Workplace Flexibility begins with a Shameless Workforce

I would like to extend many thanks to Theresa Chambers of the Puget Sound Recognition Roundtable and Recognition Works for allowing me to lead a discussion on Shameless You! and Workplace Flexibility. At the forum on February 24, 2010, hosted by Snohomish County, we talked about how helping your workforce boost morale and build confidence helps human resource teams craft effective workplace flexibility programs.

Workplace flexibility is a growing trend in organizations large and small. As more people are experiencing more demands on their time, work-life fit (instead of the old 'work-life balance') drives programs for attracting, keeping, and motivating top talent. Smart employers know that happy workers are more focused and more productive. Traditional work schedules were established in a time when men dominated the workforce, women stayed home with the children, and multiple generations populated socially and geographically close communities.

Today's work and social environments have placed many workers in lifestyles where both parents work, single parents are equally as common as two-parent households, and adults care for both young children and aging parents. Work-life fit becomes increasingly important when communities turn virtual and extend globally, and families grow smaller. The average worker has to fit child care, elder care, household matters, personal care, and a full time job into everyday management.

Workplace flexibility introduces new options for where, when, and how work gets done. When crafting a workplace flexibility program, decision makers can benefit from connecting the when, where and how to their overall strategies and focus on"why" the work gets done. When workers can align the "why" of the organization with the "why" in their personal lives, they can influence workplace flexibility programs that consistently deliver exceptional everyday performance.

Shameless You! reveals "why" to your team members so that they understand their career strategies, personal strengths, and work-life fit opportunities. When workers are shameless, they understand and voice their workplace contributions, aligning their individual concerns with the organization's strategy and concerns. Shameless workers know that their contributions are appreciated and speak openly with their supervisors about what works and what can be improved.

When workers are not shameless, they don't understand why they come to work each day, other than to punch a clock and collect a paycheck. They do not feel appreciated, and hesitate to point out inefficiencies and concerns. In the shameful workplace, talent disconnects from the underlying strategy and excellence turns into apathy in everyday performance. Once apathy and disconnect set in, workplace flexibility can only mask underlying failures in strategy and performance. How, where, and when work happens becomes irrelevant if individuals cannot connect with why work happens.

I invite you to learn more about how to bring Shameless You! to your organization. Whether a program for your internal teams, a learning experience for your distributors, or an appreciation seminar for your customers, Shameless You! equips individuals with the tools they need to better understand why they do what they do, and perform each day with more confidence, integrity, and accountability.

What can you do to help your team be shameless and understand why they are important to your workplace flexibility program and other strategic initiatives?

Just what is strategy anyway?

I'm getting a bit frustrated: it seems that there's a misconception in the business community about what strategy really means. This week alone, I've heard three different people confuse strategy with initiative, project, or strategic plan. The most appalling misuse of strategy came in the form of a conversation with a friend: she shared how her company relegated the low-performing people in their division to a new "strategy" team. I got physically queasy at the thought of such idiocy.

Companies with solid strategies know better than to lump low-performing people into a "strategy" team just to keep an eye on them. They have more respect for their strategy's ability to strengthen or cripple growth. They treat their strategies like the foundational drivers they are designed to be. And they fire low-performing people who drain company resources.

With all the confusion with business terms and the bad rap that strategy has been getting lately, I think it's time to clarify just what strategy means. Contrary to traditional business terminology, I have broken apart the strategy and the strategic planning process to make it clear the role that strategy plays in a well-run organization.

• Strategy is the foundational soul of an organization. It usually starts as a gut feeling about markets, opportunities, and methodologies in the founding or leading executives. It gets translated into a strategic framework that drives the decisions and behaviors of the organization. The strategic framework captures the strategy into terms that the internal team can understand, and includes vision, mission, values, and position. When well crafted, the strategy of an organization should rarely, if ever, change.
• Strategic plans outline the goals and initiatives of an organization and/or teams over a set period of time. These goals and initiatives directly connect to the strategic framework, yet allows an organization to quickly and easily change their behavior to keep pace with changing market forces and stakeholder concerns. Strategic plans should be reviewed regularly -- in this economy, that means at least monthly -- to adjust to market course corrections.
• Goals capture the key near-term milestones along the road to growth and change, on which the organization hopes to move closer to fulfilling its vision, deliver on its mission, act according to its values, within the parameters of its position.
• Initiatives are the first actions needed to meet strategic goals. Each of these high-level actions ties directly to its goal with a set of processes, tools, and systems that include success measures to gauge everyday performance. Subsets of actions within initiatives are called projects.

