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Do You Have the Right Elements to Hold Your Team Accountable?

“When you have clear, 90-day deliverables, reported on every quarter, a lot more progress is made - and all the questions about accountability and alignment start to fade away.”

It's a funny perception people have that leadership is full of people who yell and are tough on their colleagues in order to get things done. In reality, many excellent leaders are more caring and compassionate than callous – and they are very good at holding people accountable.

And then there are those who just aren't naturally good at it.

Over the years, we've found that although people want to hold others accountable, they've had some bad experiences - usually because they're doing it based on opinions and feelings rather than facts and crystal-clear expectations.

This is also true of most of our frustrations with people in life. When there is miscommunication or a lack of aligned expectations, both sides come away disappointed.

The Right Elements

The ultimate management tool is to set people up to self-manage, with only a light touch from leadership.

When a leader puts a lot of energy into making someone accountable - not fun for either side - it’s because there aren’t enough systems for a clear understanding of expectations and current performance.

Here are the right elements you need:

Lead by example. While a cliché, if you don’t feel that you are fully accountable or are not comfortable with being held accountable, odds are you're going to be soft on the people around you – either because you don't like tension, or you feel you might violate your own integrity because you’re weak at it. When you hold yourself to a higher standard, it’ll be easier for you to do the same for others.
Clear Goals. Make sure you have three to five crystal-clear SMART goals for the company, for each executive and for every team in your entire organization to deliver every quarter. (You can listen to Episode 71 of The Growth Whisperers to learn more about SMART goals).
Clear performance metrics (KPIs). Make sure that each team and every individual has three to seven operational numbers which show how their part of the business is performing and if they are delivering to expectation.
Conduct. This is about behavioural expectations that are anchored in the core values of the organization. How we show up as human beings, and how we conduct ourselves in relationships with peers, customer, and direct reports. Call out behavior that is inconsistent with company values and culture.
Transparent reporting. No secrets. Be clear about the metrics of every team and how they are working towards their goals.
Carrots and sticks. Practice positive reinforcement when an individual or a team performs well - whether it's a thank you note, lunch with the CEO or a financial reward. And acknowledge people who don’t achieve what’s expected. When kids misbehave in school, they go to the principal’s office or stay late to redo a test. In business, this could be a meeting with the executive, a written warning, or performance improvement plan. And, if they consistently can’t do it right, it may mean a demotion or being asked to leave the company. Just make sure it’s not public or brutal – and that they have the tools and resources to fix the problem.

These elements allow people to manage their own accountability because it's so clear what is expected.

And if you have to intervene too much, the root cause is often not the person. Instead it's that what is expected of them isn’t clear.

The Challenge

How can you enhance the elements of accountability you’re already doing?
What new elements can you add?

For more on this topic, listen to Episode 72 of The Growth Whisperers podcast.

Lawrence & Co’s work focuses on sustainable and enhanced growth for you and your business. Our diverse and experienced group of advisors can help your leaders and executive teams stay competitive through the use of various learning tools including workshops, webinars, executive retreats, or one-to-one coaching.

We help high-achieving leaders to have it all – a great business and a rewarding life. Contact us for simple and impactful advice. No BS. No fluff.

by lawrenceandco

How Good is Your Hiring Sales Pitch for Key Talent?

“If your hiring process is deep, methodical and unsentimental, your chances of landing A-Players skyrocket.You know how deeply you know someone after you’ve taken a long trip together? Yeah, that’s how well you should know your candidates.” - Chapter 10, Your Oxygen Mask First

How compelling is your hiring sales pitch - your offer to attract talented people to join your company? And I’m not talking about the financial side.

A CEO I spoke with recently, told me about an amazing VP he wanted to bring into his company. He wasn’t fully convinced this person was going to join the team, even though the candidate had gone through the formal screening process - but he had a good sense. As a result, he invited him out to his ranch for dinner and to meet the family and just had a great time hanging out. He wanted to make a personal connection with this high performer and to get to know the real him – and vice versa.

