I Fought the Law

Try to watch “Law and Order” as if you’ve never seen an episode before.  Pretend like those two Bum-Bumps are the first time you’ve heard them.  It’s fascinating to watch the entire hour and see how the two detectives process the investigation which typically leads to the court case.  I used to watch the original “Law and Order” religiously.  Yes, I know that there are SVU, CI, SUV and hybrid versions, but I was a fan of the original.  The course of action taken by the detectives is methodical, a bit stale and thorough, but it works.

For the employee who comes to the HR department with a complaint, inquiry or charge, there is an expectation for answers and investigation.  HR loves the answers, but perhaps to a fault.  Our ability to provide solution to the complaint may not really handle the issue at hand.  The employee can feel his/her issue has been minimized as he/she leaves your office (or cubicle area or working table or Segway mobile office).  Are we satisfied with just an “answer” or do we need to spend time trying to understand where this issue comes from?

Honestly, there are times that a simple answer is all that is needed.  Let’s not make a mountain out of molehill.  If someone comes to complain about not being off for Arbor Day, that may be a very quick conversation.  Something like, “I’m sorry that you’d like the company to be closed for Arbor Day, but if you have PTO available to you, perhaps you could plan on using some in order to spend time planting trees to honor the day.”  Smile sincerely and usher them out.  Close the door and reflect on why you’ve chosen the career you have.  After a few minutes, you’ll be back at it!

But what about the ones that take a bit more?  If an employee asks about hours not paid on a paycheck, then perhaps a quick look at the time system, finding where the data was corrupt or not transferred into payroll will prevent the occurrence in the future.  Perhaps there is a bit of management training needed.  Perhaps the employee needs a reminder on the time clock.  Perhaps it’s a one-time Gremlin in the system.  All it would take is a little bit of research mixed with a little bit of conversation and/or training.

And then, there are the ultimate investigations, such as harassment, discrimination or theft.  A process for this investigation should be in place.  What will it take for the company to handle the claims presented?  Is there a path to follow?  No? 

There are components of good investigation that are universal.  Try to work within a flow of process in those components in order to gather the information needed.  An investigation is serious and it does require professionalism in approach.  If you are the HR person who would lead or conduct the investigation, have you established yourself in the company as someone capable of such work?  If you’ve been relegated or allowed yourself to be relegated to the party-planning HR person or the gossip-laden HR person, then it’s not likely that you’ll gather all of the data necessary in your investigation.

Staff may not be able to draw a line between the “Buddy HR” person and the “Detective HR” person you’re trying to be.  That is a tall order.  As such, determine whether outside help might be needed.  Does your process allow for this possibility?  Between the HR role played, the characters in the investigation and the subject matter involved, an outside expert might be the most beneficial for the organization.  Be okay with letting someone in.  It’s not about dirty laundry but about ascertaining the truth and finding solution, however difficult that may be.

Be clear, too, in the fact that you will need to speak with others.  When an employee starts his/her complaint to you with “Please don’t say anything, but…”, you can be sure that you’re likely going to need to say something to someone else.  A true investigation will need facts and accounts from all parties named and involved.  Keeping this between us is not possible, let alone the matter of law that may be in play.  Disclosure may be required.  Consult your counsel if you have questions in any of these areas.  Likely an attorney will tell you that you cannot promise to keep what’s shared only between you two.

There are great resources available to you to help with investigation.  Take the time to research and develop a plan prior to needing a plan.  You will be able to approach plan development with less stress and with more clarity of thought.  Talk to your senior team, your counsel, your HR colleagues in other companies, your SHRM group…anyone who has been through developing a process.  Learn from their victories and hiccups.

And while it may not be the wisest to wear a badge around the office as if you’re the cop on duty, you should establish yourself as being an integral part of the investigative process at your company.  Just pin the badge on the inside of your suit coat or sweater.  You can know it’s there.  Bum-Bump.

The Boss

Managing people is a skill. Yes, there are attributes that come easier for some which allow them to manage easier, but the use and refinement of those attributes is what makes it right.  The guilt some feel about not being a good manager is often a result of comparison to one of these “naturals.”

Are you a natural?  Do you find yourself easily speaking with your team?  Do you find that there is an ability to connect with people that just flows from you?  That’s wonderful! But, it doesn’t mean that you’re managing people.  It could mean that you are a great friend, a great listener, or a great motivator, but it doesn’t mean management is natural.  Being the boss is meant to be categorized by effectiveness, best use of talent and profitability, to start, not merely being the "fun" manager.