 A well-defined strategy drives the day to day actions of an effective organization. CEOs and other leaders who get that communicate the strategy well and don't let their employees think that the strategic planning team is where bad employees go to die. If you're hearing such confusion happening in your organization, puh-leeeze get my new book, The Strategy String, for your leadership. No organization can afford to operate without a strategy in this fickle economy, and everyone on your team should be clear on the role it plays on your success -- or lack thereof.

Help others fill in the blanks when shaping your Strategy String

On January 25, 2010,when The Wall Street Journal reported that strategy as we know it is dead, I knew that my new book, The Strategy String, was timely. Now, with Wired Magazine's about on compressed sensing titled "Fill in the Blanks", I realize that The Strategy String can mean survival for organizations looking for strategies that keep pace with rapid market changes.


Compressed sensing is a new data capture technique that streamlines how information is gathered and reported. The premise is that by only capturing a fraction of the available information, say for instance 20% of a MRI or digital camera image, you can capture data much faster. Mathematical algorithms then interpolate the remaining data bits, delivering a complete picture that is accurate each and every time.

Why this is significant is seen in the article example: a two-year-old boy at Lucile Packard Children's Hospital was experiencing a failure with his liver transplant. Doctors needed to stop his breathing in order to take a clear MRI to find the issue and save his life. A traditional MRI would have required stopping his breathing for a full two minutes, risking depleting his tiny body of much needed oxygen that could result in tissue and brain damage. Using compressed sensing, they were able to capture just a fraction of the data in just 40 seconds, and interpolate the remaining image data after restarting his breathing. The results? No loss in oxygen in his blood supply, and a clear image which doctors used to fix the problem with the transplanted liver and save his life.

Like a MRI, strategy development traditionally took a long time to complete, depriving the organization of changes needed to respond to immediate threats. A six to 18 month data capture and strategy development process runs the risk of forcing an organization to miss immediate market opportunities and stall on addressing immediate concerns. Today's economic opportunities come and go in the matter of weeks, not months or years as in days of lore. Data capture and processing, and the acting on the findings require more responsive strategy development processes that captures only the most critical framework needed to move forward in the market place. And once that framework has been developed, it should be flexible enough to allow for more responsive implementation that clearly aligns with the strategic goals to complete the organizational picture. 


The Strategy String does just that. Instead of mapping every detail of the strategic plan, The Strategy String provides a framework with which each individual and department can fill in the blanks to paint the picture of forward-moving success and growth. With the most critical guidelines of strategy in place -- vision, mission, strategy, and positioning -- each team can focus on how to customize implementation to respond to swift market and stakeholder fluctuations. The strategic team gets to focus on the "why" while the integrators and implementers work in the trenches to deliver "how" and "what" that adapt to whatever changes might arise.

Do you have a strategy that uses Compressed Sensing to be responsive to change and growth opportunities?
 
I invite you to read The Strategy String: An Organizational Primer for Tying Strategy to Performance. The book is available on Amazon.com, or you can save $5 by ordering at www.StrategyString.com.

The Strategy String available on Amazon.com

My new book, The Strategy String: An Organizational Primer for Tying Strategy to Performance, is now available for order on Amazon.com. This book on quickly and effectively setting strategies for organizations of all sizes provides guidelines for teams and clients in need of strategic planning. Order yours today.

PS: Save $5 off the Amazon price when you order on our web site at www.strategystring.com.

Small Business Brings Fresh Ideas to Washington State

On February 9, 2010, Business Solutions Manager Karen Pemerl joined the Greater Seattle Chamber of Commerce's Council for Small Business meeting to share what's new at the Washington State Department of Commerce. In this video, we heard about great initiatives that Washington State is implementing to fuel a job growing economy, and participants contributed great ideas on how state governments can be more responsive to small business needs.

