Executive Velocity

Beth Miller Earns Prestigious Strategic Workforce Planning Certification

Beth Armknecht Miller, President and Executive Coach, Executive Velocity Inc — Thu, 17 May 2012 01:13:03 +0000

Executive Velocity Founder and President earns certification in a rigorous, first-of-its-kind program through the Human Capital Institute

DATE (Atlanta, GA) – Executive Velocity, a leadership development assessment and coaching firm for fast-growing small and mid-sized companies, today announced that president and founder, Beth Miller, CMC, earned the Strategic Workforce Planning Certification from the Human Capital Institute.

The program is the first of its kind in its industry to offer a Strategic Workforce Planning designation. Executive Velocity clients will benefit from Ms. Miller’s enhanced skillset and offerings to accelerate performance and organizational transformation.

The Strategic Workforce Planning Certification includes rigorous requirements such as demonstrated subject matter expertise and proficiency in solving relevant business challenges. The certification process enables professionals to expand their capabilities in business analysis, strategic development and business planning.

“Ongoing learning and improvement is critical to delivering more successful guidance and powerful results for our clients at Executive Velocity,” said Miller. “Certifications such as Strategic Workforce Planning help keep our skills sharp and current while also deepening the expertise our clients depend upon.”

To learn more about services offered by Executive Velocity, visit http://www.executive-velocity.com.

About Executive Velocity

Executive Velocity is a leadership development assessment and coaching firm committed to ensuring the success of top-level executives and business leaders of fast growing and mid-size companies. We’re committed to accelerating the growth of businesses by shaping and enhancing their leadership capacity. Our approach is based on solid, tested business principles including focused goal attainment, continual learning, and developing trusting and supportive relationships. Services offered include facilitation, executive coaching, assessments and team building. Visit http://www.executive-velocity.com.

Quick Tips to Create an Engaged Workforce Employee Engagement is a hot topic as the shortage of...

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Four Steps to be an Effective Influencer in the Workplace

Beth Armknecht Miller, President and Executive Coach, Executive Velocity Inc — Mon, 07 May 2012 22:33:16 +0000

Your currency in the workplace lies in your ability to persuade. You have to make decisions, and those people who are most effective at influencing the outcome of choices will find greater success. Whether you are seeking a raise, looking to close a sale or simply want to get ahead, having more control means bettering your odds of getting what you want.

But not everyone is gifted with a command of the fine art of persuasion. If it doesn’t come naturally to you, here are four steps you can use to become a master persuader.

1. Establish Credibility
	Before you can wield influence, you have to establish your credibility. Having a strong opinion isn’t enough. According to Kim Harris, a writer and consultant with Cutting Edge PR, credibility comes from not only from demonstrated knowledge but also from building relationships and proving that you are a team player. Those with established credibility “have demonstrated over time that they can be trusted to listen and to work in the best interests of others,” Harris writes.
2. Know the Facts
	While knowledge is important for building credibility, it is crucial for backing up your position. Pointing to credible evidence and hard-to-dispute facts means you are more likely to be successful in your efforts. However, don’t go overboard. Too many stats, studies and statements might just lose you your audience. Simple is better, writes Steve Roesler on his All Things Workplace website.“Resist the urge to show off your knowledge and sophistication and keep it simple,” he said. Don’t forget, easy to remember names and ideas work best.
3. Listen and Be Flexible
	Persuasion and communication are both two-way streets, so you must be adept at more than just talking. Don’t bluster your way through a presentation without taking note of the body language of your audience. You may need to adapt and improvise, according to CareerBright.com: “We all are different and there is no universal style of persuasion that works for everyone. Prepare your presentation or the final solution after you assess and understand how others respond to your ideas.” Which isn’t to say you should abandon your goals— although compromise will play a role in most decision-making processes, you need to believe in what you want and fight for it. “If you don’t care, don’t bother,” says Chrissy Scivicque at EatYourCareer.com. “Whatever you want to persuade another person to do (or think or feel), you simply MUST believe it’s the right thing. The more confidence you can demonstrate, the more convincing you’ll be.”
4. Walk in Their Shoes
	Easily one of the more important things to remember throughout the entire process is to keep an understanding of your audience clear in your mind. You know why you want that promotion, but is that what your boss wants? Try to think like your boss does and you’ll be able to anticipate his or her objections. When you know those possible objections, you can properly frame your argument

Ultimately, like everything in communication, it’s all about the audience. Know your audience, frame your argument and adapt quickly to your audience. Do all of these things consistently and you might just get that raise or promotion you’ve been working toward.

