As a training consultancy operating within the business sphere over the last eighteen months, the economic state across the corporate sector signals a major shift in doctrinal thinking. With this in mind, a huge consensus suggests the sector is starring down the barrel of a massively destabilizing short range future outlook.
In the aftermath of our financial meltdown and in the words of President John F. Kennedy, “there’s something immoral about abandoning your own judgment.”This being said, there are two questions that consultants must consider today: “if the economic state has degraded (limited) our retaliatory options, for consultancy firms, how must we step-up our customer over flights (intelligence and understanding our clients), while determining best-fit organizations for individual service offerings?” And, “how can we help the organizations and the economy respond in the future by understanding ‘what’ to do before our leaders engage the ‘how-to’ do as a first strike policy?” Your response is highly respected and welcomed with the highest regard. I will be using your answers, with your permission, in my upcoming book “Success TRAPS: Awaken your Realized Potential for Lasting Fulfillment.”
Ref. “The Devil’s Paint Brush within Organizational Leadership” Thank you; please respond to Dpitts@thebisongroup.com.
The Philosophy of LeaderShaping, the off-spring of the “Six Levels of Leadership,” depends heavily on “Communications” and “Intelligence” to be successful. When one or both of these elements becomes compromised, the result is known as the Fog of War. In military terms, this phenomenon encompasses all of the confusions and miscalculations, which can occur during an actual combat situation. In the case of unsuccessful organizational behavioral influences within the business sphere, it is defined as swaying public opinion across popular culture due to misinformation or ambiguous reporting of the facts. The Fog of War offers a clear definition for the “Devil’s Paint Brush:” a description of the actions across any organizational body that causes immanent death over a period of time.
An organization dealing with uncertainties within its master plan, internally and externally, can relate to the Fog of War through a common event known as “Murphy’s Law” (that whatever can go wrong, will): the natural result of organizations and their leaders rushing headlong into situations of negligible visibility. Further, this is explained as the influences of externally induced obstacles, which disrupt internal goal-oriented/directed behavior and process. The results of this common event could be catastrophic, as leaders in an organization fail to recognize the intentions of their cohorts, or target competitive positions thought to be clear of the organization’s interests. A collapse in process can be attributed to the Fog of War.
When Napoleon still ruled most of Europe, a Prussian general named Carl von Clausewitz wrote a book entitled “On War” – one of the all-time, classic books on warfare and strategy, still studied in military academies worldwide. In it, he coined the term “friction” to mean all the things that fail in the chaos of battle conditions. It’s better known in business as Murphy’s Law: that whatever can go wrong, probably will.
In another chapter of the same book, “Intelligence in War,” he discussed the problems of getting accurate information in the middle of a military engagement (for business purposes, this is known as “Intelligence of Process”): the effects of occupational hassles on negative mood and effort exertion.
Communication failures can also occur as a result of the Fog of War. By not closely examining operations, leaders cannot relay vital and timely course corrections or competitive positions to their Centers of Gravity in real time. This action can place the organization in harm’s way. Such delays and miscommunications are typically blamed on the Fog of War, since competitors and foes (in some cases, these people reside internally) may have to improvise a new strategy or retreat without sufficient time to relay their actions to their own operations. The Fog of War can also be blamed (in some cases) when vital orders from leaders are unsuccessful in reaching the strategic and execution teams in time.
The concept of a Fog of War has come under considerable criticism over the years. But, in the last eighteen months, it has been pronounced due to economic instability and poor planning by leaders across industry. Political leaders, elected officials and public and private leader’s response to these allegations often includes an allusion to Fog of War, meaning that some failures were due to real-time confusions, miscalculations and non-effective response to injury – not poor planning.
Some critics charge that the military depends too heavily on the Fog of War defense to excuse their own actions or missteps. This same defense can also be argued in the business sectors, but either sector being considered, military or business, the defense “should” not be accepted on a frequent basis – as a defense to failure (excuse) or missteps – for it goes against the very reason that “leadership” was birthed. Here’s an example of the Fog of War at work in business.
Fog and Friction: Why Organizations Suffer from the Devil’s Paint Brush
In 2008, I had the pleasure of training a new client on leadership, execution and team building.
For the sake of eliminating any instance of embarrassment, I’ll change the client’s name to ABC & Company. Their dilemma at the time was two-fold; first, they wanted to become a stronger, more cohesive working team. Second, they wanted to learn a better way to execute by improving the leadership culture across the organization. During the four months of their training, an interesting occurrence continued to show itself – an example for demonstrated “Intelligence of Process.”
While outlining the Six Levels of Leadership, the client quickly realized that their business (and its future), like warfare, was messy and uncertain. They also learned that what von Clausewitz wrote holds true on both the battlefield and in the boardroom. As soon as people move from the calm of planning meetings to the messiness of action, fog obscures the vision and friction confounds preparation. While actions fail to work as planned (friction), accurate information is missed, lost, or mangled (fog). Regardless of how things are expected to turn-out, “all best laid plans change upon first contact with the enemy.” Amazingly, and with all of their training, the client quickly learned that regardless of any amount of training and learning, behaviors not changed brings calamity to any well run organization or military unit.
Fast forward a year to mid 2009, the client found themselves dealing with the Fog of War in the most profound way. A senior official responsible for running one of the organization’s successful profit centers decided to leave for a new opportunity. In doing so, the senior official offered a resignation, effective thirty days from the date of submission. In this specific situation, the executive leadership’s actions fell fault to Murphy’s Law and the Fog of War all in one swoop. Because their culture was one that demonstrated a “hierarchal leadership” approach, one that was actually disconnected from the day-to-day operations of the specific revenue center, the resignation caused confusion, tension, adrenaline, and anxiety to govern the more important pre-events of the transition process.
If you create “battle” pressures within an organization – by a lack of leadership and timely communications, competitiveness, low employee moral, fear of dismissal, pressure to win no matter what, and tyrannical management – you’ll get what real battles bring: chaos, confusion, constant breakdowns, frantic levels of anxiety, and many unnecessary losses. By the last week of the resignation and leading up to the last day as a member of the organization, the senior official was faced with employee infighting, a lack of trust from the consumer markets, insubordination, rebellious attitudes, and disobedience. The culture across the organization along with the stresses, competition, anxieties and pressures increased fog and friction a thousand-fold. This is a clear example of the effects of occupational hassles on negative mood and effort exertion. Simply, this is the potential for the beginning of the end – and, if this is not a wakeup call for the hierarchal leadership culture across ABC & Company, it could be the end of the organization as a whole. Little do they realize, but the Devil’s Paint Brush is designing a masterpiece on the very canvas of the client’s organization and culture.
Ten Lessons to Overcome the Devil’s Paint Brush
Every business activity has to generate a benefit to the business; if it does not I suggest you change it or stop doing it; hence, the concept of the Fog of War. The implication is that you need to measure the productivity of a number of activities so that you can measure and improve their profit contribution. This is why it is important to outline a series of lessons to overcome the Devil’s Paint Brush. These are your levers of productivity for your business – “a common architecture, a common application and a seamless approach” by all stakeholders to combat Murphy’s Law. This segment explains the principles of execution to increase/overcome barriers to productivity. Simply setting goals will not achieve your objectives; managing the activity that produces the result is what really counts. As we begin to look at how-to overcome this fog phenomenon, it’s important to comprehend the words of Carl Jung, a Swiss psychiatrist, influential thinker and the founder of analytical psychology (known as Jungian psychology): “The pendulum of the mind oscillates between sense and nonsense, not between right and wrong.” – Memories, Dreams, Reflections, 1962.
The lessons to overcome the Devil’s Paint Brush show you where to start:
1.Empathize with your Enemy,
2.Understand “Rationality” as the No-Safe-Zone,
3.Maximize Efficiency, Decrease Ineffectiveness,
4.Proportionality is an Absolute Guideline that Fails – within Reason!
5.Achieve the Data – Optimize its Resource,
6.Belief/Seeing are both often WRONG,
7.Prepare to Re-Examine your Reasoning,
8.Learn to Win Good by Engaging the Devil,
9.Never say Never – Never say I Can’t!
10.You Can’t Beat a Man at his Own Game – Human Nature.
Empathize with your Enemy. In order to limit opportunities for conflict, yet experience potential for peace, empathy must reside in all situations. However tough business and organizational needs might be, communicating with the enemy, empathically, creates an opening for successful outcomes. Empathy is the corrective action that overcomes all forms of misrepresentation and misunderstanding. Leaders using this strategy can remove themselves from their current emotional state, look at a situation through the lens of the opposing force and understand the thoughts that drive the decisions being made. The key to winning this strategy lie in your ability to know the enemy and how their culture responds to differing circumstances. In a military context, during the Vietnam War, the Vietnamese Government saw the United States as wanting to replace the French Government to preserve colonial power. The United States saw the Vietnamese as another potential cold war power, similar to the Russian Government. In the end, both countries were wrong. Neither imposed the strategy of “empathy” to learn what the other actually wanted (strategic intent was never understood). In the end, hundreds of thousands died on both sides and life for both cultures changed forever.
In the business context, leaders can only win this strategy by remaining connected to the day-to-day operations. Keeping a finger on the pulse of the business, internally and externally, including the actions, behaviors and thoughts of all stakeholders, allows leadership to remain ahead of the curve. But, at times of uncertainty as when essential staff moves away from the organization to pursue greater opportunities, the incident cannot cause for alarm as in the case of calling the fire “out-of-control.” This is the time that the leaders are able to spread their wings and demonstrate the true strength and foundation of excellence – the true substance of the organization must prevail beyond the parties being removed. To be successful, leaders must empathize with the situation from all aspects (good and bad), understanding what is needed to use the situation as a growth opportunity, and get their hands dirty to realize how-to maximize the talents of the remaining human capital. People are the greatest asset to any organization, so this means that the leadership must be able to understand the thoughts and feelings of others – their internal and external customer. This cannot be done if the leaders are disconnected from the daily functioning of the organization or department being effected.
Understand “Rationality” as the No-Safe-Zone. I remember watching a fantastic movie titled, “Thirteen Days,” staring Bruce Greenwood and Kevin Costner. The film is set during the two-week Cuban missile crisis (Soviet nuclear weapons in Cuba) in October of 1962 and it centers on how President John F. Kennedy, Attorney General Robert Kennedy and others handled the explosive situation.
In October, 1962, U-2 surveillance photos revealed that the Soviet Union was in the process of placing nuclear weapons in Cuba. These weapons had the capability of wiping out most of the Eastern and Southern United States in minutes if they became operational. President John F. Kennedy and his advisors had to devise a plan of action against the Soviets. Kennedy was determined to show that he was strong enough to stand up to the threat, and the Pentagon advised U.S. military strikes against Cuba, which could have led the way to another U.S. invasion of the island. However, Kennedy was reluctant to follow through because a U.S. invasion would have cause the Soviets to retaliate in Europe. A nuclear showdown appeared inevitable and the question to ask now, some forty-seven years later is this: “how was it prevented?”
This story offers one of the greatest lessons for leaders to truly understand how-to win the strategy here. I encourage you, the reader, to rent the film from your local video rental for a lesson in leadership, patience, communications, strategy and the Fog of War. Having a true understanding of the actions from both presidents, Kennedy and Khrushchev, during this tense stand-off teaches just how fragile “rationality” actually is in times of uncertainty. It was later found out in a meeting in 1992 that the Soviets had parked 162 nuclear warheads, including 90 tactical warheads in Cuba during this critical moment in the crisis.
In the business context, leaders must have a proven process by which individuals are selected to be leaders, given they possess the required attributes and style that best fits the organization. Leaders responsible to the selection process must be equipped to make the best decisions to maximize the greatest payoff distributions. They must select the abilities after removing the noise inferred ex post from the immediate observed outcomes. The framework design to follow must offer a model, which leaders’ judge relative to three different outcomes: First, risk must be considered at all levels of the organization. Behaviors and personalities coming together as ineffective ingredients can have a greater cost to the organization than any newly appointed incoming/ineffective leader.
Second, “overconfidence” must be considered to ensure the actual needs of the organization are not being underestimated. This can cause a potential appointment decision to be based on “rationality” rather than “best practices” to meet current and future needs. Third, numerous implications for the analysis of real-world leadership and organizational behavior, new product development, relation of risk-taking to an organization’s situation and culture (past, present and future) must bediscussed (i.e. one who underestimates project risk, has a higher probability of being chosen as the leader than an otherwise identical rational manager). Rationality can in fact cause a “No-Safe-Zone.”
Maximize Efficiency, Decrease Ineffectiveness. Time is critical and has a value that is mostly misunderstood. Efficiency must be a major consideration when faced with serious issues. Maximizing efficiency requires both “incremental change of process” in the way things are being done today, and “fundamental change” that brings on greater gains in efficiency for the future. Another aspect for consideration on this topic is “acceleration.” As we venture into the new world after the down sizing of the global business sphere, we’ll begin to see the need to do more with less – less cost, less time, less risk and less redundancy.
To win this strategy, leaders must learn to increase efficiency across all aspects of their information infrastructure, deploy the most energy-efficient common application platforms for best practices, simplify their processes of compliance with regulations and policies, utilize the benefits of the digital age (automate IT management platforms and archetypes), secure accurate and trustworthy information at every level to execute strategically and flawlessly, and aim to be a strategic partner that enables the success of the people and organization simultaneously. Experiencing high levels of success in this area not only maximizes efficiencies, but also leverages expertise to help the organization emerge from areas of uncertainty stronger than ever into the future. All of these actions (and some not listed) decrease ineffectiveness across an organization and offer, to a leader, the many opportunities to be more effective within their operations.
Proportionality is an Absolute Guideline that Fails – within Reason! Some people seem to pursue an intuitive definition of proportionality in warfare: that the civilian casualties in war on either side should not be significantly higher than the civilian casualties on the opposing side. But, the actual definition, from international law, does not define it that way: the incidental or unintended harm caused to civilians or civilian property must be proportional and not excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated by an attack on a military objective. The question now is this: which definition makes more sense, the intuitive one or the legal one? One problem with the intuitive definition is that civilian casualties on one side could be used to justify deliberate civilian casualties on the other side. But, the official version is also problematic because it seems to justify any number of civilian casualties if the military advantage is judged great enough. Neither formulation, however you examine them, offer a quantitative comparison, which means that in any war, people holding different biases are unlikely to agree on whether or not proportionality was actually observed. Simply stated, “proportionality” in the military context is all about the rights and wrongs of killing civilians.
Proportionality in the business sense also has parallels to the definitions above, only it is outlined as a strategy to win. How, you might be asking yourself. Earlier, we outlined the definition for the Fog of War as the “actions across any organizational body that causes immanent death over a period of time.” One of the actions that leaders fail at is taking care of their organization’s greatest asset – the people. The principal fundamental asset of an organization is its people. They are the engines that drive performance and make things run. Without people, nothing can be achieved.
If leaders fail to inspire greatness from their people, they’ll quickly establish a guideline of perception that things such as profit and process has a greater value. This action is one that promises to cause immanent death to an organization. The key is to establish “Success Traps” that help individuals achieve Personal Proficiency to increase Professional Mastery. Leaders must be able to get people to answer a few questions:
§How do “I” respond to problems and challenges?
§How do “I” influence others to my point of view?
§How do “I” respond to the changing pace of the environment?
§How do “I” respond to rules and regulations set by others?
And, they too must be able to get their people to answer the following questions, as it relates to the overall state – and the future state – of the organization as well:
§Do “I” know where the organization wants to be in the future?
