It's More Than the Xs and Os: How's Your Team Chemistry on 'Game Day?'

There was a great scene in the NFL Network's "Bill Belichik - A Football Life" last night that captured Bill Belichik's understanding of team effectiveness that makes him a great football coach and leader.

He's showing game video to his players and instead of focusing on the Xs and Os, he points to specific video clips that show how his players' lack of on-the-field team esprit indicates a team that's "not good enough to play that way."

Jimmy Toscano captured this excerpt in his review, "Film on Belichick gives fans a look under the hood."

"'There's nothing wrong -- in fact you should be excited when you make a play,' Belichick said in a team meeting prior to their Week 1 win against the Buffalo Bills. 'Hell, look at all the work you put into it all the time you spent in practice . . . you should be excited about it, and your teammates should be excited, too.'

"Cue the footage of them not being excited. 

"'Nice play, Ty [Warren],' Belichick said while watching the footage of a play in a one-sided loss to San Diego in the previous season. 'Can't even see one guy saying good hit. Walk back to the huddle and it looks like, 'God, we don't even care.'"

How many times have we seen scenes of coaches using game video to analyze their offensive and defensive plays or an opponent's plays?  Here we have a coach who clearly understands one of the fundamental tenets of coaching and leadership:  The effectiveness of the Xs and Os is only as good as the team members' "game day" team chemistry and resilience.  He uses video to drive this point home.

"Then, a shot of the [Patriots] celebrating after a TD during a drubbing of the Denver Broncos on an Oct. 20, 2008 Monday Night Football game in Denver.  'Do you think we were ready to play against Denver last year, Monday night?' he said of the game, which the Patriots won, 41-7. 'It's so obvious, it's so visible.'  As a downtrodden Broncos player was shown on the screen, Belichick said, 'It's going to be a long night [for Denver].'" 

Perhaps other coaches do this as well, but it was revealing and insightful to see Coach Belichik do this.  How's the chemistry of your team on "game day?"

Lastly, loved this excerpt from the NYTimes review of "A Football Life:"

"An alien force must have invaded Belichick to get him to allow NFL Films to follow him through the 2009 season. That would seem like giving the filmmaker Michael Moore the O.K. to hang out at the National Security Agency."

Part 2 of "A Football Life" will be shown next week.  I'll be watching.

Learn and Adapt - The New Business Imperatives

My comments to Forrester's "Voice Of The Customer Programs Need Better Understanding, Not Just Better Analytics" by Andrew McInnes (@apmcinnes) prompted this post about the importance of Learn and Adapt - the new imperatives for business, government, and NGOs.

What's the basis for stating that these are "imperatives?"  For starters:

General Petraeus: 'Learn and Adapt' Replaces 'Hearts and Minds' in Afghanistan's COIN strategy

You Have To Lean and Adapt to Use the Power of Social Media

In Cybersecurity, It's "Learn and Adapt"

In The End of Social Media 1.0, Brian Solis (@briansolis) wrote:

"Listening, learning and adapting is where the real value of social media will show its true colors. Listening leads to a more informed business. Engagement unlocks empathy and innovation. But it is action and adaptation that leads to relevance. And, it never ends."

There are three key points in this excerpt:
1.  Listening and learning, with few exceptions, are prerequisites for action and, properly applied, can make the action more meaningful and therefore, more valuable.
2.  Action and adaptation lead to relevance.  Relevance is based on the trust and performance that accompany action and adaptation.  In an increasingly dynamic marketplace, relevant organizations will be those that enhance their credibility by quickly adapting to market changes by either driving or anticipating those changes and improving performance and the customer experience.
3.  Change is a constant and therefore, learning and adaptation are the new imperatives, ones that will also be constant.

Learn and adapt are essentially an update of the continuous improvement principle.  Today, information and communication technologies (ICT), with the increasing availability of data and information, are driving business and program initiatives using social media, social innovation, and co-creation, to name a few.  There are excellent opportunities for organizational learning on a scale that would not have been possible three - four years ago.  Given the increasing emphasis on innovation, organizations also need to learn how to recognize and leverage breakthrough ideas that may emerge from small discoveries as Peter Sims (@petersims)wrote about in "Little Bets."  A well communicated and visible emphasis, exemplified through leadership actions, on learning and innnovation can also serve to attract strong candidates and retain valued employees.

Continuous improvement's emphasis is on "incremental, continuous steps rather than giant leaps."  Organizations need to recognize when incremental improvement may not be enough.  Stories abound of competitors leapfrogging their rivals such as Apple over RIM and Nokia, Facebook over MySpace, Netflix over Blockbuster, and Target and Walmart over Sears and KMart.  Adaptation may require significant changes in the way the organization does business.

How does this impact Forrester's Voice of the Customer (VOC) cycle that has four major activities: Listen, Interpret, React, and Monitor?  There needs to be a "Learn and Adapt" activity between "Monitor and Listen."

"React" or "Engage" is what the organization does based on its interpretation of the "Voice of the Customer."

"Monitor" or "Assess" is where the organization assesses the customer's and market's reaction / feedback to what it has done and / or its engagement.

