Leadership 365: Tips for Delegation

Effective Delegation often holds the key to managerial success and time management. What should you consider before delegating? Here are some tips to make sure delegation goes the best it can:

1. Be clear on the tasks you want to, and can, delegate. Not eveything can be delegated as a manager. What are some of the concrete activities/tasks you can pass on.
2. Consider who might benefit from the opportunity to take on the task. Do they have the skills (or stretch ability) to get it done?
3. Be clear on what the end result is expected to look like. Make sure that there is a common picture held by both of you.
4. Ensure that the person you are delegating to has the necessary resources, and authority, to complete the task.
5. Create a common understanding about time frames, success factors, and what the final product will look like.
6. Set up regular touchpoints/meetings to check in on progress and identify any roadblocks that are emerging.
7. Once the task is completed, review/identify any lessons learned.
8. Recognize and celebrate the achievement in a way that is meaningful and relevant.

Have a great week,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Author of Effective Group Coaching (Wiley, 2010)

Leadership Vs. Management

Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things.

Peter F. Drucker

There is often a lot of debate regarding the differences between leadership and management. For most of my career I have held the view that leadership can be fostered in everyone, regardless of title, versus management being more related to a specific role.

In his book, The Leaders Digest, Jim Clemmer makes the following distinction between leadership and management:




Ask yourself:
What activities are you undertaking this week that fall under the management side?
Which activities are you engaging with for the leadership side?
Where is it more important for you to spend you time?
Which skills and approaches do you want to put further focus on this month?

Have a great week
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Author of Effective Group Coaching (Wiley, 2010)

5 Tips for Managing The E-Undation

Did you know that many professionals spend up to 40% of their day managing email? How much time to do you spend on email every day? Does the time you spend, match the payoffs you receive.

Email is an essential part of business today, but the question has become who is running the show - you or email?

If you have found that your inbox has run amok, here are 5 tips to support you in getting it under control:

1. Check email at regular points throughout the day. Many organizing experts suggest checking it two or three times a day only, and turning it off in between so you are not tempted to see who just emailed you.

2. Communicate to others when you will be checking. If people are expecting a response right away and don't know that you are only checking at selected points of the day, it may cause even more problems.

3. Unsubscribe from lists you really don't need, or read.

4. Colour code/flag emails of different priorities so you know which ones are urgent (red), of medium importance (yellow), or low priority. This visual map can help you quickly identify what is really important to respond to.

5. If you don't need it DELETE it! If you really don't need an email, delete it. Microsoft has some great tips on helping you decide what you may want to do with your email box. Known as the 4 Ds, do you want to do it, delete it, delegate kt or dump it? (Note: the 4D tool is a great tool for time management as well).

Question:
What's the one thing you are going to do today to tame your email box?

Have a terrific week!

Warm regards,
Jenn

Jennifer Britton
Author of Effective Group Coaching (Wiley, 2010)
Potentials Realized
Email: info{at}potentialsrealized{dot}com

We're in the top 150 Management and Leadership Blogs

I found out a few days ago that we've been honored to be included in the listing of the Top 150 Management and Leadership Blogs pulled together by Jurgen Appelo. We've joined the ranks of Steven Covey, Tim Ferris and many other great writers, leaders and speakers. You can see the complete list here

The blogs were scored according to their Google Page Rank, Bing hit count, Alexa Ranking, Technorati Authority, Twitter Grader, PostRank and FeedBurner count.

I am looking forward to getting back to more regular posts here at the BizToolkit in the coming months. The first 4 months of 2010 have been wonderfully full with great work with clients here in Canada, the US, and West Africa, as well as a lot of speaking on my new book published in January by Wiley and Sons - Effective Group Coaching - which continues to be snapped off the shelves by coaches, educators and HR consultants around the world. Thanks for your support!

I look forward to being in touch in coming weeks.

In closing, what are your favorite management and leadership blogs? As always, feel free to share your thoughts below

Warm regards,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized
Group Coaching Essentials
Phone: 416.996.TEAM (8326)
Email: info{at}potentialsrealized{dot}com
Follow me: twitter.com/jennbritton

What's Happening with Creativity in Your Team or Organization?

What's happening to creativity in your team or workplace these days? Is it increasing, or decreasing?