§Do “I” know what the organization will apply its resources against to achieve its Future Picture?
§How will the organization apply those resources? And, how might “I” contribute in the process?
§When and under what conditions will the organization exit from its current strategic plan? And, what influences will “I” contribute to ensure greater success to its outcomes?
It basically comes down to a single issue: “does leadership help everyone in the organization lead upwards? And if so, do they reveal the secrets of Service Performance Management to everyone?” In the current economy, facing the challenges of a deepening global recession with limited financial resources; many organizations are charting a new course. As business leaders navigate this evolving terrain, it is important that they satisfy the demands of customers, employees, and vendor relationships – and develop new strategies that address the economic, social, and environmental impact of their business processes and practices. This is where service performance management adds value: Strategies to create business and societal value to provide the strategic clarity needed to align performance and service oriented management to business and organizational strategy, and hold individuals accountable while managing successfully through the downturn.
When leaders take care of their people, “proportionality” becomes a non-issue. But, when they do not value their people as their greatest asset or forget, immanent death over a period of time (shorter rather than later) is realized.
Achieve the Data – Optimize its Resource. Machines that run at high speed demand constant and abundant lubrication to prevent friction between the moving parts. Slower-speed machines need less. Running a machine, or a business organization, faster than it is designed to perform is the perfect recipe for provoking the maximum number of breakdowns. This is even more true when an organization is being forced to operate efficiently and effectively on a daily basis. Although its design requires peak performance, without the proper data to optimize its resources, things will go wrong and the leaders will experience the Fog of War.
Speaking about the need for data quality helps organizations generate the right form of business intelligence and assist leaders with making the right business decisions that becomes the game changer for the people and organization. The key to maximizing the data relies on a simple acronym that is all too familiar: GIGO – “Garbage in, Garbage out.” Data integrity is essential to an organization’s success and the leader’s ability to make great decisions.
Belief/Seeing are both often WRONG. “We see only what we want to see, and in most cases, our judgment in the face of chaos, causes us to be wrong – and right – when we only see half the picture.” Tom Petruno’s Money & Co. Blog back in April, 2008 talked about Wachovia Bank’s shareholders wishing that they could have a “do over” of the bank’s major foray into California. What he was referring to at the time was Wachovia’s 2006 purchase of Golden West Financial, the California lender that specialized in so-called option ARMs. As mortgage loan losses soared in 2008, Wachovia was forced to slash its quarterly dividend payment by 41%, from $.64 a share to $.375. At a time that the business world, more specifically, the financial markets were imploding, Wachovia was stated as saying “California really is bad and the acquisition of Golden West Financial was riskier than we initially thought” (Source: Goldman Sachs & Co. report). The Golden West Financial organization didn’t just specialize in option ARMS, it lived, ate, and breathed them. According to Bloomberg News, “99% of Golden West’s mortgage loans were option ARMs.” You wonder, then, how it’s possible that Wall Street didn’t recognize how risky these loans were until, um, today (April 2008). Leaders must learn to take heed in the lesson that others have paid the ultimate sacrifice. The key to winning this strategy lies in a keen ability to “achieve the data and optimize its resource – and, understanding that there’s more than what meets the eye!”
Prepare to Re-Examine your Reasoning. Robert S. McNamara, the Eighth Secretary of Defense for the United States serving under Presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson from 1961 to 1968, is quoted as saying: “Were those who issued the approval to use Agent Orange criminals? Were they committing a crime against humanity? Let’s look at the law. Now what kind of law do we have that says these chemicals are acceptable for use in war and these chemicals are not. We don’t have clear definitions of that kind. I never in the world would have authorized an illegal action. I’m not really sure I authorized Agent Orange. I don’t remember it, but it certainly occurred, the use of it occurred while I was Secretary.”He is also quoted as saying: “What makes us omniscient? Have we a record of omniscience? We are the strongest nation in the world today. I do not believe that we should ever apply economic, political, and military power unilaterally. If we had followed that rule in Vietnam, we wouldn’t have been there. None of our allies supported us. Not Japan, not Germany, not Britain or France. If we can’t persuade nations with comparable values of the merit of our cause, we’d better reexamine our reasoning.”
What an amazing leadership lesson for us to learn from. These words are profound in a way that stipulates the reason to develop GREAT teams across an organization – and, hold them accountable for their actions and their leaders for the decisions being made when executing strategy. The greatest mistake that leaders can make is not reexamining their reasoning for moving forward with a decision. Responsible leaders develop a framework, or adopt a proven model that provides their people with a toolkit to think strategically, assess financial implications of their decisions, mobilize change within the organization and communicate with other business leaders. These actions help their managers and team leaders to chart the future of their departments, as well as manage for bottom-line performance in real-time. When a leader is able to perform in this manner, he/she provides engaging opportunities for others to specialize in a specific area of career interest. Having the confidence to remove yourself from popular culture, the “Art of Detachment,” and reexamine your reasoning, eliminates opportunities for mistakes to be repeated – by ALL parties.
Learn to Win Good by Engaging the Devil. Again, quoting Robert S. McNamara, he stated: “How much evil must we do in order to do good? We have certain ideals, certain responsibilities. Recognize that at times you will have to engage in evil, but minimize it.” This statement is in relation to the many awful things that took place in Vietnam. But, it still rings true today for the battles that are engaged by leaders in the business battle space. Sometimes, doing the right things means “not” doing what is right. Small business owners are faced with this dilemma day after day. However you look at it, it comes down to a decision having to be made. What do you do when you have to make a decision to speak an untruth because the circumstances are not right and the outcomes from the truth will do more harm? Here’s a way to deal with this dilemma.
In most cases, the Fog of War in business are the prime causes of loss and wastage in organizational settings – waste of money, time, effort, manpower, and resources of every kind. They turn opportunities into fiascos and cause excellent plans to fail. The world is already a turbulent place; there’s not much that you can do to change that. It makes no sense to add to your problems through self-inflicted and unnecessary pressure. So, the best way to avoid the effects of the Fog of War and ineffectiveness within the organization is this: slow down and operate from a clear Memorandum of Understanding that provides a common architecture, a common set of applications and a requirement of teams to complete the necessary tasks to win.
It is important that you, as a leader, have the necessary time to be proactive in order to limit any risk while moving forward (the difference between making a “compromise” vs. being “compromised”). When things go wrong, as they often do, do not switch into a panic mode, yet operate as if all is OK. The only way to pull this off is to learn how to remove yourself emotionally from the scenario you found yourself in, get reliable feedback from your peers, ensure the information (data) is accurate and uncompromised, make decisions with the future picture in mind (don’t win the small battles ONLY to lose the big war), and flawlessly execute to win.
And, if you’re wise, you’ll have expected failures along the way, prepared your contingency script and continue with non-missteps and limited surprises. Take time to let the fog clear and the dust settle. Most situations are less pressing and critical than you think. Success in business rarely depends on split-second decisions; but, in some cases, success may require you to come into the devil’s living room. When this happens and you are faced with asking yourself the question posed earlier in the segment, or a question that is unfavorable, keep the future picture and mission within sight. Engaging the devil may have to occur; when you must, do so with stunning insight and perspective. The cleanup when it’s all over must be as limited with work as possible and its cause cannot be revisited by you.
Never say Never – Never say I Can’t! Winning this strategy is simple: one of the lessons I learned early on during my service as a United States Marine is this: Never say never – never say I can’t! Never, never, never, never… say never or I can’t. And more importantly, never answer a question that is asked of you. Answer the question that you wish had been asked of you and do it honestly. Quite frankly, it is my opinion that if leaders follow these two rules, they’ll find themselves in a pretty successful position and be able to sleep at night with a clear conscience. These rules offer a simple approach. These rules are very easy to follow.
You Can’t Beat a Man at his Own Game – Human Nature. Here’s one last quote from Robert S. McNamara: “We all make mistakes. We know we make mistakes. I don't know any military commander, who is honest, who would say he has not made a mistake. There's a wonderful phrase: 'the fog of war.' What 'the fog of war' means is: war is so complex it's beyond the ability of the human mind to comprehend all the variables. Our judgment, our understanding, is not adequate. And we kill people unnecessarily.” There’s an old adage that says “everything that’s gold don’t shine and people waiting in a long line do not constitute that they are waiting for something that is good.” Any military commander or business leader who is honest with him/herself, or with those they are speaking, will admit that he/she has made mistakes in the application of military power or in making sound business decisions. In order for leaders to win this strategy, human nature must be paid attention to at all times.
Here are a few things that can be achieved if to win the man at his own game:
Self-Serving Bias: We consistently think that we are better than we actually are. This can lead us into all kinds of traps that we will not be able to escape from. The key to avoiding this pitfall is to increase personal and situational awareness of strengths and weaknesses. Undergoing a behavioral assessment offers insight into your behavioral language and influences and provides an unfiltered view of the things that need improving overcoming the many things that hold up back from reaching our full potential.
Reliance on “Centers of Gravity:” The influence of others may not be as great as you think. Generally a “society” (family, employees, etc) changes more in response to how appealing the change is, rather than to the persuasiveness of a select few. Learn what motivates the people you’re concerned about and base your case on their interests. Most people will not champion an unfair system. If people believe they are being asked to do something they consider unfair, they will go to great lengths to avoid doing it. Pay close attention to what others believe is “fair” and you will keep people engaged and committed to the direction you want to take.
Behavior and PIAV Adds Up! Many people believe that behavior, personality, interests, attitude and value system are learned, most other people believe they are inbred. There’s probably a formula in there somewhere that combines all elements. What’s important is that people can learn new behaviors, gain a healthier attitude and adjust their values, which means they can change when and if they choose to do so. People operate in comfort zones. Sometimes those zones become “ruts” and we define ruts as “graves with the ends kicked out.” That means some people may figuratively die long before they’re ever buried. Because new behaviors, attitudes and value system adjustments can be learned, most people will give up an old way of doing something or take on a new, different belief, as long as there is some reward associated with an increase in pride, pleasure, peace of mind, or profit. Profit, in terms of money, is the most expensive way to work for change. Remember that the stake in the game doesn’t always have to be financial. Money may motivate, but it usually doesn’t satisfy for long and the effects are often short lived.
So, if you want to beat the man at his own game, use a compelling story to create inspiration for yourself and others. Let the people who are influenced by your leadership and actions have some say in how the story is going to be told and how the legacy is going to be lived after you are gone. Give them tools to work with. Give them feedback on how they’re doing. And, finally, pay attention to human nature. “We need more understanding of human nature; because the only real danger that exists is man himself...We know nothing of man, far too little. His psyche should be studied because we are the origin of all coming evil.” – Carl Jung, BBC interview, 1959.
Summation
The final lesson as we close this article is that leaders don’t just become prisoners of their perceived success. They also become prisoners of their errors. This article uses a strong military theme to outline the effects of unsuccessful organizational behavioral influences within the business sphere known as the Fog of War; swaying public opinion across popular culture due to misinformation or ambiguous reporting of the facts. The Fog of War also presents the phenomena as a tragedy for the best, talented and the brightest. These individuals simply follow as logic and common sense are both compromised. And, however independent they may have started off, soon these leaders fall victim as owners of an error they cannot admit to – the image starring at them in their reflection in mirror, who by the way is speaking the truth (mirrors don’t lie). This is by no means to suggest that leaders are not capable of being truthful about their mistakes and errors. It does suggest that the Devil’s Paint Brush makes it hard to do so. It is actually quite impressive that McNamara ever did, even years later and in a fairly limited way (admit his errors). But, although late, his account offers a learning tool for the rest of us.
Enhancing leadership decisions with independent executive judgment is a worthy aim. The life of so many leaders suggests that it is easier wished for than achieved. Avoid the Devil’s Paint Brush: the actions across any organizational body that causes immanent death over a period of time – and, a concept of battlefield or business uncertainty during a potential conflict – even when you refuse to see one headed in your direction.
Even in 2009, the beginning of the 21ST century, racism is still prevalent because of a lack of understanding and moral blindness; it has birthed many of society’s ills and significantly fails to appreciate the many differences in the biological and physical characteristics of individuals. It is a cause for wonder.
“Racism is conditioned by economic imperatives, but negotiated through culture: religion, literature, art, science and the media… Once, they demonized the blacks to justify slavery. Then they demonized the “colored” to justify colonialism. Today, they demonize asylum seekers to justify the ways of globalism. And, in the age of the media… demonization sets out the parameters of popular culture within which such exclusion finds its own rationale — usually under the guise of xenophobia, the fear of strangers.” – A Sivanandan, Extracted from Race & Class (Vol. 43, no. 2, October–December 2001).
Racism causes us to speak the four letter “F” word found in our daily language. It is the birthplace of discrimination, separation and segregation, byproducts of a racist mentality due to ignorance. It is a mechanism that allows a roaring emotional state due to remembrance and the verbal expression that commonly articulates surprise, shock and anger when it shows its ugly face. It doesn’t matter the lens that racism is looked through, how it’s filtered to shed reason for its cause or who is right because of circumstance, racism, or its perceived behavioral influence and re-action causes behaviors that are against the values that humanity is designed. And, the convicted parties on all sides demonstrate that all too familiar four letter “F” word that expresses the emotion that everyone has experienced at one time or another in their life – FEAR!
Racism and fear are synonymousof one another, both causing people to feel anxious or apprehensive about a possible or probable situation, circumstance or event. They are used to introduce unpleasant statements or emotions experienced in anticipation of some specific pain, danger and uneasy or apprehensive concern (usually accompanied by a desire to flee or fight). The fear is due to the conviction that the members of one specific group are inherently superior to the members of other groups. This conviction is often manifested by discriminatory behaviors and practices towards the members of the supposed inferior groups.
Now that the lessons for racism have been defined, let’s talk of ways to overcome the fears that ultimately lead to the sword of demise. Yes, the word sword is used because it is often seen as an instrument of death and destruction. But, since we are focusing on bringing a resolution to the forefront of the issues that stem from racism and fear, we can learn from one of the greatest swords in the world, carried by men and women of one of the very best organizations that produces the top leaders on the globe – a premium grade Mameluke Sword and the United States Marine Corps.
Just like our U.S. Marines who always seek improvement, the Mameluke Sword is symbolic of excellence. The blade is already beautifully prepared; the craftsmanship is refined and etched to perfection. When presented to a U.S. Marine Corps officer, the sword consists of absolutely superb castings (the drag on scabbard and the acorns on the hilt) and carries with it a tradition that lives on almost as a mythical legend. The sword represents a certified metaphor of performance, now enlisted to the men and women who are “expected” to perform as the best the world has to offer. To some, the U.S. Marine Corps offers imagery of an organization led by old military commanders seeking to wage battle. This remains largely dubious, especially in today’s increasingly complex, networked world. Rather, they are leaders – men and women, young and old – of all races and endeavors who seek to better themselves and others each day of their life. They love to win, yet they think beyond themselves. They love to compete, yet they show compassion for their fellow human beings. And, they see no race, yet each individual is seen as crossing the right of passage – the rigors, disciplines, decisions, pains and defeats – of becoming the leader who has earned the title “United States Marine.”
A Marine and his/her sword regard with feelings of respect and reverence; consider hallowed or exalted and they are in awe of their own will to win through the efforts of others. They marvel at genius, a feeling of profound respect for someone or the mission they are assigned to accomplish. They too fear that which is not understood, but they carry with them a culture of honor, respect, tradition, resilience, excellence and perfection in performance that overcomes the actual fear that they face. This form of reverence overcomes the destruction that opposes harmony or community, the enslaved misunderstood mindsets that keeps division.