"Learn and Adapt" is perhaps the most important activity in this cycle. It enables the organization to learn, apply, and adapt to knowledge gained from the "Monitor" activity. Without this organizational learning and adaptation (as necessary), there cannot be any meaningful performance improvement. 

There are two key VOC learning opportunities for the organization; the first being "Interpret." The "Interpret" activity can be viewed as establishing initial hypotheses with supporting actions ("React" or "Engage"). "Learn and Adapt" is the second learning opportunity that serves to validate those hypotheses based on information collected from the "Monitor" or "Assess" activity. It is here where information becomes knowledge. That knowledge should drive any organization adaptation actions that may be necessary.  The cycle then repeats itself with "Listen."

"Learn and Adapt" may also be the most challenging of these VOC activities. Adaptation may involve changes that range from incremental process improvements to real innovation.  The challenge of adaptive changes should not be underestimated. An excerpt from Why We Crave Creativity but Reject Creative Ideas, based on research to be published in an upcoming issue of the journal, Psychological Science, articulates this challenge very well:

"Uncertainty drives the search for and generation of creative ideas, but 'uncertainty also makes us less able to recognize creativity, perhaps when we need it most' ... 'Revealing the existence and nature of a bias against creativity can help explain why people might reject creative ideas and stifle scientific advancements, even in the face of strong intentions to the contrary. ... The field of creativity may need to shift its current focus from identifying how to generate more creative ideas to identify how to help innovative institutions recognize and accept creativity [and adapt to changes that may accompany this creativity].'"

Challenges are not just restricted to responding to marketplace dynamics.  They also include accepting creativity and corresponding changes within the organization.  Dennis Stauffer (@DennisStauffer), in Innovation Case Study:  Sliced Bread, wrote:

"Winning acceptance of any new idea is far from automatic. Those who are in a position to enable or obstruct an innovation often stand in the way, sometimes predicting dire consequences, even when the end-user is destined to embrace it. ... When we’re tempted to think of some new idea as, 'The greatest thing since sliced bread,' we should realize that that thing we’re referring to may in fact be not only the greatest ‘convenience' for consumers, but also the greatest 'challenge' for us, and the greatest perceived 'threat' by others."

The Learn and Adapt imperatives are not "nice to have" tenets.  They are an effective way for businesses, government organizations, and NGOs to address today's and future challenges to enhance customer responsiveness in the face of constant change.  Organizations can recognize the challenges inherent in learning and adapting to market dynamics by making these imperatives part of their culture.

Action- and engagement-based learning builds on the data and information learned through assessments. That learning is the foundation for effective adaptation.

BI and KM Can Make a Difference in HR Organizations and in the Enterprise

Tom Malone, the CEO of Accero, provided a guest post titled, "Why Business Intelligence is Failing HR Managers," at Steve Boese's HR Technology blog.

Tom's premise is that "In the past few years it seems like business intelligence has been all the rage. Vendors promise a tool that will help HR managers pull a seat up to the table with strategic insight gained through predictive analysis of the company’s own data.  However, according to analysts, most companies never achieve the results they expect with these tools. Why is it that business intelligence fails to live up to expectations?"

I agree that tools will not "help HR managers pull up a seat to the table."  Thomas Wailgum wrote an excellent article on this challenge at CIO.com titled "BI's Dirty Secret:  Better Tools Are No Match for Bad Strategy." I also agree with Tom Malone that, for most HR departments, easy-to-use BI tools and pre-defined solutions are lacking.

However, the fact that HR and IT "must determine what key metrics they want...what data they need to support those metrics...couple the BI tool with other technologies such as a database and ETL tools (extraction, transformation and loading) to build a data-mart that manages and stores complex workforce data," etc. is no different from what other organizations within the enterprise are doing to leverage and succeed in using BI.

These challenges present opportunities for innovation and the achievement of business goals.  A "seat at the table" will be earned by demonstrating value that comes not just with strategic insight but also by showing how that insight can lead to improved outcomes in the enterprise's business goals and supporting programs and services.

BI can make a significant difference in HR organizations and in the larger enterprise.  One example is talent management. Businesses, including government agencies, are focused on attracting and recruiting high quality candidates and then professionally developing and retaining those employees.  A HR / talent management question might be, "What employee attributes show a strong correlation with high performing enterprise programs and services?"

The delivery of enterprise programs and services are assessed by outcome measures associated with “On Time,” “On Budget,” and “Quality.” BI technologies can be used to assess the correlation of specific employee attributes with “On Time,” “On Budget,” and “Quality” program and service outcome measures.

One such initiative would be to undertake a pilot or larger (depending on several factors) project focused on identifying key personnel attributes that have a strong correlation with important and high performing programs and services within the enterprise. Are there specific personnel attributes such as attitudinal outlook, education, experience, etc. that have a statistically strong correlation with the performance of these important programs? Such analyses may provide the enterprise with opportunities to sustain and improve program and service outcomes by matching employees with programs and services that will benefit from the attributes that these personnel bring. In turn, employees stand to benefit as well by matching them with programs and services where they have the opportunity to be seen as making a difference.

