Time to re-skill our educators!

In order to put learning on the agenda in French higher education and help the educator understand how students learn, a more detailed understanding of the generational characteristics of student cohorts, their epistemological beliefs and conceptions of learning, as well as their learning styles and preferences is advocated.

Source: ” The Pedagogical Challenges Facing French Business Schools in the Implementation of E-learning Initiatives; 2006 ”

The quote above might as well apply to any typical B-school across the globe. I am not here for a name-dropping but I experienced a similar pedagogical (or should I say, andragogical?) challenge in one of our most visible and illustrious B-schools, Indian Institute of Management- Calcutta! The vision statement of the premier B-school reads its aspiration to be a truly centre of excellence in all aspects of management education. The past records of its academic excellence and the cognitive prowess of its alumni would most certainly vouch for the high ground it claims. There are sizable number of  Indra Nooyis of the world who would proudly flaunt their alumni-status from this ivy-league institute. However, history has been unkind to the past successes as a future-guarantor of success.

Coming to the genesis of my writing this blog- I was completing the campus-leg of an executive program in Human Resources at the premier B-school last week and almost all the faculty unmistakably but unintentionally passed on to me (and I would make a safe bet that to many other fellow learners) the same very notion that the educators are possibly uneducated of the learning preferences of adult-learners and the evolving trends and techniques of pedagogy!

In the paragraphs below, I will explain three key adult-learning principles (of Malcolm Knowles fame) that were being ignored and what possibly could have been done,

1. Adults bring life experiences and knowledge to learning experiences-Among 100 odd learners, we would’ve grossed an experience-base of 1000-odd years if not more, I’d guess. Relying on power-point presentations could have been expected of any bottom-rated institutions and I felt much to be desired from the faculty of IIM-C! Instead, if the materials were sent well in advance and different work-streams were formed to debate the issues then a deeper and long-lasting learning would have been ensured.The biggest spin-off could have been the wealth of tacit knowledge and know-how flowing far and across the class. Flipped-classroom could have been an excellent choice wherein these educators would have shone up as great facilitators of knowledge and experience.
2. Adults are relevancy oriented-  Adult-learners are selective about the content that they think would benefit them through application. Any learning practitioner would do well to prepare him/ herself to moderate and tune up the contents that have the highest probability of getting applied in day-to-day life. One such important topic was about Balanced-Scorecard (BSC) and the faculty was evidently a researcher of the subject but what snapped the interest-levels of many a learner was the fact that almost 95% of his time was consumed in explaining the theoretical framework of BSC thus leaving a very negligible time for review of real cases of BSC applications, examples and more importantly the practitioners’ challenges with the tools. Executives are primarily interested in experience-sharing, gathering knowledge and information about the ways to effective implementation and measuring the impact of their learning efforts. A case-based approach would have benefited the most.
3. Adults are internally motivated and self-directed- These executives who had spared resources to be back to the class didn’t need any extrinsic motivation, instead they looked for opportunities that would have improved their learning curve and equipped them to deal with real-world challenges.The fact that these learners were mostly the millennial and hence, technology played a key part in their lives. Modern collaboration tools such as micro-blogging ( a twitter back-channel discussion for example), QR-codes etc. would have proved to be more engaging and fulfilling for most of them. These techniques would have made the learners engage with the content in the best way possible and the peer-learning more permanent. When will we see these premier B-schools and their academicians keeping pace with the industry and practitioners?

It was with an intent to scribe a running commentary on the practices in the most illustrious of B-schools, I wrote the above and not to show anyone down. When  the world looks up to the academic might of these institutes with an awe, it’s time for our educators re-skilled and kept pace with the changing time and practices notwithstanding the fact that Knowles wrote these principles many decades back. Only then these pantheons of knowledge can claim to be the true catalyst churning out leaders capable of innovation, managing change and transformation in real-sense in this VUCA world.

It’s time to re-skill our educators!

Please share your experience with going back to the school and build a meaningful conversation around the pressing theme.

Use-cases of QR-codes for Quick & Quality Learning!

QR Codes or Quick-Reference Codes are almost ubiquitous!These black fuzzy squares are to be seen right from a pack of cereal at the breakfast table to the back of a bedside read of your favorite novel and on myriad of things that you use through the day. These two-dimensional bar codes were invented by Denso for the car maker Toyota to track automobile components during manufacturing. Later they found their most prolific and successful users in marketing departments.

