Adaptability and Flexibility in the Workplace

Several weeks ago I read an interview in the NY Times with Anne M. Malcahy, CEO of Xerox. She had some interesting things to share about leading an organization in today's complex world. Over the years as an organizational coach, I've seen an increase need for executives to learn the art of adaptive leadership. The ability to assess a situation, the environment, and the different (and sometimes conflicting) motivators of the people involved to know the best way to lead in different circumstances.

Ms. Mulcahy is also seeing the importance of adaptability in the workplace. Here are some of the main points from the interview that I thought you'd find interesting:

* Move as quickly as you can during "that window of opportunity called a crisis" and identify failure quickly.

* Adaptability and flexibility in staff have become more important since "we have to change all the time. The people who really do the best are those who actually sense it, enjoy it almost, that lack of definition around their roles and what they can contribute."

* The importance of talent development: "identify those high potentials and treat them differently, accelerate their development."

What are you doing to create an environment that encourages and supports adaptability within your organization?

If you want to read the interview, click here: http://nytimes.com/2009/03/22/business/22corner.html.

Leading In Challenging Times

We're all asking ourselves these days:

How do I get through these challenging times?
What type of leadership does my organization require in order to survive this "reset"?

Since this is no ordinary downturn, but a time of recreating ourselves, you'll need creativity and collaboration from everyone within the organization. I'd suggest that you and your staff look at your organization more deeply and ask these questions:

1.) What business are we really in? Why do we exist?

Don't stop at the first answer. Ask yourself "why" at least 5 times. A client of mine recently did this exercise. The first answer was: we provide direct marketing council to our clients. After asking "why" several times, they identified its reason to exist as "to help clients achieve their mission for the social good." There are other things they could do to help clients achieve their mission in addition to direct marketing and fundraising, such as use their database and web development knowledge to increase public awareness of their mission and their success in achieving it by using blogs, podcasts, or webeminars.

2.) What is happening outside your organizational walls that may affect you? What technical, economic, cultural, or marketing changes are occurring that may affect the organization and its clients?

Although we don't know what America will look like after this economic crisis, you can be pretty sure it won't look like it did in 2008. We most likely will have new government regulations, a new health care system, and possibly new industries emerging such energy, green products, etc. Find the opportunities to offer new products or services that address the needs and interests of living in a different environment. Or, identify products or services that need to be retired because they aren't as relevant.

3.) What capacities does your organization have? Identify knowledge, talents and abilities within the organization that could be used to develop new products and services. Especially, ones your clients need but you're not providing now. My direct marketing client has added staff to develop web sites for fundraising. If it was to expand it's services to offer an educational component, it might need to learn about creating blogs or podcasts.

In an interview I read recently, Debra Nunes, VP at Hay Group's McClelland Institute for Research and Innovation, said: "Leaders are looking at how they're going to have to change their companies--how to adapt their strategies and operating models for the short term, and how those changes will affect their business in the long term." (To read the entire interview, visit: http://haygroupnews.com/ve/ZZ69s8962My627083q835/VT=0/page=10.)

You are not in this alone. Every leader is facing the challenge of surviving this crisis. You have an organization of people who are smart, innovative and care about the organization. Let them and other others help you answer the three questions that I ask my clients. From looking at your organization from different perspectives, you can see new possibilities for the future.

Participative Leadership

Leadership is a popular topic these days. With the presidential elections next week, Americans are talking a lot about who is the best leader for the United States. Do we want someone who has experience, yet has new ideas? Someone with strong convictions, yet is open to listening to diverse viewpoints? Someone who is thoughtful, yet quick to think on his feet? Seemingly opposite attributes, we want leadership that is flexible and appropriate for the situation.

Tom Friedman talks about leadership in his new book: Hot, Flat and Crowded: Why We Need a Green Revolution—And How It Can Renew America. Although the subject is about what America needs to do to tackle today’s environmental challenges, it is also about leadership. Here’s a quote in the book that resonated with me:

“But outgreening requires a wholly different mind-set….Instead of digging or drilling deeper into the ground, you have to dig and drill deeper into yourself, your company, or your community. Instead of mining the environment, you have to create a different kind of environment—a collaborative (my italics) environment in which you, your company, and your community are constantly thinking about how to generate more growth, more mobility, more housing, more comfort, more security, more enjoyment, and more packing from the most innovative use of the cleanest electrons and fewest resources.”

In my last blog I talked about the need for collaboration in facing our changing social, business and cultural environment. In addition to more traditional leadership styles, such as commanding, coaching or democratic, we need to learn how to create environments that encourage participation from everyone within the organization or community.

The Co-Intelligence Institute (www.co-intelligence.org) describes participatory style as one where “leaders interact with other participants as peers to see what they can discover and create together.…everyone in the group leads according to their competence, insight, experience, or passion in ways that others can and do honor and follow. Such co-leadership and co-followership are shared by all in co-intelligent partnership.”

