Highest Effiency: 90 Minutes at a Time

Working in 90-minute intervals turns out to be a prescription for maximizing productivity. Professor K. Anders Ericsson and his colleagues at Florida State University have studied elite performers, including musicians, athletes, actors and chess players. In each of these fields, Dr. Ericsson found that the best performers typically practice in uninterrupted sessions that last no more than 90 minutes. They begin in the morning, take a break between sessions, and rarely work for more than four and a half hours in any given day. ...

Along the way, I learned that it’s not how long, but how well, you renew that matters most in terms of performance. Even renewal requires practice. The more rapidly and deeply I learned to quiet my mind and relax my body, the more restored I felt afterward. For one of the breaks, I ran. This generated mental and emotional renewal, but also turned out to be a time in which some of my best ideas came to me, unbidden. Writing just four and half hours a day, I completed both books in less than six months and spent my afternoons on less demanding work. ...

By managing energy more skillfully, it’s possible to get more done, in less time, more sustainably. In a decade, no one has ever chosen to leave the company. Our secret is simple — and generally applicable. When we’re renewing, we’re truly renewing, so when we’re working, we can really work.

                                   -- Tony Schwartz, CEO of The Energy Project, in a New York Times column (2/10/13)

On Change Management/Culture

My long-time TEC III member, Mitch Weckop, CEO of Skyline Technologies, made a great  presentation to a meeting of the local Servant Leadership group recently, regarding his learnings on how to make change happen.  They are not only about process, but also about the cultural items that ingrain a low performing culture and inhibit the movement to the needed one.  You have to recognize and change them ... to make change happen!  The essence of his remarks:

Most people have frustrations and want to change things. CEOs certainly do. And so do VPs,

managers, directors, salespeople, accounts payable processors, machine operators and ... And not just

at work ... in personal lives, and in the community.

And we can. But you have to make sure it's something you're passionate about (because

changing other people's habits is very, very hard), and that it's something you can directly impact.

(Forget about world hunger, the national debt, etc.). And, that directly impacts you (because that's

what will sustain your passion).

First of all, he says, you have to map out your process. Here it is:

1. Identify the Current Reality, especially the negative or sub-optimal result it is achieving.

2. Document the Reality you would Like To Have. What would it "look like" in broad

descriptors, especially the positive results it is providing.

3. Identify the "Rubber Bands" that are keeping the current culture intact. This will be a long

list of specifics ... things that need to be changed.

4. Identify the Work required to Break those Rubber Bands. Not only do you list here the

details of the New Reality (usually opposites of what"s listed in #3), but the specific

Challenges you will have in making them happen. Identifying the "barriers" is important,

because then you think about how to overcome them; you are less surprised when you

encounter them, and more confident because you have a plan. What's very important is

knowing that when you try to change someone else's habits, there is much pullback.

Eventually, most will come around, but some won't and they will be very publicly vocal.

You have to be firm and resistant.

5. Finally, Prioritize what you will do By Quarter. You can't start everything at once. Start

with a few, very few, and fight to get them to work. As people get comfortable with them,

they will be more accepting of your next changes at a faster pace. You'll also be learning

about how to make these things happen. Having the time schedule in place gives you

confidence that there is a foreseeable completion ... even though it will go slower than you

think, and the schedule will be lengthened.

Developing this Process Map doesn't take long ... just a few thoughtful hours or days by your

core group of people who will be masterminding it. At a transportation company, Weckop's 5-person

senior team developed the process in little more than an hour.

What takes long is implementing it. At the transportation company, it took three years to

achieve the New Reality described on the Process Map.

Here are things you have to look for, because they are CULTURAL ... meaning they are

ingrained, even invisible habits and processes that fight AGAINST change. Your current culture

wants to perpetuate itself, and is designed to do so.

So, you must identify and change the cultural elements that are retarding change. Here is

what to look for:

1. Stories. Your organization has stories that are perpetuating the current reality. They talk

about the world that was, lifting it up, celebrating it. You don't want to kill those stories,

because they are part of the legacy, but you need to initiate NEW STORIES ... ones that

describe the new reality, the new vision, the new rewards that you want the organization

to embrace. Look at your desired reality, and tell the story of how you developed it ... and

tell it OFTEN! There will soon be sub-stories, new ones that get created on your journey.

