Tag Archives: Mapping Strategy

Mapping Strategy to the Leadership System

19 Thursday Oct 2017

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A smedicalleadershipprogram2mall rural healthcare system sees a significant opportunity to improve its its strategy map. Expertly design their strategy map is a simple one-page document illustrating their strategy for growth. It is posted proudly in their various “visibility walls” that provide staff, patients, and visitors graphical displays of leadership, performance, and strategy. Structured in a classical Balanced Scorecard (BSC) methodology it identifies Aspiring Cultural of Greatness, as the central theme of leadership (learning and growth perspective). Where many organizations are content to leave it at that, this rural hospital took their BSC to the strategic horizons. They determined that a leadership system needed to be designed that would in fact – create a culture where all staff aspired to be great – individually and organizationally.

Nearly a year in the making, it follows the structure of classical systems theory. It has 1) a central focus (empowerment), 2) critical elements leaders control; 3) routines & activities for leaders to follow, a clear system for deploying the system; and 4) three mission critical performance objectives. They will be able to measure the performance of both their leadership system and individual leaders with non-financial measures of performance. They will actually be able to measure how well individual leaders are doing empowering their staff!

What is so impressive, is that this focuses individual leaders on executing the requirement of the leadership system rather than gaining followers. In this organization, there is little room for the dynamic charismatic leader following a model of personal power and control. The entire leadership system is mapped to a growth strategy that will execute on the mission and vision. Furthermore, it will deliver mission and vision with an approach consistent with their values.

 

Leadership: Its the System Stupid

02 Monday Oct 2017

Posted by in Baldrige, Leadership Systems, Mapping Strategy, Praxis Solutions

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Oops! Road SignMay I please have your attention? Leadership is a system it is not a person!

Living in the shadow of Microsoft world HQ I have many friends who work with Microsoft. Without exception, everyone repeats the same thing: the culture is toxic. It is impossible to work collaboratively because the rules of engagement are such that one can only advance on the back of co-workers or by heroic effort which means 80-100 hour work weeks. Those who genuinely want to work for organizational mission, who want to produce outstanding products and services that are truly innovative (and have a life outside Microsoft) – cannot. I am even hearing reports, that experience with Microsoft, once a ticket to the C-Suite, is now considered a negative work experience. Employers are concerned they may inherent the toxic culture.
I recently read Kurt Eichenwald article titled Microsoft’s Lost Decade (Vanity Fair, July 24, 2012). In it he blames the toxic culture on the practice of stack ranking employees. For example, a manager with 10 employees has to rank each one in a performance order of 1-10. This means that two will get a great review, two will get ranked with deficient performance and six will get average reviews. Therefore, to consistently get a great review, one must make sure his team mates score poorly. His conclusion is that Microsoft could hire Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg, Larry Page, Larry Ellison and Jeff Bezos and one of them would rank as a disaster.
Therefore, Microsoft could hire the best leaders and creative thinkers on the planet but the system of leadership would prohibit them from leading effectively. Each may bring tremendous value to the company but only the one who can sabotage his colleagues would be considered successful. Conclusion: the leadership system will always trump the individual leader.
In 2013 Microsoft announced the practice of stack ranking was being abandoned. Let’s see how long it takes to change the underlying culture.

Three Leaders, One Leadership System

27 Wednesday Sep 2017

Posted by in Balanced Scorecard, Baldrige, Leadership Systems, Mapping Strategy, Praxis Solutions

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Close up of men's rowing team

Leadership Systems: All Leaders Pulling Together

Three leaders. All well recognized for their expertise. All brilliant and hold post graduate degrees. All operate non-profits. Two are CEO’s of similar organizations with a similar mission and comparable size. One is growing rapidly. The other is growing but slowly. One has that unique ability to gather followers. Volunteers and funding flow easily but he struggles with long term strategy. He is concerned that growth and well-meaning activity is masking real and long-term transformation. The other is a brilliant strategist but struggles communicating new concepts and making them simple. Hence, funding and the necessary volunteers don’t come so easily. My observation is that both struggle putting the necessary systems in place to be as successful as they would like. Especially a leadership system. To them, leadership is an individual person.

The third leader is the CEO of a different type of non-profit. He operates in a world of dynamic change, high competition, high regulation and everything he says and does is open to public review. He understands that leadership is not about one person exerting power and control. He is building a formal leadership system. It is a work of art. His senior leadership team is operating – like a team. They are mission driven and their leadership system is designed to execute on that mission. Yes, he hires leaders for their technical expertise and experience but he also hires them to the requirements of the leadership system.
For long term organizational excellence, transformation and innovation my bet is on leader number three. His personal leadership is not about attracting followers but about executing organizational mission. He understands that this will take all leaders pulling on their individual oars in concert with the others. My prediction is that soon, they will be recognized nationally for their excellence.

