You Gave the Message But Did They Get It?: Why the Messages Leaders Give Often Don’t Get Through to Their People

Today we have a guest blog from Lauren Owen:

“I can’t believe he didn’t follow up on the request I sent. I thought my email was really clear.”

“But we had a meeting on this very topic and we all agreed on the action steps. I’d say only half the people who were at that meeting did what we talked about!”

“I don’t understand why people are still confused about our mission. We just had an all-company meeting where we announced our new mission statement at the beginning of the year.”

The above statements are familiar to anyone who has ever been a leader, worked for or with a leader. It’s certainly a common theme in many of the CEO peer groups and leadership workshops we’ve led.

As leaders, we think we’ve been clear: we sent the message out, by email, phone conference, meeting, or any number of methods, and……nothing happens. Or, something happens but it’s sure not what we thought it would be. Or, we find out people’s actual interpretation of the message is way off from our intention.

Are we, as leaders, simply bad at telling people what we want? Are people really so unwilling or obtuse? While both of these reasons might be true in some situations, we believe other factors are at work.

First, a story that illustrates my point. When Urs and I lead workshops, we usually start with an opening exercise that is designed to help participants warm up and relates to the day’s topic.

One of our favorite exercises for leadership workshops is this: we arrange participants in a close circle and have one of them start out by naming something in a classification, such as a type of car, for example, “Honda”. The kick-off person points to someone else in the circle and says “Honda”. Then that person in turn comes up with another type of car, for example, “Toyota”. This second person then points to another person and says “Toyota”. This goes on until each person has come up with a unique car name and told it to another person in the group until the circle is completed.

For each pattern, “cars” in this example, the same person says the same car name to the same person each time we repeat the pattern. We practice this pattern until the group can get through it quickly.  It seems pretty easy until we add another pattern, for example, city names, only this time with different people giving different city names to different team members at the same time they are also working through the car pattern. Then we might add a third (and different) pattern to the mix.

Although we initially instruct each person in the circle that they are responsible for ensuring that their “receivers” gets the “word” (the name of the car or city) each time, inevitable once we add more than one pattern, for example cars plus cities plus states, one or more of the patterns breaks down: names of cities and states and car types start flying, sometimes two or three at one time and we eventually lose a pattern.

It’s only after we stop and then restart several times that most groups get into the swing of things and can handle several patterns going through at once without dropping a round.  And it’s really only after we remind everyone that they are responsible for making sure their “receiving” partners really “get” the word, in this case, by deliberate hand gestures, eye contact and body language, repeating the word if necessary until they actually see their partner ‘get’ it, that the patterns start to flow quickly and completely through the entire circle.

So, besides getting people laughing, energized, and synapses firing, how does this relate to good leadership communication?

As leaders, we need to take responsibility for ensuring our team members “get” the messages we are giving. In our warm up exercise: what gets in the way of people getting our messages? Multiple messages sent at the same time, people not paying attention, people dumping and running on to the next thing while assuming/hoping that the message(s) that they gave got through to their teammates. Hmmm, what does this remind you of? A typical work environment for many of us! THIS IS VERY NICE!

For leaders, how might our behaviors change if we truly took responsibility for people “getting” what we are “giving”?

For one thing, we’d tell our messages multiple times in multiple ways. We might hold one on ones, followed up with an email or even follow up meeting. (Research backs up the efficacy of this multiple times, multiple methods approach). Click here to se Urs’ article on this very point.

We’d get over our fear of “redundancy” and concern that we are bothering people with repeated messages because we know it’s more effective. Patrick Lencioni, author of the 5 Dysfunctions of a Team and The Advantage, says the best number of times for a leader to communicate something is not just a couple --  it’s seven.  “It was reported, employees won't believe a leader's message until they've heard it seven times. Whether the real number is five or fifty-five does not matter, the message is – people are skeptical about what they hear unless they hear it repeatedly over time”. This is especially true as your organization grows in size and complexity.

• Before we ended any meeting, we’d ask each person present for their understanding of the action items discussed. We’d follow up with emails that detail the action step, person responsible and completion date.

• We’d figure out different ways to communicate the same message: one-on-one, email, conference call, team and company-wide meetings.

• Just like in our warm up exercise, you can give someone an instruction but there’s no guarantee they are going to get it until they actually try it out. How can we build in more “try outs” and post action debriefs when we are trying something new?

