Many business owners started with the goal to have greater control over their time but as the years progress, they realise they’ve onboarded a runaway train. It seems their entire lives are spent keeping the operation from spinning off the tracks. 

One client I’m working with has a major objective to move to a 3-day workweek. This is what it involves:

• Identifying what their future role will be in the company. 
• Highlighting current responsibilities that don’t belong to their future, thus reallocating them to other team members or stopping them altogether. 
• Training other team members to operate in those new tasks. 
• Re-working position descriptions to reflect the changes. 
• Ensure the business systems and people are operating efficiently.  
• Establishing a reporting system so they have a sense of control, even when they are absent. 
• Developing disciplined task completion habits. 
• Reminding them of how far they’ve come and how close they are to achieving their objective (when they feel they aren’t moving fast enough). 

Like building a home, plans are drawn first and then the construction proceeds according to that plan. Business manoeuvres, like moving to a 3-day workweek is similar: draw up the plan and then follow through to completion. 

Here’s to 3-day work weeks!!! 

*Photo by Lex Photography from Pexels

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I recently offered my right hand to shake as I greeted a carpenter, whereupon he offered me his left instead. A football injury had painfully dislocated a finger on his right hand.

It got me thinking about dislocation at work with some contributing factors being:  team/relationship issues, poor leadership, weak systems and supporting processes; and then there are the challenges of growth and the COVID rollercoaster that Lea Hicks from the Hix Group highlighted: “I hate that as we get bigger, we see some of our people less as they are out on-site, and Covid has not been kind with the lack of Toolbox Talks either.”

Dislocation has the capacity to render an entire business ineffectual if we don’t take steps toward the healing process.

Healing dislocation at work is a lot like healing a physical dislocation:

1. Ease up. Sometimes people need downtime in order to come back together again and function optimally.
2. Don’t repeat the action that caused the dislocation. Identify the cause and take steps to correct it, making every effort to avoid repetitive injuries.
3. Try to avoid painful movements while things are healing and being brought back into balance. This may mean the application of soothing strategies: Ice – maybe put that controversial project that no one likes on ice for a time; Heat – potentially turn the heat up on a long-needed process fix; Pain relief – Monday morning barbeques or Friday night drinks with the team.
4. Above all maintain motion.

Dislocations can be incredibly painful but they do heal when given the due attention of rest, soothing and maintaining of activity.

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In my latest book, How Efficiency Changes the Game, I write:

“…much of today’s strategy work focuses on the gaining of strategic advantage over the competition. But sometimes, if we look beyond the competitive landscape there are wide open spaces in the marketplace, representing golden opportunities that few, if any, are pursuing. These are classed as noncompetitive advantage or which can be considered our uncongested strategic advantage.

Imagine with me for a moment: There is a centuries-old, stone-walled city perched high on a hill in central Tuscany. The businesses there have for many years been servicing the needs of the residents within those walls with the cafes, restaurants, taxis, and others all having to compete against each other. They have promoted different points of distinction in the hope of attracting customers from the other businesses to themselves. On a warm spring morning, one of the business owners took a coffee break on the deck of a café that looked out over the city walls to the fields, small towns, and mountains beyond. Her mind started seeing new opportunities, silently mulling the question, “what if?” As she was day-dreaming she looked back at the hustle of the town, reflecting on the fact there was only limited supply and demand within the city walls. Grasping the power of this insight she determined that while she would maintain her current work in the city, she would begin researching opportunities outside of the city walls to create an uncongested strategic advantage.”

Strategy work is thinking work and my question is: how can you position your business or career that takes you from being another player in a congested market to the wide-open fields of opportunity?

*Photo by Aliona & Pasha from Pexels

* My recent book, How Efficiency Changes the Game. Developing Lean Operations for Competitive Advantage can be purchased here. 

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*Photo by Alpha 

** For a detailed read on the science of rest, check out the book Rest. Why You Get More Done When You Work Less by Alex Soojung-Kim Pang.