As a learning professional, I was always fascinated by the immense creative potential QR codes hold in as many creative ways as we possibly could imagine! These 4000-character containing codes are being experimented with by learning professionals in variety of ways. I’ll delve into two distinct phases of learning cycle where my participants found QR codes very exciting and engaging.

Recently during a workshop on ‘Value-based Negotiation’, I successfully incorporated QR codes on two important stages- Delivery of training & Learning sustainability. The workshop being effectively balanced between theories and practice sessions, employed different sets of posters on concepts and frameworks containing QR-codes which directed participants to either a website (for further reading), a short video (building up of a discussion around a theme) or other downloadable resources for real-time uses. Participants have long been exposed to corporate and other learning videos and they served well the purpose, however, these are mostly passive way of engagement with the learning materials. Contrast this with a QR-code that leads to a short video clip of say, 2-3 minutes and then getting the participants debate and discuss the content- you suddenly have a bunch of eager and engaged learners thanks primarily the fact that the learners are in command of the learning instructions- scanning, viewing,storing (most of them do) and debating.

Today’s learners have grown on smart phones and other social media tools and for them such experiments are native and the pedagogy in-sync with the current trends and practices! Learners accessed further readings and real-life tools and templates through such posters and for them it meant being in control and possession of such reference materials for just-in-time use besides a higher degree of engagement with these learning materials. Most of the participants were seen to be book-marking such web-pages for future review and reference!

The second most crucial use-case happened while using such QR-codes for learning sustainability. Over a period of 6-8 weeks after the class, key tools from the workshop were converted into QR-codes and were pasted on various locations in the office (pantry, near common-space, besides the print-stations) and the learners were encouraged to go and scan them to receive further references, some best-used field cases around the application of learning. Unlike other formal platform for driving learning sustenance such as webinars, tele-coaching sessions this QR codes could bypass the element of a formal learning rigor making the whole exercise more learner-centric and informal (remember, adults learn best such pieces which they perceive to be of real-life use and where they are in command of learning). For field-based employees, such QR-codes were sent over mail or WhatsApp groups where they scanned the materials and saved tools for real-time use. They were also trained on how to generate QR-codes so that some of them could share their success stories among the peers and the learning department. In all of these, the participants were on the driver’s seat so that the learning is more engaging and enabling- the holy grail of any learning intervention.

In summary, I can look at the experiments on the following success parameters,

• Higher order engagement among the learners and most evidently, with the learning resources and materials- probabilities are much higher for deeper and immersive learning outcomes
• The young workforce receive these tools of pedagogy to be more native and and extension of their self- these are the learners fed on the staple diet of Apples & Blackberrys!
• On a more socially responsible note, we could save many trees for we could do away with loads of prints- call it, Green learning!

These two use-cases of QR codes at workplace learning are just among the many more creative uses and experiments by fellow learning professionals. I’d be interested to listen to your tryst with QR-codes in various learning set-up. These exchanges are what learning communities are made of.

I am listening!

Negotiations: It’s all about principles!

Often you might hear people saying ‘Win that negotiation! It’s extremely critical for our business’ and similar stories unfold…

Is negotiation then all about winning?

In a recent interview to The Forbes magazine, Prof. William Ury of Harvard Law School’s Program on Negotiation (PON) says, “Most negotiations take place in the context of long-term relationships, as in a marriage. If you are always asking: “Who’s winning this marriage?”, the marriage is in serious trouble. Focus on your interests- short-term and long-term. It may be instructive to remember the Chinese billionaire who made his fortune by always giving his business partners a little more than he took for himself; everyone wanted to be his partner and they made him rich!”

Profoundly, insightful- Isn’t it? Negotiation is a a collaborative process to further win-win outcomes for all involved and hence, it’s ‘value-driven’, ‘values-driven’ and ‘principle-driven’!

