Vareity What’s Up

Here’s the blitz of what’s on my mind and what I am doing right now:

1. Anon vs Brand? Should I keep blogging anon? What’s the value to me in doing that? If I keep blogging anon, nobody connects my expertise and writing skill to me, myself, and my actual brand — which I need. But if I don’t blog anon, can I still effectively write about the tender parts of my career development, and about the object lessons from staff and colleagues? But is blogging about others anon ethical?  I am getting alarmed with myself that I am NOT being ethical! I am leaning towards scrapping this whole thing and starting anew, as myself.
2. Is Penelope Trunk crazy or the true new wave? Is she taking the blend-your-professional-and-your-personal-and-tell-all meme to the non-useful extreme, or is she just the new normal? At least she’s ethical.
3. I am pissed at my boss. And I told him so. But I don’t think I told him effectively enough.  He stripped me of a responsibility (goal) without telling me that he’d done it nor telling me why.  And this after he happily agreed that we should de-prioritize it.  His action was more about getting control of one of my peers (he gave my goal to her boss) than about punishing me.  It’s well known that I don’t effectively influence her.  But not telling me was reactionary, and somewhat chickenshit. I’m pissed at myself for fumbling a great opportunity to be more candid. It will be on my agenda at my next career development status with him.
4. I am doing a personal brand assessment using Reach 360. They are a very interesting company that I have been following for a few years, but I’ve never used their 360-degree brand assessment tool before. I will let you know what I learn. They have good teleseminars – go check them out.
5. I am reading Back of the Napkin, and thinking about how to apply it to both project planning and communication.
6. I got great feedback from two people this week. That’s nice.
7. I am giving up one of my direct reports to someone else. I was expecting this, at about this time of year – her project is ending and she is working on something new.  But I am still bummed. My little empire is shrinking, that never feels good!
8. I think my least-resilient employee wants to kill me. Too bad. That’s her responsibility.  Just imagine how pissed at me she’ll be when I share the consequence of her behavior, hostility and inability to engage with the team — she is missing out on a great opportunity because we the management team won’t offer it to her due to track record of behavior, hostility and inability to engage with the team.
9. I am giving a stretch assignment to one of my other employees. That always feels great!
10. The stretch assignment involves an initiative I own that stems straight from the CEO. THAT always feels good!
11. I am recommitting to networking. I have set up regular lunches and coffees with some key leaders with whom I want to reconnect and talk both work and development. I still need to set up regular connections with three VPs with whom I’ve worked in the past, and one VP whom I’ve never met (but he went to my college and he may be the only other Obie at the F50C).  I have also set up some tracking so I can better manage my contacts, track stuff I want to talk about, and not let so much time go between meetings.

Cheers, y’all!

Rant About a Bunch of Leaders in a Twist

I am very frustrated today.  Let me just describe the situation to you in a neutral fashion:  a bunch of mid-level managers, certainly though all in pay grades way above mine, all with their man-panties and lady-panties in a twist, and none able to agree with each other on:  a) presenting problem, b) possible approach, c) solution options.  All with a falsely heightened sense of urgency. None (well, maybe one) with a methodical approach. And I am caught in the middle.

I am feeling a little sorry for myself, and also pulled in about four directions simultaneously.

Hmmm, I should buck up.  Buck right the hell up.  What would I tell my employee, if this were her caught in the middle?

• You add value by creating clarity, simplicity and a methodical approach where this semi-hysterical group of leaders can’t.
• Don’t rely on your leader(s) to fix this for you. Influence w/o authority.
• You want to be promoted? Act like you already are.  How would a Manager Level 3 handle this?
• It’s your job to get these partners organized, cooperating and moving forward.
• Need the boss to actually fix something? First identify really clearly what you need. Then delegate up, setting really clear expectations. Don’t just ask him to “help me manage Leader X” — that’s too vague.
• Be a calming influence.
• Help Leader Y and Director Z act. Stop their spin.

