I first wrote this in August, 2007 for Fast Company. It was about the fact that we have been turned into silos. This has enabled us to focus on our areas of expertise, but has hurt the ability to cooperatie, collaberate and innovate. President-elect Obama has implored and will continue to implore us to work together across the aisles, across the country and across the world. Let’s hope he can be the silomaster we need.
Until you rise above the fray of WIIFM (”what’s in it for me”)-minded participants, everyone will put their needs above that of their company or their country.
A couple years ago, theSan Fernando Valley Business Journalreported: “Mike Wall has led Northridge Hospital Medical Center to become one of the strongest high-tech hospitals in the San Fernando Valley. He has taken the Catholic Healthcare West facility from a position as a money-losing operation in 2000, to one that netted a $10 million profit in 2004.”
How did Mike accomplish this? I spoke at an offsite for Northridge Hospital in 2006 and was especially interested in discovering the answer to this after I observed Mike receiving five spontaneous standing ovations from the heads of the hospital departments who were attending the retreat.
I asked Mike the secret to his success. Like most “Good to Great” (Level 5) leaders, Mike is too busy discovering the “meaninginlife” by living it through his actions and deeds to search for “the meaningoflife” by endless, often meaningless, introspection. Like such leaders, he doesn’t focus on himself too much, but on defining a vision, articulating it, and then actualizing it.
Therefore, it didn’t surprise me when he smiled shyly (when the spotlight was focused onhim) and said with great humility, “I don’t really know or spend much time thinking about that. However two things were clear to me when I arrived at Northridge Hospital: a) it’s lousy to be sick and b) it’s lousy for the families of people who are sick. So one of the first things I did was tell those two things to everyone who worked at our hospital with the two directives: a) let’s give every patient and every patient’s family the best possible experience when they are sick when they come in contact with Northridge hospital and b) don’t be sending me a lot of emails about stuff that would distract me and that you can handle on your own.”
I don’t think Mike realized it at the time (because he is not needlessly introspective), but that ability to see and articulate an observation about how lousy it is to be sick was something that everyone understood and had experienced. Furthermore, making illness a less lousy experience for patients and their families was a noble vision that everyone in the hospital would want to make happen.
It was on the heels of that offsite that I coined the phrase “silomastery,” because I had seen first hand what a great “silomaster” Mike Wall was. What is silomastery and who are the silomasters?
As I sat at tables with people from different departments of Northridge hospital I observed how different — or siloed if you will — each of them were. Purchasing was different from housekeeping; housekeeping was different from human resources; human resources was different from nursing; nursing was different from doctoring and the list went on. It was clear to me that these departments would never truly understand what it is to walk in each other’s shoes or understand and empathize with each other’s concerns. In other words, despite all of these different departments trying to cooperation with each other, they would still be siloed because of how specialized each was.
What was also clear to me was that Mike Wall, who had a bachelor’s degree in science and a master’s degree in hospital administration, had transcended all of his prior specialized training to become a “dyed in the wool” leader. As such, he was able to sit atop the siloed departments,enspireand embolden all of them to achieve the vision of “giving ill patients and their families the best possible experience when they are sick.” So compelling was his vision that siloed departments put aside their own self-interests to be part of something grander, something more satisfying, fulfilling, and gratifying.
Silomastery is not only something that has application within a company or organization, it also plays a vital role in any merger or acquisition forming a “new” company. In those instances, there is a great hazard that the pre-merged and pre-acquired companies will have such entrenched, self-interested silos between and within each company that they will never be able to get in the samecanoeand paddle in the same direction.
In order for the merger or acquisition to succeed, “merger mastery” between companies is every bit as important as “silomastery” within a company. In both instances leaders must do the following: 1) develop and articulate a compelling vision that people from both companies will not merely share, but will passionately want to be a part of; 2) develop a consensus of the most important processes to focus on to get there (one of the best people and best companies I know to do this is Ward Wieman, owner ofManagement Overload; 3) identify the strengths and passions of your key people and make sure they align with those processes to getting there; 4) get rid of distractions and of people who willneverclimb aboard and whose negativity and naysaying will only sap the energy of those who want to make it a success.