Value-based Negotiation then, is all about creating and claiming ‘value’ through collaborative process where focus is on these four pillars,

• People- Separate people from the issues. This is aptly summarized in Prof. Ury’s words as “We’re negotiating with human beings, not computers. So often, we are trying to solve a problem and the people — their emotions, their ego — get in the way. The first challenge in negotiation is to disentangle the people (or psychological dimension) from the problem (or substantive dimension). Be soft on the person, hard on the problem”.
• Interests- Focusing on interests rather than position will provide for creative solutions to the given issue. This will help empathize with the other side and chances are better that they are more committed to the agreed outcomes rather than renegading. This will prevent us from the headaches of positional-bargaining which mostly turn out to be win-lose affair
• Options- Inventing multiple options for contemplating action is anyway a better idea than being stifled with a single point agenda. How creatively and collaboratively parties engage in negotiation process separates effective negotiations from not-so effective ones. In negotiation arena, often it’s said that- One is fixated, two is a dilemma; It’s three where solutions start emerging!
• Criteria- Basing your negotiation actions and decisions on some objective and rational criteria will save from heart-breaks. This will be viewed as impartial, fair and transparent by all the parties. ‘Yield to principles and not pressure’ is a great dictum in negotiations.

When you combine these tenets of principled-negotiation with the practice of value-creation & value-claiming you get ‘Value-based Negotiation’– a model of negotiation that has the potential to rewrite your negotiation paradigms and practices!

To know more about ‘Value-based Negotiation’ and how it can benefit you and your teams be more pragmatic and effective in everyday negotiations and conflict resolution, please click the link here and visit the page-https://www.facebook.com/ValueBasedNegotiation

L&D’s Change-agenda: Back to Future

In my last blog “L&D in 2015 & Beyond: No Crystal-gazing only C’sense”, I tried to play devil’s advocate for L&D leaders and practitioners in the fast changing world-order unleashed by the forces of VUCA. Most often than not, transformational changes can be traced back to elementary factors that were neglected for long. How often have you seen new CEOs drive organizational changes and cultural-shift because for long the predecessor/s ignored fundamentals viz. decline in R&D spend, thrust for innovation, product-development strategies and what you have. In political landscape too examples abound, disintegration of erstwhile USSR is a classic example. Problems of today have roots in the myopic quick-fixes of the past!

I ended the last blog with a question ‘“How do you create the agenda of change for L&D professionals and practices in dealing with the executives of today who are apparently higher up the VUCA learning curve?” I’d try deal with this question in this blog.

Thanks to Dave Ulrich, HRBP is a fairly established concept and practice. The fraternity has by-and-large earned the ‘Sit-on-the-Table’! Can the same be said for L&D? Did someone ever coax us to be L&D-BP? Sobriquets apart, there is an urgent need to re-position the function as not a support or an enabler but a true business driver a kind of change-agent! I have a three (3) point agenda to drive this shift. These are not entirely transformational in nature but been under-practiced for long or in some cases uninitiated thus far.

1. Next-level of Performance Consultation: I would assume that all L&D professional are doctrined with the principles and practice of performance consultation! I might be wrong, for I know that many training departments in some of the industries barely have an idea of effective consulting with business. They have been contended being ‘order-takers’- pardon for being self-critical of the fraternity (some even might find it ‘harsh’)! When I say of next-level of performance consulting, I add an element of ‘educating’ the business leaders and executives besides the 4-S of basic consulting.

This new level of performance consulting would require us to

• Get better with the understanding of business and its changing requirements in the times of VUCA. In fact, as learning leaders we must create some of the changes that would help business stay ahead on the VUCA curve. We’re uniquely placed to ‘educate’ business from a ‘dissociated’ state. Past business experience of L&D leaders might help but then we need to build the aircraft while flying!
• Educate business leaders about the traits of social leadership where he is a creator, curator and distributor of contents (not restricted to learning alone but other business dimensions too). Learning leaders can actually assuage many of the fears of leaders arising out of vulnerabilities in social leadership practice.

Source: McKinsey 2013 report on Social Leadership

  2.  Drive the culture change of ‘Leaders as Teachers’: It’s been known for long that a good leader is a great teacher. A 2010 article from Harvard Publishing quotes Noel Trichy as saying “Winning companies—those that consistently outperform competitors and reward shareholders—[have] moved beyond learning organizations to become teaching organizations,”

I have often impressed upon my senior executives to don the hat of a teacher and the results have been mixed- one has to persevere in case of change in beliefs and behaviors. The rewards are disproportionately high! Leader-led learning is the thing of the future! Learning leaders need to act as catalyst.