It's important to emphasize that such an initiative should not be limited to HR and IT participation. Business unit and program managers should be involved as well so that they are part of the process and have opportunities to provide input and reviews.  This presents an excellent opportunity for the enterprise to leverage the knowledge that these personnel have.  Their input is key to identifying attributes that, from their perspective, have a strong impact on employee performance and program and service performance. In effect, by doing this, the enterprise is building the foundation to effectively use knowledge management practices to support enterprise initiatives and impact outcome performance.

Hypotheses would be established based on collective input that are either validated or invalidated by analyses. The results of such a BI initiative should then be factored into recruiting and professional development actions to get the enterprise the most talented workforce possible. It is important to continuously re-assess these attributes and outcomes and establish feedback mechanisms from employees and managers so that there is an emphasis on continuously improving the BI model.

This in turn enables enterprise talent management initiatives and corresponding resources to be focused and provide the enterprise with "the biggest bang for the buck."

One key issue comes down to how important is the HR function viewed within the enterprise? The answer to that question in turn is driven by the answer to another question: Is HR seen as adding value to the enterprise? If not, then there may be other critical challenges facing HR that HR needs to address before looking at how to use BI.

The "value add" challenge is similar to the one facing CIOs. Just as CIOs are leveraging BI technologies to make a difference in the enterprise, there are opportunities for HR / talent management executives to do the same. Look to see what BI initiatives are working within and external to the enterprise. Do any of those initiatives address one or more of the enterprise's HR challenges? If so, how? What are the projected benefit outcomes and how will those outcomes be assessed? What are the costs and risks? How can risks be mitigated? Are the right resources available and ready to commit to the success of such an initiative? Who is the enterprise executive that will champion a HR/talent management-focused BI initiative?

The answers to these questions can provide a foundation for identifying BI initiatives, supported by the knowledge inherent in the enterprise, that make sense for the HR organization to undertake that offer the greatest opportunity to succeed.

Leading (Not Managing) Culture Change in Government

My response to Chris Jones' excellent post, "Culture Change in Government: No Small Task," prompted me to get my blog, "Within the Slipstream," up and going. I need to make one acknowledgment up front: This blog entry is essentially my response to Chris' blog post with more elaboration added.

I'm also going to explain why I chose "Within the Slipstream" as the title for this blog. As a recreational cyclist, I've learned the value of staying within someone's or a group's slipstream. It is one of the keys to maximizing efficiency when going out an extended bike ride, tour, or race. Amateur and professional cyclists know the value of slipstreams in winning their races. Nature is also replete with examples of slipstreams from birds flying to pools of fish moving through water to move their collective bodies in the desired direction. 

"If an object is inside the slipstream behind another object, moving at the same speed, the rear object will require less power to maintain its speed than if it were moving independently." It is sometimes thought that only the trailing entity benefits from the slipstream. However, "in addition, the leading object will be able to move faster than it could independently because the rear object reduces the effect of the low-pressure region on the leading object."  In effect, the lead entity and the trailing entity both benefit by working together (read: collaborate) to create a slipstream.

Similarly, government organizations are in the process of determining how to best work together to achieve mutual goals, not just with other government organizations, but also with citizens, businesses, and non-government organizations (NGOs).  Government, at all levels, has moved from e-government to collaborative government.

Government organizations are looking at new ways to collaborate.  Open Government is one reflection of this collaboration.  In many cases, organizational culture change must take place to optimize this collaboration, especially changes associated with Open Government.

Chris cites an excerpt from Beth Beth Noveck's (the Deputy CTO for Open Government) 2009 “Wiki Government" book: "The entire agenda for change cannot rest on any one CIO or CTO .. collaborative governance depends on having people through the agencies with the skills, ability, and willingness to innovate .. taking risks, and implementing collaborative strategies.”

The above is very much true. Nevertheless, leaders still have to step forward and lead that culture change.

• Leaders have to publicly state that they value “taking risks and implementing collaborative strategies" (as an example).
  
• Leaders have to articulate a vision of what that change looks like in a way that leaves little room for ambiguity and resonates with people's hearts.
• Leaders have to prioritize what they want their organizations to focus on so that there are opportunities to take risks and make change happen.
• Leaders also have to recognize people that succeed not just by rewards by also by narrating stories to others about these efforts that resulted in positive change. This will encourage others to do the same.

Is this alot to do? Absolutely, but that’s what comes with being a leader.

The point about leaders prioritizing what they want their organizations to focus on is sometimes not emphasized as much as it should be. Every organization has what I call a “Capacity for Change.” If no prioritization of effort is provided, organizations can exhaust themselves in trying to do too much. If they exhaust themselves, the desired change may not be achieved. This point, referred to as “Motivate the Elephant," is well made in Chip and Dan Heath’s excellent book, “Switch – How to Change Things When Change is Hard.” I recommend this book for anyone involved or interested in organizational change (and who isn’t these days?).

Lastly, work associated with cultural change is often referred to as “change management.” That is not the best term. Yes, change must be managed but to succeed, it really must be led. Change leadership is a much more appropriate term and reflects the tough work that must be involved for cultural change to succeed.