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.

In Memorium, Francis X. Maguire

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Many of our readers are attached one way or another to an organization called Vistage (formerly TEC). Every month, the members of each group around the world gather together to listen. They are visited by a resource speaker, who has a story to tell about management, about building a company.

Frank Maguire was on his way to tell his story, one last time. He died with his boots on.

Bud Carter, a Chair in Atlanta, in an email last night, described Frank, “a unique man whose professional life began as a late night disc-jockey in New York City, led him to serve in the Kennedy White House, work for the ABC network (hiring Ted Koppel), to be on the ground floor side-by-side with Fred Smith during the Fed Ex start-up, and there with Colonel Sanders when he sold.”

We will miss him on the circuit. Rest in Peace, Francis X. Maguire.

Not a Matter of Talking

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When I get a phone call for help, before a word is spoken, I can lay money on one of three reasons.

  1. Someone needs help with Time Management.
  2. Someone has a personality conflict with someone else.
  3. There has been a breakdown in communication that needs fixing.

And that’s how my day begins.

We experience breakdowns in communication for a whole host of reasons.

  • Difference in gender.
  • Difference in experience.
  • Difference in agenda.
  • Difference in education.
  • Difference in priorities.
  • Difference in culture.
  • Difference in values.
  • Difference in (you fill in the blank).

I don’t know if you detect a common theme.

The problem is NOT a breakdown in communication. That is only the symptom, the smokescreen that ignores the difference between two people.

To solve this problem, most people conduct a communications intervention, to examine the methods of communication to see where the problem is.

Methods of Communication

  • Speaking
  • Writing
  • Reading

You will never resolve a breakdown in communication using any of these methods, because the problem is not communication. The problem is the difference between people. This difference can only be resolved by the communication method we seldom think about, seldom practice. Only resolved by listening.

Seven Stages of Listening

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Every conversation can be calibrated. Every conversation has a platform. These are the seven stages of listening.

  1. Ignoring completely
  2. Pretending to listen
  3. Listening selectively
  4. Listening to respond
  5. Listening to understand
  6. Listening to learn
  7. Listening for the intersection where someone else’s experience meets our experience on which we can build trust.

Thinking about your relationships, as a manager, as a friend, as a stranger, as a parent. Where is your intersection with reality?

It’s Not About Talking

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“Communication. My biggest issue is communication,” explained Lawrence. “That’s what it all boils down to. If we could just communicate. If we just would communicate more effectively, things would be better.”

“Do you have trouble speaking?” I asked.

“No,” he retorted. “I always know what I want to say.”

“Well, then it seems you have that part down. If talking is the one part of communication that you don’t have a problem with, what is the other part of the conversation?”

Lawrence was a bit chagrined. He was no dummy. “Listening,” he replied.

“Lawrence, if you just listen, your customer will tell you how they want to be treated. If you just listen, your team will tell you how to solve the problem. If you just listen, your team member will tell you how they want to be lead.

“Most managers think communication is all about talking, when, the critical part is all about listening.”

Managerial Impact Related to Trust

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“Isn’t that kind of personal?”

“Well, yes.”

“Doesn’t it make people uncomfortable to talk about that?”

“Well, no.”

People like to talk about themselves. In fact, most people are actually waiting for someone to come along so they can talk about things close to the heart, what they believe in, things important. They have been waiting all their lives for someone like you to listen.

The impact you have, as a manager, directly relates to the trust in the working relationship. How do you create that trust? How do you, as a manager, create a foundation of trust that you can build on, over and over?

Our Next Subject Area Kicks Off April 12
Communication, the Mineral Rights Conversation, explores a step-by-step method to create that foundation. Most Mineral Rights Conversations last 15-30 minutes, but I have used this powerful formula to create that trust in as little as six minutes.

  • What does your team member want out of the job?
  • What influences your team member to make certain decisions?
  • What type of work does your team member place a high value on?

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They’re Not Listening

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“I think I am pretty good at explaining our policies and procedures. I mean, we spent a lot of time developing our processes. We have tested things. We know the best way to get things done. So, why doesn’t my team listen to me?” complained Megan.

“What happens?” I ask.

“Okay, there are 13 steps in this process. And there are certain things that you have to look for, like you can mess up step number two and you won’t notice until step number six, so you have to take the whole thing apart back to step two.”

“Sounds complicated.”

Megan gave me the look. “That’s why I have to explain it. But they don’t seem to listen, then they start doing things their own way. About half the production has to be scrapped.”

“What do you think is happening?”

“They’re just not listening to me,” Megan stated flatly.

“I think you are right. They’re not listening to you. Sounds like they care more about what they think than what you think?” I watched Megan for her response. She didn’t like what I said, but I was just confirming what she had observed. They weren’t listening to her.