Interestingly, I can do all this.  Creating clarity, finding a plan through the mud, calming, stopping spin, bias for action are all things I do.  I’m a little tense about influence w/o authority, but that is on my developmental agenda for this year.  And gee, the powers that be (God? Universal force for good? Martians?) have handed me a perfect opportunity here on this old silver platter.

I really need to stop feeling sorry for myself.

For now I will just adjourn to watch Battlestar Galactica on DVD.

Rypple Again

I swear this is it.  But I did try out Rypple on my team and 100% of them ended up replying! And they were very candid, which is awesome.   Not just candid, but focused, specific and actionable.  VERY awesome, totally usable.

(Rypple says if you ask 4+ people you have a stronger chance of candid response and full participation.  I think this is because the people you ask can see the count (not the who) of people you ask, and with 4+, folks are more comfortable that they’re truly anonymous.)

So, ta-da, here I share with you:

What my team said about me

Keep Doing

• Empower your direct reports, which makes them feel their commitment and work is valued and does add to the bottom line.
• Be very proactive & take follow-up action.
• Share knowledge, contacts & resources with your tea.
• Hold career development conversations.
• Recognize us, & hold us accountable.
• Give immediate feedback.

Start Doing

• Consistently ask for feedback and make those discussions open and comfortable.
• Ask, trust & limit over-advising when it sounds like things might be working out.
• Don’t react quickly to bad news. Let us talk through it together to arrive at next steps or a solution together.
• Provide information on how we each fit into your area and how your area fits into the team space. Provide leadership and direction on how we can add value to the broader business intelligence efforts at our company.

This is only slightly wordsmithed:  I reformatted it into keep doing/ stop doing form, and changed the “Don’t do X” statements into “Do Y” statements, because it’s always more effective declare what you ARE or WILL be instead of what you are NOT or SHOULDN’T BE.  I firmly believe you accomplish much more when you run towards something instead of running away from something.

I really like how candid everyone was. They called out a couple of blind spots which I didn’t know I had! Specifically:  jumping in to give too much advice too soon, and over-reacting to bad news.  Wow, I’m glad to hear i do the latter because I always hated it when I had managers who did that!  I can see it in myself now — I hear bad news and my bias for action goes into  fix it fix it fix it mode.  My team members will be better served by letting them — and holding them accountable to — fix the messes themselves.  This means holding back the advice, asking more questions like, “what do you think we should do?” and tempering my over-reactions.

I’ve sent this same summary to my team and my boss, so that all can see what people like about my management style and so that all can see what I want to hold myself accountable to address.

I hope that some of you are totally shocked that I shared the results back to my team & boss, at review time no less.  Good, if you are shocked you should be! We managers should absolutely be modeling how to know and own our strengths & weaknesses, and if we are going to hold our teams accountable to be more effective & use feedback, then we should in turn model it ourselves and avoid hypocrisy. Try it, try being honest & show your integrity!

If you manage people and think asking your team for feedback and then heaven help it, letting everyone know what that feedback was is too risky or immature or sets a dangerous precedent or whatever, then there is something wrong with you and you shouldn’t be managing people. Also you are a total coward.  I’m serious, go find a new job where you aren’t allowed to manage or review others.

The Importance Giving Upward Feedback

The new(er) manager stopped into my cube at the end of the day today and asked, I just had my self-review with our boss. Is he always this bad?

And I was all like, Huh?

Because I know he has his annoying traits and blind spots, goodness knows he does and goodness knows I’ve faced all of them.  But I also really like working with him, I know those traits are never meant to be personal attacks, and he is actually the best reviewer I’ve ever had at the F50C.  Really. I’ve learned a ton from him, largely by example and discussion, about how to write a good self review and how to give reviews effectively.

She went on to describe her review experience and I was somewhat shocked to hear it.  Which I told her, and I also told her the stuff I just told you above.