3.  Setting learning expectations right from the word ‘go’: Often we hear business leaders and executives’ lukewarm response to learning evaluations- some even desisting! (They’re the same folks who will ask you for the return on dollar spent!) Some of them half-heartedly suggest some behavioral metrics for measurement. Setting the right expectation from the beginning is critical- talk of Return on Expectations (RoE) in conjunction to financial RoI. Asking leaders to bring in their share of pie to the table when it comes to evaluation is utmost important to hold managers and leaders commit to the success of learning.

A rough estimate of all learning evaluations across curricula and even industries would suggest that Level-4evaluations are restricted to approximately 9-11% of all programs. As learning leaders we must relook into this state of measurement- we must focus on the right measuring tools for the right things to be measured (#metricthatmatters)

My articulation of the change agenda for learning leaders is based on the simple premise of ‘Back to Basics’. I believe integrating some of these basics with newer trends in workplace learning aka, collaborative and social learning, self-directed learning, personal learning networks (PLNs) and informal mentoring have the potential to transform a learning leader to be a successful business driver. Can we then usher in L&D-BP?

Talk of sobriquets!

L&D in 2015 & Beyond: No Crystal-gazing but Common Sense!

Through various social media posts, blogs, tweets (and many more avenues that I might not know of) I have been observing a tendency to portend major trends in L&D during 2015. I hold the highest regards for many of these sources and people behind. They’ve achieved significant milestones in their respective areas.

The disillusionment starts happening then- being in such positions of a thought-leader, industry go-to-person or resource, they have the power and influence  to shape future course of action and not continue with the trends of past many years that have barely evolved or changed marginally. Yes, I’m alluding to some of the trends in L&D space over past 7-8 years and more specifically to one area- Delivery of learning.

I’ve included two such State of Industry Reports (SOIR; ASTD press) from 2009 and 2014.

You can barely point out which precedes the other due to almost identical content in letter and spirit. It brings forth two vital issues for the L&D community and its though-leaders to be ruthless about and to do a soul-search. Are we doing enough? These issues are,

1. Even after six (6) years the industry practice and preferences of learning delivery methods have barely transformed. We often hear and talk of VUCA world and its implications for L&D community. I believe, 6 years is a great deal of time in context of VUCA environment. Still two-thirds of learning delivery happening through instructor-led programs. Don’t take me for a second, that I am averse to ILTs; indeed they are critical to many curricula and context. I’m not redefining 70:20:10 but there too, the pie is just the first number of two digits! Why then the practice and trend (if you’d call it!) still stack up disproportionately? It gets more acute when millennial influx the workplace at a scorching speed- US workforce is already 36% millennial, ready to soar to 75% by 2025!^[1] India already has a demographic dividend -50% of its population is millennial ^[2] Their workplace and learning preferences are distinct and different from the generations gone by. Two of the most cited areas for this generation are
   • Self-directed learning
   • Informal mentoring

In this backdrop, I have reservations in studying the various industry reports be it from American Society of Training & Development (rechristened as ATD) or Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD). Being a credentialed learning professional myself, I expect these bodies to be more assertive and actually act as torch-bearers of workplace trends when it comes to learning & development. How do these organizations and their thought-leaders interact with the executives from the industry to make case for what is desired by the changing workforce. For example, Flipped class-room is a novel way to engage the students and the working professionals. Time is ripe when we can experiment and evolve together- learners as well as the facilitators (not the ‘teachers’ and ‘trainers’ of the world!)

2. The second issue that flows almost as a corollary to the above is- ‘How ground-breaking and trend-setting are these annual surveys and reports where many thousand professionals participate? These all to chart out what can be aspired for as guidelines, consensus-report and industry-practice changing recommendations. But sorry to say, I could see little novelty and agility in approach while coming up with predicts and guidelines that would meet the challenges of VUCA world coupled with the changing demographics at workplace.

This brings up the question that should be directed to the thought-leaders, professional-body and professionals like me “How do you create the agenda of change for L&D professionals and practices in dealing with the executives of today who are apparently higher up the VUCA learning curve?”

