Are your lights on?

On Being a Connoisseur of Learning

2014-07-31T13:42:00.000-07:00

On a recent Sunday, I spent six and a half hours in a “class” to prepare for my amateur radio operator’s licensing exam. I expected to attend a high quality class. I assumed it would be a learning experience that would uplift and enrich and enlighten me; prepare me to become an amateur radio operator; and inspire me to join with my husband in one of his beloved hobbies. Yes, I had high expectations. I willingly gave up a valuable Sunday to do this because I like spending my weekends taking classes. I thought this class would be something different to stimulate me in a new way.

What I experienced was something quite different than what I had expected. The objective given at 9:30 am when the session started was to prepare the 38 people in the room to pass the technician’s license exam which would be given at 3:00 pm. Preparing for the test was the order of the day. For those who passed, classes on subsequent weekends would cover hands-on radio operation, but first we had to get at least 26 answers correct on the 35 item standardized test.

It was barely a class. More like a study hall cram session. One fifteen minute segment of every hour was a lecturette. A couple of the lecturettes covered useful information and mnemonic devices. Those moments were the high points of the day. The other 45 minutes of every hour were a reading period where we independently studied, and attempted to memorize, the correct answers to the pool of 400 questions from which 35 would randomly appear on each test. I could have done the memorization on an airplane trip, or while reading before bedtime, or in my dentist’s waiting room, and then shown up at 3:00 pm to take the test. I would have preferred that.

I’m left wondering if perhaps the reason so many people despise attending training is that too many training events are similar to what I experienced that Sunday? There were no faculty introductions beyond names written on a board, so we didn't know who they were or their credentials to be at the front of the room, and that robbed the audience of forming a connection with them (even, me, and I had previously met the instructors). There were no icebreakers, so there was no lessening of the social tension that we human beings experience when we walk into a room of strangers, knowing there is a test at the end of the day. Tension interferes with learning. Five minutes spent shedding some of the tension early in the day would have made it easier to absorb and retain information. Learning is social. We learn from each other. This class had almost no interaction among the participants, except for whatever lunchtime chit chat we initiated ourselves. In fact, we were told to keep the room silent.

Despite these complaints, I did get some value from this experience. Number one, I gained compassion and empathy for people who dislike formal learning events. I am a glutton for learning, and sometimes I forget that other people don’t appreciate learning events the way that I do. Today’s experience reminds me why that might be the case, and makes me appreciate the exceptional quality of the learning experiences that I usually attend. Number two, I gained perspective on why it might be inefficient to invest the time to create a great class. Yes, it would be feasible to apply adult learning principles to create a class with sound instructional design, but it would take a good bit of time to create it and prepare instructors to deliver it. If the pass rate based on the study hall method is nearly 100%, and the only point of this introductory class is to pass the test, there would be no return on the investment. Number three, I gained (yet again) a reminder of the importance of asking questions about what I’m committing to. I went along with the class because my husband wanted me to become licensed, and I wanted to make him happy. I didn't ask if there was more than one way to reach this goal. I learned late in the day that I could have skipped the class and just taken the test. I passed the test with a perfect score, and I could have achieved that by cramming on my own. There are people who can’t or won’t ever getting around to memorizing information for a test and need the structure of a class/study hall to do so, but I know that I’m exceptionally self-directed, and if I’d made it my goal, I would have accomplished it.

I have already forgotten many of the facts that I crammed into my short term memory on that Sunday. The more lasting effect of the class is a deepening concern about what my children may be enduring at school. As our society has become more focused on standardized testing, I wonder how much of my kids’ school day feels similar to my amateur radio study hall? I asked my three kids (entering grades 4, 6, and 8 this fall) whether they ever spend time in school just memorizing information. The two older ones said yes, and their biggest complaint was vocabulary lists. I actually favor learning vocabulary, but when I consider why, the first thing that comes to mind is doing better on the SAT (a sure sign, much as I cringe to admit it, that I've been infected by the test-prep mindset).

What if our society’s concerns with school accountability and common core standards are turning schools into test-preparation centers? I want my kids to be critical thinkers with the intellectual curiosity to pursue questions that intrigue them and the desire to be lifelong learners. I want my kids’ teachers to be passionate about their profession and creative in the ways they adapt their instruction to students’ varying needs. Reading textbooks and taking quizzes on what they have memorized sounds a lot like my radio “class,” and I fear that’s what my kids are being asked to do too often. When teachers and principals are being held accountable for raising test scores, higher test scores is what we’ll get. But testing gains aren't learning gains; I got a perfect score, but I couldn't tell you today about amateur radio frequencies and wavelengths or the proper length of an antenna.

Having the opportunity to think and explore and discuss topics that fascinate me is a primary source of joy in my life. I wanted the radio class to add to my joy. Instead, it created a kind of dread. Sitting in a classroom and memorizing facts to pass a test is not good enough for me, and it’s not good enough for my kids. What the heck am I going to do about it?

The premise of coaching

2012-12-20T16:06:00.001-08:00

Have you ever found yourself in front of an audience of intellectual giants?

In my former role at IBM, I occasionally facilitated management development classes at the IBM Research Lab in Almaden, CA. The storied IBM Research organization is full of people who are at the top of their game in a wide range of technical fields. There have been five Nobel prize winners among the IBM Research workforce. The talent there is dedicated to finding and telling scientific truths.

I ran a couple of half-day sessions to develop Research managers’ skills in giving feedback. Those classes were so well received that I was invited back to facilitate another program, this time to develop coaching skills.

“The premise of coaching is that everyone, no matter how good they already are, can raise their game. Coaching is a way to make that happen.” So went the opening of my class.

The next moment, a fellow stood up from one of the tables and approached me at the front of the room. He said, “I don’t agree with the premise. This isn’t the class for me.” And then he left. The rest of the room eyed me. After a doubt-filled pause, I decided to just carry on. The rest of the session went fine.

Reflecting on it later, I realized that in almost any other setting, that fellow would have fabricated an excuse. Perhaps he would have claimed that his boss had just texted about something that needed immediate attention, or that he received an email on his phone from his kid’s school about a problem, or that he was suddenly not feeling well. But the Research culture is so dedicated to finding and telling the truth, so values the truth over any urge to save the instructor’s feelings, that he just told me that he thought the premise of coaching didn’t hold water.

I told this story over dinner the other night with a former IBM colleague and he laughed loud and hard. He thought that perhaps the Research manager WAS actually trying to save my feelings - - that it might have struck him as more sensitive and respectful to offer, and easier for me to accept, a valid intellectual reason for his departure, than some made-up excuse.

While I believe in the capacity for life-long growth and development, what I realized from this experience is that some people may not share this widely-held view. It’s not just that they’re stuck and don’t (yet) see how to take the next step in development. Rather, they truly believe that they have developed all the capacity they are capable of developing, at least in the ways they care about. Mathematicians, for example, tend to do their greatest work early in their careers. They may not ever get better at math after their 20’s or 30’s. Could they get better at coaching, or managing, or parenting? I think so. Would raising one’s game in those domains matter much to people who are (or have been) THE world’s expert in a specialized realm?

It must be tough to truly be (or have been) at the pinnacle of one’s field. And even tougher to have such a person as one’s manager.

