Leadership Lessons: Delegating, Empowerment, and Strategic Alignment

Getting your organization strategically aligned through delegation

There are good habits that we hope all of our supervisors and managers have to help them handle the often powerful and complex challenges of leadership. Bill Gates once said:

"Virtually every company will be going out and empowering with a certain set of tools, and the big difference in how much value is received from that will be how much the company steps back and really thinks through their business processes - thinking through how their business can change, how their project management, their customer feedback, their planning cycles can be quite different than they ever were before." --Bill Gates

Some Perspective

Leaders who regularly delegate are strategically aligned with their employees to improve business processes and provide feedback. This engages employees so that they are reciprocally aligned with their leaders.

Delegating demonstrates trust and encourages development. When you have these two factors at work in your organization, you have a positive environment in which empowered employees are focused on organizational goals.

By delegating responsibilities and projects with clear communication, the bonds of the team are strengthened, manager-employee relationships are improved and a synergistic relationship results. This ties managers and employees together in strategic alignment for the achievement of business goals. A Solution One of the most powerful tools a leader will ever have is communication. There is no replacement for being able to communicate well in the delegation process. Leaders must be able to communicate the "what" and the "why" of every task they delegate. Without taking the time to communicate correctly, misunderstandings occur, workloads become unbalanced, bonds are broken, processes stall, and strategic alignment with goals never occurs.

Therefore, to delegate and empower appropriately, managers and supervisors must learn the following skills:

• Explain the need for delegation.
  
• Use delegation of tasks to motivate.
  
• Explain tasks and ask team member's view (getting feedback).
  
• Specify responsibility and authority (empowerment).
  
• Confirming team member's understanding and set up time review (process improvement).
  

In a perfect world everyone is going out and empowering as is alluded to in our quote from Bill Gates; however, delegating does more than that. It develops people who are able to work through processes and make things better. Then as people develop, they move through the corporate ladder. Delegating expresses confidence in team members and motivates them to achieve strategic goals and redefine their own potential. Delegating creates your leaders of tomorrow, who already are strategically aligned with leadership and goals. What could be better than that?

The Vital Learning curriculum is designed to meet your training and budgetary needs. Want to learn more about "Delegating" or the complete Vital Learning leadership development curriculum? Available in Classroom, Online, or Blended delivery options, the Vital Learning curriculum includes the following essential topics.

• Delegating - understanding when to use delegation and how to make it motivating
• Complaints - being able to effectively manage complaints
  
• Coaching - knowing how to productively coach job skills
  
• Project Management - being able to run projects, both on-time and on-budget
  
• Conflict - understanding how to successfully resolve conflict
  
• Hiring Winning Talent- knowing what to do to consistently hire the right talent
  
• Providing Feedback - understanding how to establish performance goals and standards and give feedback
  
• And more...

For detail go to www.TheLearningEngine.org

Leadership Lessons: Communicating Up

Communicating upward to avoid productivity spiraling downward...

Interaction today comes in two ways: human-to-human and human-to-information. As a natural extension of the Information Age, the Interaction Age has come with messaging capabilities and real-time conferencing; however, with so much technology at our fingertips, it is easy to lose sight of what makes for productive communication between team leaders and employees. Of particular concern is the kind of communication that focuses on upward communication that leads to productivity and high performance.

Some Perspective

Great team leaders actively listen to employees. They also actively encourage employees to talk to each other, to customers, and to their leaders. The good news is that most people already have the skills to communicate to their team leaders; they simply need to apply them to their manager. This is the power of human-to-human dialogue that constitutes interaction. With it, employees are able to see the vision for the company and come closer to a sense of ownership in the company initiatives. In addition, this new interaction breeds an environment of teamwork, organizational flexibility, and corporate agility.

For employees to communicate effectively, they need to have a broader understanding of their manager's style and the work environment. For example, one manager may need communications provided in an "executive summary" format as an overview, while another requires more of the detail behind the summary. In any case, employees need to feel empowered with this understanding to alert their managers when issues, concerns, problems, as well as opportunities arise. Employees, who are engaged in the kind of interaction that uses 1) an understanding of style and 2) a process for communicating effectively, create a powerful framework that produces results and a positive working environment.

Take Jack for instance. Before receiving training on a process for communicating with his manager, he was stymied by what seemed to be impossible weekly meetings with his boss, Denise. It seemed to Jack that they were always butting heads because Denise constantly needled him for more details. Jack felt like she didn't trust him.

