There is a famous quote that says "Failing to Plan is Planning to Fail". This statement is so true ! Planning is one part of the project management. The Project Management Institute defines 9 bodies of project management (PMBOK). I am not going to bore you with the theories of PMBOK. Rather I will share my experiences and in the process provide few tips that, I hope, will be useful to you.
I have seen many technical engineers not giving due credit to planning. In their view, no amount of planning guarantees that the schedules will be met. I make a counter-point that "You do NOT need a plan if you know that you can meet all the schedule milestones". What the planning does is to help you track the tasks, so that you can plan contingency actions for any slips in the schedule. Without a proper plan, you will not know when and for what tasks you should take any contingency actions.
A typical R&D project has three degrees of project management freedom - Scope, Resource and Schedule. As part of the project boundary agreement a flexibility matrix is created, which essentially tells which of these degrees of freedom is least critical, medium critical and most-critical. At the beginning of the project a schedule is drafted with a defined set of resources for a defined scope of the project. Rarely does a project go as per plan with zero variance on all these three degrees of freedom. When the project slips then you need to use the flexibility matrix to decide if scope has to be changed, or add more resources or accept the schedule slips. If schedule is least flexible then either scope has to be limited or additional resources should be added to the project. Having a project plan and tracking it will help in taking these contingency actions at the correct time.
Following are the lessons in project management that I learnt :
1. SCOPE is KING - In my experience I have seen that schedule slips not because people do not put in their best, but because they under-estimate the effort. When they estimate the duration of a task it is based on their gut feeling. Scoping the task is crucial to make better estimates of the effort. You have to list the assumptions that you make for coming up with the effort estimates. Listing these assumptions can bring clarity in the scoping of the task and hence results in better estimates. So next time you are asked to estimate the effort, list the assumptions and scope it better. If you are the project leader, ask the team member to list the assumptions used to come up with the estimates. If you find any discrepancy in the scoping, you should point it out. This will help the persons make a better estimate next time. What applies to making a better estimate of the duration of the task also applies for the project. At the beginning of the project quality time should be spent on the scope of the project. Involve all the team members and experienced people to scope the project.
2. Tracking is Key : A good plan is only the start of effective project management. Good project management calls for effective tracking of the project. Most often the tracking of the project at the beginning of the project is not rigorous. Because of this the project starts to slip. If you rigorously track the project from the very beginning, any surprises that can derail the schedule can be found upfront and you have more time to correct it. In order to effectively track the plan, the project plan should have milestones that have reasonable resolution of the task duration, say a week or more. Having a project plan with tasks of 1 day or 2 days will be a nightmare to track.
3. Task-based Scheduling : Do not schedule tasks based on resources. It defeats the whole purpose of effective project management. If a resource is slipping the current task, the person's unavailability to work on the next task will make the project plan show a critical path that is not the true. Always schedule the tasks based on their dependency. This gives the flexibility to re-assign resources on the tasks that are slipping so that the critical path can be alleviated.
4. Murphy's Buffer: When you ask a person to estimate the duration of his tasks, his estimates are usually padded with some buffer. This buffer gives him a feeling of comfort that he can meet his schedules easily. However, in reality Parkinson's law takes over - Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion, and in the end the schedules may not be met. Eliyahu Goldratt in his book "Critical Chain" talks about student syndrome , students working on their homework at the eleventh hour, due to which the person working on the task does not get serious till he approaches the deadline. There is reasonably a high probability that he may miss the schedule as his start was late. These little buffers at the end of each tasks blow up the project schedule. The approach to counter this syndrome is to ask people to plan their schedule a bit agressively with no buffer for the task. Add the buffer at the project level for the tasks in the critical paths to address any uncertainities. So remember project buffer is for Murphy and not for Parkinson.
