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Dynamic Following April 6, 2008

Posted by Chuck Musciano in Leadership.
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I recently finished reading Orbiting the Giant Hairball by Gordon MacKenzie.  An entertaining, quick read with many quirky illustrations by the author, the book recounts MacKenzie’s long career as a rebellious creator within the staid corporate world of Hallmark Cards.  He neatly summarizes the world of corporate conformity and suggests many ways to succeed and even thrive in spite of the pressure to conform.  Having spent 10 years in a rebellious R&D group within the confining structure of Harris Corporation, I immediately related to MacKenzie’s stories and advice.

Towards the end of his career at Hallmark, MacKenzie became something of a Dutch uncle to many employees who would come to vent and cry on his shoulder with their concerns.  He related one incident where a frustrated employee came to him, shared their problems, and concluded with “I wish we had some dynamic leadership around here!”  MacKenzie immediately replied with “I wish we had some dynamic following around here!”

Yes!  Absolutely!  His response perfectly summarizes the frustrations many of us have as leaders. Dynamic leaders don’t get very far without people who can creatively, aggressively, and enthusiastically solve all the problems that accompany any initiative, big or small.  It is the dynamic followers who get the job done, not the dynamic leader.

As leaders, we cannot possibly imagine everything that will come up on the long journey between where we are and where we need to be.  If our teams expect us to spell out every potential problem and solution, we’ll never get started, let alone finish.  If they wait for our direction with every new challenge that crops up, they’ll be waiting a long time. Instead, we need teams that can roll with the punches, find clever solutions, solve problems, and keep moving.

The military teaches this as a fundamental skill.  Every military operation begins breaking down moments after it starts.  Successful engagements are marked by soldiers who assess the problem, react accordingly, keep moving, and never lose sight of the goal.  While our day-to-day jobs don’t carry the life-and-death concerns of a military engagement, we can still encourage our people to behave in a similar way.

The key to this is clearly defining the goal.  When a team knows where it needs to go, they can quickly solve local problems in ways that keep them heading in the right direction.  When the goal is unclear, they may be unable to react or even worse, their local solutions may actually be counterproductive.  As leaders, we need to constantly communicate our vision and communicate with our people to make sure they understand it.

Except for those at the very bottom or top of the org chart, we are all leaders and followers. As leaders, we need to engage and coach our teams to be good followers.  As followers ourselves, we need to demonstrate dynamic following so that our people can see how it should be done.  Don’t make the mistake of demanding dynamic following from your people while you sit like a lump, waiting for your boss to tell you what to do.  Be a dynamic leader and a dynamic follower, and you’ll be well on your way to being a success.

Your Attitude Is A Choice March 25, 2008

Posted by Chuck Musciano in Leadership.
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As leaders, everything we do is scrutinized. How we do everything we do is cataloged and noted. Our demeanor is infectious and our whole organization will adopt our attitude, good or bad.

For passionate leaders, this is a problem. Passion usually cuts both ways: passionately optimistic, and passionately perturbed. We want our people to be passionate, but we want to infect them with the right kind of passion.

One of the coaching points I have with new managers is the concept that they must choose their attitude, every day. Their choice influences their people, whose ability to execute ultimately decides the fate of the manager.

At work (and in all of life) there is an ebb and flow of good and bad. Our natural emotions will oscillate as a result. As leaders, we must consciously choose to suppress the negative emotions and emphasize the positive, without regard to our personal feelings at the time. This is not to say that we must adopt a Pollyannish approach to every problem at work. Instead, we must project controlled optimism even in the face of difficult odds or troublesome problems. If you believe a problem can be solved (and you better, or you’ve got other issues to deal with), you need to dwell on the solution, not on the effects of the problem. This gets your people focusing on the solution instead of wallowing in self-pity and fear.

Some leaders love to wail about things in public, going on about the difficulties being faced and the unfairness of it all. These people aren’t leaders; they are whiners. They love the attention of being pitied and seek the sympathy of their audience. Pity and sympathy may make you feel good, but they never solved a problem.

If you really need to explore the negative aspects of a problem, do it in private with a few trusted peers. You must have an accurate handle on the challenges you face, and you can only do that by honestly assessing how deep a hole you may be in. That assessment is done behind closed doors. When the door opens, you choose how to carry yourself. Good leaders choose to be strong, optimistic, and positive.

In troubled times, the team looks to the leader for direction, both subtle and overt. Your chosen attitude will spell the difference between success and failure for you and your team. Choose wisely.

Pedantic Punctuation, Part 2: Emphasis Quotes March 19, 2008

Posted by Chuck Musciano in Random Musings.
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Another in my ongoing series on punctuation errors that drive me crazy…

There are a few simple rules to using quote marks correctly. These are easy to remember, so let’s get them out of the way quickly:

  • Quotes are used to indicate words that are directly quoted from another source.
  • They are also used to indicate an alternative or non-standard usage of an otherwise well-understood word or phrase.

That’s it.  You may not use them emphasize words or phrases.  You may not use them draw attention to the important part of a sentence.