So, why do we fear what is not understood? One wonders. You may recall that as a very young child, you were usually free from fear. You may be swinging at the playground, racing your buddy to see who could go the highest and ready to jump, or about to fuse a firecracker – you aren’t scared and the unknown for the immediate future is also not understood. Can we call it something other than fear, such as bravery? Absolutely not; being unaware of the misunderstood is a means to grasp the opportunity for further education – one that is freed from fear. So, at this very early stage in life, children are guided by their parents, guardians and well-wishers in ways that teaches them to conqueror their fears, only in some cases, fears are placed within them that they do not own – racism. It is at this early stage and time that adults must carry the Mameluke Sword and teach the perfections that will etch the superb castings of our future – the children. And, prepare them through teachings of the Lord: “to love thy neighbor as you would want them to love you.”
We must get back to the basics and principles that have been afforded us by the men and women who have laid the foundations of a great race – humanity – which is unique. Each individual regardless of race or gender is special in a way that teaches others to become a better quality and quantity to life. Most importantly, we must teach our children (and adults who act as children even when they are greatly respected) that humans actually have more in common than not. Even science agrees to this point and it is supported by the Bible. Acts 17:26 (King James Version) declares, “And hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation.” This makes us know that all mankind has the same origin, indeed we are one race of human beings. The diversity and uniqueness of both people and nations are manifestations of God’s awesome creativity and power.
But, the battle wages on in us all, regardless of how one feels. The moral blindness of racism fails to appreciate that the differences that we all offer to one another. Do we ever spare a thought about how a child would cope with the unknown or misunderstood? At a time where the United States of America has come together, in the majority – all races and both genders – to elect the first African American President, we still have stories in the media that instructs to our children that we have not grown up to lead by example. It is here that we forget that the child (and again, the adult who acts and speaks as a child) must be taught to deal with and overcome the bullies of life – racism and fear.
We must teach them to carry their own swords as a metaphor of performance. To become the leaders – men and women, young and old – of all races and endeavors, who seek to better themselves and others each day of their life. They must be taught to love to win, yet they think beyond themselves. They must be taught to love to compete, yet show compassion for their fellow human beings. And, they must be taught to see no race, yet “understand” that each individual is seen as special with something to teach and offer to the world.
This my friends is the only way to journey the right of passage – the rigors, disciplines, decisions, pains and defeats – of becoming the people who have truly earned the right to wear the title, a “LEADER.”
The power in this program stems from using the Laws of Performance Management combined with the military strategies from the United States Marine Corps. The Laws of Performance Management does not offer a rule or code to follow, but distinguishes the moving parts at work behind defining a process for setting goals and regularly checking progress toward achieving the desired outcomes and effects as observable phenomenon. A law is invariable, a system of rules usually enforced through a process and by institutions. It shapes politics, economics and society in numerous ways and serves as a primary social mediator in relations between people – whether you believe that the military does more than just fight wars or not doesn’t lessen its effect on you.
The greatest advances in history have come at times of uncertainty and economic despair that called for applying newly discovered laws and strategies. Think of Sir Isaac Newton’s laws of motion. They describe the relationship between the forces acting on a body to the motion of the body. When applied in a business context, they become powerful and predictive. When the Laws of Performance Management combined with the U.S. Marine Corps stratagem are applied, performance and leadership transforms to a higher level of understanding and purpose far beyond what most people think is possible. It does not occur in small subsets, but all at once, as individuals and organizations rewrite their Future Picture.
The opening segment of the program, the “Executive Education” overview, takes the stratagem one at a time, introduces and examines “The Six Levels of Leadership” and demonstrates how to apply them. You’ll pinpoint the effects of applying an “adaptive” leadership style through an interactive session and how to jettison what’s holding you back; create a future for yourself and your organization beyond what’s predictably going to happen. Along the way, you’ll likely see and transform much of what is holding you back (behaviors and values), both personally and professionally.
Through the journey of the opening segment, we’ll show how “The Six Levels of Leadership” will hold true, in any circumstance individuals and organizations may face – they are universal principles that will win at any time and in any scenario type. We’ll see the result of understanding and applying them – dramatic elevations in performance that can be used to lead you out of a downturn and re-orient the minds of staff and employees toward a positive vision of the future.
The second part, “Charting-off: Leadership Levels 1 & 2,” is about the personal face of leadership. This session shows how you can apply the stratagem – and in the process expand your own leadership. Charting-off is about taking the long walk down the short path to increase your level of Personal Proficiency and provides some guidance on how to take these new ideas out into your world. Charting-off establishes your Leadership Signature and increases your level of Emotional Intelligence – clarifying and critiquing the attributes of emerging and adaptive leadership. It looks at leadership in light of the Laws of Performance Management.
This segment identifies key leadership behaviors and value propositions, and how to apply them in and across organizational environments and workplaces. We also look at the new frontier of organizational behavior: working effectively in the emerging and developing world, creating sustainability in communities and generating the expansion of wealth (both material and in the well-being of people). This segment is intended for people interested in becoming an agent of change, raising their levels of individual and professional leadership.
The third part, “Plotting the Course: Leadership Levels 3 & 4,” helps you with understanding how-to experience a “Breakthrough” to begin your “Break-with” and increases your level of leadership, performance and execution all with the same amount of energy. We’ll visit national and international organizations through third party white papers, looking into diverse industries such as aerospace, energy, construction, and technology. We’ll even make stops at top U.S. conglomerates, the Wharton School of Business, Harvard Business School, Darden School of Business and other institutions.
The fourth part, “Raising the Sails: Leadership Level 5,” helps you with learning to lead teams into qualitative team building maneuvers that prevails over the challenge of change at a time that change is definitely required in most organizations. It explores expansive influence, leadership multiplication and cohesiveness.
The fifth part, “Into the Wind: Leadership Level 6,” helps you with learning to employ organizational strategic execution tactics (The OrgSx Paradigm) that permeates enduring greatness through a paradoxical blend of personal humility and professional will – and the disciplines of “strategic agility and flawless execution (debriefing) with a modest approach and an unwavering commitment to higher standards – individually and organizationally.
“The Six Levels of Leadership” is the stimulus to initiate and maintain the behavioral and emotional relationships necessary to develop the leadership traits needed to successfully contest rapid change: an interactive investigation that takes you on a journey to increase Personal Proficiency that leads to greater levels of Professional Mastery and respect. You’ll learn from one of our Master Facilitators how to lead at both the head and heart levels – from any position within your organization.
Based on the content of nationally-acclaimed leadership and team building expert, facilitator, and author Damian D. “Skipper” Pitts, the Six Levels equips you with the tools and knowledge to become the leader “you,” “your team” and “your organization” requires: The LeaderShaped Leader! Additionally, with the daunting outlook and uncertainties in the current economic climate, participants are able to examine the newest features of the program, “Success TRAPS: Understanding How-to Answer the Four Questions to Heal the Pains and Strengthen your Future Picture.” This segment works to help participants understand: Why am I hurting? What is it about “me” that influences the hurt? How do I prevent re-injury – although I know that it will be re-visited? And, how do I change my circumstances, current and future?
With a dedicated perspective, participants are able to navigate through various steps to ensure they follow the right path for the greatest benefit. Learning to transform into a LeaderShaped Leader, you’ll be able to transition top leadership, project management, execution and team building performance – all encompassed within the stratagem – the Laws of Performance Management combined with the military strategies from the United States Marine Corps. This program delivers the required skills so that you can execute and more effectively communicate to gain more retention from the people influenced by your leadership.
This program is not an academic study, although its conclusions draw on well-established lines of research. Our intent is to introduce these principles and illustrate how their application can enhance performance. The examples almost all come from cases in which we and our colleagues have been personally involved – and in some cases, from third party relationships such as Booz & Company, Bersin and Associates and others in the field of leadership, strategic execution, team building and performance research. We’ve been there, seen it and now we want to share it. In attending this program and reading the materials, journals and publications – and applying the stratagem – you’ll do more than find fixes to your problems and challenges. You’ll find the power to rewrite your future.
For additional information, please contact: Toll Free: (877) 838-3753
While sitting at a local coffee shop enjoying the company of two business colleagues, a significant question was posed that caused time to stop for a brief moment: “Skipper, how does your organization measure leadership ROI in plain language for an executive to understand when considering hiring your team?”
Wow I thought… do I answer in my normal corporate language and attempt to impress upon that we really are good at what we do? Or, maybe I throw around a few $20 words and some leadership jargon to sound important. Either way, I must answer the question with an assumed definition as to demonstrate that I am actually seasoned to field the question with an absolute and unquestionable resolve. “I don’t know…I’ve never actually had anyone ask that question before now,” I replied. What a moment of agony while sitting at the table with two very successful and respected businessmen with polished academic backgrounds, including a mid 1980’s graduate of the Wharton School of Business, both retired and now successfully working on their next ventures. The pressure of just wanting to receive an endorsement from either of them to a colleague of theirs in hopes of that person is willing to accept a meeting from me to present our perfected elevator pitch: “this is why you should use us.”
The remainder of the evening and much of the next day, I researched why and how to answer the question in the future. With the many uncertainties in the “NOW” real-world that business is forced to coexist, this is a question that will most likely show its face again and again. “I must be better prepared to answer it with profound implications that will impress upon our experiential learning from the participants in our past session,” I thought. But, the real skinny on this new found dilemma that I am faced with is this: I too must “again” reinvest in my own development and learning.
It is my hopes that this article can help others who might be sitting at a similar table having coffee in the same dilemma. In my research and looking at Scott Saslow’s writings, the Executive Director of The Institute of Executive Development, a significant high number of people “Rarely” or “Never” calculate the ROI on executive development (take a look at the table below, from market study Leadership Development: Challenges & Best Practices).
Although there are several factors that lead to reasons for tracking the impact of executive development leadership and team building programs such as those delivered from our team, it is very important to do so in plain language for others to grasp the concept of the programs intention. In answering the question for our programs, I am not only looking to monitor the impact, I am also interested in expressing a thorough examination of developmental activity along with the benefits and cost to deploy across the entire organizational environment.
According to Saslow, “conventional wisdom on any corporate spending, executive development investments need to be fully understood and ranked against other company projects to ensure proper allocation of scarce organizational resources.” This is so true in the current economic climate. No organization can take a leap of faith to engage any form of human capital training without knowing that their current needs are being met and pains are being cared for.
There are a few factors that drive the need to track program and developmental investments:
- Increased accountability for all functional areas within the organization, driven by initiatives such as “Balanced Scorecard, Six Sigma, et al” and other process improvement programs. In areas such as training and development, which are known to produce a mix of tangible and intangible benefits, there is an increased desire by senior management to measure performance management outcomes and desired effects.
- Increased awareness by both executive management as well as HRD professionals on the availability of tools and techniques to quantify impact of executive development programs.
- A visible increase in Human Resource Development (HRD) professionals who view their departments as stand-alone business units/revenue centers and are utilizing department profit and loss statements as one measure of performance. Increasingly, professionals from non-HR departments have figured out the many benefits of joining HR teams to bring “bottom-line” perspective to human capital investments.
The following ¹information explains the results from the question relating to organizations that attempt to calculate ROI on executive development:
10% – Always: Each program is evaluated independently,
7% – Frequently: Most of our programs are evaluated,
15% – Sometimes: As appropriate, we will evaluate some of our programs,
21% – Rarely: Only a small number of programs are evaluated, and
46% – Never: We never measure ROI for leadership development.
Business Benefits and ROI Assumptions for The Process of LeaderShaping Executive Education Leadership and Organizational Behavior Program
The business world has quickly realized that their very best people, leaders and organizational specialists, are their greatest asset. Taking that potential and developing it is highly desirable. The Process of LeaderShaping, a transformational leadership and organizational behavior program that focuses on team building and strategic execution, is the stimulus to initiate and maintain the behavioral and emotional relationships necessary to develop leadership traits at every level of an organization.
With a dedicated perspective, participants are able to navigate through various steps, six phases/stages, to ensure they follow the right path for the greatest individual benefit – achieve Personal Proficiency – while attaining a greater level of Professional Mastery (ROI in the form of individual growth).
LeaderShaping transforms top leaders to be more effective in their communication and more strategic in their execution. Regardless of circumstance, LeaderShaping takes every participant on their very own personal journey to explore their inner “self” while influencing others to find their voice. The journey explores the following six developmental stages:
Stage 1 is the “Recruit, the good-to-great highly capable individual who makes productive contributions through talent, knowledge, skills and good work habits. This individual is the one person in the environment that understands ‘people first, then the organization;’ hence, the development and achievement of the desired effects within the expected Future Picture.”
Stage 2 is the Experienced Manager “who is working to establish his/her ‘Leadership Signature’ to integrate their newly found skills to the achievement of team and organizational objectives (mission) and work effectively with others in a team-led environment. The Experienced Manager begins his/her growth by learning the constructs in the Memorandum of Understanding to find a voice; then, influences others to find theirs.”
Stage 3 is the competent Fleet Leader who “understands the criticality of employing organizational behavior across environments – organizes people and resources to develop an effective strategy forward using the critical Centers of Gravity to achieve the desired effects.”
Stage 4 is an effective Breakthrough Executor who “outlines the specific cognitive abilities that will be sought and cultivated by other leaders in the years ahead using the Five Minds for the Future: the disciplined mind, the synthesizing mind, the creating mind, the respectful mind, and the ethical mind; the leader who remains committed to a vigorous pursuit of a clear and compelling vision, stimulating higher performance standards using team maneuvers."
Stage 5 is the Team/Project Leader who “employs the highest standards of customer service by achieving the five disciplines of greatness – these are the leaders who understand maneuver warfare and the disciplines within a Five Paragraph Order: SMEAC. They know an extraordinary organization is one that is driven by extraordinary people who make a distinctive impact and deliver superior performance over a long period of time – as a team unit.”
Stage 6 is the LeaderShaped Leader “who employs organizational strategic execution tactics (The OrgSx Paradigm) to permeate enduring greatness through a paradoxical blend of personal humility and professional will. All successful organizations have a single component in common; they have a strategic-executor at the helm who knows the disciplines of ‘strategic agility’ and ‘flawless execution.’ These leaders are described as being tactical in their approach, ferocious and fearless, yet modest with an unwavering commitment to high standards.” This is the leader who knows how to win!
LeaderShaping helps people to consider key talent management processes that drive high levels of business impact:
Performance Management
• Coaching and development drives much greater value than appraisal.
• Goal setting and goal-alignment drive high levels of impact.
Competency Analyses
• Skills-based workforce planning and critical job analysis is imperative to succeed.
• Competency management is a foundational process to make talent management work.
Assessments & Recruiting
• Assessment metrics and recruiting are key strategies and replace decentralized recruiting.
• Internal sourcing tools drive greater value than improvements in external sourcing.
Learning & Development
• Alignment with talent gaps is biggest area of impact.
• Tremendous growth in career development programs.
Based on interviews from our executive education program participants at Temple University since 2007, these four key elements were identified, which positively had an impact on the participants and their organizations upon returning to their respective workplaces. Nonetheless, the environment (culture and organizational behavior) and the organization's processes received the greatest impact with staggering results.