5 Early Contingency actions : If you track the project rigorously from the start then you get an early warning on any slips in the schedule. I have seen project leads reluctant to act early on any contingency actions. I have also heard them complain that getting a extra resource from other team would not help as they would have to spend time ramping this new resource and it would not be worth it. Get over this reluctance !!. Investing in the new resource early in the project will help a long way when the project gets under more schedule pressure towards the end. Remember the last 10% of the task takes 90% of time. So having extra resources never hurts. Again when you involve the resource from a different group early, it gives him time to do a complete job. His sense of belongingness to the task increases. So you can potentially get to use his services even beyond the official time-line of help. Remember never say NO to the extra resource you can get, to pull your project back on schedule.
6 Continuous Communication : Keep communicating with all the team members of the project continuously. Show them the connect between the tasks they do and how it relates to the project goals and to the organisational priorities. Over communication never hurts.
These are not the end of the lessons - with every project I learn new lessons. If I keep up this momentum of blogging perhaps in the future I would come up with next revision. Till then I hope these few lessons I learnt doing project management was useful to you. Happy reading.
- Ram
Thursday, March 26, 2009
Saturday, March 21, 2009
Career Impasse
Unike 7 year itch some may go through in their marital life, many go through an impasse in their career at some point or the other. Getting stuck, becoming stagnant, getting saturated , going through the motions, are common ways you can describe this state. You reach this state when you are in the same group or domain for long enough that your learning stops. The paradox is that you know you have got stuck but you are not willing to acknowledge it. You get into a comfort zone. Based on the past accomplishments in the group, you have established enough credibility within the group and also earning a reasonable pay package. The inertia sets in and you do not want to make change even though the learning has stopped. Time and again you may contemplate making a change in the domain you work or even move to a different group, but do not muster enough courage to do it. There is a fear of losing the adulation you got in the current group, fear of taking a hit in your pay (you may not be a T10 or N10 when you move to a new group) or fear of adapting to a different group culture. When you are frustrated in going through the motions, you want to make a change but then again fear of leaving the comfort zone weighs down your decision to move. This continues and with every year that passes by, the resistance to change or move out of the comfort zone increases. Sooner or later the people junior to you may be adding as much or more value to the organisation that you do and you stand the risk of losing the job. Especially in the current economic conditions you stand higher risk of getting axed as your value addition to the organisation does not commensurate the higher pay packet you get.
If you introspect what could have been the reasons for getting into this impasse, it could be that you were fortunate to work for a very good manager and hence did not worry about where your career was going. Maybe you had established so much credibility that you did not want to let go the adulation that came with it. Maybe you were working in a silo and not interacting enough with other groups to know if there were better career opportunities outside your group. Maybe you did not want to rock the boat. Maybe you got used to the current group culture so much that you did not want to risk changing it. Whatever be the reasons, it is better that you address this impasse proactively sooner than later before the system takes it course.
One of the ways to overcome this impasse is to continuously self-introspect and keep checking the value you are adding to the organisation. One rule of thumb you can use is to look for a change in role/responsibility when someone in the team can do your job at 70% efficiency. Your taking up a different role/responsibility within the same group or other group creates a position that others in the organisation can take up. This helps others in the organisation to grow.
Also looking for a role in a different group is a welcome proposition. It would help you to come out of the comfort zone. This is a less risky proposition than moving into a different company as the credibility you have built in the current group will be known to the other groups in the current company but need not be known in other companies. However you have to be prepared for changes.
Moving to a different group may mean that your rate of salary growth may slow down till you start adding enough value in the new group. It may mean working for a different manager and you need to adjust to the individual's style of management. It may also mean getting used to the new group culture. But look at it, all these changes are good for you.It makes you more accepting to change and makes you mentally strong. More importantly your learning never stops. You increase your knowledge bandwidth and your network.
All these are critical components for having a successful and sustaining career. The earlier you do these changes in your career , the less resistant you become to more changes that come your way in the future. The organisational positions are temporary, only the skills you pick up are permanent.
So be more open and proactively keep growing your career and make impasse a thing of the past.