Craft them carefully, and tell them, too. Weckop says, "Be very intentional about the

stories you need to tell. They must be compelling, and justify your new vision."

2. Language: BE intentional about your descriptors. Make them more compelling than the

current ones. Example: Employee titles. Receptionist has become Ambassador and Mgr,

First Impressions. More and more have become Technicians or Technical Consultants.

3. Artifacts: There are all sorts of things around the office and plant that support or are

memories of the old culture. Remove them, and replace them with something new,

ideally emblematic of the new culture. Start with vending machines with high fat content

foods.

4. Status: Who gets special parking places? Certainly not executives. Customers for

certain. Then, nobody ... egalitarian? Or an employee who got a special award or

recognition?

5. Symbols of Success: "My office has more ceiling or floor tiles than yours, so ..." Better:

Who gets selected to go to special training, to visit customers, etc.!

6. Taboos: Look for Taboos that are counter-productive. We should be doing them. Then,

begin the fight to change that cultural element.

7. Rituals: What happens all the time that reinforces the old way, the old guard, the old

culture? Locate it. Change or replace it .. to what you need now. Create new rituals that

reflect the new regime. Could be simple things ... like a new approach to the employee

cookout.

8. Rewards: Whom and when do you reward? For seniority? No. People who are taking

you in the new direction, at a faster speed than others! Make sure there is a

Principles/Values check ... but that's a 'cost of entry,' not a gainer.

Says Weckop: "Find where your passion is about something that needs to change, and go for

it!"

What Maximizes Accountability ...

Greg Bustin is a TEC resource from Dallas who talks about creating an Accountability culture so that performance occurs almost automatically.  Too often, he says, one critical piece is missing ...

Accountability is taking personal responsibility to do what you say you’ll do within the timeframe you’ve agreed to do it. The key from a leadership standpoint is “being precise about what the result is ...what it looks like, what the measure is, and by when! AND, what the CONSEQUENCES are for  NON-PERFORMANCE! Almost ALWAYS, we fail to include this last point about Consequences. The statement doesn’t always have to be about the Consequences to the failing individual; it may be even more powerful to discuss the Consequences to the TEAM! Setting the Consequences provides awareness that performance is important, and eliminates arguments later. When you require accountability, you are living the value of Trust ... that people can count on each other to perform what they agree to do. VERY CRITICAL! 

 But observe: You as a leader can’t /don’t create accountability. You create the culture that demands it ... that each person will hold themselves accountable to perform to what they agreed. That’s the only “accountability” possible. Another can’t hold a person “accountable.” Only each person "can hold himself/herself accountable.”

Keys to Success: Personal Mastery & Personal Awareness

"I've never worked with a client who used Personal Mastery and Personal Awareness as a Culture who wasn't successful," says James Newton, head of Newton Learning Systems and former head of TEC's Chair training.  Indeed, he says, "those who do this well significantly outperform their TEC peers, who in turn significantly outperform average non-TEC companies."
In a recent Wisconsin workshop, he said the following should be key elements of CEOs' efforts at Personal Mastery/Awareness.  Embracing and displaying them, he said, convey to the rest of the organization that they are critical habits, resulting in energized employees.
•  The most important one is Self-Disclosure/Vulnerability.  Believe it or not, it's THE key to a high performance TEC Group and a high performing company!  Why?  Because it yields Trust and Caring and Support!  If you are emotionally open to your fellow executives and employees, it not only shows them that you trust them, but they will feel that you are Authentic.  In return, they will be both caring and, most importantly, supportive of your efforts.  It makes people "all about others."  The result will be a collaborative, peak-seeking organization presenting an incredibly appealing and energized face to customers and prospects.  