In the next few posts, I will share a synopsis of the comments shared here and through other conversations with small businesses.

The Council is a great way to engage and explore ways to help small businesses thrive. If you're a small business in the Puget Sound region, please contact the Greater Seattle Chamber of Commerce about getting involved with the Council and attending our Opportunity Exchange events each quarter. If you're not in the Puget Sound, I encourage you to share your ideas in the comments below.

Here are links to a few of the small business resources we discussed:

• Current legislative bills in Washington State: Lobbyist Brad Boswell’s latest bill tracking report and legislative summary are available online.
• Regional Contracting Forum: http://www.kingcounty.gov/exec/BusinessDev/regionacontractingforum.aspx
• Doing business with Washington state: http://access.wa.gov/business/
• Small Business Liaisons Flyer:  http://www.ora.wa.gov/documents/small_business_liaison_flyer.pdf
• Reports following the Summer 2009 stakeholder feedback sessions with Dept of Commerce: http://www.commerce.wa.gov/site/1268/default.aspx

Here are a few government contracting links for businesses:

• National consolidation for local, state, and federal bid opportunities: http://www.govdirections.com/
• Onvia's 2010 Government Market Outlook Report: http://www.onvia.com/governmentstimulus/fp/government_market_outlook.aspx

Recognition Roundtable presents Shameless You! and Workplace Flexibility

Wed, Feb 24th, 2010 12:00 pm
Bob Drewel Building, 1st Floor, east, Public Mtg Rm #1
3000 Rockefeller Ave., Everett, WA 98201 US

Part One: Shameless You! We are fortunate to kick off our meeting with a presentation by Tracy Corley, Chief Strategist at Tracy A. Corley & Associates and Shameless You! Tracy's session, Shameless You! encourages employees to drop their shame so they can live, work, and play with confidence and integrity. This program helps individuals build personal strategies by identifying, acknowledging and accepting their strengths, preferences, and values. Tracy will lead us in a discussion about how a shameless workforce can lead to better alignment of personal and organizational values, one of the components of a flexible, effective workplace.

Part Two: Does Workplace Flexibility Matter? Theresa Chambers will present information on a) the workplace flexibility movement and how it is viewed as a business strategy to attract, retain and engage talented employees and b) the Alfred P. Sloan Awards for Business Excellence in Workplace Flexibility. Visit www.whenworkworks.org for more info. Deadline for nominations is March 5.

This event is for organization hiring leaders and managers who want to build and maintain great places to work for a talented workforce.

If you would like to attend, contact Theresa Chambers, Chief Motiviation Officer, Recognition Works, 206-353-8267 or theresa at recognitionworks dot net

Is there a Worker's Comp crisis? You decide.

During a Friday morning legislative update with WashACE, we discussed a few issues including education, tax changes, and worker's compensation. We reviewed how the recent election in Massachusetts and tax changes in Oregon impact Washington legislative policy. For me, a few key items stood out that will have a major impact on small business.

First, Washington business taxes comprise nearly 52% of all state and local tax revenue for the state (see the numbers). The success of small business is critical to the success of the state. Lawmakers should be working harder than ever to ensure that small businesses succeed.There is real concern that recent changes in Oregon could signal higher taxes for corporations. With businesses already struggling, an even higher tax burden will make it difficult for small employers to hire and could even drive them out of business.


Then we heard about the proposed changes in worker's comp. In addition to a controversially high rate, the program runs the risk of insolvency, which could trigger an insolvency tax. One small business owner shared that in 2010, her tax rate went up by 347%, though her company is claims free. This increase means that she cannot hire because of the increased cost. Bringing on new employees would risk her company's insolvency.

Washington desperately needs job growth so that consumer confidence will increase and improve the demand for the products and services of small businesses. The governor's proposed tax incentives will help offset the costs of hiring in the future, but small businesses need real breaks now to get Washingtonians back to work.

Our economic development leaders agree that small businesses will once again lead us out of this recession. We hope that our legislature will give them the opportunity to do that through job creation and innovation. The goal is to find a way to encourage job growth and keep your economy going without taxing small companies out of existence and sending large employers elsewhere.