The Flexibility Trend

Over the span of history there has been an undoubted trend of improvement to work-life balance. The average working person in the 19th century worked an estimated 60 hours per week, whereas today in the UK the average is 42.7 hours.  Maternity and Paternity leave are both enshrined in law and in April 2011 new legislation came into affect increasing the flexibility of entitlement for both parents.

In  the last two decades  there has also been a considerable increase in other schemes that positively impact work-life balance, such as flexitime, home working and part-time working. Today, some 26% of employees are estimated to make use of flexible hours arrangements, some 25% occasionally work from home and 27% of UK employees work part-time.  The figures for all these statistics were between 10 and 15% in the Eighties.

Yet despite these trends there are some significant imbalances. One in six UK employees works 60 hours a week or longer.  There are also significant imbalances between the public and private sectors, and between large and small businesses.

Many public sector organisations have a considerable amount of schemes to assist work-life balance. These include provisions for:

• Special leave including  bereavement leave, parental leave,  elderly or ill dependent leave
• Career breaks and educational leave
• Very flexible part-time work including term-time working
• Job sharing
• Time-off for community working

Whilst some larger private sector organisations offer a similar range of schemes, there are actually very few legal requirements for flexible working.  The employment act of 2002 introduced a parental leave provision whereby parents of children under 6, or disabled children under 18, are entitles to up to 4 weeks of unpaid leave each year.  For all parent of children under 16 you do have the right to ask for flexible working, and your employer must ‘reasonably’ consider it – but that’s about as far as it goes. The only other clear right that exists is for youths of 16 or 17, where employees must allow a degree or paid educational leave.

The argument for flexible working and other work-life balance schemes does have other potential benefits other than those for the employee.  Most surveys suggest there is an increase in morale, productivity and staff retention where employers offer good schemes. There are wider potential benefits too. The energy conservation benefits of home working as one example.

But despite the improvements in work-life balance schemes, there is still a long way to go. After all, 27% of people working flexibly leaves 73% of people who don’t, and 1 in 6 people working over 60 hours a week is 16%!

For any significant breakthrough or step forward there needs to be a mindset change, where employers challenge commonly held assumptions including:

• Part-time workers are less committed that full-time employee
• Job-sharing is impossible for important jobs
• Homeworking or teleworking makes it hard to monitor what people are doing
• It’s impossible to accommodate all these flexible working schemes if you’re a small  business

If these assumptions can be challenged and new models found, working life could be very different in 30 years time -  and if not we may well struggle to build an economy with more flexibility, less carbon emissions, greater employment and more social responsibility.   

The Ultimate Question

I’ve spent all of my career in marketing and one of the most interesting customer feedback mechanisms I’ve come across has been the Net Promoter Score.

Net Promoter is a customer loyalty metric developed by (and a registered trademark of) Fred Reichheld, Bain & Company, and Satmetrix.

It was introduced by Reichheld in his 2003 Harvard Business Review article "The One Number You Need to Grow” (which he later expanded into a book “The Ultimate Question”, 2006 HBS Press)

Companies obtain their Net Promoter Score by asking customers a single question - The Ultimate Question -  on a 0 to 10 rating scale: "How likely is it that you would recommend our company to a friend or colleague?"

Based on their responses, customers can be categorized into one of three groups:

• Promoters (9-10 rating), 
• Passives (7-8 rating), and 
• Detractors (0-6 rating). 

The percentage of Detractors is then subtracted from the percentage of Promoters to obtain a Net Promoter score. A score of 75% or above is considered quite high. Companies are encouraged to follow this question with an open-ended request for elaboration.

Proponents of the Net Promoter approach claim the score can be used to motivate an organisation to become more focused on improving products and services for customers and to build ‘good profit’.

The potential downside of NPS, or any survey or feedback programme, is that if handled badly it can have a negative impact on customer loyalty. We’ve all had experience of being interrupted during a family meal or our favourite TV programme by a phone call from someone soliciting our feedback.

But there are ways in which surveying can enhance customer loyalty and Reichheld gives some examples:  

• At Harley-Davidson, for example, customers are treated like family members – they get phone calls only from recent Harley retirees (hired back part-time) who know the company and its products well and who are charged with listening closely to customers. Not coincidentally, these retirees generate deeper customer insights while also reinforcing the Harley culture and brand.
  
  
• At Southwest Airlines, president Colleen Barrett insisted that any employees who wanted feedback from a customer write a personal letter requesting that information and explaining what they intend to do with it. They must also write a thank-you to customers who respond, describing the actions that will be taken as a result of their feedback.

How many of you have examples along the lines of Harley-Davidson or Southwest? What about the other side of the coin? As always it is interesting to share and learn from others.  