Secrets to Effective Conflict Resolution We all have had to deal with conflict in the...

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Five Qualities to Identify High Potentials

Beth Armknecht Miller, President and Executive Coach, Executive Velocity Inc — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 08:27:00 +0000

As business leaders, it is important to be able to see and cultivate the employees who will be the future of the company—and direct its present course. These high potentials, as they are known, can be identified in a number of ways, but are you identifying them in your business? Or are these emerging leaders slipping through the cracks—maybe to another company that will identify their ability to rise through the company ranks?

Quite a few different metrics exist among companies and the support systems companies use, and the methods they use to identify high potentials. But a review of expert opinions on the subject shows that there is actually quite a lot of consistency across the board when it comes to what qualities high potentials have—and knowing these qualities will help you be on the lookout those who possess then in your own company.

First of all, it’s important to know how to go about finding high potentials. Yes, they may have certain definable qualities, but how do you figure out who has those qualities? Several different methods are used by different organizations, but a survey by the HR consultants ERC of twenty-six organizations revealed that the most-used practices are identification through skills and personality assessment through testing, and reviews by peers, managers, and clients.

And now, the most burning question of all—what qualities make a high potential? How can you find the emerging leaders in your company and spend the resources developing them so they can become the high level executives of tomorrow, when you want to make sure your company is in good hands? So here are the qualities based on research conducted at places such as Cornell and Rutgers.

Ambition Individuals with high potential are, unsurprisingly, ambitious. Of course, it takes a certain amount of ambition to move careers forward, but these high potentials are competitive, goal-oriented, and they take active steps to improve themselves and learn the things necessary to progress. This, naturally, takes a work ethic of steel, so make sure to recognize those people who always have their nose to the grindstone.
Attitude High potentials don’t waste time being negative and doing their own thing—it’s all about the positive with them, and they infect their peers and supervisors with their good attitudes. They’re team players, and they create long-lasting relationships with the people they work with. But they don’t merely want a team of people who are just like them; high potentials value the assets that diversity and many differing points of view can bring. And, another check on the attitude list? High potentials have a great deal of integrity and professionalism. They can be trusted to make the company not only look good, but be good, as well.
Critical Thinking & Communication Critical thinking and strong communication skills are not possessed by every employee, but it is critical that those you select as emerging leaders do. This means they can reason their way through complicated problems and consider several options simultaneously. But critical thinking without constructive communication is useless—and again, this is where a high potential is a team player who can communicate their ideas with others, and listen to their ideas as well to come up with even better ideas.
Expertise It goes without saying that an employee who is going to move forward in their career must exhibit a broad technical expertise in whatever their role may be. Not only that, but a high potential should be able to understand their role in relation to the overall function of the company.
Boldness Last of all, a high potential must have a quality that goes beyond ambition and skill: the boldness and courage to take risks. A high potential is a risk-taker who knows that every cost-benefit analysis can’t deliver a promise of how a venture will go, and can decide whether or not to go ahead anyway, rather than be crippled by uncertainty. They know that change comes, and they adapt to it and thrive rather than holding onto past practices—and even better, they will make those changes themselves. This quality will ensure that as they move forward, your business does too.

So look around you: which of your employees are thriving where they are, and which ones are high potentials who are going to lead your company ahead?

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Disengagement During Meetings

Beth Armknecht Miller, President and Executive Coach, Executive Velocity Inc — Tue, 13 Mar 2012 02:11:52 +0000

Have you ever been in a meeting where one person decided to display a negative attitude?
You know, the person who starts reading his PDA, or the other one who suddenly falls quiet, or what about the one who starts to slide down his chair and on to the floor?

Well if you are the one in charge of the meeting what is your role in this dysfunction?
I recently heard a speaker, who was talking about the culture of accountability say, “You get what you put up with”. Bad behavior and rudeness happen because people continually get away with it.