There was a terrific article last week in the Globe and Mail entitled Workplace Creativity Shrivels on the Vine by Jennifer Myers

The article includes 3 quick questions to stimulate creativity, creativity by the numbers and a look at what CEOs are doing to bolster creativity.

Click on over - I think that you'll like it!

Warmly
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized
Email info{at}potentialsrealized{dot}com

Manager Shortage Ahead?

I read about some interesting research put out by Randstad (2009 World of Work Report) in an article in this month's HR Professional magazine. Chair of the HRPA Board of Directors, Antoinette Blunt writes:

"The report, draw from a survey of 2199 employees and 833 managers in the US, found that only 49% of employees aspire to be managers, and, specifically, only 42% of generation Y employees (aged 18-29), 47% of generation X (aged 30-44), and 50% of baby boomers (aged 45-63)."

Pretty interesting findings from Randstad. Blunt continues that the research also found that "sharing knowlegde with others, being responsible for the success of an organization, and able to influence decisions in an organization" are motivators for employees

What are you noticing about the enthusiasm of succession into management in your organization? Does this reflect what you see? Is stepping into management positions motivating in your culture? What are the implications, if any?

Have a terrific week! For those who may be attending HRPA's Conference this week I look forward to connecting with you. I will be presenting on Thursday afternoon on Mentoring: An Essential Ingredient for Any Talent Management Program, followed by a 4:30 booksigning of my new book Effective Group Coaching at the Conference bookstore.

See you there!

Warm regards,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Group Coaching Essentials
Potentials Realized

What's your meeting style?

I'm sure that many readers here at the blog participate in virtual meetings. Prehaps maybe even too many! As a facilitator, I am always interested in seeing "who" participates in meetings, and what their style is.

There's a terrific article on The Top Ten Meeting Personalities which Jackie Yearney over at FastCompany.com has posted. Take a look. She's cut to the core archetyping some of the key personalities that show up on virtual meetings.

Which meeting personality matches yours?

Have a terrific week!

Jennifer

Jennifer Britton

Potentials Realized

Infusing Coaching Skills into Managers

Coaching skills are critical for managing in today's ever changing landscape. Equipping managers with enhanced coaching skills is an important piece of building internal capacity, strength and resilence within organizations.

Dan Kennedy over at the Great Leadership blog wrote the following article on Infusing Coaching Skills into Managers. He proposes four solid tactics to start equipping your management team with enhanced coaching skills.

I appreciate Dan's comments, especially as I am working right now with a number of corporate clients on enhancing coaching skills and/or developing internal mentoring programs. Several months in to many of these medium term iniatives we are starting to really see tracking and a changing landscape of business relationships with is having an impact on the bottom line.

How are you building coaching skills with your management team?

Have a great week,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton, PCC, CHRP
Potentials Realized
Phone: (416)996-TEAM (8326)

Time Management: An Alternative

An Alternative to Time Management: Manage Your Energy, not your time

“Managing Energy, not time is the fundamental currency of high performance. Performance is grounded in the skillful management of energy”
- Jim Loehr and Tony Schwartz, The Power of Full Engagement

A few weeks ago I spoke on time management tips and high performance to a group of managers and staff. As part of our session I challenged participants to consider looking at managing energy, rather than time as a key to "great" performance. A wonderful book on this topic, which you may in fact find a real paradigm shifter, is Loehr and Schwartz book - The Power of Full Engagement. It is worth checking out!

“Great leaders are stewards of organizational energy. They begin by effectively managing their own energy. As leaders, they must mobilize, focus, invest, channel, renew and expand the energy of others”
- Jim Loehr and Tony Schwartz, The Power of Full Engagement

What steps have you taken this week to manage your energy?

If you are a leader, what steps are you taking to mobilize, focus and renew the energy of others?

Teams on Thursday: Creating Quality Communication

I led a seminar yesterday on time management strategies and was reminded of the importance of taking time to reflect on the quality of our communication within teams. Communication is not just about the frequency, it's really all about the quality.

Ask yourself the following questions:

• On a scale of 1-10 (with 1 being really, really terrible and 10 being exceptional), how would you rate your communication with team members overall?


• How frequently do you communicate with your team members face to face or by phone (rather than text or email)?


• What's the impact of face to face or voice to voice communication over your email communication?

Overutlization of email continues to be a huge barrier to performance within teams. The time that a series of back and forth emails takes, can often be resolved in a five minute phone call.