Sense of Belonging

A couple of weeks ago I was the headline act at Wembley Stadium. Before you think “never heard of you”, I was part of a 1000 strong Choir at the Saracens Leicester rugby game. It was a wonderful, proud experience, singing alongside like-minded people who love to sing and it got me thinking about a sense of belonging and community.

In his 1943 paper, "A Theory of Human Motivation" American psychologist Abraham Maslow cited belonging as the third most important human need on his hierarchy of needs, after only physiological and safety needs. In a culture that values independence, we sometimes forget that our survival and ability to thrive depend on interrelationships.

It is a reality that we define ourselves by gender, race, creed, nationality, occupation, religion, abilities, hobbies, skills, etc. There are many ways to define ourselves and if you think about it, it mostly has to do with grouping. As much as some of us hate being categorised or stereotyped we do it all the time!  When asked what we do we answer our occupation. In that instance we are defining ourselves by our job.

Even if you see yourself as ‘a loner’, you are still a member of one group or another – family, friends, social media, organizational departments, the gym, your football club, your children’s class at school, etc. Some we enjoy and others less so, some we feel included in and welcomed into and others excluded from – which, as most of us know, is not a good feeling.

Community can help bring meaning and support into our lives but it can be a double edged sword. In some cases, the things that create the sense of belonging are negative aspects of being human; such as drug addictions, alcoholism and racism. Indeed, you can argue that much of what is wrong with this world revolves around either lack of belonging or the reverse - toxic groups and communities.

What is interesting and provides food for thought for all of us is scientific evidence that people with more social support and a sense of belonging in their support networks are less likely to experience depression (University of Michigan).

So spend a few minutes thinking about the groups you belong to. What do they give you? What do you get out of the group? And of course, what do you give to the group? Remember relationships are all about give and take.

I feel genuinely connected to my choir, not just because I enjoy singing or go with good friends, but also because we share a sense of pride and belonging. For me, community is important because a community supports the people in it. And to read in the sports pages of the Sunday Times the day after our Wembley Stadium appearance that “the choir looked great and sounded great” was just magic.

Returning to Work - A New Perspective

Summer holidays can really help in bringing perspective to your work.  Two or three weeks away from your daily routine gives you a distance from which to view things. In the atmosphere of a summer evening away work takes on a different perspective – you can see it as an important part of your life, but maybe not the most important part - and certainly not the all too consuming pressure that it can become when you’re in the thick of it.

Problems and issues at work loom large when you’re caught up in them everyday – to the extent that they can seem larger or more insurmountable than they actually are.  When you have mental distance from them they take on a truer perspective.   

The fresh feeling you get after the holiday break can recede quickly once you are back at work, but returning from holiday does give you a chance to take a fresh look at unresolved issues, challenges and opportunities - and bring a fresh perspective to them before continuing with business as usual. Imagination and creativity can work better after a break as well.  It may well be that solutions to problems come to light that you just couldn’t think of before the break.

Companies hire consultants to bring objectivity and a fresh outlook, which they can do simply because they’re not involved in the everyday business. Taking a break and coming back into work with fresh perspective gives you the chance to be your own consultant – and at a fraction of the cost! 

Many people get one other important realisation after a break, provided they’ve resisted keeping in continuous touch by mobile or email. They realise that the business went on quite well without them!

If that’s the case for you, take the time to consider whether you delegate enough. How did they cope without you? Who rose to the occasion? What opportunity did your absence give others?

So the message for this month is simple – use the benefit of your recent holiday break to put your work into perspective, to view it with refreshed eyes and to share the burden of your work with the people who filled in for you while you were away.

Look for the lessons - even when you succeed

In my last posting (Why Leaders Don’t Learn from Success) I described how success can lead to failure as individuals and organisations fail to learn as a direct result of their success.

As individuals we hold certain theories, models, principles and beliefs that guide our actions and our decision-making.

Sometimes these theories are quite sophisticated and rooted in science and in other cases they are pretty informal.

Learning is the process of updating our theories. We will typically challenge our assumptions, models and theories when something has gone wrong.

Failure provides a motivation for individuals (and organisations) to learn. This has been true from the time we first tried to walk or ride a bicycle. We fall down, it hurts and we try another approach.

An amazing number of high ranking executives report that early failures in their careers taught them lessons that ultimately led to their success. Without failure to provide the challenge, we need to challenge ourselves.