Regardless of ROI, it is important to understand that no matter what measures are placed on the program itself, or what name the initiative goes under (team-based improvement effort, continuous improvement, total quality management, lean manufacturing, Human Sigma, or self-directed work teams) you must strive to improve results for internal and external customers. Few organizations and leaders, however, are totally pleased with the results their team improvement efforts produce because of the limited shelf life and excitement the program itself warrants upon completion (how often are the materials from the visiting program “never” shared with others and, in most cases, only become a part of the office library never to be looked at again?).
Here are a few things to consider when measuring if a program drives positive impact that is poised for the ROI you are seeking. The “twelve Cs for effective unit development,” (let’s get it straight, the only reason to engage a specific program is to institutionalize its effects across every level of the organization) offers successful maneuvers that develop effective, focused impacts that require attention to detail in the following areas.
It is important to think about the many questions posed to ensure the appropriate discussions are stimulating directional flow towards the organization’s success – if to measure ROI appropriately:
1. Clear Expectations: Has executive leadership (to be successful, there must be buy-in from the top) clearly communicated its expectations for the team’s performance and expected outcomes? Do team members understand why the team was created? Is the organization demonstrating consistency of purpose in supporting the team with resources of people, time and money? Does the work of the team receive sufficient emphasis as a priority in terms of the time, discussion, attention and interest directed its way by executive leaders?
2. Context: Do team members understand why they are participating on the team? Do they understand how the strategy of using teams will help the organization attain its communicated business goals? Can team members define their team’s importance to the accomplishment of goal orientation? Does the team understand where its work fits in the total context of the organization’s goals, principles, posture, vision, organizational behavior and values?
3. Commitment: Do team members want to participate on the team? Do team members feel the team mission is important? Are members committed to accomplishing the team mission and expected outcomes? Do team members perceive their service as valuable to the organization and to their own careers – is there a “win-win?” Do team members anticipate recognition for their contributions? Do team members expect their skills to grow and develop on the team? Are team members excited and challenged by the team opportunity?
4. Competence: Does the team feel that it has the appropriate people participating? (As an example, in a process improvement initiative, is each step of the process represented on the team?) Does the team feel that its members have the knowledge, skill and capability to address the issues for which the team was formed? If not, does the team have access to the help it needs? Does the team feel it has the resources, strategies and support needed to accomplish its mission/objectives and future picture?
5. Contract: Has the team taken its assigned area of responsibility and designed its own mission, vision, posture statement, Memorandum of Understanding and strategic intent to accomplish the mission. Has the team defined and communicated its goals; its anticipated outcomes and contributions; its timelines; and how it will measure both the outcomes of its work and the process the team followed to accomplish their task? Does the leadership team or other coordinating group support what the team has designed?
6. Command and Control: This can be defined as the exercise of authority and direction by a properly designated team leader or members on a team over assigned and attached resources in the accomplishment of the organization’s mission. That being said, does the team have enough freedom and empowerment to feel the ownership necessary to accomplish its contract? At the same time, do team members clearly understand their boundaries? How far may members go in pursuit of solutions? Are limitations (i.e. monetary and time resources) defined at the beginning of a project before the team experiences barriers and rework? Is the team’s reporting relationship and accountability understood by all members of the organization? Has the organization defined the team’s authority? To make recommendations? To implement its plan? Is there a defined review process so both the team and the organization are consistently aligned in direction and purpose? Do team members hold each other accountable for project timelines, commitments and results? Does the organization have a plan to increase opportunities for self-management among organization members?
7. Collaboration (Coalition of Forces): Does the team understand team and group process? Do members understand the stages of group development? Are team members working together effectively interpersonally? Do all team members understand the roles and responsibilities of team members (Concept of the “Bus”)? Team leaders? Can the team approach problem solving, process improvement, goal setting and measurement jointly? Do team members cooperate to accomplish the team contract? Has the team established group norms or rules of conduct in areas such as LeaderShaping, conflict resolution, consensus decision making and meeting management? Is the team using an appropriate strategy to accomplish its action plan?
8. Communication: Are team members clear about the priority of their tasks? Is there an established method for the teams to give feedback and receive honest performance feedback? Does the organization provide important business information regularly? Do the teams understand the complete context for their existence? Do team members communicate clearly and honestly with each other? Do team members bring diverse opinions to the table? Are necessary conflicts raised and addressed? Do team members understand that conflict is necessary for lessons learned?
9. Creative Innovation: Is the organization really interested in change? Does it understand the contextual implications for the change? Does it value creative thinking, transformational thinking, unique solutions and new ideation? Does it reward people who take reasonable risks to make improvements? Or does it reward the people who fit in and maintain the status quo? Does it provide the training, education, access to publications and textual resources, performance management assessments and infield trips necessary to stimulate new thinking?
10. Consequences: Do team members feel responsible and accountable for team achievements? Do team members feel responsible and accountable for other team members? Are rewards and recognition supplied when teams are successful? Not successful? Is reasonable risk respected and encouraged in the organization? Do team members fear reprisal? Do team members spend their time finger pointing rather than resolving problems during the necessary Debrief sessions? Is the organization designing reward systems that recognize both team and individual performance and organizational behavior? Is the organization planning to share gains and increased profitability with team and individual contributors? Do team members feel responsible and accountable for team and individual strategic execution tactics? Can contributors see their impact on increased organization success?
11. Coordination: Are teams coordinated by a central leadership team that assists the groups to obtain what they need for success? Are teams coordinated by a designated “Red Team,” one who works to employ contingency script that assists the team with working out problems and challenges as a precursor to engaging the mission? Have priorities and resource allocation been planned across departments? Have the proper configurations or reconfigurations been made and planned for across departments? Do teams understand the concept of the internal customer – the next process, anyone to whom they provide a product or a service? Are cross-functional and multi-department teams common and working together effectively and efficiently? Is the organization developing a customer-focused process-centric orientation and moving away from traditional departmental thinking?
12. Cultural Change – Collective Behaviors: Does the organization recognize that the team-based, collaborative, empowering, enabling organizational culture of the future is different than the traditional, hierarchical organization it may currently be? Is the team a networked unit or hierarchical one? Is the organization planning to or in the process of changing how it rewards, recognizes, appraises, hires, develops, plans with, motivates and manages the people it employs? Does the organization plan to use failures for learning and support reasonable risk? Does the organization recognize that the more it can change its climate to support teams, the more it will receive in pay back (ROI) from the work of the teams?
Spend some serious time, while applying a significant amount of "attention to detail" on each of these “twelve Cs for effective unit development” to ensure your work teams contribute most effectively to your business success after completing an executive education program. In a position of leadership, your team members will respond favorably, your business will soar to new heights and empowered people will “own” and be responsible for their work processes. Everyone will find his/her voice – this is ROI that permeates enduring freedoms (breakthroughs) and successful outcomes that lasts.
Can you ask for anything better in the workplace than what is proposed here? There's a table of critical information to support this segment of the article that you can request by email at Solutions@thebisongroup.com (In your headline, remember to include the title of the article and request the "best practices" table).
The table outlines “best practices” in measuring and maximizing ROI in executive education and development programs like The Process of LeaderShaping. No more will I have to agonize on the original question posed that sparked me writing this article. The factors that drive positive impact & ROI for executive style leadership programs lie in the hands of the participants going through it and their response to the instruction upon entering back into the workplace.
So, measuring ROI begins in the decision and selection process of the individuals chosen to attend. Everything else is a culmination of everyone doing their part to ensure successful outcomes within the desired effects in the end.
Scott Saslow is the Executive Director of The Institute of Executive Development, a company that delivers a unique service to executive development professionals by providing an unbiased source of information on the best practices and innovative ideas in executive development. Clients of The Institute include professionals from global companies who manage their organization’s executive development programs, as well as recognized experts who advise, publish, and speak on industry topics. The Institute is the largest in its field and most dynamic in terms of its services. There are currently over 4,000 individuals from 85 countries who use the Institute. As head of the organization, Mr. Saslow is responsible for all strategy and operations. Mr. Saslow also manages the design and delivery of multiple market studies in executive development such as “Transforming Corporate Leadership: Best Practices in Executive Education” and “Leadership Development in European Organizations.” In all, Mr. Saslow has authored over 15 articles and in-depth research reports on the field of executive development for publications such as CLO Magazine, Strategic HR Review, Leadership in Action, and ASTD’s Leadership/OD Newsletter.
An attempt to perceive what things really are, not how they appear to be, and to discern how things really work, not how they appear to work – a comprehensive overview on the differences in “leadership,” “management” and “LeaderShaping” – and why LeaderShaping matters today.
3.Further Reading – Experiential Learning
Learn to deal with the “absolute” brutal facts about your current leadership realities, while maintaining the faith that you’ll win your goals to prevail and succeed. With consistent effort, your ability to experience the breakthrough you are seeking will happen and – BANG! You realize that you are becoming LeaderShaped to flawlessly and strategically execute to reach your breakout point.
THE IDEA IN BRIEF
Organizational Behavior (OB): Emerging Realities that Transforms the Workplace. This paper presents an overview of the Bison Group’s executive education program on the theories and practices of organizational behavior and the techniques of applied management – Defining a Refreshed and Irreplaceable Type of Organizational Leadership: The LeaderShaped Leader.
This course focuses on individual and team behavior (leadership development, accountability, a contextual blend of the paradoxical combination of deep personal humility that achieves Personal Proficiency with an intense will to achieve Professional Mastery) in life and in organizations.
Taking a passive approach to influencing peak performance will most likely lead to exasperating results that you will regret later in life. LeaderShaping continues the trailblazing innovations that make other studies that develop healthy workplace cultures less appetizing. Integrating the strategies, practices, tactics and principles of the United States Marine Corps, discussions of traditional behavioral theories, organizational dynamics, current trends and transformative directions to develop the archetype for a solid Future Picture offers new “OB” realities and knowledge that everyone needs in and around organizational environments.
Acclaimed for its readability and presentation of current knowledge, the course’s philosophy is that OB and strategic-execution knowledge is a “must” for everyone, not just traditional leaders. The Process of LeaderShaping is unparalleled in its ability to engage participants by bringing cutting edge military-style battlefield concepts closer to reality through the “OODA Loop” approach: Observe, orient, decide and act – it has become an important concept in both business and military strategy. This military strategy, when applied to the concepts in LeaderShaping, allow participants to connect OB theories to emerging workplace realities (the developers of this concept emphasized that “the loop” is actually a set of interactive spheres that are to be kept in continuous movement during combat; hence, the phase of any competitive engagement has an important bearing on the ideal allocation of one’s energies).
Accordingly, decision-making occurs in a recurring cycle of observe-orient-decide-act. An entity (whether an individual, a team or an organization) that can process this cycle quickly, observing and reacting to unfolding events more rapidly than an opponent, can thereby “get inside” the opponent’s decision cycle and gain the advantage. LeaderShaping’s use of this strategy provides a much deeper, richer, and more comprehensive “set of lenses” to glean instruction from OB best practices. The Bison Group’s interpretation explains how to direct one’s energies to separate emotionally from constructive conflict, defeat an adversary and survive – both in business and in life.
What is LeaderShaping and WHY should it matter?
A synonym for “Fearlessness,” LeaderShaping provides the cultural influences and the collective behaviors used for facing the reality of your current situation, to recognize what you can actually achieve given the powerful organizational and relationship dynamics without thinking that you cannot actually achieve success through your own will, and become more powerful than you are.
And then, at the same time, while moving equal amounts of energy from the depths of your character, you decide who you want to be, so that you can stand firm on personal conviction and the practices of life that you believe most deeply in so as to accept criticism and achieve greatness. This is the beginning stage within an expected healthy debate about the nature and effectiveness of employing transformational thinking and change across organizations that is seeking to achieve a well planned Future Picture for generations to follow.
Simplified: LeaderShaping is the stimulus that moves a decision into reality and away from a state of fearlessness by increasing two very different perspectives in a person’s life – “Personal Proficiency” and “Professional Mastery!” LeaderShaping works to provide summary answers to key questions about why it is important for people to accept change using transformational thinking: What is it? How is it applied? Why is it critical to my current circumstance? How will it help me to respond to problems and challenges? Can it help me with influencing positive change within my point of view? How does it help me to respond to the pace of my changing environment? How does it help me to respond to rules and procedures set by others? (Personal Proficiency)
As it relates external organizational relationships, LeaderShaping prepares your voice to be heard in answering these key questions: Where does your organization want to be in the future? What will the organization apply its resources against to achieve its Future Picture? How will the organization apply those resources? When and under what conditions will the organization exit from its current strategic plan? (Professional Mastery)
LeaderShaping provides a performance DNA using the Bison Group’s Breakthrough TTI Performance DNA™ LeaderShaping instruments that is designed to increase the understanding of an individual's talents. The instruments provide insight into three distinctive areas: Behaviors, motivators, and competencies. Understanding strengths and weaknesses, “Strength Finders,” in each of the three areas, the user is led into an achieved level of personal and professional development along with a higher level of satisfaction.
The Prerequisites
A willingness to achieve a successful life, business, organization, team and future by learning to apply the skills and acumen “not” previously used in order to get greater returns on your behavioral deposits and withdrawals, and human capital investments.
THE IDEA IN PRACTICE
“Personal Proficiency + Professional Mastery = A LeaderShaped Leader”
How do ordinary people manifest humility to achieve significant Personal Proficiencies that deliver extraordinary results? They remain on a continuum for learning to achieve greatness, become an agent of change through positive organizational behaviors and establish a leadership signature that links their leadership to their legacy.
Most importantly, when the unexpected happens and the results are less than expected, they carry the pains and burdens upon their shoulders without blame to others – relying on a Memorandum of Understanding – the collective behaviors and cultural influences from the trusted people, their teams, within their employ.
A Memorandum of Understanding, the inspired standards and code of conduct, demonstrate the LeaderShaped Leaders’ unwavering will and drive. Intolerant of mediocrity and failure, they are determined to do whatever must be done to produce extraordinary results – terminating everything that has the potential to get in their way. And, they develop others to successfully complete succession planning to ensure that the torch can be carried by competent men and women into the future.
Can you become a LeaderShaped Leader?
The LeaderShaped Leader sits atop a hierarchy of six significant leadership and organizational behavior stages – and possesses the skills of all six. Individuals without these skills have gaps in their understanding of producing exceptional leadership for the 21st century and beyond. Gone are the days of good and great; the future requires exceptional and extraordinary. With these six skill sets, leaders are able to perform in ways that leaves others amazed because of their ability to make it look so easy, yet effective.
The LeaderShaped Leader
Perhaps the most important component in the transition from ordinary to extraordinary is what our faculty calls, the “Process of LeaderShaping: the ‘intellectual and emotional thought space’ for value creation.”
§Stage 1 is the “Recruit, the good-to-great highly capable individual who makes productive contributions through talent, knowledge, skills and good work habits. This individual is the one person in the environment that understands ‘people first, then the organization;’ hence, the development and achievement of the desired effects within the expected Future Picture.”
§Stage 2 is the Experienced Manager “who is working to establish his/her ‘Leadership Signature’ to integrate their newly found skills to the achievement of team and organizational objectives (mission) and work effectively with others in a team-led environment. The Experienced Manager begins his/her growth by learning the constructs in the Memorandum of Understanding to find a voice; then, influences others to find theirs.”
§Stage 3 is the competent Fleet Leader who “understands the criticality of employing organizational behavior across environments – organizes people and resources to develop an effective strategy forward using the critical Centers of Gravity to achieve the desired effects.”
