Moving to Telework

Why move to telework? Telework has environmental and cost benefits.

According to a Harris poll, U.S. workers waste an estimated $4.3 billion in energy costs each year and generate 32 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions from this energy consumption. From a business prospective, the benefits of telework include gains in productivity, the ability to access a global talent pool (including people with disabilities who find it difficult to work in an office environment), lower overhead costs, and a hedge against the risk of natural or manmade disasters.

The authors liken a successful telework leader to a symphony conductor who brings together a diverse group of musicians to play a complex piece of music successfully. The leader must be able to get all employees (both those who telework and those who do not) to work off a common platform of clear, open, disciplined, and deliberate communication.

Before even implementing a telework arrangement, the leader must ask if the workforce or team has the skills, abilities, commitment, and time to learn and use both the technology and communication skills required for telework. Then, if the company decides to implement telework, the leader must make sure that all employees understand both the why and how of telework.

The authors’ advice is to communicate, communicate, and communicate again. Since everyone processes information differently, it is important to use many different means of communication (e-mail, company blogs, podcasts, etc.) for the same message.

Closely linked to communication is change management. Leaders must work through barriers of resistance for many employees to accept telework and for telework to be successful.

Change management might include celebrating small successes, using hard data to create a case for change, and using interpersonal skills. An organization’s or team’s culture is important to the success of telework.

Culture can propel people forward in the desired direction or serve as a roadblock. Culture influences and reinforces behaviors without the need for formal documentation or guidelines.

When telework is in conflict with the corporate culture, teleworking arrangements are likely to fail.
Recognizing an organization’s culture requires recognizing what the organization truly values.

For an organization that values a lot of face-to-face time, telework is a hard fit. The authors note that although successful telework cultures vary, they generally have several things in common.

Looking for more resources on that will help boost your career? Look into business book summaries found on BusinessSummaries.com.

Organize According To Your Priorities

Living a clutter-filled life requires no particular skill – anyone can get the hang of it. Who is the most likely to be unorganized?

It’s those who have not identified their priorities and established supporting goals.

To organize effectively, it helps if you identify your priorities. Otherwise, you’re organizing without a goal.

Priorities are broad elements of life.

They are so basic that you can often misplace them somewhere in your go-go schedule. Start identifying
your priorities, and you’ll realize that much of the clutter you have collected does not serve you or support what you have deemed to be of importance.

Much of what you have assembled in the places and spaces of your life is useless!

The five-step procedure that follows is simple and direct and will help you to establish priorities.

1. Write down everything that is important to you, assigned to you, or that you seek to achieve. Feel free to make this list long and involved.

2. Several hours later or even the next day, revisit your list. Cross out those things that, on second reading, are not that crucial. Combine any items that appear similar to each other. The object of this second encounter is to dramatically pare down your list. If you have too many priorities, you are likely to feel anxious and frustrated. We can’t all be Superman.

3. Now, restructure, redefine, and rewrite your list if necessary; seek to streamline it. When in doubt, toss it out. If you’re unsure if an item belongs on the list, chances are, it doesn’t.

4. Put your list away and take it out the next day or the day after that. Now review it as if you are seeing it for the first time. Can any items be combined? Can anything be dropped? Should anything be reworded? As always, if something seems as if it is not that important, it probably isn’t, so feel free to drop it!

5. Go ahead and make a working list of what you feel are your priorities at this time. Yes, things will shift and change as time marches on, but this is your list for now.

The 60 Second Organizer is a valuable resource and a daily action guide to help you become a more organized person in your workplace and make it a total and effective lifestyle. To read a book summary of 'The 60 Second Organizer' please visit BusinessSummaries.com.

Assessing Your Own Work Performance

Is it human nature that we don’t stop to assess our performance most of the time? We’d rather plow ahead, hell-bent for leather, to what’s next, whether or not we’re proceeding wisely in pursuit of a given task or goal.

However, when it comes to generating innovative ideas, self-assessment is a valuable tool. If you’re in a meeting, especially one you’re conducting, record the conversation for playback later, perhaps while you’re driving!

As you listen to what transpired. Ask yourself:

• When people suggest a new idea, are you cutting them off at the pass?
• What happens when you suggest a new idea?
• If your idea doesn’t get an immediate warm reception, do you prefer to toe the line rather than rock the boat?

When you have some time, letting an idea marinate can help you gain perspective:

Put your idea in a drawer. That is, put the notes, folders, documents, and what have you in a drawer and don’t open it for a couple of days. Later, revisit the idea and see if it still seems as valid and worthwhile as when you first devised it.

Bounce your ideas off of others. This activity is recommended throughout the book, as other people’s reactions can give you valuable information about how good your idea is and what you may need to do to sell it to others.