After training, he learned that everyone has a communication style and that his boss's style was different from his own. Jack deduced that their weekly interaction was not necessarily negative nor a personal attack; it was just Denise's need for more detail. Jack now has a greater understanding of what is required to satisfy his team leader's communication style and move the conversation forward to reach their objectives. Now, Jack looks forward to his weekly meetings.

A Solution

It's actually pretty simple. When employees are trained how to communicate up, they are more committed to the organization and naturally ask for more feedback from their team leader. Everyone takes the next step, listening to each other and responding appropriately. The environment changes, and old problems clear away to be replaced by productive interactivity and passionate employee involvement.

"Communicating Up" is a program by Vital Learning that can teach your managers, team leaders, and employees to be engaged in positive interaction. This program will help your people:

• Enter meetings with well-thought out and clearly stated objectives.
  
• Clearly link objectives that support plans and goals.
  
• Move conversations toward questions that focus on understanding gained when your objective is reached.

These are just a few of the powerful tools for communicating up interaction. Putting your training plan in place to address the Interaction Age will keep the human-to-human communication on track and move it toward productive goals.

The Vital Learning curriculum is designed to meet your training and budgetary needs. Want to learn more about "Essential Skills of Leadership" or the complete Vital Learning leadership development curriculum? Available in Classroom, Online, or Blended delivery options, the Vital Learning curriculum includes the following essential topics.

• Delegating - understanding when to use delegation and how to make it motivating
• Complaints - being able to effectively manage complaints
  
• Coaching - knowing how to productively coach job skills
  
• Project Management - being able to run projects, both on-time and on-budget
  
• Conflict - understanding how to successfully resolve conflict
  
• Hiring Winning Talent- knowing what to do to consistently hire the right talent
  
• Providing Feedback - understanding how to establish performance goals and standards and give feedback
  
• And more...

For detail go to www.TheLearningEngine.org

Leadership Lessons: Coaching Job Skills

High tech + Low change = No productivity

Singularity is the term that technologists and futurists use to describe the point at which rapid technological progress leads to a quick, completed transformation of the human experience. Are your employees prepared to embrace rapid technological changes and experience singularity?

Based on the rate of past improvements, some believe that technological advances are likely to be exponential in the coming decades. For those who work in HR and training, the impact is huge. A report issued by the Society for Human Resource Management, 2015: Scenarios for the Future of Human Resource Management, brings this to the forefront as an issue to be considered now.

Some Perspective

The rapid turnover of technological knowledge may well require that employee education be embedded and coached as a part of everyday working life. A shortage of supervisors, team leaders, and managers, who are capable of coaching employees in the face of increasingly complex technologies, is quickly becoming a reality.

Take the example of Steve. He's a supervisor for a cereal processing plant. He's faced with the addition of three new machines and the need to hire new staff. It's also budget time. He's finding that he has little time to coach his current team members through job tasks related to the new machines, much less showing the new team members what to do. It's all happening too fast.

Steve's team is not likely to be productive and may be destined to fail. Why?

A Solution

In order to achieve results every coach must go beyond simply showing how to perform a task. Coaching must involve observing, analyzing, demonstrating, and developing relationships with team members. This process is essential to help team members adjust and adapt to rapid changes, and it creates a foundation of trust and respect that is essential for optimal performance.

To achieve this, your managers and team leaders should be trained and prepared to:

• Understand why coaching is important and how it supports company goals.
  
• Prepare for a coaching session using observations and analysis plans for a successful dialog.
  
• Hold a coaching conversation which improves an individual's performance and productivity.
  
• Use coaching as a way to build a valuable sense of teamwork, communication, shared goals, and collaboration.
  

While rapid change, speed, and innovation continue to transform the workplace, it is imperative that leaders are ready for this challenge with the right coaching skills that help team members work appropriately and productively.

The Vital Learning curriculum is designed to meet your training and budgetary needs. Want to learn more about "Coaching Job Skills" or the complete Vital Learning leadership development curriculum? Available in Classroom, Online, or Blended delivery options, the Vital Learning curriculum includes the following essential topics.

• Delegating - understanding when to use delegation and how to make it motivating
• Complaints - being able to effectively manage complaints
  
• Coaching - knowing how to productively coach job skills
  
• Project Management - being able to run projects, both on-time and on-budget
  
• Conflict - understanding how to successfully resolve conflict
  
• Hiring Winning Talent- knowing what to do to consistently hire the right talent
  
• Providing Feedback - understanding how to establish performance goals and standards and give feedback
  
• And more...