So lets break down bad behavior into three primary categories:

1.	Checked out or disengaged
2.	Negative
3.	Rude

Because of the proliferation of PDAs, I want to specifically discuss the scenario of disengagement.
Reading PDAs and “multi-tasking” have become common place in business meetings.

So you are leading a meeting and notice that one or more participants are texting or reading email on their smartphones.
What options do you have at this point in time?
First, you need to assess if this is a theme or an instance i.e. does the person disengaging have a reputation for checking out and not actively participating or is this something unusual for the team member. If this person has a reputation for disengaging then it should be addressed within the meeting.

As the leader of the team you have the following options:

1.	You have the option of communicating to the person that you recognize that they are not currently part of the meeting. Ask them “Is there something urgent that you need to take care of at this time?” It may be that an emergency has come up which she needs to address. And if this is the case and she is key to the meeting, then reschedule the meeting. If she isn’t key to the meeting, then dismiss her to her emergency. However, in my experience this usually isn’t the case.
2.	You can wait until after the meeting and then pull the person aside to discuss what was driving the behavior. If there wasn’t an emergency, find out how they think their behavior impacts the meeting, other team members, as well as their effectiveness in the job.
3.	You can wait for an opportunity to ask her a pointed question specific to the conversation, such as “What do you think of Rick’s idea? This will either bring the person back into the conversation and/or will create a moment of embarrassment. Depending on their response, you may need to have a follow on conversation with them one on one.
4.	Or you can address the whole team and open the discussion to everyone. What are their thoughts about team members checking out? What would their suggestions be to become a more high performing team and have everyone engaged? This option may uncover process or content issues of the meeting that you haven’t considered may be part of the disengaging behaviors.
5.	You can ignore the behavior, limiting the team to less than high performance and continue the dysfunction by not managing the bad behavior. If this is your choice, you may want reevaluate why you are managing a team.

So as a leader it is your choice, allow the dysfunction to continue and you may wake up without a job in the future. Or, address the issue and set the tone for more productive meetings that will lead to team success.

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Don’t Let the Pebbles Cover the Rocks

Beth Armknecht Miller, President and Executive Coach, Executive Velocity Inc — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 21:01:11 +0000

One of my five top leadership mistakes is the vicious spiral many leaders get sucked into: the urgent taking over the important on a continual basis.

This spiral leads to goals that are unmet or have slipped past their deadline. It causes a lack of focus for the organization as people begin to question what the real priorities are for the company. And ultimately, the success of the organization is held back and performance is limited because employees are focused on putting out fires and not preparing for the future because the future is so unclear. And, often changes are taking place externally in the market that are missed providing competitors with the advantage in the long run.

So what are the important things a leader should be focused on? And when the urgent hits you in the face, which it does to us all, what process do you have to quickly get back to the important items, which will make the difference between your company surviving and thriving?

The Important

A leader’s ultimate job is to move her organization forward towards the company’s long-term vision. So the important things to a company are those projects, decisions, meetings, employees, and external influences that will impact a company in getting to their long -term vision.
And we all know the urgent, an employee crisis, a problem with a customer delivery, a vendor not meeting their commitment, a key prospect requiring a quick proposal turnaround, and the list goes on and on.

Over the years, I have had the opportunity to work with many business leaders who were very effective at managing the important versus the urgent and what I have found is three things that have made them effective…. delegation, time management, and emotional intelligence (the ability to be calm and not over react).

Effectively delegating urgent issues requires a level of trust that the person being delegated to, can be trusted to perform in a timely manner and has the necessary skills to deliver quality work. If you find yourself consistently taking on specific urgent issues, for example customer issues, then this probably means you either don’t have the right person managing customer relationships or you need to develop the person so that you can offload more customer issues. Or, it may be that you have trouble letting go of control. It this is the case, ask yourself ”How will I be able to grow the business if I continue to fear letting go of the comfortable and non risky tasks?”