Exercise:

Over the next week observe what patterns of communicaton are present in your team.

Which communication patterns or activities support the team, its' results and purpose? Which ones aren't effective?

What is one specific action step you can take this month to create quality communication within your team.

Have a great week!

Jennifer

Jennifer Britton, PCC, CHRP, CPT

Potentials Realized
Team Coaching
Coaching, Training and Assessments for Team Peformance and Results

Teams on Thursday: Essential Team Reads

Here are a few of my favorite books on teamwork and team issues:

The Five Dysfunctions of a Team -Patrick Lencioni

The Speed of Trust - Stephen Covey

The Wisdom of Teams - Kazenbach and Smith

Mastering VIRTUAL Teams - Duarte and Snyder

The Leadership Challenge - Kouzes and Posner (more about leadership in a team envrionment)

You can pick up several of these at the bookstore I've set up with Amazon here.

A couple of these I am particularly biased about (The Leadership Challenge and the Five Dysfunctions of a Team) as I deliver workshop programs from these models to teams, AND I also know how powerful the models can be for teams.

What are some of your favorite team reads right now?

Warm wishes,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton, PCC, CHRP, CPT
Potentials Realized
Toll Free: 1-866-217-1960
Email: info@potentialsrealized.com

My Top Book Recommendations for Books this Year

I love books (even though I don’t get enough time to read having a toddler in the house)! These are some of the Top 10+ books I have been recommending to clients this year:

Team Issues:
5 Dysfunctions of a Team – Patrick Lencioni
The Relationship Cure - John Gottman
StrengthsFinder 2.0 – Tom Rath

Management/Business Issues
First things First – Stephen Covey
Good to Great – Jim Collins
7 Habits of Highly Effective People – Stephen Covey
10 Steps to Be a Successful Manager – Lisa Haneberg
Mass Career Customization – Benko, Weisberg

Small Business Building:
Building a Dream – Walter Good
Never Eat Alone – Keith Ferrazzi (About Building Relationships)
Get Clients Now! - CJ Hayden

Relationship Issues:
7 Principles for Making Marriage Work - John Gottman

Many of these books are available at the Potentials Realized bookstore I host with Amazon here.

What books have you been reading or have found useful this year for business? What books are on your recommended reading list?

Have a wonderful weekend,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton, PCC, CHRP, CPT
Group Coaching Essentials.com and Potentials Realized
Toll Free: 1-866-217-1960
Email: jennifer{at}potentialsrealized.com

Year End Review and 2008 Visioning - Audio

Every year at this time I send out to my clients a special exercise, to help them reflect on the past year and do some planning and visioning for the year ahead.

This year I am pleased to provide you with a link so you can listen to it:



I hope that you enjoy it! I know that you will find this useful, whether you are a business owner, manager, virtual team leader or team member.

I'd welcome your comments -- as always, please feel free to comment below.

Warm regards,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton, PCC, CHRP, CPT
Potentials Realized
Toll Free: 1-866-217-1960
Email: jennifer{at} potentialsrealized.com

PS - Stay tuned for a number of special virtual retreat programs to wrap up 2007, and kick off 2008! Space still remains in Tuesday's Biz Success Virtual Planning Retreat for Small Business Owners (7-10 pm EST on Dec 11 and 18/07)

Mobile Workers (M-Workers) Part II

A few weeks ago I did a posting on mobile workers - those professionals who spend at least 10 hours per week away from their office and need to remain connected via technology. I've had some great comments off line from readers who wanted to know more...so here's part two.

Several people have asked, " What are the typical characteristics of an M-Worker?"

Returning again to Cisco's Study "Understanding and Managing the Mobile Workforce" the study found that mobile workers tend to be:
* Male (Women 67% less likely to be mobile workers than men)
* Those with a degree level education
* Self employed workers are almost twice as likely to be mobile than paid workers -- in part because we need to be, especially when we serve multiple clients

The study even looked at personality characteristics which are dominant in mobile workers, including the need to be an independent decision maker, being a disciplined achiever, and embracing curiosity and exploration. Flexibility and adaptability go hand in hand with the personality of an MWorker (and interestingly the characteristics that I always hired for for many years as a manager).