Here are five ways in which an organisation can learn from success:

1. Celebrate success but examine it - when a win is achieved, the organisation needs to investigate what led to it with the same rigour and scrutiny it might apply to understanding the causes of failure. This may be an uncomfortable process and it may reveal tha a company’s major success was due to good luk rather than good judgement. 
2. Institute systematic project reviews – Pixar, which has had 11 hit animated films in a row, conducts rigorous reviews of its production process. It religiously collects data about all aspects of a production and uses this to “stimulate discussion and challenge assumptions”. Staff don’t like doing them and would prefer to celebrate a film’s success, but Ed Catmull, Pixar President, sees the benefit of not becoming complacent. 
3. Use the right time horizons – In industries such as pharmaceuticals and aerospace, the development and feedback timeframe is long. It is critical to keep the appropriate time frame in mind when reviewing performance rather than focus on recent events. 
4. Apply the root causes of the success – replicating success is important but that does not mean creating a check list of all the things to do the same way the next time. Break down each process into “something we can directly control” and “something that is affected by external factors” and study those elements under direct control using such tools as Six Sigma. 
5. If it ain’t broke, experiment – in scientific research and in engineering, designs are subjected to ever more rigorous tests until the thing they are designing actually breaks. Organisational experiments can be conducted to push boundaries, provided the cost and impact are managed. 

The path to effective learning involves simple but counter-intuitive steps: Managers must actively test their theories, even when they seem to be working and rigorously investigate the causes of both good and bad performance.

Ironically, understanding success can better prepare you to avoid failure.

Engaging People in Tough Times

Employees feel engaged and deliver growth when they share a clear agenda and are using all their talents.  Leaders add true value when they communicate clear expectations, outcomes and boundaries to allow others to be successful. 

Right now we are all being asked to do more with less. Many corporate leaders have responded to the tough environment and huge uncertainties by:

• Cutting people and rewards – but not necessarily expected outputs
• Pulling decision-making upwards – to give a sense of control

These actions are very understandable but make it a difficult environment in which to keep people engaged and motivated. In the face of this challenge, managers need to step back and get very clear about how they create employee engagement.

The Business Benefits

Key to engagement is getting people to “buy-in” to the purpose of the work and feel connected with the outcome. This is simply stated in research findings from The Corporate Leadership Council in 2007 which showed that “Employees who can see a clear link between how their individual efforts relate to organisational goals … engage with the organisation and perform at their best. Increasing the connection between the employee’s work and the organisation’s strategy drives positive employee engagement and performance by up to 33%.”

When people are engaged and motivated you get:-

• Success without having to oversee every single detail
• Cohesion in a team
• The energy to overcome obstacles
• Things done faster, to a higher standard
• A positive, happy team
• New ideas and better processes

The 5 Key Principles of Positive Engagement

Creating engagement involves using 5 principles:

1. Start with creating compelling shared goals – involve people in this process directly
2. Be motivated yourself – your energy is infectious whether positive or negative
3. Understand what’s in it for them -remember that what motivates you might not work for other people
4. Gain the support of all your stake-holders – they affect whether staff believe it’s worthwhile or not
5. Give feedback - being clear about what is expected of someone is essential to stimulate engagement and performance.

Employee engagement is not something you can get a quick fix for but consistently using these 5 principles builds engagement with both the work and with you as the leader. That leads on to better outcomes for everyone.

Why Leaders Don’t Learn from Success

I was once fascinated by an article in the Harvard Business Review entitled ‘Why Leaders Don’t Learn from Success’.  To illustrate its point the article focussed on the case of the Bologna-based Ducati Grand Prix motorcycle team that entered the MotoGP for the first time in 2003.

Being a newcomer, it approached 2003 as ‘a learning year’ – a time to acquire knowledge that would help to develop a better motorbike for future seasons. To that end the team fitted its’ bikes with sensors to capture data on the bike’s performance and riders were asked to provide feedback at the end of each race.

Then something unexpected happened. The team finished among the top three in nine races and with each success the team focused more on winning and less on learning spending very little time analysing the data it collected.

In 2004 they decided to radically redesign the team’s bikes for 2004 rather than incrementally improve the 2003 model. At the end of 2004 they ended third overall which was considered a failure due to the team’s high expectations. Only then did the team examine the team’s approach to developing bikes.

Further research in entertainment, pharmaceutical and software industries saw the same phenomenon. There were three impediments to learning:

1. Making dangerous attribution errors – any number of factors may lead to success. In racing it could be the rider’s talents and decisions, luck, weather, bad riding by competitors. It is all too common for executives to attribute success to their own insights and managerial skills and downplay random events or external factors outside their control.
2. Falling prey to the overconfidence bias – Confidence is critical in business but success can make us believe that we are better decision makers than we are. Overconfidence can infect entire organisations causing them to ignore warning signs such as dips in customer satisfaction or increases in quality issues. Overconfidence amongst bank lenders has contributed to our current downturn.
3. Failing to ask why - success is commonly interpreted as evidence not only that your existing strategy and practices work, but that you have all the knowledge and information you need. When you’re confronted with failure it’s natural to ask why disaster struck – unfortunately success does not prompt such soul searching. Toyota’s drive in pursuing higher and higher sales blinded them to the fact that quality was being compromised. This was only revealed when it was forced to recall a number of its vehicles.