Give it a five-time review. Review your idea on five separate occasions. Anytime it seems as if it doesn’t have sufficient merit, go ahead and chuck it. However, if it survives five intermittent reviews, proceed at full speed. You probably have something worth developing.

This article was based on the book, "Leadership in High-Performance Organizational Cultures" by Stanley D. Truskie, PhD. A book summary is available on BusinessSummaries.com.

The Optimally Balanced Culture

Organizational cultures take time to evolve. Patterns of consistent behavior do not emerge overnight.

A newer organization, in its early stage of development, may not have as strong and embedded a culture as an organization that has been around for some time. But, even an organization that has been around for years may not have a strong culture.

The goal for leaders should be to form a strong, optimally balanced culture by incorporating appropriate ‘characteristics’ which are described in the following sections.

THE COOPERATION CULTURE

This cultural pattern stems from the term ‘collectivism’, which is rooted in family values especially those of Asia, South America, and Southern Europe. Being of service to one another, and to the group is a very important value.

Relatedly, each member develops a greater commitment to cooperative efforts and creates a positive concern for collective interests.

This culture values and develops teamwork. Individuals and member groups strive to help each other.

Relationships are very important, as is open communication. Members approach and solve problems together. Interpersonal conflicts are dealt with openly and constructively.

THE INSPIRATION CULTURE

The inspiration cultural pattern values self-determination, encourages individual initiative, and shows concern for the total person including one’s freedom, growth and development. Members of this culture are inspired to achieve because they truly believe in, and trust an organization that is concerned about people as individuals, and who treats them with dignity and respect.

This culture also demonstrates social responsibility by demonstrating concern and support for all individuals, not just its members.

The inspiration culture is driven by ‘doing good’, or improving the human condition by making things better than they were before. This culture takes its social responsibility seriously. It attempts to build moral content into its purpose or mission.

It strives to be a model citizen. It is a culture of mercy and compassion. This translates into developing people, recognizing what people contribute, responding to family and community problems, and sourcing from disadvantaged groups.

THE ACHIEVEMENT CULTURE

The achievement cultural pattern values competition, being the best, striving for excellence, advancing and improving performance. This culture constantly strives to be at the leading edge.

This culture is held together by a commitment to winning. The long term aim is the achievement of measurable goals and targets.

This is highly productive culture is marked by hard work, drive, and discovery.

The achievement culture’s emphasis is to work against a standard of excellence. The standard may be related to past performance; an objective measure; the performance of others or even what anyone has ever done.

The achievement culture is guided by these qualities in attempting to become “best in class” and have a superior advantage over its competitors.

THE CONSISTENT CULTURE

The consistent cultural pattern values stability, predictability and order. It strives to consistently produce key results expected by its customers and stakeholders.

It monitors results versus plan in some detail, identifying deviations, and then planning and organizing to resolve these deviations.

The consistent culture strives for control. This is done through the examination of pertinent statistics and facts.

Critical data and information are carefully collected, thoroughly analyzed and systematically examined. No stone is left unturned, so to speak.

Leaders in the culture take a long time to gather and systematically analyze the facts.


Do you want to know more about developing an effective workplace culture? Resources are available at BusinessSummaries.com. 

The Heart of a Leader: The Seven Qualities of Leadership

Leadership is more about who someone is than what they do. The more a person incorporates the essence of leadership internally, the more effective they are as a leader on the outside. More than 3,000 studies on leadership traits have been conducted over the years, and seven key qualities have been identified. The good news is these qualities can be learned.



Quality #1: Vision - Leaders have a clear picture of where they want to go and how to get there, and are able to articulate that vision to others. They have strong beliefs and values which they are unwilling to compromise, and combine these with goal-oriented, measurable action.

Quality #2: Courage - Leaders are willing to take risks in order to innovate and to maintain the “continuous offensive” toward the company’s stated goals, even if there is no guarantee of success. However, smart leaders gather as much information as possible to reduce the element of risk before making a decision. They also practice “courageous patience,” or the ability to stay the course even when things are not going well, and exhibit the ability to remain calm during a crisis.

Quality #3: Integrity - Integrity is most often cited by executives as the key leadership quality, and forms the foundation on which all other leadership traits are based. It requires dealing with every situation or challenge based upon the facts or the reality rather than upon assumptions, and accepting responsibility when things go wrong, and then focusing on solving the problem.

Quality #4: Humility - Leaders must take the blame when mistakes are made, and offer congratulations to others for success. Humility does not imply weakness, but reflects the self-confidence to listen and learn from others and a willingness to surround oneself with those who possess strengths or skills which one lacks.