It’s part of their hiring sales pitch. For key hires, it's important to take money off the table and make a personal connection,

If your HR team drives the whole process, they’ll do all the necessary screening. But what does this look like when executives are involved? Ideally, you’ll have a step-by-step process that can be consistently operationalized.

For ideas, look at what your salespeople do to land new customers. For example, site or company tours, presentations, specific needs assessments, and a refined sales pitch.

The Challenge

Is your sales process for bringing on top talent as strong and well thought-out and well-executed as your sales process for bringing on new customers?
What can you do about this?

For more about this and specific things you can do to leverage this process, join us for episode 67 of The Growth Whisperers podcast.

We help high-achieving leaders to have it all – a great business and a rewarding life. Contact us for simple and impactful advice. No BS. No fluff.

by lawrenceandco

Go, Put on Your CEO Ambassador Hat

I had a great conversation with Brad Giles, my cohost on The Growth Whisperers podcast, about the CEO ambassador role, a concept from his book Made to Thrive. Consequently, this got me thinking about a higher level of the CEO role.

Leaders are focused on strategy, engaging people, driving execution and ensuring financial performance. As a result, the CEO ambassador role is often overlooked. However, CEOs often spend too much time on things that actually create less value than the impactful benefits of enhancing their company's most important relationships.

One of my clients, in the farming space, calls this “windshield time”. To stay connected to a farmer who is critical to their business, they jump into a pickup truck and drive through the fields to see the crops.

It’s simply about making people feel connected, important and proud to be working with your organization.

So, put on your ambassador hat and get out there.

The Challenge

Where can you create pride and connection in relationships key to your organization? This can be with customers, community, industry, employees or shareholders.
How can you find time to connect them to what matters, to your purpose and values?

For more about the value of the ambassador role, join us for episode 66 of The Growth Whisperers podcast.

We help high-achieving leaders to have it all – a great business and a rewarding life. Contact us for simple and impactful advice. No BS. No fluff.

by lawrenceandco

Proactive Recruiting Helps Stack Your Talent Deep

“Stacking the right people, in the right seats, is a game changer.”

Ever think that leaders should be more like commissioned salespeople in the sense that they should be constantly prospecting?

One important way directors, executives and managers can do this is through proactive recruiting. This helps leaders build relationships with key (prospective) employees they want to add to their team. Furthermore, this can also apply to new clients in some cases because they have influencing connections. This is no different than a general building an army. You want to build your bench deep and stack it with talent.

In fast growing companies, sometimes team members don't make the cut, or you need to expand into a new region, or add more horsepower and knowledge to the team. When that happens, most companies rely on external recruiters or HR to bring in people, and that process can be slow, expensive, and reactive.

Invest 1-Hour Per Week on Proactive Recruiting

But if you spent just an hour a week on proactive recruitment strategies and activities - like the executives, directors and managers do in some of the best companies we’ve seen - you’ll build your own robust prospect lists.

For example, if a CEO and team of seven people each had a list of 20 amazing high-performers you’d love to have in the company to continually follow up with, that’s a prospect list of 140 people. (And, if you're a business-to-business organization, there’s potential for some other business to come out of it, too.)

What would happen if you bring in the next level of directors, say 20 people? That's 400 A-Players you’re in conversations with every month and working to bring towards your organization.

Then, when some of that amazing talent gets dislodged or frustrated, there’s a very good chance they’re going to come your way and land, just at the right time.

After 25 years working with scaling companies, we know execution is a discipline but stacking the right people, in the right seats, is a game changer.

The Challenge

Where is your list of 14, 140 or 400?
What’s your plan to follow up the 17 times it will probably take to land them?

For more about having a Topgrading virtual bench, join us for episode 69 of The Growth Whisperers podcast.