I will attempt answering to some of the aspects of this question in my next blog. Watch out for this space and of course, please drop in your thoughts, critical comments to this post and the question raised. It’s important as L&D practitioners that we work-out-loud (WoL) , debate, disagree (agreeably) and design the future of L&D and not just set trends for 2015 but much beyond into the future.

References:

1. http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/235444
2. http://www.pwc.com/en_M1/m1/services/consulting/documents/millennials-at-work.pdf

Creating a brand called ‘You’

‘Personal branding’ is a hotly debated topic these days. When I was speaking about it with the fellow executive committee member and the country director, I immediately stuck a cord with him to run a program on it for our employees.

Interestingly I stumbled up the story of the twin Iranian sisters , Ladan and Laleh Bijani who were conjoined at the head. At the age of 29, they decided to separate from each other and lead individual lives much to the resistance of the family and even the spiritual leaders and clerics. Unfortunately, after being operated at a Singapore hospital, both the sisters died of severe blood loss. Later sources narrated that the sisters were partly driven by their strong desire to follow their preferred career paths- while Ladan wanted to pursue law, Laleh’s interests lied in journalism. This eventful story had strong message about how individuals want to pursue their aspirations feverishly to carve a niche for themselves even if they are conjoined. This poses the question ‘What is your brand?’

Marketing consultant and a thought leader on ‘Personal Branding’, Dorie Clark defines it as ‘something you stand for’. She writes in her latest book ‘Reinventing You’ about how can you imagine your future and create a strong narrative establishing the brand ‘You’. When you’ve left the room, what do others speak about you? What values do you bring to the table? What kind of imagery does your name evoke in others mind? All these and more will create the brand ‘You’. Often I am asked why does personal branding matter all the more these days? People are increasingly becoming virtual friends first and then after many months (even years) they probably meet in the real world- face-to-face. You want to project a certain image of yourself but there are chances that the world outside perceives you in a different light which is something that you wouldn’t like to create. Unless you take charge of your brand and the impression that it creates, it will always be at the mercy of others’ interpretation.

Roll back to product marketing space, a brand represents a promise. A promise of a certain authentic experience that the consumer would have from the product. It conveys a degree of predictability and persona. Similarly, a personal brand stands for the attributes which you as a professional symbolize. This represents a strong purpose of your being self and what values do you embody. It makes you a ‘go-to-person’ in a given domain. For example, I, as a learning professional, symbolize the resources to bring the very best of other individuals and someone who believe in ‘Life-wide’ learning and growth for himself.

I am not an expert on personal branding but during my preparation for the program I could synthesize a very interesting framework for Personal Branding much as a parallel to 5-Ps of marketing (some claim 8-Ps!). I call it ‘5-C’s of Personal Branding. When crafted diligently, these elements will effectively go a long way in establishing you and your personal brand.

1. Character: It’s the equivalent of Product in marketing parlance. This gives a distinct personality that you come to represent as a professional. One needs to craft this very meticulously over a period in time. I might wish to portray myself as a people developer who genuinely invests time in others but if my acts and words are casual and insincere, even though inadvertently, they will ruin my prospects. Authenticity is the name of the game.
2. Community: As a personal brand, you have an audience who look up to you. You are the ‘go-to-person’ for them. You are considered a thought-leader by them. This is analogous to People of product marketing. You add value to them through your interface and interaction. Think of the community that looks up to you as a resource center. Build your assets there and declare periodic dividends for the community. Being genuine to your community is the hallmark.
3. Channel: In today’s networked economy, choose the right medium to express yourself. It has synergies with your own attribute. Place-equivalent in personal branding this medium will augment your narrative. Don’t be a carpet bomber, be a sharp shooter in your approach. A plethora of social media are available to express and build your repertoire- be choosy in your approach. If you are a fun loving social animal, Facebook would be your fit medium but for an avid wild-life photographer Instagram might be better option. Again, express yourself authentically.
4. Creation and Curation: As a brand you are viewed as a resource center and you can ill afford to belie their expectations. A while paper from McKinsey in 2013, outlined six skills of a social leader- content creation featured as one among these. As a strong personal brand, what is your expertise and contribution to the community? You mean a lot to your fellow community members. Express your creativity and creation through the appropriate media that you have chosen for yourself. It could be a blog or LinkedIn post or simply a regular contributor to your Enterprise Social Network (ESN). Internet is buzzing all the time with big data- there’s a literal cacophony out there. As a curator, you develop a method in the madness and convert this cacophony into symphony. Curate the relevant resources for the community- they will be indebted to you. These are equivalent of Promotion in product marketing. Sincerity and genuineness is the key.
5. Commitment: The community that a strong personal brand caters to put in serious commitment of time and attention. You can think of this as the counterpart of price for a brand that we choose. A genuine and authentic engagement of a successful personal brand with its community begets the fitting commitment of its audience. Guy Kawasaki, Brian Solis and Oprah Winfrey all command commitments from respective community they serve. Authenticity will go a long way in ensuring that kind of a commitment.