Riffing on The Atlantic

2012-11-12T21:44:00.000-08:00

On a recent Wednesday night at the Emma Institute, an intergenerational networking event attended by about 35 women, I was one of a half dozen participants to share a two minute overview of an interesting professional experience. A couple of the women approached me towards the end of the evening to let me know that I was one of their favorite speakers and they wanted to follow up and have coffee. They weren’t just interested in what I shared about my experience leading the women’s leadership development program at IBM; they were also curious about my decision to leave my global job at IBM for an opportunity with more civilized hours.

These conversations foreshadowed the article that appeared a day later in The Atlantic, Why Women Still Can’t Have It All. Just four days after its publication, there were already 1,500 comments on the magazine’s website. Since then, it’s gone viral. Numerous friends and colleagues have posted about it on Facebook or Linked-In and sent me emails about it. For me, it prompted a re-examination of my own decisions on career and family - - the choices I’ve made about what to have and how to have it, if I can’t have it all - - and the underlying assumptions I’ve held. I made some deliberate choices that have turned out to be pivotal. Some unexpected things happened, things I would not have chosen, which also have had a big influence on where I am today. I’ve discarded some assumptions and taken on new ones, but not necessarily better ones. It’s enough soul-searching to spawn an essay.

I was married for nearly 12 years when my first child was born. Before we got married, David and I agreed that we would not have kids. To make it official, we announced that decision to our families. My dad didn’t listen, and his toast at the wedding was basically an exhortation for grandchildren. My in-laws accepted our pronouncement, which is probably why we caught them so off-guard when we revealed that I was pregnant when they were driving to High Holiday services in 2000.

My reasons for not wanting kids were varied. My family has a history of genetically inherited disorders which have tragically affected kids. I’ve got relatives with cystic fibrosis, mental retardation, crossed eyes, learning disabilities, and psychological issues. Growing up, I had frequent contact with two mentally retarded cousins and I lived with an unstable brother. In my adolescent’s mind, I assumed I would become responsible for all three, eventually acquiring them as dependents when their parents passed away. Well before I married, I had matured enough to realize that wasn’t true (and my two cousins had passed away young), but still I harbored vestigial fear associated with being responsible for a special needs child. If I never had kids, I wouldn’t have to be a parent dealing with this.

My interest in children was also negligible because I was extremely focused on career achievement. I had always excelled in school and in my first jobs. People told me that I was a person who had the gifts to accomplish anything to which I really applied myself, and I mostly believed it. Two weeks after my wedding, I started a PhD program, thinking that I was headed for an academic career. It didn’t take long for the reality of life as a graduate student in architectural history to set in. After a semester and a half, I quit graduate school and went back to work in the consulting industry, which is where I’d been just before my wedding.

In four years I became a partner in a boutique firm. I was working many hours, including weekends, and making frequent trips. It’s worth noting that this was a firm run by women. My five partners were all female, like me. The founder had started the company around age 40 and had been growing it for 15 years when I joined as a Research Associate. By the time I arrived, her four kids were grown. You might think that such an environment would be family-friendly. To the contrary, it was more like a start-up, with everybody doing everything. We worked long hours - - sweaty ones on weekends when the building’s air conditioning was off - - and it was stressful. I took on graduate school at UCLA in addition to work, earning my master’s degree and several awards, while continuing to work fulltime. I had a series of debilitating “back attacks” and kept a standing appointment with my acupuncturist as a way of managing the strain. Two of my business partners did have kids, and from my vantage point, it looked exceedingly hard, and expensive to boot, with full-time nanny help. I was still firmly in the “no kids for me” camp.

A few years later, I left my small firm and joined Price Waterhouse, mostly because I wanted to gain international experience. At PW, the level of work intensity persisted. There still wasn’t room for kids in my life and even if I’d wanted them, most months I probably wasn’t home at the right time to get pregnant. For my female PW colleagues who were trying to conceive, the constant travel was a real problem; if you’re out of town every time you ovulate, it is difficult to get pregnant.

In 1999, I went on a six month assignment to London which changed my career direction and my life. I was sent as a subject matter expert in project management, joining a team of learning experts who were developing and launching a new global project management methodology and curriculum for the recently merged consulting practices of Price Waterhouse plus Coopers & Lybrand. I attended the firm’s courses in learning and organizational development, and I was sent to the Master Trainer Institute near Geneva, Switzerland to become familiar with adult learning theory and instructional design. I discovered a natural talent for designing and delivering professional development. I found that I loved the work and excelled at it. Finally, a decade after college, I’d found my calling.

I also discovered how very different two cultures that speak the same language can be. There were many memorable and humorous cross-cultural contrasts, but attitudes towards work presented one of the starkest disparities. While I was living in London, there were laws which limited the hours of operation for many businesses. Parliament was debating a measure which would allow many more shops to be open 24/7. I was surprised that this was even up for debate. In my American capitalist mind, the operating time of a shop was a decision to be made by the shop’s owner or manager: if they thought that staying open 24/7 would be profitable, presumably they would do so.

The premise of the debate in Parliament (at least the part that got my attention) was about the effect on society of 24/7 shopkeeping. The argument against the measure went something like this: if shops are allowed to stay open around the clock, every day of the week, then staff will need to work in those shops all those hours and all those days, and if people are working in the shops that means they will be away from their families more hours and days, and that would be bad for society. I remember sitting in a pub on the Thames after work one day discussing this with a British friend. He was convinced by the logic of the opposition. I, too, found the societal critique to be good logic, but I wasn’t comfortable with the idea of lawmakers deciding shop hours. I was deeply affected by this debate, confused really, which was a good thing because it stayed on my mind and prompted many more discussions. It was also an important milestone in the development of my cross-cultural awareness.

Several months after I had returned home from my special assignment in London and unhappily resumed my normal duties, I met with the PricewaterhouseCoopers partner for whom I worked. I explained that I wanted to leave the client-serving consulting practice to become part of the Learning & Development team. I had tried to re-integrate into my prior role co-leading the government consulting practice in California, but realized that I was meant to do a different kind of work. He pointed out that I was in a good position to advance to partner, and if I joined the learning team I would never make partner. I acknowledged and accepted this reality. I was happy to keep my salary and pursue a new career direction in learning and development. I willingly gave up the chance to compete for a partner role, and the trappings that go with it, in order to pursue something that was even more compelling.

While the mission of the L&D function moved me, I was also attracted to its lifestyle advantages compared to serving external clients. I would have much more control over my schedule. No more last minute trips to prepare a proposal or appear at an orals; goodbye to clients yanking my chain; hello more nights at home. Heroically appearing when needed, soothing prickly clients and especially travelling had always been appealing aspects of my job. I thrived on the adrenaline. But that Parliamentary debate had planted a seed in my mind, and my biological clock had started to water that seed. I realized that if I shifted career direction into corporate learning, I would have the space in my life to start a family.

