Dawn Metcalfe's Blog, page 3

Demystifying empathy at work

When Dr. David Dao boarded his United Airlines flight on April 9, 2017, he had no idea the firestorm his experience with the airline would cause. We all remember the video: a passenger being dragged from his seat, his face bloodied, and onlookers horrified. We empathized with him to the highest extent; haven’t we all had miserable experiences with air travel?

Few were expecting United Airlines CEO Oscar Munoz’s response to the incident. In an internal memo to UA staff, he characterized the situation as “re-accommodating the customer(s)” while describing Dr. Dao as “disruptive” and “belligerent.” His first two statements on the events of that day were labeled tone-deaf and insensitive, and they were sorely lacking in one of the greatest traits every great leader is required to have: empathy.

What makes a leader empathetic? And how does a leader display the empathy needed to command a cohesive and collaborative team? Two great questions, but first let’s tackle the basics.

Demystifying Empathy at Work

Empathy is defined as the ability to understand and share the feelings of another person. It’s different from sympathy in that you aren’t feeling sorry or pity for someone; you are attempting to relate to them by feeling what they are feeling at any given moment.

Although many people view it as either nonessential or too difficult to try, empathy is a necessity in corporate culture; it is fundamental to creating great cultures and growing capable leaders. As Gen Y rises in the management ranks, and with Gen Z on the verge of entering the workforce, empathetic training leaders are crucial to retaining top talent in these younger generations.

According to the 2018 State of Workplace Empathy report, CEOs are beginning to see the light. Eighty-seven percent of CEOs (as well as 79 percent of HR professionals) agree that a company’s financial performance is tied to empathy. On the other end, 90 percent of employees are more likely to stay with an organization that empathizes with their needs, while 79 percent would consider leaving their organization if it became less empathetic.

Empathy is clearly important to retaining top talent. The issue is that many companies don’t know how to train their leaders and teams for empathy…

Read on to find out how to embed empathy in your organisation in this piece by Sharon Steed for TD magazine: https://www.td.org/insights/empathy-at-work-for-high-potential-young-leaders

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I’m tired of talking about diversity, aren’t you?

I was inspired to write this following a recent tweet thread in which a large number of women made the point that they don’t want to talk about diversity anymore. Instead they want to talk about their subject expertise. I hear that — I’d much rather use my energy discussing a topic that I am not only passionate about, but considered an “expert” in.

It’s not that I don’t believe in diversity anymore — it’s the opposite. The argument has been made and won: Diversity (and inclusion) are good things. Both are good for individuals, teams, communities, organizations, and the bottom line. The research makes this abundantly clear.

And yet, we know diversity and inclusion aren’t always easy. The WEF’s latest findings suggest we’re centuries away from gender equal pay — 202 years, to be precise. Changing the world isn’t easy; even when it’s the right thing to do, we are often loath to do it. And “doing the right thing” isn’t enough. We also have to worry about “doing the thing right.”

“Should we have quotas or not?” is my favorite example of a dilemma we face when thinking about doing things right. There are arguments on both sides, and honestly, I don’t have the answer — I believe it’s often best judged on a case-by-case basis. But again, I’m tired of talking about it, because it sometimes feels like we’re using a lack of complete certainty about how to do it right to stop ourselves from doing anything at all.

What happened to trying things and breaking them, and then doing them again? If it’s good enough for technology that’s changed our world, isn’t it good enough for bringing diversity and inclusion (two known goods) to the workplace more quickly?

I also feel we need to readdress our common definition of diversity; we talk about skin color and gender, and of course both are important. But there is a lot more to the diversity conversation. There is religion, generation, education, and everything that goes into making each of us so much more than the components that make us up.

We are these fabulous “messy” packages, made up of every experience we’ve had. And when we understand that, we can acknowledge all our differences while still celebrating how much there is to unite us. Some things are universal: We care about being loved, respected, and safe. It may be that we manifest these desires differently, but they are universal. We all want to belong.

As social science researcher Brene Brown describes it, we have an:

Innate human desire to be part of something larger than us. Because this yearning is so primal, we often try to acquire it by fitting in and by seeking approval, which are not only hollow substitutes for belonging, but often barriers to it. Because true belonging only happens when we present our authentic, imperfect selves to the world.

That’s what really unites us. We are all “imperfect” selves who want to be acknowledged by others. We want to be seen, heard, understood, and listened to. Ideally, we want to be agreed with, but if all the other things can be managed, then we can probably still have a relationship, even in the absence of agreement. We can see the things that make us the same, and that allows us to accept the “imperfect” difference.

