Analytical-Mind

Few people have the courage to kill their "puppy"

Before you call animal protection agencies, I need to warn you upfront that this blog post is not about taking the life of man’s best friend. This post is about making difficult decisions – very difficult decisions when it comes to ending your own initiatives. For the record, I love animals but I found the analogy so powerful that I decided to use it to support my perspective [thanks to André for the analogy].

I wrote about an organization’s ability to create, select and grow new ideas in an earlier blog post. I already highlighted 2 very different methods of launching new initiatives and in this post, I want to write about a leader’s ability to kill an initiative before it reaches full potential. No sane person launches an initiative or a project with the objective of not being successful.

Too many organizations lack the ability to innovate so when an organization has the amazing ability to generate new ideas, it is a wonderful thing. In such organizations, employees are motivated and the company makes sure it will continue to grow by bringing innovations to the market. Such organizations typically have a healthy pipeline of ideas that help them re-invent themselves. Some large organizations even have the goal to generate more than 30% of their revenues from products created in the last 24 months. That’s an aggressive but worthwhile strategy.

The challenge I have seen is with smaller organizations where the initiator of the idea is also typically its leader. In such circumstances, the leader no longer has the ability to take a step back and see things as they are – not as he wants them to be. After investing money and personal energy and imagining such high potential, making the right decision about pursuing the project (or not) when the results aren’t there is nearly impossible. The emotional ties to the project are so strong, it requires a lot of courage to make the decision to kill the project.

What do you do when the initiative doesn’t deliver on its expectation? Do you keep moving forward or do you put an end to the project? When do you know when enough is enough? How do you know you didn’t kill the idea too soon?

Unfortunately, there are no easy answers to these questions except it depends… It is obvious that the decision to end an initiative is much easier to make when you are not emotionally associated with the initiative. Not having taken part of the initiative makes it easier to use clear-cut criteria and apply them. If the project didn’t generate the expected revenue or doesn’t meet which ever other criteria used to evaluate it, it is much easier to decide to cancel it – to make a rational decision instead of an emotional one.

As with every thing in life, no one can ever be certain that the decision was the right one but I firmly believe that making no decision (or maintaining the status quo) is worst than making a decision. Isn’t insanity the behavior of repeating the same actions and expecting a different outcome?

As for your initiatives, stop seeing them as puppies. Take a step back and if you must kill your project, see the experience as an opportunity to develop new skills that you will need further down the line. As Agile people keep saying “Inspect and Adapt” which is a clever way of saying “Learn from your mistakes, and move on”. Very few large success happened on the first attempt. See your failed initiatives as a pre requisite for your next success.

I’ll tell you about some of my “puppies” in an upcoming post…

Volkswagen has launched a competition to demonstrate that FUN is the easiest way to change people’s behaviour for the better. The competition ends December 15th and the winner will receive 2500 Euros (US$ 3700).

“Take the stairs instead of the escalator or elevator and feel better” is something we often hear or read in the Sunday papers. Few people actually follow that advice. Can we get more people to take the stairs over the escalator by making it fun to do? See the results here.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2lXh2n0aPyw]

To throw rubbish in the bin instead of onto the floor shouldn’t really be so hard. Many people still fail to do so. Can we get more people to throw rubbish into the bin, rather than onto the ground, by making it fun to do? See the results here.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cbEKAwCoCKw]

It struck me today that the way organizations select and promote ideas and projects basically fall into 2 different categories.

Comparison to Hot Chili Peppers

To demonstrate my point, I will compare the 2 approaches organizations used to find and select their next big blockbuster initiatives to the way my father and my father-in-law use to grow hot chili peppers. Before I start, I need to explain that my father-in-law was born and raised in Southern Italy where they traditionally grow and assemble these hot chili peppers as presented in the picture below.

Hot Chili Peppers

Normand’s Approach – My Father

The first approach used by organizations to find their next big blockbuster initiative is to let people generate many quality ideas in the course of their activities. There are typically many ways to capture these ideas and some organizations even allow employees to experiment and put forward a prototype of their idea.

This is similar to my father’s approach of putting many (many) seeds in a flower pot to ensure that he will get at least some plants as a results.

Planting as many seeds as possible in order to ensure some results

Domenico’s Approach – My Father-in-Law

By comparison, other organizations carefully analyze the various proposals and hand-pick a few high potential ideas behind which they will heavily invest time and resources in order to reach full market potential.