And so began chapter two of my career, in which I began to climb up the ladder of learning and development while raising a family. At first we decided to have just one child. I went back to work when my son was about three months old. We planned for my husband to care for our son for the next six weeks, under the FMLA leave to which he was entitled. He was the first man at his company ever to use the FMLA benefit. A couple of weeks into his leave, he was terminated, supposedly because his role was eliminated. He soon learned that his role had actually been backfilled. (The HR department at that company was apparently incompetent.) A legal complaint ensued, and my husband ended up with a settlement that consisted of roughly a year’s pay. With that cash in hand, he stayed home for most of a year to care for our son.

In our society, is it still extremely unusual for a dad to stay home to care for a baby. I am very proud of my husband’s parenting – he can do anything I can do except carry the babe in the womb and breastfeed - and yet I wonder if the career troubles that he’s experienced didn’t start with this turning point. He has never regained the same level of earning that he had before becoming a dad. Our economic times have been harder on men, and there are many factors contributing to that sad reality. Is it possible that men’s (not just my husband’s) increasing involvement in child-rearing is one of those factors? Is society de-valuing men who shoulder more parenting responsibilities?

My son turned out so well that we decided to have another child. After our eldest daughter was born, I returned to work and was immediately asked to take a big new role. It was proof to me that “the system” was working, in that a woman just returned from maternity leave wasn’t held back from advancement. My move up to managing a global team of 26 direct reports was a great learning experience. Among the lessons was the importance of asking for what you want and deserve. I failed to ask if a promotion or a raise went along with this big new job, and they didn’t offer one. I never made the same mistake again when taking on a new role.

My youngest daughter was born two years after the eldest. By that time, in 2005, IBM was well along on its strategy of global integration. (I had migrated to IBM when the entire consulting business at PricewaterhouseCoopers, including its learning function, was acquired by IBM in 2002.) I was working with colleagues from all around the world and managing a team with people in the U.S., Europe, India, and Brazil. Being based on the West Coast, for years I had started work early, checking email or getting on the phone in my home office by 7:30am to connect with colleagues on the East Coast. Coordinating with India now meant calls at 9pm at night. But not if someone from New York or London also needed to be on the call along with someone from Shanghai. In that case, which was often, the call would happen at 4am or 5am Pacific time, indecent for me but civilized for the rest.

In 2006 I took an even more global role. As part of the headquarters staff, I had responsibility for the leadership development of middle managers across the entire enterprise. My focus was the emerging market countries, where lack of management capacity was a primary inhibitor to growth. I was soon travelling – to Moscow, Beijing, Sao Paulo, Warsaw, Kuala Lumpur, Dubai and many other destinations. And when I wasn’t travelling, I was working with colleagues around the globe. Learning how to work effectively with IBMers around the world wasn’t easy, it took stamina, but it did enliven and enrich me, opening my mind and my heart. I became even more cross-culturally adaptable and competent.

People asked me how I was able to travel so much with three little kids at home. Sometimes I explained that I was fortunate to be married to super-hubby, that he took care of the kids when I was away, which was the absolute truth. I would not have realized my professional accomplishments without his hands-on involvement with our kids. But sometimes I felt snarky when people asked about my travel patterns, and then I would fire back a question of my own: “Do you ask men who travel a lot for work the same question?” I’d like to think that I was acting as a change agent with that question, but it was more a defense mechanism to shut down this line of discussion on days when I was feeling a twinge of guilt - - or sensing an implied criticism of my parenting - - for being away so much.

My husband was able to single-handedly care for the kids when I travelled because of his own work arrangements. When our son was one, my husband went to work as an I.T. engineer for one of the banks that eventually collapsed in the global financial crisis. It was a role with a very predictable schedule, a boss in another city, and very little travel, so he was able to drop the kids off, pick them up, and handle much of the domestic routine. After the bank collapsed, he was unemployed for awhile, then self-employed as an I.T. and home automation consultant, and now employed part-time with some consulting on the side. The flexibility in his schedule has been an advantage, but it has carried a high cost in terms of foregone income, affecting our family finances.

I appreciate that my husband was able to take primary responsibility for handling drop offs and pick ups and homework. And yet there were sacrifices. As the owners of a backyard pool, we did prioritize swimming lessons and got all the kids to a level of water safety, but my kids didn’t take more than a few music lessons, they didn’t participate in organized sports, and they only went to religious school for two years. Neither of us could commit to getting them to after school activities on a predictable basis, given the demands of work, even my husband’s part-time and consulting work. Being there at 5pm every day to pick-up them from the after school club is far different from being there at 2:30pm. So other than after school enrichment classes through the club on the elementary school campus, we did not schedule extracurricular activities during the week. On the weekends, neither of us would commit to spending our weekends shuttling for activities. We needed to preserve down time for ourselves. If a chunk of every Saturday had been devoted to soccer and if a good part of more Sundays had been devoted to Hebrew school, it would have crowded out the already slim opportunities to spend the weekend just hanging out around the pool, or cooking recreationally, or seeing our own friends, or doing my beloved knitting and ceramics, not to mention grocery shopping and other errands. Sometimes I rationalized this whole set of decisions as a wise way to avoid the trap of over-scheduling the kids. But the truth is that our kids watch too much TV and spend too much time on the computer because we did not immerse them in other activities. For me, this is a case of not being able to have it all or provide it all.

When we added an apartment over our garage for my husband’s parents, I thought we might be able to expand the possibilities. Before undertaking the construction, my husband and I had some earnest conversations with his parents about the types of boundaries that would make such close living workable. For example, we agreed that there would be a separate front door for the new unit which would serve as its primary entry. We would not enter one another’s living space without calling first. There were other things which were assumed but not discussed. I assumed that the grandparents would want to take on some supervision of the kids. I envisioned that they would provide after school shuttle services for various activities. Alas, those ideas turned out to be fantasies. They are busy with their own lives and rarely even babysit for an evening. They are next door neighbors with whom we have dinner every week or two, and who we can especially count on in case of emergencies, but not integral to the work of raising the kids.

In 2010 I began the process of becoming officially certified as an executive coach, adding to my professional toolkit by getting advanced training in something I had been doing for years. Part of mastering the coaching methodology is applying it to oneself. I crafted a vision statement: To love what I do, do what I love, and have the time to spend with my family to make our life together the best it can be. I also created a set of goals to get my life aligned around my vision, including making more space for ceramics, exercise, family vacations, and intimate time with my husband. When I wrote out my vision for a day in my imagined life, it started with a walk for exercise, not an international phone call at 5am. To regain control over more of my time, I would need to stop working global hours. As the leader of the executive coaching program pointed out, it would be an opportunity to change my relationship to striving.

Not working globally would mean giving up some of what I loved to do. The best part of my work life was leading a worldwide program at IBM to advance more women to executive roles. Key themes of the program were intent and choice. By inviting more women to deliberately choose to aspire to executive positions, and demonstrating to them that they are wanted and needed in those roles, and equipping them with the missing skills they would need to make it, and connecting them to the sponsors and decision-makers who select executives, I was making a difference for women at IBM and for the corporation. Some of the women in every cohort - - all high potentials - - would express (usually in private) that they didn’t want executive advancement. I remember women in India who told me that they were already out-earning their husbands and didn’t want to increase the pay gap and thereby the friction it caused. That hit close to home.