In a nutshell, personal branding is increasingly getting important and critical determinant of success in professional (and personal) sphere. Create a strong narrative that distills your brand promise to your audience and hold dear your authenticity. Consistency of approach coupled with genuineness will foster the brand that you’ve always cherished for.

You can access my further take on Personal Branding by scanning the QR code below,

Likeability: Your Passport to Professional Success

Modern social networking tools such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and their clans have redefined the meaning of many of the words in English vocabulary. One prominent such word is ‘Likes’. This has changed the dynamics of social interaction on an individual level. More often than not people on these social sites return to them checking their ‘Like’ and ‘Follower’ status. Many decades back when Dale Carnegie wrote the iconic book ‘How to Win Friends & Influence People’ he wouldn’t have the faintest of the idea what transformation these words would undergo in less than a century!

Enter the workplace of today. Likeability is a trait of an employee that makes him or her likeable to others. It’s about being pleasing to others. According to Labour Bureau statistics, employees spend 36% of a day’s time at workplace. This has serious repercussions for not only professional relationships but personal as well as. Likeability is an important interpersonal skill for professionals across hierarchies. We get along well with like-minded people and pleasing personalities. However, many in the corporate world manipulate this trait to play favorites and cut short others.  We’ll cover this in the next blog, the second in the two-part series.

In this blog, I will discuss how to work on and improve your likeability at workplace. While most of the guiding principles of Carnegie’s book still hold true, there are a couple of new avatars given the nature of networked society and economy.

• Take genuine interest in others: This might include their work, social lives, interests etc. A sincere appreciation of what the other person is doing will help strike rapport at the earliest. Any interaction that has requests such as ‘Tell me some more on that…’ will immediate get you an eyeball as well as mind-share but it goes a long way to get dividend of ‘heart-share’. One caveat here, though, is the genuineness of your effort.
• Be present in the moment: Human interactions are way too complex. ‘Presenteism’ cost dearly which means an interaction where you’re physically present and not mentally. ‘Here and Now’ is a time-tested method of human interaction yet so often we find our mind wandering far and wide while speaking to others. No wonder the other person sniffs at it quickly and rapport withers.
• Show respect to others: No brainer here- yet often we see our work relationships strained thanks to irresponsible and casual remarks and acts. Showing respect to the person and profession is a virtue that never went out of fashion.
• Greet people with genuine warmth: A ‘Good Morning’ uttered authentically to co-workers goes some way to beat the Monday blues. While doing so, be present in the moment; bear a smile and court a comforting eye-contact. Take their names- this is the finest word to the ears of a person.
• Disagree; Agreeably: While confronting someone for facts, doing it the right way makes all the difference between an assertive and a bully. While you stand by your conviction and principle, you let the other person save his face. Showing down never helps. Praise in public and reprimand in private is a good practice.
• Be available for your co-workers: When others are burning mid-night oil, it will go a long way for you if they know that they have your shoulder even if it doesn’t fall under your direct deliverables. Reaching out with moral and physical support is a rapport-multiplier.
• Be mindful: Prof Ellen Langer, a psychologist from Harvard coined the terms- Mindfulness and Mindlessness. As you would have guessed them, they are simple yet elusive traits of human being. Observing something for details and newness is what mindfulness is all about. While interacting with people, can we watch out for two or three new things about them? It takes effort to begin; however, this can strike deep trust and rapport with them. Practices in likeability have given interesting trends in sociology and economics. See them in graphics here,

  With the ever changing social and workplace mores, likeability has emerged as the new currency of interpersonal skill and a yardstick of our success at workplace or lack of it. Likeable people are promoted over those having higher caliber but lacking in this sphere. It’s an emerging critical success factor in professional domain. Finishing schools and corporates will do well in sensitizing their people on this trait whose importance has grown immensely than ever before.