Another interesting part of the study points to the fact that work-life balance and stress management are key concerns for the mobile workforce. For any of you MWorkers reading this post, how many briefcases/suitcases do you have packed, ready to go by your front door? A few weeks ago, I was joking with a colleague that rather than having a fixation on purses, when I worked as a virtual manager and had staff in 10 countries, my fixation was on briefcases that I could take on and off planes. I certainly know first hand the stress that can be created by living and working on the road. If you are looking for some work-life balance tidbits, I hope that you will jump on over to my Your Balanced Life! blog.

So what are some recommended management approaches for mobile workers? The Cisco study has some great recommendations including some of the more common sense ones (which take on new meaning for M-Workers:
* Providing space for M-Workers to do their job -- so avoid micro-managing
* Aim to understand the context of the M-Workers working world (and their realities)
* Build a high degree of trust with your M-Team
* Ensure that communication is clear, to the point, unambiguous, and delivered at a convenient time
* Reward and recognize M-Workers within the organization (even if they spend more time on the road than at their desk)
and finally, my favourite - invest in team building for your M-Team, ensuring that staff do get to know one another and are able to build relationships with their managers and peers.

I do hope that you will check out the Cisco study -- it's right on the mark and will be of great benefit to any organization with M Workers.

As always - I welcome your comments -- what is your take on M-Workers needs, management strategies and team support? Feel free to comment below or drop me an email.

Have a wonderful week,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton, PCC, CHRP
Potentials Realized
Toll Free: 1-866-217-1960
Email: jennifer{at}potentialsrealized{dot}com

BNet's How to Manage Employees in Remote Locations

I just came across a great article for any readers who are following my posts on virtual teams. Today's business environment is exploding with virtual teams, where employees are managed remotely. As a former virtual team manager myself, I am well aware of the challenges which virtual teams pose, as well as the new management skill sets it requires.

To get a handle on some great tips on how to manage employees in remote locations, or virtual teams, I urge (not just recommend) you to check out Kelly Pate Dwyer's article "How to Manage Employees in Remote Locations". You can find her article on BNET here.

It's a comprehensive article in which she shares a number of super tips including:
1. Build a Strong Team Starting with You
2. Gather the right people
3. Put technology to work
4 Master the Art of Communication
5. Build a Sense of “We”
6. Manage by Results

I really appreciate how the article has placed responsibility on the manager, and also organizational systems needed to enable a virtual team to succeed and thrive. What skills sets do you see as essential for virtual team management? I would welcome your comments.

If you don't read BNet already, it's a fantastic online resource! Check it out.

Have a wonderful week,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton, PCC, CHRP, CPT
Potentials Realized
Toll Free: 1-866-217-1960
Email: jennifer@potentialsrealized.com

My Business and Life Lessons

My Business and Life Lessons
Copyright 2007 - Jennifer Britton. All rights reserved.

Dave Prouhet over at Business Advice Daily, a small business advisor, had a great post earlier this week on My Business Life Lessons. Author and Management Consultant, Jm Stroup, over at Managing Leadership, emailed me this morning, encouraging me to add my own thoughts through my own blog this week. You can visit's Jim's excellent post the other day "Lessons from the School of Hard Knocks". Dave will consolidate and post all our blog contributions as a single list in a short while.

As a former manager myself, and now a business owner and management trainer, coach and consultant, I am always amazed at how the principles of business, leadership and management are transferable across industries, sectors and niches. Here are a few of the golden rules I live and work by:

1. People are the strength of the business -- Invest in your people, you invest in your organization. At the end of the day, a business is more than just its' balance sheet. It is a web of people and their strengths and talents. Treat your employees well, and you will tend to get engaged employees, willing to give it their all. Invest in your people as much as you can - and remember investing is not just about money.

2. Pay people first: This issue pops its ugly head a lot in the small business world, non-profits, and increasingly in larger corporations. Make sure your people are paid! Late pay cheques or payment for invoices is not just a legal issue, but it will weaken the foundation of your most important resource - your staff and/or suppliers.

A number of times, especially at the end of a fiscal year, I am always surprised to hear about business owners and CEOs paying themselves first, and others later. What's the impact of this? What can you do as a manager, or business owner, to make sure your people are compensated on time, and for what they are worth?

3. Build your team - As Jim Collins says so eloquently in Good to Great!, get the right people on the right bus in the right seat. Hiring wonderfully skilled people only gets its' leverage when they are in the right position, at the right time, with the right organization and culture. Take time to build your team, in terms of recruitment, training and ongoing team building intiatives.