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Today, I was reminded of my street friend Travis. While I have never lived rough nor begged for money, I gained an appreciation and respect for this man from sitting beside him.  As we huddled together on bone-chilling pavements in the depth of Melbourne winters and engaged in late-night conversation (where we agreed that what was said on the corner stayed on the corner), changed my view of the world. Instead of rushing past and glancing down at a street person, I was now on his level, looking up and out at the world.  

Harper Lee, the author of To Kill a Mockingbird, wrote, “You never really know a man until you understand things from his point of view, until you climb into his skin and walk around in it.”

Gaining understanding from another’s point of view takes purposeful effort. It means discarding judgement and embracing acceptance. It means sitting at their level, stopping long enough and frequent enough to gain insight into their world: their patterns of feeling and thinking; their greatest joys and deepest challenges; how they approach life and work; what is meaningful to them. 

The more I understood Travis, the more I could contribute to his world and, on the flip side, as he got to know me, he then provided insights and assistance to the challenges I was facing. It was a two-way street on one street’s pavement.   

In over thirty years of coaching others, I consider this lesson in empathetic leadership to be one of the greatest realisations I have ever received. And I hope this small story does the same for you. 

The original post about Travis can be found here. 

Photo by Hamza NOUASRIA 

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An old lady from across the road ambles on her walker to the neighbour’s place. Stiffly bending, she picks up the newspaper from their garden and resumes her journey to the front door, placing it there for late morning collection. There is no need to do this – the neighbours flex and walk faster than her, but she does it, most mornings. 

She gives me a silent smiling wave as she slowly makes her way home. 

My neighbour seems a kind person and every morning, my neighbours and me, are better off for having encountered her presence.

Drops of kindness. A small task for another. A smiling wave or greeting. It doesn’t take much but those seemingly insignificant gestures of kindness impact others greatly, turning an ordinary day into a significant one. 

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I asked a client what the upstream issues were that impeded her productivity. She immediately identified two areas (1) accurate information from the field service technicians and (2), accurate scheduling from the service coordinator.

I suggested one correctional activity. Coach them to accuracy.

One element of coaching is identifying key questions to help the employee arrive at the solution themselves. Banging on with the same complaint again and again simply trains team members to develop selective listening disease to tune you out.

… and you don’t want that.

So, when you need to solve an upstream problem such as improving accuracy, approach the relevant person as coach rather than manager, and ask “what do you propose we do about this? How can we resolve the issue?” Once you’ve asked the question, stay silent.

Using the word we, positions both of you on the same side. Remaining silent creates a context for them to “learn, improve and grow rather than to just get something sorted out”.¹ Solutions that employees identify are more likely to work too. They often know the details and therefore the mechanics of solving it; and, also because having solved it, they are more likely to stick with it to prove it works. After that, the rest is supporting them to implement their changes.

Protecting and enhancing your productivity is vital. When workloads increase and people are involved, upstream issues often affect downstream productivity. A coaching approach can make big problems easier to solve and foster positive work relationships where people feel valued and respected for their contribution. Bringing such issues to a halt well before they hit your desk is always a happy outcome.

If you want to lead people more effectively and/or create efficient processes, my two books will help. Download for free here or purchase from Amazon. The Business of People and Smash The Bottleneck.

¹ Bungay-Stainer Michael (2016). The Coaching Habit: Say Less, Ask More & Change the Way You Lead Forever. Box of Crayons Press. Toronto. Canada.

*Photo by Cristofer Jeschke 

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In January 2006, “the roof of one of the buildings at Katowice International Fair collapsed in Chorzów / Katowice, Poland.” Subsequently, “a forensic investigation found numerous design and construction flaws that contributed to the speed of the collapse. The snow from the roof was not being removed which resulted in construction overload by more than 100%.” **

This story illustrates what increased load does to a building if it is not designed to handle it. In organisations, business structures are also created to support load. Those structures may either be designed for scalability or, may simply emerge in an ad-hoc and reactive way that can never adequately accommodate increases in workload. And when neglected amid times of heavy load, collapses are common.

