Blogit

Are there some common challenges faced by leaders all around the world? Last year we facilitated leadership development programmes in diverse locations in Europe and the Middle East, in the USA and Asia, and finally in East Africa, giving a great platform to ask company leaders about their challenges. And to ask myself, what do they have in common?

I got some answers in Hargeisa, Somaliland. As I sat sipping the sweet, spiced local tea, I asked the CEO of a local company the same questions that I’ve put to company leaders around the world: what is the outcome he is looking for from the leadership development programme he is investing in? What should we concentrate on with the managers from his telecom company we will be working with this week?

His answer was pretty much the same as I’ve had from CEOs in very different parts of the world.

He mentioned three leadership competences:  1) Coaching. Build up the coaching competency in my managers, so they can coach and challenge each other to grow and develop; 2) Self-leadership. Help my managers to develop their ability to manage themselves – their ability to manage their time more efficiently through better planning, decision-making and implementation. 3) Innovation. Help my managers to develop their creativity and innovation competencies – we need new thinking, new services and new products in our rapidly changing business environment.

I was struck by this answer as it is pretty much the same wish list as from any other CEOs I’ve asked around the world. Somaliland tea needs a spice mix of ginger, cardamon, cloves and cinnamon. And Somaliland leaders need a skills mix of coaching, self-leadership and innovation. 

It seems companies around the world are looking to their leaders to be innovative, self-managing individuals who are willing and able to coach and develop their colleagues.  

David Goddard

Leading Renewal in Four Continents

Can Intelligent Leadership be exported?  Reading Abdi Jama’s inspiring blog last month,My Journey to Pertec, I was reminded of what was on my mind 8 years ago when I started my own Pertec journey. How well would an approach to leadership, born in the far North of Europe, work in other cultures?

Well, I soon found out. My first assignments with Pertec were in Sweden, Denmark and Saudi Arabia. I was not too worried about the Nordic neighbours. Of course there are cultural diferences that affect leadership style, for example consensus driven decision making in Sweden against the more challenging style to the team leader from team members typical in Denmark. But as the values underpinning Nordic societies are fairly similar, Intelligent Leadership should work out OK.

I was most worried about the client in Saudi Arabia: how would Intelligent Leadershipplay out so far from its home? Surprisingly, it was in Riyadh that I got the best reception. The group I worked with there was extremely diverse, with participants coming from all over the Middle East, Asia, Europe and the Americas. Here, I noticed something really interesting -  the more diverse the group I work with, then the greater the appeal of the Pertec approach to Leading Renewal.

In Saudi I learned that Intelligent Leadership is an approach from Finland, but it is also a global approach to leadership. Some of the features that give Intelligent Leadership this global appeal include:

• its holistic approach to the human being

• the need to use multiple sources of intelligence: rational, pragmatic, emotional, spiritual and cultural

• the strong emphasis on self-leadership as the starting point for all leadership

• its original base came from Pentti Sydänmaanlakka''''s global leadership experience

• it has been added to dynamically by the diversity we have in the Pertec team

And the journey will continue this spring as we have trips lined up in our team to Tanzania, Kenya, Namibia, USA, France, Italy and the UAE. I’m leaving for Somaliland on Saturday and look forward to telling you in my next post about the leadership challenges in East Africa.


David Goddard
Senior Partner

Why is self-leadership so hard? Self-leadership is the topic that provokes the strongest reaction on Pertec seminars. There are tears more often than not. "It’s pretty heavy to think just about yourself for many hours", commented one participant last week. But why is that so? Why do many people spend more time on keeping their car in good working order, than they invest in their own service and maintenance?  

Self Ltd Model                                                                                                                               

On Pertec seminars we follow the Self Ltd model from Pentti Sydänmaanlakka’s Intelligent Self-Leadership where participants are encouraged to think about themselves as an organisation. First of all, if you were  an organisation, could you answer Peter Drucker’s Five Most Important Questions:

• What is our Mission?
• Who is our Customer?
• What does the Customer Value?
• What are our Results?
• What is our Plan?

Usually the last question is the catalyst for the strongest emotions. Many people say they would never consider working for a company that does not have a strategy, then they realise they have not got one for themselves; Self Ltd does not have a strategy! 