4. Recognize the leader in all: If you haven't gathered through reading this post already, I come from the school of participatory management. I truly believe that there is a "leader" in each one of us. The more we can as managers, coaches, leaders find the "leader" in others and create the environment for them to step into their leadership capacity, the more engaged and productive your staff will be. My philosophy as a manager was always to work myself out of a job -- not the most financially sustainable, but certainly the most important for organizational capacity building.

What leadership qualities do your staff possess? How much have they explored their own capacities? Is it time to invest in some leadership training for your team?

5. Delegate wherever possible: A very common pitfall for business owners and newer managers is to hoarde responsibility, taking on every little task, and failing to share authority and responsibility. The cost? Burnout, disgrunted employees, and even business failure.

By building the capability of your team, and leveraging their strengths and interests, delegation is a natural progression. Not every task can be delegated in every situation, but what could you pass on to another? What would be challenging and a stretch, but within a person's capability? What support would you need to provide that employee?

I often refer to delegation as a muscle. The more you do it, the easier it gets, and the stronger your team becomes. Delegation of tasks builds ownership of the results to the team, and hence, a stronger organization.

6. Create Momentum -- I speak a lot about Building Momentum in my work and my writing. Momentum is a wonderful thing and enables work to take on a life of its own. Whether you are a new business owner, or a seasoned manager/leader, what momentum is present in your work right now? Like a snowball that gathers up speed (and size) as it rolls down the hill, what will it take to steer that momentum towards the results you want?

7. Regular Consistent Effort -- A number of management speakers like Robin Sharma, talk about the value of regular consistent effort towards goal achievement. Small, daily actions over time can have a huge impact. It's like making a 1 degree tiller change that may seem small at the time, but will move your ship to a totally different location.

Ask yourself, what is one goal you could focus on this month, and take small, daily action steps towards? I'd love to hear what your results look like after a month!

8. Ensure that people are clear about their roles and responsibilities. Whether you are a business partnership, a team or a couple, spend time looking at the roles you play and how it all fits together. Lack of clarity about roles, and who is responsible for what, costs business billions of dollars every year. In today's world of matrix management and virtual teams, role clarity and clear understanding of responsibilities is taking on even more importance. Not sure about where to start with this one? I'm sure that others blogging about this, myself included, would love to support you on this through some coaching or training work.

9. Communicate, Communicate, Communicate - Effectively!: In my world of work and life, communication is the foundation of everything. Invest in becoming a more effective communicator-- is what you are saying really understood the way you intended it to be? Globalization and working across cultures quickly shows the cracks in our own communication styles. What do you need to focus more on?

10. Be Clear on Your Vision - If you don't know where you want to go, how will you know when you get there? I could say a lot about vision, values and purpose...and will leave it for another post, but ask yourself, "What is my vision for my work in 1 year? 3 years? 5 years? 10 years?". What is the fire in your belly? Are you walking your talk?

I hope that you've received some value from what's turned out to be quite a lengthy post. I'd love to hear which of my golden rules resonate with you. What are your top work and life lessons?

Looking forward to hearing your thoughts,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton, MES, CPT, CPCC, CHRP
Potentials Realized ~ Group Coaching Essentials
Toll Free: 1-866-217-1960
Email: jennifer[at]potentialsrealized[dot]com

Silence Fails

The authors of Crucial Conversations have put out some very interesting research called: "Silence Fails: The Five Crucial Converstations for Flawless Execution". This research was undertaken by Vital Smarts and the Concourse Group. More than 1000 executives and project management professionals were surveyed across 40 companies, representing a variety of industries.

What they found is that five common business problems are responsible for 85% of the failure of high stakes business initiatives. This research identified the most prevalent and costly barriers to project success, including:

1. Fact free planning
2. AWOL Sponsors
3. Skirting
4. Project Chicken
5. Team Failures

The interesting thing about all of these factors is that they are within our control as managers and executives, and when avoided can save money, time, and other resources. The premise of this research outcome is that Five Crucial Conversations that Business Leaders can have can predict and prevent failure.

To view the whole report visit the Silence Fails Website. I think that you will find it quite interesting -- I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized
90 Day Biz Success Program - starts February 27th
Email: jennifer[at]potentialsrealized[dot]com
Toll Free: 1-866-217-1960