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Leadership:How New Leaders Can Keep Their Nerve & Avoid Distractions…Managers Who Think they are Fully Prepared & Equipped to Take on Top Jobs can Come Unstuck when They Finally Land the Role

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Countless books and articles have been written about what might be termed “the grander aspects” of leadership – the need to have a vision, the ability to decide on and execute a strategy, the importance of communication, the crucial role of motivation and such like – but rather less attention is paid to the “nuts and bolts” of being a leader.

laughing-leader-4

 

While it is understandable that management thinkers should focus on ideas of leadership, managers themselves need to realise that what seem like little things can assume great importance and have a significant effect on their ability to pull off those great ideas. Quite simply, even managers who think they are fully prepared and equipped to take on top jobs can come unstuck when they finally land the role.

Marcus Agius is a former investment banker who chaired Barclays Bank and the former UK airports operator BAA and has for the past year been chairman of PA Consulting. He says that many people appointed to chief executive or chairman positions fail to appreciate “how very different it is to run the whole show rather than just a bit of it”.

A key part of this is understanding that, while he or she may be in overall charge, the CEO or chairman does not actually run anything. Those reporting directly to them do the running. Allied to this is the realisation that, while it is possible to know most of everything when you are running a division, it is impossible when you are in charge of a whole big business. “That’s worrying, because you worry about what you don’t know,” says Agius. “One of the new things you have to learn is how to keep your nerve! How to resist the temptation to interfere.”

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Another perspective on this area is provided by Kevin Kaiser, Michael Pich and I.J Schecter in their recent book, Becoming A Top Manager (Jossey-Bass). They warn managers to beware of their expertise. By this they mean that executives spend most of their careers being promoted on the basis of their perceived functional knowledge. This obviously gives them confidence, but, they say, “it may also prevent proper appreciation of the relevance of other areas in the company”.

This is a problem because a general manager is supposed to be just that – a person who looks at the whole business – and not somebody who is stuck in a comfort zone based on their own experience and abilities. Worse, expertise in a particular business function “may simply strengthen incorrect presumptions” and close minds to the willingness to take account of new information or insights, say Kaiser and Co.

Delegation plays an important part in helping new managers deal with the realities of a bigger, more complex business than they have been used to. Agius acknowledges that this can be difficult for the simple reason that the typical CEO has a certain degree of confidence, even arrogance, and is therefore likely to take the view that nobody is likely to do what needs to be done better than them. But John Adair, a highly respected writer on leadership, believes that delegation is vital. “Delegating can save you time and develop your staff. You should delegate as much as you can,” he writes in John Adair’s 100 Greatest Ideas For Effective Leadership and Management(Capstone/Wiley).

At the same time, the leader cannot just rely on divisional directors to tell him or her what is going on. There needs to be a means of them being alerted to potential problems. The actual mechanism can differ – some CEOs have chiefs of staff, others rely on their finance director, still others have long-serving personal assistants. Indeed, Agius says that a good and trusted PA can make a huge difference to a leader’s effectiveness through minimising disruption and stress. Conversely, managers who get through a lot of PAs can “get in a muddle” and never seem to be as efficient, he adds.

One of the key ways in which an effective PA can help a new leader settle into the role is through diary management. On being appointed to the top job, the leader will inevitably have a lot of calls on his or her time. While the leaders themselves will need to learn to be ruthless about which meetings they need to attend and which calls they need to take, the experienced PA can be invaluable in managing the mechanics of this activity and – via their relationships with other PAs – in ensuring smooth and effective communications with other executives.

Leaders themselves can help with this, however, by managing their time as well as the business and the people working for them. Adair says that a leader needs to be certain that he or she can define their business role and know what amounts to a successful outcome; that they can spend time thinking and planning for themselves and others; that they have a clear understanding of their business purpose and that they know the balance they wish to achieve between business and private commitments.

But, given the intense demands that are a characteristic of the typical general manager’s life, the importance of time management cannot be overstated. Adair reminds readers of the view of the late management guru Peter Druckerthat only when we manage time can we manage anything. This is true, of course, of any manager, but it is especially true for those at the very top of the organization. Adair, and indeed various other self-help experts, offer valuable advice on such areas as handling meetings, avoiding receiving too much paper and travelling. In the end, though, it comes down to priorities and ensuring energy goes into effort that – to coin a phrase – really makes a difference.

Perhaps the biggest challenge for a new general manager is to focus on being effective rather than busy. The problem with rushing around is that, while it looks like the individual concerned is justifying their pay cheque, they are really not in control and so are unable to carve out the time necessary for reflection and making sense of what is going on around them.

 

Forbes.com | March 19, 2015 | Roger Trapp

Strategy: 9 Rules of Office Politics you Have to Understand to Get Ahead…Women are More Likely than Men to Avoid the Politics & Believe That If they Focus on Their Performance & Work Hard

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There isn’t any topic about the workplace that brings up more anger and frustration than office politics.  “It’s just not fair!” is what I hear over and over again when addressing this topic in presentations and workshops. Women especially find this an emotional issue.

house of cards season 2 frank underwood

Why? Because women are more likely than men to avoid the politics and believe that if they focus on their performance and work hard, they will get ahead. This avoidance, however, sets them up to be blindsided.