• We’d come up with ways to “test” people on their understanding of especially important messages such as company mission and values and we’d keep the discussion going. (Ideally we would include them in the development of these from the get go.)
  
  

Sounds like a lot of work? You bet, but likely not compared to the money, time and energy wasted from assuming people were taking the correct action when they weren’t.

I once had a very wise boss who said (many times!), “It’s a constant passing parade out there and you need to make sure you get your message across to each one as it goes by.”

LAUREN OWEN:

Lauren Owen, Redpoint Succession and Leadership Coaching

Lauren works with businesses leaders who want to develop and execute succession plans, sharpen their business practices, strengthen their leadership, and create long-lasting value in their businesses. She is a certified Marshall Goldsmith Stakeholder Centered Leadership Coach. She is also a leader of the Excell Puget Sound Southend Group.

(206) 427-2856, (253) 245.3518

 lauren@redpointcoaching.com

www.redpointcoaching.com

Building Strong Teams

Today we have a guest blog from Earl Bell:

Top performing companies have highly functioning teams.  If you want business outcomes to improve dramatically in your company, build an action plan based on the idea that employees are NOT created equal.  

To begin the journey of creating highly functioning teams, start by taking time to separate employees into three categories:

1. Actively Disengaged:  This group hinders your company in a big way.  They are disruptive to customers, vendors, or co-workers.  If you were evil and wanted to destroy a strong company, its culture and values, you'd look for these people as your go-to individuals.

2. Going through the motions:  Most employees fall into this category  They are comfortable with and competent in their work, show up and participate when asked, but could be accurately described as biding their time until something better comes along.

3. Actively engaged:  These employees are passionate about their work and strive to improve dramatically the experiences of customers and co-workers, transforming ordinary results into extraordinary outcomes. 

Now that you’ve segregated employees into three categories, let’s discuss next steps:

1. Actively disengaged: Take a moment and add up the total compensation and benefits you are paying to actively disengage employees.  Then add to that the spillover costs resulting from customers who decide to buy from a competitor along with high performing employees who leave your company seeking a better working environment.  Now ask yourself, "How long am I willing to continue paying the cost of employing these actively disengaged individuals?"  My advice is to stop it and get rid of those who are cancerous to your company.  Until challenged, many CEOs won't do this - they will have all kinds of reasons to maintain the status quo.  Remember, there is a cost for doing nothing...

2. Going through the motions:  Invest the time to lead and inspire these employees to become actively engaged.  Building a healthy company culture is most important.  In addition, clarifying how the employee is important to the company's success, and then providing recognition and reward when they behave and preform in ways consistent with desired company culture and goals can build active engagement in short time.

3. Actively engaged:  What are you doing to attract and retain key performers?  What is your plan?  Is it effective?  What needs to change? What needs to stay the same?

Big picture -  the goal is simple.  Weed out disengaged employees while inspiring remaining employees to become or remain actively engaged.  The results will astound you!  My challenge to you is simple... "What will you do this week to begin the journey of building strong teams in your business?"

ABOUT EARL BELL:

EARL BELL is the author of, Winning in Baseball and Business, Transforming Little League Principles into Major League Profits for Your Company, which provides a roadmap to success for leaders that desire to build thriving companies in a very competitive 21^st century business environment.  Earl believes that “everything you need to know about business, leadership and team building can be learned from Little League baseball.”

Earl coaches and consults with owners, business leaders and their teams, teaching them how to dramatically reduce the time it takes to improve profitability, customer experience, employee engagement and company value, while simultaneously increasing discretionary time and reducing both stress/employee burnout.  He believes the secret to winning in baseball, business and life can be summarized in a simple formula:  Winning = Service + Humility.  His motto is that Winning in Business is a Team Sport!

Earl has served in the Chief Financial Officer role for numerous companies throughout North America. His personal passion is youth sports and he has coached 28 teams since 2002.  Earl is a CPA, graduated from SU (Seattle University) with a BA in Accounting and from the MILL (Mercer Island Little League) with a Master’s in Youth Baseball.

Showing urgency while moving slowly

In case you are wondering, my golf game is showing steady positive progress.  I am pretty consistently in the eighties (my goal for this year).  I played twice last week.  My first game was a scramble with three other golfers (in a scramble, you choose the best ball hit and each of you hits from that place).  I did not add much to the team.  I was mystified… what had happened to my game?  Then on Sunday, I had a wonderful outing at a tough course and scored an 89.  What was the difference? 