§Stage 4 is an effective Breakthrough Executor who “outlines the specific cognitive abilities that will be sought and cultivated by other leaders in the years ahead using the Five Minds for the Future: the disciplined mind, the synthesizing mind, the creating mind, the respectful mind, and the ethical mind; the leader who remains committed to a vigorous pursuit of a clear and compelling vision, stimulating higher performance standards using team maneuvers."
§Stage 5 is the Team/Project Leader who “employs the highest standards of customer service by achieving the five disciplines of greatness – these are the leaders who understand maneuver warfare and the disciplines within a Five Paragraph Order: SMEAC. They know an extraordinary organization is one that is driven by extraordinary people who make a distinctive impact and deliver superior performance over a long period of time – as a team unit.”
§Stage 6 is the LeaderShaped Leader “who employs organizational strategic execution tactics (The OrgSx Paradigm) to permeate enduring greatness through a paradoxical blend of personal humility and professional will. All successful organizations have a single component in common; they have a strategic-executor at the helm who knows the disciplines of ‘strategic agility’ and ‘flawless execution.’ These leaders are described as being tactical in their approach, ferocious and fearless, yet modest with an unwavering commitment to high standards.” This is the leader who knows how to win!
MAKING IT HAPPEN – LIVING THE WORK …Doing the STORY for the GLORY!
In this day and time, there are some people who are willing to have the glory before the story. Let me be the first to say that this is the wrong thinking that results terrible outcomes. Nothing in life, and certainly not in leadership, comes easy. Having the story before the glory prepares anyone for the tough road ahead and allows for the proper amount of “humility” along the way.
A question to ask yourself and those individuals who trust in your leadership is this: what do we do to prepare our people, our teams and our organizations for uncertainty – a plan for the future that exceeds everyone’s expectations? The answer is a complex, yet simple one; keep pace with today’s rapidly changing business environment by engaging and improving your emotional intelligence and organizational behavior skills to recognize, adopt and adapt generational expertise, to include concepts of team-building practices and high-performance perception and values that result realistic winning solutions into the future.
Are you ready to challenge yourself to a higher purpose of leadership?
Taking on a leadership role in today’s environment is like signing on for a constant race against change. You have to stay several steps ahead of the trends...strive to develop new strategies and keep ahead of the crowd. It’s up to you to ensure that your department or team is on track for success. And now you can achieve your leadership goals! Here is your opportunity to learn how to identify and manage the challenges you face with practical and proven-in-action techniques. The following information explains what it takes to become a “LeaderShaped Leader.” In-class exercises, coupled with updates on current research and performance management assessments, allow you to practice new ideas, military stratagem, gaming/simulation and to try out shared insights. In this highly interactive executive education program, participants will have the opportunity to learn from their team associates and peers as they stretch their leadership driven minds and methods for learning to assert their role upon return to their workplace, organization and home life.
LeaderShaping as a Philosophy
In general, philosophy is the search for sense, meaning, cause and principle using logical thinking and rigorous thought. Philosophy unearths foundations and stresses being and mechanisms, discerning what things are and how they work. It is an attempt to perceive what things really are, not how they appear to be, and to discern how things really work, not how they appear to work.
Philosophy seeks ultimate, irreducible truth.Philosophy claims to be able to make sense out of any human awareness or endeavor, however massive or minuscule. Perhaps we will find interesting things about the nature of investing in humanity. But how? The answer lies within the Process of LeaderShaping’s hierarchy of six significant leadership and organizational behavior stages.
As you think about how individuals are by nature, you quickly realize how selfish people really are. They consider their own actions first: How will this affect me? At the same time, we try to disguise our selfishness with an authentic portrayal of interests that ultimately show its true face that leads to problems. This brings us to the alpha and omega on influence. It is important to acknowledge an individual’s ability to get along well with others while achieving their cooperation and shared-vision for reaching mission objectives and assigned tasks.
Bydefining the differences between “leadership” and “management” (this is still, to some, confusing phenomena) as the prior and “LeaderShaping” as the ladder, we can identify noteworthy differences and commonalties, clarify what LeaderShaping includes that the other omits, and identify significantly fruitful ways that a marriage of the three can engender an interesting new concept or philosophy.
Leadership is frequently defined as the ability to exercise influence across a group or team of people with the expectations of meeting the mission objectives established for the future. The ability to exert such influence can derive formally from one’s position, office, title, function, control of resources, control of rewards and punishments, or role; or informally from one’s abilities, skills, experience, expertise, behavior, style, charisma, or charm. A given leader may have at his/her disposal either or both formal and informal sources of influence, but it remains his/her potential to manage them to decide just how successful they are as a leader. Regardless of the level of influence, a social relationship exists.
There are two forms of social relationships to consider; one with people and the other with the environment. So far, we’ve spoken about the people aspect, but the relationship with the environment, also known as “Social Learning Theory: the reciprocal relationships between behaviors and environments,” focuses in the area of “Organizational Behavior: the study and application of knowledge about how people, individuals, groups and teams act in organizations, while being influenced by others.” It does this by interpreting people/organizational relationships in terms of the whole person, whole group, whole team, whole organization, and whole social system. Its purpose is to build better relationships by achieving human objectives, organizational objectives, and social objectives. As you can see from the explanation above, the study of organization behavior encompasses a wide range of topics, such as human behavior, change, leadership and management, teams, execution and more.
It is important to be aware that leadership does not exist in a social vacuum, but rather is socially defined and determined in terms of one’s influence on others. Leadership only exists if there is someone to be led who accepts the leader’s influence in order to attain a goal, while management is all about managing process. Leadership, by its very nature, is an entity of influence through choice and changing environmental reality. As we think about popular culture and its belief for what leadership may be, the conclusion would bring most individuals to the conclusion (and not an assumption) that there is a greater state that achieves leadership itself. Leadership focuses on the long-term, but management places its focus on the short-term.
Leadership keeps its eye on the horizon, while management keeps its eye on the bottom-line. Leadership will tolerate failure or missteps as long as the direction provides instruction toward the goal for both the individual and the organization to learn from the failure or the lessons learned.
Failure, therefore, is viewed as a significant opportunity to learn – only when it is managed and turned into a precise process. It is therefore safe to say that when thinking about how individuals comprehend an ability to influence environments to become successful at meeting its objectives, it would be OK to acknowledge the current state of leadership does not fit into a single mold. There are six characteristics that provide a framework for people in leadership that helps them to achieve a state of understanding for its being. By gaining a thorough understanding for the framework’s place, the six characteristics define the leader’s intent and builds his/her level of trust with others – the framework is also the core discipline that increases credibility across the environments that leadership has a significant presence.
The six characteristics within the framework are known as the 6Cs: Consistency, Courage, Conviction, Commitment, Contrite, and Captivating.
1.Consistency. Leaders steadily act to influence greatness. They achieve all accomplishments through collaboration by fostering a warrior culture and the ultimate obligation of a winner rather than an uninspired drive that results significant under-achievement.
2.Courage (Challenge the Established Processes). Leaders must never run from doing what is right. They must be prepared to step out on faith, removing themselves outside of popular culture, while searching for the courage and understanding to win over failure. This characteristic is where the rainmakers reside.
3.Conviction. Leaders communicate their convictions boldly.
4.Commitment (Model the Way). Leaders understand that the only thing necessary for the triumph of greatness is for the chosen to fail at not trying! Allowing your walk to mirror your talk demonstrates by example “what” should be done and “how” it must be done to execute task and responsibilities strategically and flawlessly.
5.Contrite (Encourage and Inspire the Heart of a Winner). Leaders know when to be humble and willingly demonstrate ability for being flexible in their way of thinking, hence transformational thought. Be prepared to recognize, appreciate, and celebrate the contributions from all persons involved in the winning process.
6.Captivating (Inspire a Shared-Vision). Leaders are tactical in their ability to positively influence a journey within the community that helps the stakeholders to find their voices. Individuals must envision the future picture that includes a sense of vitality and creativity that appeal to the desires of all stakeholders who act and contribute to the realization of an established vision.
The characteristics that make-up this framework for leadership helps individuals to become the maverick conformists that stimulate a community’s ability to change its perspective to current reality, using best practices, when needed. As time matriculates as a changing paradigm, so does a vision and the expected outcomes within an environment of trust. And, as this happens, an individual in a position of leadership will assert or affirm positive influence that transfers an attitudinal approach for achieving excellence to others within their community. In doing so, recognition is achieved at all levels and places individuals on a continuum for future examination of proactive change.
Here are some other things about leadership for consideration. Leadership must reinforce the values of the mission outlined by positive organizational behavior. Because all actions are based on internal and often unexpressed motivation and behavior, leaders recognize that achieving buy-in from their associates is the way to success.
In contrast, management focuses exclusively on the actions and behaviors of their associates with little or no interest in the reasons behind those actions. One of the greatest attributes for effective leaders is that they are unafraid of looking vulnerable to their peers when they don’t have the answers that others are seeking. In the same light, some managers when they don’t have the answers to the information tend to place emotional distance between themselves and those seeking the information. Leaders will listen to the people around them, knowing that they may glean lessons from their peers.
Old school managers were known to talk at the people, thinking that they can not learn from people who may not be on their level. Leaders quickly and effectively learn to openly embrace diversity and multiculturalism, while managers might try to encourage traditionalism. Effective leaders inspire the heart of a winner, while a manager may focus exclusively on the mind of a player. Leaders will courageously embrace change if they feel that change is eminent for the system to experience growth.
Managers will have a difficult time overcoming resistance to change and might hold the reins tightly to preserve the status quo. Leaders inspire and develop emotional bonds to the mission at hand, but managers will tend to create compliance issues and stick closely to the status quo that might lead to a commanding perspective. Leaders create, inspire, and support ideation within their peer groups, while managers dictate based on the inflexible approach to leading.
Leadership, therefore, is crucial in creating exceptional performance. Leadership and management skills are complementary. Leadership combined with management creates synergistic opportunities and engage the mind, body, heart, and soul of the associates influenced by the actions of a winning team of great leadership qualities and positive influence. Leadership is the successful influence of management in human behavior in and away from the environment. Those chosen to lead lay foundational structure for the leaders they develop and influence to no longer just give words to lofty, ethical values; now they are required to walk the talk and deliver at high performance levels with significant implications for effective results.
Success into the future requires not only leaders who can manage, but managers who can lead systems, people, and environments into greatness, only now, at a much higher level. The people who are able to accept “command” as the exercise of authority and “control” as feedback about the effects of the action taken. This is the outcome and most significant difference from those who are LeaderShaped and the people who are not.
A discipline of leadership that works to develop an intense, custom learning experience used to understand leadership and management to increase the leadership ability – personally and professionally – in people seeking a better tomorrow means that a process must be endured. This is a process that helps individuals to drive fundamental change and to achieve communal commitment by applying a unified framework of understanding a significant body of knowledge – the body of knowledge that encapsulates leadership, management, organizational behavior, team building and strategic execution – hence, the essential and key disciplines in LeaderShaping!
In addition to what has been explained thus far, LeaderShaping too, inspires and encourages a shared-vision of making “deposits” and “withdrawals” that both profit individuals and organizations and creates winning attitudes within the race of change. There are several questions to consider here: how would one go about creating new paradigms to current reality and norms? How do you overcome resistance to change? A third issue to examine is the outcome of the Future Picture (a state that you intend to make happen as a successful platform for forward motion or an end-state). How do you stimulate change and own it as a requirement for transitioning your life, relationships, teams, or organizational development? The answer to these questions lie in your ability to comprehend the profound implications of both the social aspects in leadership and the centurion principles that each LeaderShaped Leader possesses: a rise throughout the ranks of leadership while demonstrating exceptional mental sharpness and discipline, and physical endurance to understand and deal with the strategic and tactical thought …and it all comes at a cost; “emotional restraint, sweat and sacrifice.”
The LeaderShaped Leader’s sword is his/her ability to outthink his enemy using a strategic and tactical philosophy and approach, touching the enemy first before anyone else in battle (the first to engage) to win them by leading from the front with strength, honor and unyielding integrity. The key is not to engage the enemy on their terrain, but to change their behaviors by engaging them prior to arriving to the battle – you win by changing the way they think by keeping them on the offensive with a well designed Battleplan.
An interesting state of affairs exists between leadership, management and LeaderShaping – people, both as followers and leaders themselves, and the complex dance along the way. To be an effective leader, an individual must possess certain qualities or certain sources of influence that other people do not possess. They seek to readily employ these qualities as credible resources to address various burning platforms before they flare up when required or needed.
In a sense then, a leader is someone who differs from all others. If leadership was easy, more people would be doing it and recruited for it. However, when you add the additional ingredients that are needed for the 21st century and beyond, LeaderShaping, the leader must perform a very difficult balancing act, to be like their followers, but also to behave differently than their followers. Expressing this balancing act in a somewhat different manner, a leader must be in front of followers, (no longer leading from the flanks, rear or middle) taking people from a an ordinary group to an extraordinary team, where they must want to journey or be influenced to go.
LeaderShaped Leaders must be able to do the following, much different from leaders:
1.Transform their way of thinking from simply thinking outside of the box; they must have the know-how to bury the box and be damn certain that the enemy cannot find the box and dig it up.
2.Understand that failure is the greatest teacher; “victory” instructs the simple, “failure” the wise; success teaches few lessons, but failure teaches many. Debrief for lessons learned and learn from them – the failures that is!
3.Know “how-to” use fresh ideas, hone them for efficient and effective integration, and model for reproduction using the ideas as the basis for modeling to learn, teach, and lead into the future: Instruct a shared-vision by influencing trust through balance; Demonstrate by example the benefits and features found in success; Experience the glory after executing process and procedure flawlessly; and Assess all areas of the environment to reshape and reconfigure process to ensure enduring success.
4.Understand the know-how for using the Seven “D’s” of Courage: (1) Desire: Become a champion of change; a major part of a solution; (2) Dream: Achieve a preferred future picture with just leaders; (3) Decisiveness: Recognize the process of trust, competence, and influence to encourage and inspire a journey to find your voice; (4) Dare: The courage to act outweighs the fear to not! (5) Dedication: Remain committed to fulfill the responsibility within a call; (6) Direction: Achieve a clear plan of influenced and proactive change; and (7) Dependence: Rely on achieving greatness – not effectiveness.
5.Transfer the knowledge and use of the “The Morale Constructs Strategy.” The secret to building a shared-vision across an organization is to get the associates to think less of their motives and more of the mission at hand. Achieving this measure requires trust, credibility, character, and an understanding of your situational awareness at all times. Ensure the members of the community each understands the competitive forces against the system and the potential outcome should the forces breach the talent fields of the organization. Turn the mission into a crusade that everyone is a major influence to narrow the competitions base of support and room for tactical maneuvering. Always lean on “right,” as the good guy’s white hat never hits the ground due to his convictions and disposition for righteousness.
6.Practice the skills found within the Memorandum of Understanding and ensure that everyone does the same.
Our research shows that building extraordinary people and organizations requires a process that facilitates a hierarchy of six disciplined stages with a foundation that also translates the process into increased effectiveness and efficiency to raise the overall performance value and growth – specifically within the individual and organizational life cycle. The foundation is a simple code of conduct, known as the “Memorandum of Understanding.”
Establishing Principles to Achieve Personal Proficiency and Professional Mastery
You now have before you the opportunity to take the steps that achieve a high level of personal mastery for your life. It requires the adoption of a “code” as a living organism into your life. How can you build awareness, use your experiences in implementing a new approach to deportment, and develop a strategy, which includes resolve and ethical conduct? This is the task before you.