Unaware of the politics at play, they are often passed over for promotions and not given the resources they need to succeed. They become disillusioned and angry.

The reality, which is sometimes hard to come to terms with, is that it takes political savvy to get ahead and stay ahead.

1. You can’t escape it. It’s everywhere.

It is not uncommon for people to voice their annoyance with the politics in their company and department and seek another position to solve this problem. They make a move only to find out that politics exists everywhere. In some instances, the politics may not be obvious, but it exists in every department and every company. In fact, whenever there is more than one person, there is politics!

Think about going out for dinner with a group of friends. Who sits next to whom? Who shares the gossip with whom? In sharing this gossip, are they hoping to gain favor and influence? Are they seeking to be accepted and liked? They are perhaps using this information for “political” influence with their friends.

Have you visited your children’s classroom and observed the dynamics? Aren’t there politics at play there as well? Children seeking favor with the teacher or other students is a common behavior. They learn at an early age what it takes to have power and influence and what it takes to succeed.

The fact is you can’t escape politics. It’s everywhere and you need to deal with it at some level in order to thrive in the workplace.

 

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2. The unwritten rules often rule.

The people who try to diligently follow the rules are often very frustrated. Yes, every company has a company handbook with the formal policies, but it is the unwritten rules that are important. What’s frustrating about this fact is that these rules are not obvious. It takes both focus and intention to discover what the rules are before you break one of them by mistake.

In fact, some unwritten rules are sacred and you need to know what they are or you can step on a landmine that will sabotage your career. If you’re lucky, when you join a new company or department, a trusted colleague will fill you in as to what the real rules are.

Once you accept the fact that there are unwritten rules, you can make it your intention to uncover them. The rules often differ depending on your boss, department, and team. Therefore, you must be cognizant of your surroundings to understand how to play the game and how to win the game.

Playing ChessFlickr / Gábor

3. The rules are constantly changing.

Another challenge to office politics is that the rules are always changing. Just when you’ve figured out what rules are sacred to your boss, he/she changes the rules and what was acceptable yesterday will not help you move forward tomorrow. New leadership comes in and things shift.

People adapt to these changes and what they once considered to be important is no longer valid. It’s a full-time job staying abreast of people’s rules and the importance they attach to their rules at different points in time.

4. People who get promoted aren’t the most qualified.

This can be the most frustrating fact of all. For when you work hard and then witness other people less qualified than you getting promotions, it doesn’t seem fair. It seems that these people pay more attention to the politics than they do their jobs, so you feel justified in being upset.

In reality, however, the people who have developed their political and social capital along with great performance will always come out on top. For they have mastered how to work the system, and they have aligned themselves with people in the organization who have power and influence.

5. All decisions are influenced by politics.

Politics influences all decisions; whether it’s access to scarce resources, promotions, special bonuses and incentives, or raises. There are most certainly policies and procedures in every company but if you track how decisions are made, you will recognize that they are often influenced by politics.

Some people get special attention because they happen to be in favor with decision makers and influencers. These people are plugged into the power sources and benefit from it.

If you want to know who the people are who have influence and power, take the time to track how decisions are made. You will soon see that decision makers have a network of influencers that they consult. These informal networks of influencers have tremendous power.

golf driving rangeCindy Hughes/Shutterstock

6. There are informal networks within the company that have power and influence over all decisions.

The power and influence isn’t always determined by the organizational chart. There are informal networks, sometimes referred to as the Old Boys Club, that have the ear of senior management. They don’t necessarily occupy the top of the organizational chart, but don’t be fooled.

They still have a great deal of power over decisions that impact the direction of the company and your career. These decisions are most often made in informal settings outside the office, over drinks after work or on the golf course. That’s when the brainstorming and discussion takes place that results in major decisions.

7. The informal power networks are extremely difficult to penetrate (especially for women).

Women have traditionally been excluded from these informal networks. This fact makes it more difficult for women to impact the decision-making process. Typically, they aren’t invited to the informal meeting before the meeting or the meeting after the meeting where key decisions are made. This is certainly frustrating if you’re an outsider to these networks, because it means you can only react to decisions and not be proactive in the process.

8. There are constant shifts in power and influence.

One thing we know for sure is that change is constant. Over the course of my corporate career, I lost count of the number of mergers and acquisitions my companies endured. Each time, there was a change in leadership and direction.

Senior leaders come and go and the culture changes, the rules change, and as a result, the power and influence shifts. People gain and lose favor and the dynamics are always in flux. Yes, it’s frustrating to keep track of all this, but it’s necessary for you to survive and thrive in a politically charged environment.

9. Politics can make or break your career.

This is, of course, the most frustrating fact of all, especially for those people who believe in a meritocracy. Many of us believe that we will be rewarded for our hard work and talent. After all, we succeeded in school because of our diligence. But the rules in the workplace are different. It’s not a true meritocracy. It’s not a level playing field.

In order to be successful, you need to not only do the hard work, perhaps even extra work, but also create visibility and credibility for yourself. Otherwise, you run the risk of remaining invisible in a crowded and competitive environment.

Politics is all about relationships. It’s critical to build and nurture relationships with people who can positively impact your career. You need to build a power network by identifying and aligning yourself with those with power and influence. You also must be aware that politics rules and there are constant changes in the workplace dynamics that can trip you up if you aren’t aware of them.