I was trying to figure out how to make some changes in managing my time when an opportunity came along. The job description was similar work, which I would still love, with a North and South America geographic scope (only five time zones!), working for a boss in my own time zone, a company with a great reputation, and a comparable salary. I decided to make a change. Moving on to a new job was exciting for me, as I looked towards what was coming next, and at the same time I felt wistful and nostalgic as I reflected on the relationships and experiences that I had with colleagues over the years. The transition was sort of magical. I had a sense of renewal and a heightened focus on the importance of living in a way that is aligned with my values, positive energies and personal vision for the future. Nine months on, I continue to feel like I am on the verge of something. And yet, I also have pangs of loss. I do miss talking with clients scattered across the world and I don’t have any big international trips to look forward to.

It helps to remember that taking on something new usually means giving up something old. I am proud that I’ve made intentional choices about what to take on and what to shed. It’s true that I haven’t “had it all,” but not because someone forced me to settle. I’m responsible, even for the things that I’m not proud of (like the extracurricular activity gaps), and even for my responses to bad things that have happened (like my husband’s job loss). My choices about child-bearing and child-rearing are interwoven with decisions about my career and management of my life as a whole. Unlike Slaughter’s conclusion, I don’t think we need more government policies to make it easier for women to “have it all”. I think we need more women (and men, too) to do the soul searching about what they really want, and then to chase those dreams, accepting the tradeoffs that go along.

And for me, in particular, it’s about accepting the tradeoffs without scolding myself. What I’ve realized in my own soul searching is that even when I get what I want (like the opportunity to exercise in the morning instead of taking phone calls), I can sabotage the opportunity. There is something strangely compelling about NOT having it all. And maybe that’s a good thing in the end…a reminder that we are all a work in progress.

All journeys have secret destinations of which the traveler is unaware

2012-01-18T11:49:00.000-08:00

“All journeys have secret destinations of which the traveler is unaware.” ~ Martin Buber

Humans have a desire to create things

2011-02-16T08:40:00.000-08:00

I loved this quote taken from an interview with Father Greg Boyle of Homeboy Industries.

"Since humans were civilized, they have had a desire to create things. Look at the Watts Towers. Here's Simon Rodia, who barely had two nickels, and spends every day collecting tile fragments, spending what little money he has to buy cement and steel and by himself puts up this crazy-beautiful monument. It comes from some deep inner human need, creating and then looking at the work of art. What's your motivation to be educated? What's your motivation to live? It's to strive for something great and beautiful and complicated. If you take away art, you have very little; obviously, if you take away food and shelter, you have nothing. I can never see them separated. You have to live, but you have to live for something."
- - Father Greg Boyle of Homeboy Industries

Reflections on my third trip to India

2010-12-11T23:12:00.000-08:00

I’m wrapping up a week in India, where I facilitated leadership development for an inspiring group of women leaders. Every day, I was asked, “Is this your first time to India?” And every day, I answered, “No, this is my third trip to India, but my first trip to the Delhi area.” This weekend, I made a short side-trip to Agra. I’ve previously traveled to Bangalore and Kolkata (aka Calcutta). So I’ve been exposed to four cities in India. Really, that’s not much, considering the size and vast diversity of this country.

A few vignettes from this trip.

The Metro. I encountered two queues to enter the Metro, one for women and one for men. I’d seen this previously in Indian airports, where same-gender personnel perform security pat-downs for the respective queues. But why were there two queues here? It turns out that due to security concerns there are metal detectors and pat-downs to board the Metro. These precautions were cursory – are they really deterring any bad guys (or gals)? Still, the experience made me think of an article that I read in The Atlantic which imagined how life could be changed by terrorism, including security inspections for public transit. Having passed the checkpoint, I rode the escalator up to the platform. The station near my hotel is the end of the line, so I walked right onto the first car and I had my choice of seats. After a couple of stops, the car was filling up, and I was wondering if I was the only woman on the Metro. Soon the car was jammed with men. I was the only woman in the car and I felt conspicuous as a female non-Indian. Eventually I changed Metro lines and at the transfer point I made a discovery. On the platform was an area marked with a pink line and the words “ladies only.” It turns out that each Metro train has a ladies-only car. From that point onwards, I rode with the ladies. I’m sure the gents on the first train were wondering why a lady was in their car. If one of them had guessed that I wasn’t local (not a hard guess, since I don’t look Indian), and therefore didn’t know about the ladies’ car, it would have been nice for them to offer the suggestion.

A glimpse of rural life. All my time in India has been spent in urbanized areas, so during my side trip to Agra, I asked my guide and driver to take me through a village on the outskirts of the city. This required a call to the tour company boss, who was reluctant, but eventually agreed to let the guide and driver take me for a quick look. Impressions: People and animals (buffalo, goats) living together in courtyard houses…little children everywhere, many toddlers with clothes covering only their tops…older children sitting on the grass in front of the school building with the instructor talking to them…older people lying down or sitting in out of the way corners…men cooking something in an old pot over an outdoor fire in a circle of rocks while under their canvas tent strung from a tree they watched TV (I have no idea what they were using for power). I didn’t take a single photo in the village. I was apprehensive about offending someone and I also didn’t want to treat people as objects to be photographed (bad enough that I was looking at their lives just for the experience of doing so).

Indian railway. The train cars look quite prison-like, with bars on the windows. The lowest class of cars has no assigned seats, and the cars are positively jammed with masses of Indian humanity. It made me think of train cars packed with people en route to concentration camps (horrible image, I know, but that’s what came up for me). I was booked in a first class car with an assigned seat and air conditioning. The smell on the platform was strong with fresh urine and other human odors. The toilets on the train open up directly to the tracks, which explains the aromas. On my trip to Agra, an older gentleman shared my compartment. He sat in rock pose on the upper bunk and meditated for a while before he laid down and went to sleep. On my return journey, it turned out that the Indian fellow sitting next to me did his MBA at UCLA in 1971…small world…

Plan the Next Chapter

2010-11-15T07:47:00.000-08:00

On Sunday, we spent the entire day on action planning. This is a typical thing to do toward the end of a personal development program. The objective to produce a plan was typical, but the approach we took was unique.

Each person first reviewed all the work she completed over the prior days, highlighting or taking notes on the specific actions to include in her plan. She then created a set of specific goals, with deadline dates, and a short list of supporting tasks or milestones. Some people had a few specific goals, and others had loads. I ended up with ten goals. It sounds like a lot, but they were clustered into four themes and they feel 100% do-able to me.

We used large sheets of cardstock to create a planning board. Some people organized their goals into a timeline. Others used a quadrant format. Some had an arc. One person created "books" to hold various goals in themes. Some people used both sides of their board. I created a mindmap. Once we had the goals and steps articulated in words, we cut up magazines and added images and/or headlines to embroider our plans with more layers of meaning and beauty. Unbelievably, we spent three solid hours on this activity and most of us would have taken more time.

After a quick lunch, we shared our plans with our small groups and got feedback from each other. Then we rejoined the main group and shared a one minute version of our plans with everyone. It was inspiring to see how everyone's personal visions came together.

We closed the day with some thoughts about how to take the work forward, how to keep in touch with our small group, and how to stay connected to our plans. I already re-set the wallpaper on my cellphone as a picture of my plan. My small group has a call scheduled for next month to reconnect.