Here’s what was surprising:

1.  The behaviors exhibited were somewhat hostile and very overt, including an unwillingness to make eye contact. (Note: no yelling, swearing, or anything like that – mainly disengagement, not paying attention, reading ahead, and a very tense/hostile carriage of self).

1.5 Corollary: The behaviors exhibited were not a surprise to me, nor should they be for anyone who’s worked with him for more than six months, because they were “classic our boss” — completely part & parcel of his style, just taken to a really bad extreme.  This is not an excuse, just explanation for my surprise at her surprise.

2. There is apparently a pattern of these behaviors — when this new manager sat in on a mid year review he gave to a team member (she was too newly hired to give it herself), his style so upset the team member she had to do “repair work” (her words) afterward.

3.  She did not give him direct feedback at all about the mid year incident, at the time. Or ever.

4. She did not give him direct feedback today, or stop the review in the middle and ask, Should we reschedule – you seem disengaged, or Is something wrong? From your body language you seem upset.

So is the thing that pisses me off here, his behavior? Yes.  Duh.

Or is it her behavior? Yes. More so, I think.  Because:

• Giving feedback in the moment, about specific, observable behavior and its consequences, is the most effective way to ensure the person hears, understands, and is empowered to take action on the feedback. Because it’s relevant, can’t be misinterpreted, and can’t be easily dismissed. And she failed to do so both times.
• It’s one thing for us as his direct reports to have to manage up and deal with his style. It’s another thing not to shield the team below us from having to do that. Failing to run interference after the mid-year and to help our boss see the impact of his style/behavior on our team member is a huge disservice to both our boss and the entire team.
• I should note that the team member in question is one of our brightest and most resilient team members so the fact that our boss rattled her so much is a HUGE consequence.
• Failing to stop the self-review now and address the issue, or address it at the end means she lost an opportunity to teach our boss how to treat her.  And for people that have blind spots around people issues (our boss does and will be the first to admit it) you MUST protect yourself by not letting yourself be treated poorly. And you help very much the person with the blind spots by helping them see their blind spots. (This goes for anyone with any type of blind spot!)
• She was overly concerned with hurting his feelings. Hmmmm, was he concerned at all with hurting hers? No. Would she be concerned with hurting one of her team members’ feelings if she had to give this feedback to them? Yes. But would she find a way to do it effectively and not hurt feelings? Yes.

Here’s what I appreciate about the situation / am sympathetic about:

• She got a neutral 3rd party perspective -mine – to ensure she was reading the situations correctly before taking action.
• She committed to giving him the feedback tomorrow/soon (but it needs to be SOON) about both incidents
• It is hard to give your boss feedback. And our boss definitely can be intimidating. (I’ve coached him on this before.) But we all still need to do it – it helps our bosses, it helps us and it helps our team.
• I offered to let her blame it on me if that gives her a helpful buffer. MFK suggested I talk to you directly about this, or MFK suggested you’d want to know how your actions in these two reviews were read, and the consequences.

People, we are all adults! We MUST be able to speak frankly — firmly, fairly, politely, but frankly — with each other.  We teach people how to treat us. We help each other when we call out harmful behavior and support each other to change.  We have a right to give upward feedback.  We build ease in doing so by starting small and being consistent — then, when the big rocks happen, like today’s incident, it’s easier to be frank.

Please challenge yourselves to to the honorable thing. But if you work for someone abusive, someone who has insane behaviors, someone who is extremely hostile to hearing feedback, you must leave.  Even in this economy, you must leave. The final power is the power of goodbye.

Experiments in Setting Clear Expectations

In a former life, I had an employee who was full of ambition, a sense of entitlement and a task focus (vs a big-picture focus), but just did not “get it” in terms of understanding what it take to be promoted or take on increasingly complex responsibilities. She felt that if she could just notch up a long, long laundry list of tasks completed it proved she should be promoted.