The facts about office politics may be very frustrating, but they must be understood for your success. Embrace the politics, whatever they are, and pay special attention to the reality of your workplace. How are decisions made? Who influences those decisions? What are the unwritten rules? What does it take to get promoted?

Your performance and your political savvy are the key to getting ahead and staying ahead.

Want to know how savvy you are about what it takes to get ahead? Take this challenge on The Politics of Promotion.

Interested in learning how to navigate office politics? Check out my book, “The Politics of Promotion: How High Achieving Women Get Ahead and Stay Ahead.”

 
http://www.forbes.com/sites/bonniemarcus/2015/01/19/the-9-most-frustrating-facts-about-office-politics/#ixzz3UlnFbH3f

Leadership: Managers Need to Make Time for Face Time…Heavy Travel Schedules often Interfere with Necessary Interaction with Subordinates

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Alan Buckelew, chief operations officer of Carnival Corp., moved to Shanghai last September so he could help the world’s biggest cruise-ship company expand in China. He still supervises five executives at its Miami headquarters.

Directions Man

A heavy workload forced Mr. Buckelew to conduct year-end performance reviews for three of those deputies via videoconference—but he wasn’t happy about it.

“A review is probably the one time when you want to be physically present,” Mr. Buckelew says. He says he apologized to them about his Miami absence, and vows to evaluate every lieutenant face-to-face this year.

As businesses expect more senior leaders to both manage more far-flung teams and spend more time with distant clients, face time has become a precious commodity—and a source of professional agita. Technologies like videoconferencing and enterprise social networks claim to enable true connection over great distances, but the reality is often is far from perfect.

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When it comes down to it, there is still no good substitute for being in the same room with a direct report or a high-level boss, many executives say. Yet there is little consensus about how much face time it takes to manage effectively.

“Few executives can deliver business results quickly and engage their people at the same time,’’ says Matt Paese, vice president of succession management and C-suite services for leadership consultants Development Dimensions International. “But increasingly, our corporate clients try to hire or grow ones who can,” because they recognize “they can’t sustain business growth without a healthy culture.”

Hands-off leadership carries career risks. Take, for example, Louis Chenevert, who abruptly relinquished command of conglomerateUnited Technologies Corp. in November 2014 amid criticism that he was too detached from his top team.

Traveling frequently for work can leave employees without adequate feedback or a boss wondering whether you manage well, suggests Bruce Tulgan, author and chief executive of Rainmaker Thinking Inc., a management researchand training firm. “You have to be there to problem-solve.”

Ramesh Tainwala, CEO of luggage maker Samonite International S.A., says that after advancing into the top job in October, he quickly replaced its head of Latin America because the man ran the region from Denver and spent only 40 days a year in Latin America. (Samsonite previously had been based in Denver.)

“Unless you are in the field with your people, it’s difficult for you to manage it,” he adds.

The new head of Latin America is based in Chile, but is almost constantly on the road. Mr. Tainwala told him, “You need to be traveling 20 to 25 days a month” in the new role.

Mr. Tainwala himself travels 25 days a month for Samsonite from his base in Hong Kong. Since becoming CEO last fall, he has held four face-to-face sessions with his senior management team, stationed in four regions world-wide. An April 13 session in Mansfield, Mass., will be his third far from Hong Kong.

“A conference call cannot substitute for face-to-face interactions,” Mr. Tainwala continues. “When we meet in person, we almost hear each other’s thoughts.”

Yet a distant boss with a sudden yen for face time may encounter resistance from subordinates. That happened to a senior manager at an environmental consulting firm in 2012.

The manager realized she had been too hands-off with her team, missing meetings due to conflicting client demands, she told Mr. Tulgan of Rainmaker Thinking after attending his seminar about being a highly engaged boss. She soon scheduled half-hour sessions with each team member.

Several staffers bristled at the sudden outreach, complaining that she was micromanaging them, according to Mr. Tulgan. She convened a meeting to explain how her increased engagement could be helpful. “I want you to help me help you,” she said. Her team adjusted over time, and that helped her land a higher-level role at a larger rival early last year, Mr. Tulgan says.

Even when the team is nearby, isolated bosses must find ways to appear present. When Rick Russell managed 1,100 people as chief commercial officer of Sunovian Pharmaceuticals Inc., a small drug maker in Marlborough, Mass., his dozen deputies occupied the second floor at headquarters. He toiled behind closed doors in the executive suite two floors above.

After a 2012 employee survey concluded that people felt walled off from their leaders, he decided to make himself more visible. He created a second-floor satellite office surrounded by glass on three sides. Dubbed his “fishbowl,” he worked from the office nearly every Friday, with a deliberately light schedule and no executive assistant.

Wary colleagues gradually grew comfortable about dropping by, Mr. Russell recalls. The chief medical officer adopted the satellite-office idea, too.

The next year’s poll showed Sunovian employees’ trust for the top brass improved significantly.

“Fostering close ties with your lieutenants is the stuff that gets results,” says Mr. Russell, now CEO of Greer Laboratories Inc., a midsize biologics concern. “You have to rally the troops. You can’t do it from a memo.”

Mel Berning, chief revenue officer at A+E Networks in New York, takes a different approach. He travels two weeks a month for the cable network. While at headquarters, he says he tries to avoid “antiseptic” formal meetings and calls with his six direct reports.