Right now, many trade and construction-related businesses are experiencing increases in workload and are running hard to keep pace. Now is a strategic time to review and address key structural pillars that may have served well but that could be vulnerable to collapse under load.

Here are eight areas worth reviewing to ensure scalable business structures capable of flexing in response to changes in load.

1. Leadership
Leadership is about taking care of the team as much as it is about taking care of the business. Whether you work in a large organisation, a small team or are a solo operator – it’s important to dedicate time towards the creation and maintenance of scalable business structures. An ad-hoc spreadsheet here and a sneaky work-around there, are never going to sustain things when the pressure’s on. Leadership for scalability involves gathering data, as well as listening to and hearing from the team about where the “pain-points” and bottlenecks are. Involving them in finding solutions helps with buy-in. Remember too, organisational change places extra load on your team, so check in with them frequently to make sure they are on board. It’s one thing to bring flailing business structures into a bright new scalable world, it’s another to create a positive environment so that the people want to come with you.

2. Strategy
Strategy is about endpoints. It connects where we are today to an ideal future state whilst providing a framework for decision making aligned with the direction of the organisation. Checking in to ensure your business strategy has been adequately adjusted to enable responsiveness to the uncertainties inherent in 2021 is an activity well worth the investment of time and effort to safeguard against collapse under load.

3. Time Management
When workloads increase the tendency is to run harder, faster and longer. While busy periods demand heightened responsiveness and adaptability, the undergirding structure of planning our time and managing ourselves often takes a hit. No matter how hard it is, it’s valuable to step back and enshrine time for yourself to think, plan and to manage your own wellbeing. It may seem like you are losing valuable time when you could be just “getting on with it” but it will pay you back many times in the long run with improved foresight and stamina.

4. People
When our people feel the love, they are more likely to show the love. When management: communicate the value of each team member; express interest in their broader life; provide the opportunity for advancement and training; ensure people are placed in the right role according to their personality and skillset; define their responsibilities and performance measures while supporting and holding them accountable; this provides significant strength to the organisation. And in times of increased load, people who have been treated this way, often go the extra mile for their leaders.

5. Workflows
Smooth effortless workflows are a feature of businesses with scalable structures. Existing systems may have worked well in the past but as incoming work increases, they may be vulnerable to collapse. Creating smooth and effortless workflows is an art and a science. It demands a commitment to finding simple solutions to big problems and then to simplify those. To get started, pay attention to the repetitive things that give rise to staff unhappiness, try to identify themes that can be wrapped into a systematic solution. Do the same for customer complaints, look to the themes to see if there’s an overarching solution. Try to avoid duplications, or having more than one system with overlapping functions. Think about what kind of data you need to be able to access from these systems. The power of effective workflows to reduce waste, improve morale and increase profitability make them worth the time investment to create.

6. Marketing
This area often takes a secondary position when work increases and sales are strong. However, I have observed that companies who stop marketing when things are good are left floundering when the tide turns (and it always does). You will do well to be consistent in your marketing efforts.

7. Sales
Similar to marketing, sales efficiency is relegated down the chain in good times. Training those who are responsible for winning quotations and business development, along with establishing performance metrics provides an underlying strength. It will also give you a competitive advantage as most companies don’t invest in strengthening this area.

8. Money
It’s far too easy to get caught up in doing the work and neglect the fundamentals of financial management. Too many companies have collapsed because they focused on top-line growth and forgot about profitability. Incorporating a rigorous financial management process that includes diligently monitoring cash flow, attention to key financial ratios, job monitoring and completion reviews with a stringent collections process is essential to provide a bedrock of strength in this area.

Business structures require ongoing time, attention and investment to ensure they will support you strongly. Creating one or two key indicators for each area assists in quickly identifying which are scalable and those that are likely to yield under load. If you do this regularly it will help ensure that your organisational roof doesn’t collapse.

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** Al-Marwaee, Mohammed. (2017). Structural Failure of Buildings: Issues and Challenges. The Scientific World Journal. 66. 97-108.

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