Success can breed failure by hindering learning at both the individual and the organisational level. Learning from success is a great challenge and, because it’s counterintuitive, maybe an even greater challenge to learning from failure.

Going For Gold

When facing an important occasion in your work – be it an important interview, a crucial negotiation or presentation - how do you prepare yourself to be able to give your optimum performance?

Watching the world’s leading tennis players this last two weeks at Wimbledon, there are some lessons that can be drawn about what it takes to excel when things really count.

The physical athleticism and technical skill aside it’s always striking to see that it’s the mental state, attitude and preparation that can make the all-important difference.

So why not draw some tips from the Wimbledon champions for whatever your next important match is?

Make sure you relax the day beforehand – you simply cannot work at pressure all the time and have enough in reserve when you have to tackle something that may demand everything you’ve got.

1.  As seen with Andy Murray’s coaching from Ivan Lendl – reduce the highs and lows of your emotional state. You may of course be nervous but don’t give way to over elation, anger or disappointment. Extreme emotions simply sap energy, take away from focus, and take time to recover from. Most importantly don’t beat yourself up!
2. Have a strategy and a game plan, but be flexible and be prepared to change and adapt if it’s not working.
3. Know your strengths and play to them, but be prepared to take risks at crucial times. Remember you’ve actually got to go for it – you can’t succeed with just a defensive posture.
4. Be prepared to go the distance. You may face setbacks but you need to have the wherewithal and resilience to turn things around when they’re not going your way.
5. Don’t project too far ahead. Stay with the next important moment because every small step counts.
6. Probably most importantly - have an utter and unassailable belief that you can do it.

These tips are not a guarantee that you can just step into the elusive “zone” but it’s unlikely you’ll find that zone without them. Part of the key is in not trying to do it yourself – but trusting in your systems and faculties -  and their capabilities, training and experience. We are at our best when our bodies, brains, mind, emotions and instincts are in harmony - all pulling in the same direction. When that happens the challenge for us is to let it happen and to ‘go for gold’.

A practical plan for when you feel overwhelmed

Sheena Iyengar, a management professor at Columbia University Business School, researches and speaks on the dilemma of choice. In one of her studies, she offered a group of people samples of six different jams available for purchase while she offered another group 24 different jams, including the six jams offered to the first group.

With all that choice you'd think the group offered the 24 jams would be more likely to purchase one. But it's the opposite. Those in the six-jam group were ten times more likely to actually purchase a jar of jam.

The more numerous our options, the more difficult it becomes to choose a single one, and so we end up choosing none at all. That's what happens when we have too many things to do and think about. We become overwhelmed and don't do anything. Sheena says this is ‘suffocation by meaningless minutiae’.

So how can individuals move from being overwhelmed to becoming productive? Partly it’s to do with moving forward and doing something/anything ….getting on with it. And there are a few examples of this work ethic.

• Trollope used to get up every morning very early - at 5:30 - and write for 3 hours before going to work at the Post Office.
• Richard Strauss used to be shown to his study by his wife with the admonition. "Richard, go and compose."
• Sheridan had not written the last act of "The Rivals" on the Friday before it was due to open. They locked him in a room with paper, ink and bottles of port until he did so.

Here’s an action plan that may help you get on with it.

First, take a few minutes writing down everything you have to do on a piece of paper. Resist the urge to use technology for this task. Writing on paper — and then crossing things out — creates momentum.

Next, identify a block of time in your diary which is not broken up with meetings or telephone calls. Aim for an afternoon or morning session.

In 15 minutes — no more — get as many of the easiest, fastest tasks as you can. Make your quick phone calls. Send your short emails. Don't worry about whether these are the most important tasks on your list.The objective is to cross off as many items as possible in the shortest time and launching yourself into action. Use a timer to keep you focused.

When 15 minutes are up, turn off your phone, close down all the windows on your computer, and choose the most daunting thing on your list, the one that is the highest priority or is most stressful.

Then work on it and only it — without hesitation or distraction — for 35 minutes.

After 35 minutes, take a break for 10 minutes and then start the hour-long process over again, beginning with the 15 minutes of quick actions.

Working within a specific and limited time frame is important because the race against time maintains focus. Using a short time frame actually increases the pressure but it keeps our effort specific and particular to a single task. That increases a good, motivating tension while reducing negative, disconcerting pressure. So the fog of overwhelm dissipates and forward movement progresses.

Whilst we still have the endless decisions and dilemma of choice to contend with by actioning items we are creating focus and feel more positive that we are moving in the right direction.