Here’s a topical example that makes this clear:

Elliot Spitzer was seen at the hotel with his “wife.”

Hmmm.  In this case, efforts to emphasize that Mr. Spitzer was seen with his wife seem to have gone astray.  I am also fond of statements like this in restaurants:

Try Our “Beef” Special

Thanks, but I’ll pass.  Mentally, I am saying the word “beef” while making “finger quotes” in the air, which leads me to believe that the special may be many things, but it certainly isn’t beef.

If you are directly quoting a source, verbatim, make sure you use the quotes.  If you are making finger quotes to the reader while saying something, get those quotes in there.  But if all you want to do is draw attention to what you are saying, there are other proven conventions that still work.  Really!

Enabling Career Innovation March 18, 2008

Posted by Chuck Musciano in Leadership.
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I’m a big believer in consistency and rules.  I like it when everything fits together nicely and a satisfying order arises.  I recognize that this isn’t always, or even often, possible, but I can dream.

I like consistent, orderly job descriptions.  By this, I mean a consistent way to define jobs within an organization along with the levels of those jobs.  While it certainly appeals to my desire for consistent order, I was recently reminded why it means so much to those whose jobs are caught up in those descriptions.

Whenever I’ve run an organization, we’ve used a simple job matrix, with skill sets across the bottom and experience levels up the side.  This is not uncommon in engineering and IT: a new hire comes in as a Thing, and with hard work and determination, becomes a Senior Thing, followed by a Lead Thing, and eventually, a Principal Thing.  Different companies have different naming conventions, but the model is similar.  Everywhere you go, you’ll find Lead Software Developers and Senior Systems Administrators milling about, and everyone knows where they stand.

I also make sure that there is a clear parallel management track that equates increasing management responsibility with peer levels on the technical track.  Thus, a Senior Thing that switches to the management track becomes a Team Lead.  If they like management, they can stay on that track and move up to a Senior Team Lead, Manager, and Director.

Here’s an important rule: if they don’t like management, they can switch back.

Over the past month or so, I’ve had several employees share with me how much they value the ability to switch back.  High-performing people will naturally want to try new things but won’t always succeed.  When they fail, they must be allowed a path back to try again.  With projects, that’s easy: go tackle a different project.  With career choices, that’s a lot harder (and scarier).

Too many organizations lock a person into management: once a manager, you leave the technical world behind.  As a result, some awful managers stay stuck in their job, much to the detriment of their people.  Moreover, some technical people who would make great managers never make the jump, fearful of what will happen if they fail. In many places, just asking to come back can result in career suicide.

When people have choices, coupled with recovery plans, they will try things and aspire to greatness.  If you take away the choices, or you fail to provide a path back, they will stagnate.  In a previous post, I addressed the need for innovation in our solutions; we also need to let our people innovate with their careers.  Foster both in your organization and you are well-positioned for success.

Pedantic Punctuation, Part 1: The Serial Comma March 14, 2008

Posted by Chuck Musciano in Random Musings.
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I am a stickler for correct spelling and punctuation.1 There is no greater indication of the decline of modern civilization than the lax attitude taken towards these foundations of correct communication.  Recently, my son took the North Carolina State Writing Test for seventh graders.  Among the various metrics used to grade the test was “Conventions.” Conventions are spelling and grammar; they comprise 10% of the score.  The only way to not get full credit for Conventions is to commit some error so egregious that it renders your essay completely unintelligible.  As long as the student “comes close” to correct spelling and grammar, modern educators are satisfied.

Ahem.  Spelling, grammar, and punctuation are not “conventions.”  They are rules, well defined, easily taught, and easily applied.  They indicate that the author actually cares about his work and respects the intelligence and time of his audience.  While incorrect essays in school may be overlooked by teachers, incorrect communication in the real world is viewed at best as sloppy and at worst, illiterate.

To that end, and to inaugurate a new series of occasional posts, let us address the serial comma.

The serial comma is the comma that should always be placed after the next-to-last element of a sequence, just before the “and” or “or” that joins the last element to the sequence.  This is not an optional comma, to be deleted by the sloppy or careless writer as is their wont.  It is a required element that always makes the sequence clear and unambiguous.2

Consider the sequence

My favorite foods are steak, shrimp, macaroni and cheese and crackers.

Confusing?  Of course!  We’ll never settle on a dinner menu. But the serial comma removes all doubt:

My favorite foods are steak, shrimp, macaroni and cheese, and crackers.

or

My favorite foods are steak, shrimp, macaroni, and cheese and crackers.

There are some who will insist that most sentences do not suffer from this kind of potential problem and are thus exempt from the serial comma rule, as if commas are in short supply and must be hoarded for such crucial uses.  In fact, punctuation should be consistently applied throughout a document so that all lists use serial commas all the time.

Next time on Pedantic Punctuation: inappropriate use of quotation marks for “emphasis!”

1 As a result, this post is almost guaranteed to have some spelling, punctuation, or grammar error.
2 Contrarians can create sentences that are ambiguous with or without the serial comma, but these are fundamentally unsound sentences that should be rewritten anyway.