If you introspect what could have been the reasons for getting into this impasse, it could be that you were fortunate to work for a very good manager and hence did not worry about where your career was going. Maybe you had established so much credibility that you did not want to let go the adulation that came with it. Maybe you were working in a silo and not interacting enough with other groups to know if there were better career opportunities outside your group. Maybe you did not want to rock the boat. Maybe you got used to the current group culture so much that you did not want to risk changing it. Whatever be the reasons, it is better that you address this impasse proactively sooner than later before the system takes it course.
One of the ways to overcome this impasse is to continuously self-introspect and keep checking the value you are adding to the organisation. One rule of thumb you can use is to look for a change in role/responsibility when someone in the team can do your job at 70% efficiency. Your taking up a different role/responsibility within the same group or other group creates a position that others in the organisation can take up. This helps others in the organisation to grow.
Also looking for a role in a different group is a welcome proposition. It would help you to come out of the comfort zone. This is a less risky proposition than moving into a different company as the credibility you have built in the current group will be known to the other groups in the current company but need not be known in other companies. However you have to be prepared for changes.
Moving to a different group may mean that your rate of salary growth may slow down till you start adding enough value in the new group. It may mean working for a different manager and you need to adjust to the individual's style of management. It may also mean getting used to the new group culture. But look at it, all these changes are good for you.It makes you more accepting to change and makes you mentally strong. More importantly your learning never stops. You increase your knowledge bandwidth and your network.
All these are critical components for having a successful and sustaining career. The earlier you do these changes in your career , the less resistant you become to more changes that come your way in the future. The organisational positions are temporary, only the skills you pick up are permanent.
So be more open and proactively keep growing your career and make impasse a thing of the past.
Saturday, March 14, 2009
Effective Time Management
Time management is a hot topic of discussion with my reportees. If you are wondering whether if there's anything new to add to this topic, having already been beaten to death - by so many people so often, I wish to share my personal experience with time management - one that works for me. I hope it will be useful for you as well. I have been very influenced, and so is this blog, by Steven Covey's principles of 7 habits, of which time management is one.
Time Management, defined as managing time, is a very narrow definition in my opinion. Time management should also help in prioritising activities and this is where Steven Covey's definition hits the bulls-eye. These days multi-tasking is the need of the day. You need to resolve the priorities between the multiple tasks. These tasks can be classified as urgent and/or important. Given these two variables, there are four possible combinations that have been lucidly captured by Steven Covey, in the four-quadrant model. Without proper planning, you would be spending all your time on addressing urgent tasks(and this need not be important) resulting in low sense of accomplishments and high stress levels.
So how would you define a task as important ? The tasks which, when accomplished, take you closer to your goals are the important tasks. So before you get down to scheduling tasks, you need to define your short term goal. Define the activities that help you realise this goal. Depending on the level of responsibility you have - individual contributor, team leader, manager, general manager, you have many roles to take up, beyond the tasks of executing the project. For example if you are a team leader then you may have roles like mentoring people, architecture definition, project execution, managing the outsourcing vendors etc.
One of the critical roles for everyone, again taking a leaf from Steven Covey's book, is the "Sharpening of the Saw ". All of us, irrespective of our designation, always has some skill or other to sharpen. This is what helps us to do our current job well, or prepares us for a bigger role in the future.
So before we start scheduling the tasks, we have to define the roles we play. For each of the roles, define the tasks to accomplish in the week or weeks to come. One of the roles easily forgotten is the personal/family role. It could be to pursue a hobby or take care of the kids or do some community service.
I find weekly planning very useful and meaningful, as there is enough clarity of what's in store for the next week. I usually spend 15 minutes on a Monday morning, filling the tasks under each role. Once this is done, I start populating my weekly calendar with these tasks. A suggestion I have is to not pack the calendar, end to end. Leave some wiggle room to address any unplanned activities or interruptions. Make sure you spread the tasks under each role uniformly across the week - this will ensure that important but not urgent tasks also get equal attention. Again leave more wiggle room in the later part of the week. This is to address tasks that spill-over from the early part of the week. For the tasks under the "Sharpening of the Saw" plan, save it at that part of the day when you are at your best. The first hour of the morning works best for me, when there is minimal interruption and I am mentally fresh.