Quality #5: Foresight - Leaders are tasked with thinking about the future. They need to be strategic thinkers, able to anticipate possible pitfalls and market trends. They may use scenario planning to help anticipate future crises and opportunities, creating detailed scenarios of the company and the business environment five, ten or twenty years down the road based on information about the company’s products, customers, competitors, and business regulations and laws.

Quality #6: Ability to Focus Energies and Resources in the Most Important Areas - Leaders must harness the limited resources of time, money and people, making sure they are used efficiently and effectively where they will have the most impact.

Quality #7: Cooperation and Ability to Work Well with Others - Leaders must be able to encourage everyone to work together for an organization’s success. This requires continually practicing cooperation and getting along with everyone in their daily lives.

To access more resources on leadership and management, please visit BusinessSummaries.com.

Maximizing Personal Productivity

The author notes that success in business planning and execution relies heavily on personal productivity skills. These skills help individuals get organized for implementation, improve their time utilization, present ideas effectively, and increase their ability to delegate work.

The most common time-wasters that plague managers are crisis management, procrastination, ineffective meetings, interruptions, and lack of plans and priorities.

Individuals who are successful at time management work on priorities that are both mission-critical and time-sensitive. According to Capezio, there are three primary types of meetings in the workplace: informational meetings, advisory meetings, and problem-solving meetings.

To make meetings more productive, Capezio recommends using the TOO Method, which stands for Topic, Objectives, and Outline.

The first step is to identify the topic. A best practice is to allow only one topic to be covered per meeting.

The second step is to establish the objectives. These are the expected outcomes from the meeting.

The final step is to prepare the outline. This contains the steps that the meeting leader and attendees will follow to accomplish the objectives.

Another important skill is making effective presentations. To communicate effectively with audiences, it is essential to analyze oneself, the audience, and the situation.

After conducting this analysis, it is possible to begin formatting the presentation. Work should focus on three key components: the introduction, the body, and the conclusion.

During the presentation, managers should consider how to create a presence through appearance, language choices, pacing, and volume. After the presentation is complete, a Lessons Learned Analysis should be conducted.

When developing business plans, negotiation will inevitably occur. This type of discussion can be used to resolve a dispute, to reach an agreed-upon direction, or to satisfy diverse interests.

The negotiation style that is used will often determine the outcome of the discussion. There are three major types of negotiation styles: competitive, avoidance, and accommodating.

The competitive style focuses on winning at all costs. In contrast, the avoidance style seeks to avoid conflict and any engagement in a substantive discussion. The accommodating style focuses on pleasing the other party, but it can easily develop into a competitive style.

The most effective negotiations incorporate the interests of both parties. While this approach may be more time-consuming, it tends to create more enduring agreements.

The last way to enhance personal productivity is to strike a balance between work and one’s personal life. Capezio recommends assessing whether one’s current balance is appropriate.

It may be necessary to set explicit goals to free more time and to create a better balance. Other suggestions are to create a more flexible work schedule and to integrate work and family wherever possible.

Looking for more articles and resources on personal productivity? BusinessSummaries.com is a book summary service that provides succinct summaries of today’s business bestsellers in an easy-to-read format. For more information, please visit http://www.bizsum.com.

Developing a Diversity Management Capability

If the time for developing alternatives to affirmative action is now, what is our next step? What must leaders do to help their organizations move more broadly toward diversity so that the Band Aid is no longer needed? In broad strokes, these action steps must be taken:

Affirm your organization’s commitment to racial and ethnic representation. This means working proactively to create and maintain a representative workforce. Without firm evidence of your trustworthy commitment to representation, any effort to exit affirmative action will provoke a defensive reaction to cling to the status quo.

Work to depoliticize affirmative action within your organization. If you don’t, any serious discussion of affirmative action will continue to take place in the context of political contests. This win-lose environment will hinder progress with any complementary and alternative approaches to affirmative action.

Secure commitment to developing an exit strategy from affirmative action. The purpose isn’t to abandon or oppose affirmative action, but rather to prepare for an orderly transition when the time comes. Affirmative action proponents will accept the concept of an exit strategy only if they are convinced the organization will maintain its will and ability to achieve a representative workforce at all levels.

Legitimize the dialogue. Developing an effective exit strategy takes creativity and innovation, and those two qualities occur only in an atmosphere of honest debate. As a leader, you must create an environment of trust, openness and candor.

Develop race-neutral, gender-neutral, and ethnic-neutral people processes for attracting, selecting, and retaining a representative workforce. Apply a common set of process criteria and performance standards to all. Do whatever you must to ensure that each criterion and standard is based on absolute requirements and not on personal references, conveniences or traditions.

Build a collective and individual diversity management capability. Collectively and individually, organizational participants should work to acquire diversity skills and to attain diversity maturity.