Coaching Tip: Start documenting the type of urgent issues that are derailing the important work and look for trends. Once the trends have been identified determine who and how you can offload the urgent.
Time Management is the next critical skill to stay out of the trap of being stuck in the urgent. Many of you have heard the story of the “big rocks”, I’m not sure where it originated but I first heard it from Verne Harnish of Gazelles Inc. The point of “big rocks” is that if you keep tackling the small things, the sand and pebbles, and not the important strategic items, then your pot will be full of sand and pebbles with no way of inserting a big rock. The urgent really aren’t the rocks; they are like pebbles, which get caught in a bicycle’s gears, which can derail a company. As a leader-manager your time should first be focused on the big rocks, and when the pebbles pop up and try to derail you spend time to reprioritize so that you can get quickly back on track to address your big rocks.

And finally, having the skill to manage your emotions in times of the urgent is critical to leadership success. Many leaders forget that they are “on stage”. Their employees are always looking to them for emotional and behavioral cues. So when something or someone becomes that pebble, you need to kick up your level of emotional intelligence. Step back and think before you react.

Coaching Tip: Explore your stress triggers, what causes you to react emotionally versus logically? Once you know your triggers you can learn to manage your approach and reaction to the triggers.

So if you are tired of spending all your time fighting fires and not focused on the future, take the tips from executives who have been able to free themselves of the vicious cycle: delegate, manage your time and your emotions.
And, in turn have enjoy continued growth, success and less stress.

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Top 10 Clues that Employees are Disengaging

Beth Armknecht Miller, President and Executive Coach, Executive Velocity Inc — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 01:31:20 +0000

From 2008 to 2010, employee engagement dropped to 56%. This was the largest rate of decline in 15 years, according to Aon Consulting. So how can you measure employee engagement within your organization? Generally companies will deploy an employee engagement survey using an external company to administer the survey ensuring anonymity for employees. Others will develop their own internal surveys which lack question validity and robust reporting features which can be drawbacks to developing an improvement plan.

But what if you don’t have the time or money and want to get a broad sense of overall engagement, what are your options?
My suggestion is to look for the top 10 clues that employees may be disengaging from their work. And, the 10 clues are:

1.	Quality of service and products is dropping–employees are not showing a genuine level of concern for customer needs and the quality of their workmanship
2.	Absenteeism is increasing–the amount of time employees are missing from work is affecting overall department or company performance and may be affecting the morale of those having to pick up a greater work load.
3.	Employee complaints are on the rise–negative comments about management and the company from employees to other employees can be like a cancer and impact the performance of others. An analysis of where the complaints are coming from and the type of complaints may uncover some employment issues that should be addressed.
4.	Employees don’t work as a team–there may be some great individual contributors but the environment doesn’t encourage cooperation and team work which can lead to missed opportunities. Make sure that teams have the right members to be successful, that each member understands their role and how it fits into the team, and that the team understands what success looks like for them.
5.	Shrinkage and theft rates are increasing–these issues can start small and then rise to levels of significance impacting profitability. Identify potential problem areas and address the issue as soon as you see an uptick before it becomes a bigger problem.
6.	Lack of accountability–as the frequency of employees blaming others increases others will take the same attitude of avoiding personal responsibility for failures at work.
7.	Fewer employees are coming to you with concerns–don’t assume that this is good news and bury your head in the sand. It often means employees don’t have a high level of trust and confidence in management. You may be missing the opportunity to hear about some good ideas and suggestions that can improve results for the company.
8.	There are fewer times taken to recognize success–your organization may be struggling yet there is a team or an individual who has been successful. Don’t’ just get caught up with the big goals, remember to recognize and celebrate the smaller ones.
9.	Turnover rates are too high–replacing good performers is expensive. Is it an isolated department or an overall company problem? Review exit interview results to determine any trends that should be addressed and then put a plan together.
10.	Key positions remain open longer–this may be a sign that your employer brand is suffering. You may not have a good reputation as an employer in the market which impedes you from attracting top talent. With the internet and social media, employers bad practices and culture don’t remain a secret for very long

So which one of these clues do you see in your organization? Ask some of your key managers for their input on these clues and sit down to determine what areas do you want to address first. And remember that this technique is not a replacement for a professional engagement survey.

Make sure that this becomes a key initiative in the next 12 months!