Instead, he breezes into somebody’s office at 8:30 a.m. “You have a conversation that is less hurried and less guarded,” Mr. Berning notes. “Face-to-face encounters are so much more revealing than a text or an email.”

Inhi Cho Suh, a unit vice president at International Business Machines Corp. who manages a far-flung team, says being reachable at odd hours helps her stay involved.

During a West Coast business trip last year, she rose at 4 a.m. to join a conference call with East Coast team members as they struggled to launch an important new service. IBM unveiled the cloud-computing service in October.

Ms. Suh works hard to decide when she must deal face to face with lieutenants. For an urgent decision, she occasionally alters her schedule to meet them in person.

“It’s not about being available all the time,” observes Ms. Suh, who is on the road 40% of the time. “You have to be available when they need you.”

—Kathy Chu contributed to this article.

Write to Joann S. Lublin at joann.lublin@wsj.com

 

WSJ.com | March 17, 2015 | JOANN S. LUBLIN

 

Strategy: The Algorithm That Tells the Boss Who Might Quit…Wal-Mart, Credit Suisse Crunch Data to see Which Workers are Likely to Leave or Stay

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Employers want to know who has one foot out the door. As turnover becomes a bigger worry—and expense—in a tightening labor market, companies including Wal-Mart Stores Inc.,Credit Suisse Group AG and Box Inc. are analyzing a vast array of data points to determine who is likely to leave a post.

The idea, say people who run analytics teams, is to give managers early warning so they can take action before employees jump ship.

Corporate data crunchers play with dozens of factors, which may include job tenure, geography, performance reviews, employee surveys, communication patterns and even personality tests to identify flight risks, a term human-resources departments sometimes use for people likely to leave.

The data often reveal a complex picture of what motivates workers to stay—and what causes them to look elsewhere.

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At Box, for example, a worker’s pay or relationship with his boss matters far less than how connected the worker feels to his team, according to an analysis from human-resources analytics firm Culture Amp. At Credit Suisse, managers’ performance and team size turn out to be surprisingly powerful influences, with a spike in attrition among employees working on large teams with low-rated managers.

Human-resources software company Ultimate Software Group Inc.assigns clients’ employees, and even its own workers, individual “retention predictor” numbers, similar to a credit score, to indicate the likelihood that a worker will leave.

As the employment picture improves, companies are focusing more on retaining workers, largely because replacing them is costly. The median cost of turnover for most jobs is about 21% of an employee’s annual salary, according to the Center for American Progress, a liberal-leaning think tank.And it can cost, on average, some $3,341 to hire a new employee, according to the Society for Human Resource Management.

William Wolf, Credit Suisse’s global head of talent acquisition and development, says a one-point reduction in unwanted attrition rates saves the bank $75 million to $100 million a year.

No single piece of data predicts whether an employee will stay or go, though many employers wish it were so. Data scientists create models to predict which workers might leave a company in the near future, combining a range of variables and testing the predictions over time. They might refine the calculations depending on which variables are most predictive for a given company or group of employees.

“One of the things that people want to find is that one nugget, that key thing that correlates with someone leaving, but it is never that simple,” says Thomas Daglis, a data scientist at Ultimate Software.

ENLARGE

Employers may not mind that some employees are at risk of leaving, though companies stress that they are using the data to find ways to improve retention, and not nudge people out.

Those caveats aside, data scientists who study retention say they have found some meaningful correlations.

VoloMetrix Inc., which examines HR data as well as anonymized employee email and calendar data, found that it could predict flight risk up to a year in advance for employees who were spending less time interacting with certain colleagues or attending events beyond required meetings. And Ultimate Software found a correlation between a client’s employees who waived their benefits coverage and those who left the company.

The big challenge for employers is what, exactly, to do with the information. Some aren’t sure how to approach employees at risk of leaving.

“Our goal is to never say the only reason we are coming to talk to you is because an algorithm told us to do so,” says John Callery, director of people analytics at AOL Inc., which recently started working with workforce analytics firm Visier Inc. on a program to help predict attrition down to the individual employee. Mr. Callery says it is too early to tell whether AOL’s retention figures will improve, or by how much, since it takes at least a year to test a predictive model.

For the past three years, Credit Suisse has studied what happens to employees over time, including raises, promotions and life transitions, to predict whether they will choose to stay or leave the bank in the subsequent year. Changing jobs makes people “sticky,” or likely to stay on, says Mr. Wolf, who oversees the bank’s people analytics team. Yet as recently as five years ago, fewer than half of open jobs at the bank were posted, and most went to outsiders.

About a year and a half ago, the bank launched a global effort allowing its workers to raise their hands for internal moves. Credit Suisse recruiters now post 80% of open jobs, and cold-call employees when jobs open up.

‘Our goal is to never say the only reason we are coming to talk to you is because an algorithm told us to do so.’

—John Callery, AOL’s director of people analytics

After observing that some who volunteered to be considered for internal moves ended up leaving for jobs elsewhere, bank recruiters began using attrition probability estimates in deciding which employees to target when positions opened up.

Some 300 people have been promoted through the internal program; many of those people, Mr. Wolf says, might have left otherwise. “We believe we’ve saved a number of them from taking jobs at other banks.”