We had to have endless conversations about the fact that stunning performance does not equal merely a long list of tasks accomplished.  Rather stunning perofrmance includes critical thinking, problem solving, offering recommendations and solution options and not just talking about problems, taking initiative to look beyond the first right solution, taking initiative to go beyond the clients’ literal expectations and delight them, communicating extremely well, building trust, managing up and taking action without having explicit instruction or every last data point.

I always felt if I’d just been more explicit from the start about my style and my expectations, it would have been easier for her to “get it,” about thinking beyond just tasks and understanding the more complex behaviors and attitudes necessary to out-perform.  So after working with her I typed up an explicit list of my expectations and now I use it with new employees.  I think too many of us managers expect our team members to read our minds or magically figure out what our style & expectations are.  But how can people out-perform if they don’t know what good performance looks like? As well, too often we tell employees, take initiative or communicate well, but we don’t tell them what good initiative, or “well” looks like. It’s so much easier just to talk about it frankly and start off on the same page.  Since I give new employees a copy of this list and we talk through it, it’s also easier to hold them accountable when they are not meeting expectations.

This list is a compliment to job duties (make widget X, maintain database Y, deliver project Z).  This list is about  things that directly contribute to your being supremely effective in doing those things, vs merely scraping by & getting them ticked off your list.  It’s also about how best to manage up to me.  It’s not perfect, and it’s not exhaustive, but it has been really helpful in terms of getting off on the right foot.

My Management Style/Expectations

1. I prefer to give basic direction & step back

• You are empowered to problem-solve & act without my detailed approval for every choice or action.

• I expect “insurance,” however:

• Tell me how you will gain my confidence in your decision-making, without asking me for approval on all details.
• How will you approach insurance for basic issues vs big or very sensitive issues?

• Identify reasonable deadlines, interim milestones, etc and manage to them.  Hold your partners/virtual teams accountable as well.

• If you need more direction, clarification, clearer deadlines, or have questions, I expect you to ask me right away

• Don’t burn time spinning your wheels

• Better to clarify than make assumptions

2. I expect you to manage my expectations

• I generally expect a 1-week turnaround for basic assignments, and a 24-hour turnaround for critical issues / fires
• 1-week or 24-hours too short? Propose a more reasonable time frame
• Surface material issues & proposed course of action in timely manner
• Challenge me & propose better ways of doing things
• Bring me thoughtful options & recommendations, not just problems
• Regularly inform me of your wins!,
• Regularly share feedback that you get, both positive & constructive
• Give me a regular pulse on your workload and capacity

3. I expect effective communication

• Provide regular progress reports at every status, and in-between status if necessary
• Identify interim milestones, communicate & manage to them
• Ensure you can present the bottom line / exec summary, and provide relevant level-setting or context, without drowning me or your audience in too much detail
• Share drafts whenever possible and request feedback regularly
• Identify how you will communicate to and gain buy-in from stakeholders, then execute on that plan
• Identify how you will need to leverage me for communication support

4. I want feedback from you (thanks in advance!!)

• How am I doing? Are you getting what you need from me?
• What should I start/stop/continue doing?
• Give me specifics about what actions I took that you liked or didn’t like

5. I expect you to be savvy about your strengths, weaknesses & development

• Be able to speak frankly and freely about each
• Own your weaknesses – none of us are perfect!
• Identify how you leverage your strengths and how you can position yourself to operate primarily from within your strengths
• Identify how you can mitigate, work-around, or neutralize your weaknesses
• Ask me for support, tactical ideas, strategies, etc to help you bolster strengths and mitigate weaknesses.

• Be proactive in regularly asking for feedback from me, clients & peers
• Identify and articulate your development interests – what are the next experiences you want to have, and why?  What do you want to learn?

Your Health Condition Is Not An Excuse

I found out recently that a colleague who has been acting poorly at work — paranoid, hostile body language, disengagement, scattered — is totally pregnant.  And had a rotten first tirmester.