Pretty simple… In the scramble, I was focused on the result.  I lost my presence.  On Sunday, I slowed my swing and was in the moment for 75-80 of the 89 strokes I took. 

My point?  It is the same in business, for many of us.  We race to a goal.  Get that RFP in, make sure it is edited well and is our best shot at getting the business.  We race to a meeting having half prepared.  We don’t catch the tone of a supervisor who is coming to us with a problem.  When some minutes, days, or weeks later, we reflect and wonder what happened, it is rare that an executive can pinpoint what went wrong or where. 

So, here is your answer…. Pay attention to each moment.  Don’t rush.  Instead, build in travel time to meetings, be prepared to say to someone who approaches you, I want to really hear what you have to say, can it wait until ____ (a specific time)? 

We can show urgency by living in confusion (what went wrong) or by building in ways to strengthen our performance and increase the likelihood that we will achieve the results we say we want. 

How do you stay present?  What do you do to slow your swing and hit that great shot?  

Quickly respond to a failing campaign

Today we have a guest blog from Andrew Ballard:

Don’t allow a failing campaign strategy to play out. It comes down to having real-time data to drive informed and timely decisions. Sometimes that means pulling the plug or making adjustment before your promotions budget is history.

A campaign is a “series” of ads with a “unified theme” designed to lift brand recognition and, subsequently, increase sales and share. In the past, most large-cap companies put their budgets into “institutional branding.” Which is not intended to generate an immediate response; rather, it is expected to establish stronger brand recall. Now we’re seeing more of the big boys going the “direct response” route because direct response advertising is much easier to measure.

Even though we’re moving past the “great recession” advertising drought, “accountability” has become more vital than ever before. The big brands no longer tolerate failing campaigns; they’re now more quickly making adjustments?

Tracking sales back to each advertising channel, to determine return-on-investment (ROI), is essential for every enterprise…large and small. That may sound obvious; however, in my 33 years of working with small and midsize businesses, I can share with certainty that less than half consistently measure the results of their advertising investments.

Here is the key to applying more accountability in your advertising program. Identify measurement metrics and milestones before your campaign launches. Following is a simple four-step system.

1.     Establish realistic objectives, timelines and budget. What are you trying to accomplish: an increase in awareness, sales, share, margin, your database?

2.     Decide on what you’ll measure: inquiries, qualified leads, referrals, sales, gross margin? Eventually, it all boils down to results.

3.     Determine key milestones. Decide where along the campaign timeline you’ll assess whether you need to change the message, media or pull out altogether.

4.     With staff, set up a tracking system. Too many times, management comes up with a system that the frontline won’t or can’t implement.

Questions:

•  Do you have a measurement system in place that is consistently used?
• Who is charged with gathering, entering and analyzing the data?
• How often do you evaluate and act on that data?

If any of your answers to the questions above begin with and “N” (No, Nobody and Never), then follow the four steps outlined in this post. I assure you, measurement will improve your ROI.

ANDREW BALLARD

Andrew Ballard is the president of Marketing Solutions, a Seattle area agency that developsresearch-based growth strategies for small to midsize businesses.  He has over 30 years experience specializing in marketing research, strategic planning, brand development and revenue generation.  Ballard has helped hundreds of organizations (from startups through Fortune 500 companies) realize significant growth.

Andrew is a graduate of the Ford Marketing Institute and Certified in Six Sigma.  He is also a respected author and educator.  His articles on marketing strategy have been published in business journals through all 50 States.  His first book, entitled Your Opinion Doesn’t Matter, recently released to rave reviews in both corporate and academic circles.  In addition, he is adjunct faculty at the University of Washington.

 He can be reached at 425-337-1100 or www.mktg-solutions.com

Creating Alignment to Drive Performance (short and long-term) for Your Company - Employee Retention and Incentive Compensation collide.

Today we have a guest blog from Chad Blevins:

For nearly all business owners, the real engine that drives performance is the employee base.  And even more specifically, it is the leaders within the employee base that can make or break a company. 

Because of this, these same owners struggle with the idea of how best to attract, motivate and retain these key leaders over time.  Whether your goals are to double in size, to enable you to spend 3 months a year in Palm Desert, or to create a succession option – your success will begin and maybe even end with your leadership team. 