Credit Suisse also used analytics to investigate why women with certain job titles left the company at higher rates than men, and determined that transitions—whether a promotion or a personal milestone, such as a maternity leave—increased the probability of a woman deciding to leave.

To kindle closeness among team members, and help forestall attrition, Box has encouraged managers to throw more social events, recognize team-based work and hold more mentoring meetings between senior leaders and newer employees. Since workers were more likely to leave if they didn’t see clear career opportunities at the company, it has sought to improve at pointing out career possibilities for individual workers and encouraging “stretch” assignments.

Semiconductor maker Micron Technology Inc. is using data in its efforts to reduce turnover among first-year employees, who have about a 20% world-wide attrition rate, largely driven by manufacturing personnel.

Among its early findings, Micron discovered that workers were more likely to leave if they felt their job hadn’t been accurately described when they were hired, so the company is trying to create clearer job descriptions. Micron also found that people who relocated for a job were more likely to leave, but it isn’t sure why.

“It’s very delicate how you approach things,” says Timothy Long, the company’s director of workforce analytics and systems. “The idea is to determine, what can we do to get [fusion_builder_container hundred_percent=”yes” overflow=”visible”][fusion_builder_row][fusion_builder_column type=”1_1″ background_position=”left top” background_color=”” border_size=”” border_color=”” border_style=”solid” spacing=”yes” background_image=”” background_repeat=”no-repeat” padding=”” margin_top=”0px” margin_bottom=”0px” class=”” id=”” animation_type=”” animation_speed=”0.3″ animation_direction=”left” hide_on_mobile=”no” center_content=”no” min_height=”none”][people] to stay?”

Companies also are trying to predict when workers might leave their positions, but not necessarily the company. Wal-Mart is trying to determine in advance which employees are likely to get promoted so that it can line up replacements more quickly. The company says it promotes some 160,000 to 170,000 people a year.

“If we can tell three months in advance [that a position is going to be open], we can start hiring and training people. You don’t want the jobs vacant for that long a time,” says Elpida Ormanidou, Wal-Mart’s vice president of global people analytics.

Write to Rachel Emma Silverman at rachel.silverman@wsj.comand Nikki Waller at Nikki.Waller@wsj.com

WSJ.com | March 13, 2015 | 

RACHEL EMMA SILVERMAN and
NIKKI WALLER

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Strategy: Here’s a Simple Exercise that Can Help you Think Through any Big Decision…It’s Respecting my Natural Inclination to Think Through the Worst that Could Happen

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Anxiety gets a bad rap. We often talk about it as something that needs to be “cured.” But according to “Anxiety Toolkit” author and psychologist Alice Boyes, that’s over-simplifying.  With a little mental finesse, anxiety can be an ally.

Bad Employee

Boyes herself uses a simple thinking exercise to put her anxious nature to good use.

“I make myself think of the worst that could happen and the best that could happen,” she tells Business Insider. “Instead of just automatically assuming that something will have a negative outcome, I’ve trained my brain to see the possibility that it might have a positive one.”

It’s a thinking exercise that dates back 2,300 years ago to the Stoic philosophers of Ancient Greece.

“It’s respecting my natural inclination to think through the worst that could happen,” Boyes says.

Imagining the worst helps her prepare. Channeling a tendency toward anxiety can be super helpful in the case of travel, she says, since she always has backup plans. For example, if a bus doesn’t come and she needs to get somewhere, she’s going to have already looked up the alternative route.

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And imagining the best helps her see options she would have otherwise skipped.

“When I started my therapy practice, I contacted some magazine editors and said, ‘Hey, I’m available if you need comments for your stories,'” she recalls. “I was thinking they would think, ‘Who is this little person contacting us?’ But it actually led to writing for magazines.”

After writing for magazines like Psychology Today, Boyes found that one of her key skills was translating the principles of therapy into advice people could use in their everyday lives. But she never would have had that realization unless she would have imagined positive outcomes — and ignored that voice in her head that said: Why am I doing this? This is silly.

By thinking through the best and worst outcomes, you work with your emotional tendencies in a constructive way:

• If you’re a naturally anxious person, it will make use of the tendency to plan while training you to imagine more positive outcomes.

• If you’re a naturally optimistic person, it will make use of that dreaminess while keeping you prepared for what might happen. 

It’s about making use of all of both styles.

“All of these emotions have a positive role in people’s lives,” Boyes says.

Strategy: The Shocking Differences in Basic Body Language Around the World…The Body Speaks Volumes. But what it Says Depends on the Culture you’re In.

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The body speaks volumes.  But what it says depends on the culture you’re in. Facial expressions, gestures, mannerisms, and degree of eye contact vary greatly across countries.

playmobil-lego-handshake-hand-shake

For example, “Arms, which are used little by Nordics during conversation, are an indispensable element in one’s communicative weaponry in Italy, Spain, and South America,” writes Richard Lewis in “When Cultures Collide: Leading Across Cultures.”

The cultural differences in body language are vast — there are entire books dedicated exclusively to hand gestures — but we’ve selected a few to create a simple, body-language etiquette guide that highlights some surprising differences, thanks to information from Lewis’ book and the National Academic Advising Association (NACADA):

Body Language Infographic_02

Strategy: 3 Ways the Best Leaders Deal with Change…Some People just Can’t Accept Change. Others Thrive on It.