Having now completed Life Launch, I'm ready to start the Coaching Certification phase. That starts on Monday and I'm looking forward to it.

A Full Day of Life's Assignments

2010-11-13T17:47:00.000-08:00

Life Launch started today with the same opening exercise: bouldering on the beach. We are so lucky that the weather in Santa Barbara has been so beautiful these past few days, allowing us to enjoy not only bouldering but many other sessions outdoors. Four members of our group experienced the bouldering exercise yesterday. Today it was my turn to be one of the remaining three in our group to experience bouldering. It was a workout in both a physical and a mental/emotional sense. I will retain a strong memory of my bouldering for a long time to come.

Balancing the roles and activities in life was the next thing we tackled. We looked at six human systems: Work, Family, Couple Relationships, Friends, Personal, and Community. Our task was to example how we have invested our time and energy into these six human systems in recent months and years, and how we want to schedule ourselves into these systems going forward. In turn, each of us had a chance to experience our as-is and to-be systems map. I assigned a member of the group to hold up a sign with the word "Friends" on it and told her where to stand in relation to me and what to say. I did likewise with each of the six human systems. The group then bombarded me with their messages until I called a timeout. I then re-set their places and their messages and they bombarded me again. We debriefed how that worked, what else to fine tune, etc. It was fun and enlightening. I enjoyed participating in this for myself and for each of the women in the group. We all shared a commonality, in that involvement in community organizations was on the periphery compared to everything else. Then we sat down and did some personal work on what to change, eliminate or start in order to realize the shift in the balance of our six systems.

Writing a letter from the "old sage" within me was the next activity. Each of us projected ourselves 20-30 years into the future and wrote a letter from that point of view to the woman each of is today. We had no idea while we were doing this that we would be asked to read our letter aloud. When our facilitator showed up to let us know that time was up on letter writing, and she was holding a box of tissues, I had a feeling what was coming! I'm looking forward to taking some of the advice that the "old sage" within me had to offer.

The afternoon sessions were intense. We defined our purpose and found our richly detailed personal vision. Doing this work allowed us to braid in all the insights we had developed up to this point. Included in one group member's vision was a reunion next December. I'll be looking forward to that.

It's break time now. This has been a jam-packed, intense and very worthwhile day. I'm glad for the chance to reflect and regroup myself.

Tonight we have a group dinner and parlor games. It should be good fun.

Boulders, Renewal and Passion

2010-11-12T21:33:00.000-08:00

We started a very full day in the Life Launch seminar with an exercise called "bouldering" that is designed to address resistance and help overcome resistance. We worked on the beach in small groups. One of us shared a goal, and then shared the voices and messages that inhibit pursuit of the goal....things like "You don't have the talent." or "You'll never be successful at that." Each member of the group took one of those messages and repeated it, while the group worked to block the goal-seeker's progress. We were enacting the process of resistance. Eventually, the goal-seeker broke through the resistance or told us it was time to let her go. Then we shifted gears and the goal-seeker came up with messages of encouragement. The rest of the group repeated the encouraging messages and helped the goal-seeker to move forward. After we left the beach, we talked about how to take the process of boldering forward into real life (e.g., through writing about the voices).

The next segment focused on deepening our work on the Cycle of Renewal. I settled on Quadrant Four "Getting Ready" as my current status, although I continue to feel that my life experience today is divided among all four quadrants. I am already doing many activities that are appropriate for this phase. One of my challenges is that I'm impatient with this phase. I want to be done with getting ready and move into Quadrant One! Meanwhile, I do need to continue the networking and learning and exploration that I've got underway.

After lunch we worked on passion and core values. I've had the same passions and core values for many years: achievement, relationship intimacy and creativity. It was useful to revisit how these passions have shown up in my life, how they motivate me today, an dhow they inspire me for the future. I gained a few insights about concrete things I will do to advance my values and passions. We're referring to these as experiments. The purpose of experiments is to gather data to prove or disprove a hypothesis...which means that experiments can't fail as long as you learn something.

The last exercise of the day involved creating a personal symbol. I did an intricate drawing of a coil pot brimming with what's important to me: My family, yarn, good food, flipcharts, etc. I really like the way this drawing turned out. This may need to end up in a frame on the wall of my office where I can look at it often.

Most of the group had happy hour and dinner together. It was an enjoyable evening. I'm looking forward to tomorrow.

Life Launch

2010-11-11T21:45:00.000-08:00

This week I took the first step towards becoming a certified coach. I've done a fair amount of coaching over the years and have even taught John Whitmore's G.R.O.W. model of coaching. I would like to enhance my coaching capabilities so I can 1) be even more effective in my current role and 2) expand my range of options for future roles.

After gathering recommendations from people I trust, I investigated a few coaching programs. I settled on The Hudson Institute after talking with one of the faculty and reading a book by the institute's founder, Frederic Hudson. The book, titled The Adult Years: Mastering the Art of Self-Renewal proposes a theory and model of adult development. Unlike child development models which are premised on a linear increase in levels of capability, this model is a circle and is premised on a repeated cycle of renewal. The theory resonated with me.

So here I am, in my hotel room in Santa Barbara, reflecting on my first day. A pre-requisite for the coaching program is completion of a seminar called Life Launch. This is a program to help adults who are in the midst of transition and change to reflect and envision a plan for their next steps. Prospective coaches have to complete the Life Launch program before they can start the coaching certification program.

Today we did a lifeline exercise to summarize our personal history, plotting our peaks and valleys. My biggest insight was that the peaks were generally things I chose or resulted from things I chose, while the valleys were generally things that happened to me or resulted from things that happened to me.

We also spent some time getting to know the others in the program. There are 14 participants, 11 women and three men. We are doing much of our work in two small groups of seven. My small group is all women, and I'm intrigued by each of them. I'm looking forward to spending more time with these ladies over the coming days and into the future.

We wrapped up the day with an overview of the cycle of renewal and some discussion on how it might apply to each of us. I feel like I'm in all the stages at once. Perhaps I'll have more clarity on where I really am after sleeping on it tonight. We spoke about ways to "feed and water" the stage called cocooning. The value of journalling came up. I used to do a lot of journalling during my college years and early adulthood. I found myself resisting - - and voicing my resistance - - during the discussion this evening. I was thinking "I haven't even been blogging lately, how can I journal?!" And that brought me to this moment. For the next few days, I'll use my blog to keep a journal of the Life Launch experience.

We closed today's session with a "check out" activity in which each person shared a single word that summarized how they were feeling. All I could think of was the word "minty" so that's what I said. I was chewing gum, so of course, I did feel a minty taste, but there is something more to it. Mint is invigorating, clean, awake, and a little edgy in a good way. That's how I'm feeling after the first day.

How can we identify and assess creative capacity in leaders?

2010-05-26T09:18:00.000-07:00

I just received a form from my child’s school, seeking permission for an assessment as gifted/talented. I’m blogging about it because it got me thinking (again) about how we assess and identify high potential individuals (ok, and maybe I'm bragging a little, too, but just a little).