So how do you design and implement an incentive compensation program that creates an environment where these leaders can truly help drive a company’s success? 

While all company cultures have their own nuances and owners have their own goals – there are some key elements of a successful plan that hold true in nearly every organization.

• Alignment, Alignment, Alignment.  The simple idea is to create alignment so that everyone is going in the same direction.  Easily enough said – often tough to do.  It includes:

o   Alignment of the leaders among themselves to truly work as a team.  If you measure their performance only in the respective areas they manage their incentive is to only do what benefits their “area”.  Even worse, it can cause actions/behaviors that are actually counter-productive to other areas of the company.

o   Alignment of leaders and owners.  Seems simple enough, but is often not practiced.  If you as the owner have specific goals – create an incentive plan that motivates behaviors toward those goals. 

o   Alignment of leaders and long-term health.  Everyone has heard the horror stories from the Fortune 500 world where decisions are made to make quarterly earnings that will hamper long-term success.  Incentive compensation plans can have the same impact in closely-held companies.  Balance short-term performance with long-term health. 

• Communication.  Tell the key employees how you are going to measure them.  Even better, share the company objectives and get them to help define actions and measurements they can impact to help achieve those.  All too often employees get a year-end bonus with little explanation of what created that bonus, much less communication at the beginning of the year around how they will be measured.  If you want them to act a certain way…tell them.  Then tell them how they did.

•  Data Sharing.  Hold quarterly meetings with the key leaders around how the company is tracking.  If you need them rallying, the last quarter of the year is too late.

• Measurement and Consistency.  Have a methodology for outlining their expected performance at the beginning of the year and measure them at year-end to those expectations.  Use the same methodology consistently year-over-year to ingrain it in the culture.

• Return on Investment.  At the end of the day, any incentive compensation program ultimately shares some of the benefits of success with the employees (usually cold hard cash).  Because of this, a properly designed program will look to create a return on investment for the owner for doing so.  Outline that need and measure it. 

Again, each company has its own key attributes that make it unique.  But every company can foster a culture of performance while still maintaining its own uniqueness. 

So ask yourself… do you have a plan that addresses all the aspects outlined above?  Is it driving a culture of performance?  Is it enabling the leaders of the company to truly lead rather than just follow you?  Are they motivated to work together as a team?  If not, can you get a better Return on Investment with a different approach?  

CHAD BLEVINS

Chad Blevins founded Blevins Financial to serve the complex financial and estate planning needs of the closely-held business owner and high net worth individuals. His focus on combining an overall estate planning strategy with life insurance analysis positions him to serve clients in a more comprehensive -- and often more simple -- manner.

He has held executive leadership positions in Fortune 500 companies (GE, Honeywell, MagneTek), private start-ups as well as family-held businesses. His experience includes executive positions in Sales, Marketing, Business Development, Finance, Operations and M&A work. This diversity of experience allows him to work in a highly comprehensive manner in dealing with client’s personal and business objectives.

Chad is a Board of Directors member for the Northwest Family Business Advisors, which focuses on teaching advisors how to work together for the client’s benefit.  His level of expertise and desire to educate has also prompted speaking engagements with the following organizations:

Washington State CPA Association Association of General Contractors (AGC)

National Electrical Contractors Association (NECA) Approach Management Systems/Smart Association Northwest Family Business Advisors.

Chad was a recent honoree by the Puget Sound Business Journal as one of the “40 Under 40" top business people in the Puget Sound area, recognizing his contributions to both the business and charitable communities.

The easiest companies you’ll ever market (& sell) to are…

Today we have a guest blog from Elizabeth Andreini:

The easiest companies you’ll ever market (& sell) to are…your customers of course! But yet that seems to always be the group that gets the least attention by marketing (and sales). Don’t make that mistake!

Not too long ago I found myself at a company that was suddenly agitated because their customer retention rate unexpectedly dropped by almost 10% in a single year. Customer subscription revenue was a significant part of their total revenue, and actually had more impact than new customer revenue, so the impact to the bottomline was significant. The company hadn’t been paying attention and consistently marketing to their customers because they had been so busy chasing new business. Once the revenue started to drop it took them a while to respond, and by that time the damage was done. While they couldn’t have saved all those customers, neglect had taken its toll.

An unfortunate story and a hard lesson learned.