For detail go to www.TheLearningEngine.org

Leadership Lessons: Retaining Winning Talent

Managing talent for greater success...
If your organization is focused on growth, profitability, customer loyalty, new product introductions, employee engagement and shareholder value to name a few, you must also be in the process of managing your talent. This is a strategy that allows you to not only develop new leaders, but also retain the exceptional talent you hire. It is a tightly woven process, and what you do to retain talent must be threaded throughout all you do.

Some Perspective

The fine art of retaining talent has an effect on your ability to deliver business value. A recent survey by McKinsey & Company asked senior executives of global companies to rank obstacles that prevent them from having talent management strategies. Among the most critical, as defined by executives' response rates, were:

• 54% - Senior managers don't spend enough time on talent management
  
• 52% - Line managers are not sufficiently committed to people development
  
• 51% - Silos discourage collaboration and resource sharing
  
• 50% - Line managers are unwilling to differentiate high from low performance
  
• 47% - Senior leaders do not align talent management and business strategies
  

Here's one more statistic for you. A recent study showed that 85% of HR executives stated that the single greatest challenge they've had was their organization's ability to compete for talent.

If your organization is one of those facing obstacles with talent management, and you're concerned about your ability to compete for talent, then consider a plan to train your organization on how to effectively retain your best talent.

Most people can understand that turnover is costly in replacement expenses, but it also impacts productivity when other team members see good people leaving the organization.

Picture this scenario: Ray was an executive for a hotel chain that had lack-luster performance. Attrition of leadership was high in the organization. He decided to conduct an analysis of risk factors in retaining top talent. He identified new strategies and tactics such as creating an emerging leaders program, training future leaders, and providing more on-the-job training for line supervisors. As a result, they have recruited better talent and, more importantly, have retained that talent resulting in the value of their stock growing by more than 50% in the last five years.

A Solution

By training your managers, you will help them realize their ability to combat turnover in the organization. You will be giving them the tools they need to create a proactive and productive environment that values key talent.

"Retaining Winning Talent" is a new program from Vital Learning that teaches managers about the process of retaining talent.

Managers will understand that they need to be concerned with team member retention and how to identify individuals at risk. Managers will be able to:

• Describe the scope, severity, and cost of attrition
  
• Determine the risk of attrition for each team member Identify which retention factors motivate each team member
  
• Increase each team member's engagement and commitment
  
• Build and implement an effective
  
• Retention Action Plan for their entire team

The Vital Learning curriculum is designed to meet your training and budgetary needs. Want to learn more about "Retaining Winning Talent" or the complete Vital Learning leadership development curriculum? Available in Classroom, Online, or Blended delivery options, the Vital Learning curriculum includes the following essential topics.

• Delegating - understanding when to use delegation and how to make it motivating
• Complaints - being able to effectively manage complaints
  
• Coaching - knowing how to productively coach job skills
  
• Project Management - being able to run projects, both on-time and on-budget
  
• Conflict - understanding how to successfully resolve conflict
  
• Hiring Winning Talent- knowing what to do to consistently hire the right talent
  
• Providing Feedback - understanding how to establish performance goals and standards and give feedback
  
• And more...

For detail go to www.TheLearningEngine.org

Leadership Lessons: Blended Learning

Two for one... From a training perspective, sophisticated technologies provide endless opportunities for the delivery of training. They offer just about every combination you can think of between the classroom and online. In a recent study on lifelong learning trends, students preferred a moderate amount of technology in their learning programs, viewing it as supplemental to classroom instruction.

Technology can be one of the major keys to success when applied properly. It satisfies the need to keep employees engaged; it satisfies customers both internally and externally; it also offers employees learning opportunities.

Some Perspective

Originally, most people thought "blended" learning would save them time in the classroom. What we are finding is that rather than saving time, blended learning offers higher value and more effective training. Thus, when participants complete an online module prior to an upcoming class, they come to class armed with the basic terminology and skill points. This knowledge positions them to be ready for discussion and practice. With blended learning, they have the additional advantage of returning online for reinforcement and practice to further ingrain their new skills. This is what real blended learning is all about.

In a recent study conducted by the University Continuing Education Association (UCEA), more than 80 percent of Chief Learning Officers indicated that online learning strategies would play an increasing role in their companies over the next two or three years.

Studies also indicated that learners appreciated trainers, who used the technology wisely to guide participants through online learning and add value to the process.