One of best examples of a merger master and the merger both between reality and fantasy and father and son was portrayed in the iconic father-son movie,Field of Dreams. In that movie Kevin Costner played Iowa farmer (and “merger master”) Ray Kinsella who was compelled to build a baseball field that fulfilled the unfulfilled dreams of the long forgotten and disgraced Chicago Black Sox baseball team. In doing so, Ray not only fulfilled those players’ dreams, but also his own of: 1) helping his worn down father fulfill a dream to play baseball; 2) having his father meet his wife and daughter; and 3) getting to“have a catch” with his dad(get out your handkerchief). When the field was finally built with the promise that “people will come” the movie ends with a pan away from Ray playing catch with his dad and miles of cars of coming to the field.
Interestingly, despite that movie being nearly twenty years old (filmed in 1989), the baseball field built for the film continues to be atop tourist draw in Iowa.
American democracy has been the grand experiment of humankind for more than two centuries. Being an ocean away from Europe and Asia, with no threats from the North or South and having a new world upon which to build a non-old world infrastructure enabled us to transcend the restrictive and limiting mindsets and capabilities of the rest of the globe and transform this country into something that had never been seen before.
However for the past four decades we have lost our way. I think this dated back to the 1960’s when idealism and all that was possible was snuffed out by the assassinations of JFK, Robert Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X and replaced by hurt and betrayal, Vietnam and a string of less than transformational Presidents. This cast us into skepticism which hardened into cynicism. Instead of remaining transformational and transcendent we slid into transactional myopia and now into transactional blindness that is fueling the fear-on-the-brink-of-panic that we are living in daily.
The hope that President elect Obama brings is that he might fulfill the promise of “what might have been” that ended with the deaths of those larger than life luminaries of the 1960’s whose lights were darkened too soon. Everything we have seen thus far in Obama is that he has been able to transcend the “zero sum” transactionally myopic AND limiting mindset of politics as usual and offer the possibility of transforming America into the world’s champion of what could be.
His victory was in no small way due to Americans being sick of bipartisan pettiness based more on winning and not losing than on helping the common good and tapping into the common goodness that we all possess.
An early criticism of his being too high minded and not relating to the masses of mere mortals bespeaks his challenge of how to be truly transformational in a world that is largely transactional. That is the elephant in the room and the worry we all share. We all want him to help us transcend our fears and immediate needs to lead us to something grander, but we live in the world of transactions (one need look no further than the volatile stock market to attest to this). The devil IS in the details and it’s in the details that we live, but if we only keep our eye on surviving today we will miss out on thriving tomorrow.
Like many, I eagerly await President elect Obama’s arrival in Washington to see if he can meet the challenge of presenting us with a future that we will all want to make happen that will be promising enough to transcend our transactional needs for immediate relief and after our fears lessen for immediate gratification. You can’t solve a transformational problem with transactional solutions.
Let us hope that a President Obama will be that rising tide we need to lift us all up and cause us to stay committed to our noble cause and calling. And good luck to him in dealing with the lowering tide of bipartisan, transactional myopia that threatens to sink us all.
It’s not what happens to you that matters, it’s what you make happen.
Barack Obama, 44th President of the United States.
Yes we need change, but even more importantly is that we need to change. It is true that unless leadership spells out a vision of a future that we will want to be a part of, we are not going anywhere. But it’s just as true that we have to go from being “ready for change” to being “ready to change.”
Most people are ready for change if it is done for them; few are ready to change if it means hard work, focus, discipline, accountability and taking responsibility for their actions (i.e. a willingness to accept and pay all the consequences of them).
The three areas that America will need to change if any large scale change is going to happen are: Mindset, Skillset, Capability.
