Category Archives: Teams

Quiet Power of Fundamentals

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Christophe Mengin pulled away from the peleton at 23.5km into today’s race. He pounded through wind and rain for four hours, at times extending his lead beyond 8:00 minutes. In the end, the peleton caught him. With less than 500 meters in the race and the lead down to ten seconds, Alexandre Vinokourov launched from the pack to overtake the lone survivor. From the helicopter, you could see Mengin stretch into a hard right turn and, on the rain-slick pavement, go skidding across two lanes into the barriers.

The ensuing chaos saw riders pile up left and right. The top sprinters, positioned for the final gallop, found themselves upside down or skeetering around.

“Where’s Lance? Where’s Lance?”

Except for the time trials earlier in the week, these first stages have been fodder for sprinters, the top teams always up front, always launching their guns at the finish. Team Discovery quietly goes about its work. It keeps the pace quick but refrains from the frenetic and dangerous conclusions at the line. They have focused on speed in the time trials and keeping Lance safe during each race.

It’s not flash, it’s fundamentals. Quiet power and speed. In the overall standings, Team Discovery occupies five of the top eight places, with Lance Armstrong in Yellow and his teammate George Hincapie right behind.

So often, as Managers, we look for flashy sprint behavior to make our mark, but it is the quiet power of fundamentals that truly spells success. As a Manager, where do you focus your team?

Standings after Stage 6

1 001 ARMSTRONG, Lance USA DSC 17:58:11.000

2 004 HINCAPIE, George USA DSC 17:59:06.000

3 019 VINOKOUROV, Alexandre KAZ TMO 17:59:13.000

4 028 VOIGT, Jens GER CSC 17:59:15.000

5 023 JULICH, Bobby USA CSC 17:59:18.000

6 008 RUBIERA, José Luis ESP DSC 17:59:25.000

7 007 POPOVYCH, Yaroslav UKR DSC 17:59:27.000

8 005 NOVAL GONZALEZ, Benjamin ESP DSC 17:59:37.000

9 021 BASSO, Ivan ITA CSC 17:59:37.000

10 022 ARVESEN, Kurt-Asle NOR CSC 17:59:43.000

My hat is off to OLN for their coverage of the Tour. I am trying to stay way back on this side of the hill as far as reporting the “action” while looking for insights that illustrate this small study of management. For those who are interested, detailed coverage of the TDF is available at www.olntv.com.

Saturday’s Prologue

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This Saturday begins the prologue to the 2005 Tour de France. Since I grew up in Austin, I have more than a passing interest in Lance Armstrong’s attempt at a seventh Tour win. Four riders in history have won five Tours, only Lance has won six. If he brings home a seventh, the earliest a newcomer could best that record would be year 2013.

While there is enormous respect for Lance, there is no shortage of riders committed to bring his streak to a screeching halt. Toppling Lance Armstrong would be an emotional maelstrom.

But who, and how?

What appears to be a mass of tires, spokes, and expensive carbon fiber all charging headlong to the finish is more precisely an intricate team sport, playing games with physics, wind resistance and muscle fatigue. Should Lance be beaten, it will NOT be by a single racer, but by a tight cohesive team, working together better than Team Discovery.

From July 2 through July 24, we will watch the drama. If you are a Manager in your organization, you will find principles of leadership, coordination, cooperation and challenge on the faces of world class athletes. There will be lessons for any team willing to learn. -TF

P.S. To watch live and same day coverage, tune to cable channel OLN. Listings can be found at olntv.com.

P.P.S. To read past posts about teamwork and cycling, follow the link to Managementblog’s homepage, scroll down the Category list and follow the link to Henrik’s Wheel.

No Top of Head Thinking

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I was sitting at the back, observing the meeting. Edward was struggling to get participation and when he got it, the response was ill formed, almost off topic.

I pulled Edward aside during the first break. “I can see you are a little frustrated. You ask a question and no one raises their hand. After a few seconds, you can’t stand the silence, so you answer your own question. And when someone does answer, they are talking off the top of their head.”

“Yep, that’s the way it usually goes. Kind of a dull group, don’t you think?” Edward replied.

“Not at all,” I said, raising my eyebrows. “This will take some courage and some patience, but your group will brighten immediately. Never let them talk off the top of their head. Every time you ask a question to the group, ask them to write down their response. Just one sentence or a phrase, but they have to write their response first. Now that means you will have to endure a little silence, but not more than you are enduring now, only this time it is planned silence. Ask each team member to write their response, then put down their pen, so you will know they have an idea. Then, wait.”

Edward went back into the meeting and he posed the next question to the group. He asked them to write down their response. Then he waited. Twenty seconds later, seven people were ready to participate, and their ideas were good because they were no longer talking off the top of their heads. -TF

Crabs in a Basket

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“Have you ever been crabbing?” I asked. We were discussing the negativity of Chet’s team. Every meeting, they seemed successful at shooting down everything that Chet wanted to do.

“Crabbing, you know, where you trap crabs, pull them out of the water and throw them into a basket?”

Chet looked at me a little strangely. “What’s that got to do with my team?”

“Here’s the thing, Chet. If you only have one crab in the basket, you have to really watch him, because he will crawl out of that basket lickety split. The trick is to catch some more crabs quickly. It’s amazing. With a bunch of crabs, when one starts to crawl out, all the other crabs attach to his legs and pull him back into the basket. You would think they would all try to crawl out, but that’s not what happens. Sometimes, teams are the same way.