How leaders can facilitate growth

Employees feel engaged and deliver growth when they share a clear agenda, and are using all their talents.  Leaders add true value when they communicate clear expectations, outcomes and boundaries to allow others to be successful. 
From talking to business people and reading the press, it’s clear that many corporate leaders have responded to the tough environment and huge uncertainties by:

• Cutting people and rewards – but not necessarily expected outputs
• Pulling decision-making upwards – to give a sense of control

These are perfectly natural responses to a crisis but they have long-term consequences that are starting to appear. Cutting people and rewards without cutting the expected outputs can indeed result in people finding more efficient and innovative ways to do and share work – but only up to a point. The tipping point comes when they feel there is no hope of meeting what is expected of them after which they become de-moralised. In a tough jobs environment some will move on for a better work experience but many will simply disengage.

Similarly many decisions end up going through very senior people to give the leadership the illusion of control. The resulting bottleneck results in chronic slow or, worse still, no decision-making. Despite all the pressure to do more, managers can’t actually deliver their goals because they aren’t allowed to make the necessary decisions and judgements appropriate to their responsibilities. Again, unintentionally, the leaders have disengaged the very people they need to deliver growth and development of the company.

Smart, ambitious people can accept those conditions for a period of time. If it goes on too long they get start to question how much real opportunity they are getting for growth. What can they say on their CVs about these years if every initiative seems to be required and expected of them but all action gets bogged down from lack of senior decision-making?

One of the major benefits of the leadership coaching I deliver is helping leaders push decision-making downwards in their team, releasing strategic thinking time upwards in the organisation. To make this change, leaders have to take some critical actions:

1. First they have to step back and create some reflective time for themselves - often that in itself requires some tough decisions about control of their time and possibly saying “no” to some “nice to do” tasks
2. They need to get much clearer what is central and essential to their team’s or organisation’s success going forward – a tough, demanding but clear agenda is much more stimulating
3. Once clear, they need to communicate these outcomes to employees in ways that allow them make sensible and effective decisions aligned to those outcomes – they need to give back the head-room to deliver.

It's all a question of control

Work-life balance concerns balancing time, priorities and energies between your working life and your personal life – in which the ability to exercise choice and to have some degree of control and flexibility is all important.

But beneath this there are actually a whole range of balances that impact our well-being and ultimately our degree of satisfaction with our working and personal lives. As a quick self-assessment consider the following list and ask yourself what is the balance in your life? It’s not that these balances need to be 50/50, but too much on one side or the other, or a complete absence on one side or the other, may be an indication of something needing attention. Be aware also that many of these apply to both your professional and personal lives.

1. The balance of demands - between doing what you want to do and what others (employers and family) want you to do
2. The balance between being planned and scheduled on the one hand and being spontaneous and unplanned on the other.
3. The balance between the routine and the new.
4. The balance between fulfilling the basic needs in your life and fulfilling your dreams and aspirations.
5. The balance between being under pressure and being relaxed.
6. The balance between being on-line and available as opposed to off-line
7. The balance between being rational and being creative
8. The balance between planning your life and taking life as it comes.
9. The balance between following and leading (yourself and others)

Many people achieve a balance in these things by compensation - in other words, if their job is too routine they look for the new and exciting in the rest of their life, and the converse can also be true.

Ultimately, it is not your response to these questions that determines your work-life balance; it is your ability to influence the answers.

Listening

I was talking to some coaches I know recently about their work in business and life coaching. They all felt that a large percentage of the value they give their clients is simply in being someone prepared to listen. They offer a neutral and impartial circumstance – where people can air their feelings, and explore issues. This process alone – being able to talk things out – may often be all that the person needs to find fresh perspective and insight. It’s a truth that psychologists and counsellors know well also.

Of course there’s a skill and experience that these professionals bring in being able to guide a person towards insight and next steps, but the fact remains that somehow in this world we’ve professionalised listening – and that some professionals have assumed roles that in other times or cultures may have been taken by family members or friends.

Being able to talk openly is essential to our well being. We all need the time and space to express and explore feelings, worries, concerns, aspirations, hopes and difficulties. To do so we need someone whom we can trust, someone who won’t react or bring their bias, and someone not directly involved in what it is we may want to talk about. It’s what friends should be for.

Being prepared to listen is one of the most important things friends can do for each other. So the advice for improving your work-life balance and reducing stress is don’t go it alone. Find a friend with whom you can talk things over.  Make sure to set an understanding first though about confidentiality and trust. It can be a mutual pact – a friend who is prepare to listen to your ramblings as you seek to find clarity and to whom you can offer the same in return.

Mission I'm Possible

A play on words perhaps, but how is it that some people think that the world abounds with possibilities and others look for barriers? Of course the law of probability will show that not everything is possible but there has to be something in the much quoted Henry Ford mantra “Whether you think you can or whether you think you can’t – you are right.”