It is also important to have high quality and alignment with the content -- There needs to be a strong connection between the material taught and the practices and objectives of the organization. When training and business practices are in sync, productivity and improved performance are not far behind.

A Solution Look for organizations that provide both online components and classroom elements that mirror each other. These components might include fully- accessible online videos and skill practice exercises that can support the classroom component and that can be replayed by the learner at a later time for reinforcement of the skills learned. The flexibility of the online component should allow you to structure the learning segments for use before and after the classroom portion of the course.

At Vital Learning Corporation we have readily available programs in formats that allow you to transition and blend traditional classroom training with online. Blended learning has gone strategic. Is it time for your organization to follow?

The Vital Learning curriculum is designed to meet your training and budgetary needs. Want to learn more about "Blended Learning" or the complete Vital Learning leadership development curriculum? Available in Classroom, Online, or Blended delivery options, the Vital Learning curriculum includes the following essential topics.

• Delegating - understanding when to use delegation and how to make it motivating
• Complaints - being able to effectively manage complaints
  
• Coaching - knowing how to productively coach job skills
  
• Project Management - being able to run projects, both on-time and on-budget
  
• Conflict - understanding how to successfully resolve conflict
  
• Hiring Winning Talent- knowing what to do to consistently hire the right talent
  
• Providing Feedback - understanding how to establish performance goals and standards and give feedback
  
• And more...

For detail go to www.TheLearningEngine.org

Leadership Lessons: Essential Skills of Communicating

Promoting open and honest communication...

In today's world, we have communication innovations such as iPODs, Instant Messaging, Text Messaging and other technically savvy ways of communicating. However, it is the essential skills of communicating that really allow an individual to convey a message to their team that will inspire, create, and drive free-thinking and innovation.

Some Perspective

The foundation for great communication is openness. When a manager encourages the free exchange of open, honest communication, people are not afraid to offer up new ideas or disagree with an old one that could be improved. When this is done consistently by all your managers, it signals a change in your organization that brings innovation to the table. Innovation leads to better ways to serve the customer and eventually comes back to your bottom line in increased productivity and revenue.

Because of workplace diversity, managers also have to be cognizant that the way they communicate can't be a one-size-fits-all conversation. Managers have to be concerned with understanding individual team members' interests and tailoring their messages accordingly.

Great companies have managers who communicate openly and often, ask for feedback, listen, and then respond appropriately. Take Grand Circle Corp., a Boston travel company, which is one of HR Magazine's 50 Best Small & Medium Places to Work. Grand Circle defines what they celebrate as "open and courageous communication" as being willing to ask tough questions, give constructive feedback to others, and accept such feedback without defensiveness. It's one of the organization's values.

What happens when you have both innovative communication technologies and managers trained to communicate more effectively? Employees look forward to coming to work because the organization promotes good, open communication and innovation.

A Solution

Communication technology in conjunction with managers, who communicate well, will streamline work, accelerate transactions, release creativity, and empower employees. High Performance Innovation is one of the top ten forecasts of what every business needs to prepare for according to the Institute for Global Futures 2007 Global Trends Report.

Making the next step toward an innovative culture means you need to train your managers well. "Essential Skills of Communicating" is one program from Vital Learning that can help you to have a high performing, innovative organizational culture by:

• Creating a climate of open communication
• Design clear, concise messages
• Listening to communicate

The Vital Learning curriculum is designed to meet your training and budgetary needs. Want to learn more about "Essential Skills of Communicating" or the complete Vital Learning leadership development curriculum? Available in Classroom, Online, or Blended delivery options, the Vital Learning curriculum includes the following essential topics.

• Delegating - understanding when to use delegation and how to make it motivating
• Complaints - being able to effectively manage complaints
  
• Coaching - knowing how to productively coach job skills
  
• Project Management - being able to run projects, both on-time and on-budget
  
• Conflict - understanding how to successfully resolve conflict
  
• Hiring Winning Talent- knowing what to do to consistently hire the right talent
  
• Providing Feedback - understanding how to establish performance goals and standards and give feedback
  
• And more...
  

For details go to www.TheLearningEngine.org

Leadership Lessons: New Goals for 2009

Tough Times

The economic crisis has brought a new business reality to today's leaders. The jobs of human resources and training professionals have expanded so that they are now in ensuring that performance goals and standards are in sync with this new reality. According to management issues.com and a research study of more than 1,500 high-income U.S. workers conducted by the Center for Work-Life Policy, managers will have their work cut out for them in maintaining the moral and engagement of those left-behind in the face of long hours, uncertainty and stress. These factors essentially drive productivity in the wrong direction.