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Some people just can’t accept change. Others thrive on it.  Some hunker down and try to avoid it. Others face it head on, embrace it and climb up the next rung of the ladder because of it.

steve jobs

The news of change provides them the incentive and the energy to prevail over some challenge. Employers generally want to hire and keep this type of person.

There is nothing more constant in our lives than change. It’s dynamic.

Change simply means that something is different than it was a minute, a day, a week ago. Some trigger has modified the details of your life, the organization you work for, even global economic conditions.

Most all news, tweets, synchronous viral updates — which report change — are typically bad news. When have you read something on your device that was good news?

The fact is the overwhelming amount of change going on is actually good. It just doesn’t get spread around like its opposite. Fear is also a virus carrier, and it breeds on the dark side of things.

Edmund Burke wrote: “We must all obey the great law of change. It’s the most powerful law of nature.”

Change usually results in some kind of upheaval in our lives. Someone will say “I didn’t see that coming” — like a divorce, or getting fired, for example. Another might be laid off from a job and feel like they are the victim of change.

But change is actually just energy, and its positive or negative force could evolve with the personal perspective you have on it. For example, as horrific as it sounds and feels, getting fired could ultimately be positive.

The fact is, the more technology-managed our world, the faster the rate of change.

Change can be caused by evolving external forces, such as the rise of ISIS. Most people did nothing to start this phase of terror perpetrated on the world. But that doesn’t mean they can avoid its ramifications.

And then some change is fostered internally, by the change in the way you see your life going, by new perspectives on your employment, education, relationships, and your health.

Leaders are people who don’t just learn to live with or manage change — they actually create change and help others successfully navigate it.

steve jobsChange is disruptive and can even be turbulent — especially when it hits close to home and plays with our emotions. But then leadership today is all about managing disruption. And disruption is an hourly occurrence.

Here are three ways to come out as the victor over change.

1. Recognize that change is a permanent fixture of our economy and our lives.

Somehow identifying it this way takes the edge off of change. President Kennedy wrote: “Change is the law of life and those who look only to the past or present are sure to miss the future.”

john f kennedeyUniversalImagesGroup/Getty Images

Change is always around the corner. You don’t need to live in fear of it but you need to welcome it, even encourage it. This is what smart business leaders do to anticipate changes in market conditions that can effect everything from the cost of financing because interest rates fluctuate — or the loss of sales because consumer trends evolve.

Smart business leaders know they have to reinvent their business model every eighteen months or face the consequences of unseen change.

I remember my discussions with the brilliant “car guy” Bob Lutz, who transformed Chrysler and later General Motors by embracing changes in the auto-buying public. He told me that he tried to change the culture at these companies to turn them into entertainment firms father than transportation manufacturers because this was the change customers were demanding. And look at how American cars have come roaring back.

2. Listen carefully to catch the change behind the change.

Change can be tricky and misleading. Be careful not to make a superficial translation of some trend only to be led down some dead end. Not all change is what it seems on the surface.

If you don’t truly get under the change and analyze it before you react to it, you may miss something — like the critical time to quit your job and move on.

Since what I deliver for companies and nonprofits is growth, change is both a cause and a lever for the growth I am attempting to produce. At least 50% of the time there is resistance to change or what is called the “RC Factor.”

Some people cling to their old beliefs until they are torn away from them and forced to change. Sometimes people want change but they want it without changing! How much growth do you think that produces?

I remember working for one company that completely missed a major change in the market conditions that rendered their products obsolete. They just could not accept the fact that people were no longer buying from them — they knew better!

Of course that is not how it works. The customer is king. And the king will lead you to revise your products and services if you will only listen carefully enough to what the market is telling you.

3. Impersonalize change.

You are not the only person in the world affected by change. You may be stuck in a trap where you think that you caused the change in your life and that it is harmful to you alone. Taking responsibility for personal behavior is always the right thing to do. Obsessing about your own personal problems caused by change it is not.

Most often change actually happens just because world beliefs, politics, economic and social conditions are dynamic and they are constantly acting and reacting upon each other to cause the change that filters down to the individual.

It’s also important to accept that the world is in general on a course of individual and collective improvement — even though there may be dips into brutality, accidents, weather catastrophes — living conditions the world over improve every day.

More people are being educated, fewer people live in poverty, there are more cures for diseases. Longevity is increasing and that itself shows a consolidation of progress.

Jim Rohm wrote that “Life does not get better by chance. It gets better by change.”

What I try to do is to balance what I hear about conditions in general. I try to not be influenced by one speaker or leader. I attempt to think for myself and form my own opinions about change. Then I try to use it to my advantage and play a game to see if I can guess when and where it will appear next.

James Rosebush was a Reagan White House official and is now the CEO and founder of GrowthStrategy.us. His leadership column appears on Business Insider every Tuesday.
http://www.businessinsider.com/3-ways-the-best-leaders-deal-with-change-2015-3#ixzz3Ueylz0pE

Strategy: How To Make Your Own Luck…So, How can you get the Luck of the Irish on Your Side, Year Round?

