Category Archives: Competence

Information, Understanding and Action

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“When you had the meeting,” I asked, “and two people volunteered ideas, how did you know they were the ones you could count on and delegate to?”

“I didn’t,” Madison replied. “Snap judgement would have said, give them a promotion, give them a raise, but just because they had one or two good ideas does not mean they could actually execute. Just because someone has information doesn’t mean they understand it. And, just because someone understands it, doesn’t mean they can take action, or will take action.”

“And?”

“So, I asked each of them to put together a small project team and test their idea to see how it worked. It was a project, on the real line, with real project members, using real materials and assemblies.”

“What did you learn?” I wanted to know.

“Both teams were successful,” Madison answered. “I have two leaders that I can continue to assign project work. Somewhere, there will be a failure point and then, I will know where they will bump their head. We can always work inside head bumps, but now I will know.”

“I’m encouraged,” I nodded.

“Not done yet,” Madison insisted. “Just because they have the information, doesn’t mean they understand it. Just because they understand it, doesn’t mean they will take action. Just because they take action, doesn’t mean they can consistently act to form a habit. That’s next.”

Wrinkles, Bumps and Calamities

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“Tell me, Madison,” I prompted. “When you think about your team, what are the characteristics you find most valuable in a team member?”

“That’s a tough one,” she replied. “I have a pretty good team. I could look at it by who produces the most output, but I manage the incoming work and spread it out evenly, so no one person gets overloaded. I could look at it by who produces the highest quality work, but we have a defined set of performance standards that every project has to meet. And, these are not mediocre threshold standards, but identify the quality that sets our company apart from our competition.”

“I understand, pace and quality are good measures of output, but still, you have team members you lean on more than others. Step through your team, one by one, what are the characteristics you look for?” I pressed.

“When things run smoothly, there is little difference,” Madison pondered out loud. “But, you know things never run smoothly. There are always wrinkles, bumps in the road and the occasional calamity. My best, and there are only a couple on my team, are those who take the wrinkle in stride, hurdle the bumps with a little adjustment and gather themselves to meet the occasional calamity. It’s when things go wrong that the best people shine.”

“Example?”

“When things go wrong, meaning something unexpected happens, most people tense up. Their logic narrows. They force solutions that don’t work, rely on old fixes that didn’t really fix. My best team members feel the same tension of uncertainty, but open alternate solutions. In fact, my best team members think about alternate solutions before the wrinkle occurs. It’s as if they are in flow in ambiguity. They remain calm. Their focus narrows, but their logic opens up to see underlying causes to the bump in the road. When they fix something, it addresses the specific situation AND provides a lesson in anticipation. In short, they make wrinkles, bumps and calamities go away. Those things still happen, but I rarely hear about them until we debrief the project.”

Is Paying Attention a Skill?

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“Meeting, after meeting, after meeting,” Addison lamented. “If it’s not a meeting about this, it’s a meeting about that.”

“Management is about meetings,” I replied. “If you stood back from all the meetings your company has, what is the big subject area for most?”

“That’s easy,” she nodded. “Most meetings are about some shortfall, some underperformance, a debrief on why something went wrong, a meeting to fix something next time. If you listed all the meeting subjects, you would think we were a company of incompetent stooges.”

“When there is a meeting about underperformance, how would you characterize the conversation?” I asked.

“Again, that’s easy. It starts by looking for the reason why. It ends up attempting to blame someone or some thing. It gets defensive right away, everyone CYA. No real accountability for the consequence.”

“You described the play as a group of incompetent stooges. Setting aside the stooge part, is it a problem of competence?” I wanted to know.

“Yes, you could say it that way,” Addison stopped her thought. “The blame conversation usually describes someone not paying attention, or someone skipping a step, or someone too lazy to double-check. But, I don’t know if its just an unwillingness to pay attention, or a lack of skill in paying attention.”

“Is there a skill in paying attention?”

“If you break it down,” she explained. “What should catch your attention? How often do you pay attention? What distracts you from paying attention? How do you know when you are paying attention?” A few seconds of silence lingered. “We train on the steps. We train on the sequence. We train on the quality standard. But, we never train on paying attention. And, not paying attention causes most of our problems.”

Mastery and Practice

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“And, how does the rest of your team see Carl?” I asked.

Carson smiled. “I get it. You are right. The rest of the team sees him as a brown noser. They laugh behind his back. Maybe secretly jealous.”

“Jealous of what,” I prodded.

“Carl gets some preferential treatment. If we can only send one person to training, we pick Carl, because we know Carl will come back and share what he learned.”

“Does the team see Carl as successful?” I wanted to know.

“Yes, they do, but they think it was all about luck. Sometimes, I have to step in and mitigate some of the taunting.”

“So, having someone competent, inquisitive and curious on the team can create a problem for you?”

“Yes,” Carson nodded. “As long as people see success as luck, it can be made fun of. As the manager, I have to be vigilant and communicate success as a mastery and practice of fundamentals, enthusiasm and support of the team.”

“Of course, it doesn’t hurt to be a little lucky.”