The Performance Management system in Self Ltd needs renewing

Similarly, most people would not be happy working for a company that had no performance and development discussions, no tools or processes for performance management, but yet they do not take the time to have their own Target and Development Discussions for Self Ltd. This is often when the tears come, when we go through the performance of each of the departments in Self Ltd.

• How is your Body Department performing as measured by your physical condition?
• How is your Mind Department performing as measured by your mental condition?
• How is your Feelings Department performing as measured by your emotional condition?
• How is your Values Department performing as measured by your spiritual condition?
• How is your Work Department performing as measured by your professional condition?
• How is your Renewal Department performing as measured by your renewal condition? 
• Great tips for managing your own performance

When we do this exercise, I usually get the feeling that the challenge in self-leadership is in the implementation. We always get some great ideas from the seminar group on improving the performance of each department. It seems there are plenty of thoughts about good things we should be doing. The question is, as with many organisations, how to close The Knowing-Doing Gap? Here is a selection of my favourite tips from these seminars.

• Don’t skip meals.
• Remember that the lunch break is called a ”break” for a reason.
• Sit with someone cheerful and positive at lunch.
• Try practising in-box zero and use email as a tool (or it will use you!).
• Learn to say ”no” and think carefully about when to say yes.
• Decline any meeting invitations that don’t have an agenda.
• Schedule time in your calender for the stuff you need to get done (such as decision making, planning a meeting or preparing a presentation).
• Go to bed earlier! We are sleeping an hour less than the previous generation. 

What are your favourite self-leadership tips?

David Goddard

The Global Workspace

Early in 2006 I read a Microsoft white paper predicting that “Political and economic dynamics are forging a single global market, a global workforce, global customers, partners, and suppliers”. This global workforce would collaborate across time zones, organizations and firewalls in “A Single World of Business.” I wondered if the workspace becomes a single global entity, would this mean that working habits, management patterns and leadership styles would also become global? Will there really be one world of work? Or would culture still have a strong impact on our values, communication patterns, ways of solving problems, how we build trust, notions about teamwork – that is, our basic idea of how we collaborate?

A little later the same year, I came across the answer whilst on an assignment in a call centre in Bangalore. The CEO of the company had invited me there to develop a cross-cultural skills training program for their call centre and back office process operators. In particular, the Training Manager of the company told me, their communication style was “Too Indian”. Asked to explain this, he quoted me an example of an operator who was working on the help desk for a well-known computer brand. This young graduate, on receiving a call from a lady in the US who had said her “lap-top was on fire, can you help me?” had replied – with typical Indian politeness - “Yes, Madam, I will try.”  This is, the Training Manager explained to me, the Indian way to say “No”: unfortunately the American caller took it literally and they spent 14 minutes exploring how in fact he couldn’t help her! “So, David, could you teach our employees (there’s only 7000 of them) how to say “No” – when necessary!”

Cultural Intelligence

I got a flash of inspiration in that call centre in Bangalore: as the world of work has become global, then understanding and adapting to different cultural styles has become increasingly important for individual and organizational success. The world has become more interconnected and the work space is increasingly distributed and diverse. In fact, in the five years since I was first in Bangalore, the demand for cross-cultural training has grown tremendously. From call centres in India, to the World Bank in Washington DC, to the Head Office of a Finnish telecom and countless other organizations around the world I have been asked the same thing again and again – please can you improve our abilities to work across cultures? 

To work effectively in a diverse environment requires cultural intelligence:  the ability to see yourself from different perspectives, to shift your thinking and behaviour to work effectively with others in multiple contexts. Cultural intelligence requires an awareness of one’s own cultural biases and those of your partners: values, communication style, ways to build trust, handle conflicts and so on. It does not mean that we abandon our own culture, but rather as Ghandi said “Let my house not be walled on four sides, let all windows be open, let all the cultures blow in, but let no culture blow me off my feet.”     