Think about a boss you’ve had that you liked. Perhaps the reason you liked him/her is because of the great manner with which your department was led.  You liked that he/she took the reigns, presented as a resource for the team and kept everyone focused on the mission.  You like that.  You crave good direction.  You desire knowledgeable people to take seriously their role.  Perhaps.

Or perhaps it was because you connected with him/her relationally.  You had common interests.  You shared a passion for sports, for a hobby or for beer (maybe beer is a hobby?).  You got to know each other’s families.  You shared time outside of work being social.  Did that make the person a great manager?  Or merely a great friend?

I am not suggesting that every manager become a Miranda Priestly and remain clearly unfriendly and distant.  However, I am suggesting that swinging the pendulum too far the other way might make managing just as a difficult.  Hone in the skill sets needed to manage effectively and use those skills as you rally your team together.

Time – There is a skill involved in planning and in the usage of time.  If you are someone that just lets things “get away from you” then you aren’t managing.  Time needs to be managed.  Haven’t we all looked at the clock during the work day and thought, “How can it be 3PM? I haven’t gotten done what I needed to today.”  Be competent in time management and help your team to pursue a similar goal.  Efficiencies to process are certainly business-centric and are worth the effort.

Material Knowledge – What do we make, how do we make it, why do we make it.  If it’s a service-related industry, follow the same pattern – what do we do, how do we do it, why do we do it.  You’ve got to know this backward and forward, and be able to translate it well to your team.  They will look to you to see how seriously they should know the answers to those questions.  If it’s just a job for you, then don’t be surprised when it’s just the same for your team.  Be passionate about the ingredients, materials, resources used to get done what you are tasked to get done.

Communication – “Hey, Bud, how ya doin’ today?” should not serve as the moniker of your relational investment.  What does that communicate?  Likely, you are a necessary person in my life and I can’t avoid it.  Intentionality in communication is necessary.  Plan what needs to be said; don’t hope you remember.  Know what and why things have to be shared, the time it will take to do so and the opportunities for that communication to be collaborative. 

Of course, there are more elements than this, but deciding to become proficient in these areas will certainly impact the team being managed.  Once there is a mastery in skill development and process, then begin to attack the next step.  It will become second nature.

The effort matters.  A manager who is deliberate in seeking to refine those skills or to develop new ones sets a stronger tone in his/her department right away.  Your staff will recognize that you’re not there to be everyone’s best friend, but to be a developer of talent by taking seriously your own development.  It also communicates a belief that not everyone is a “natural.”  It’s okay to work at it.  Think about the impact on the team you lead if they see you studying, practicing and exercising these skills.  You will be encouraging them to do the same in their areas of functional responsibility and soft skill development.

There were many days were I would have liked to do a “Devil-Wears-Prada-Throw-My Jacket-On-The-Head-Of-An-Employee” moment, but I didn’t.  I had to make the decision that the proactive development of my management style would be compromised by either creating a too-friendly demeanor or a too-mean demeanor.  So, hold onto your jacket as you walk in and hang it up yourself!

Digging Your Scene

Dance, baby, dance.  Get up and move.  Shake your thing.  That’s it, make it groove.  Use your hips.  Get down into the floor.  Arch your back more.  Work it!

Those are various performance phrases used in the dance world to encourage excellence in the performer.  Uncomfortable?  Did it make you think I’d finally snapped?  (Don’t answer that).  A dancer needs to have his/her performance graded early on so that he/she can make corrections to the movement in the dance.  If a choreographer has developed a sequence of movement to tell a story and thoughtfully chosen a piece of music to compliment the story, it’s vital that the dancer perform the movement exactly to match the intention of the story.  Real time performance review is necessary.

In the case of the dancer, the choreographer is there teaching the dance.  He/She can then provide timely feedback, such as listed above, and encourage the dancer to move differently or with more precision when working to execute the story through dance.  Travis Wall, one of the best current choreographers, has to be unyielding in seeing his vision executed and so has to watch his dancers often and provide commentary.  A dancer then adjusts in real time.  And when the performance is shared with an audience, the efforts are displayed, and in Travis’s case, usually without flaw.