Developing a can-do mindset can be a scary road for some people – “what if I fail?”, “what if I don’t have what it takes?”, “what if people laugh at me?” are commonly asked questions when people face challenges. The obvious reframe is that if you don’t give it a go, then you will never know! If “can’t do” becomes a repeated pattern of behaviour then you will continually spend your life within your comfort zone – and maybe worse, become stale, complacent and ultimately dissatisfied.

So how can you adopt a “have a go” attitude? Here are some ideas

1: Consciously challenge the voice in your head that urges caution – listen to it, is it keeping you safe or is it holding you back?

2: Look upon challenges as learning opportunities – so what if you don’t achieve perfection, at least you have learned something in the process. Every successful person has hit setbacks along the way

3: Realise that you have a choice – you can choose to have a go, or not. And in so doing, recognise that you are responsible for your own choices, no one else can make them for you

4: Take on the challenge with gusto! If you are going to have a go, then do so whole heartedly and give it 100%

As the American essayist Ralph Waldo Emerson says: "What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us". So change the mindset of impossible to I’m possible. That small change could be so liberating.

Performance reviews - It's not just about what you say

Performance reviews are a management ritual that everyone dreads.

And now, according to Daniel Goleman (Emotional Intelligence author), brain science shows that the way in which that review gets delivered can directly impact an employee’s response and, consequently, their ability to do anything constructive with that feedback.

The neuroscientist, Richard Davidson at the University of Wisconsin, has found that when we’re in an upbeat, optimistic, I-can-handle-anything frame of mind, energized and enthusiastic about our goals, our brains turn up the activity in an area on the left side, just behind the forehead. That’s the brain state where we are at our best.

But when we’re feeling down, with low energy and zero motivation, even anxious, our brain has turned up the volume on the right side and that is the side where we are least productive and energised.

Performance feedback that focuses on what’s wrong with us puts this downer brain area on overdrive. We’re so preoccupied with the bad news (and our thoughts that this means we’ll be fired) that we just don’t have the energy or can’t focus on working at our best.

Not only that, but how you deliver the message has a huge impact on how it’s received. In one study, when people got positive performance feedback that was delivered in a negative, cold tone of voice, they came out of the session feeling down–despite the good news. Amazingly, when negative feedback came in a warm, positive tone of voice, they felt upbeat and energized.

Of course, any manager should be giving staff performance feedback as a matter of routine. But too many are poor at giving feedback. The problem here takes two forms: being hyper-critical and focusing only on what’s wrong without balancing it with what’s right, or undermining even positive feedback with a negative tone of voice.

In theory, well delivered performance feedback improves our performance, setting us on the right track. Such feedback is best given on the spot (not months later in a formal review), and with a sense of trust and openness between the giver and receiver.

One of the most effective feedback styles is:

When you do X (action) it has the impact of Y with the consequence of Z.

For instance,

When you habitually turn up late for meetings (action) it gives the impression that you don’t care about wasting the time of your colleagues (impact) and consequently they don’t want to work with you (consequence)

But now, according to Daniel Goleman and Davidson, you not only have to master giving feedback effectively, you also have to remember to try to deliver it in as positive, upbeat way as possible.

Leaving work behind

A skill that everyone needs to achieve successful work-life balance is to be able to fully switch off your mind from work when enjoying your hard earned family and leisure time. Having work issues and ideas play through your mind in the evenings and weekends is a common experience for many executives, so why does it happen and how can a person learn to mentally close the door on work when they leave the office?

The reason it happens is that our emotions like completions. Unfinished or unresolved business, strategic issues, business uncertainties and open issues by their very nature don’t complete in a day – and can create a symptom of overrun where a person finds it harder to switch-off.

Interestingly surveys report that amongst the most stress free professions are those where there is a definite opening and closing to a day’s work – like a machine tool engineer who sets up the machine to begin and closes down and cleans it at the end of the day. 

Good time- and self-management practices can emulate this closing-off process. Taking the time each day or week to note what you have achieved and completed not only gives a psychological boost, it also gives the satisfaction of completion that our emotional life needs. For open issues making a note of any progress and telling yourself you don’t need to think about them again until you return to work is also a vital self-training. Another practice that works well for many is to finish the week with an empty email inbox. You may have longer-term issues of course, but an empty inbox has a definite satisfaction. 

And lastly, for those that work at home – try not to leave work related papers and files out around the house or home office – every time you see them it will remind you of something!

Where to get ideas

Standing on the station platform, waiting for the Philadelphia train one night in the summer of 1902, Willis Carrier was about to have his 'eureka moment'.

As the fog rolled in across the track, he suddenly realised how he could fix the nascent air-cooling system he'd been working on, using water as a condensing surface.

This sudden moment of inspiration led to the invention of modern air-conditioning, a fortune for its inventor, and the foundation of a multi-billion dollar company.