Believe me, that first trimester can be a B-I-T-C-H.

But pregnancy (which I frimly believe is NOT a medical condition) or any ACTUAL health condition are not,

NOT

may I repeat NOT

An excuse for acting poorly at work, an excuse for paranoid, hostile body language, disengagement, scattered, or any other behavior that gets in the way of delivering results, building trust and making your boss & clients happy.

If you are having a rotten pregnancy but aren’t public with it yet, have a health problem, are going through a major life change like home sale or divorce or custody battle or aging parents with problems or whatever, find someone to talk to.  And take care of yourself with some vacation or a sick day here and there. Or take a leave of absence. Or reach out to your manager and ask for confidentiality.  Or make some other kind of change. Or cry in public. Or get a mentor. Or tell folks, I have something external to work going on, but nonetheless I want to keep being your trusted partner. Or find someone to talk to.

But don’t take the risk of pissing off a boss or clients, or not delivering results. Don’t risk eroding your personal brand. Or worse yet, creating a new, negative personal brand.  Hold it together or take a breather, but your external condition is not an excuse.

How to Give Useful Feedback

Intern Nathaniel at Rypple left a comment the other day and then pinged me, which I thought was thoughtful since he is clearly doing some viral marketing.  So I like Intern Nathaniel, he seems conscientious and the guy’s just doing his job, trying to be a good marketer in a web 2.0 world. Brother’s gotta get the rent.

Anyhow, squeaky wheel gets the grease and all, I did go check out Rypple and it’s intriguing.  It’s a service that “lets you ask a question of people you trust and get back private feedback and then use that feedback to improve.”  I haven’t tried it yet, but I will after I write this post and then I’ll report back.  Cruising quickly around the site, here are my initial impressions:

• Might be very useful for small companies or firms where HR does not have a robust partner feedback process in place.
• Hmmm, how is this better than sending an email request for feedback?
• Only as good as the question you ask: with a vague, open-ended question you might get vague answers.  With a focused, specific and actionable question you will probably get useful answers.
• User interface is cute. I’m big on cute & friendly UI.
• The sample questions scrolling on the home page are really good. They appear to be real questions from users; Rypple has some beta users who really know how to solicit useful feedback.

Like I said, I’ll try it out and report back.  I am going to ask two questions of my team:  what is the one thing you wish I would do more more of to support you, and what is the one most annoying thing I do that I should stop?

In the meantime, here are my top tips for giving really useful feedback.  These come from real-life trial and error with my teams, effective feedback I’ve gotten, and trainings:

• Give it right away. Give it in the moment, when the behavior and result is fresh.  This makes it real and concrete for the person you’re giving it to.
• Make it actionable. What’s the call to action? Feedback like, Listen more, has no clear action a person can take to fix it. Feedback like, When you text in meetings and interrupt when I’m talking, it doesn’t seem like you’re listening to us, has very clear actions a person can take to fix it.
• Don’t avoid the hard stuff. Ignoring subtle things, or painful things does not mean they will go away. They will get worse. Nip it in the bud.
• Be as objective as possible. Obviously, this is about judging others’ behavior and style, so no one is perfectly objective.  But focus on observed, demonstrated behavior, the impact & consequences of that behavior.
• Load up on praise. People, if there’s one thing to remember, it’s REWARD THE BEHAVIOR YOU WANT MORE OF. Same concept as focusing on strengths: you’ll get a way bigger payoff when you focus on what’s working.
• Give it all year long. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: if you’re not giving balanced, fair, constructive feedback all throughout the year, or if your message when giving performance reviews is a surprise, then you shouldn’t be managing people and there’s something wrong with you.
• Set expectations for change. Don’t just say, You sucked at X. Also say, I expect to see Y next time.
• Support them to change! For Pete’s sake, please also say, Let’s work together to figure out how you can do Y. Or, I’ve got your back as you work on Y. Then have them put Y on their agenda each time you meet for status — keep it active and real, and for Pete’s sake, GET THEIR BACK.
• Give feedback to peers & partners. Just because you don’t have direct reports doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be helping peers & partners to be more successful by catching them doing things right and providing actionable, specific, balanced and useful feedback when things aren’t going so well.  And just because you have direct reports doesn’t mean you get to slack on this.  We are all more successful when we help our peers, partners & clients to be successful. Do your part.
• Give feedback to your boss and your boss’ boss. This is tricker.  You have to invest a lot in your upwards relationships.  You MUST be trusted & known for being reliable and driving results.  But giving upwards feedback helps your mucky mucks be more successful, and a rising tide lifts all boats. This is good for them, for you and for your team. Practice with the small stuff and work up to the big stuff. Catch your mucky mucks doing things right, too! Here’s an example:  I used to tell my boss he needed to thank & recognize my team more.  I also helped him out by telling him what to thank them for and by writing nifty handwritten notes for him to sign.  He respected and valued this feedback, so I branched out a little, tested the watters and still got good results.  Finally I was able to tell him, Hey I don’t think you realize it but you come accross as really intimidating to certain folks at lower pay grades, and here’s why. He had no way of seeing this directly, and knowing this helped him adapt his style to connect better and thus get better results from some key people.

How I Manage Up

Everyone’s boss is different — we all have our weird blind spots and paranoias and strange weaknesses and hyper-focused strengths.  So my tricks for managing up may not work for you, in fact they probably won’t.  But if my boss ever hires you, you can use these tactics on him.

1.  I debate with him. He likes debate.  He likes to argue the point and the merits.  Once I got some feedback that he & my former director liked me because at the time I was one of the only people pushing back.  That little reinforcement was all I needed to get super comfortable saying, “I completely disagree, and here’s why.”  The real tactic here is that I communicate with him using his preferred style.

2.  I give him direct, relatively blunt constructive feedback. He’s from Jersey, he likes direct communication.  We live in MN, there’s a lot of passive aggressive communication.  I try to be plain & straightforward.  I give direct feedback to him on his performance and style because 1) he’s not very self-reflective and doesn’t always monitor the interpersonal after-effects of his approach.  And 2) he once invited me to give feedback.  The first time I gave it, it felt like a big risk.  But there were no bad consequences to me; in fact he thanked me.  And that encouragement was all I needed to keep doing it.  The real tactic here is that I help identify pain points & friction points, and suggest possible solutions, before they cause trouble.

3.  I demand clear expectations and well-defined, specific desired outcomes. Actually, I need to get better at demanding these things, at the time, in the moment, when the confusion is happening.  He’s strategic, and he’s often thinking out loud at a mile-a-minute clip.  He usually locks onto his desired outcome like a pit bull locking it’s jaw, but often the outcome is not fully baked and it’s up to the rest of us to bake it.  A lot of the time I feel like I’m trying to mind read.  Or, I’ll have to digest our conversation for a while and then go back to say, “This is what I think we discussed, and now that I’ve mulled it over, here’s what I actually think I should do.”  This, more than anything, directly causes most of my stress, so my goal in 2009 is to stand up for myself right in the moment and get specifics and clarifications.  Just like the ROWE people say I should.  The real tactic here is that I [should] insist on specifically defining, and agreeing on, desired outcome and timing. Also I [should] ask for proof/data/objective facts when he makes an assertion that’s way out of left field.

4.  I take abstract, vague ideas and execute them. I take the crazy ideas and make them happen.  Like I said, he’s often stuck in his desired outcome without a clear path to getting there or an understanding of all the steps to take and issues to clear, and a lot of the time he’s lighting a panicky fire to get there.  He’ll be the first to admit, he isn’t organized, task oriented or a process master. (On the HBDI: no green.)  So he hires people like me, who are.  The real tactic here is that I complement his weaknesses with my strengths. Part of the success here is that he hired me to be this complement — however, I spent a lot of time early on figuring out what his strengths & weaknesses were so that I knew where I could add value.

