Last month 93 Central Falls RI school teachers were fired. It's a great story, Google it yourself. Yes, everyone in the entire school got the axe. Their little ship had sailed a long way off course and nobody cared to respond. Pay cheques were blissfully accepted in a complete contribution vacuum for many years.
Central Falls was a school in the lowest 5% in the district, less than 20% of it's students could read at grade level, math proficiency was 7%, and it's graduation rate is 48%. Apparently a collection of character deficient adults in complete agreement that how they spend their day should have no connection to why they were being paid.
The management point.
When you hire, when you select employees, you must select for character, values, work ethic and maturity because once on your payroll, their education and skills take a very secondary role.
I have to assume all the Central Falls teachers had the requisite education, credentials, experience and deserved to be in their roles. Yet too few of them had enough character to bring any of those hard skills to their job.
Education, experience, brains, don't matter in the least if not supported by a person of integrity or character.
Hard skills are required, but not sufficient. The tipping point in any hire is character. Choose well grasshopper, for you may not be able to fire them all so easily later.
See you for breakfast,
Wolfgang
A. Is teaching a child a shared responsibility? Well, yes and no. It is for poor teachers. Great teachers seem to produce great results in spite of the same constraints.
B. Do parents, poverty, class size, etc. play a role in teacher effectiveness? In schools yes, at a football game, no. At a football game you can put 60,000 students in one cold room, feed them beer, and teach them so effectively they remember everything vividly Monday morning. Maybe the difference is beer and not class size.
C. Before you write me a steamed email, . . . oh heck, go ahead and write.
Thursday, 25 March 2010
The Lazy Manager's Guide to Salary Reviews
FAQ—"How do I tell this person she's not getting a raise because she didn't work up to speed? She'll argue with me, question my judgement, ask me for proof, facts, etc.. It would be easier to just give her a bit of money and let it go at that."
Answer: A performance review is not about that person. It is about that person's performance in relation to the goal. You and I aren't really supposed to evaluate the person, we're supposed to evaluate the performance. And that performance doesn't happen in a vacuum, it's performance relative to a goal.
If you don't have goals for your people, you are a bureaucrat and have no right to evaluate anything. Only managers with goals and a vision have the right to evaluate other's performance.
FAQ—"How do you decide on a salary increase?"
Answer: Don't let the annual wage review make you lose sleep. There are only three ways this can go.
1. No salary increase. Salary stays the same. That's for people who's work is minimally acceptable, but not quite bad enough to fire them. The salary review should show that improvement is required. It also tells the employee that if performance gets worse or does not improve, they will be eventually considered for dismissal.
2. Cost of living increase. For those people who have done the work as required. They have not expanded or grown the role, they've just done what was asked. Nothing extra, but no fault either. Comfortable coasters who believe life as they know it will go on forever, but, - we need them.
3. Wage raise. For those people who have brought extra value to the role, have gone beyond the requirements, have expanded what this role brings to the department. They have moved the process ahead.
FAQ—"Do we have to have a performance review?"
Answer: All companies that don't use performance reviews, find seniority becomes the replacement. Generally, they're not happy about that.
FAQ—"Should performance reviews be connected to salary reviews?"
Answer: You don't have to. You could tie it to nepotism.
I hope it helps you out as you step into the next review meeting with your people.
See you for breakfast,
Wolfgang
P.s. Great ideas, - "A generation with financial incontinence."
Answer: A performance review is not about that person. It is about that person's performance in relation to the goal. You and I aren't really supposed to evaluate the person, we're supposed to evaluate the performance. And that performance doesn't happen in a vacuum, it's performance relative to a goal.
If you don't have goals for your people, you are a bureaucrat and have no right to evaluate anything. Only managers with goals and a vision have the right to evaluate other's performance.
FAQ—"How do you decide on a salary increase?"
Answer: Don't let the annual wage review make you lose sleep. There are only three ways this can go.
1. No salary increase. Salary stays the same. That's for people who's work is minimally acceptable, but not quite bad enough to fire them. The salary review should show that improvement is required. It also tells the employee that if performance gets worse or does not improve, they will be eventually considered for dismissal.
2. Cost of living increase. For those people who have done the work as required. They have not expanded or grown the role, they've just done what was asked. Nothing extra, but no fault either. Comfortable coasters who believe life as they know it will go on forever, but, - we need them.
3. Wage raise. For those people who have brought extra value to the role, have gone beyond the requirements, have expanded what this role brings to the department. They have moved the process ahead.
FAQ—"Do we have to have a performance review?"
Answer: All companies that don't use performance reviews, find seniority becomes the replacement. Generally, they're not happy about that.
FAQ—"Should performance reviews be connected to salary reviews?"
Answer: You don't have to. You could tie it to nepotism.
I hope it helps you out as you step into the next review meeting with your people.