Organizations must be smart about the kind of training that they provide for managers, supervisors and team leaders. With employees becoming increasingly more demoralized, encouraging them to work harder and step up to the plate to deliver is not enough. Organizations must maintain loyalty and trust in this scenario. An employee can be working very hard, but may not be doing the right thing. Often, the employee is the first to know it. The Center for Work-Life Policy's study indicated that employees who said they felt loyal to their companies fell from 95 percent to a little more than 50 percent over the past year. That's startling. Are your workers starting to crash?

What to Do Now

One of the most important things team leaders can do right now to turn the tougher environment in their favor or stop it from becoming negative, is to start preparing for 2009. Developing goals and performance standards that teams can look forward to makes them feel like they are a part of the plan and a part of the solution. They see that someone is actually asking them to define the issues and the goals to deliver results that they feel good about!

Manage the Knowledge A second issue associated with this is how you empower employees with knowledge to deal with new issues and pressures. Part of the planning process is to develop a system whereby much of the existing knowledge surrounding tough business issues is available for employees to find out what they need to know. The rise of the knowledge-based economy requires more attention to knowledge filtered through the organization for greater transparency in the planning process. Performance goals must encompass this aspect. Teams can then identify their needs and issues as well as and current and potential barriers to individual and organizational performance. This allows for organizational strategies to bubble up and for focuses to become solidified. Findings from performance standard sessions lead to further knowledge and better performance.

Key Behavior Modeling

Your training program for the development of performance goals should include highly practical and interactive components that provide participants with a clear framework to successfully prepare for a changing and challenging environment. Through exercises that are tailored to the environment, team leaders and employees gain insights into more competitive strategies, value opportunities and clear lifecycles for development. These are the practice sessions that identify and set performance standards that are specific, measurable, attainable, results-oriented and time-framed using concrete language that can help employees justify sound business decisions when they are on the job.

Case Study

Marty has been a top performer in his organization. The economy has been tough and the organization made a decision to downsize, eliminating three of Marty's peers. In the re-structuring, Marty received three new teams to manage. He determined what some of his team members did, organizationally, but productivity is off because of the changes. Many individuals on Marty's new and old teams are disgruntled and frustrated. Marty is working longer hours and is finding it harder to be a team player. He feels like the re-structuring was a bad decision and no one asked his opinion about the plan. Now, Marty is being asked to create a strategic plan together and have it finished by the end of the month. He has vented to his team about it. "Nobody is taking this seriously," he said. "This is just a piece of paper; we all know that this isn't how it really works." Marty's collective team is now completely de-motivated and starting to see their frayed manager come apart at the seams. The result is that Marty might find it difficult to engage his employees in and individual performance development processes. Apathy rolls down hill. Nothing positive is occurring in this scenario.

If a good process of setting performance goals and standards were in place, Marty might have faired better by coming up with concrete solutions with his team members that could be integrated with a better strategic plan.

Developing a Roadmap

Increased demand and competition, a complex marketplace, tough workforce decisions and changing technologies are all impacting organizations today. A good performance and development planning process is the key to developing a clear roadmap to guide employees through the rough terrain ahead. This starts with well-trained managers, supervisors and team leaders. Train them with "Developing Performance Goals and Standards" by Vital Learning. Then ask them to commit to applying what they have learned immediately. Leaders benefit from the following:

• Learning to influence future results from their team rather than leaving it to chance.
  
• Planning that will increase job contentment among team members and eliminate confusion.
  
• Improved quality of work through planning which ensures that work is conducted properly and in a timely manner.
  
• Leaders who plan usually discover what works and what doesn't, then seek to improve individuals, teams and the organization.

For general supervisory leadership skills, we continue to offer you the award-winning series by Vital Learning. Available in Classroom, Online, or Blended delivery options, the Vital Learning curriculum includes the following essential topics.

• Delegating - understanding when to use delegation and how to make it motivating
• Complaints - being able to effectively manage complaints
  
• Coaching - knowing how to productively coach job skills
  
• Project Management - being able to run projects, both on-time and on-budget
  
• Conflict - understanding how to successfully resolve conflict
  
• Hiring Winning Talent- knowing what to do to consistently hire the right talent
  
• Providing Feedback - understanding how to establish performance goals and standards and give feedback
  
• And more...

For detail go to www.TheLearningEngine.org