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Today on St. Patrick’s Day, everyone celebrates the Luck of the Irish. On the other 364 days each year, the rest of us (without this Irish heritage) seem to lament the few who are always lucky, catching big breaks out of nowhere and being in the right place at the right time.

 

 

However, the reality is simple – few of us are actually luckier than anyone else; some people are just more prepared than others. There’s an old saying that, “when the student is ready, the teacher will emerge.” The same principle applies to opportunity: the more prepared you are, the more “lucky” you get.  So, how can you get the luck of the Irish on your side, year round? Start doing the things you need to do NOW, so that when the opportunity comes up, you’re ready to seize it.

Know your elevator pitch cold. If you EVER meet someone who asks you what you do or what you’re working on, there should be no hesitation. Your 20-second description of your startup’s mission should be as ingrained in your brain as your own name. If it’s not, practice. It will feel awkward to say the same thing repeatedly (your shower or car are perfect places to do so), but you need to develop that muscle memory. You never know whom you’ll bump into, in line at a coffee shop, at a friend’s house for dinner, or even in an airplane seat next to you. Bonus points: always have business cards handy – should be an obvious point, but just in case.

 

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Do the job that you want, not just the job that you have. It’s great if your aspirations are to move up from junior developer to a senior one, or from an entry-level sales associate to a team leader. Keep dreaming big – that’s the first step. Now, in practicality, do your job and rock it out. And then, step it up.

Take it upon yourself to solve a problem, lead a project, or even develop something on the side. No matter what it is, take the initiative to demonstrate that you’re capable of a role above your current station. When it’s time for leaders to determine who’s the best fit for a promotion, it’s hard to ignore the person whose actions spoke louder than words.

Always be learning. Read every article you can get your hands on. Attend every industry-specific conference to can afford. Study under a trusted mentor and expert. Have lunch with a professor doing research in your field. Investing in yourself is one of the best investments you can possibly make.

No matter your trade, there’s an infinite amount of content that’s available for consumption – and you never really know where inspiration will strike. In this case, the more “at bats” you take by consuming that much more information, the better your chances of being on the cutting edge, transforming your field, and riding the prized first-to-market wave.

Today and every day, remember that the harder you work, the “luckier” you’ll become. So, in order to make your own luck, just out-hustle everyone else.

Josh Linkner is the author of two New York Times Bestsellers, “Disciplined Dreaming” and “The Road to Reinvention.” For more info, check out joshlinkner.com or follow him on Twitter @joshlinkner.

Your #Career: 7 Signs You Will Be #Fired Soon…How Can you Know if you will be Fired soon? Here are 7 Warning Signs to Look Out for.

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Infrequent #Restructuring & #Layoffs were the Only Things an #Employee could worry about in the past, but a lot has changed nowadays considering the tough economic times. For instance, companies are going through bankruptcies, non-stop downsizing and even the illusion of job security will soon be a thing of the past. These factors have seen the #Job Layoffs & #Unemployment numbers rise to double digits.

It is quite evident that no one would like to be caught unaware, especially when it comes to losing a job. Nonetheless, how can you know if you will be fired soon? Here are 7 warning signs to look out for.

1. No work pressure

In the corporate scene, it is quite common for everyone to complain of the work pressure that comes with being allocated a lot of responsibilities and projects. However, if you are that kind of a person who floats free because you have less work than your colleagues, then there is always a high chance that this could be one of the most obvious signs you will be fired soon.

Basically, this is a clear sign that your skills are no longer valuable to your superiors who see no future prospects for you in the company. Ideally, no work pressure essentially implies no work soon.

 

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2. You’re no longer in the loop

If you feel you no longer know what’s happening in the company or your office, then your clock has just started ticking. You can rest assured that you are no longer in the loop if memos are sent out or important decisions that you previously would have been consulted on are made without your knowledge.

For instance, if you use to be consulted during important recruitment decisions, and you walk into your office just to realize that someone new has been hired, get ready to hit the job hunting road very soon.

3. You don’t get along with your boss
When things get really bad, people tend to run in the other direction, and an impending job termination is actually no different. This is actually one of the most common signs that indicate you will be fired soon. You can tell if your job is in imminent jeopardy if your boss seems standoffish or rather unfriendly because he/she isn’t sure of the best way to break the news to you. But take heart, some bosses can even fire you without a second thought if the distance between you and them gets wider.

4. When you see your own job posted on the job boards
This might sound a bit impossible, but beware if you see an advert for a job on the internet or any other job board that’s very similar to your own. As much as it can be such a great disappointment to see your own job advertised as vacant internally or externally, it is always a good sign that you will be fired soon. In most cases, your boss will give an excuse about expanding the department or some other bait and switch. Nonetheless, it is always a good idea to use the job placement period to accelerate your search for a new job.

5. Your company is sold The current prevailing economic times have become very tough to the point that mergers or even take overs are becoming more rampant. Mergers and acquisitions can imply that the deck will be shuffled by the new bosses, and hence you must ensure that you hold your cards firmly even if you are told that your job is safe.

6. You made a colossal mistake
It is pretty obvious that everyone makes mistakes, but you our job could be in real danger if you made a noticeable one, even if you are not to blame for it entirely. Basically, there are some mistakes an employer cannot ignore, such as stealing or sharing company’s confidential information. You will definitely get fired if you make a colossal mistake that can cost the company its reputation, but you can take responsibility by dismissing it as a minor slip.