One of the advantages of doing time-management is that you get to control another persons schedule (assuming that the other person does not plan). For example if you schedule a meeting based on your plan, the other person who does not plan has little choice but to accept your meeting-invite.
The success of time management lies in discipline. Stick to the planned schedule. There is always a tendency to continue with the task beyond the planned schedule. Resist it. If the task was incomplete, because of underestimation or due to other distractions, then schedule to continue this task next day. By doing this you ensure that you are sticking to the plan, as much as possible and that you are accomplishing tasks under all the roles you have.
For the first few weeks you may feel a slave to time-management and that you have lost your freedom. DO NOT GIVE UP and go back to the old ways of not planning. When you continue to practise time management, I assure you,you will feel you have accomplished a lot more because you are not only doing the urgent tasks but also the important tasks that matter. Imagine the happiness you get when you see a smile in your kid's face because you promised to take her for a bicycle ride and you kept your promise.
Beware that you may not complete all the planned tasks. Even if you have finished only some percentage of the planned tasks, you would have completed some of the important tasks in it. This would not have been accomplished without time management. Keep practising it and once it becomes a habit the success rate of accomplishing the planned tasks gets closer and closer to 100%.
Before I sign-off I thought I will share an example to supplement the theory I talked about in the above paragraphs.
Roles - Manager, Supervisor, Technical Lead, Family Member, sharpening the saw.
Activities for the week
Manager - Finance forecast, Vendor feedback, Setting Priorities for the team
Supervisor - DPM sessions, One-On-One
Technical Lead - Design review, Datasheet creation, weekly meetings, conference calls
Family - Taking the daughter for badminton class, Attending birthday party, Disposing newspaper
Sharpening the saw - Reading Ethernet systems, Reading "Keep them on your side", Write blogs.
Now I can fill the calendar with these tasks and work on them over the week.
Before I end the blog, let me leave with you a fine quote on time
" Time is like a grain of sand in your palm. If it slips through, then you cannot recover it"
So practise effect time management ....
-Ram
Time Management, defined as managing time, is a very narrow definition in my opinion. Time management should also help in prioritising activities and this is where Steven Covey's definition hits the bulls-eye. These days multi-tasking is the need of the day. You need to resolve the priorities between the multiple tasks. These tasks can be classified as urgent and/or important. Given these two variables, there are four possible combinations that have been lucidly captured by Steven Covey, in the four-quadrant model. Without proper planning, you would be spending all your time on addressing urgent tasks(and this need not be important) resulting in low sense of accomplishments and high stress levels.
So how would you define a task as important ? The tasks which, when accomplished, take you closer to your goals are the important tasks. So before you get down to scheduling tasks, you need to define your short term goal. Define the activities that help you realise this goal. Depending on the level of responsibility you have - individual contributor, team leader, manager, general manager, you have many roles to take up, beyond the tasks of executing the project. For example if you are a team leader then you may have roles like mentoring people, architecture definition, project execution, managing the outsourcing vendors etc.
One of the critical roles for everyone, again taking a leaf from Steven Covey's book, is the "Sharpening of the Saw ". All of us, irrespective of our designation, always has some skill or other to sharpen. This is what helps us to do our current job well, or prepares us for a bigger role in the future.
So before we start scheduling the tasks, we have to define the roles we play. For each of the roles, define the tasks to accomplish in the week or weeks to come. One of the roles easily forgotten is the personal/family role. It could be to pursue a hobby or take care of the kids or do some community service.
I find weekly planning very useful and meaningful, as there is enough clarity of what's in store for the next week. I usually spend 15 minutes on a Monday morning, filling the tasks under each role. Once this is done, I start populating my weekly calendar with these tasks. A suggestion I have is to not pack the calendar, end to end. Leave some wiggle room to address any unplanned activities or interruptions. Make sure you spread the tasks under each role uniformly across the week - this will ensure that important but not urgent tasks also get equal attention. Again leave more wiggle room in the later part of the week. This is to address tasks that spill-over from the early part of the week. For the tasks under the "Sharpening of the Saw" plan, save it at that part of the day when you are at your best. The first hour of the morning works best for me, when there is minimal interruption and I am mentally fresh.