Our school district considers students who fall into one or more of these categories for gifted/talented programs:

Intellectual Ability - Students whose general intellectual development is markedly advanced in relation to their chronological peers
High Achievement Ability - Students who consistently function for two consecutive years at highly advanced levels in both English-Language Arts/reading and mathematics.
Specific Academic Ability - Students who consistently function for three consecutive years at highly advanced levels in either English-Language Arts/reading or mathematics. Students in Grades 9-12 may also be considered in either science or social science.
Creative Ability - Students who characteristically perceive significant similarities or differences within the environment, challenge assumptions, and produce unique alternative solutions.
Leadership Ability - Students who show confidence and knowledge; influence others effectively; have problem-solving and decision making skills; express ideas in oral or written form clearly; show sense of purpose and direction.
Ability in the Performing or Visual Arts - Students who originate, perform, produce, or respond at exceptionally high levels in either dance, music (voice), drama, or in drawing or painting.

This list reminds me of Howard Gardner’s theory of multiple intelligences, although it doesn’t strictly match all of Gardner’s categories. I appreciate that the schools are making an explicit effort to identify individuals with exceptional abilities not only in academic and intellectual domains, but also in creative, artistic, and leadership pursuits. Depending on the area of gifted/talented nomination, formal assessments can include intellectual ability testing, auditions or demonstrations, and a review of past work.

To identify high-potential individuals in business, we typically look for a record of high performance (good business results) combined with evidence of leadership ability. Organizations often compare candidates to a competency model that describes what outstanding behavior looks like in a specific company. A known problem with this is that competency models are built at a point in time, but leadership needs change, so we may end up selecting high-potentials (or leaders) based on yesterday’s criteria if our competency models are not refreshed often enough.

IBM’s recently released Global CEO Study found that leaders of organizations around the world identified CREATIVITY as the single most important leadership competency for enterprises seeking a path through the complexity that characterizes our times. The report finds that CEO’s now realize that creativity trumps other leadership characteristics. Creative leaders are comfortable with ambiguity and experimentation. To connect and inspire a new generation, they lead and interact in entirely new ways.

How can we identify and assess creative capacity in leaders? To what extent is creativity and ability that aspiring leaders can develop?

Worldwork High Impact Leadership Seminar

2010-05-12T21:53:00.000-07:00

How could I resist a weekend seminar that promised:
- Concepts and tools to understand and work with unpredictable, non-linear behaviors of teams and organizations.
- Inner work to re-discover vision and spark, independent of outer situation and support.
- Concepts and exercises to relate to team members, independent of their willingness to collaborate.
- Methods to collaborate with networks to unfold the impact that they can have on your leadership.

I had heard about the work of Max Schupbach from a former colleague so I was prepared to have an intense experience, and I did.

The content of the session was compelling, starting with the idea of a “second globalization,” in social relations and personal psychology, as a successor to the globalization of commerce. The seminar aimed to expand leaders’ self-awareness and effectiveness in working on a worldwide basis, and to equip them with tools to enable others to do likewise.

Max’s techniques fuse organization/leadership development with art and Jungian psychology. For example, to access a deeper sense of personal vision, one exercise required us to identify an historic, mythic or fairytale figure we could associate with our vision. We then had to make a hand gesture and a facial expression to express the essence of the figure. The next step was to scribble a picture to help us remember the creative, artistic expression. We then talked about how to develop the vision. What daring acts would help it grow? What aspects of our habitial behavior and self-identity would we need to drop or change in order to follow this vision? What dropping ritual could provide support in making personal change?

This work was done in pairs. The paired work allowed each person to get a significant amount of "air time" in practicing the techniques as a facilitator and experiencing them in an applied way. The level of personal discovery was quite high, exceeding my expectations for the seminar.

Max facilitates processes like this with corporate clients, public agencies, and grassroots community-based organizations. Is my organization ready for this kind of approach?

Women Leaders in Latin America and Elsewhere

2010-02-11T19:09:00.001-08:00

Did you hear the news that Costa Rica’s new president is a woman? Laura Chinchilla, the former vice-president, won by a landslide 47 percent of the vote.

Her election this week caught my attention because I recently led a couple of workshops for high-potential IBM women in Latin America and I will probably lead similar sessions there later this year. I thought I might use Ms. Chinchilla’s election as an inspiring example.

As it turns out, Ms. Chincilla joins two other women who are leading nations in Latin America: Michelle Bachelet in Chile and Cristina Fernandez in Argentina. Clearly, these women leaders in Latin America are facing and surmounting many obstacles in order to achieve their influential positions. Wow!

It turns out that there is quite a global sisterhood of national leaders. They even have their own official organization, The Council of Women World Leaders. With just a little digging, I turned up a roster of other women who are leading their countries:

Bangladesh’s Hasina Wajed

Finland’s Tarja Halonen

Germany’s Angela Merkel

Iceland’s Johanna Sigurdardottir

Ireland’s Mary McAleese

Liberia’s Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf

Lithuania’s Dalia Grybauskaitė

Mozambique’s Luisa Dias Diogo

Netherlands-Antilles’ Emily de Jongh-Elhage

The Philippines’ Gloria Arroyo

Ukraine’s Yulia Tymoshenko

What a list! I’m inspired.

Tour of USC’s Institute for Creative Technologies

2010-01-22T12:39:00.000-08:00

A few months ago, I took a half-day tour at the University of Southern California’s astonishing Institute for Creative Technologies (ICT). As a citizen, I set aside my view of current military engagements and allowed myself to be amazed at the leading-edge training that ICT is developing for our soldiers. As a learning professional in a company that prides itself on innovative use of technology in learning, I was blown away by a new glimpse at the art of the possible (given enough budget).

According to the tour, the idea for ICT was first raised by a woman named Anita Jones when she was the Director of Defense Research & Engineering at the Pentagon. She observed her son’s immersion in video games and wondered about the use of video games in training for the military. A few workshops, conferences, and publications followed, leading to the founding of ICT in 1999 through a contract with the U.S. Army. Its mission was to create synthetic experiences so compelling that participants would react as though the simulation was real. As the tour guide put it, “We were trying to create the holodeck from Star Trek.”

I learned on the tour that from the start, the human dimensions of simulation had priority. While other organizations were focused on functional simulations to develop the motor skills involved in driving a tank or flying an airplane, ICT was focused on simulations to develop skills in interpersonal interaction, critical-thinking and decision-making. The examples shown on our tour included examples of learning simulations for:
-Leadership

-Cultural awareness
-Negotiation
-Post-traumatic stress disorder therapy

ICT tackles these difficult challenges by teaming experts in learning, graphics, and computer science together with creative professionals from Hollywood and the videogame industry. Together their teams produce immersive, interactive media for learning and entertainment.

Projects generally start with a cognitive task analysis to understand the activities to be simulated. Subject matter experts describe detailed steps, including physical movements, environmental factors, mental activities such as judgment calls, assessments, or problem-solving, and emotional responses. Care is taken to surface not just the behaviors of actors in the simulation, but also their thinking and emotional processes. Many recent projects focus on soldiers working in the Middle East, so cultural components also receive due care.