Four Worlds of Culture

One tool for increasing cultural intelligence is the Four Worlds Model developed by Pertec Consulting. In this model there are four different worlds or areas of cultural behaviour:  Rationalism (North), Humanism (South), Pragmatism (West) and Holism (East). Some of the key features of each of these cultural types are presented below:

It does not mean these features are exclusive to one particular cultural area, but it does mean they are given more value or emphasis. The Four Worlds Model gives a mental framework for understanding cultural differences as well as providing practical behavioural tips. For example, the emphasis in the Humanist (Southern) cultures on Family and Relationships generally produces much more hierarchical organizations than in, for example, the Rational (Northern) cultures. According to the model, a manager from for example Brazil when working in Sweden should not expect to be treated with the usual respect or deference and that people will want to get to know him or her in an informal manner - with little protocol or etiquette. Good advice for the Brazilian manager would be to be more inclusive in his leadership style as being overly directive will be poorly interpreted. Involve others in decision making and do not base judgments of people on appearance, demeanor, privileges or status symbols.

The Four Worlds Model also gives some practical help in improving cross-cultural communication. For example the emphasis on Harmony in the Holistic (Eastern) cultures generally produces a less direct, more implicit and formal communication style than in the Pragmatic (Western) cultures where communication patterns are usually more direct, explicit and less formal. According to the model, a manager from for example the USwhen working in China should not expect to get results following the KISS principle (Keep it Short and Simple). Rather he should pay much more attention to context in communication, i.e. who says something, how it is said, what order they say things in and even what is not said can all be more important that what is said in Holistic Cultures.

Leading in Four Worlds

The global world of work requires leaders and managers to have a high level of cultural intelligence. The global leader is “at home” within the four worlds and is able to use the four different capabilities: Pragmatic, Rational, Holistic, Humanistic. As well as the Four Worlds model Pertec Consulting has developed an on-line cultural assessment for individuals and organizations to assess their affinity with each of the Four Worlds and gauge the ability to move in and out of each world as needed. For each of the Four Worlds has particular strengths, as outlined below, and today as work moves between Helsinki, New York, Bangalore, Shanghai and so on, we need to be able to access all these strengths

David Goddard

Just sitting down to write my first ever blog post after considering it for eight years (Hamlet was a pretty quick decision-maker really) when I get a Skype message, an email alert pops up and the phone rings. The phone? Who uses the phone anymore? In an article in the August issue of Wired magazine, Clive Thompson writes: "We''''''''re moving… toward a fascinating cultural transition: the death of the telephone call." The average number of phone calls we make every year is dropping and our calls are getting shorter. In 2005, the average call was three minutes long, now they''''''''re not even half of that. So who could be calling me? Well of course it’s my Mum. Like watching TV, writing letters and reading newspapers made of paper, phoning is something your parents did. 

Ignoring the younger communication tools of email and instant messaging, I show manners to the oldest and give priority to the phone call: “What are you doing?” my Mum wants to know from her self-employed (slacker) management consultant (when will you get a proper job) youngest son. Trying to impress, I tell her that I’m now entering the blogosphere, “I’m blogging, Mum” I tell her. “Ooh, that sounds rude … what is it?”. Good question, Mum! “Well, it’s writing stuff on the Internet that you want to tell people about - what’s happened to you, what you’ve seen or heard, where you’ve been and so on. It’s like a cross between a diary and an opinion column.” There’s a pause, I can hear her thinking of several replies and then “But shouldn’t you be working?”.

So does blogging count as work? The average worker spends more than half of their working time using communication media today. Work is communication. Are you reading this blog at the office? Does that count as work? How we spend our time at work, what communication tools we use and how we use them are increasingly important questions.

Just noticed that it has taken me two hours to write this blog. Yep, two full hours because I have been interrupted by phone calls, emails, instant messages and tweets. Or let myself be interrupted. Bloggers: Are You Still Multitasking? asks timethief at one cool site: “If you think juggling phone calls, e-mail, instant messages and computer work makes you more effective or productive then several studies say you are wrong.  Their results point in the opposite direction and highlight the fact that the more heavily you multitask the less effective and productive you become. It seems the more multitasking we do the more mediocre the results are. “ The only time we really need to multitask is when cooking. How to kick the multitask habit? “Schedule blocks of uninterrupted time to work in and then carry through and get the work done. Allow no distractions or interruptions – focus”. Now that’s what my Mother would call “working”.

David Goddard

 PS: No actual parents were harmed in the writing of this blog