{"id":158,"date":"2017-04-13T22:29:16","date_gmt":"2017-04-13T22:29:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/greensummit.co\/?p=158"},"modified":"2017-04-13T22:29:16","modified_gmt":"2017-04-13T22:29:16","slug":"java-with-joe-slow-down-to-go-fast","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/greensummit.co\/?p=158","title":{"rendered":"Java with Joe: Slow down to go fast!"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>My mother was a very wise person, but she never could really understand what I actually did as an HR executive. We were talking about this one day, after I\u2019d had a tough conversation helping a senior manager understand that his newly acquired MBA wouldn\u2019t result in an immediate promotion, and I said, \u201cBasically, Mom, I help people manage their expectations.\u201d Her immediate response was, \u201cNow that<\/u> I understand! People get really upset when their expectations are not met, even when those expectations were probably unrealistic in the first place.\u201d<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve certainly found that to be true when it comes to helping organizations develop higher levels of employee engagement. In fact, some of the hardest work I\u2019ve done over the years is helping executives manage their expectations around change in this area. Most executives see themselves as problem solvers. They take pride in scoping a problem, identifying the root causes, and executing a solution. Then it\u2019s on to the next problem. This mindset is reinforced by the fact that so many organizations remain\u00a0 focused on short-term\/quarterly results\u00ad\u2014and reward leaders who deliver them.<\/p>\n

But, while transforming an organization from dis<\/u>-engaged to engaged will produce immense long-term value, it doesn\u2019t typically include immediate positive results. The fact is that this kind of transformation requires significant culture change, and culture change is rarely, if ever, a quick fix. An organization\u2019s culture is made up of a complex web of attitudes, emotions, behaviors, and institutional memories, and that complexity makes significant change hard to achieve and even harder to sustain.<\/p>\n

In other words, it takes time to build an engaged enterprise, and the more disengaged the organization, the longer it takes. Unfortunately, that fact is hard to accept for \u201ccan do\u201d executives whose expectations for rapid improvement in the engagement status quo are not immediately met. Not surprisingly, these folks tend to get frustrated when the organization invests time, effort, and resources in solving the organization\u2019s \u201cengagement problem,\u201d only to have its engagement scores move just a few points or maybe even stay flat\u2014not just for one or two quarters, but possibly even for a year or two. When that happens, as it often does, the response can be, \u201cYou (the HR leader) got the strategy wrong.\u201d Or, \u201cMaybe the data\u2019s wrong. We should find a new survey vendor.\u201d Or, \u201cMaybe we need a new initiative of some sort that will make people happy.\u201d<\/p>\n

I encountered this at Cleveland Clinic when after the first year of our engagement initiative our engagement scores remained totally flat\u2026and the CEO told me that this was the worst news he had heard in five years! The good news is that he agreed to stay the course, so we worked even harder to help leaders at every level focus on engagement, and continued to roll out programs that resonated with our employees. The following year we had a big spike in our engagement scores and momentum finally started to build for long-term improvement.<\/p>\n

In my experience, managing expectations is critical to the success of any major culture change initiative. You need to help the organization\u2019s leaders understand that it takes time to overcome the skepticism and even outright cynicism that many employees feel when the organization starts talking about engagement. You also need to help them understand that a successful engagement initiative will typically involve considerable experimentation: promising ideas for new engagement-related programs need to be \u201csocialized\u201d first with managers and employees, then tested using a kind of rapid prototyping approach in which you try the program, get employee feedback, tweak it and get more feedback until it works. That all takes time.<\/p>\n

Much of that time involves planning. When you look at organizations that have won the coveted Baldrige Award for quality, what you find is that their leaders typically spend as much as 65%-70% of their time planning. In other words, they \u201cslow down to go fast.\u201d<\/p>\n

They lay out a framework for change. They build a coalition and support for that change, which is socialized around the organization. They are clear about who will play what role in executing the change initiative, and they make sure those people have the necessary skills and experience to do so successfully. And when the strategy or particular programs need to be adjusted or recalibrated\u2026and that\u2019s almost always the case\u2014the leaders make the necessary adjustments and stay the course.<\/p>\n

The bottom line is that if you view building engagement as a matter of banging out a basically tactical solution to a straightforward problem, and if you expect to see positive results quickly, you\u2019re probably going to be disappointed. And when those unrealistic expectations are not met, it will be hard not to just reach for another tactic\u2026which will not give you those quick positive results either.\u00a0 Even worse, the decision may be to drop the whole initiative and move on to another problem.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s another possibility too. Your initiative may actually generate a quick bump in your engagement scores, just because you\u2019re doing something different. In that case, your leaders may decide that the problem is solved, and again decide that it\u2019s ok to move on to another issue.<\/p>\n

Either way, you\u2019re only going to increase the level of skepticism, cynicism, and disengagement in your organization.<\/p>\n

So, do the hard work of setting realistic expectations\u2014for yourself and your colleagues. Take the time to make a plan, socialize the changes you decide to make, and ask for, listen to, and act on your employee\u2019s input at every step in the process. Slow down to go fast\u2026and you\u2019ll come out way ahead!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My mother was a very wise person, but she never could really understand what I actually did as an HR executive. We were talking about this one day, after I’d had a tough conversation helping a senior manager understand that his newly acquired MBA wouldn’t result in an immediate promotion, and I said, “Basically, Mom, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-158","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/greensummit.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/greensummit.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/greensummit.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greensummit.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greensummit.co\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=158"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/greensummit.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":159,"href":"https:\/\/greensummit.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158\/revisions\/159"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/greensummit.co\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=158"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greensummit.co\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=158"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greensummit.co\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=158"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}