Limiting the number of seeds and investing energy in growing them

This is similar to my father-in-law’s approach of carefully picking and drying seeds from the previous year’s crop to ensure that the selected seeds came from a high yielding plant. He then plants a few seeds and will spend countless hours nurturing them throughout summer to ensure he will get the best peppers he can.

Conclusion

I came to realize that both methods are valid. The choice depends on what market the organization operates in and its ability to properly select the right ideas upfront. I suspect most organizations start with the first approach and as they build their expertise, the eventually move on to the second approach.

As time goes by, I realize there is no such things in life as coincidence. I’ll probably expend on this topic in an upcoming post but for now I’ll jump to the purpose of today’s blog post.

If you have been reading some of my recent posts (this one, this one and this one) you will notice that I took upon myself to help implement an innovative organizational structure for the organization. As a consequence, Raphaël suggested I take a look at Holacracy.org.

I had the pleasure of sitting in on the webinar given by Brian J. Robertson from Holacracy and found the content was very much in line with the organizational structure we are aiming to implement. In short, here are two take-away I got from the presentation:

• We need to distinguish the organization from the individuals that compose the organization.
• The organization has to be purpose driven. Its goal is not only to generate profits for the shareholders but to have a purpose of its own.

Although there is much more to this than these 2 points, the 60 minutes presentation gives a good introduction to the concept. I am unfortunately unable to attend their next events in Philadelphia and Dallas both hopefully they will add events to their calendar shortly.

If you get a chance, I suggest you sign up for one of their upcoming presentation and share your thoughts.

Our organization is using an innovative human resource management approach inspired by the “golfer – caddy” relationship in golf. Although the approach isn’t fully matured and there are still adjustments to be made, I believe there is value in sharing the process.

Some background

During its early years, human resources management was done entirely by the management team. The communication was centralized and the company’s founders had relations with all employees. They were responsible for hiring, annual evaluations and taking decisions relating to salary revisions. The fast growth of the organization highlighted certain limitations:

• Managing the relationships between employees and the founders was increasingly difficult to maintain as the organization grew;
• The centralized communication channels weren’t efficient;
• The willingness to develop a new process without hiring specialized HR specialists;
• The management of special situations and salary determination lacked transparency and were perceived to be unfair.

To address these emerging issues, the organization developed the “Caddy” process, a model of decentralized community-based human resource management.

What is a Caddy?

In golf, the caddy is the person who carries the golf bag, gives advice and provides moral support. A good caddy is aware of the difficulties, obstacles and peculiarities of the course, as well as the best strategies to play the course. The caddy is not the one who plays the game, the golfer is!

Objectives of the process

The objective of the process is to support employees’ success and monitor their well-being. In addition, the caddy process is a way for all employees to participate in the management of the organization by helping their peers to receive the proper feedback and skills to be successful in their role. The caddy process is deemed more efficient than the traditional hierarchical model.

The process

When an employee joins the company, he/she is assigned a caddy for a period of six months. After that period, an employee may decide to change caddy any time. A discussion between the golfer and the new caddy is required to identify the expectations of each party and determine if the match is possible and desirable.

Role and responsibilities of the Caddy

The caddy has certain responsibilities to the employee. In a traditional organization, these responsibilities are held by the Human Resources Department:

• Communication of the corporate strategy;
• Keeping track of business objectives;
• Accompanying the employee in his career development and providing the support to develop new skills;
• Assisting the employee to set goals and support them in achieving these objectives by offering the means to do so;
• Preparing the salary revisions and making recommendations.

Caddy Team Charter

“I am unwavering in the success of each of my players, my caddy and the caddy team”.

Why?

Because people are the most important asset of the organization. Their development is linked to the success of the organization.

What?

The Caddy process is based on trust and respect. It is a relationship of support and coaching without direct authority.

Who?

The Caddy is a humble person with great listening capabilities. He has the courage to confront the person if necessary and the wisdom to do so in respect of the person. Above all, he shares a common goal with his golfers: the professional success and development of the latter.

Mean

The Caddying is one of the most important roles in the organization and he is recognized as such, encouraged and valued by the organization.

Result

The Caddy process has a significant positive impact on the development of the golfer.