The lone genius, beavering away in the seclusion of his lab, is how most of us imagine the great moments of innovation have come into being. But is this really the whole story?

Not entirely, according to author Steven Johnson. He believes Willis Carrier is very much the exception rather than the rule. He has written seven books on how science, technology and human experience interact, including the best-selling Everything Bad Is Good for You:How Today's Popular Culture Is Actually Making Us Smarter.

"When you go back and you look at the history of innovation it turns out that so often there is this quiet collaborative process that goes on, either in people building on other peoples' ideas, but also in borrowing ideas, or tools or approaches.”

So what should companies be doing to foster innovation in their workforces? Mr Johnson argues that creativity is a continuous process.

"Part of the problem is that one day a year they have a corporate retreat and they all go into the country, and they do brainstorming sessions and trustfalls and then they go back to work.

"But equally you don't want to have a non-stop creative process where nothing gets done.

"Corporations have an opportunity to cultivate hunches and hobbies and the sideprojects of their employees because those are such great generators of ideas."

Google is one company that has famously capitalised on giving space for workers to innovate, with its 20% time system. Employees are required to allocate 20% of their time working on their own pet projects.

According to the company, about 50% of new features and products have resulted from it, including Adsense, Google Suggest and Orkut.

If you don’t work for Google but want to develop your creativity gene, Johnson has a number of suggestions.

"Go for a walk; pursue a number of hobbies (the one trait creative people such as Darwin) shared in common; cultivate hunches; write everything down; but keep your folders messy; embrace serendipity; make generative mistakes; frequent coffee houses and other liquid networks; follow the links; let others build on your ideas; borrow, recycle, reinvent."

So what brilliant suggestions do you have to develop your creative spark? And what are organisations out there doing to promote creativity and innovation?

Happiness is Good for the Bottom Line

Should we bring our emotions to work? I was asked this question by a finance manager when delivering a leadership programme recently. Part of my answer was to ask “Is it possible to leave them at the door on the way in?” We then went on to discuss a more fruitful question - how can we actually harness our emotions productively at work? 

At around the same time, I read a magazine where the whole issue was devoted to the emotion of happiness. What is surprising is the magazine was Harvard Business Review. Being happy at work makes people more productive and more creative, says the Harvard psychology professor Daniel Gilbert.  New research suggests that happiness depends more on our day to day experiences – our routine interactions with colleagues, the projects we work on and our daily contributions - than on the stable conditions previously thought to promote happiness, such as high salary or a prestigious title.

My experience from coaching conversations with people at all levels has shown me that people become happier and more fulfilled when they:

1. Build challenging yet achievable goals with clear and measurable targets – seeing progress towards a well-visualised desired improvement is one way my coaching clients build their self-confidence and become more innovative as well as fulfilled.
2. Become more positive with themselves and those around them – one of my clients was quite startled when he compared the amount of poorly phrased, critical feedback he was giving himself versus the positive, carefully constructed feedback he gave others and so switched to giving himself higher quality, respectful, positive feedback
3. Build strong networks where they can both give and receive support – using time away from the “task” to network can seem like a luxury but interestingly many clients who are strong networkers seem to embrace high workloads with less stress, often by getting more things done for them. 

I was very interested to see that the latest research supports this approach, reinforcing the positive link between a happy working environment and the bottom line.

Like it or not emotions exist regardless of whether we are at work or not. Some people are managed by their emotions; others try to bury them. Learning how to use emotions effectively is a skill that gets results and, the Harvard research shows, impacts on the bottom line. How much more effective could you and the people around you be if tackling your work in ways that result in happiness and fulfilment?

So are emotions appropriate in the workplace? Yes – and not just happiness. There are a number of emotions that effective leaders and managers should be developing proactively. One really powerful secret emotion stands out to me. I have seen used to great effect by those in the know..... but you’ll have to wait for my next article to find out more !

Getting the balance right - Homeworking

There are estimated to be over 4 million people in the UK who work mainly from home, and this only counts those working 3 or more days a week from home. There are numerous others who work at least one day a week or at least occasionally from home.

Home working claims to improve work life balance, and there are undoubtedly positives. Homeworkers don’t have to face the daily grind of commuting, for one. Theoretically at least they have more family time and increased flexibility.  

Yet this superficial view can overlook one important consideration. Optimum work-life balance requires a separation of work from your private time. With our 7x24 on-line world this separation is already blurred and for people who work at home it can be even more blurred.

It’s not just work encroaching into your private time by email, phone, mail, work papers around the house and so on – it can also be family encroaching onto your work-time by expecting you to be available for errands at a moment’s notice for example.

Maintaining separation if you work at home requires even more discipline than if you work in an office and clear guidelines both for yourself and others. If you work at home often, think about the following points and see what you can do to help achieve a better clarity and separation.

