Lead through Innovation and Creativity!

Alberta's public sector is again being challenged to tighten its collective belt for fiscal year 2013/14 - and into the foreseeable future.  Funding increases for some departments are being reduced from former commitments while others are experiencing outright funding reductions.  Salary negotiations in the public sector are taking the expected turn as well - wage freezes and tough negotiations.

I'm leaving aside any comment or perspective on whether Alberta has an expenditure problem or a revenue problem.  Regardless of where I weigh in on that debate it won't have any bearing on the situation facing Alberta's public sector.  The reality is that there will be funding challenges to deal with while at the same time achieving what's expected given a continuous boisterous economy and population growth.  And growing expectations of performance!  Some of the responses that have been considered under similar circumstances in the past have included service reductions, program elimination, fee increases (e.g., tuition fees, parking rates) and other generalized cost-cutting measures (e.g., eliminate or reduce travel and professional development).  These same approaches will likely surface this time around too. 

There is more debate this time around about core directions for some institutions - What type of programs really should be offered on a go-forward basis?  Are all programs offered really part of our core direction/purpose?  Do we need a new facility in this location?  Will this facility serve another few years longer versus being replaced?  Can we fulfill our mandate without a particular program or a particular facility? We are even seeing discussions within the education sector that would be akin to merger/acquisition talks within the private sector.  The promise of the latter approach is to reduce duplication of services and associated expenses.  We definitely need to have these discussions and make our system reflect what service requirements are today and into the future.  We should also be prepared to evaluate whether some of our service delivery options are meeting pure health and education requirements or might be too focused on other economic and political goals.

What I haven't heard much about yet is whether truly innovative and creative solutions are being looked at to meet this funding/service challenge into the future.  It's not like we haven't seen this movie before.  And I can't see pure cost-cutting as a sustainable long-term strategy.  So how do we make our services more sustainable - and better! - into the future?  What can we learn - and adapt - from other businesses to promote innovation in service delivery and creativity in meeting the challenge?  How can we lead and succeed with innovation and creativity?

Fundamentally, I believe we need a change in our public sector culture.  And by this I do not mean that we must demand more from our public sector employees in terms of hours worked or benefits foregone.  We have to overcome the myth of public sector employees as unmotivated and entitled individuals who could not cut it in the "real world".  That approach will not get the commitment we need to make necessary changes to service provision.  More likely, that approach will get us more of the continuing conflict and dysfunction we already observe in our labour negotiations.  As challenging as it will be, we will have to do more work on developing true respectful partnerships within our public sector.

Success will also mean doing a 180 degree turn on some of our traditional leadership and management practices.  I'm sure most of us have heard from public sector staff and managers the frustration of having to jump through innumerable hoops and navigate countless barriers to fulfill duties of their jobs - much less have time or energy left over to be innovative.  As pressure to manage budgets and perform to expectations has increased over time, the reaction of "the system" has been to put more and more processes in place to somehow enforce performance and manage risk.  This emphasis on process is further compounded by some who confuse micromanagement with accountability and responsibility - and leadership.  Neither additional process or oversight will allow our public sector to implement required changes in a timely and effective fashion.  Instead what is required is more inspiring leadership, leadership vision that is focused more on "what" then "how", and a system that starts to re-establish trust in the ability of its people to perform.

To foster the innovation and creativity we require, there is the need to provide the space and time to be innovative and creative.  Staff and managers have been running full out - responding to the latest directives, the need for more reports, the need to justify positions and expenditures, the need to respond to a host of expectations and so on.  There are not enough hours in the day and they generally feel that success is surviving the shift, the day, or the week.  Their collective heads are down, nose to the grindstone, trying to meet expectations.  Do they feel they have made progress?  Do they feel they have made a difference?  Do they feel fulfilled?  The answers are generally no.  Simply telling people to "work smarter" without actually giving them permission to disengage from their regular tasks, duties and expectations merely generates more frustration.  It may seem counter intuitive given the pressures the public sector is under right now, but there is a necessity to create some real breathing space to fully engage our skilled and dedicated professionals in meeting long-standing challenges.  As Einstein said (and I may paraphrase) - "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results."

A challenge to leadership in the current circumstances is continuing to be courageous enough to take on the status quo.  This relates to previous points on developing a compelling vision for the future, focusing on outcomes (the "what"), empowering people to achieve (the "how"), and just as importantly - especially in this time frame - sacrifice more than a few sacred cows.  There is a need more than ever to reframe our conversations and redefine how our work is getting done (and even what our work should be!).  There is no doubt that powerful forces within our institutions or amongst various stakeholders will resist such change - after all, they have done well under the current setup.  There has to be more courage and willingness on the part of all leaders at all levels of our organizations to truly commit to an inspiring vision and stay the course. 

Leaders will also have to foster and support change agents throughout our public sector.  They will have to ask themselves, "Who really is equipped and ready to lead the change we need to make to be successful in achieving our vision?"  They will not only have to take steps to identify those current and future leaders, but they will also have to make very real efforts to ensure these change agents are not just the first over the hill to get the spear.  There are those prepared to step up at all levels of the organizations to make real change but they face many up-hill battles right now.  Leaders must display the courage to really support a strong vision for the future and support their change agents to overcome inertia and the forces supporting the status quo. 