Intentionally taking the time to watch the scenes of performance that our employees create is a responsibility of management.  It is not to sit in an office and hope they are doing what they should be.  It’s not just looking at numbers at the end of a day or week, and then make grandiose decisions about staffing and product or service implementation.  The repetition of bad choices made in this context overflows into poor corporate culture, low gross sales, inferior candidates and frustrated management. 

Watch what’s happening in the “dance” scenes you’re creating at work.  Give feedback.  It does not need to be done via the official performance review annual form.  It doesn’t have to be a quarterly review.  It CAN include those things, but that’s not all it is.

As a kid, when I was doing my homework, my mom would look over my shoulder every so often to check.  If the writing was rushed and sloppy, she would tell me to erase it and write it again.  The longer she took to check in on me left open the possibility that I would have more to erase.  If she caught me after only doing a few, it was more manageable to correct the behavior and the remaining work was done neater.  It’s the same for management.  Observe often.

Micromanagement, by the way, is not the same as observing often.  A course correction is the responsibility of the manager by knowing why and how staff are travelling a certain road.  A micromanager is telling staff how to move their left foot forward, and then the right foot, and then the left again, and then the right and so on.  Travis can dance the choreography he creates himself, but the point is to take that vision and entrust it to the skill sets demonstrated in the dancers he works with regularly.  The cause is spread to a wider circle and therefore a wider impact.

Give staff the opportunity to perform.  Tell them the objectives and watch what they do.   And along the way, affirm what’s working and advise on what should look or be different.  Keep coming back to the mission or purpose of the work.  Managers have to be involved in what their teams are doing, with consistency and investment.  Come up alongside those employees who are working to make the mission happen and encourage them.  Praise and critique are encouraging, if it comes from an involved, invested perspective.  Do your staff see you that way?

The surprise in good performance review is that it seems very much like conversation.  It feels very much like smart people sitting together to get better at the responsibilities they have.  It opens the door for a deeper understanding of the support, tools and practice needed.  And it also allows for honest dialogue, due to the consistency of review, regarding who can do what’s needed.  Sometimes staff will even call themselves out to say that they don’t have the full skill set required.  And those are employees you want to keep for a long time, even if it means a role change.

Like me, for instance.  I know that in my mind, I dance with as much passion and skill as Alex Wong and could absolutely handle the choreography of Travis Wall.  And though I have been known to “get down”, the vision in my mind won’t make it a reality.  When I leap around the house with my daughters, they remind me, too, that I might not quite have the skills to dance or to choreograph.  Seriously? Have you seen me do the Cha-Cha Slide? Breathtaking. 

Respect (by +Victorio Milian)

95 years ago women earned the right to vote on a national level in the United States. On August 18, 1920, the Nineteenth Amendment of the US Constitution was ratified. This Amendment prohibited United States citizens from being denied the right to vote based on their gender.

---

"The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex."

---

95 years. It seems like a long time ago, and yet... not really. In the cooperative (co-op for short) where I live there are numerous neighbors of that age or older. The co-op itself was built in the 1920's, so many of its first residents knew what is was like to live under both sets of legal circumstances. Also, that's roughly two generations removed from me. My grandmothers were kids when this went into effect, possibly making them the first women in their respective families to be able to vote. That makes this (in my mind at least) more tangible, and more horrifying as well.

It probably seems like a no-brainer now, but denying people the right to be full participants in what's considered to be a democratic republic was considered normal and proper at one time. And just because it was ratified doesn't mean that further resistance had to be overcome in order for the Nineteenth Amendment's intended purpose to be fully realized. Enacting a law doesn't necessarily mean it won't be challenged in some way, as evidenced by the use of discriminatory Black Code laws to circumvent legal protections afforded to African Americans following the Civil War.

Photo by Gordon Parks

Social justice, like any large scale change management process, is imperfect. It requires perseverance, the ability to convincingly articulate the need for change, and thick skin to deal with doubters (and worse). It involves successes (both big and small), and set-backs. It also requires building coalitions amongst those looking to achieve similar goals. Unfortunately, coalition building is easier said than done.

As important as all of these qualities are, successful change on the scale of an organization or larger requires enough people aligned around the change in question. With regards to the woman's suffrage movement (the driving force behind the Amendment's passage), it took more than the well known efforts and profiles of figures such as Susan B. Anthony, Lucretia Mott, and Elizabeth Cady Stanton to achieve success. It required the efforts, large and small, of people from many backgrounds who believed in the main purpose of the change in question.