With the focus on developing simulations to build skills in areas such as leadership and negotiation, the emotional content is particularly important. Compelling stories are a key way that emotional context and cultural content are included in the simulation experience. ICT uses “story nets” to convey a series of events over a sequence of turns. The story changes (within the limits of the simulation) depending on the learner’s actions and the responses of other parties in the simulation. So, for example, if the soldier using a negotiation simulation foregoes the opportunity to prepare and then, uninformed, takes an action that is disrespectful of the local culture, the tribal leader with whom he is negotiating might derail the conversation.

Non-verbal communication behavior by the avatars - their gestures, facial expressions, and stance - also has key importance in realistically conveying human emotion. ICT has advanced the state of the art in rendering avatars through innovations in lighting, photography, and skin scanning. Their advances have been used not only in simulations for the military, but also in Hollywood movies, for which they earned an Academy Award. Realistic avatars help learners become immersed in the simulation.

ICT sees itself as a research center, and so of course it undertakes a huge amount of R&D. This ranges from foundational research in the construction of virtual humans and learning simulations, to the development of enabling technologies such as the “virtual human toolkit” and the LAST method (learning with adaptive simulation and training), to a series of prototype applications.

According to a speaker on my tour, it considers all of its products to be prototypes. Clients don’t necessarily expect deployment, although many of the “prototypes” have been good enough to be widely fielded. During the tour, I saw excerpts from Bilat, which provides training and practice in cross-cultural negotiation, Urban Sim, which was the subject of a recent article in The Atlantic, and the Mobile Counter-IED Interactive Trainer, a blended learning solution delivered to soldiers in the housing of a shipping container which can be dropped at nearly any location.

In addition to conducting R&D to develop new prototypes, ICT also publishes studies about the impact of their innovations. They have found, for example, that the serious-game-based approach to teaching intercultural communication skills in ELECT BiLAT successfully led to learner’s mastery of cultural rules relating to meeting phases and the timing of communicative actions.

How much does all of this cost? In 2004, the Army awarded ICT $100million to continue its overall R&D work. The Mobile Counter-IED Interactive Trainer was the result of a $10million contract in 2009.

Clearly, the military’s need for state-of-the-art training tools stands to benefit the videogaming industry and its customers who are willing to pay for ever-more-realistic scenarios.

My work involves accelerating the development of corporate leaders. How can we apply the insights and technology developed by ICT? We’ve got enough scale (almost 35,000 first-line managers). If we invested $250 per manager in annual leadership vitality education, that would be $8.75million…more than enough to produce something really compelling. It is possible that one solution, even one with a lot of story nets, meet our needs globally? These are conversations worth having.

The CEO of the Future

2010-01-13T16:48:00.000-08:00

A few months ago, a colleague asked me to read a speech given by Indra Nooyi, the CEO of PepsiCo, at the Economic Club of Washington, DC on May 12, 2009. It was an inspiring speech. Even just reading the words - - without the benefit of seeing her deliver them - - you get a sense not only of Nooyi’s intelligence, but also her warmth and humor and humility.

Her message is that the CEO of the future must “marry performance with purpose.” This isn’t a new idea. Peter Drucker advocated that the deeper purpose of a company lies beyond producing a profit for shareholders. Contributing something useful that customers really need is the essence of business. Nooyi goes even further, arguing that the company of the future has to see itself as an organization rooted in the community, with ethical obligations to pay back to society.

She notes that CEOs of the future will still need to know how to operate a company, manage the economics of the firm, and lead people. Those capabilities will continue to be table stakes. But leading a company that both produces performance and serves a social purpose will take a different kind of leader than today’s typical cost-cutting whiz or a financial engineer, or short-term-returns-at-all-costs hard liner. This implies a different kind of shareholder, as well - - one with long-term interests.

There is a lot more to her speech, and you have the link so you can read it and decide what you think about her ideas. As often happens, I’m now seeing variations of these ideas everywhere…from IBM’s worldwide investment in Smarter Planet, including transportation, food, healthcare, utilities, and other public goods….to an article titled “Toward a Common Wealth” in my Cal Berkeley alumni magazine…to a new book by Rosabeth Moss Kanter called Supercorp: How Vanguard Companies Create Innovation, Profits, Growth, and Social Good.

One more thing about Nooyi’s talk. Only a woman CEO could have given this speech. I love that she talked about her own mother in the speech and that she described how she writes every six months to the parents of her 29 Executive Committee members, telling them about how their grown sons or daughters contribute to Pepsi, and thanking them for the gift of these individuals.

So go read it, and tell me what you think!

Global Work

2010-01-08T13:04:00.000-08:00

In the course of career discussions with mentors, managers, colleagues and friends, working globally is always something that comes up. Working internationally is something I’m paid to do, and I’m happy about that! Working globally is often hard, and it is a challenge that I truly enjoy. Why?

Maybe it’s a natural strength. According to Marcus Buckingham, each of us has strengths. He defines these as specific activities that “make you feel strong.” In his methodology, you can look for signs of strength in the following ways:
• If you have some success at it, it may be a strength.
• If, before you do it, you find your self instinctively looking forward to it, it may be a strength.
• If, while you are doing it, you find yourself easily able to concentrate (your synapses firing, your brain literally growing), it may be a strength.
• If, after you’ve done it, it feels like it fulfills a need of yours, it may be a strength.

I have had success working globally, I do look forward to it, I can lose track of time when I’m engrossed in a conversation or running a workshop with colleagues halfway around the world, and I do get a sense of fulfillment. I love learning about people everywhere, and in the process learning about myself. This sums up as a set of positive emotions around this kind of work. (NB – I get a similar charge working with colleagues nearby, but there is a little something extra that comes with connecting with others around the planet.)

Maybe it’s enlightened self-interest. As Thomas Friedman has written about with such clarity in The World is Flat, if politics and terrorism don’t get in the way, knowledge workers like me will increasingly be part of a single global network. The ability to collaborate with others throughout the world will be more than an advantage, it will be table stakes to get into the game of knowledge work. As we continue to find activities that can be digitized and decomposed and shared with lower cost providers around the planet, then the touchy-feely human relationship and consulting skills that I have will also become more important than ever. Effective communication among people is hard enough, and even more so across distance and culture. So maybe it’s not just a natural strength, but also a sober reckoning of economic advantage.

Maybe it’s a family legacy. Although my grandfather Martin L. Ehrmann passed away when I was only six years old, I retain strong memories and a feeling of attachment for him. He was a mineralogist, and traveled the world collecting minerals at a time when global travel was far more difficult and far less comfortable than it is for us today. He wrote several chapters for a book about some of his adventures to Burma (Myanmar) and other locations where just getting there took a week or more. He seemed to be able to adapt to do business in any country and relished extending his network around the world; I aspire to the same. He was able to pick up a little of the language wherever he went; I too, find it easy to learn at least a few words of any language (and I can do better than that in several). He counted many of his business counterparts as his friends; the same can be said for me (even in a company where this sometimes feels a little counter to the culture). So maybe the explanation goes beyond strengths or skills or economics to something that lies in my genes.

Of course, there is a lot to complain about, too, working globally. But that's for another post.

Do you work globally? How do you find it?

Lessons learned from Zappos.com

2009-10-06T21:29:00.000-07:00

Experiencing a recent day at Zappos was eye-opening. Never heard of Zappos.com? The company has been the subject of articles in a number of magazines because of its rapid growth and business success, enabled by an obsession with customer service and a unique culture. More recently, Zappos has been in the news because it is soon to be acquired by Amazon.