Finally, there must be the patience to develop a culture of creativity and innovation - and trust.  Culture doesn't change or evolve overnight.  People won't simply become creative or innovative or calculated risk takers overnight.  Too many of these potential change agents have been burned before when they have stepped out into the spotlight.  Developing creative and innovative solutions - and a culture that supports culture and innovation - takes concerted effort and many small steps.  If there is belief that real change is necessary all organizational efforts and systems must be aligned to creating a belief and a culture that will support and sustain that change.  The "Big Bang Theory" of change that we have seen play out too often may seem appealing and demonstrative of a commitment to action but it has limited and questionable affect in my opinion.


Let's fuel passion.  Let's celebrate (not punish) new ideas.  Let's foster autonomy.  Let's be courageous.  Let's experiment.  Let's take (many) small steps. 

Let's lead with creativity and innovation!

______________________________

Greg Hadubiak, MHSA, FACHE, CEC, PCC
TEC Canada Chair/Executive Coach/Senior Consultant
hadubiak@wmc.ca

Helping leaders realize their strengths and enabling organizations to achieve their potential through the application of my leadership experience and coaching skills. I act as a point of leverage for my clients. I AM their Force Multiplier.

Good Leadership requires Good Governance

I'm not sure how many of us appreciate the role that Boards of Directors play in setting direction for large organizations and helping it achieve those objectives.  In most circumstances public and media focus falls on a leader - a President, a CEO or other top executive.  Ultimately, however, a well functioning Board is fundamental to the success of an organization through their decisions - not the least of which is their selection of the senior operational leader.  The quality of their decision making and their commitment to their governance task can have wide-ranging impact.

I have worked with a variety of boards in my 25 year career.  I have worked with good boards and not so good boards.  I have seen them lose their way in a variety of circumstances including being burdened with an ineffective Chair, a disruptive board member, uncommitted board members, boards that get too involved in operations, and boards that simply perform a rubber stamp role for what senior leadership wants to get done.  Ineffective governance can severely compromise and inhibit the ability of an organization to succeed and fulfill its mandate.

Sometimes it's the case that boards don't even understand what their key responsibilities are.  This lack of understanding or confusion can often arise from the process by which a person is recruited to the board or the quality of the orientation they receive upon becoming a member.  Too often board members can be selected on criteria that may have nothing to do with kinds of skills that a board requires to fulfill its functions - they are part of the same personal network as existing board members, they are prominent community members, they are politically connected, they are major donors, and so on and so forth.  None of these factors necessarily make for a good board member.  A poor selection process can then be compounded by inadequate orientation to the role of the board.  In that circumstance, an individual board member has to either rely on the skills they bring to the table from their life outside of the board room, the examples set by their fellow board members (for good or bad), or they may be left to take what orientation or guidance they might get from senior leadership of the organization.  Not the ideal recipe for success.

So what's the starting point for good governance?  The first task is clearly understanding what the roles of the board are.  First and foremost a board needs to focus on setting direction - making clear choices on an organization's vision, mission and strategic directions.  Failure to fully engage in this first set of major responsibilities means that an organization can easily drift from its fundamental purposes.  And as "environmental" circumstances change so too does the organization move from objective to objective, without any clear plan and with major implications for public confidence and deterioating staff morale.  Moreover, if there is no consensus amongst the Board as to vision, mission and strategic directions how can senior operational leadership be effectively guided or held accountable for performance? 

Second, a board is required to exercise oversight on organizational performance.  It is important here to distinguish oversight for organizational performance from managing the organization.  Neither the board as a whole nor individual board members (including the Chair) should get involved in managing their organization.  The temptation to direct operations is intense, especially for those board members who lead and manage significant entities outside of the organization for which they are a board member. The board needs to remember that they have engaged operational leaders - the CEO in particular - to manage operational matters.  Ostensibly, they have utilized a robust process for recruitment and selection, have followed up with appropriate performance reviews and feedback, and have trust in the CEO and other management personnel to achieve the Board-established strategic directions.  If the Board lacks such confidence then it has erred in selection, has erred in communicating expectations, or perhaps has not been engaged in managing performance at all.  Ultimately, if that confidence erodes the choice of the Board is to more clearly communicate its expectations or remove the CEO.  The choices available to the Board does not include becoming more engaged in operational decision-making.

That being said, a Board MUST exercise appropriate oversight.  It must be clear on its expectations and establish robust and objective mechanisms by which to evaluate CEO performance on achievement of the organization's vision and strategic directions.  Moreover, a Board would do well to evaluate not only outcomes but also evaluate - at a high level - how those outcomes were achieved.  The Board has a key role in ensuring that the values of the organization are fostered and upheld.  Every effort should be made to ensure that objective, quantifiable reports on performance are made available to the Board on a regular basis.  In this regard, the Board should avail itself of a variety of forms of feedback to evaluate performance and success in achieving objectives. 

