Implementing a Blueprint for Success…

Topic for December Round Table Discussions: Implementing a Blueprint for Success through Measures, Succession, and Relationships. 

Kalamazoo – Tuesday, December 9, 2014 

Challenge:

• Pick out leaders
• communicating across the ranks
• Relationships
• Measures, Dashboards
• Training/Development

Solutions:

• Talent is King – Recognize talent
• Knowing people, what they can and want to do
• Identify what the position is
• Expose people to new projects to see what they are capable of
• Train and develop
• Quarterly leadership/development programs
• Use consultants with Leadership team
• Simplify, get focused, balance time
• Alignment, get everyone on the same page
• Evaluate
• Restate vision and mission to team members
• Create wind, measures, cycle
• Internal relations, increasing soft skills
• Spend 1-on-1 quality time with leaders
• Adjustment/Culture “People will only love the job as much as they feel loved.”
• Don’t drive looking in the rear view mirror.  Look and plan for 5, 10 and 15 years out.
• Top down approach, short and long term goals, Hire in groups and train 2 times a year
• Equip to manage the growth
• Measures on development, find dashboard that benefits team, move forward, IFMA
• We must be the right bus.  What kind of bus are we?  Then…place the right people on it.
• Communicate – multi-sensory communication

Take a Way:

• Right accountability in place, ownership
• Strategic Communication, be solid, vision, mission, build foundation
• Can’t miss a beat
• Fastest growing business is Google, everyone is a leader.  A totally different culture, a newer generation.
• Trust and alignment, Multiple modes of communication

Kalamazoo – Thursday, December 11, 2014

Your Challenge:

• Culture
• Measures
• Employment
• Engagement
• Communication
• Distractions/Time
• Get employees to embrace the Mission/Vision
• Dashboards

The Solutions:

• Lead with safety both emotionally and physically.
• Be innovative taking risks.
• Idea/Creation.
• To have a good company it is said that every person needs to contribute ½ an idea per year.  For a great company you need 4 great ideas.  You to act upon these ideas within 2 weeks.  Everyone contributes.
• Department projects to help become more productive.
• Getting people of faith together to see the heart in order to impact others.
• Build relationships.
• Separate responsibilities appropriately.
• Determine what the roles are.
• Get Journey Champions to get more passion. Develop them within your team.
• Recognitions for attitude, leadership, innovation, etc.
• Create an environment that makes employees feel successful.
• Prepare the next generation of leaders by training skill sets.
• Establish a leadership program.
• Determine measures by clearly identifying an expectation blueprint.

“You can accomplish anything as long as you don’t care who gets the credit.” – Ronald Regan

 Grand Rapids – Thursday, December 11, 2014 

Top Challenges

• Truly prioritizing what we measure is hard work, but it is also an essential part of the process.
• Keeping the top priorities at the top of everyone’s list is challenging because not everybody’s department, nor everybody’s customer can be #1 on the most important list.
• The 80/20 rule must prevail, but it can run smack dab right in the face of the vocal minority.
• When it comes to employee engagement, beware of the 3 Elements of Job Misery – irrelevance, immeasurement and anonymity.
• Succession planning – demands that we retain our top talent, and that we hire top talent.

 Top Solutions

• When it comes to prioritizing, separate the absolutes from the preferences.
• Differentiate between measuring lagging indicators (I.E. how did we profit and grow in the past) from leading indicators (what strategic proposals must be delivered)
• Invest in our employees by knowing their interests.  Engage them by asking, listening and responding.  This is key to building trust and to delivering fulfillment at work.
• Express our gratitude to our staff and to our customers, more, more, more.

Top Takeaways

• Connect vision with outcome.  I.E. As we articulate our 3-year vision, include our 3-year outcomes as well.
• Be organized, disciplined and crystal clear with our priorities, but meet each employee and each customer right where they are to understand their true needs, first.
• As we intentionally tend to the process of building relationships with the people we employ as staff, who we serve as customers, who we engage as vendors, and who we love as family, we should always do so in a way that prioritizes Godly impact on all levels: intellectual, emotional, physical and spiritual.

Grand Rapids – Tuesday, December 9, 2014

Your Challenge

• Don’t plan
• Shifting landscape
• Limited resources
• Analysis paralysis
• Lack of Experience
• Lack of interim steps
• No actionable items
• Lack of commitment

The Solution

• Bring in the experts
• Choose who to do business with
• Identify the right person (succession planning)
• Consistent messaging through meetings and other communication vehicles
• Celebrate victories with those who got it done
• Establish a process
• Understand your team via personality testing

The Takeaway

• Plan
• Pray
• Execute the plan with purpose / commitment