Zappo’s business model is straightforward: Sell shoes (along with eyewear, watches, bags and apparel) online. Zappos believes that one third of U.S. retail transactions will one day occur on line and that people will buy from the company that provides the best service and selection. Zappos wants to be that company. Shoes were their foundation, but they believe that as long as they focus on service, they can move into any category. The business today is focused on the U.S. market. With the upcoming Amazon deal, the worldwide market is coming into focus.

I didn’t visit Zappos to learn about shoes or service. I went to learn about their approach to leadership development. Even without the looming Amazon deal, they have been a company in high growth mode, facing the need to grow leaders to keep up with the pace of their business expansion.

The company’s revenue was $1.6m in 2000, $184m in 2004, and over $1b in 2008. The number of items stocked is continually increasing. The day I visited 4.6 million different items were in stock from over 1,300 brands. IBM’s growth markets are also facing growth-related leadership development challenges, and I hoped that an exchange of ideas would be fruitful.

I did have a meaningful exchange with the “Pipeline Team,” as Zappos calls their professional development group, but my most powerful insights didn’t turn out to be about leadership development. Instead, I was struck by how Zappos has defined and executed its version of being a values-based company.

Zappos has ten core values from which the culture, brand and business strategies derive:

1. Deliver WOW through service
2. Embrace and drive change
3. Create fun and a little weirdness
4. Be adventurous, creative and open-minded
5. Pursue growth and learning
6. Build open and honest relationships with communication
7. Build a positive team and family spirit
8. Do more with less
9. Be passionate and determined
10. Be humble

I observed a remarkable degree of congruence between these espoused values, their physical manifestation in the organization, and the behaviors of people who work there.

Artifacts of all kinds reflect these values. Service is the focus of everything. I was wowed when the person who set up my visit offered to send a Zappos shuttle to the airport to pick me up. The shuttle driver was a young woman with several tattoos and facial piercings - - she didn’t look like a typical corporate driver - - reflecting the largely Gen Y workforce. She was very friendly and professionally inquisitive, and seemed genuinely interested in my reason for visiting. I learned that she works on the “Help Desk” which provides all kinds of internal services (but not IT support). She let me know that as part of her job, she updates the flat screen display in the lobby with the list of the day’s visitors and light news items. She wanted me to know that my name would be appearing on the display. In addition, since it happened to be the birthday of the first IBM PC, there would be a little story about that. (Did she go hunting for IBM news? I was so wowed that I forgot to ask.)

The Zappos core values are printed on cards and bookmarks, reproduced on employee-produced artwork that hangs in the hallways, scrawled on graffiti in the stairwells (this practice is encouraged and enabled with a supply of handy markers), posted on bathroom mirrors, and used as the basis for an annual 'Culture Book’ that compiles employees’ ideas about the culture and what it means to them. All employees are invited by the CEO to contribute, and this book is printed and bound for distribution to employees, prospective employees, business partners, and even some customers. Every contribution is included. As a visitor, I was given a copy of the most recent Culture Book.

On arrival at the Zappos HQ, I noticed that the best parking space was reserved for the person who had created the most WOW. Employees can nominate their colleagues for this honor, which is awarded weekly. The WOW factor is embedded into core processes. Zappos focuses on delivering on line purchases quickly, often overnight. To do that, they warehouse everything they sell and they won’t make available any item that is not physically in stock. Shipping is free, both for outbound deliveries and for returns. Workers in the call center (called the Customer Loyalty Team) write personal thank you cards to customers. Sustained ratings on the Net Promoter Survey (NPS) are above 90%, an unheard of high level.

The other core values are also visibly evidenced. When I entered the HQ building, the first thing that caught my eye was an enormous wall display and calendar of classes offered to employees. The pursuit of growth and learning was also demonstrated by a half dozen tall bookshelves full of business and personal improvement books. These are available for free to any employee. As a visitor, I was invited to take books, too. Some of these are used in classes, others are discussed in employee-led book clubs, and the rest are simply for enrichment.

The values of fun, weirdness, family spirit, and teaming were also quite evident. An employee-organized egg-drop contest was happening on the day of my visit. Teams of employees from a dozen departments had followed a set of constraints to construct contraptions that would hopefully protect their eggs during a drop from a second story balcony. Around lunchtime, a crowd gathered outside (in Las Vegas’ blazing summer sunshine) to watch the contest unfold. A member of the Pipeline Team noted that this kind of activity happens frequently, but not always with such success. Any employee who gets an idea to do something like this is free to pursue it. Not only do wacky activities help to keep the culture going, they also serve as tests of (non-positional) leadership, and can provide opportunities for constructive feedback.

So how does an organization get such congruence between words, deeds, and beliefs? The employee recruitment and selection process focuses first on cultural fit. Applicants have to pass a culture screening before their skills or qualifications are considered. The application form itself is a reflection of the culture. It includes the normal questions, along with “If you could be a superhero, what superhero would you be and why” and also a crossword puzzle about Zappos. Applicants who ask questions like “Do I really have to complete these silly parts?” or who leave them blank are screened out for indicating too little inclination for fun. In one recent calendar quarter, the company received 6,000+ applications and hired only 45 people.

While I observed a great deal of accomplishment in living by their values, Zapponians think they can do better. Every employee is challenged to make one improvement per week that makes Zappos better reflect its core values. It’s the accumulation of small things that seems to make a difference – making forms more fun to fill out, or organizing group activities, or sending a customer an extra special thank you note. The company has also proven that it can take on big changes. In its short life, there have been three complete swapouts of the store/pick/pack infrastructure and technology at Zappos’ warehouse and distribution center in Kentucky. A large wall display illustrates the evolution and communicates key real-time performance statistics (number of items stocked, number of items shipped, revenue).

What if you asked your employees to make one improvement per week to better reflect the values of your company, and reinforced this expectation vigilantly, and published stories associated with rising to the challenge, and encouraged colleagues to microblog or blog to share their improvement each week?

The real purpose of my visit was to specifically focus on Zappos' leadership development programs. All new employees, regardless of how senior their level, must attend a 4-week new hire program. The content includes eight hours on Zappos history and five hours on Zappos culture. The program for all new hires also includes 40 hours on the phones in the Customer Loyalty Team. At the end of the new hire program, participants are offered $2,000 if they decide that they don’t want to work for Zappos. The company thus weeds out those few who made it through the screening process, but who are not truly a good fit for the organization. If passion for the business is a key element of leadership, Zappos establishes it from the outset.

Formal leadership and professional development education continues throughout an employee’s first 18 months. Upon promotion to first line manager, another set of classes is required. Those promoted to more senior roles complete a further leadership curriculum.

In addition to the formal leadership development curriculum, there is an on-site life coach, Dr. Vik. His guidance and coaching - - available to any employee who elects to seek it out - - supports and enables the development of leadership behaviors and overall career goals.

Will the winning formula at Zappos survive the merger with Amazon? Can this kind of culture persist in a larger organization (there are only about 1,500 employees today). I'm looking forward to finding out!