Mindset – America has slid from a can do, will do country to a can’t do, won’t do nation. We bring more excuses than we bring results in the work we do. We have more of a spend ethic than work ethic. We are a country of burners vs. earners. We have been seduced by what’s interesting in both our work and personal lives away from what’s important. We have deteriorated from being transformational (as in democracy being humanity’s grand experiment) to being transactionally myopic (get the deal, do the deal, next deal) and finally to being transactionally blind.. It is that transactional blindness that pushes us towards panic when we are stopped from making transactions. We can’t solve a transformational problem (i.e. rising above the Darwinian survival fray where nobody wins in the end) with a transactional solution. On a more humane level, Obama and McCain have both given us a direction we need our minds to take. Obama is demonstrating the need to be inclusive vs. exclusive; McCain is demonstrating the need to be gracious in defeat and taking personal responsibility where it applies. With regard to McCain and before him Hilary Clinton, both have demonstrated a model of mental toughness that we would do well to emulatle, i.e. how much disappointment and frustration can you feel without becoming belligerent, vindictive, grudge holding and inelegant.
Skillset – We are still stuck in bricks and mortar when we need to be more technologically and informationally competent. Our children and even leaders eschew math and science and have given the advantage to the rest of the world that not only embraces those subjects, but dare I say, actually enjoys them. With regard to being late to the digital age, Jack Welch once said: “I avoided the Internet, because I couldn’t type.” Either we become competent in the skills necessary for tomorrow or we will work for others who are and who won’t take too kindly to our excuse making and complaining.
Capability – Process and infrastructure. After we have the proper can do, will do mindset and know what to do skill set, we will need a know how to use those skills process to actually implement, create or build the services or products to succeed in a global economy. Then we will need an infrastructure over and through which to do the building and creating and delivering. Little did we know that one of the best strategies for succeeding in the 21st century was to lose a war to the United States or have such a dilapidated infrastructure that you couldn’t buy or use US products and services. Enter the United States to rebuild or build those for you while letting its own infrastructure deteriorate and you have the world now tilted very much away from us.
No matter how powerful the vision, if it is not followed with readiness to change as demonstrated by the proper mindset, skillset and capability, it will never be realized.
God bless Barack Obama and John McCain, God bless America, and God bless all of God’s children.
What you claim to know or claim to be able to do has no impact on people. What does have an impact is knowing what you've already done and whether this has produced a positive, measurable result that is relevant to the person making the assessment.
If you haven't already accomplished that, then saying you can do it when you haven't will require you to b.s. and do some fancy tap dancing which anyone with half a brain will see through.
What's the solution?
Step 1 - Think of what you have already done that produced a positive, measurable result for someone other than yourself.
Step 2 - Step back and think of who or what company urgently needs what you have already done.
Step 3 - Think of how you can get in front of those people who will recognize the value of what you can offer.
For instance, I have an ability to identify, speak to and help people deal with the elephant in the room that is preventing them from moving forward. I used to do that when I would make house calls to dying patients and their families and help break the log jam of unresolved conflicts. After successfully doing that I thought, "What are situations where there are similar unresolved conflicts and time is running out?"
That opened the door to meeting with executive teams and management teams that were going through difficult transitions.
Thank God Europe, China, Japan, India and other areas are also experiencing economic meltdowns.
If you haven't noticed, rightly or wrongly the global economy has taken center stage away from wars, global warming, health, hunger, poverty (except where it involves the nouveau poor casualties from the financial crisis). The way things were going with America tanking financially and the rest of the world not, we could have been heading for the possibility of the more financially strong countries and regions forming a private equity consortium that could buy America and then try to flip it.
Fact or fiction? Think of how foreign investors have already purchased a chunk of America and it may not be so crazy as it sounds.
Actually, imagining what such a consortium would do with America is not such a bad exercise. I think here are ten ways they would cut the fat and make America a better investment than it currently is:
Adjust CEO pay and bonuses to be the same multiple of entry employees as it is in all other western countries.
Stop all bonuses to CEO's of underperforming companies. Give all CEO's of such companies an edict: "Turn the company around within two year maximum or you're fired." (If many companies routinely let go of the bottom 10 % of their employees based on performance, a private equity company would do the same with top executives.)
All excuse makers, blamers and people who act entitled to more than they deserve would be given warnings and then terminated. At the top of the list would be replacing the spoiled children of baby boomers with people from other cultures or countries with a higher work ethic who are grateful for the opportunity to work in America.