•  It's Tough, but  ... Avoid being Judgmental.  "In any situation, the person who can most accurately describe reality without laying blame will emerge as the leader,"  a quote by Edwin Friedman.  Very important ... perhaps the secret to a leader's ability to not being so separate from his/her people that critical communication doesn't occur.  It's also a key to effectiveness:  Laying blame is judgmental, and immediately causes recoil in the other person.  If you avoid any judgment about the "person," but only about the idea, then the personal relationship isn't impaired and effectiveness is more likely to occur.  One technique:  Say, "I feel ...," rather than "You are ..."

Some Things to Think About

•  Anytime there is a Third Party in the middle of a transaction, especially a level of government, prices go up.  Because they can.  I can get away with charging a Second Party a higher price that he/she can't afford, because the Third Party who's partially funding the purchase can get the extra money from other people.  That's what insurance companies and large employers do.           

•  One of the reasons we have HIGH cost of the sick care system is that we have HIGH usage ... because we're less healthy.  We got that way because of family and community support for bad eating and lack-of-exercise habits.  NOW, we have to create a different emphasis of family and community support.

Access this article for another approach that seems to be working:   http://www.easyreadernews.com/63855/beach-blue-zones-miracle.

Zingales on Capitalism

I recently read a book by an Italian-born economist about Capitalism.  He says he escaped the brand of "crony capitalism" practiced in Italy by coming to the U.S.; he's now a professor at the U. of Chicago business school.  He says that the requirements of Capitalism are not only the normal ones of individual property rights and a judicial system to protect them, but also competition.  To the degree that competition is compromised (by taxes and regulations), capitalism fails to provide its rewards.  Of course, some taxes and regulations are necessary ... to pay for government services and to provide guidelines for how society wants it to operate.  But, he says, many taxes and regulations go further than that, effectively rewarding those pushing for the changes because they will benefit them at the cost of others.  That, he says, is the beginning of "crony capitalism" ... and the U.S. now has it in spades, he says.  The result is a distorted economic system that benefits too many people disproportionately to the rest, causing people to lose faith in it and choose not to engage.  He says that's what we're seeing now ... in both our complex tax system, and the amount of complex regulations that we have.  Every time there is a tax or regulation change, somebody wins and somebody loses.  Watch for it.  You will also see it shortly as pressure builds to change tax systems and regulations.  You can see who benefits from them now, because they will be arguing for the status quo through their lobbyists.

Oh, yes.  The book, written in 2012, is:  A Capitalism for the People, by Prof. Luigi Zingales.  I have a three-page summary of it, if you ask.

More on our National Debt Debacle, all of which is unpopular

•  When a country starts to run into trouble:  Two sets of economists (Reinheart/Rogoff and Kumar/Woo) have done research of OECD countries that have gone through significant ups-and-downs that effectively states:  "At 90% of debt-to-GDP, the debt effect becomes large and negative causing a significant reduction in the rate of growth."

•  How to cut:  Another review of 21 OECD countries by economists Biggs/Jensen/Hassett, says "the more aggressively a country cuts spending, the more likely it is to successfully reduce debt in the long term.  A typical 'successful' consolidation consisted of 80% spending cuts and 20% tax increases."  In particular, they said, "cuts to social transfers, largely entitlement spending, and government wages, are more likely to permanently reduce debt and deficits than cuts to other expenditures."  It is a more effective way to lower government debt levels than increasing taxes.  It reduces GDP growth in the short run, but increases the likelihood and degree of economic growth in the long run.

•  Tax Structure Changes:  A 2008 OECD study by Jens Arnold suggests these priorities for the tax structure change part:

First:  "Property taxes and particularly recurrent taxes on immovable property (assets/wealth), seem to be the most growth-friendly because they don't take away from spending capability  ... followed by consumption taxes, and then by personal income taxes." 

Second:  Corporate income tax increases appear to have the most negative efffect on growth of GDP per capita (i.e., they disrupt the trickle down of lower prices effect of additional investment).  "A reduction in corporate income taxes has a stronger positive effect on GDP per capita than a similar decrease in personal income taxation."  (Indeed, reducing corporate income taxes to zero would free major dollars for investment in R&D, testing, production and selling ... all of which adds jobs.  When profit dollars are siphoned for personal income instead, they would be taxed at personal income rates.)