Finally, a Board manages its direction setting accountability, its oversight responsibility, and its own functions by establishing policy.  These policies must clearly distinguish Board function from management function.  Just as important, they must describe and detail how the Board itself shall function - role of Chair and other officers of the Board, how decisions will be made, what committee structures if any will be utilized, and so forth. 

As can be imagined, it is easy for Boards to become involved in non-Board activities and tasks.  Board members can easily neglect the very real work that is required to ensure proper Board functioning.   If this high-level, strategic work is not done or is done poorly, there will be little or no foundation for success for the organization as a whole. 

Boards have very real responsibilities.  The tasks they are engaged in cannot be minimized or trivialized.  We have seen too many organizational failures in recent years which can be traced back to governance failures.  Complacency about board performance is not an option.  However, effective governance does not mean becoming more engaged in operational leadership.  Nor is it to establish ever more controls and bureaucracy.  Boards need to do very real work in understanding their roles and responsibilities, establish proper structures to do their work, recruit and retain good members, and set the tone for the values and ethics that will guide the organization.

To achieve operational excellence there must be a foundation of governance excellence.  Good leadership requires good governance.
______________________________

Greg Hadubiak, MHSA, FACHE, CEC, PCC
TEC Canada Chair/Executive Coach/Senior Consultant
hadubiak@wmc.ca

Helping leaders realize their strengths and enabling organizations to achieve their potential through the application of my leadership experience and coaching skills. I act as a point of leverage for my clients. I AM their Force Multiplier.

A Passion for Leadership

After my last blog entry on Appreciative Inquiry a colleague of mine e-mailed and posed some interesting questions.  She asked, "What compels you to write about leadership?" and "Is there something in your experience that drives you to do this?"  So bear with me as I engage in perhaps a bit of self-indulgent, public self-reflection on my passion for leadership.

The questions were great questions.  Coincidentally, they came only a day after I was also engaged in a lengthy conversation with a seasoned executive coach who posed similar questions within the context of my expanding executive coaching practice.  Her questions were similar in that they called me to further articulate a personal vision for myself and to describe my coaching and consulting practice a year further into the future.  The conversations and the answers seemed to tie very nicely together even though they took place a day apart and were inspired by different motivations.

The word "compelled" seems very appropriate in this context for me.  Some of the words used to define compelled include force, drive, duty, necessitate, and irresistible.  To me it also conveys a feeling of lack of choice.  I have NO CHOICE but to be passionate about leadership, leadership development, and executive coaching (and being coached) to reach new levels of capability and excellence.  I have always been driven to make a difference and to strive to support achievement of goals beyond myself.  I have recently begun to use a military term to describe the impact I want to continue to have as a leader and executive coach - I want to be a FORCE MULTIPLIER!  I want to be that force or capability that "...when added to and employed by a ... force [or by individual managers and leaders] significantly increases the ...potential of that force and thus enhances the probability of successful mission accomplishment."  As one individual I can have impact.  As an individual who can foster, support, engage, reveal, prod, or otherwise develop the skills and abilities of others I can have an impact out of all proportion to any individual effort. 

Individual leaders have a ripple effect on everything and everyone around them.  They set the tone and establish (consciously or unconsciously) performance expectations within and even beyond their sphere of influence.   Unfortunately the ripple effect is just as noticeable when there is poor leadership as when there is good leadership.  We have only to consider recent events in various aspects of our lives - politics, business sector, financial services, public sector - to appreciate that.  We readily see and experience the negative impact of poor or even malicious leadership.  Poor leadership and efforts to fight it are even "celebrated" in our popular culture (e.g., "Horrible Bosses").  Scott Adams captures this spirit most eloquently with Dilbert and his cronies on nearly a daily basis.  At the least we are frustrated with the results.  At worse we feel bullied, intimidated, demoralized and devalued in these circumstances. 

So I want to do good.  I want to do better.  For at least the past dozen years as I have had the opportunity to lead large portfolios I have always been excited and energized by the prospect of helping my staff succeed in their personal endeavours and advancing in their careers.  I want to continue to be, and become even more of, a Force Multiplier.  I believe I can do that within the context of my consulting practice, my executive coaching and even through this blog.  Imagine the impact of successfully helping leaders develop their capabilities and as they do so to become Force Multipliers for their staff!  Imagine that they can get and then deliver the support, energy and sustenance necessary to discover and grow their leadership to the future benefit of their organizations, their professions, their staff and ultimately their clients. 

Take up your own challenge and opportunity.  Become more of a Force Multiplier (for good).

It is about Leadership!
______________________________

Greg Hadubiak, MHSA, FACHE, CEC, PCC
TEC Canada Chair/Executive Coach/Senior Consultant
hadubiak@wmc.ca

Helping leaders realize their strengths and enabling organizations to achieve their potential through the application of my leadership experience and coaching skills. I act as a point of leverage for my clients. I AM their Force Multiplier.