This is a new way of leading. Non-hierarchical, non-competitive, and more complex. I’ve been asking myself: How do you create a more participative environment that allows an organization or community to encourage dialog and sharing of knowledge and insights? I believe it starts simply with conversations.

This isn’t you as a manager or leader talking at people, but showing up completely interested in the people in your organization. Who are they? What do they have to teach you and one another? What does the organization look like from their perspectives?

Margaret Wheatley in her book, Turning to One Another, gives some tips for beginning a formal conversation process:

1. We acknowledge one another as equals. (We can’t see enough of the whole. We can’t figure it out alone.)
2. We try to stay curious about each other.
3. We recognize that we need each other’s help to become better listeners.
4. We slow down so we have time to think and reflect. (Rediscover the joy of thinking together. Note this doesn’t mean telling people what they should think or what you think.)
5. We remember that conversation is the natural way humans think together.
6. We expect it to be messy at times.

You may want to consider having more conversation with the people in your organization. True conversations! Not monologues. But conversations where you do most of the listening rather than the talking.

Maybe you start with just a few intimate conversations with a few people as practice. Once you become more comfortable and proficient, you may want to start having formalized conversations with small groups within the larger organization.

Here’s a suggestion for a conversation starter from the Wheatley book: There is no power for change greater than a community discovering what it cares about.
Maybe a good place to start a conversation is finding out what people in your organization care about.

It’s an excellent start in becoming a participative leader. Who knows what you’ll discover and where you’ll be able to lead your organization in these changing times!

Leadership for a New Era

Is this just another ordinary economic downturn or is something else going on? I think it's the latter.

Our systems and infrastructures that were developed in response to the Great Depression in the 1930s can no longer support the complexity of the society that has emerged since then. A new paradigm needs to emerge.

According to William Strauss and Neil Howe (authors of Generations and the Fourth Turning), American cultures goes through a "turning" or crisis every 80-100 years. These "turnings" are about the emergence of new paradigms or civic orders. And, I believe that is what is happening now.

Although there are lessons to be learned from past paradigm shifts, they are not blueprints for the next shift. Why? Because the conditions are different for each one. In fact, the reason for the crisis is that the solutions from the prior crisis created the conditions for the future crisis. Each crisis period requires new structures, perspectives and competencies to emerge based on the conditions for that time.

No one knows now what new systems will emerge from this current crisis. We need to create them. With the complexity of our world today, I believe it is through collaboration that we will discover the answers to the question: from what to what?

Our issues have become so complex that it takes looking at them from multiple perspectives. For instance, Hospices are facing a challenge of reduced Medicare reimbursements to pay for their services to provide compassionate end of life care. But, this is a larger issue. We live in an aging society (the 80+ population is the fastest growing demographic) with a healthcare system that has gotten prohibitively expensive. How are we going to care for this population at the end of their lives? Hospice offers a caring solution at a substantially lower cost (a savings of $2 billion annually).

It is my belief that Hospice can't solve this alone. It needs the intelligences, knowledge and competencies of all its shareholders: doctors and nurses from the medical community, the government (local, state and federal), care facilities, the community, Hospice staff and volunteers and the families who have benefited from Hospice. Each shareholder has a piece of the puzzle. To assemble the puzzle correctly, everyone needs to bring his or her piece or perspective to the table.

Hospice isn't the only organization or community facing the challenge of a changing social and cultural environment. All organizations are faced with this same challenge.

As does each new "turning" or crisis require new structures and competencies to emerge, they also need different leadership skills. Leading in a collaborative environment is different from leading in a hieracharical structure. People and organizations will have different value systems, perspectives, needs and expectations requiring different types of leadership at different times. Environments now are much more fluid and complex than they have been in the past.

Leaders will need the wisdom to know what is the right organization structure (hiarchical, networks, teams, etc) at this time under these new conditions? What competencies are needed from people? What leadership style is most appropriate (coaching, authoritarian, democratic, etc). As environments shift, "leaders" will need to know when its time for them to lead or when it's best for others to lead.

Because the new paradigm hasn't emerged yet, there are no answers to what needs to be. Together we need to create what will be.

But it will take leaders who are willing not to have all the answers, flexibility, and the ability to use multiple leadership styles based on the needs of the people, the environment and the situation.

Ask yourself: am I ready to be a leader in the new world that is emerging?

Succession Planning: Developing Tomorrow's Leaders

Who will be leading your organization in 5 or 10 years? Is it you? Or, are you preparing to exit the corporate stage? As Baby Boomers prepare to move out of the executive suite over the next decade, there could be a leadership gap.