It sounds like the normal work that we all know and do so well. But be cautioned, it is not! When we bind the code with rules and regulations, reporting and accountability to force conformity to standards, we will fail – to oppose change by way of fear is not what we want. Rather, achieving personal mastery is a continuous, yet discontinuous pursuit of ethical behavior that ultimately manifests into a quest of improving the human spirit; to pursue good, to do the right thing in our lives, work and in the workplace. The code says that who ever should adopt it into his/her life, will possess a level of courage – both physically and emotionally – to execute the necessary task that drives performance that exemplify the highest level of personal conviction.Why establish a code to live and operate by?
The answer is simple; establishing a code or set of principles ensures a level of conduct (code of conduct) for healthy lifestyle living and workplace etiquette. This code of conduct is also known as a “Memorandum of Understanding.” As a code of conduct, the Memorandum of Understanding provides a resource to assist people in their personal development, growth, guidance, and assessment in the leadership of self. The Memorandum of Understanding establishes a strict perspective for instructing successful practices, theories, and beliefs that drives people to achieve a successful future (how you intend to conduct yourself into the future for others to emulate).
The Memorandum of Understanding, followed by and inspired from the LeaderShaped Leader, is also designed for people to learn broadly; to inspire the service out of generosity for others; and to prepare them to lead courageously into the future.
A Memorandum of Understanding must encourage a perspective to become firmly grounded in the potential for successful growth using the following constructs (A Portfolio Management Series):
§The Cardinal Rules
§The Guiding Precepts
§The Forms of Disposition
§The General Orders
§The Strategy Forward – Establishing Professional Mastery
§The Centers of Gravity
The Cardinal Rules. The Cardinal Rules are a set of guidelines that are invaluable for people and organizations to follow while planning and executing at the strategic or tactical level. These rules, once established by the individual(s) or teams are the rules that govern forward movement and must not change.
The Guiding Precepts. The Guiding Precepts are designed to inform people what they should and should not be doing in accordance with executing a well designed strategy to win. They also inform of the reasons “why” an action must occur and the repercussions should the individual and/or organization fail at meeting such a task.
The Forms of Disposition. The Forms of Disposition offer a substantive transformation in “thought” about how people achieve a perspective on things in life. It refers to an orchestrated, systemic and revolutionary new world-view resulting in a “change” of societies, cultures, and marketplaces due to behavioral perspective. This is today often called "systems theory," which sees a web of relationships coalescing to become something greater than the parts. Individuals must be able to look at things from a perspective that they are always changing and evolving into new forms – thinking “out-of-the-box!” We are doomed to a slow death unless radical change occurs in the way we think. Change your way of thinking or die a slow death.
The General Orders. The General Orders are broad, community-wide "need statements,” designed to encompass a variety of related issues in a person’s life or within the life cycle of an organization. These related issues are referred to as “Guiding Objectives,” which are specific items that need to be addressed. The Guiding Strategies (developed to fit current and future circumstance) are the methods identified for addressing the Guiding Objectives, and the Guiding Policies are the specific action steps that are recommended to implement the Guiding Strategies. The General Orders, all eleven of them, offer the ability to explore implications in an open and reflective manner and reinforce each other in providing a coherency and wholeness often lacking in life cycles.
The Strategy Forward – Establishing Professional Mastery.The traditional values are the foundation of the modern day; that was yesterday. Tomorrow, you have an opportunity to create commitment and the needed momentum to establish, publish, share, and teach a different set of life’s code, values, and ethics to journey into the future. After much hard work, you are prepared to develop a strategy to move forward and plan the next steps to target critical successes for winning the Future Picture. What a legacy you will leave when executed with personal and professional bearing for others to follow. This is the way of the future. This is a new chapter!
The Centers of Gravity. Just as time changes, so does the internal and external influence in your life and in the life cycle of an organization. The Centers of Gravity are the dynamics within a process that offer the greatest impact on the overall system when change happens. They offer a high level of “value” and return on your energy “investment.” When combined with the concept of parallel deposits (creating energy from various perspectives in a short period of time), the Centers of Gravity make possible the seemingly impossible task of realizing success in changing paradigms. The Centers of Gravity places significant influence on the five established epicenters of any changing system to receive desired effects: Leadership, Processes, Infrastructure, Population, and Action Units.
In summary, this Memorandum of Understanding offers an opportunity to free up our actions as public servants (leaders responsible for influencing social relationships). It is empowering, it is enabling and it grounds us in a public way on the fundamentals that we all must share. There is no ethical malaise.
It is important to realize that the “new” is not a finding from what has been lost. Rather, we are like the journey of the Scarecrow in search of a brain (brain power in this context), the Tin Woodsman in search of a heart, and the Lion in search of courage in the Wizard of Oz. Your value system is intact and has been with you the entire way thus far. This Memorandum of Understanding simply articulates and reaffirms the core value and behavioral perspective that already underlie your personal and professional conduct to achieve significant growth. The key is for everyone to have the discipline of following it to ensure successful organizational behaviors in leadership and beyond.
Summation
The challenge with overcoming the many barriers in life and in the workplace lies in our abilities as adults to stop making things so hard. Everything in life, both personally and professionally, can be achieved if we will only begin to think back to our childhood (if you remember that specific time in your life). Growing up as children reminds us of how fearless and invincible we were.
For most of us, it didn’t matter how tough the issue, we would try anything to fix a problem. All that it required was for us to think differently from the way we did prior to beginning to solve the issue that lay in our way. And, in most cases, the issue was brought to a resolution and was quickly forgotten about before moving on to something else or a bigger issue. Well, the same should apply for leadership and organizational behavior. For the LeaderShaped Leader, the journey begins by becoming a participant in an exciting, fun filled 2 hour special topics session based on the classic film, the “Wizard of Oz.”
While the metaphor of The Wizard of Oz receives light treatment in the opening session for LeaderShaping, The Seven “T’s” of Oz: Getting Results Through Critical Thinking, Effective Decision-Making and Team Building Maneuvers, uses the characters in the story as a powerful illustration to demonstrate the positive impact the seven principles gleaned from them can have on an individual’s life. Each of the six characters in the story unlocks the Steps to achieve Personal Proficiencythat is required for the journey from ordinary to extraordinary.
Keeping in the tradition of providing clever instruction for people to grow their lives our team felt that there is no greater time than today to use a creative and innovative approach to provide dynamic instruction that entertains, guides, teaches and facilitates thought provoking insight for anyone to use in life. After watching the famed film classic, Frank L. Baum’s 1939 adaptation of “The Wizard of Oz” with Judy Garland et al, we noticed how the characters, through no fault of their own, found themselves in circumstances beyond their control.
Dorothy Gale from Kansas finds herself ripped from her home by a tornado and transported, beyond her will, to the Land of Oz. The Scarecrow was cosigned to life in the fields because he had no brain and, therefore, no options to make effective decisions. The Tin Woodsman was frozen with an inability to act because he lacked the heart (passion) and drive to move. And, of course, the Cowardly Lion was robbed of his courage and ability to live the life as the king of the jungle he was destined to live. Lastly, the Wicked Witch of the West was very upset because her sister was killed by Dorothy’s house when it landed on top of her from the tornado. This happening caused a snag in her plans to torment the Land of Oz with her sister, the Wicked Witch of the East!
This timeless story brings together each of these seemingly helpless characters, all of whom felt victimized by their individual circumstances and shortcomings. Feeling powerless and unable to change their situations, a unique thing happened during the journey to Emerald City. They became a team and pooled their many resources during their journey on the yellow brick road to the Land of Oz in hopes to find the great wizard to solve their problems and help them with winning the many obstacles that stood in their way. However, upon arriving in Emerald City much after a very dangerous journey, Dorothy’s trusted companion Toto pulls the curtain back to reveal a powerless Wizard who is controlling levers and blowing smoke and who can actually do nothing for them. In the end, we see each character eventually rise above their circumstances and shortcomings to achieve the results they were looking for. Their success came not from the magic of the wizard, but from each of their own willingness to change; “change is an inside-out process.” Working together to find the unique talents required to win found their way to surface to help each character achieve their own successes.
We encourage you to begin a refreshed journey of leadership for your life by enlisting in a Seven “T’s” of Oz session. The seven principles outlined in the session each demonstrate how to make significant deposits into your life and the lives of others. You’ll see glaring similarities between your life experiences and those of Dorothy Gale from Kansas, the Cowardly Lion, the Scarecrow, the Tin Woodsman, and the Wicked Witch of the West and the Wizard of Emerald City. You will be required to think “outside-the-box” for learning the uniquely creative approach for adding a new set of guiding precepts into your life.
While you will not find much more in the session and materials about The Wizard of Oz than you have already read, you will find a set of transferable skills, seven of them to be exact, that begin the journey to be LeaderShaped. These carefully selected facilitative skills will help put an individual’s leadership on course to boldly push the boundaries of organizational behavior, strategic execution and discovery of the required emotional intelligences for business and entrepreneurialship in the 21st century and ensure the long-term vibrancy of America’s executive education programs everywhere.They will also deepen your understanding for achieving your Personal Proficiency and Professional Mastery in life – valuable and necessary changes from the status quo – what we like to call, “a long walk on a short path on becoming a LeaderShaped Leader!”
Have a bit of leadership news, feedback on this article, or to learn more about the Process of LeaderShaping and becoming a LeaderShaped Leader, please send me an email at: Dpitts@thebisongroup.com.
Here at the center, participants immerse themselves in a session that emulates one of the world’s most demanding training environments, the United States Marine Corps. They are tested and evaluated for character, appearance, speech, command presence, mental endurance, dexterity and agility, coordination and intelligence. Participants are quickly tested to see if they possess the resolve to remain on task for being some of the more progressive thinkers in the world. These professionals feel responsible for their organizations along with fates of their associates and constituents, as they toil under multiple demands with limited resources. With growing organizations in today’s troubling economy, opportunity continues to present itself for these progressive thinkers to act.
Upon successful completion of CILC, participants earn the right to call themselves extraordinary leaders; much different from the ordinary individuals that entered the center on day one. Beyond the rigorous, yet disciplined curriculum, another training program offered at CILC is the “Battleplan.” As individuals and organizations alike grapple with today’s economic challenges, the unique course prepares the participant class how-to navigate the downturn more effectively, uncover opportunities that may arise from disruption, and position or reposition enterprises for greater profitability during the next cycle. A unique collaboration between The Military Channel and The Bison Group, this program explores the challenges of organizational change and renewal from the diverse military Battleplan perspectives of environmental structure and culture, transformational leadership, organizational behavior, strategic-execution, team building maneuvers and risk management. Participant gain the tools and insights to develop practical approaches and specific action plans that balance short-term success with long-term innovation.
The Battleplan series is delivered in four parts: Preemptive Strike (Series I), Counterstrike (Series II), Guerilla Warfare (Series III) and Urban Warfare (Series IV). For college students, freshman and sophomores, Battleplan consists of two six-week summer training sessions at CILC. Juniors and seniors both attend a 10 week summer session. Following completion of a CILC program, all LeaderShaped leaders attend “The Team Building Maneuvers Course (TBM)” taught at CILC’s SULES’ Institute (Small Unit Leadership Evaluation School) in Philadelphia. It provides a foundation of professional knowledge and skills necessary for leaders to effectively command and lead individuals into successful future pictures that results peak performance across their organizational environments.
While at CILC, leaders will begin their journey to develop healthy cultures. A healthy culture offers the fertilization for communities to grow and the people are the drivers for positive change. CILCs main responsibility is to awaken the inner spirit to further ajar the untapped potential of its participant leaders. To do this, the leadership and facilitation corps at CILC will implement additional resources and tools, planning initiatives, organizational strategies, and execution tactics into the transition plans unlike ever done in the past at a similar organization. This is a very bold move and it begins with developing each individual that accepts the journey to change.
This course provides advanced transformational leadership, organizational behavior, strategic execution and team building skill training for leaders in preparation for duties as senior staff members and executives within the leadership ranks across the business and private sectors.
The discipline of CILC’s directional approach forward, integrated as an essential tool, is critical for a successful strategic execution plan: “The alignment of people behind a strategy. Incentives do not in themselves create alignment, but re-developing the posture, purpose, and alignment of soft-skills across the organization by establishing a culture of trust, commitment, and a fair strategy-formulation process, will result staggering outcomes,” stated Damian D. “Skipper” Pitts, the director of the center. Additional programs invite up-and-coming leaders to join with their peers in leadership seminars that impact both sides of an organization's leadership equation to foster better understanding and cooperation.
The course is designed to develop leaders who have the will and knowledge to take decisive action in an uncertain environment, within their commander's intent. This course seeks to deliver to the world extraordinary leaders who are technically and tactically proficient and who are confident in their abilities as leaders and decision-makers to encourage and promote the global prowess of the United States as a sustained super power and progressive free nation.
The Center for Integrative Leadership and Change, established in 2004 at The Bison Group, evolved from a two-week course with emphasis solely on developing leadership for the youth to its present 15 week course. It includes more than 98 hours of academic training and executive education. As the new academic year begins for 2009, the season at CILC will run from March to December 2009 with sessions running in collaboration with Temple University and other institutions across the region.
The Center for Integrative Leadership and Change develops highly disciplined, morally and ethically efficient, effectively decisive professionals who are prepared for responsible leadership by becoming an agent of transformation and change. The program’s design help professionals succeed by offering a structured military-style learning environment, bringing lessons from the battlefields into the board and meeting rooms. Of all the training and seminars in the marketplace, the center is the only one of its kind that is based on the traditions, values, rigors and ideals of the United States Marine Corps leadership training command, and is the one place to receive the many benefits from such a program. The center and its programs and curriculum, are byproducts of The Bison Group Corporation, founded in 1996 by a team of United States Marines turned business professionals and industry specialists.
Once trained in the skills that stimulate the needed change into extraordinary leadership, participants move back to their job specialties prepared to defend what is promised, protect what is precious and preserve what is treasured – heightened ethical leadership in others to also prepare them to take their own journey to find a significant voice of self. For some, this will take them into areas that they never though possible, only now, they are up to the task and ready to overcome the many obstacles and burning platforms they may encounter.
In 2005, I was faced with a personal dilemma that had frightening circumstances, which most of us have had in life at least once. I was driving the car of life over the speed limit – the same time that the rest of the vehicles in life were on the road – when a car came barreling out of a side street on my right, attempting to make a left hand turn straight into traffic. I slammed on the brakes, but it was clear to me that there was no way I could stop in time. I simply waited for the awful sound of crunching metal and the abusive shaking within my body to cause harm to my current disposition.
But it never came. I had stopped in time – yet, to this very day, I am convinced that the near missed collision was impossible. And for some reason, I was very calm in the awful mix of things. My heart wasn’t pounding like it should have been in a close call like that. I think that it was because the experience didn’t feel and/or seem quite real. I was so focused on thinking about the impossibility of what had just happened that I do not think the seriousness of it ever registered.
That’s exactly what it felt like to me on that day in Greensboro, NC – like an invisible angel had reached out with her hand and stopped my vehicle just inches from impact. I seriously doubt if an angel’s hand is any wider than a whisper, but apparently that’s wide enough to protect us from harm. As I drove away, my thoughts at the time were on the phrase, “the width of an angel’s hand.” One of the first times I was able to experience something of the sort was during my military tour in the United States Marine Corps, hearing the words “lock and load,” while on the firing range (preparation for war and the loss of life from weapons of destruction).