One of the advantages of doing time-management is that you get to control another persons schedule (assuming that the other person does not plan). For example if you schedule a meeting based on your plan, the other person who does not plan has little choice but to accept your meeting-invite.
The success of time management lies in discipline. Stick to the planned schedule. There is always a tendency to continue with the task beyond the planned schedule. Resist it. If the task was incomplete, because of underestimation or due to other distractions, then schedule to continue this task next day. By doing this you ensure that you are sticking to the plan, as much as possible and that you are accomplishing tasks under all the roles you have.
For the first few weeks you may feel a slave to time-management and that you have lost your freedom. DO NOT GIVE UP and go back to the old ways of not planning. When you continue to practise time management, I assure you,you will feel you have accomplished a lot more because you are not only doing the urgent tasks but also the important tasks that matter. Imagine the happiness you get when you see a smile in your kid's face because you promised to take her for a bicycle ride and you kept your promise.
Beware that you may not complete all the planned tasks. Even if you have finished only some percentage of the planned tasks, you would have completed some of the important tasks in it. This would not have been accomplished without time management. Keep practising it and once it becomes a habit the success rate of accomplishing the planned tasks gets closer and closer to 100%.
Before I sign-off I thought I will share an example to supplement the theory I talked about in the above paragraphs.
Roles - Manager, Supervisor, Technical Lead, Family Member, sharpening the saw.
Activities for the week
Manager - Finance forecast, Vendor feedback, Setting Priorities for the team
Supervisor - DPM sessions, One-On-One
Technical Lead - Design review, Datasheet creation, weekly meetings, conference calls
Family - Taking the daughter for badminton class, Attending birthday party, Disposing newspaper
Sharpening the saw - Reading Ethernet systems, Reading "Keep them on your side", Write blogs.
Now I can fill the calendar with these tasks and work on them over the week.
Before I end the blog, let me leave with you a fine quote on time
" Time is like a grain of sand in your palm. If it slips through, then you cannot recover it"
So practise effect time management ....
-Ram
Monday, March 9, 2009
How to motivate people in these tough times using differentiated recognition
Hi,
Couple of weeks back my colleague caught me at the breakfast table and wanted me to give a talk to his leadership team on recognitions. I asked few questions and realised he wanted me to talk on engaging with people with the emphasis on recognitions. I was astounded when I saw the email he sent to his leaders wherein the the title of my talk was coined as "How to motivate teams in these tough times using differentiated recognitions". I felt the this title fancy so retained it as the title of this blog (sure it would trigger people to atleast read few lines of this blog). I did not change the frame-work of my presentation as what I wanted to talk was on "people engagement" and of which recognition is one piece of it. However I wanted to connect the title of the talk to my presentation so that people see a connect and not go out of the room thinking the "managers usually tell what they want others to hear". If you closely look at the title, the words - people, motivate, recognition are all key components of people engagement. How well one engages with people gets noticed clearly in these "tough conditions". The word "differentiated" - a buzzword the technical folks cannot live without , is to create a euphoria so most of the people attend the talk.
Having set the stage connecting the title to the talk, I started presenting my philosophy of people management. To me it is a simple three step process - Set Stretch goals, Provide means to achieve them , and Reward (recognition comes here). At the core of these three steps is how one engages with their people on a regular basis. Let us explore into each of this steps.