“Here is the way I set things up. Before I describe a possible solution, I go around and have each team member describe the major benefits if we are successful at solving the problem. If I can get them to focus on the benefits, they are less likely to focus on the crab trying to crawl out of the basket.” -TF

Head Down Doing the Work

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The pace line was threading its way along the beach route. Our morning ritual had six bikes one behind the other holding 22 mph into a stiff headwind. I was second in line behind my favorite draft. As our speed climbed to 23, I shifted forward, watching my rpms move to 101.

Second on the paceline carries responsibility. While the lead certainly has more visibility for road hazards (cars, potholes, water), second position is the backup. The lead sometimes gets head down doing the work into the wind and fails to focus forward. Often, second position is relied upon to catch road hazards missed by the lead. Sometimes, it’s just a wake-up call to the front.

Head down doing the work can be dangerous. That’s why it takes a team. Take a look at your team. How often do things get overlooked? How often does the big picture fade away because everyone has their head down doing the work?

Sometimes, you have to look up. If you are the lead, that’s you. Make sure your second is looking, too. It takes all eyes. -TF

Getting Tough for Real

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Question:
Related to your discussion about Reserve Power. I understand not driving your team to the brink of exhaustion. But how do you build Reserve Power?

Response:
Building reserve power for a team would be like any athletic training. The point of athletic conditioning is to build either endurance or sprint power. Athletic conditioning uses drills which are planned and controlled. Here are some suggestions for drills to build reserve power with your team:

  • Cross training drills.
  • What-if drills.
  • Higher volume production drills.
  • All hands on deck drills.
  • Change order drills.
  • Change over drills.
  • Time Motion studies.
  • Broken machine/alternate machine drills.
  • One-person-short drills.

Because these are drills, they can be planned and anticipated. My favorite is the cross training drill. Announce that “the second Wednesday at 10:00am, these selected people will work a 2 hour period in another position. Between now and drill day, team members should prepare with short term training. ”

These drills build reserve power so when things get tough for real, your team can effectively respond to extraordinary demands. -TF

Reserve Power

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Saturday was 75 miles downwind into Key Largo and Sunday was 75 miles back, into the teeth of the same blustery wind-gift from the day before. The event was the MS-150 to raise money for Muscular Dystrophy.

At the end of a single day cycling event, the bike is parked, muscles stretched and beer consumed. A multi-day event requires a different strategy, a strategy called Reserve Power.

On the second day, through a particularly gusty stretch, leaning into the handlebars, turning 105 cadence, it occurred to me how often projects go this same way. Anticipated energy and resources are consumed, yet the project continues. Overtime cranks in and phone calls home tell of delayed dinners.

Often in management, we focus on tangible resources, raw goods and machine capacity. An important area we often miss is the management of energy. This is seen in morale, momentum and enthusiasm.

On a bicycle, running out of energy is called bonking, and once bonked, recovery to continue is rare and performance dramatically compromised. As a manager, be aware of the emotional energy of your team. Manage that energy. Build reserve power. -TF

Gap Analysis

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The meeting took a sudden turn for the worse when Emil stood up, walked over in front of Sharon and slammed down the report. Up to then, things had been ambling along with the usual finger pointing, back biting and general nastiness. Now, there was real confrontation.

The GPS Project had been off track for several weeks and had been the whipping post of every department meeting in the past 14 days. As I listened, it occurred to me that, what had been said, was true. The problem was in the structure of the conversation, or the lack of it, that prevented the team from making progress.

I suggested a Gap Analysis. This is quick and easy. Take a flipchart piece of paper and make three columns. Column 3 is used to define what we expected. This could come from any list of goals, benchmarks or milestones. Column 1 is to document what we got, instead. This is what actually happened in relation to the expectation. The middle column is the gap, which can now be used to document what actions can be taken to close the gap.

This simple structure can be used to turn the whining, moaning and complaining into a useful conversation. -TF

The Cause of the Problem

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Monday’s blog about open door policies struck a nerve. Here is an excerpt from one of many e-mails:

“People tell me that I should have one of those number machines outside my door, like the ones they have at the deli. Sometimes, my open door policy really does prevent me from doing my job and meeting deadlines.”

As a manager, people line up outside your door because you have trained them to do that. One day, they had a problem, they brought it to you and you solved it. Now, whenever they have a problem, they bring it to you. As a manager, you have created a downward spiral that continually shifts the burden to your shoulders. If you manage a team of six, you have six people constantly dumping problems on your desk.

Stop it.

As a manager, it is your responsibility to reverse the flow. As a manager, your primary objective is to build a team that can solve its own problems. Train your people to bring you solutions.

One of my clients printed up a small pad of paper that he kept on the corner of his desk. Whenever a team member arrived with a problem, he ripped off the top sheet and sent them to the conference room for ten minutes. Here is what the sheet said:

1. What do you think is causing the problem?
2. Name three solutions that might solve the problem?
3. Which is the best solution that might solve the root cause of the problem?

So, ten minutes later, the manager would go to the conference room, only to find it empty. Problem solved. -TF

Simple Exercise

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The meeting had come to a standstill. Oh, Marion was still talking, but no one was listening. No one was thinking, no one was contributing.

“Marion, stop!” There was an immediate startled moment in the room. “In one sentence, Marion, what is the issue we are talking about?”

“Well, it’s not really an issue, it’s just an update on the Phoenix project, just the stuff that happened last week.”

“That’s not true, Marion. This is not just a report on what happened last week. The Phoenix project is four weeks behind schedule, the clients pissed off and we don’t have a clue what is driving it into the ground.”

Simple exercise. Pair off the team members and give them the following assignment: Create twelve questions designed to expose what needs to be corrected on the Phoenix project. Only questions are allowed. Time frame: Six minutes to create the questions.

Six minutes later, this meeting had a dramatic change in mood, tempo and attitude. Marion was no longer comfortable responding to the questions. It is possible we were finally talking about something real. -TF