1. Ideally have a separate work environment – an office or study – and make that the only place you work in when at home. This helps reduce the spill over of work papers, phone calls etc all over the house – so you’re not constantly reminded of work when you’re in your private time.
   
2. Think about the technology you use. Some people have a separate work computer from their family computer for example. Having a separate phone line and at least a separate email account for work can be really beneficial. As long as it’s appropriate for the type of work you do, it means you only need answer the calls or look at emails when you’re in work. It means you’ll always know whether a call or email is work related or not.
3. Set a pattern as much as you can of regular working hours – with a clear start and end to the working day. The flexibility of homeworking is great but too much mixing up of time between work and personal activities can blur the boundaries – and make it confusing for others to know whether you’re “at work” or not.
   
4. Set expectations with others at home also so that they know when you’re at work or not – this is also where a separate environment really helps.
   
5. Set expectations with your employer and colleagues also. There can be the temptation for them to think that if you’re working at home you’re always available.

Homeworking offers tremendous advantages, but it isn’t an automatic ticket to a better work-life balance – planning how you will manage your time and your working environment is essential if you’re to reap the rewards.

Why Companies Should Insist that Employees Take Naps

Naps are a powerful source of competitive advantage. Naps are not just physically restorative, but also improve perceptual skills, motor skills, reaction time and alertness.

When Sara Mednick, a former Harvard researcher, gave her subjects a memory challenge, she let half of them to take a 60 to 90 minute nap. The nappers dramatically outperformed the non-nappers. In another study, Mednick had subjects practice a visual task at four intervals over the course of a day. Those who took a 30 minute nap after the second session sustained their performance all day long. Those who didn't nap performed increasingly poorly as the day wore on.

When pilots are given a nap of just 30 minutes on long haul flights, they experience a 16 percent improvement in their reaction time. Non-napping pilots experience a 34 per cent decrease during the course of the flights.

The conclusion is inescapable: the more hours we work continuously, the greater the toll on our performance.

The best time for a nap is between 1pm and 3 pm, when the body most craves a period of sleep. The ideal length for a workplace nap is 30 minutes or less, which assures that you won't fall into the deeper stages of sleep, and awake with that loopy feeling scientists call "sleep inertia."

If encouraging employees to take a half hour nap means they can be two or three times as productive over the subsequent three hours in the afternoon — and far more emotionally resilient — why don’t more companies do it? There is the odd example here and there including Google, which provides napping pods and renewal rooms. That's a good first step, but it's scarcely the norm.

I would be interested in hearing from anyone that has worked in an organisation that is encouraging post lunch napping (besides the House of Lords) in the name of better performance. And/or whether you’ve practised napping yourself and what impact that has had on your performance?

And if you’ve yet to try it in a work setting and you want to, please let me know what happens – to your own productivity and creativity levels – and your working relationships with your colleagues!

Please yourself for once

I have a friend who is a serial apologiser. She starts almost every sentence with “I’m sorry, but…”. She seems to believe that by asking for something, no matter how small, or by saying no to something, will wreck all her relationships. So she lives in the land of apology – the classic state of a people pleaser – and importantly she doesn’t realise how much it limits her, and stresses her.

People pleasers tend to yearn for external validation – as if their personal sense of security and confidence is based on getting the approval of others. It is almost an addiction that makes them feel like they are needed. At the core, people pleasers lack confidence. What they don’t realise is that people-pleasing carries risks. You put pressure on yourself which can ultimately result in being over committed and overloaded. This will probably result in anxiety, sleep deprivation and depletion of energy resources. Not a good place to be. Here are some ideas starting with the most important:

1. Recognise you have a choice – you don’t have to say yes all the time

2. Stall for time – to remind yourself of that choice. Tell the other person you need to think about it

3. Be a fly on the wall looking in on your situation. Try to distinguish when others are taking advantage from those situations where you genuinely want to help. Breaking this habit is not a one track journey to saying no!

4. Don’t give loads of excuses – this will come across as defensive and enable the other person more wiggle room!

5. If something isn’t your fault don’t apologise. Get into the habit of saying sorry only when you need to

6. Think about who really matters to you and who you want to help and say yes to

7. Work out your boundaries and show stoppers and stick within them. If anyone asks for anything out of those parameters then say no

8. Congratulate yourself each time you don’t fall into the lure of people pleasing for people-pleasing’s sake. Then bottle the feeling to act as a motivator next time

9. Reframe what saying no can actually do - it has great benefits such as giving you more time to do with as you choose

10. Recognise there will not be catastrophic consequences. The fallout is never as bad as we think it will be

Remember you can’t be everything to everyone all of the time. And ultimately the only person you can absolutely know you have pleased is yourself. As Eleanor Roosevelt once said “no one can make you feel inferior without your consent”, so don’t give it. Then you can please yourself from time to time!