Indian Festivals: Lessons on ‘Creative Destruction’ for Leaders

I was packing up for the festival holidays that mark 5-days of Diwali in India. We know of Diwali as the festival of light that drowns the darkness for the light to brighten our lives. It also marks the homecoming of Lord Rama after the Vanawash (exile) of long fourteen years. We’ve just come out of a series of big festivals in this part of the world- Ganapati, Navaratri, Durga Puja.

Truly, there are proverbial thirteen festivals in twelve months. I am no expert on mythologies or religious practices but what I could distinctly make out of the common theme in many of these festivals is of ‘Creative Destruction’. Simply put, letting the old guard die for the new to emerge! Most of these festivals will have ‘Havan’ (the pious pyre) that burns wood and other ingredients for the heat, light and ‘senses-filling’ fumes for the so-called purification of air and the environment. They are really, refreshing and inspiring for most of the practitioners.

What lessons does ‘Creative Destruction’ have for the leaders of today?

I conclude three critical leadership lessons from ‘Creative Destruction’.

1. Self-renewal: Most of such religious or mythological practices allude to creation of new and something better than what was present before. Incessantly discovering oneself by selectively destructing the past is hallmark of a great leader. They create changes. They allow stability and status-quo to die in order to let newer patterns emerge. Someone in tech-world let the Pagers die for Mobile phones to emerge.
2. Strong bonding around a common act or purpose: Devotees of all hues perform their religious acts during such ‘Havan’ for the hope of self-good and good for the society. Leaders rally their people around with such profound purpose which is bigger than these individuals themselves. Such act of greater good for the organization or society make a Tata or Gandhi out of ordinary mortals.
3. Compelling sense of a better and brighter future: These ‘Havans’ are carried out with the inner belief of a better tomorrow for the society at large irrespective of the present state. So are the true leaders, who have a deep sense of a brighter future whatever be the present situation. ‘The Stockdale paradox’ characterizes the unwavering faith that good will prevail at the end despite having the realization of the harsh realities of today.

Thankfully, every year we are reminded of the virtues of self-renewal and unwavering faith in a better tomorrow through the festivities and myriad practices therein. Leaders not only should participate in these religious practices but more importantly, make these inherent messages stick with them, the larger organizations and society.

We talk of VUCA world so often these days, interestingly, our century-old practices always reckoned change and self-renewal as integral part of everyday life.

Reinvent, reinvigorate and renew yourself this festive season!

3 Leadership Lessons from Carabiners!

I met Tom, my ex-colleague, in downtown Boston yesterday and he said, ‘I want to gift you something very symbolic as you move up in your career’. He presented me with the carabiner and said this was the ‘life-saving’ gear of mountaineers and is symbolic for corporate leaders! I could understand pretty little then but upon contemplating, I was zapped with the profound message this simple tool has for organization leaders. For mountaineers, they have been sacred and ‘life-saving’ gears.

Carabiners are used to hold securely the mountaineers while allowing them to navigate through the climbing efficiently while it passes freely the rope through it. A good quality carabiner with appropriate kN rating (a measure of the force that a kilogram of weight would exert during free falling) will ensure that it can withstand not only your weight but a couple of your friends’ as well!

In the context of organizational leadership, it has three profound messages, I reckoned later.

It’s lonely at the top!

As a leader, you allow free exchanges of ideas and feedback within the organization that you lead similar to that of carabiner that allows free movement of the rope in various styles of knotting. As one moves up the corporate leader, he is akin to the mountaineer who is climbing up and is often alone at the top. They say, it’s lonely at the top- so true! This makes organizational leaders all the more vulnerable being immune to the feedback (often in the form of murmurs through ground-up). After all, who will call out, ‘The king has no clothes!’ ; It takes the innocence of a child and the courage of a fearless. Modern organizations curb these virtues and create clones and cronies. As a leader, are you allowing yourself to be surrounded with the ‘child-like’ mind of your employees who can brutally show up you the mirror. Like a carbiner, are you allowing free-exchanges of ideas, feedback and at times the brutal truth and critique?

