Transformational Consulting

 from a great post by Rosabeth Moss Kanter on the virtue of humor.

You will find peace not by trying to escape your problems, but by confronting them courageously. You will find peace not in denial, but in victory.” J. Donald Walters (1926 - ), Romanian author, lecturer, composer

"Devising and maintaining an atmosphere in which others can put a dent in the universe is the leader's creative act." --Warren Bennis

Can doing good keep employees engaged and grow your business? You bet it can.

Ramping up altruism may well be the killer app in 2009 and early 2010 — a time when companies need their top talent to be firing on all cylinders to spur growth and renewal, but where conventional rewards such as pay raises and bonuses are hard to come by, according to Sylvia Ann Hewitt in her forthcoming book Top Talent: Keeping Performance Up When Business Is Down.

Hewitt is an economist, member of the World Economic Forum Council on the Gender Gap, and founding president of the Center for Work-Life Policy where she directs the "Hidden Brain Drain"—a task force of 50 global companies committed to fully realizing female and multicultural talent.

Her research shows that high-potential employees are motivated by a desire to give back to their communities. These employees are increasingly seeking out employers that allow them to do so on the job. Real life examples and the associated returns? By integrating "doing good" into their business strategies, GE's healthyimagination and Pfizer's Global Access programs are expanding company revenue and attracting and retaining these key employees.

Weaving the 'feel good' factor into a go-to-market playbook gives high potential employees priceless psychic rewards, and a reason to stay, play and win, says Hewitt. This approach is certainly working for Ponni Subbiah — one of Pfizer's most talented female leaders. "We all want to feel that we can have an impact on the world. That's why I like Global Access. The fact that we're going to increase access to our medicines in a part of the world where people are very needy .... that's very gratifying for me." And it's good business.

Action

While donations and volunteering are wonderful avenues for allowing your employees to give back, do not limit your company's socially responsible efforts. Explore ways that your company can combine social responsibility and commercial viability by offering lower cost products to emerging markets or developing a new profitable solution to a social problem.

Adapted from Harvard Business Publishing

The smart folks at Vital Smarts and the MIT Sloane Management Review recently released a study on the root causes for the shockingly high failure rate of cross-functional projects and programs. Estimates are that as many as 80 percent of strategic initiatives, IT projects, corporate programs, and the like are awful disappointments. For example, four years ago, the world watched as Gustav Humbert, the CEO of Air Bus, was dismissed from his job in shame when the A380 aircraft missed its delivery date by more than a year. The worst of it was that the announcement of the delay happened on the day the plane was due! Makes you scratch your head in wonder that this information did not seem to be available to Mr. Humbert any sooner than the minute he was supposed to unveil the engineering marvel to the world. What was going on?

The study identified five early warning signs of project failure. How companies handle these five issues predicts with up to 85 percent precision how well they achieve critical results. In fact, if the people at these organizations handle any of these crucial issues poorly, the odds of the project being delayed, of quality being compromised, and of costs escalating are better than 70 percent. Not good.

1. Fact-Free Planning — Commitments to deadlines and limits on resources are made with little consideration for the real demands of the project.
2. AWOL Sponsors — The executive sponsor of a project is not leading as s/he should. S/he is not showing up for meetings, holding people accountable, or walking the talk.
3. Skirting — Powerful leaders bypass agreed upon decision-making processes or quality gates in ways that are allowing scope creep or putting commitments at risk.
4. Project Chicken — Critical aspects of the project are going over schedule or running over budget and it's not politically popular to admit it. Instead, people play "chicken"—letting things get closer to the deadline without acknowledging problems.
5. Team Failures — Key members of the project team are not competent or do not follow through on their commitments.

ACTION:

• In your project plans, remember to give the right level of focus on the people aspect of the project. Confirm sponsor commitment and what 'commitment' means to project success.
• Make one of the first steps in your project a "Roles and Responsibilities" list. In organizational (or project team) design 101, a fundamental reason why teams don't work effectively is because it is not clear who is doing what. Make it clear – write it down and discuss with everyone on that list.
• Raise issues as soon as you identify them. I think we all know that it is much more effective to handle issues when they are spark vs. a full-blown wildfire.
• Get clear on how people, groups are to be held accountable for this project. This is tricky, but if you get this agreement upfront, it gives you the leverage to question accountability should something go awry.

Adapted from Vital Smarts, 2009.