Author Archives: Tom Foster

About Tom Foster

Tom Foster spends most of his time talking with managers and business owners. The conversations are about business lives and personal lives, goals, objectives and measuring performance. In short, transforming groups of people into teams working together. Sometimes we make great strides understanding this management stuff, other times it’s measured in very short inches. But in all of this conversation, there are things that we learn. This blog is that part of the conversation I can share. Often, the names are changed to protect the guilty, but this is real life inside of real companies.

Certainty or Readiness

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“But, I want my plan to be realistic,” Tyler protested. “I want to think about the most likely scenario, and set in place the steps to meet our objectives.”

“Yes, but the most likely scenario rarely happens,” I replied. “Planning is all about readiness. Your realistic plan may be wrong, and the steps you set in place may lead you down a path of futility.”

“But I still have to have a plan, don’t I?”

“Yes, a plan that considers a number of scenarios, with contingencies and alternate paths to the goal. A plan is less about certainty and more about readiness.”

Plan for Certainty or Flexibility?

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“I think I have it all down,” Tyler reported. “I’ve studied the trends, defined our customer, studied our price points. It took a lot of thinking, but I am satisfied with all the data that supports our plan.”

“Been doing a lot of thinking, have you?” I asked.

“It was a lot of stuff to pull together, took a bit of time, but, yes,” he nodded.

“What you have described is a collection of known elements from your past, that you are betting will stay the same,” I replied. “That’s all well and good, might make you feel better, but the tough thinking is about your imagination. You have researched all the answers, but have you gathered all the questions? It is wonderful to nail things down so your plan feels rock solid, but life rarely happens that way. Your plan may give you guidance, but it may also distract you from seeing something in your periphery that changes the world around you.”

Prescriptive Solutions

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“I got my weekend reading done,” Lucas was proud. “This is the second management book this month,” he nodded.

“I encourage reading,” I replied, eyeing the bright red cover, written by a famous author. “What did you learn?”

“This guy has a recipe he says is guaranteed. If I just follow the steps, he promises the same result he had with his company.”

I smiled. “Do you respect this author? Do you believe he was successful in the problems he tackled? Do you think he had a deep understanding of his circumstances and his points of leverage?”

“Absolutely,” Lucas nodded. “The author is very well respected, with a very successful company.”

“Do you think the author has a deep understanding of the problems you face, with your company, in your market, with your team?” I wanted to know.

“Well, of course not, he doesn’t know my specific problems,” he said.

“You see, for this book to helpful, you have to understand your problems as deeply as the author understood his problems. And, they will be different. Whatever prescription he laid out is unlikely to work in your scenario. The value in the book is not the prescriptive solution, though that is what everyone skips to. The value is in the understanding of the problem, the analysis, alternative solutions. Understand your problems as deeply as the author understood his.”

Management Panacea

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“I have a new team,” Alex announced. “We had a tough week. I think I may have thrown them into the deep end of the pool and just expected them to swim.”

“How so?” I asked.

“I know it was a complicated project, but it was the next project on the schedule, had to be done,” he described. “Lots of moving parts, a bit of coordination. Problem is, this new team didn’t even have the basic fundamentals down, much less the ability to sequence each step of the process.”

“And, your game plan?” I wanted to know.

“I was thinking about one of those team building programs, you know, get everybody to know each other. I hear good reviews for that type of activity.”

“Do you really think that’s the problem?” I shook my head. “You have a new team, no skills, no understanding, practically incompetent. No little program, no matter now popular, is a substitute for incompetence. That team building exercise may be useful down the road, but what would be a more important first step?”

It Started With Pizza

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“You know that pizza party we had last Friday, for all the people on the team who stayed late, helped us get that project shipped?” Henry smiled.

“Yes,” I replied, waiting for the rest of the story.

“That worked so well, I thought I would expand that idea,” he added. “I think, if I offered restaurant gift cards for extra effort, things might perk up around here.”

“I am all for extending appreciation,” I nodded. “Sometimes, pizza goes a long way. But, what do you think will happen with your gift card program?”

“Sometimes, I see people slow walking pieces of projects, no skip in their step, no smiles, no enthusiasm. I thought maybe, if I gave out a few gift cards, this might be a happier place.”

I winced. “If you create a gift card game, do you think it will be a happier place, or do you think you simply create a culture of performance for gift cards?”

Competence and Happiness

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“A new day, a new way?” I asked.

Sophia smirked. “Yes, but this is more difficult than I thought. I mean, I thought I would like this kind of work, I thought I would be good at it.”

“Conventional wisdom,” I said. “Isn’t that the pursuit of happiness? Find something you like and you will be good at it.”

“Don’t get me wrong, I like the work, it’s interesting, but it doesn’t seem to come natural to me,” she said, shaking her head.

“It is possible you have it backwards,” I nodded. “We like activity in which we are competent, not the other way around. Just because you like something doesn’t mean you are competent. Just because you are interested and read a book about basketball does not mean you are a good 3-point shooter. On your way to becoming a good 3-point shooter, which takes practice over practice, as you become competent, you will find your happiness. Those who are competent in their pursuit will find the most satisfaction. Those who are not competent, who did not practice, will soon become disinterested and go another way.”

Bitter Solution

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“It turned out to be a slippery slope,” Noah described. “We had the answer right in front of us. The entire team saw it, but they hesitated.”

“He who hesitates is lost?” I asked.

“I’ll say,” he replied. “The solution to the problem was going to be expensive, with no real way to push off the risk. So, we sat with the problem, we argued about it, complained about it, we pointed fingers at the enemy. All of that, instead of solving the problem.”

“In the end?” I wanted to know.

“In the end, a competitor, who was willing to do the work, swooped in and snatched the contract from our fingers.”

“And your analysis?”

Noah took a breath. “It was like we would rather argue, complain and blame. We would rather sit with the problem than come up with the painful solution we didn’t like. It may have been a bitter pill for our competitor, but they got the contract, and the margin that went with it.”

Never Do That Again

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“Needless to say, we will never do that again,” Charlotte announced.

“Indeed? How so?” I asked.

“I should have seen it coming,” she replied. “We had a similar situation last year that turned out great, though we all attributed it to blind dumb luck. This year, blind dumb luck turned out to be blind, dumb, BAD luck.”

I nodded. “They say experience is the best teacher. Is that not true?”

“Absolutely true. Like I said, we will never do that again.”

I chuckled. “Experience may be the best teacher, but it’s not experience that gets the credit. It’s the way you interpret the experience. And, what you learn, is no better than your interpretation. So, when you do your post mortem debrief, you have to look at the circumstances, the observable events, AND you have to look at your interpretations. That’s where the thinking kicks in.”

Most Important Variable

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“But, shouldn’t we start with the great management books in the literature?” Leonard questioned. “I mean the great management books, not the mediocre, not the lousy ones. Those people have tried and failed, tried again and finally succeeded. Shouldn’t I pay attention to how they did it?”

“How they did it, might be instructive,” I replied. “IF you were in those exact circumstances, at that exact time and IF you were who they were. But you’re not. You expect all things to be equal. Your circumstances are different, your time is different. Most importantly, YOU are different. The cogent variable is not the step-by-step instructions. The most important variable is YOU.”

The Way It Works

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“So you are not so high on reading books about leadership?” Leonard pushed back. “You read books on leadership. Are you saying that I shouldn’t listen to you. After all, you are the teacher.”

I smiled. “Yes, I read books. And, you choose whether to listen to me or not, it’s your choice. I know for a fact that I cannot teach leadership or management. It doesn’t happen that way. I also know, for a fact, that leadership or management can be learned. That’s the way it works.”