Stretch goals - The key word here is "Stretch". As managers/supervisors one is supposed to have a clear understanding of their people's ambitions/goals. Be honest to make sure that you find opportunities within your organisation or sister-organisations that matches the person's ambitions with the group's goals. Once you get this connect, the next step is to make the goal stretched. The reason for this is to make the person aim for more than what he thinks is realistic, only then the true potential of the person would be exercised. Trust me, when the person meets this stretched goal the sense of accomplishment and happiness he would feel is far beyond what any tangible recognitions can achieve. The fact that the goal is stretched would make the person come out of their "comfort zone" and think of newer ways to meet the goal. There lies the new learning he/she would get. I have seen many managers influencing the individual to change their goals to meet the organisational goals. This may be OK in the small run, but for long term engagement with people the manager should work to map the person's goals with the organisation goals. Even if this means moving him into a sister group.
The second step is to provide means so that the person can achieve the goal. This is where the fact that you as a manager is genuinely interested in the person's career comes out. Creating opportunities, responsibilities, finding a mentor etc., so that the person can reach the stretched goals is your responsibility as a manager.
The third step is the rewards. If the person meets the stretched goals then as a manager this should be acknowledged by rewarding this person. This could be good hike, bonus, promotions etc.,
When one follows this simple three step model continously the employee's career will progress really well. He will accomplish lot more for the company. His loyalty towards the company also increases.
While doing the above, a manager should be well connected to the people through his daily interactions. I am big fan and proponent of MBWA- Managing By Walking Around. Make it a point everyday to walk around and chat with your employees. This chat need not be centered only around the work. It could be simple enquires about his/her family, hobbies, etc., I found this to be effective technique to find out any issues or concerns a person may have. You get to know it well in advance and not wait for the structured 1-on-1 to find out. Knowing the issue/concerns early means solving them early before they become bigger issues.
I also found giving feedback timely is very effective as the person would understand the context of the feedback easily. If one restricts oneself to the DPM or appraisal time to have 1-on-1 and give feedback it may be very late and the person may not appreciate it as he would have forgotten the context. The human mind remembers negative feedbacks more distinctly than the positive feedbacks. So one of the challenges for a manager is to look out for opportunities to give positive feedbacks. These positive feedbacks need not be restricted only to colossal accomplishments. It could be as simple as acknowledging that a person's presentation in the meeting was very good. The fact that he/she is doing a good job in mentoring a new college graduate is also worth acknowledging. These little appreciations over the year motivates the person all along and the sense of belongingness to the team and the value he brings to the team gets reinforced.
The most important part of people engagement is to have fun. Little things like celebrating a person's birthday, going out for lunch once a while, chatting over lunch/tea breaks, seeing a movie together - they all increase the team work and people engagement.
Now if you are wondering that I forgot about the recognition part, you are mistaken. I am not going to let you go that easily. But on a serious note the reason the people engagement that I talked about in the previous paragraphs is so important is because, recognition by definition cannot be done for the 100% population. With any recognition there are few (many) people who do not get recognised. So how would you address their motivation issues ? Precisely by doing the things I talked about in the people engagement. So recognition is not a substitute for not engaging with people. One has to first engage with people and then supplement it with the recognition. Atlast let me come to the topic on recognition.
The most critical part of any recognition is the "timeliness". If you are happy with the presentation the person made in the meeting, do not wait for the structured 1-on-1 to mention it. The punch would be lost. Do it immediately after the meeting. Simple emails can do wonder. These days I see managers not using this simple no-cost tool to motivate the people. Crisp emails clearly highlighting the value-add the person did can work wonders.
Personalisation of recognition creates lot more impact. This requires that you as a manager understand your employess well enough that you can choose the right recognition for him. I know a colleague who likes ipod but for some reason has not bought one for himself (he bought one for his wife). So if I were to recognise this person for some accomplishment I would get him an ipod rather than giving him cash or gift certificates.
Involving family is also more effective when it comes to recognition. There was this person who used to report to me. He had worked hard to release the design on-time working many weekends. Immediately after the release he took vacation to meet him family. I wanted to recognise him for his hard work. I did not want to wait till he came back from vacation (remember the timeliness) so I drafted an appreciation note with a reward for taking his family out for dinner. I couriered this letter to his home. Imagine the sense of happiness he got when he saw this appreciation note and also his parent's happiness that his son is really valued by the company. Little innovations like this can do a world of good to keep the employee's spirits high.