See you for breakfast,
Wolfgang
P.s. Great ideas, - "A generation with financial incontinence."
Thursday, 11 March 2010
Obama, Wellness Poster Boy? Not
President Obama smokes. Who knew? I didn't know and would not have guessed. I paid attention as his visit to the Cleveland Clinic was a poster boy photo op for America's wellness program and healthcare reform, but it lacked believability.
Fortune did a recent case study about the Cleveland Clinic, perhaps prompted by Obama's symbolic visit there. Not a usual hospital, some numbers that caused me to pay attention. 4.2 million patient visits annually, $5.5 billion (no kidding) in revenues, and 40,000 employees. It ranks among the top hospitals in the world and is a model for health care reformers.
Additionally it has some heretic management goodies such as, - doctors do not get tenure but are reviewed every year. You might be a neurosurgeon but that doesn't mean you have a job if you get a lousy performance review. No variable compensation. Whether you did one heart transplant or ten, your pay remains the same. Which supports my position that hardwiring incentives is not a substitute for accountable management.
However, the point of this letter was to share some of their radical hiring and employee healthcare ideas.
* The clinic counts total pounds of weight loss. In the first year the employees lost 140,000 pounds.
* Took deep fryers, candy bars and pop out of the cafeteria.
* Gave out free Curves and Weightwatchers memberships.
* Employees have free access to hospital gyms.
* Free pedometers for everyone. (10,000 steps thinking.)
* No smoking on campus rules.
* Free smoke cessation classes.
* Pushed for a law banning smoking in public places in Ohio—which passed.
* Stopped hiring smokers, (now it gets tricky)!
* They test all new employees for nicotine was well as drugs as part of their employment physical. Even people in Ohio didn't know that was legal, - but it is. (I'm not sure about BC)
Health is personal, it's tough. Easier to talk about it than to do it. Wellness programs, no matter what their form, fuel absenteeism, sick days, lates, morale, productivity and all kinds of other management problems. Companies can lead wellness and impact the bottom line, - a lot!
Encourage and lead wellness for your existing employees. Hire for health where you can. It just makes life a lot easier for everyone.
See you for breakfast!
Wolfgang
a.) Watched sixty minutes on bull fighting. Great line, "rely on courage until you find art." True for those of us who find ourselves. Finding yourself is defined by what you protect.
b.) April seminar, "Time Management" - individual tickets $135. Still some seats left.
c.) Where do you think recruiting breaks down? Answer at Wolf's blog.
Fortune did a recent case study about the Cleveland Clinic, perhaps prompted by Obama's symbolic visit there. Not a usual hospital, some numbers that caused me to pay attention. 4.2 million patient visits annually, $5.5 billion (no kidding) in revenues, and 40,000 employees. It ranks among the top hospitals in the world and is a model for health care reformers.
Additionally it has some heretic management goodies such as, - doctors do not get tenure but are reviewed every year. You might be a neurosurgeon but that doesn't mean you have a job if you get a lousy performance review. No variable compensation. Whether you did one heart transplant or ten, your pay remains the same. Which supports my position that hardwiring incentives is not a substitute for accountable management.
However, the point of this letter was to share some of their radical hiring and employee healthcare ideas.
* The clinic counts total pounds of weight loss. In the first year the employees lost 140,000 pounds.
* Took deep fryers, candy bars and pop out of the cafeteria.
* Gave out free Curves and Weightwatchers memberships.
* Employees have free access to hospital gyms.
* Free pedometers for everyone. (10,000 steps thinking.)
* No smoking on campus rules.
* Free smoke cessation classes.
* Pushed for a law banning smoking in public places in Ohio—which passed.
* Stopped hiring smokers, (now it gets tricky)!
* They test all new employees for nicotine was well as drugs as part of their employment physical. Even people in Ohio didn't know that was legal, - but it is. (I'm not sure about BC)
Health is personal, it's tough. Easier to talk about it than to do it. Wellness programs, no matter what their form, fuel absenteeism, sick days, lates, morale, productivity and all kinds of other management problems. Companies can lead wellness and impact the bottom line, - a lot!
Encourage and lead wellness for your existing employees. Hire for health where you can. It just makes life a lot easier for everyone.
See you for breakfast!
Wolfgang
a.) Watched sixty minutes on bull fighting. Great line, "rely on courage until you find art." True for those of us who find ourselves. Finding yourself is defined by what you protect.
b.) April seminar, "Time Management" - individual tickets $135. Still some seats left.
c.) Where do you think recruiting breaks down? Answer at Wolf's blog.
Let me insult you, - "I'm seeking a simpler life."
The interviews I love the most are those with unskilled and reluctant liars. I know they don't want to lie, it's not who they are but circumstances have forced them to edit the truth. Or, by the standard that truth is anything which moves things forward for the good, perhaps they are not lying.