Large scale change can be daunting work. Consider then what the potential impact will be. In the case of the Nineteenth Amendment, it meant that legally, women can now be fully engaged in the American voting process. That change also meant that they could also participate in the economic growth and development of the country. For example, according to a 2011 report published by McKinsey and Company, between 1970 and 2009, women went from holding 37% of all jobs to nearly 48%. This increase in workforce participation contributes to the country's Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Giving people the ability to be heard can also impact bottom line results.

For business leaders looking to make (or may be reluctant to make) deep organizational changes, consider what was accomplished on August 18, 1920.

What sort of impact are you seeking to make?

Apologize

Simple: When you do something wrong, say you’re sorry.  Whether that action was purposeful or accidental, a sincere apology should be offered to those affected by the action(s).  It’s very simple.  Yet, the truth is that it’s hard to do. 

We love to watch others mess up, though, don’t we?  We are outraged at public figures who make mistakes – small and large – and then have to apologize in public ways.  Tiger Woods, Bill Clinton, Michael Phelps, Ariana Grande, Charlie Sheen, Kanye West, Hope Solo, Mel Gibson, Michael Vick, etc. have all had to do it.  We hunker down to watch TMZ show us all of the dirt that lead to the apology and then listen to interviews of “professionals” who diagnose the apologies offered.  We are sick people.

On an individual basis, we don’t like being wrong.  Usually, it’s because we really don’t think we’re wrong.  We choose to put our efforts into defending our position, outlining the course of events that lead to the repercussions and to bringing up the twelve previous wrongs of the “offended” party.  We’d rather keep the truth of our wrongdoing to ourselves.

Consider this: How many people do you think do wrong things daily?  Even if 75% of those doing wrong do so on purpose, there are still 25% of those who’ve done wrong without intention.  Why should it be hard for 25% of the population to apologize when a mistake is made?  FYI – that would be about 1.75 billion people.  There would be media coverage and interviews due to the buzz of apology.

In our businesses, why is the act of apology disproportionate?  Specifically, why is it difficult to have senior leadership own their shortcomings?  News flash: There are qualified individuals in senior leadership roles who make mistakes.  Think about the first time you held a new position.  Not just with a new company, but the position itself was new to you.  You’d never been a manager before.  A director, a VP, or a CEO before.  It had to be the first time at some point.  Why would anyone think that someone in a new role would get it all right all of the time?  Apologies should be expected to come.

And pride?  Please.  You’re going to make mistakes.  Own them.  Your pride can handle it, and if you think it can’t, you shouldn’t be working where you work, or in the role you have…or with people.  Own it and say you’re sorry.  You cannot really think that you are the first to make an error, do you?  You think because you’re a CEO, you will damage your reputation or status as a leader by owning mistakes?  Think about what you’re doing to your reputation by not owning the mistakes you’ve made.  Everyone knows already; your screw-ups aren’t a secret.

The other side of the coin is not right either.  Don’t you know someone who often begins sentences with, “I’m sorry”?  Stop apologizing for so much.  When you say you’re sorry all of the time, it’s like crying wolf.  It loses its punch and sincerity.  What about when you really need to apologize?  Won’t it seem like every other sentence?

Offering the apology is appropriate when something was done wrong.  Offering the apology is appropriate when something was received wrongly.  Of course your intention is important, but it may not overshadow the way others took what you said/did.  The apology, too, does not negate the consequence that may come from your actions.  It does, however, set the tone for the consequence and it just might allow others to support you more willingly as you travel that road.

You may have noticed that the apology is one-sided.  Offering it does not mean the response you’d like will come.  You may apologize and that offended party may not forgive you.  That is not something you can fix.  The other party may need time, may need to work things out, may never come around.  That’s not your responsibility.  Yours is to genuinely say you’re sorry. 

Our staff and leadership need to know they can make mistakes, offer an apology, correct the errors and choose differently moving forward.  If the same errors keep happening, even though apologies are offered, it might not be the best role for the person.  Repetition is a great teacher both for the individual and the community.  Giving people room to learn means mistakes.  Giving people room to consistently repeat the same mistakes is foolishness. 

Again, saying your sorry is tough.  It’s uncomfortable and awkward.  It’s dynamically opposed to our natural inclination.  It’s a reminder to us that we’re not perfect.  Just remember that we’re all in the same boat.  That will help us to offer the apology from a right frame of reference…and maybe to receive it rightly, too.