Another effective but tough recognition is "Peer recognition". It is similar to MVP (Most valuable Player) and is confined to a month. Through a well defined process the peers/employees of the team make recommendation on who should be recognised as the MVP for the month. There is no monetary reward, but a revolving shield (in our case we had Rhino toy) that the rewarded person keeps in his/her office for that month. This encourages others to aim for such a recognition. The fact that it is confined to a month, there is an opportunity created to recognise atleast a dozen people every year.
One of the most economical recognition is to give a certificate to an individual for their accomplishments. One can create a custom template for this cerificate and get it color-printed on a glossy paper. Mention on the ceriticate briefly the reason for the recognition. As part of the monthly meeting you as a manager can recognise many employees using this technique.
One caution I would like to highlight with regards to the recognition is that for every person recognised there are many who are left out. So be careful of public recognition. Make sure there is a clear objective process for recognition. Share the process with the entire team. Make sure someone other than you makes the recommendation for the recognition. If the process is not transparent then you may cause more damage to the rest of the team while you try to motivate few individuals who deserved recognitions.
I hope this was a good read. Comments are welcome.
-Ram
Couple of weeks back my colleague caught me at the breakfast table and wanted me to give a talk to his leadership team on recognitions. I asked few questions and realised he wanted me to talk on engaging with people with the emphasis on recognitions. I was astounded when I saw the email he sent to his leaders wherein the the title of my talk was coined as "How to motivate teams in these tough times using differentiated recognitions". I felt the this title fancy so retained it as the title of this blog (sure it would trigger people to atleast read few lines of this blog). I did not change the frame-work of my presentation as what I wanted to talk was on "people engagement" and of which recognition is one piece of it. However I wanted to connect the title of the talk to my presentation so that people see a connect and not go out of the room thinking the "managers usually tell what they want others to hear". If you closely look at the title, the words - people, motivate, recognition are all key components of people engagement. How well one engages with people gets noticed clearly in these "tough conditions". The word "differentiated" - a buzzword the technical folks cannot live without , is to create a euphoria so most of the people attend the talk.
Having set the stage connecting the title to the talk, I started presenting my philosophy of people management. To me it is a simple three step process - Set Stretch goals, Provide means to achieve them , and Reward (recognition comes here). At the core of these three steps is how one engages with their people on a regular basis. Let us explore into each of this steps.
Stretch goals - The key word here is "Stretch". As managers/supervisors one is supposed to have a clear understanding of their people's ambitions/goals. Be honest to make sure that you find opportunities within your organisation or sister-organisations that matches the person's ambitions with the group's goals. Once you get this connect, the next step is to make the goal stretched. The reason for this is to make the person aim for more than what he thinks is realistic, only then the true potential of the person would be exercised. Trust me, when the person meets this stretched goal the sense of accomplishment and happiness he would feel is far beyond what any tangible recognitions can achieve. The fact that the goal is stretched would make the person come out of their "comfort zone" and think of newer ways to meet the goal. There lies the new learning he/she would get. I have seen many managers influencing the individual to change their goals to meet the organisational goals. This may be OK in the small run, but for long term engagement with people the manager should work to map the person's goals with the organisation goals. Even if this means moving him into a sister group.
The second step is to provide means so that the person can achieve the goal. This is where the fact that you as a manager is genuinely interested in the person's career comes out. Creating opportunities, responsibilities, finding a mentor etc., so that the person can reach the stretched goals is your responsibility as a manager.
The third step is the rewards. If the person meets the stretched goals then as a manager this should be acknowledged by rewarding this person. This could be good hike, bonus, promotions etc.,
When one follows this simple three step model continously the employee's career will progress really well. He will accomplish lot more for the company. His loyalty towards the company also increases.