5.  I make sure he recognizes the team. I show off their wins to him, insist he send thank-you’s or notes, nominate them for awards he gives.  Because it’s not a strength of his at all, and because it helps him not be scary.  The real tactic here is just a variant of both #2 and #4.

6.  I make him look good. Because: DUH. His priorities are my priorities. I’ll drop everything to get him a deck for a meeting with his boss or an important client.  I scan his calendar to figure out when big-deal meetings are happening and either offer or ask what he needs. I feed him wins & measureable successes from my team so he can in turn show them off to his boss and partners. I get shit done. I warn him when trouble or stupidity happens, if it’s likely to get back to him — no surprises. The real tactic here is that I make him look good. Dang, I wish my own team would take this one more seriously with me! LOL.

7.  I delegate up. I am not afraid to give a clear request or assignment back up to my own boss.  I particularly like to deploy him when I think some particular action on his part will make it easier for me or my team to cut through an obstacle and move forward.  Becuse our success is his success. Also sometimes I just think there’s something he should be doing, not me. The real tactic here is that I protect the boundaries of my own work, and ask for the resources (usually action from my boss) I need to be successful.

Weekly Review 12/21/08

How did I do against the developmental goals I focused on last week?

1. Goal: strengthen reputation as outperformer. MIT: push hard hard hard in the goal/objective setting offsite Monday to ensure the management team in general, and I specifically, do NOT sign up for ANY objectives that are not seriously specific and measurable.

Sort-of accomplished.  The way the goal-setting session was run, it was hard to push for measurable objectives, because we rarely got down to the objective level.  However, I was an active participant and was vocal about making our goals specific and not boil-the-ocean big.  I was also able to ensure all my goals were represented and that I didn’t sign up for anything vague or that I didn’t expect.  And I made it abundantly clear — I was funny, funny, funny about it but very serious — to my boss (shout-out for managing up!) & a couple of peers that I am not signing up for any work that isn’t prioritized, meaning: doesn’t align to my goals

2.  Goal: strengthen my reputation as an outperformer. MIT: once the offsite locks down the management team goals/objectives, lock my g/o into a final draft by Friday.

Accomplished.  I noodled all week and took the the goals I owned coming out of the goal-setting session down to the objective level.  All my objectives are measurable, even the more strategic ones. (Don’t get me started on strategic objectives).  I’m working now on crafting a reference document that actually lays out the measures I’ll use. This will help me track performance and gather data along the way, and I’ll also review this document each Friday during my weekly review at work, to keep me focused.  I’ve also got my G/O document out for review & feedback with to of my favorite (read: smartest & most trusted) peers.

3.  Goal: be courted for new roles & new jobs.  MIT: work on re-opening my network, by scheduling two coffees, lunches or statuses, one with a hiring manager who has a prospect for me, one with a former manager, director or VP, to reconnect, hear what’s up in their world, drop my elevator speech, and remind them (sweetly, graciously) how great I am. 

Not accomplished!  I did set up coffee with that hiring manager, for after the holiday break. But I totally shied away from reaching out to any of my former leadership at that Director or VP level.  Why am I so shy about this? Well, reaching out and taking positive risks is the big weakness in my resilience profile.  What am I so skeezed out about? I have been thinking about it all week: more to come in a post about it some time this week.

Goals & MITs for next week:

1. Goal: strenghten my reputation as an outperformer. MIT: finish crafting the measures for my objectives. Review and revise my goals overall.

2. Goal: Be courted for new roles and jobs. MIT: figure out why I’m so gun-shy about networking with leaders way above my pay grade.

Only two goals this week, and probably fewer posts too: Merry Christmas!