Leadership Systems – Staying Connected to Staff and Customers

08 Monday May 2017

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A team orientationSummary

It is time we recognize that our current approach to leadership development is a waste. $50 Billion and research says there is nothing to show for it. It’s only value is perpetuating the fantasy of a tiny minority ruling over the majority. This has been the view since the beginning of time. We still kneel at the altar of gods and goddesses … and wonder why there is no measurable value in developing leaders. We believe that training emerging leaders as sages will make them better rulers when the more power they acquire the further they are from their greatest source of brilliance – their staff and their customers. Or to be blunt, the higher they rise the stupider they get.

In an article titled, Leadership – It’s a System, Not a Person! author Barbara Kellerman, the James MacGregor Burns Lecturer in Leadership at the Harvard Kennedy School takes on the $50 Billion leadership development industry and states: From the beginning, learning about leadership was, for good and sound reasons, all about leaders: single individuals who could, despite being a tiny minority, control the overwhelming majority and on occasion, single-handedly change history. She goes on to say: the leadership literature – was focused for eons on gods and goddesses, sages and princes, philosopher kings and virgin queens. The basic model of leadership has not changed. It is time to change it.

Problem

People are frequently promoted because of their technical skills. Nurses move into senior positions because they are good nurses. Associate engineers become senior engineers because of technical experience. Eventually they become leaders when they need to manage people with technical skills different than their own. They can no longer rely on the prowess of their technical skills to manage and direct others. They are part of a system of leadership. The system serves as their platform. However, without platform design, individual leaders default to the traditional role of leaders = leaders tell followers what to do. All too often, the results are revenues at any cost, profit at any price, and production not matter what the risk.

Case: In September the U.S based – Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), sited a major automotive parts manufacturer and its staffing agency for repeated safety violations. The most notable of which was a robot that malfunctioned. A young woman, laboring to meet demands of leaders who required quota be maintained at any cost (usually at the expense of worker’s personal time and safety), stepped in to clear a sensor fault. It abruptly restarted, crushing her to death. She and her family had been planning a wedding. Now they were planning her funeral.

Solution

Two Lenses of Leadership

There are two lenses through which to view leadership. 1) The lens of the individual leader seeking to influence others; and 2) The lens of the organization which should be structured to deliver measurable value. All systems, including the leadership system, should be designed and aligned with the delivery of this value. But Barbara Kellerman points out that the 40 year old leadership industry “has not in any major, measurable way improved the human condition, which is precisely why it should be reconsidered and reconceived”. In our view, the solution is understanding leadership as a system which is the platform for leadership success. Without a designed leadership system or platform, individual leaders operate to their own sense of mission and organizational performance becomes highly variable.

The remainder of this article can be viewed in its entirety at:

http://www.managementexchange.com/hack/leadership-development-inflating-egos-and-destroying-value

 

Mapping Strategy and Operational Alignment

18 Wednesday Jan 2017

Posted by in Balanced Scorecard, Baldrige, Leadership Systems, Mapping Strategy, Praxis Solutions

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Close up of a men's quadruple skulls rowing team, seconds after the start of their race

At Praxis Solutions we strongly believe in the value of a strategy map. The chief reason is that it is – visual. Most of us are visual learners. We feel, think, respond to and remember pictures and stories. “Pictures are worth thousand words”. This means one well-crafted picture can tell the story behind three pages of text. Time and again we see the power of a visual representation of strategy.
However, there is another important value in a strategy map – operational alignment. A strategy map visually tells the story of a leadership system and how the system is aligned with mission. In addition, a strategy map shows the connection between budgets and the execution of vision. Processes become aligned around meeting customer requirements instead of asking customers to bend to the requirements of the process. Leadership knows what they are supposed to produce rather than the default command and control.

Aligning Leadership

We recently finished building a strategy map for a rural healthcare organization. An additional phase included the development of a formal leadership system. This too is coming together well. But what we have found that is just stunning is this – the leadership model is perfectly aligned with process outcomes. For example, the strategy map identifies two process outcomes:
1. Safe & coordinated care; and
2. Efficient systems.
Without consulting or directing the outcome of the leadership model we are seeing that two primary results of their leadership system are – safe & coordinated care and efficient system. In other words, there is a recognized cause and effect relationship between what leaders do and the twin goals of safe & coordinated care and efficient systems. As one of the senior executives stated: “I have always been promoted because I was good at being a nurse, but when they put the title of “leader” on me, I was not at all sure what I was supposed do. Now I know”.
This is a powerful statement because most leadership training is focused on the individual leader acquiring organizational power and influence. In this model the role of the leader is to direct subordinates to do her bidding. This understanding of leadership is flipped on its head. The role of the leader is now to create the environment where staff treat patient safety and the coordination of their care as the highest priority. Mindlessly doing what the boss says no longer works. There are clear and unambiguous goals to reach. Furthermore, these objectives are highly measurable so if the targets are not being met, who is responsible – leadership. They cannot play the blame game.

To download a complimentary white paper on mapping strategy:

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