This kind of approach to communicating with others gives us the best chance to really hear and be heard, and to include others, no matter how they are different from us.

Diversity is about tolerance of difference. And it can be difficult to tolerate difference. Sometimes it can seem impossible to reach across a divide, and maybe it isn’t possible to get the whole way. But we can get closer to understanding others.

It’s hard, but if we want to close the gaps that divide us, it’s a necessity for us all.

Dawn Metcalfe wrote this piece for the Ellevate Network, a community of professional women committed to helping each other succeed. You can see it here: https://medium.com/@EllevateNtwk/im-tired-of-talking-about-diversity-aren-t-you-39b266ea6d3

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Poor communication costs: Is your business in danger of losing money?

Work-style differences can cause a lot of friction in the workplace. If not quickly identified, small quirks can lead to large assumptions that drive wedges between teams.

Whereas pace of work, level of formality, and leadership style are easier to recognize and adapt to, communication preferences are tougher to figure out. And, it’s a big issue.

According to a Holmes (a voice of the global PR industry) report, the cost of poor communication has hit an overwhelming $37 billion. Also, 400 surveyed corporations (with 100,000 plus employees in the U.S. and U.K.) estimated that communication barriers cost the average organization $62.4 million per year in lost productivity.

On the flip side, this same report found that companies with leaders who possess effective communication skills produced a 47 percent higher return to shareholders over a five-year period.

No matter how you slice it, effective communication is key to team and organizational success… so how can businesses get better at it?

Read on to see the full article by Michael Schneider in Inc.: https://www.inc.com/michael-schneider/the-extrovert-vs-introvert-dynamic-could-be-costing-your-organization-millions-heres-how-to-bridge-communication-gap.html

 

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When workplace feuds are a matter of life and death

I write all the time about the need to have difficult conversations more effectively and what makes it hard. Hard in this context may involve telling something that’s difficult to say. But it also means listening to things that are hard to hear. And doing all of this in a way that improves relationships, instead of eroding them further.

When this doesn’t happen research shows a serious negative impact on morale, productivity and the bottom line. And in some cases it’s even more important than that: it can kill.

We heard recently about a London hospital unit that was consumed by a ‘toxic’ work environment among surgeons. According to the leaked report by former NHS England deputy medical director Mike Bewick, the south London facility had a cardiac surgery death rate of 3.7% – well above the national 2% average.

What went wrong? The report points to internal politics with inadequate scrutiny, to a department riven between ‘two camps’ exhibiting ‘tribal-like activity’. Staff members said they ‘felt that there was a persistent toxic atmosphere and stated that there was a “dark force” in the unit’.

And yet nobody did anything? It’s not good enough – we have rights and responsibilities and we need to exercise both. Doctors (and indeed leaders in all walks of life) say ‘Show us the data and we’ll take it seriously’. Well the data is there: according to a study in the journal Pediatrics, a rude comment from a third-party doctor decreased performance among doctors and nurses by more than 50% in an exercise involving a hypothetical life-or-death situation.

‘We found that rudeness damages your ability to think, manage information, and make decisions,’ said Amir Erez, an author on the study and the Huber Hurst professor of management at the University of Florida. ’You can be highly motivated to work, but if rudeness damages your cognitive system then you can’t function appropriately in a complex situation. And that hurts patients.’

So we know that how people communicate with each other has an impact on results and we also know, in the case of doctors, that if they can communicate effectively with patients they are less likely to be sued. This seems like something we should really get better at.

So why isn’t it happening? The same reason it doesn’t happen in other organisations. It’s hard. It involves lots of work, over time, and often dealing with egos that don’t think they have anything to learn. Or, if they do, it can’t possibly be that important.

It’s not a good enough excuse. Those who ‘get it’ need to be more vocal and organisations need to put their money where their mouths (or slogans) are. Don’t send your people on a one-day training programme and expect that to fix things. It’s important – work at it. Teach the behaviours explicitly, hire for them, train for them, get rid of people who won’t show them and create a culture where what’s being said is more important than who’s saying it.

Hierarchy is necessary. And I understand it’s necessary in healthcare. But following the chain of command doesn’t mean those at the top can bully those below them and it doesn’t absolve those at the bottom of responsibility for their behaviours either. Hierarchy tells us our roles and responsibilities and one of these, no matter where you sit, is to put the organisation’s desired results at the heart of what you’re doing: in the case of healthcare that result should be patient outcomes.