Immediately institute education and training to give Americans the proper mindset and skill sets to compete successfully in a global economy with bottom performing teachers and students outplaced to other jobs if they can't cut it.
Revamp the welfare system.
Consolidate General Motors, Ford and Chrysler under United Motors to see if they can become competitive with Japanese, Korean and German auto manufacturers. If not develop plan to develop other products and services a la GE when they sold off their appliances and IBM when they sold off their computers.
Immediately stop the war in Iraq based on economic reasons and secure from all nations dependent on the Middle East the shared responsibility for keeping that region stable.
Redistribute the money the US spends on defense above and beyond what other countries do to provide healthcare for every American.
Set specific criteria for success that are reviewed annually, if not quarterly and hold America accountable to them with clear consequences that are agreed upon ahead of time.
Turn the United Nations into a World Trade Center that is much more an extension of the global economy than an extension of Wall Street, such that all participant countries would share in keeping it safe and secure.
I welcome any and all comments from our community about what you think a private equity company would do with America.
Sadly there is much more brightness (knowing what is brand new) and smartness (knowing what will sell) than there is wisdom (knowing what is important and what is worth fighting for and what is not) in the world. If you want to bathed in wisdom from one of the wisest men on the planet you will want to attend the following event.
Join Fast Company's "Leading Edge" columnist and blogger, Dr. Mark Goulston as he interviews Warren Bennis on: "Moving From Managing to Leading" on October 28 9:30-11 AM PST/12:30-2 PM EST. Warren is considered to be the foremost authority on leadership in the world. For more info, go to: http://markgoulston.com/events/822.html.
If you owned a show dog, you would probably know the term “fearful aggression.” It occurs in tightly wound dogs that growl when they are afraid and it has to be trained out of them or else they will be kicked out and never win “best in show” You saw examples of that in the comedy movie of the same name.
Dogs are not the only living creatures with fearful aggression. People have it and John McCain has it. And it was on full display in the final Presidential debate. The drawback with having it and demonstrating it is that it triggers a reaction in viewers’ mirror neurons. According to UCLA neuroscientist, Marco Iacoboni that is the part of your brain that fires when you watch someone do something (that causes you to yawn when they yawn) and causes you to feel what they are feeling. This region is thought to be the site of empathy. This also means that viewers will also be compelled to feel their own feel fearful aggression.
So if McCain appeared uncomfortable in his own skin, it can cause viewers to feel the same.
On the other hand the frequent smile that Obama showed was more a sign of his embarrassment for McCain who was coming off as a jerk and not appearing to either know it or care about it. When our mirror neurons observed Obama, we could relate to his embarrassment for McCain, because we also felt it.
The main problem for McCain showing this is that it caused viewers to feel dissonance. Dissonance occurs when what you see and hear from someone else doesn’t match what you feel about them. In other words: “What are you going to do FOR me?/What are you going to do TO me?” Dissonance causes people to “buy out” vs. “buy in” to what you’re saying. In McCain’s case, when we watch someone who is so out of touch with how he is coming off, it can add to the feeling of his being out of touch with us.
Being in touch is not just critical to winning the election, but in being an effective leader. When people feel you really get where they’re coming from, they’re more likely to let you take them where you’d like them to go.
The question on voters minds that should be asked in the final debate is: "What have you already done individually and cooperatively that produced a positive, lasting, important,measurable result for the common good?"
Contained within it is a measure of the effectiveness, judgment, and values for each Presidential candidate.
- Effectiveness is about having already taken actions that produced lasting, measurable change for people like the electorate. It is also about being able to work independently (i.e make the final decision) and cooperatively (i.e. reach across the aisle) to accomplish those changes.
- Judgment is about knowing what is a positive and important decision and then making the judgment call to get it done.
- Values are about serving the common good. Since the President will be "presiding" over the entire country, it behooves him to do what is necessary to provide "liberty and justice for all" vs. serving his own personal, political ambition or special interest groups.