Withstand the environmental forces!

A carbiner can successfully carry your dynamic load in addition to a couple of your friends’. Likewise, an organizational leader carries with him the well-being of each and all employees. Ironically, we find the managers and leaders passing the buck on to more gullible and unsuspecting employees. The stands taken by the managers and leaders are often compromised under various environmental pulls and pushes to suit their own interests at the cost of those of employees. Employees are downsized even when the CEO compensation sky-rocket! A true leader looks into the mirror when things go wrong and looks out of the window when things are running smooth to accord the dues to his employees. A carabiner keeps the leader grounded to this reality.

Self-renewal is the basic hygiene at the top!

A carabiner takes various knotting styles that suit to the need of the mountaineers yet it preserves its effectiveness and efficiency. A leader truly rediscovers himself in the face of the changes in the organization, industry and the environment. For a leader, the test lies in self-renewal! Are you ‘preserving’ yourself and the organization’s resources or ‘recreating’ them? ‘Creative-destruction’ is what separates a leader from the manager who is engaged in stability and predictiveness. In contrast, a visionary leader recreates the ‘game’ and ushers in new changes.

As I was contemplating these lessons from the carabiner that was gifted to me, I thanked Tom for his insightful and ‘symbolic’ gift. They often say in mountaineering that the ‘peak’ is a great leveler that creates ‘equals’ of all mountaineers…but I learnt profound lessons in leadership from a carabiner today!

Insensitivity in Sensitivity Training!

I was itching to write this post for a couple of weeks now but rather chose to sleep over the matter for some time! The main reason for doing so was that I wanted to be doubly sure that my views are least influenced and clouded by my experience of a T-group as one of the participants.

T-groups should be more sensitive with their sensitivity training!

I am no expert on T-groups but what I know that one of the purported objectives of T-group facilitation is to be “more aware of the diversity-related sensitivities and issues that typically arise among work group members from different racial, ethnic, religious, gender. age, socioeconomic, etc. group identities, and better able to approach individuals from different identity groups in sensitive and positive ways” [ Source: http://www.ntl.org/]

Precisely for this reason, T-groups are often referred to as sensitivity  training also. I had heard about T-group procedures earlier also where participants were strangers to each other before the lab. This one was rather unique in the sense that the participants knew each other as co-workers! Within the first hour of the lab it was evident to me that the processes were anything but far removed from being sensitive to others feelings and emotions! A heterogeneous group that you can expect coming from the same workplace, this had a very chequered participants.

What really nudged me off from a learner’s perspective was that the facilitator started attacking one of the participants for not being expressive and contributing at par with the rest of the pack. I knew the person as to be reticent and in fact, challenged with verbal communication. Talking to a group was always a uphill task for him and I had given him the feedback and some tips from time to time. A T-group set up was possibly too much for him to reconcile especially in the very beginning of the process.

In my opinion, which I expressed candidly to the facilitators, the intent was to make him realize his behavior in a group and try help him but the instrument being applied was explicitly inappropriate. 

Seeing the facilitators acting in a specific way, some of the more expressive group members adopted the same even though they knew him and his challenges! This made him go even further into a shell and kept unnaturally quiet for most of the program.

The experience posed to me two serious questions about the behaviors of the facilitators- one, does a T-group advocate a ‘shock-and-awe’ kind of approach to change behaviors? and two, can strength-based approach to behavioral change not be a better way to facilitate such lab where self-awareness building is the key? 

In fact, Appreciate Inquiry based labs are the subsequent branch out from NTL’s experiment with T-group.

As I mentioned, I am no expert on T-groups, but I am convinced on one thing that ‘Whale done’ approach of behavioral reinforcement is far more effective than ‘Gotcha’ approach! (Those of you who’re not familiar with these terms might take a look on the book titled ‘Whale Done!’ by Ken Blanchard)

As a learner, I will be interested to listen to any experienced T-group facilitator about the approach which could have potentially damaged the self-belief of the participant for long! I am yet to reconcile with the process of ‘Shock & awe’ to bring any meaningful change in behavior.

After all, you can’t be insensitive in a sensitivity training!