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Secrets to Effective Conflict Resolution

Beth Armknecht Miller, President and Executive Coach, Executive Velocity Inc — Tue, 06 Dec 2011 21:15:25 +0000

We all have had to deal with conflict in the workplace. It can be a real energy drain as people within and around the conflict focus on the negative and not the positive. The result is decreased productivity and even worse, potential danger for other employees. As a leader, dealing with conflict is a key skill you must master. So here are some recommended steps to take to resolve conflicts in a timely and efficient manner.

First, you must be able to recognize the conflict. Some forms of conflict are subtle and not so blatant. These subtle forms can include repeated negative attitudes or behaviors such as inappropriate use of humor-sarcasm or cynicism, lack of care, empathy, and support of team members, interrupting others, appearing arrogant or a know it all, withholding of resources or information, etc. These are all subtle because they are interpreted by individuals who will interpret the behaviors based on their biases and experiences. Their interpretation will affect their relationship with the other person. As a leader, you need to understand each of your team members’ behavior preferences so you can be alert to potential subtle conflicts which can ultimately escalate into much larger ones. Then there are the more blatant behaviors such as yelling, intimidation, and continually not keeping commitments to others.

Second, research the situation by asking questions of those involved directly and indirectly. Your questions should be data driven because the focus of your discussion with the individuals will be on the problem, not the individuals in conflict. Listen carefully to filter out opinions from facts. And be careful when asking questions to not “lead the witness”. And finally, don’t share your opinions with those you are interviewing because of potential biases in their responses. Your job is to get all the necessary facts before facilitating a resolution.

Third, prior to a meeting with the team members in conflict establish meeting norms and guidelines with each member individually. Get individual commitments from them that they will abide to the following: express themselves in an unemotional manner, listen when another person is speaking- no interruptions, attempt to put themselves in the shoes of the other person, and commit to a certain date to make a final decision if you need to based on the meeting dialogue.

Fourth, facilitate a meeting between the parties in conflict. During this meeting acknowledge the problem you have identified during your research in a concise manner and communicate your role in the meeting as a facilitator. You are not there to solve the conflict but to facilitate the conversation so the conflicting parties can solve the problem themselves. Remind them of the meeting guidelines they each agreed to before the conversation begins. And, set a time frame for the meeting and let them know that if the conflict can’t be resolved then a specific time will be set aside to pick up the conversation. Be prepared to stop the meeting if someone isn’t abiding to their promise.
Coaching Tip: When reminding them of the guidelines they agreed to add the following communication guidelines:

Have them use “I” not “You” when making a declarative statement
The words “never” and “always” should not be used

Fifth and final, make your decision a timely one. Your credibility and reputation as a leader is partially based on your decision making skills. The inability to make a decisive decision during times of conflict can impact how you are viewed as a leader. Show your strength and you will build respect from those you lead.

In the end it is up to the leader to be skilled in questioning, listening, facilitating, and decision making to resolve conflicts in the workplace and insure that employees are both productive and safe.

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Quick Tips to Create an Engaged Workforce

Beth Armknecht Miller, President and Executive Coach, Executive Velocity Inc — Thu, 10 Nov 2011 01:26:55 +0000

Employee Engagement is a hot topic as the shortage of high performing talent increases.

A May study from McKinsey & Co. found that by 2018, the U.S. will face a shortage of 1.5 million managers who can use data to shape business decisions. And the shortage gets even larger for non management employees, especially knowledge workers in the areas of healthcare, technology, and accounting.

Another study in June 2011 from Mercer, the global HR consulting firm, found that nearly one third (32 percent) of American workers are considering leaving their organization, which is a 40 percent increase since 2005. So not only is there a shortage but there is also a higher risk of losing the talent you already have on your team.