Recently I read a study funded by IBM Institute for Business Value and the Economist Intelligence Unit on Unlocking the DNA of the Adaptable Workforce, it states "The global economy is transforming into an integrated market, full of opportunity, competition and swirling change....Perhaps less well understood are the difficulties this expansion is causing today's organizations as they strive to make the best use of their most important assets: their workforce." One of the themes identified in the report was a leadership gap that is "putting future growth at risk." In fact, 75% of the 400 HR executives cited an inability to develop future leaders as a critical issue. (To read the study, http://www-03.ibm.com/industries/travel/doc/content/resource/thought/3459222106.html)


One of the things we need to do before retiring to the next phase of our lives is to prepare the next generation for leadership. Before we can do this, we have to understand the conditions these new leaders will be facing and the appropriate leadership needed to face tomorrow's challenges.

Our responsibility as leaders is to develop leaders who can lead the transition from the needs and challenges of today to the different conditions and challenges of tomorrow. I suspect that the leadership that is working now or did work yesterday will not be appropriate for the new conditions that are emerging: globalization, workforce diversity, geographically dispersed employees, new technology, etc.


To be able to do this, a leader needs to have a deep understanding of how his or her organization operates. This includes:

• The value systems that operate within the employees which influences how they interpret the world around them and what motivates them.
• How internal systems support your staff in successfully obtaining objectives.
• Know what resources and assets are available

One tool I use to help executives better understand the dynamics of their organization is the Spiral Dynamics Integral (SDi) CulturalSCAN, which identifies an organization's readiness for change, priorities (i.e., purpose, principles, profits, etc.), the present and desired work structure, executives intelligences and patterns of thinking. Think of it as taking a trip to somewhere you've never visited. Before you get into the car, you probably look at a road map to see where you are now and what direction you're going in. (To learn more, visit http://www.onlinepeoplescan.net)

A question you need to answer is: Will the culture and business systems of today be able to sustain the organization in the future?

An organization will need resiliency to simultaneously support today's needs as new organizational structures and leadership emerges for the new conditions. The good news is that you don't have to do this by yourself. You probably have the talent, creative thinking and competencies on your staff now. You need to recognize what competencies are required and who within your organizational possesses them.

There is no quick and easy solution. Succession planning requires time, reflection and dedication.

Managing the Growing Pains of Organizational Success

Northwood's mission is to help organizations manage growth. Although growth is good news, it is usually accompanied by growing pains. What fits comfortably before (i.e., business systems, incentive plans, company culture, leadership styles, etc.), may start to feel too snug, limiting actions and causing rips in the organization's fabric.

Growth needs to be managed on multiple levels: Having the right leaders leading the right people to do the right things at the right time.

Questions executives need to ask themselves are:
1.) What skills and capabilities do we need now to sustain growth?
2.) What environment do we need to create to allow people with the right skills & competencies to do their jobs successfully?
3.) What type of leadership styles are appropriate to lead the right people doing the right things?

In Daniel F. Muzyka's article, Managing growth: When to hold 'em and when to fold 'em, he identifies 8 elements that exisit in organizations that successfully manage growth:

1.) A Focus on Growth
2.) Delivering Value
3.) Realizing New Value
4.) Building Organizational Depth
5.) Maintaining Resources
6.) Achieving profitability
7.) Understanding the "end game"
8.) Evolving leadership

To read his article, click here: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/Page/document/v5/content/subscribe?user_URL=http://www.theglobeandmail.com%2Fservlet%2Fstory%2FLAC.20071126.RSTRATEGYMUZYKA26%2FTPStory%2FBusiness&ord=1222700&brand=theglobeandmail&force_login=true

Doing more of the same things that help you grow are usually not the things that will help you to continue growing. Leaders need to know how to adapt to the changing conditions caused by growth.

Building Resilience into Organizations

Times they are a changin" go the lyrics to a Bob Dylan song. How do organizations deal with the unexpected whether it's a great opportunity or a problem? Some organizations do scenario planning by identifying possible trends that can impact their organization and then develop plans for dealing with those specific situations, such as how would an organization deal with rising transportation costs or a credit crunch. (For more on scenario planning, read Peter Schwartz's Art of the Long View.)

But, we can't always identify all the possible things that can happen. Who foresaw 18 terrorists flying into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on 9/11?

Instead of planning for specific situations, it is better to build the capacity for resilience into your organization. When the unexpected happens, the organization then has the ability to respond to the unplanned in general rather than to specific situations or circumstances.

One of the pieces of advice I share with my clients is to have strong relationships in place before there's a crisis. When the house is falling down around you or people are at one another's throats is not the time to start building trust. Having existing strong relationships that are built on trust and mutual respect helps you get through challenging or changing times.

A cornerstone of organizational resilience is a healthy organizational culture. Two attributes of this are:

1.) A strong sense of group identify

2.) Shared mission

Leaders need to understand the value systems within the organization and how they impact the group's understanding of the world around them and motivators (i.e., need for security, individual expression, purpose, personal achievement or harmony).