7. A very bad review for the work done
The best way for employers to document an employee’s performance is with the reviews for work done. Unfortunately, some reviews are not so favorable particularly when your performance is in question. A bad review is one of the most definitive signs you will be fired soon, whether it is a warranted bad review or not.

Lifezap.com | March 2015 

Strategy: Science says These 9 Tactics will Help you Win Any Argument…Arguments aren’t Logical. To Win them, you Have to Understand People

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Arguments aren’t logical. To win them, you have to understand people. We’ve scoured the research and compiled the following science-backed tactics that will help you win any argument.

 Be civil.

Be civil.

REUTERS/Lucas Jackson

Contrary to what your debate coach said, arguments aren’t rational.

So respect the other person’s perspective, no matter how ridiculous it sounds.

“When people have their self-worth validated in some way, they tend to be more receptive to information that challenges their beliefs,” University of California, Irvine, political psychologist Peter Ditto tells New York Magazine.

With that emotional connection established, you can then start getting logical.

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Don’t try to ‘win’ the argument.

Don't try to 'win' the argument.

John Moore / Getty

Attacking someone’s ideas puts them into fight-or-flight mode.

Once they’re on edge, there will be no chance of persuading them of anything.

So if you want to convince someone of something, practice “extreme agreement”: Take your conversational partner’s views and advance them to their logical — and perhaps absurd — conclusion.

Don’t ask why. Ask how.

Don't ask why. Ask how.

Star Wars / Lucasfilm

In a 2013 study, University of Colorado psychologist Philip M. Fernbach separated people with extreme political views into two groups — people who had to explain why their opinions were right, and those who were tasked with explaining how their ideals could be turned into actual policy. 

The result?

Folks who gave their reasons for being right were just as convinced of their convictions after the experiment as they were beforehand. But the people who had to explain the mechanics of implementation had softer views.

Follow up.

Follow up.

Justin Sullivan / Getty

Pixar cofounder Ed Catmull knew Steve Jobs for 26 years.

They had some arguments.

He avoided having shouting arguments with Jobs, and instead employed a persistent method: 

I would say something to him and he would immediately shoot it down because he could think faster than I could. … I would then wait a week. … I’d call him up and I give my counter argument to what he had said and he’d immediately shoot it down. So I had to wait another week, and sometimes this went on for months.

It would resolve in one of three ways: Jobs would admit that Catmull was right; Catmull would realize that Jobs was right; or Jobs wouldn’t respond to Catmull, in effect giving his approval.

Ask open-ended questions.

Ask open-ended questions.

Guian Bolisay / flickr

If you’re in a spat with your spouse, couples psychologist John Gottman says to ask questions that allow him or her to explain where they’re at. 

Examples include:

• How would you change it if you had all the money in the world?

• What do you want your life to be like in three years?

• How do you like your job?

It works in arguments at work, too — open-ended questions help transform competitive interactions into cooperative ones.

Be confident.

Be confident.

John Parra/Getty Images

People don’t listen to the smartest person in the room.

A 2013 study found that they listen to whoever is acting like they know what’s right.

University of Utah management professor Bryan Bonner says that people unconsciously look for “messy proxies for expertise” like extroversion, gender, race, or confidence level instead of paying attention to what people are actually saying.

“We’d hope that facts would be the currency of influence,” Bonner told the Wall Street Journal. “But often, we guess at who’s the expert — and we’re wrong.”

Use graphs.

Use graphs.

Chris Potter

A new study from Cornell University researchers Aner Tal and Brian Wansink shows that people trust scientists. Thus, doing things that make you appear scientific — like using a graph — makes you more trustworthy.

“The prestige of science appears to grant persuasive power even to such trivial science-related elements as graphs,” Tal and Wansink write.

Demonstrate that other people agree.

Demonstrate that other people agree.

Youtube

In “Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion,” Robert Cialdini says that “social proof” is one of the best tactics for getting people to see things your way. It exploits the well-documented tendency for people to conform to others’ opinions, even if they’re strange.

According to social proof, we assume what other people are doing is the correct behavior in a situation. It’s the reason why long lines in front of a restaurant make the food inside seem so tantalizing. It’s also why having a celebrity endorsement — like William Shatner — is such an effective marketing tool.

Go beyond anecdotes.

Go beyond anecdotes.

Shutterstock

A story about how your uncle or your college roommate eats loads of butter and still stays fit is an anecdote.

But if you want to be taken seriously, you need to use data, the kind that’s arrived at through peer-reviewed studies with large sample sizes.

Better yet, go for consensus.

“Scientists often use ‘consensus’ as the ultimate argument-winner, and for good reason,” Jacquelyn Gill writes on Contemplative Mammoth. “Scientific consensus is the collected opinions of all scientists, and not just the one you’re arguing with. There can be one or two scientists who disagree (just like there are a handful of people who don’t believe the Holocaust happened), but if the vast majority of scientists have reached consensus, it means that there is so much evidence in support of an idea that it’s basically a guaranteed thing, based on state-of-the-art knowledge.”

 

Businessinsider.com | March 16, 2015 | Drake Baer 

http://www.businessinsider.com/science-backed-tactics-to-win-argument-2015-3?op=1#ixzz3UazzFDkq