Tag Archives: capability

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?”

Can’t or Won’t

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“My team seems to think there are some problems they face that will never be fixed,” Kari explained. “It’s always, here we go again. Same problem, different customer.”

“Do you think they can’t fix the problem or won’t fix the problem?” I asked.

“Can’t fix or won’t fix, what’s the difference? The problem still ends up on my desk, again,” Kari flatly stated.

“Often, people prefer a problem they can’t fix to a solution they don’t like.” **

Kari thought for a moment. “You’re right. To fix the problem, they have to stop production and figure out what’s going wrong. Instead, they would rather flare a few tempers and call for help.”

“This is where you have to decide if this is a matter of can’t or won’t. Often, someone who won’t solve a problem, or even try to solve the problem, feels like they don’t have the capability to solve the problem. They feel incompetent and give up. Your job, as a manager is not to solve a solveable problem, but to build the competence of the team to solve the problem.”
—
**Shades of Lee Thayer, Competent Organization

Breakpoint

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“I know you want me to press my team, stress test my system,” Naomi agreed, “but what if they are simply not capable in that pressure?”

“When things are calm, wouldn’t now be a good time to find out?” I replied. “Identify the breaking point now, instead of after it is broken.”

Naomi looked reflective. “I can do that. I can run drills, like a sports team in practice. And, I know I am looking for the breaking point, but what about the wobbly point?”

“Capability is much like performance. The best indicator of performance is performance. The best indicator of capability is capability. And, the problems that must be solved, the decisions that must be made have to be within the capability of the team member. When you assign a decision to someone who does not possess the capability for the decision, what happens?”

“That’s easy. First they avoid the decision, deflect the decision, or find a scapegoat for when it inevitably fails,” Naomi said, without hesitation.

“There’s your wobble, that’s what you have to pay attention to.”

Your Contribution

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The competent individual has a firm sense of the capability they possess and capability beyond. Periods of doubt creep in, but that leaves room for growth and maturity. Periods of doubt are painful, as the individual moves from an ordered world to one where there is doubt.

In this chasm, most of the problems we face are self-inflicted. Looking at any problem we encounter, there are the following characteristics. The problem. The problem’s impact. The cause of the problem. The context. And, then, there is you.

You (and we, because I have the same problems as you) are part of the problem. You have made contribution to the problem and its impact. You may be the cause of the problem. If you don’t face your contribution, any solution will leave lingering conditions for the problem to resurface, perhaps uglier than before.

It is always easier to deal with an external problem out there, than an internal problem closer to your heart.

The Distraction of Advice

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Al Ripley believed, for every management problem, there was a management consultant. As issues surfaced in meetings, Al would look down his nose, over the top rim of his glasses, and ask the inevitable. “Don’t we know a consultant that can help us with that?” Outbound Air.

Consultants may be necessary and provide helpful direction, but a consultant will never lead you to the promised land.

The lower the capability of the team, the more consultants, the more tools will be purchased to offset. Those temporary measures can only be hurdled by building the capability of the team. Success can only be achieved with the right tools and guidance in the capable hands of your team. It has less to do with the guidance and tools and more to do with the capability of the team.

Integrated Competence

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To create a hierarchy of competence, we have to understand the nature of competence. “I will know it when I see it” is not really helpful. Elliott defined these four things as absolute requirements for success in a role, any role, no matter the discipline.

  • Capability
  • Skill
  • Interest, passion
  • Required behaviors

Competence is the integration of these four factors. If we want to build a hierarchy of competence, we have to understand each and what that integration looks like.

Capability and Skill
Competence is a combination of Capability and Skill. If I do not have the capability for the work, no amount of skills training (technical knowledge and practice) will be helpful. And, if I don’t have the skill, you will never see my capability. Competence is a combination of both.

Interest and Passion
Interest and passion for the work will influence the amount of time for practice. The more interested I am, the more time I will spend in practice. And if I don’t practice a skill, the skill goes away, competence goes away. Practice arrives with many qualities, frequency of practice, duration of practice, depth of practice, accuracy of practice.

Required Behaviors
Something as simple as showing up for work on time is a required behavior. I may have the capability, skill and passion, but if I don’t show up for work, competence is invisible.

Desperately Seeking Competence
Building a competence hierarchy begins at the individual level.  It’s a basic building block. Competence must be identified, selected, developed, improved and practiced. For competence to flourish, it must be placed within a hierarchy where the value, the energy and the flow is based on competence.

Your Assumption Might Be Wrong

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“I am pretty sure that Isaac is a Stratum I and that’s why he is having difficulty with his new responsibilities,” Nelson explained.

“Isaac’s not doing well?” I asked.

“No, I swear, I have explained things to him a dozen times. He always says that he understands, but when I look at the work, he is like a deer in the headlights. Definitely Stratum I.”

“And if you are wrong?”

“I might be wrong?” Nelson tilted.

“What if he is just not interested in the work he is assigned?”

“But that’s the work I gave him to do,” Nelson replied.

“Just because you gave it to him, doesn’t mean he places value on that work. And just because he underperforms, doesn’t mean he is a Stratum I. Your assumption may lead you down the wrong road. Here are some better questions that are more helpful.

  1. Does Isaac have the right skills for the assigned task? Is there some technical knowledge that he needs to know and has he practiced enough to gain the required skill?
  2. Is Isaac interested in the work? Does he place a high value on its completion?
  3. Has Isaac been effective in completing tasks with a similar Time Span?

Don’t Judge People

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From the Ask Tom mailbag –

Question:
It’s been at least four years since you spoke to my TEC group. I was chatting with one of my members yesterday and he asked me if I knew whether there was a profiling tool available that indicates a person’s capability related to stratum level?

Response:
I had the same question in 2002. The answer was and still is, no. There are some consultants who propose to have a profiling solution, but I would question its validity. Anecdotally, most profiling tools have about a .66 correlation with reality. You might say, well, that’s not too shabby until you understand the flipping a coin has a .50 correlation. So, even if there were a psychometric assessment, its validity would likely not be any better than the others.

I don’t judge people. I’m not very good at it. So, let me propose a much cleaner method. Focus on the work. I don’t judge people, but I do judge the work. Work is decision making and problem solving. Focus there.
Problem Solving Methodology

  • S-I – Trial and Error, substituting a single variable at a time until something works.
  • S-II – Cumulative diagnostics, experience, best practice. Solving a problem by connecting to a best practice.
  • S-III – Cause and effect, if-then, required for a single serial system or a single critical path, root cause analysis.
  • S-IV – Multi-system analysis, how one system impacts its neighboring system, based on outputs and inputs, or capacity mis-match.

Look at problem solving required in the work. Then look at the candidate. Is this person any good at solving problems at that level. If they are, that is a clue. Design a project with embedded problem solving, see how they do.

Don’t overthink this level-of-work stuff. It’s not that difficult.

Skill and Capability

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“I want to send this guy back to training,” Roger pursed his lips.

“Again?” I replied. “This would be the third time through.”

“I know, I know. But the mistakes he makes and the bone-headed decisions he makes, they just seem careless. If he would apply himself a little harder, he might have a break-through.”

“Roger, you have a classic managerial case of fixitis,” I replied. “You think you can fix people.”

Roger nodded. “Yes, I guess I do.”

“There is a big difference between skill and capability. You can train a skill, a skill can be learned. A skill can be practiced, honed and coached. But, you cannot teach capability. Capability is what it is. Please understand, capability grows and matures through a lifetime, but not from a two week training period.”