So what should you be doing to nurture and increase employee engagement on your team?
Here are a few tips to get you started:

1.	Before hiring ask yourself “does the candidate fit culturally with the organization?” In other words, does the potential employee have the same set of values the company lives every day? More often than not employees fail in the short term because they don’t “fit” the culture of the organization, not because they don’t have the skills. Coaching Tip: Devise several interview questions that can illuminate a candidate’s values and/or use an assessment that measures values such as the Hogan Leadership assessment.
2.	Once you have the right person on board, you need to keep them challenged which means providing them with opportunities for growth and development. Development plans are an integral part of the talent management system and should be updated on a quarterly basis. The types of development can include: special projects, rotation to a lateral position, matching a mentor with the employee, structured learning, and executive coaching. Coaching Tip: It is critical that the employee be a part of their development planning process. Too often managers assume that an employee wants certain opportunities when they either may not want the opportunity at all, or the timing isn’t right for them due to a personal situation.
3.	Demonstrate that you care about your employees by recognizing their good work and showing appreciation. The number one reason good employees leave a company is because they don’t feel appreciated. Many managers feel that if they show too much appreciation and recognition that it will make performance correction more difficult. Studies show that it takes upwards of 5 acts of appreciation to equal one act of criticism. Keep track of your appreciation for others over a week, be purposeful by looking for the sparks of good work and potential, and recognize it. Coaching Tip: Make sure that when you do provide recognition and appreciation that it be done in a timely manner and with sincerity. There is nothing worse than receiving insincere appreciation. If you can’t be sincere, then don’t even bother.
4.	Trust is a critical component to employee engagement. Employees who trust their co-workers, managers, and company generally have a higher level of engagement than those who don’t. And the one area that will impact trust the most is transparent leadership. Organizational transparency requires among other things, open access to information, and participation in decision making. Coaching tip: A higher degree of transparency will exist if communications are timely and frequent. And remember to use different communication channels to satisfy the preferences of the multiple generations in the workforce-email, text, hard copy, meetings, video, etc.

These are all techniques that can be implemented in a short period of time that can provide you with some insurance in retaining your key employees. Which one do you plan to implement first?
Employee Engagement is a hot topic as the shortage of high performing talent increases.

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Leadership Readiness- Questions to ask before taking that promotion

Beth Armknecht Miller, President and Executive Coach, Executive Velocity Inc — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 21:16:07 +0000

Many individual contributors who have been successful at their jobs often get the opportunity to move up into a management position. Because they have demonstrated an ability to handle additional responsibilities as a single contributor, the conclusion is that they can handle the additional responsibilities of leading people.

Before you step up, ask yourself these questions as a starting point. And if you are a manager about ready to promote, these are great questions to review with the potential promotion candidate.

1.	What should I do during my first day as a manager? By the 30th and 90th days? If you don’t know the answer to this question, then you need to sit down with your new boss BEFORE your first day and prioritize key success criteria for your new position.
	Coaching Tip: Managers who are promoting star performers should clearly define success and any areas of development and training the new manager should receive. It is your job to make sure they have all the tools and resources to be successful.
2.	How will I find out the strengths and challenges of each team member? Ask to review your team member’s employee performance evaluations as a start but this should not be your only data point. Develop ways, projects or tasks, to determine if the performance evaluation, both strengths and challenges, are still valid. And if you have the resources, assessment tools will provide additional data points. Some of the more common tools are DiSC, Myers Briggs and Strengths Finder.
	Coaching Tip: Always try to focus on a person’s strengths and how they can use their strengths to overcome their limitations.
3.	What should I do when someone misses a commitment? First review your process for delegation. When delegating, both you and the team member are accountable. You are accountable for making sure the person is capable of making the promise i.e. they have the necessary skills and resources. You are also accountable for getting a clear commitment from the person. A clear commitment requires an understanding of the task, the due date, and the impact the task has on you and/or the team.
	Coaching Tip: When delegating, use the SMIT model: specific, measurable, impact, and time bound. And when the person is making her promise, listen for the use of the pronoun “I”. The use of ”we” is unacceptable and does not create accountability!
4.	How should I be managing their performance? Performance management is an ongoing process and not an annual event. It may be that this is the process your company uses and here is your chance to take leadership in performance management. Make it part of your monthly routine to meet individually with each of your direct reports. This is their time not yours. It should be all about what they need, what they are concerned about, and what they feel good about. This time will show them that you care and give you an opportunity to practice your coaching skills.
	Coaching Tip: When you learn and become skilled at coaching your team members, you will be developing them to perform at a higher level which will free you up for doing the important and not the urgent. The core of coaching is asking really great questions to get them to explore their options and self-limiting beliefs.
5.	What should I be doing to be successful in my new job? Remember that success comes from influencing and inspiring others which builds trust and respect. Your success is dependent on many people’s success across many departments. Now that you are responsible for being the leader, it is about creating larger successes. It is no longer about you!
	Coaching Tip: Identify the key people outside of your team that you need to influence and then determine how you can help them be successful.
6.	What happens if I am not sure exactly what to do? Ask your team first if it isn’t personnel related. You probably have an idea of what you need to do or you may have some options that you need flushed out. What a great opportunity to have a brainstorming session and let your team members’ voices be heard! Make sure to let them know what direction you plan on taking and thank everyone for their input.
	Coaching tip: When facilitating brainstorming sessions, remember to use the “Yes I like that because, and” technique. This eliminates “yes, but” which totally negates the previous statement and shuts down the flow of ideas.

