People tell you that you should be creative and innovate to get ahead of the competition. What they don’t tell you is that creativity and innovation lead to failure. That’s right failure.
Whenever we try something different it is probably not going to work, particularly the first (few) times. It will fail. True innovation comes from learning from that failure and tweaking and experimenting and playing with it until it works.
When developing training programs, the bulk of the work is done in the back office. But the magic happens in front of a group of participants. I rarely have an insight on how to improve wording or flow when sitting at my desk. Some of my biggest breakthroughs have been from failing in the field – forgetting what I was going to say, getting ahead of myself and presenting the sequence out of order, or getting a question that I didn’t anticipate. Getting it wrong, recovering, and seeing how it can be even better leads to huge gains.
Thomas Leonard, considered by many to be the father of personal coaching, used to intentionally overload systems and processes to see what would break first. Then he’d correct that and overload it again. This allowed him to quickly understand what worked, what didn’t, and to create airtight processes.
In the mid 1980’s Suzuki developed a groundbreaking sportbike – the GSX-R. To make the engine lighter than many thought was possible, the engineers would shave weight from a part, test, and shave more weight until it failed. Doing this over and over with each component taught them the lightest reliable weight each part could be.
The problem is that we usually try something new and when it doesn’t work we deem it failure and give up. But each failure holds a lesson that we can use for improvement.
Last night I spent (way too much) time looking for a set of pedals for my new mountain bike. I finally tracked down a brand new set I wanted on ebay in a color that was ok and at the cheapest price I’d found anywhere. I could “Buy It Now” and get free priority shipping. Awesome. Yeah, ebay!
Then, right after I completed the transaction, the bottom of the page filled up with suggested items. I forget the heading, but it was something like, “You might also be interested in…” The VERY first thing shown was the same brand and model of pedal, in the color scheme I really wanted, for less. Three seconds ago I was happy and satisfied. Now, I’m irritated and kicking myself for not finding it in the search. Too late. Instant buyer’s remorse.
A friend posted this on Facebook recently: “People don’t leave because things are hard. They leave because it’s no longer worth it.”
I tried unsuccessfully for three or four seconds to track down the source, but it seemed to be anonymous. Most of the places I found it were using it as relationship advice, but the first thing I thought of was leadership and employee turnover.
It’s not hard work or tough situations that causes good people to quit. It’s rare that people find easy, simple work satisfying or fulfilling. Think back to the times when you were most satisfied and fulfilled at work. Chances are you had recently earned a hard fought success, pressed hard, stretched your abilities, and just generally kicked booty. Think back to the times when you were just coasting along – how satisfied were you? People don’t leave because work is tough. People leave because the upsides don’t balance the downsides.
They leave because of fire drills, knee jerk reactions, lack of appreciation (or even acknowledgement), thankless efforts, frustrating co-workers, stifling bureaucracy, arbitrary decisions, favoritism, patronizing attitudes, harassment, and even apathy. When people leave because of “more money” it is often not about the money. The extra dollars are nice, but what they’re really saying is, “I don’t get rewarded enough to put up with this job (and/or my manager). This new job looks like it won’t have these headaches and, even if it does, I’ll at least be paid more to deal with it.”
If you’re experiencing unwanted turnover, the question to be asking is: “What would make it worth it for people to stay?”
We human types like to evaluate, compare, analyze, and decide in order to have the very best. This, by the way, is a good thing. Except when the data doesn’t reflect reality. After all, even most exacting logic fails us when a base assumption is incorrect.
Comparison tests for whatever you’re interested in are fun to read and give you a starting point when determining what’s “best”, but are not in any way an absolute indicator of “bestness” (no matter what the magazine wants you to think). A skilled rider on the worst motorcycle in a comparison would slaughter a mediocre rider on the best motorcycle. Every time. Ditto for bicycles, cars, etc. Engineering and manufacturing have gotten to the point where there are truly few lemons and magazines are forced to pick winners based on relatively irrelevant data.
Case in point for results not reflecting reality. In a recent comparison in a popular mountain bike magazine, five bikes were evaluated and a definitive rank order given. Except that, based on the comments, #3 would have leapt past #2 with different tires. Additionally, #4 was hurt by grips, seat, and other minor items. These were $3,000 bicycles and no one willing to drop that much cash on a bike is going to leave it stock. So 4th place (loser!) could be fixed for a relatively small amount by replacing or adding parts that are 1) relatively inexpensive; 2) often replaced anyway based on personal preferences; and 3) would still give the bike a total out-the-door price that’s less than 1st-3rd place. These results are meaningless! [Fourth place bike? Wouldn’t touch it. What? I can make it comparable to the top bikes and it still costs less – done!]
So what’s that mean in business? A few examples, though you can probably think of many more.
Personality assessments used in hiring are generally highly overvalued. Whereas they are very useful for development, they rarely provide much useful information for hiring. Sure there’re pretty graphs a and comparison ratings that make us feel like we are really comparing hard data. Just like with magazine comparisons though, they are pretty good at identifying the outliers to avoid, but just don’t give any definitive answers to compare normal folks. [This person is a “7” on sociability versus this other candidate’s “6.5”. But which can do the job better? How much sociability is required? How much is too much? What other personality traits would balance a low or high score? How do you know? How do you really know?”]
Turnover rates. We want those as low as possible right? Um, maybe. Some turnover is actually good. You obviously want to retain the high-performers, but do you really want the dead weight sticking around. Low turnover might be a sign of awe-inspiring leadership. Or maybe it’s a sign of a very weak leader not holding people accountable for performance.
Expenses – cut those down to the minimum. Well, that doesn’t work as a singular measure. Salary and benefits are a huge expense, but if we lay all the employees off no work will get done and no money will be made. Don’t want excessive inventory, but get rid of all inventory and it’s a little difficult to satisfy customers. Even looking at equipment: is the cheapest the least expensive? Probably not if we factor in maintenance and downtime costs. Same thing but back to employees: the cheapest employee may not be the least expensive when we factor in productivity and ease of managing.
Are any of these bad measures? Nope. It’s just crucial to remember that they aren’t definitive or absolute measures. They provide some, but not all, data. The risk is to draw too firm of conclusion from them, especially when they don’t capture real world use. Although all pieces are necessary to make the puzzle, you can’t make the puzzle from just one piece. The all time classic example of this is the “11 is one louder” scene from “This is Spinal Tap”.
Most decisions are not cut and dried. What works really well for someone else may not work for us at all. Everyone’s situation is different; their needs unique. “More” is not always better and “most” can be counterproductive. Rather we must balance out a number of factors to decide which option best fits our specific individual needs.
I was watching Chris Rock’s “Kill the Messenger” the other night and was really struck by one of his comments. I’m paraphrasing, but he basically said that you know you have a career when there’s never enough time. You look at your watch and it’s already after 5pm so you plan on coming in early the next day. With a job, there’s too much time. You look at your watch and it’s just after 9am and the day stretches out ahead.
Absolutely brilliant! It doesn’t matter if you’re overpaid or underpaid, hourly or salaried, educated or uneducated, or what field you’re in or company you work for: if there’s never enough time to accomplish all that you’re excited about getting done, you have a career; if time is your enemy, you have a job. There’s a lot of people with college degrees in high paying jobs and there’s a lot of people just getting by (for now) who are forging their career.
So, what’s the scoop. Do you have a job or a career? If you have a job, what would it take to get a career?
fool (with a plan) 