Morning,
About six or seven years ago, at one of our Best Practices Meeting, which we hosted with some of our clients, the late Jim Mackin, a CEO of a large manufacturing company was up on the stage presenting what he did to pull his team to a new vision of being a customer-centric business with empowered, self-directed teams, doing what it takes.
Jim was an engineer, a kind and employee-focused CEO who thought the way most manufacturing companies structured their business was a bit ridiculous. He believed shareholders deserved to make decent money by driving up efficiencies and lowering costs but the entire top down, us vs. them, leave your employees brains at the door, left a lot to be desired.
Jim explained methods, such as engaging, connecting, building and training the team to help them adapt, grow and be part of the transition to help his customers - was a more progressive and profitable way. He thought leadership was about attaining the willing cooperation of his people to achieve the vision and desired results. When I think of what Jim said that day, I think of what a wonderful leader he was. I would follow him anywhere. He combined good business design with incredible people skills. He emotionally charged so many of his people’s batteries every day.
At the end of his presentation, he wondered out loud why so few business owners get the people thing. Why don’t they engage, connect, mentor, coach, and train their people? Why were they afraid of having innovative teams? Well that was years ago. Now it feels like there are very few Jim Mackins left, which is unfortunate.
Forget that manufacturing is about creating extra value (and charging for it) for their clients. The truth is, if it wasn’t for the low Canadian dollar, most manufacturing companies wouldn’t have succeeded as well as they have.
Forget that leadership is about obtaining the willing cooperation of a team by engaging them in a vision and a clear picture of reality and actions to move forward; in contrast to leaders who only have a vision about how to line their pockets (the kind of leadership that caused the world-wide economic collapse and our RRSP portfolios to go down).
Forget that you actually care about your employees’ values and what they want and especially their need to get better. They want to contribute and be coached and trained (I guess only sissies think that way).
Are there any Jim Mackins left out there?
It seems the whole world has been bluffed out by an endless changing technical orientation, so all of our answers are technical ones. Over the last ten to five years, being smart has become more important than being effective.
Isn’t it about time that we figure out the people part of the equation? The truth, to be discovered by all of us, are we effective at making the changes and transitioning our business from where we are to where we want to go? Are we really good at executing all the initiatives that will be required? Are we really willing and effective at leading, engaging, mentoring and training our people?
Here is a question to ponder, to get at the reality:
How much fun would it be working for you… for your organization?
Here are some more questions:
Do your people know the why’s of the business or are they continually told the how’s?
Do you unleash the individual initiative and risk-taking instincts of every employee by asking them the why’s? (Strategy, values, initiatives, systems, policies etc.)
Other than keeping their job in your wonderful caring environment, why would anyone contribute to building, redesigning, improving or innovating at your place?
In reality, a lot of the business is nasty and it bores employees. The young Millennials see right through an organization’s strategic design and laugh at it. They want challenge around the truth.
We “humans” have hearts, want to be happy, want to contribute, want to be appreciated, and want to be a part of something worth building. Many organization leaders think ruthless, smart logic is all that is required.
Jim Mackin and many other business leaders I’ve known knew how to capture the hearts as well as the heads of their people. They stopped telling and engaged them, listened well, showed employees how to match their values with those of the organization and showed interest in them. They created a work environment where staff motivate themselves. They mentored them, delegated well, held them accountable and were very serious about building, training and coaching them. In other words, they provided the climate and proper nourishment and let people grow. If you want more innovation, more productivity and more engagement, liberate and build your people.
When was the last time you spent a dollar coaching and training your people or sat down and mentored your people to improved performance and behaviour?
Today I take a stand for being more like Jim Mackin. I hope you will too. It’s fun watching people and the business grow together.
Actions:
1) Have a conversation with one of your team members about their interests, views and see if you can spot what makes them tick. In other words, their values. Listen for what they need to become a better performer/producer and seek out how to provide something for them (i.e. training, coaching, information etc.). Let them know that you can be a Mentor for them.
2) Tell them that you want to engage them in some questions that the organization needs answered
3) Ask the questions
Other Actions:
If it helps you to take action on what needs to be done, join us on our next Discovery Call on Thursday, December 17th at 11AM EST. We engage you in looking at your business or team’s situation and what’s going on and tell you specifically of our offering to see if it would help you get to where you want to go quickly and effectively.
Next Discovery Session: Thursday, December 17th @ 11AM EST
Have a great week!
To your continued success,
Kevin
Kevin D. Crone
CEO
Dale Carnegie Business Group
BusinessNext Inc.
Offering Dale Carnegie Throughout Canada
kevin@businessnext.ca
(905) 826-7300 / 1-800-361-2032 ext. 223
www.dalecarnegie.ca
www.businessnext.ca
Lets Connect!