Answering these questions should provide you or the person you are promoting with a head start to success!

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Mining Diamonds by Purposeful Walk-arounds

Beth Armknecht Miller, President and Executive Coach, Executive Velocity Inc — Tue, 20 Sep 2011 22:10:02 +0000

One of my clients recently returned from the Baptist Leadership Conference and during his management meeting he was reporting back on his learnings from the conference and what he intended on implementing.

As he ran down the list there was one technique that is so easy to implement and when done effectively, can provided a leadership team with valuable information. The technique is “Rounding with a Purpose”, and I wanted to share it with my readers. In essence, it takes the traditional “Management by Walking Around” and develops a structure using questions that are thought out in advance based on the current challenges management is facing.

How would you take this idea into your organization and implement it? What information today, are you not receiving because you aren’t asking the right questions of employees working on the front lines, the workers closest to many challenges a company faces?

Here are two typical business situations along with questions you may want to use that can help you learn more about what you, as a leader, can do to increase the success of your people as well as your organization.

Situation 1: There has been a recent increase in customer complaints

Questions:

If you could change one thing that can improve customer service, what would you do?
What complaints have you been hearing recently from customers?
What service policy is getting in the way of improved customer service?

Situation 2: Sales have been trending down in recent months

Questions:

If there could be one thing we could change about our products and/or services that would increase sales, what would it be?
What new product/service would you offer to our customers that would cause them to recommend us to others?
What questions should we be asking our customers that we aren’t already?
What product/service causes the most problems for you?

As you will note, the situations are specific to a certain business function but don’t let the situations lead you into a familiar trap. Don’t ask the situational questions just of those in that department. For instance, if the issue is sales, make sure you don’t just ask the sales department. Make sure to get a good cross section of input.

Once you start gathering this information, it is time to share it with your management team and teach them the technique so they can implement as well.
So what questions are you not getting answers to from your management team? And if these questions were asked to your line workers, what hidden gems may be mined? Asking good questions can unearth some uncut diamonds that may provide you with some long awaited answers.

I would love to hear your ideas of how you have used this technique to your benefit and institutionalize it within your company so all managers are consistently listening to employees. And, what particular questions have you used to obtain information that you might not have obtained otherwise?

And if you are in the health care industry and haven’t heard about the Baptist Leadership Institute, check them out by clicking on this link. http://www.baptistleadershipinstitute.com/

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Executive Velocity

Beth Miller Earns Prestigious Strategic Workforce Planning Certification

Executive Velocity Founder and President earns certification in a rigorous, first-of-its-kind program through the Human Capital Institute

About Executive Velocity

Four Steps to be an Effective Influencer in the Workplace

1. Establish Credibility

2. Know the Facts

3. Listen and Be Flexible

4. Walk in Their Shoes

Five Qualities to Identify High Potentials

Ambition

Attitude

Critical Thinking & Communication

Expertise

Boldness

Disengagement During Meetings

Don’t Let the Pebbles Cover the Rocks

The Important

Top 10 Clues that Employees are Disengaging

Secrets to Effective Conflict Resolution

Quick Tips to Create an Engaged Workforce

Leadership Readiness- Questions to ask before taking that promotion

Mining Diamonds by Purposeful Walk-arounds