Once this company started to look at their customer base more thoroughly, the other lesson the company learned was that it was not selling new products and services to their customers, many of whom didn’t even know about other solutions available to purchase. The business was not only losing current revenue, they were leaving new revenue on the table! While retaining your customers is important, what is often even more frequently overlooked is that these same customers are the most fertile ground for new sales.

Your company may not be in that same situation, but are you doing the best job you could to stay in touch with your customer base and consistently market to your customers? Chasing new customers or market segments while neglecting your customer base, leaves your customers unappreciated and makes it easier for your competitors to acquire them.

So focus on chasing after current customers! Market to them! Make keeping your customer base informed about all current and new products and services a priority. Invest time and energize your customer base and you may find they actually help you sell new customers too!

As the CEO, five questions you should ask your marketing (and sales) departments:

1.    What is our customer retention rate and how could we improve it?

2.    How much time and resources is our company spending marketing to our customer base compared to chasing new customers and new markets?

3.    How are we keeping our customers informed about new product and services offerings, and are marketing and sales working together to encourage purchase?

4.    How can we help our customers be better evangelists for our products and services?

5.    What else do our customers need that it would make sense for us to provide them?

ELIZABETH ANDREINI

As the President of Accelerate Marketing, LLC, Elizabeth Andreini, is the “secret weapon” CEOs turn to at key growth points when they need to transform marketing and product management to grow their customer base, increase revenue & scale their business. In addition to providing experienced executive insight and strategic guidance, Elizabeth often works as an interim CMO or VP to provide the hands-on leadership needed to rearchitect marketing and product management and improve execution from the inside.

Elizabeth Andreini, founder & president of Accelerate Marketing, LLC 

Accelerate Marketing, LLC

206-769-3420 or elizabeth@accelerate-marketing.com

www.accelerate-marketing.com

Twitter: @acceler8mkting

LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/elizabethandreini

We are a Grow50™ member firm.

Know your customer’s “true” motivation

Today we have a guest blog from Andrew Ballard:

There is a difference between what your customers say their motivation is for buying your product, and what truly motivates their decision. Are you confident you know the difference? The wrong assumption can cost you sales.

Most buyers believe they employ a logical thought process in making purchasing decisions. This is true for both business and consumer segments. However, many studies demonstrate that most decisions are motivated by emotion not logic. That being said, most consumers still rationalize their purchases. Psychologists refer to this event as post-hoc rationalization.   

I know this to be true, professionally and personally. When I bought my last car (a sporty red Acura with a high performance engine and suspension…fastest car I’ve ever owned), it was purely an emotional decision. Of course, I tried to rationalize the purchase to my wife. On my way home from the dealership I called her. “I just bought a new car honey; it’s a pretty red Acura, gets 30 MPG and you’ll love the navigation system, I’m pulling in the driveway.”

As I set the parking break, I noticed Sandra standing in the front doorway; I waved enthusiastically; then I made the mistake of racing the engine…busted! She gave me the look—the kind of look a husband deserves after 20+ years of bliss—then rolled her eyes and went back inside the house.

So what does this revelation mean to your business?  It means you should focus more on your brand image and the emotional connections your market makes with your product. It means you should focus less on features and comparative data, and adjust your messaging accordingly.

If you are able to identify the “true” motivation for your customer’s buying decisions, and act on that knowledge, you will likely experience a significant increase in sales. At the very least, your customers won’t roll their eyes and walk away.

So I ask you, what is your current messaging strategy…is it rational or emotional?

How can you adjust your message to trigger the emotion that “truly” drives consumer behavior? 

ANDREW BALLARD

Andrew Ballard is the president of Marketing Solutions, a Seattle area agency that developsresearch-based growth strategies for small to midsize businesses.  He has over 30 years experience specializing in marketing research, strategic planning, brand development and revenue generation.  Ballard has helped hundreds of organizations (from startups through Fortune 500 companies) realize significant growth.

Andrew is a graduate of the Ford Marketing Institute and Certified in Six Sigma.  He is also a respected author and educator.  His articles on marketing strategy have been published in business journals through all 50 States.  His first book, entitled Your Opinion Doesn’t Matter, recently released to rave reviews in both corporate and academic circles.  In addition, he is adjunct faculty at the University of Washington.

 He can be reached at 425-337-1100 or www.mktg-solutions.com