“How can you use that to your advantage?” I continued. Megan’s look at me was similar to the look she gave her team. “Megan, let’s try something different. I got this camera from some promo give-away. Here, take it. It’s only 6 megapixel and the chip will only take 25 pictures, but why don’t you give your team this camera and ask them to document this 13 step process and see what you get.”

“But they will get it all wrong,” she protested.

“Yes, but it’s a good place to start. Tell me how it goes.”

Wrong Question

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From the Ask Tom mailbag:

Question:

I use questions to coach my team members, and they provide answers but not always the right answer. As a result, the conversation can appear like an inquisition. It’s challenging, at that time, not to revert to “telling” rather than “asking“.

Response:

If you are asking a question and you don’t get the response you want, it’s not because the response is wrong, it’s because you are asking the wrong question.

Market-Test Demand

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Last in a series with Victor Cheng, a San Francisco based business coach, and author of the Recession Proof Business.

Tom:
It’s expensive to create a new product or engage new customers in a new service. How does a company make those decisions without getting spread too thin?

Victor:
Start small. Take baby steps.

In the software industry, companies “invent” new software technologies that exist only in the minds of the management team. First, they create a PowerPoint presentation describing the software (that does not yet exist). Then they market the product as if it existed.

This is known as “slide-ware” (software that does not exist in a form other than PowerPoint). Critics of this process call the product “vaporware” because it doesn’t yet exist in physical form.

In the direct marketing industry, this is called a “market-test”. They create a marketing promotion for a non-existent product, send the direct mail piece, and count the corresponding orders — then promptly refuse to take the customer’s money.

The idea is to see if the product will sell, before committing R&D dollars to actually creating the product.

Find the cheapest, easiest way to “market-test” demand. If you can present “slide-ware” and get a large purchase order out of it, that’s a very favorable sign the product is worth investing in development.
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You can download a free e-copy of Victor’s book, The Recession-Proof Business. This concludes our series with Victor Cheng. He’s a bright guy, check him out.

Does the Customer Care About the Problem?

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Fourth in a series with Victor Cheng, a San Francisco based business coach, and author of the Recession Proof Business.

Tom:
How can a company best determine whether a new product or service is something their customer cares about?

Victor:
If the product or service is one that’s easily understood by customers, the easiest way, is to just ask them.

If the product or service is highly innovative, then this approach is unreliable. It’s like asking people who have never seen a mobile phone what they think of it. The cannot grasp the value of the innovation.

In this instance, the better approach is to ask yourself “What problem does this product/service fix for my customer?” and then ask customers how much they care about this problem.

So if I were market-testing the iPod + iTunes combined service, I would ask customers the following:

Q: “How do you find new singers/artists or songs that you might like”
A: “I listen to the radio at work/home”

Q: “And when you listen to the radio and come across a song you really like that you’d like to hear more often, what do you do?”
A: “I drive across town to go to the music store.

Q: “Do you buy the single or the whole album?”
A: “The whole album.”

Q: “Why do you buy the whole album, instead of just the song you like? How do you feel about this?”
A: “It’s the only way they sell the music. $15 for the one song I like. Expensive.”

Q: “How long does the whole trip take?”
A: “1 – 1.5 Hours.”

Hopefully you can see where I’m going with this line of questioning. If the breakthrough innovation is based on fixing a specific problem the customer is very familiar with, be darn sure the customer really cares about the problem a lot… and if they do, that’s a favorable sign that you’re on the right track.
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You can download a free e-copy of Victor’s book, The Recession-Proof Business. Our conversation continues tomorrow.

Meet Your Customer, For the First Time

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Third in a series with Victor Cheng, a San Francisco based business coach, and author of the Recession Proof Business.

Tom:
As companies expand their product and service offerings to fill holes in the market, created by retreating competitors, or even retreating suppliers, what should companies think about to increase their odds of success?

Victor:
Two things.

First, customer intimacy is a major competitive advantage in this kind of environment. The better you know your customer’s current (emphasis on the word “current”) situation and needs, the more likely you will win.

Our economy is going through massive change. This creates massive change for the consumer and businesses within the economy. You have to assume everything is different, take nothing for granted, and learn what your customers are up to, as if you’re meeting them for the first time.

Second, bring something unique or different to the table. If you’re going to fill the space left by a departing competitor, how will you distance your company from the remaining competitor? If you don’t differentiate enough, you have no assurances that your company isn’t the next one departing the marketplace?

Finding the competitive edge is much easier, when you know the customer really well. The two go hand-in-hand.

You can download a free e-copy of Victor’s book, The Recession-Proof Business. Our conversation continues tomorrow.