While doing the above, a manager should be well connected to the people through his daily interactions. I am big fan and proponent of MBWA- Managing By Walking Around. Make it a point everyday to walk around and chat with your employees. This chat need not be centered only around the work. It could be simple enquires about his/her family, hobbies, etc., I found this to be effective technique to find out any issues or concerns a person may have. You get to know it well in advance and not wait for the structured 1-on-1 to find out. Knowing the issue/concerns early means solving them early before they become bigger issues.
I also found giving feedback timely is very effective as the person would understand the context of the feedback easily. If one restricts oneself to the DPM or appraisal time to have 1-on-1 and give feedback it may be very late and the person may not appreciate it as he would have forgotten the context. The human mind remembers negative feedbacks more distinctly than the positive feedbacks. So one of the challenges for a manager is to look out for opportunities to give positive feedbacks. These positive feedbacks need not be restricted only to colossal accomplishments. It could be as simple as acknowledging that a person's presentation in the meeting was very good. The fact that he/she is doing a good job in mentoring a new college graduate is also worth acknowledging. These little appreciations over the year motivates the person all along and the sense of belongingness to the team and the value he brings to the team gets reinforced.
The most important part of people engagement is to have fun. Little things like celebrating a person's birthday, going out for lunch once a while, chatting over lunch/tea breaks, seeing a movie together - they all increase the team work and people engagement.
Now if you are wondering that I forgot about the recognition part, you are mistaken. I am not going to let you go that easily. But on a serious note the reason the people engagement that I talked about in the previous paragraphs is so important is because, recognition by definition cannot be done for the 100% population. With any recognition there are few (many) people who do not get recognised. So how would you address their motivation issues ? Precisely by doing the things I talked about in the people engagement. So recognition is not a substitute for not engaging with people. One has to first engage with people and then supplement it with the recognition. Atlast let me come to the topic on recognition.
The most critical part of any recognition is the "timeliness". If you are happy with the presentation the person made in the meeting, do not wait for the structured 1-on-1 to mention it. The punch would be lost. Do it immediately after the meeting. Simple emails can do wonder. These days I see managers not using this simple no-cost tool to motivate the people. Crisp emails clearly highlighting the value-add the person did can work wonders.
Personalisation of recognition creates lot more impact. This requires that you as a manager understand your employess well enough that you can choose the right recognition for him. I know a colleague who likes ipod but for some reason has not bought one for himself (he bought one for his wife). So if I were to recognise this person for some accomplishment I would get him an ipod rather than giving him cash or gift certificates.
Involving family is also more effective when it comes to recognition. There was this person who used to report to me. He had worked hard to release the design on-time working many weekends. Immediately after the release he took vacation to meet him family. I wanted to recognise him for his hard work. I did not want to wait till he came back from vacation (remember the timeliness) so I drafted an appreciation note with a reward for taking his family out for dinner. I couriered this letter to his home. Imagine the sense of happiness he got when he saw this appreciation note and also his parent's happiness that his son is really valued by the company. Little innovations like this can do a world of good to keep the employee's spirits high.
Another effective but tough recognition is "Peer recognition". It is similar to MVP (Most valuable Player) and is confined to a month. Through a well defined process the peers/employees of the team make recommendation on who should be recognised as the MVP for the month. There is no monetary reward, but a revolving shield (in our case we had Rhino toy) that the rewarded person keeps in his/her office for that month. This encourages others to aim for such a recognition. The fact that it is confined to a month, there is an opportunity created to recognise atleast a dozen people every year.
One of the most economical recognition is to give a certificate to an individual for their accomplishments. One can create a custom template for this cerificate and get it color-printed on a glossy paper. Mention on the ceriticate briefly the reason for the recognition. As part of the monthly meeting you as a manager can recognise many employees using this technique.
One caution I would like to highlight with regards to the recognition is that for every person recognised there are many who are left out. So be careful of public recognition. Make sure there is a clear objective process for recognition. Share the process with the entire team. Make sure someone other than you makes the recommendation for the recognition. If the process is not transparent then you may cause more damage to the rest of the team while you try to motivate few individuals who deserved recognitions.
I hope this was a good read. Comments are welcome.
-Ram
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