Benchmark Learning's Blog

Uncertainties in the economy always seem to result in more work with fewer resources.  There is less hiring and sometimes even personnel cutbacks, as well as fewer financial resources to do the same work that needs to be completed.  How do leaders and managers deal with these facts most effectively while maintaining and even increasing business and reputation, all while keeping staff motivated and performing at their peak?

Before you can identify the specific solutions in how to effectively manage more with less, it’s important to take some time to assess your situation.  This may involve getting team members or peers together to discuss in order to determine where the biggest needs are occurring.  Enlisting feedback from your team and/or peers communicates that you are aware of the problem and that you are serious about taking the best actions to improve the situation.  It also helps motivate your team by keeping them actively involved in identifying the issues and later knowing that they will be part of identifying the solutions. 

Typically, the most common high level areas that need addressed in effectively managing with fewer human and financial resources are:

1. Managing time and priorities efficiently
2. Managing human capital needs
3. Managing client/Board of Director/Board of Trustee expectations

Over the next few weeks I’ll be looking at each of these categories more closely and sharing ideas that you can use that may help you and your team keep on top of the day-to-day needs within the organization and with your clients.

In the meantime, be proactive and get your team and/or peers together to assess the situation by identifying the greatest and most pressing issues. 

What makes Self-Initiated Development stick?  Having a development plan is great.  But unless you have the incentive and motivation behind it you will quickly set it aside and continue on your merry way without receiving any benefits from what you started.  This is where long-term goals and their benefits come in.  It’s like answering the question, “What do I want to be when I grow up?” and putting the answer to that question in front of yourself every day.

Think about your long-term goals?  What do you need to do to achieve them?  Think about them every day.  But, what are the benefits of the goals?  The answer to this question provides the motivation for you to work hard to achieve them. 

I know a young lady I can use as an example.  She was homeschooled and worked very hard at it.  She graduated high school at 14.  She graduated college at 16 and received her Master’s degree in psychology at 19.  Very impressive.  But, what drove her?  It was her desire to become a psychologist and to help people.  That is what she thought about every day.  She didn’t think about it in terms of what she could achieve, rather what would be the results.  But, she was flexible.  During a missions trip to India she realized that her calling was really to work in an orphanage in Mumbai.  Of course she would be able to use her education in her work, but more importantly, she was able to achieve her long-term goal of helping people.

Think about where you want to be in five years, ten years, twenty years.  Can you write down your goals for each time frame?  Don’t be afraid to change your goals as you go along.  But, think of the benefits to your goals and let these benefits be the driving force in your development. 

In the previous two blog entries, Sid discussed Receiving Feedback.  I want to look at the other side of the topic of feedback and present a new concept related to giving feedback.

I was reading some articles by Marshall Goldsmith the other day and his concept of “Feedforward” was very intriguing and a concept that all coaches should consider.  Most leaders have difficulty giving feedback and we work with them to improve this skill.  Fewer, however, provide their teams with feedforward. 

Feedforward is the approach of offering suggestions to the individual on what they can do in the future to be more in alignment with your expectations and those of your organization.  Feedforward should be linked to behavioral changes that the person can make.  It does not preclude using examples from the past to illustrate incorrect behaviors, but the focus is on the future.  The person should be given clear guidance on what they can do in the future to make positive behavior changes.

It can be more productive to help people be “right” than to focus on proving they are “wrong;” which is typically what happens when feedback is provided.  Rather than approaching the situation with optimism and hope for the future, in many feedback situations the person becomes defensive and argumentative.  This precludes both parties from talking about the future, something that can be changed.  Rather, they are stuck in the past, arguing about perceptions of a situation that cannot be changed.

Commit today that you will use the Feedforward process the next time you need to coach someone on your team!