Blunt Feedback I Wish I’d Given

Some of this is blunt feedback I wish I’d been given, early in my career.  Some of it is blunt feedback I wish I — or someone — had given various colleagues & employees. Why is it so hard for people to be frank about this stuff?  Maybe it’s because I live in Minnesota, where the official state personality is passive aggressive, but sugar coating or ignoring this stuff doesn’t do anyone any favors.

1.  Stop obsessing about pay grade. Obsessing about pay grade is the wrong strategic move. The more you obsess about your pay grade, the more I think you have no common sense and the less I want to increase your pay grade.  Why? You care about pay grade because you want to make more and feel like you’re being promoted.

But to make more and get promoted, you should instead obsess about outperforming in your current role, getting new marketable experiences, and getting marketable title advancement. These are the things you talk about on your resume and in your interviews, not pay grade.

Plus, pay grades usually overlap by enormous amounts, so is not necessarily an indication your compensation,  just your upside. Jumping pay grades doesn’t guarantee more cash.  But outperforming and racking up marketable experience both increases your likelihood of getting a raise (more cash) and jumping pay grades (more upside).

PS: title is more important than pay grade because title goes on the resume and sets compensation expectations.  For example, in my company, there are certain Analysts who are higher pay grades than some Managers.  But Manager flags as higher-compensated on a resume.

2. Fix your image. Sorry to remind you but humans are evolutionarily wired to make snap judgments based on appearance.  Image includes clothes, hair, makeup, ironing, tie, jewelry, fingernails, etc.  For goodness sake, use a q-tip! Want to advance? Dress like you mean it. Don’t dress like your kid, or yourself from ten years ago,  or the funky free spirit that you think you are.  Right now, you are over estimating how professional you look. If you tell me that “suits are uncomfortable,” or “suits don’t fit me,” than I believe believe you’re not thinking maturely or strategically about your career, because it’s plenty easy to find a suit that fits, and by the way you need to get comfortable with using a tailor.

This rant about suits comes from the suit culture I work in:  you need to carefully examine the culture of your own organization.  How do the leaders in your company present their image? How do the people you admire in the job you want (not the job you have) present their image? Follow their lead.

3. Your communication style is getting in your way. If you are not an excellent communicator, people aren’t recognizing your smarts & your contribution.  People are getting tired of fighting the communication battle with you, or being eternally confused by you. The more tired you make them, the less they will want to work with you, or for you, and to promote you.

4. You need to manage up more. If you don’t know what that is, you need to find out or get a mentor.  It is not the same as brown-nosing: it’s managing expectations, ensuring your actions are aligned with your manager’s goals, appropriately triageing issues, ensuring your manager knows your successes, making life easy for your manager and making your manager look good.  Everyone wants their manager to have their back, right?  Think of managing up as returning the favor.

5. Invest more time in your boss and your boss’ boss. You can have the greatest relationship in the world with the client or your team, but if you don’t ALSO invest in having a great relationship with your boss – and for that matter, your boss’ peers, your boss’ boss and anyone filling in for your boss  – than you are not going to have a great review or get looked at as promotable, or get great new assignments. Or be able to have a candid enough relationship with your boss such that you can say no, influence priorities, and call her on her bullshit.

6. Own your own weaknesses, start mitigating them and take off the blinders.  Why is are so many people so reluctant to own their weaknesses? Maybe because so many of us have been punished for weakness in the past. But what, do you think you are perfect? Only a perfect person would either have no weaknesses or not have to mitigate them.

7. Stop taking everyone’s advice indiscriminately. Instead ask: out of the menu of advice I’ve gotten, which is most applicable for this current situation or this current culture or this current personality?

This goes for my advice, right here, too.   I’m just a data point for you, and you can’t use every data point — I might be an outlier. I don’t have some magic solution or the key to it all.  If I had the key, I wouldn’t need to be writing this blog to figure out what I am doing.