The more each candidate answers this question in a coherent, clear, non canned way that feels right, makes sense and seems doable the more confidence we will have in them. The more each fumbles when answering it and resort to canned answers that we have already heard to obfuscate a candid answer they can't supply the less confidence we will have in them.
This is not for Presidential candidates only. It is a helpful question when hiring someone for your company that will inspire your confidence by having a track record of effectiveness, judgment and values.
Recently I landed a wonderful new client. All I needed to do was remind myself of Warren’s directive above. Boy was that difficult. Along the way I had several realizations, if not revelations.
The person I was speaking to was thoughtful, on track and relevant so I didn’t need to ask questions to keep them focused. Yet there were ten times –I counted them—when I wanted to interrupt and say something. 50 % of my motivation was to add something of value to the conversation, but at least 50 % was about ego, competitiveness, a need to impress and a need to be listened to after I had been listening so patiently.
Each time I wanted to interrupt I didn’t, but I had to manage the internal conflict between wanting to remember the “brilliant” thing I wanted to say and listening to what the other person was continuing to say. The longer he went on the more difficult it was to hold onto what I wanted to say. Eventually I had to make the choice to either blurt it out or to let it go and go back to listening more deeply.Unusual for me, I selected the latter, i.e. let go of needing to say something and went back to listening deeply.
Ironically, but not surprisingly now that I think about it, each time I did this, the other person went deeper into what they wanted to speak about and what was more important and meaningful to them.By the end of the twenty minutes all I needed to do was summarize what I heard, think to myself whether or not I could help, say exactly that.
This led immediately to the other person asking me how soon I could begin.
How often do you as a leader talk without adding anything important or necessary to the discussion? How often do your people defer to you out of politeness on the outside while privately losing respect for you inside? Maybe it's time for you listen more than you talk.
Catch my live interview with Warren Bennis on "Move from Managing to Leading" on October 28, 2008 at 9:30-11 AM PST/12:30-2 PM EST. For more info go to: The Center for Great Management.
Hoisted by one’s own petard: to be hurt, or destroyed by one’s own plot or device, of one’s own doing which one intended for another; to be “blown up by one’s own bomb.”
He has no one to blame but himself; he washoisted by his own petard.
Most people have a short attention span during non-stressful times, and when they are afraid that attention span drops to zero. As a result people jump without thinking, onto what they hear, draw the wrong conclusion, and then remain fixated there resistant to new facts and evidence. Such a mindset is much stronger than all the logic and convincing in the world.
Witness how a tantrum-throwing baby can bring an entire dinner if not vacation to its knees.
This is what is happening in the current financial crisis. Once people are locked onto believing that the bailout is all about Wall Street and giving the pigs who caused it a second chance at the trough they will not change their minds.
Given how often I have seen people stay fixated on the wrong thing until the bitter end, I am not optimistic about their changing their mind soon in this crisis. I hope I am wrong.
What usually changes their mind is such a real threat (vs. “dire”) to their survival –losing that job, not having money to buy food, having their car repossessed, or junior returned from college for failure to pay tuition—that they finally see the light and being right or self-righteous doesn’t seem so important. People will keep choking on pride until something is literally choking them to death.
How did we develop such “jump to the wrong conclusion-itis?” Americans by nature find reading, listening, thinking painful and will avoid all of them if they can. They have lost their curiosity and replaced it with what is exciting in the moment. They have become adrenaline junkies where they keep chasing after what is interesting at the expense of what is important. And that compulsion/addiction is reinforced everywhere. Why wait for something to be satisfying when you can get immediate gratification now? Why bother with college when you can become an American Idol? Why bother learning when you can be a “know it all” today?
Wall Street, sensationalistic movies,video game manufacturers, ipoderations and political candidates have done everything they can to take advantage of this increasing tendency to be both thoughtless and impulsive.
On the latter note, both candidates do everything they can in every ad they run to take whatever the other has said out of context, because they know they can hook you and me and bend you to their will.
Unfortunately, this devolution (reversing evolution) of Americans from thoughtful humans to thoughtless animals has now put us all on the hook.