If It’s Not Luck

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“When you recruit a new person onto your team, what are you looking for?” I asked.

“I think we have dispensed with luck as a criteria,” Carson replied.

I smiled. “Yes, we can dispense with luck. What are you looking for in a new team member? In fact, let’s take a look at your current team. If you had to hold someone up as a model, what would I see in that person?”

Carson nodded. “Carl. It would be Carl.”

“And, what would I see in Carl?”

“Easy. Carl shows up a half-hour early, stays a half hour late, every day. In every training session, he always has his hand up asking questions. When he makes a mistake, he always owns up to it, then fixes it. I would like everybody to be like Carl.”

“So, here are four questions.

  • Do you trust him to make good decisions at his level of work?
  • Does he practice the skills required in his role, every day?
  • Do you observe commitment to the practice required in his role?
  • Does he meet the required behaviors in the work he does, for safety, for cooperation?

“It would be easier, if it was all about luck,” Carson said.

Are You Lucky?

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“What do you think it takes to be successful?” I asked.

“Luck,” Carson snapped. “Sometimes, pure dumb luck.”

“And, do you feel like you have been lucky?” I wanted to know.

“Not lucky enough,” Carson replied.

“If luck can’t get you where you want to be, then what is it? You see, Carson, everyone looks for the magic fairy dust, the secret formula that reveals the hat trick. But, if you’re not lucky enough, and most people aren’t, then what does it take to be successful?” I asked again.

Carson was silent, thinking.

“Let me change the question,” I said. “What does it take to become competent? I think you will find the answer is NOT luck.”

Earning Trust

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“I want to empower my team members,” Reese explained. “I know you prefer I use the word authority instead of empower, but I can’t give my team the authority to make decisions. I am the one with the authority.”

“And, if that is the way you think, then you will be the same manager with same underperforming team until you grow old and gray,” I nodded.

“But, I don’t trust my team to make the right decision in the crunch of a problem,” Reese protested. “How do I give my team the authority to make the wrong decision when the stakes are so high?”

“Lower the stakes,” I said. “Do not empower someone by giving them a promotion. The risks may be too high, and you, as the manager have to manage the risk. Do not give them a promotion, give them a project, and manage the risk in the project. If you give someone a promotion and they fail, you have a chocolate mess on your hands. If you give someone a project and they fail, you just have a failed project, and you manage the risk in the project.”

Reese was quiet. “And, if they successfully complete a series of projects, my trust will go up. If there is a promotion, it will be an earned promotion.”

It’s the Golfer, Not the Clubs

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“So, you have the best tools, the best machinery that money can buy?” I asked.

“Yes,” Rolo replied. “The very best.”

“And, yet your team still underperforms?” I continued.

“Yes, and we purchase the best in raw materials of highest quality, minimum defects,” Rolo nodded.

“And, yet your team still underperforms?” I asked again. “And, your training. I assume you have the best in training?”

“Of course,” he agreed. “I mean, it’s not like we don’t run into production problems, but when we do, it shuts down the line, everything stops while we figure out the problem. Seems odd that it takes so long because we have a best practice for almost every problem that occurs. We are supposed to know what to do.”

“So, what’s the problem?” I wanted to know.

“I don’t know,” Rolo shook his head. “We have invested in the best of everything for our people.”

“What if you don’t have the right people,” I looked at Rolo squarely. “How do you invest on getting the right people?”

Life Happens or Does It?

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“I can’t believe what just happened,” Cora explained. “We have been waiting for six weeks for a special material. Today, it landed on our loading dock, and it’s the wrong material.”

“And?” I asked.

“It’s got a six week lead time. We’re two weeks beyond deadline already,” she lamented. “The customer calls me twice a day. Yesterday, I told them the material would be here today. And, now it’s going to be another six weeks. I checked the SKU number and saw the mistake we made in ordering.”

“It seems like this is happening a lot, lately?” I made a question out of a statement.

“I just don’t know what it happening to us. Bad luck, I guess.” Cora looked disoriented.

“Is that the way life is? A series of things that happen to you?” I wanted to know.

“Yes, isn’t that just the way life is?”

“Depends on the way you see things,” I nodded. “If you see life as a series of things that happen to you, things will continue to happen to you. If you see things as a series of accomplishments, you will behave differently.”

“How so?” Cora looked at the ceiling, then back to me.

“If this project is just something that happens to you, then the project will take its own twists and turns before it ends eight weeks late. If this project is a series of accomplishments that you personally drive, what changes?”

“You mean, we might double-check SKU numbers?” she smiled.

“Double-check SKU numbers, create a project schedule that accommodates real lead times on materials, call the customer before they call you to manage expectations. It’s all in the way you see the world and how you participate.”

Permission and Competence

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“That makes sense,” Nadia agreed. “I have been guilty of empowering my team to do things they did not have the capability to do. Didn’t turn out so well.”

“Yes, that weasel word of empowerment has very little to do with granting permission,” I replied. “Empowerment, or rather authority to make a specific decision has more to do with competence. It is competence that creates authority, not permission.”