versus Maslow: a Royal Lesson in Leadership appeared first on White Water Group.