And don’t think that if you’re not in healthcare this doesn’t apply to you. The lessons here are relevant outside of medical settings – of course your situation may not involve life and death but the impact on cognition of rudeness is everywhere and why sap away mental resources when you don’t have to?

The science is clear: how we communicate matters. It can improve but that takes work. If you don’t work at it the tendency is for people to create factions and develop a culture of fear. And yet the report had to be leaked so clearly there’s some way to go before there is a real commitment in the NHS to dealing with this problem. And I’m worried that the same is true elsewhere.

This piece by HardTalk author Dawn Metcalfe originally appeared in Management Today. You can see it here: https://www.managementtoday.co.uk/when-workplace-feuds-matter-life-death/leadership-lessons/article/1490130

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The importance of building a culture of candour

I’m privileged to spend a lot of time with senior leaders and I’ve recently starting asking them one question: “How long does it take you to hear bad news?” The answer is always the same: “Longer than I’d like”.

Almost every organisation has transparency or openness as one of its goals. They want people to feel safe speaking up, questioning, taking risks and giving critical feedback. They spend a long time coming up with the exact wording for the values statement that will explain this, and even longer writing their ‘behavioural competencies’.

Untold amounts of money is spent with consultants on performance management systems and yet, almost every time I ask a member of a senior leadership team how often they actually see the behaviours they want in real life the answer is “a lot less often than I want”.

When I ask why, the answer is often their employees just don’t speak up. In other words, it comes down to culture.

There is always an organisational culture. It is simply the amalgamation of all the behaviours of the people in that organisation. It’s what we praise and censure, what we reward and what we punish. We can decide what that culture is and we can do so more quickly than you might think. That’s not to say it’s easy. It isn’t. It takes courage and consistency to ensure that you have a culture in place that supports your organisational and team goals, rather than undermines them.

You might ask why we need a culture that supports behaviours like questioning, criticising and disagreeing – we’ve always got along without them in the past? And that’s true. But the world of work and the role of humans within this world is very different.

If you want creativity and innovation you need people who are able to change the status quo and leaders who encourage this. If you want to recruit and retain the best people, they need to feel their opinions and expertise are valued before they reach the senior leadership team. If you want high performance, you need people who can hold each other accountable without drama and intrigue, but in the spirit of constant improvement.

So how do we build the culture that supports this?

Build systems and norms: From ensuring there is a way to report and address bad behaviour, to expecting every manager to have at least one actual one-to-one conversation a month with their direct reports, the systems in place will make what you value clear.

Ask questions: In the 1980s Blake and Mouton found that, when faced with a potential disastrous situation, NASA pilots who asked other crew their opinions were more likely to make the right decision than those who acted on their own. You’re not Google and so you don’t know everything – stop acting like you do.

Be consistent: The same NASA study found that team members were less likely to speak up, even when asked to, if the pilot had made it clear in the past that they weren’t open to advice. This was true even when the crew had information that might save the plan and their lives.

Share information: Too often we see information as power, and so try to hide it away from others. People aren’t mushrooms: you can’t just keep them in the dark and cover them with manure. If you want people to come up with good ideas then they need to know what’s going on.

Tell the truth: When leaders tell everyone the same thing (subject to legal constraints) and don’t constantly change the story, those around them feel they can be trusted and so are willing to put themselves on the line. Remember that the days of keeping secrets are on the way out, if not already gone.

Practice: It’s never easy to speak up (or to hear ‘bad’ news) but we can get better at it through appropriate training and practice.

Don’t wait: Although your actions will have more weight the higher you are in the organisation, you can do most of the things in this list at any stage in your career. And doing so will not only help the people around you it will help you too.

In order to build a sustainable knowledge-based economy, we need to focus on building a culture of candour in the workplace – one that allows for constant innovation and improvement. We hire knowledge workers because of what’s in their head, but unless they have the courage to speak up and share both the good and the bad, we will not see the benefit.

This piece by HardTalk author Dawn Metcalfe originally appeared in Gulf Business. You can see it here: https://gulfbusiness.com/importance-building-culture-candour-region/

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If your employees aren’t speaking up, blame company culture

“Companies benefit when employees speak up. When employees feel comfortable candidly voicing their opinions, suggestions, or concerns, organizations become better at handling threats as well as opportunities.

But employees often remain silent with their opinions, concerns or ideas. There are generally two viewpoints on why: One is the personality perspective, which suggests that these employees inherently lack the disposition to stand up and speak out about critical issues, that they might be too introverted or shy to effectively articulate their views to the team. This perspective gives rise to solutions such as hiring employees who have proactive dispositions and are more inclined to speak truth to power.