I believe that’s the kind of thing described in Psalm 91. It’s very possible that the author of this Psalm had a close call of his own and was so thankful for God’s protection that he was compelled to write about it. And, even though the dangers he talks about may be hard to relate to in this day and age (for some); I believe that we all understand what he is trying to say. Despite the poetic language, which does not always appeal to everyone, this Psalm has become an every day read, my absolute favorite, and the favorite for many. After all, who can say that they do not like the song, “On Eagle’s Wings,” which comes directly from the Psalm.
It certainly is an encouraging Psalm. It reminds us that God is watching over us and protecting us, and because of that, we shouldn’t be afraid. The Psalmist gives us quite a list of things that could harm or destroy us or cause us great fear – everything from a “fowler’s snare” to “pestilence, plague, disaster, and injury” – but, according to the Psalmist, we do not have to worry about these things as we make the most of our dwelling. If we rest in the shadow of the Almighty and make God our refuge and fortress and acknowledge the name of the Lord, we too will have little to worry. If we do this, then God will shelter us under his “wings” and keep trouble from our door. He will even send us angels to guard and protect us from harm. If we love God – truly from our hearts – He will rescue us and protect us. He will be with us in trouble, satisfy us with long prosperous life, and show us His salvation.
It sounds wonderful doesn’t it? But, do you believe all of it? Should we really believe all of this can happen for us? How can we possibly believe these things when each day, hour, and minute we are faced with the troubles along the road that we steer? We have all heard or personally know of someone who loves and trusts God’s word, but has not been satisfied with long life and possibly a prosperous one. Some have nothing but pain and suffering. Others are dealing with financial and health issues that seem so paramount that they are close to giving up all together. So, where are the angels of God at this juncture? No matter where we look in the world, bad things happen to God’s people. We would have to be blind not to see that real life does not match up with the promises in this Psalm.
For obvious reasons, we are not supposed to take this Psalm literally – or at least, not all of the time. Exaggeration is often used in Hebrew Scriptures – especially in poetry like the Psalms. From the very beginning, God has made it clear that faith and trust in Him are not an insurance policy against all adversity. Abraham and Sarah ran into plenty of difficulties, many of them due to their own willfulness, and God’s people have struggled with serious challenges throughout the history of our faith. Satan is still (and will always remain) at work in the world. I have recently learned this to be known as the “Absalom and Jezebel Spirits” and until Christ returns, Satan will continue to do his work.
But sometimes, the kind of rescue, protection, and salvation that the Psalmist describes really does happen, and it happens in such a powerful way that there is no doubt that God has saved us. In some cases, by no more than a width of an angel’s hand.
And when that does happen, we have an absolute duty to praise God, give Him thanks, and continue in His word into the future. We must emulate the actions of the Psalmist by blessing others from our blessings. These special supernatural events leave us with the overwhelming sense of gratitude for God’s unseen hand, which has protected us. They are reminders that God has not forgotten us. We are children of the Heavenly Father, safe in His arms, and our names are written in Heaven.
Yet, I wonder if we understand what a close call even that salvation can be? Do we realize that without God’s help, without the angel’s hand intervening on our behalf, we are headed for a deadly collision? I was faced with this in 2005 and only now, in 2008, do I get it! This is not what God wants for us. He is always trying to get our attention and we continually show the other cheek and in most cases, a deaf ear. He is always trying to save us from ourselves and our own love for things that we place in front of Him. He wants us to be saved for eternity to be with Him. Yet, how often has God provided for us or our protection and we have not even noticed? How often has there been nothing more than an angel’s hand between us and danger, or evil and death, and, we have not realized it? How often do we go on our merry way without acknowledging, accepting, and thanking Him for his strength and security in our lives? Is it possible that we have become dependant on worldly wisdom and security, which is temporary, instead of trusting in God’s shelter for eternity?
I write in my work, “The Art of Detachment Project” the following: “Success is based on the ability to achieve the “five transformative thoughts” to plan, brief, execute, debrief, and win your actions on the battlefield of life. These five thoughts are essential for individuals to gain the managing strategy that achieves personal transformation, both proactive and positive. They are: Simplicity, Alignment, People, Flexibility, and Towering Strengths. Learning to integrate these five thoughts into your life, you will begin to see a transition to your own pursuit of security. Men, governments, and nations continue to try and provide for every stage of life and to remove the causes of fear. They have failed miserably. The gain is wealth with little value, the development of technologies and weaponry for defense, but cities are destroyed overnight, and they progress in medicine and surgical skill only to be defeated by the increasing number of diseases in civilization. Not a single victory in the field, no success at the political booths, no ingenuity in technique can save the world. What is needed are the five thoughts to transform life through faith: simplicity allows learning to be easy, alignment keeps us in God’s likeness, people are the circle of oneness in Him, flexibility allows us to live through His word, and the towering strength provides the security and promise that all will be right in His kingdom.” In other words, one will be able to connect application to a measurable difference in performance as the vehicle of life provides an assurance that through the chances and changes of life, there is a divine protector in whose wisdom and grace we may find peace.”
As a United States Marine turned business professional, I have come to the realization that security is relative, whether for a military base, a home, or a business. Guaranteed security is impossible. There are steps that can be taken to increase or enhance the security around those things, but sooner or later, Tierney will find its way in to crush the defenses. Tierney will always find its way around the guard, the hidden key to the perceived lock, and the broken link through the firewall. A breach of this type to our security remains inevitable.
This is the reason that we need much more than worldly protection. We need the kind of protection only God can provide. And, you must do your part by learning, training, and teaching yourself and others for His Marine Corps. This is your way of putting on another piece of the uniform for battle. I believe that heaven’s angles can’t even give us that because it requires a choice - Actions carry a thought and shape a destiny – sure, they may save us from things like accidents and the dangers that lie waiting in life, but angels cannot save our souls. Only God can do that! Thankfully, He has provided a way for us to be saved, and that way is through his son Jesus. It cannot hurt if you have gained the knowledge of the “five transformative thoughts”- gaining this knowledge prepares you to acknowledge how “¹God made you from spare parts!”
It is important to know that Jesus will not only save our souls, but He has promised to resurrect our bodies upon His return to establish His kingdom. But, this is not something that comes easy for anyone. We must do our part long before that day is upon us – the time is now, the choice is yours, and the place is right where you are “now” sitting – only Jesus has the power to save and nothing is as important in the “knowing” as that.
Paul tells us that anyone can be saved, whether Jew or Gentile. Anyone is able to take advantage of God’s promised protection, and guess what; it only requires a “choice.” This is your absolute “Heavenly Insurance Policy,” the ultimate protection against the storms as they become prevalent in your life. The premium that you will be required to pay to take out your own personal policy has already been paid on your behalf by Jesus and, IT WAS NOT CHEAP! It was paid for with His life and therein lays your guarantee. A guarantee that has a check written to you with a figure that is so high, no bank can cash, but see the incredible value when presented at the teller window to one of His other warriors on the other side. You will know this person by a smile and a short statement to you, “God bless you on your journey. Hold this check until you arrive at the right bank to cash it. Its worth is greater than anything, as it is your eternal life.”
Know this, Jesus did the hard part. He did the work, and we get the reward. If you genuinely believe in your heart that Jesus died on the cross for your sins and rose from the dead, and if you can bring yourself to a quiet place to humbly acknowledge Him with a verbal response, then you will be saved and one day have an opportunity to cash your personal check of salvation. It is important to know that this does not mean He is to receive lip service. It doesn’t mean that we are only to call on Him when we are in danger, on our death bed, back against the wall with financial difficulties, or only attend service on the special holiday, or wear His name as the silver bullet to defeat the big bad monster.
No, it means that you are to be faithful in your followship to conquer each barrier that is placed in front of you throughout the journey. We must give our hearts, release control of our life, and make the Lord our fortress. Unless our hearts are truly transformed, leading us to act in keeping with what we say we believe, no amount of proclaiming that Jesus is Lord will be of any benefit.
Or to put it in a very positive way, we might remember the words written in Psalm 91: “…3 surely he will save you from the fowler's snare and from the deadly pestilence. 4 He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart. 5 You will not fear the terror of night, nor the arrow that flies by day, 6 nor the pestilence that stalks in the darkness, nor the plague that destroys at midday. 7 A thousand may fall at your side, ten thousand at your right hand, but it will not come near you. 8 You will only observe with your eyes and see the punishment of the wicked. 9 If you make the Most High your dwelling – even the LORD, who is my refuge 10 then no harm will befall you; no disaster will come near your tent. 11 For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways; 12 they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone. 13 You will tread upon the lion and the cobra; you will trample the great lion and the serpent. 14 "Because he loves me," says the LORD, "I will rescue him; I will protect him, for he acknowledges my name. 15 He will call upon me, and I will answer him; I will be with him in trouble, I will deliver him and honor him. 16 With long life will I satisfy him and show him my salvation..."(New International Version)
We must not wait to receive the opportunities that Jesus has for us. We must not wait until we find ourselves in a dangerous situation that requires an angel’s hand to wake us up and remind us that our only real security is God. We need to make sure that our hearts are right with God now. Knowing this will only provide the confidence and assurance to trust that nothing that happens in life’s vehicle will ultimately harm us. When the right choice is made, our vehicle will steer us to our destination in eternity. No harm will come against us. Like the Psalmist says, God will protect us and take care of us. Nothing can separate us from the love of God in Jesus Christ – not the terror of the night, not the arrows that flies by day, not the pestilence, plague, or sword. None of that, and for that matter, not even the very wonderful and welcome width of an angel’s hand.
My angel’s hand came in the form of a Godly woman, Katherine Harrelson, while in my darkest place, sleeping in my car for several weeks, blessed me with a gift that no money can measure – prayer – and a copy of the Holy Bible. Up to that moment, I did not have one of my own. She told me to read Psalm 91 every day of my life before leaving the house to start the day. That transitioning day for me was in 2005, and now that I have been blessed to continue my journey into the 21st century, I have found true love in Christ to protect me along my journey. I believe that I have my check to be cashed. Do you have yours?
My Outward Reform Began My Inward Renewal!
The reading of this text is my personal account of my changing experience that caused me to recognize the reasons for taking my own journey from ordinary to extraordinary. As you have seen, it required me to experience “47 Humbling Days to Christ.” Acknowledging my faults and challenges (outward reform) and accepting the honest perspective of my life at the time, I was then able to experience a breakthrough (inward renewal) that has positioned me to be in a better place to realize my future.
It is important to understand that you must be willing to do the unimaginable; push the start button to engage an “atom bomb” in your life – you will have to experience an implosion before you can receive an explosion. So, what about you? Are you willing to recognize the reasons for taking your own personal journey from ordinary to extraordinary? Are you will to humble yourself to receive Him into your life from a greater perspective than ever before? If you are, here are some steps that will assist you in achieving this objective:
The Journey
Using Christ-like Principles Learn To:
1.Acknowledge, using the “Mirror Effect,” a personal reflection.
§Personal Renewal – Personal Change – Public Change – Public Reform
§Change is an inside-out process
5.Understand how to Achieve the “Law of Process:” Goals of the Church!
Read 1 Corinthians 1: 18 – 25
§The church is a family: The Goal is to achieve maturity!
§The church is a field: The Goal is to plant and harvest fruitfulness!
§The church is a building: The Goal is to be strong in its foundation for growth and security of self!
§The permanence of God’s wisdom is infinite!
6.Work to Achieve the “Law of Victory!” Read 1 Corinthians 15:50 – 58
Close with a personal prayer and begin to read Psalms 91 each morning for the remainder of your life here on earth. Most importantly, begin to share your testimony with others. This is my lesson to each of you now that we've crossed into 2009. Promote yourself in His kingdom and watch the blessings begin to change you from the inside-out. Happy New Year; make 2009 your year of renewal.
So, a team is what you are hoping to build? But, what kind of team? A team who uses the academic approach to getting things done or one that brings real-world experience to the situation at hand? What criteria, then, do you use for choosing your teammates? Team building programs during the late 80's and throughout the 90's took place in the woods at the height of the now infamous ropes courses. These courses were designed to engage organizational groups in a series of team activities that voluntarily made people face self-imposed limitations while hanging from trees and cables. The next decade lead the way for classroom-based team building sessions that included behavioral profiles and performance assessments, such as the universal language of DISC and its model, along with the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator.
To answer the questions in the opening of this text, we feel that organizations must build and develop the "GREAT" team. Building great teams hits at one of the most discussed topics within business media and the workplace: Organizational Behavior, leadership & process, and inter-office politics. The day of the individual worker is over, as today's corporate arena demands that workers possess the ability to effectively work as team-led associates within an organization. It is a scenario all top leaders and managers knows well: The organization, their people, and their systems all require efficient and effective processes to remain constant in its approach to move quickly toward new and innovative ways of reaching mission-critical objectives. This is a task that is directed by the senior officials within team environments that are lead by great initiatives. They must be committed to draft and manage the right team - a GREAT team - of commandos to lead the effort.
As we look forward to the next generation of team building programs, people will be coming out of the woods, out of the classrooms, and out of the convention centers. The question then is: Where will they be going? The answer; they'll be headed to learning environments with a sensory-rich atmosphere that enhances military training and simulation as the team building practices that increasingly requires experienced quality from the battlefield, in business, and across industry.
In April 2005, the Wharton School of Business students, staff, and sponsors traveled to the U.S. Marine Corps Officer Candidates School in Quantico, Virginia to learn what they were really made of. The venture, aptly titled "Learning Leadership and Decision Making Under Uncertainty and Complexity," sought to expose the future business leaders of the world, to the types of training exercises that have produced generations of successful military leaders. While there are obvious differences between battlefield leadership and corporate leadership, there are also many parallels that can be drawn - especially in the constantly evolving business landscape. We could be nimbler in our decision-making. We could be team players, even from the top. We could lead by example. And we could actively train our subordinates to eventually lead us. Sounds like hogwash? Don't forget that the U.S. Marines has a proven track record - 233 years and running. And by the way, this program at the Wharton School of Business lives on today.
Just as in the experiences at the Wharton School, live training continues to evolve from the military training paradigm toward new solutions that prepare warfighters (the title given to associates that are a part of a GREAT team environment) to fight against asymmetric enemies often embedded in civilian populations and organizations. Since 2005, the Bison Group has invested substantially in new live training solutions to counter challenges faced in the business marketplace, specifically Military Operations Counter-IED Devices: Decision-making, collective behaviors, and cultural influences.
However, the heavy financial burden of the U.S. economy, another form of conflict, "Domestic War on Terror (DWOT)," has taken valuable resources away from future planned training and simulation and instead toward extending the life cycle of organizations in trouble. Therefore, industries are being forced to deliver temporary solutions for less instead of future-oriented growth strategies. Future-oriented growth strategies for teams are designed to increase capacity to the individual and organizational system and building GREAT teams using military strategy and tactics that provide proven solutions where people and organizations achieve high levels of performance.
One way of ensuring that GREAT teams are developed for such a task lies in the adoption of “Business WARFIGHTING For GREAT Teams;” a high impact and hands-on curriculum that demonstrates how-to use the “Six Lenses of Innovation for teams, also known as the “Preemptive Strike” measures: (1) Establish Achievable Aims; challenge deeply-held orthodoxies about who their customers are, how they interact with them, how they define their products or services, how they configure the value chain, and so on; (2) Identify Means; harness emergent trends and discontinuities to substantially change the way things are done in their industry; (3) Ensure Intelligence; leverage core competencies and strategic assets in novel ways to generate new growth; (4) Enforce Security; understand and address deep customer needs that are currently going unmet; (5) Engage the Strike; a deliberate Battleplan used by a strategic and numerically inferior power to head off a situation in which ultimate defeat would be inevitable; and lastly, (6) Flawlessly Execute the Exit Strategy; just as everything has a beginning, all things have an end. Leaders are instructed how-to establish exit points using 32 solution-centric precepts to face fierce challenges in short time frames using the process.