We help high-achieving leaders to have it all – a great business and a rewarding life. Contact us for simple and impactful advice. No BS. No fluff.

by lawrenceandco

Strategic Leadership vs Tactical Decision-Making

“For enduring growth, CEOs and senior leaders need to escape so they can think and work on the longer term.”

Do you practice strategic leadership or are you more operational in nature?

What percentage of your time do you spend making short-term tactical decisions versus those that will help and impact your business in the long term?

For enduring growth, CEOs and senior leaders need to escape so they can think and work on the longer term. And the CEO must get over the burden of dealing with day-to-day issues. (That's why many companies have a COO or President.)

For those who use the One-Page plan that means you should be involved in decisions that impact the business three years down the road. That’s easy to say and hard to do because a lot of people are very tactical and operational, caught up in putting out daily fires.

And there are often different reasons leaders get caught up in the tactical weeds:

sometimes it's simply the style of the CEO
the strength of their team isn't where it needs to be
the dynamics of the business
what the business requires now - or what the business required five years ago, and the strategy hasn’t been changed.

Three P's of Strategic Leadership

Here are three different areas you can look at to improve your ability to be a more strategic leader. This will allow your business to grow better, faster and more sustainably. You might even enjoy yourself more.

Focus on long-term development and acquisition vs short-term performance.
Get involved in decision-making that impacts the business three years down road vs quarter to quarter.
Work on things that refine the long-term value of the company vs the short term.

The Challenge

What two things can you stop doing that keep you too involved in short-term and operational aspects of your business?
What can you start doing to be more engaged in the longer term (a three-year-plus horizon)?

For more about this, check out episode 70 of The Growth Whisperers podcast.

We help high-achieving leaders to have it all – a great business and a rewarding life. Contact us for simple and impactful advice. No BS. No fluff.

by lawrenceandco

Brand Authenticity and Consistency

“Authenticity can't be replicated or faked. You're either real or you're not.” - Bibi Bourelly (singer/songwriter).

Sometimes companies are so keen to get or impress new customers or employees that they overstate what they do or how they actually operate.

This is why, when we first interact and get closer to them (or a new person), we can be very cautious, skeptical or apprehensive to believe what we are being told is real. We need a few experiences to make sure it’s not a façade.

We want to ensure what we’re being sold is true - and not a mixed message or overstatement. We do this to avoid disappointment or frustration. If we’ve already signed a contract, we do it to avoid massive amounts of pain or disruption.

And it’s why people like to affirm, through feedback from other customers, that a company is what they represent. We value referrals from friends and family, and online reviews for companies like Airbnb, Amazon and Yelp. This is also why some people try to game that system.

WYSIWYG

People are loyal to some incredibly successful brands because they consistently give us what we want - not just from one experience or ten but hundreds. The more positive our experiences the more loyal we are because, deep down inside, we can trust them and feel safe from frustration or disappointment.

This is brand authenticity or WYSIWYG (What You See is What You Get) at work.

Think about Starbucks or Apple. Think about your favourite local restaurant, your siblings or coworkers or your best friend. Through hundreds of experiences, you know what you can expect - both good and bad.

People are also willing to try new brands or work with new companies because they’re open to a different and, hopefully, positive experience.

In my work and personal relationships, the people I trust the most are those who don’t over-package. They are easier to trust more quickly because they are open and transparent - and at the heart of two of our firm’s core values:

Tell it like it is
Do what you say and then some.

I’m not expecting every company or human to be perfect, but it makes it much easier when people are on the same frequency.

And just because someone is open and transparent doesn’t mean that they’re not misrepresenting who they are or what their company is about, but it is easier to determine that when they share authentically.

In the end, psychological comfort is the root of trust in all relationships. We trust brands and people that consistently behave like we expect.

The Challenge

When you think about your company, where are the opportunities for more consistency between what you say and what people experience? Consider this for both your customers and for your employees.
What can you do about this?

We help high-achieving leaders to have it all – a great business and a rewarding life. Contact us for simple and impactful advice. No BS. No fluff.

by lawrenceandco