By contrast, the situational perspective argues that employees fail to speak up because they feel their work environment is not conducive for it. They might fear suffering significant social costs by challenging their bosses. This perspective leads to solutions focused on how managers can create the right social norms that encourage employees to voice concerns without fear of sanctions.

These two perspectives aren’t mutually exclusive, but we wanted to test which one matters more: If personality is the primary predictor of speaking up, situational factors shouldn’t matter as much. This means that employees who are inherently disposed to speak up will be the ones who more frequently do so. By contrast, if the situation or environment is the primary driver of speaking up, then employee personality should be less important – employees would speak up, irrespective of their underlying dispositions, when the work environment encourages speaking up, and they would stay silent when the environment doesn’t…”

Read on to see the full article by Hemant Kakkar and Subra Tangirala in Harvard Business Review and find out what the research says about speaking up: https://hbr.org/2018/11/if-your-employees-arent-speaking-up-blame-company-culture

 

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5 ways to build courage and competence for difficult conversations

Some people think I’m courageous. I’ve lived and worked all over the world and regularly speak in front of hundreds of people, so I must be, right? Well, no. For whatever reason, I don’t find this scary, and courage is the ability to do something that frightens you. What would take courage is for me to jump out of a plane. So, I don’t do it. And I’m comfortable with that because, let’s face it, there is very little upside in falling through the air.

One thing that most people find frightening is speaking up when faced with decisions or actions they disagree with. And that makes sense: Many of the stories we hear about people speaking up end with the individual facing some kind of negative outcome, including, in extreme cases, being ostracised. There are few movies or books written about employees who point out a problem and are immediately thanked and rewarded for doing so, and yet that happens, too – and more often than you might think. When people speak up effectively, they can find that not only do they survive, but thrive.

My favourite example of this is a man I met in London. A highly-paid banker early-on in his career, he became the owner of chain of successful antique shops. He no longer relied on his day job to pay the bills and so started to speak up, questioning decisions he felt weren’t adequately reasoned out and asking questions that previously he might have avoided in case he came across as less than all-knowing. Suddenly, his peers and the people above him began to notice him, and he made extraordinary progress very quickly, repeatedly being promoted.

It is possible to create positive change by speaking up. Indeed, it’s practically impossible to do it any other way. But being courageous isn’t enough. You have to be competent, as well. Speaking up isn’t enough – you have to do it effectively. It’s not always the right time, the right issue, or the right person – and of course there are risks. But you can minimise these by remembering some key principles.

1) Build the relationship before you need it.

If you already have trust with the person or people you need to talk to, they’re much more likely to listen.

2) Get the timing right.

You’re a lot less likely to get a good response if you address an issue with your boss in front of her boss. Instead, find some time when you’re alone and give them a succinct explanation of what you want to address.

3) Explain your purpose.

As important as it is to be clear about what you want to address, it’s equally important to explain why. Left to our own devices, we’ll often come up with the worst possible explanation about why somebody is raising something we don’t enjoy hearing. Make it clear why you’re taking this risk.

4) Make it about them.

If possible, link your purpose to something the person you’re talking to cares about. A great example of this is a client who knew that her boss cared about hitting the sales budget and pointed out that if he interrupted the team when they spoke, he was less likely to hear good ideas about sales initiatives over time.

5) Take responsibility.

In many cases, you will have some responsibility for the issue at stake. Even if the only thing you did wrong is allow the “bad behavior” to continue longer than you should, take that responsibility. It usually disarms the other person and stops the conversation being derailed as they respond with, “But you did/didn’t….”

Remember that the skills needed to speak up effectively can be learned, but they are skills and, as such, must be practiced. You can’t simply read a book or articles; it takes deliberate practice over time.

This piece by HardTalk author Dawn Metcalfe originally appeared in Forbes. You can see it here: https://www.forbes.com/sites/ellevate/2019/02/21/5-ways-to-build-courage-and-competence-for-difficult-conversations/#3c3e92d343cd

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How to let someone go in the right way

It’s always hard to give somebody the bad news that they’re losing their job, but you can make it easier.

To read the full article click here

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5 ways to build courage and competence for difficult conversations

Some people think I’m courageous. I’ve lived and worked all over the world and regularly speak in front of hundreds of people, so I must be, right? Well, no.

To read the full article click here

The post 5 ways to build courage and competence for difficult conversations appeared first on HardTalk.

The importance of building a culture of candour in the region

Why building a workplace culture of openness is key to economic success.

To read the full article click here

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