Team building programs, like this Next Generation program, are the start of a team development revolution and your team should follow close by. Don't consider becoming a GREAT team, simply learn to transform into one! To learn more about Building GREAT teams using Business WARFIGHTING strategies, visit www.thebisongroup.com or email the author at: Dpitts@thebisongroup.com.
There are three ways to react to an organizational crisis. One way is to turn your head to ignore the situation and hope that it will fix itself (best of luck!). Another way is to run around in a panic-induced cost-cutting frenzy that could seriously impair the organization’s long-term growth potential and future state. The third and, of course, smartest method is to recognize the impending threat to both your top and bottom line, and quickly adapt the organization’s strategic outlook and business model to the new environmental conditions. So, the question to answer is this: “what are the decision makers within your organization currently doing? Are they connecting the organization’s strategy with its innovative approach to meet a successful Future Picture?” But what if you, as the leader, are having a difficult struggle to influence others to your point of view and get them to rethinking and reinventing the organization’s strategy forward as circumstances and economics rapidly change. If you are experiencing this challenge, here’s some advice to help your people to win the battlefield of transition.
I have continued to state enthusiastically over the last few years that, in a world where the pace of change has gone hypercritical, today’s most important race is the race for transformational leadership and organizational renewal. It is the race to change as fast as the environment is changing around you; the race to influence positive organizational behaviors and the race to reinvent your strategy and your business model before they become obsolete. When the economy is in a state in flux, most organizations tend to postpone their professional development efforts and favor cost cutting as the strategy that will preserve the future. This is a grave mistake that will affect the future of the organization in ways that will likely kill the very spirit the leadership teams are hoping to preserve. Their efforts during the challenging times will only prolong the inevitable; ultimate demise once the current crisis is diminished. The lesson here is this; a successful business model will break almost overnight when the waves of the ocean start crashing against the pillars of the pier if leadership does not remain on a continuous, yet discontinuous approach to train the organization’s greatest asset – the people.
So what exactly is Strategic Organizational Renewal (SOR)? Organizations undergo change to enhance their productivity. Changes can be effected in several areas of the organization including culture, strategy, mission, teams and organizational structure. SOR is a framework that defines the role, responsibilities, and performance of human capital across the organization and the planning for it must only take place in the organizations “war room.” To explain the war room concept, leadership appoints a specific room that will be specified as the location where the organizations strategy is planned. This location must remain under lock and key to ensure the organization’s intellectual capital offers an uncompromised agenda that influences positive outcomes. SOR is the resulting effect that is birthed from the war room. This is only possible when those appointed to the war room each understands the importance of establishing the organization’s “Memorandum of Understanding” (MOU) – the principles to achieve professional mastery.
Establishing Principles to Achieve Personal Mastery – People First, then the Organization
You now have before you the opportunity to take the steps that achieve a high level of professional mastery that achieves organizational growth. It requires the adoption of a “code” as a living, breathing organism to each level of the organization. How can people build awareness, use their experiences to implement a new approach to deportment and develop a strategy, which includes resolve and ethical conduct? This is the task that lies before them.
It sounds like the normal work that we all know and do so well. But be cautioned, it is not! When individuals combine the code with rules and regulations, reporting and accountability to force conformity to standards, they will fail – to oppose change by way of fear is not what is required. Rather, achieving professional mastery is a continuous pursuit of ethical behavior that ultimately manifests into a quest of improving the human spirit; to pursue good, to do the right thing in across the workplace. The code says that who ever should adopt it into his/her life, will possess a level of courage – both physically and emotionally – to execute the necessary task that drives performance to exemplify the highest level of personal and professional conviction.
Why establish a code to live by? The answer is simple; establishing a code or set of principles ensures a level of conduct (code of conduct) that extends the life cycle of the organization. This code of conduct is what I have been referencing – the “Memorandum of Understanding.” As a code of conduct, the MOU provides a resource to assist people in their personal development, growth, guidance, and assessment in the leadership of self. The MOU establishes a strict perspective for instructing successful practices, theories, and beliefs that drives people to achieve a successful future (how you intend to conduct yourself into the future for others to emulate).
The Memorandum of Understanding is also designed for people to learn broadly; to inspire the service out of generosity for others; and to prepare them to lead systems courageously into the future. A MOU must encourage a perspective to become firmly grounded in the potential for successful growth using the following constructs:
§The Cardinal Rules
§The Guiding Precepts
§The Forms of Disposition
§The General Orders
§The Strategy Forward – Establishing Professional Mastery
§The Centers of Gravity
The Cardinal Rules. The Cardinal Rules are a set of guidelines that are invaluable for people and organizations to follow while planning and executing at the strategic or tactical level. These rules, once established by the individual(s) or teams are the rules that govern forward movement and must not change.
The Guiding Precepts. The Guiding Precepts are designed to inform people what they should and should not be doing in accordance with executing a well designed strategy to win. They also inform of the reasons “why” an action must occur and the repercussions should the individual and/or organization fail at meeting such a task.
The Forms of Disposition. The Forms of Disposition offer a substantive transformation in “thought” about how people achieve a perspective on things in life. It refers to an orchestrated, systemic and revolutionary new world-view resulting in a “change” of societies, cultures, and marketplaces due to behavioral perspective. This is today often called "systems theory," which sees a web of relationships coalescing to become something greater than the parts. Individuals must be able to look at things from a perspective that they are always changing and evolving into new forms – thinking “out-of-the-box!” We are doomed to a slow death unless radical change occurs in the way we think. Change your way of thinking or die a slow death.
The General Orders. The General Orders are broad, community-wide "need statements,” designed to encompass a variety of related issues in a person’s life or within the life cycle of an organization. These related issues are referred to as “Guiding Objectives,” which are specific items that need to be addressed. The Guiding Strategies (developed to fit current and future circumstance) are the methods identified for addressing the Guiding Objectives, and the Guiding Policies are the specific action steps that are recommended to implement the Guiding Strategies. The General Orders, all eleven of them, offer the ability to explore implications in an open and reflective manner and reinforce each other in providing a coherency and wholeness often lacking in life cycles.
The Strategy Forward – Establishing Professional Mastery. The traditional values are the foundation of the modern day; that was yesterday. Tomorrow, you have an opportunity to create commitment and the needed momentum to establish, publish, share, and teach a different set of life’s code, values, and ethics to journey into the future. After much hard work, you are prepared to develop a strategy to move forward and plan the next steps to target critical successes for winning the Future Picture. What a legacy you will leave when executed with personal and professional bearing for others to follow. This is the way of the future. This is a new chapter!
The Centers of Gravity. Just as time changes, so does the internal and external influence in your life and in the life cycle of an organization. The Centers of Gravity are the dynamics within a process that offer the greatest impact on the overall system when change happens. They offer a high level of “value” and return on your energy “investment.” When combined with the concept of parallel deposits (creating energy from various perspectives in a short period of time), the Centers of Gravity make possible the seemingly impossible task of realizing success in changing paradigms. The Centers of Gravity places significant influence on the five established epicenters of any changing system to receive desired effects: Leadership, Processes, Infrastructure, Population, and Action Units.
In summary, I see the Memorandum of Understanding (once established for the organization), as an opportunity to free up the actions of people as servants, but develop them as encouraged opportunists. It is empowering, it is enabling, and it grounds people in a public way on the fundamentals that they all must share to benefit the organization. There is no ethical malaise. It is important to realize that the new is not a finding from what has been lost. Rather, it is like the journey of the scarecrow in the Wizard of Oz in search of a brain (brain power in this context), the tin man in search of a heart, and the lion in search of courage. People’s value system is intact and in most cases, has been during the journey of personal growth. The MOU simply articulates and reaffirms the core value and behavioral perspective that already underlie their personal and professional appearance and conduct to achieve significant growth. And, all of this is stimulated from the affects of the war room; hence, the influences that lead to significant strategic organizational renewal in the end.
The Memorandum of Understanding is designed to help an organization answer four fundamental questions in order to develop and execute an effective strategy forward plan. These questions are:
§Where does the organization want to be in the future?
§What will the organization apply its resources against to achieve the Future Picture?
§How will the organization apply those resources?
§When and under what conditions will the organization exit from their current strategic plan?
It’s the act of dynamically adjusting business models and strategies to the deep changes at work in the external environment. Above all else, this requires innovation and the Memorandum of Understanding definitely offers an innovative perspective to most organizations. In a 2003 article in Harvard Business Review entitled “The Quest for Resilience,” Gary Hamel wrote, “Strategic renewal is creative reconstruction.” It’s all about dissecting the traditional business model and examining it for imaginative ways to reconstruct it to create significant intellectual and emotional thought space for value creation to positively influence the internal and external customers of the organization. This becomes all the more urgent in challenging times, when customer needs and market conditions swiftly and dramatically change.
As in the case of the New Covenant Church of Philadelphia organization, where the senior pastor and Chief Executive Officer Bishop C. Milton Grannum, set aside a specific room on the same floor of the building as his office for directing the organization’s strategic organizational renewal efforts. The organization’s new “war room” had the same critical importance as Winston Churchill’s cabinet war room in London, used to direct military strategy during World War II. Bishop Grannum’s Innovation War Room was a simple, but highly effective device that guided the New Covenant Church of Philadelphia’s appointed leadership team to focus on establishing the strategy forward to reinvent the business model and find bold, new growth opportunities. And, its impact on the organization’s strategies – and, ultimately, its performance – is still being felt today.
Late in the month of November 2008, even in the face of formidable pressures and economic challenges, New Covenant Church of Philadelphia braved the climate and made the decision to bring in yet another trainer, speaker and author Dr. David Ireland from the region only to learn that they were on the right path to extend the organization’s life cycle. The New Covenant Church of Philadelphia continues to be one of the most progressive thinking faith-based organizations in the region. The reason; the CEO fully understands that the time to input integrated talent management to boost the organization’s human capital is when most organizations are calling on “cost cutting” as its strategy in the face of adverse conditions.
Very few organizations, for-profit and not-for-profit, can claim to have a specific innovation war room somewhere on location. But, what every organization can and should do – right now! – is organize a serious, high-level strategy forum (at least call it the “Innovation War Room” where innovation intersects strategy) to begin exercising transformative thinking and rethinking their business from the customer backward. One of the fundamental questions the leadership team must ask is this: “how do we get the people to buy-into the organization’s new perspective of transformational thinking to experience upward movement in a market where people no longer have financial resources?” And, in a nutshell, it is my perspective that in answering the question, these people should take a look at the slogan of Royal Bank of Scotland: “Less Talk!” “Start engaging the necessary requirements to strategically execute flawlessly to influence the organizations Future Picture.” Innovation powers us out of everything and must be taken seriously as a strategy that wins.
The absolute worst thing any organization can do during the greatest of challenging times is to assume they can go on with “business as usual – and to go along with the status quo.” Instead, they must conduct themselves as great leaders do and get busy working to understand how organizational clients’ (internal and external) priorities may have changed and quickly realign the organizational business model to address their new needs. Reading through a past edition of the Wall Street Journal, most of the advertisements (for luxury watches, exorbitant real estate, and fabulous vacation resorts) looked embarrassingly inappropriate in view of the ongoing national economic crisis that the United States of America has been facing in the past few years and the next years to come.
One ad, from NOKIA, stood out in contrast. The headline: “Can anyone provide cost cutting solutions that work now? My answer is YES. Now, there’s an organization that seems to get it. But wait a minute. Didn’t that headline sound more than a little like Barack Obama? NOKIA seems to have understood the lesson from the past month’s U.S. election between President Elect Barack Obama and Senator John McCain: Whether you’re overcoming organizational politics or training people to remain on top in their careers, the winners will be those who recognize that the game has changed, and that “same old stuff” just does not cut it any longer. The world’s processes have changed in ways that the world looks much different than it did a year ago (unemployment is up 47% from 2007 – 2008, home ownership is down 26% and the statistics continue to get grim). The way to make effective decisions require innovative thought and those who miss the opportunity to change will be left behind. The best quote that I teach from fits great here: “If people seek to achieve what they have never had, they MUST be prepared to do what they have never done.”
As a U.S. Marine turned business professional, responsible for leading a dynamic team of specialist into the lion’s belly when the team engages a client who is seeking to overcome business and process challenges, innovation takes precedent as our strategic starting point. Our team defines the importance of the war room, helps to identify its location and then the work begins – in the newly organized Innovation War Room. Without this component added to the mix, there’s no need to start because without it, the potential for failure rises incredibly. As we establish these critical strategy rooms, we teach companies to unpack their business model into five Centers of Gravity: Leadership, Infrastructure, Processes, Populations and Action Units. These five are used to influence positive organizational behavior from the leadership who is responsible for making the decisions to drive momentum: who they serve, what service they provide how they provide it, how they generate revenue and how they differentiate and sustain a strategic advantage.
Then we demonstrate how the Centers of Gravity are used to radically rethink each component using the “Six Lenses of Innovation” – the cutting-edge military-style ideation and methodology, “Battleplan for Preemptive Strike,” outlined in my latest book “Business WARFIGHTING For GREAT Teams.” So, we get the strategy teams to (1) Establish Achievable Aims; challenge deeply-held orthodoxies about who their customers are, how they interact with them, how they define their products or services, how they configure the value chain, and so on; (2) Identify Means; harness emergent trends and discontinuities to substantially change the way things are done in their industry; (3) Ensure Intelligence; leverage core competencies and strategic assets in novel ways to generate new growth; (4) Enforce Security; understand and address deep customer needs that are currently going unmet; (5) Engage the Strike; a deliberate Battleplan used by a strategic and numerically inferior power to head off a situation in which ultimate defeat would be inevitable; and lastly, (6) Flawlessly Execute the Exit Strategy; just as everything has a beginning, all things have an end. Leaders are instructed how-to establish exit points using 32 solution-centric precepts to face fierce challenges in short time frames using the process.
We believe that as organizations begin to reshape their cultures; it’s not hard to recognize how the principles found within the military-style ideation and methodology of the Battleplan for Preemptive Strikeapply to the many burning platforms organizations are facing today. Isn’t it time you subjected your own business model to some “creative reconstruction,” aimed at making it better suited to today’s shifting customer needs and new economic realities?
Damian D. “Skipper” Pitts, A United States Marine turned business professional is co-author of Business WARFIGHTING For GREAT Teams (Book Surge Publishing, 2009) and Founder and Chairman of the Bison Group Corporation, a management consulting and training firm. He is the author The Process of LeaderShaping, a cultural transformational program and university course of study and has consulted or presented to numerous leading U.S. and foreign corporations, helping them to realize increased integrated talent management strategies, team building maneuvers, and decision-making skills to compete in today’s highly uncertain business environments. He has also authored four additional publications with his most successful title, The Art of Detachment: Breakthrough Principles to Transformational Leadership (Kendall Hunt, 2007). His works allowed him to be chosen as the technical, military and development specialists by the U.S. film industry to the feature film “Stateside” that released in theaters in May 2004 where he trained and acted onscreen with “A-List” talents Val Kilmer and Jonathan Tucker along with 75 -other actors, teaching them the principles of leadership, team development, and influence for the production. He is now teaching his programs at Temple University.