Common among highly paid managers and engineers who have fallen from grace with big national companies is the lie that they had to step out of the corporate rate race to reclaim some quality and balance in their lives. To put the romance back in their marriage, spend time with the children, smell the roses, walk the dog, tend the garden, you get the idea
Before you smile and nod your head in agreement, remember crisis in life is a more effective driver of gardening, dog walking, and the sale of Eckhart Tolle books than well rounded success is. The old doctors tale, - when you hear hoof beats it's probably not a zebra, - applies here.
We're all self satisfied when our life choices work. I mean all parts of our life, not just the money. In a personal crisis "Walden Pond," ahh the simple life, looks like a good book to read. Then things improve and we ask Amazon to send us a copy of Donald Trump's "How to Get Rich." Funny that.
Enlightened answers cover the underlying practical reasons. Enlightened answers are patronizing. When someone tells you they are applying to your company because it means they can bring some quality back into their life. Dig deeper, don't accept that answer at face value.
A clearer mind than you or I would ask why we're talking to lifestyle candidates anyway. Lifestyle employees don't build winning companies. But let's save that for another newsletter.
Don't be patronized by lifestyle answers. Questions which provoke patronizing answers have hit their mark. You're on to something when you get a "higher calling" lecture. Keep going! The hoof beats you're hearing are not made by zebras.
See you for breakfast!
Wolfgang
P.s. Please reserve for Apr. 14th at the Planetarium, (Kit's Beach). Subject, see below.
Individual tickets still for sale for April, $135 each.
P.s. All our newsletters are archived at Wolf's blog
Click through and register, please. Productivity is the focus. Productivity through hiring and managing correctly.
P.s. I hope you're annoyed the next time a candidate gives you a philosophical or enlightened answer. You're being patronized, - it's okay to push back.
P.s. I'm all for the simple life. I even think Tiger Woods googled "Buddhism."
Common among highly paid managers and engineers who have fallen from grace with big national companies is the lie that they had to step out of the corporate rate race to reclaim some quality and balance in their lives. To put the romance back in their marriage, spend time with the children, smell the roses, walk the dog, tend the garden, you get the idea
Before you smile and nod your head in agreement, remember crisis in life is a more effective driver of gardening, dog walking, and the sale of Eckhart Tolle books than well rounded success is. The old doctors tale, - when you hear hoof beats it's probably not a zebra, - applies here.
We're all self satisfied when our life choices work. I mean all parts of our life, not just the money. In a personal crisis "Walden Pond," ahh the simple life, looks like a good book to read. Then things improve and we ask Amazon to send us a copy of Donald Trump's "How to Get Rich." Funny that.
Enlightened answers cover the underlying practical reasons. Enlightened answers are patronizing. When someone tells you they are applying to your company because it means they can bring some quality back into their life. Dig deeper, don't accept that answer at face value.
A clearer mind than you or I would ask why we're talking to lifestyle candidates anyway. Lifestyle employees don't build winning companies. But let's save that for another newsletter.
Don't be patronized by lifestyle answers. Questions which provoke patronizing answers have hit their mark. You're on to something when you get a "higher calling" lecture. Keep going! The hoof beats you're hearing are not made by zebras.
See you for breakfast!
Wolfgang
P.s. Please reserve for Apr. 14th at the Planetarium, (Kit's Beach). Subject, see below.
Individual tickets still for sale for April, $135 each.
P.s. All our newsletters are archived at Wolf's blog
Click through and register, please. Productivity is the focus. Productivity through hiring and managing correctly.
P.s. I hope you're annoyed the next time a candidate gives you a philosophical or enlightened answer. You're being patronized, - it's okay to push back.
P.s. I'm all for the simple life. I even think Tiger Woods googled "Buddhism."
Where does recruiting break down?
Ans: Selection.
Where we become weak is in understanding a person's work ethic, character, motivations, confused career plans, goals, inherant traits, intellect, culture, the problems of too much charm, beauty, . . . . it's a long list. Most choces don't fall apart because we didn't identify the person's skills, experience, or education incorrectly. Domain skills aren't the tipping point. Character is.
Add your managers to our weekly management letter.
Wolfgang
604-931-6813
wolf@managing.ca
Where we become weak is in understanding a person's work ethic, character, motivations, confused career plans, goals, inherant traits, intellect, culture, the problems of too much charm, beauty, . . . . it's a long list. Most choces don't fall apart because we didn't identify the person's skills, experience, or education incorrectly. Domain skills aren't the tipping point. Character is.
Add your managers to our weekly management letter.
Wolfgang
604-931-6813
wolf@managing.ca
Tuesday, 2 March 2010
A Management Book Suggestion
I think Salman Rushdie, (Sir), is a great writer. I’’m not sure because I don’t understand his books but I think he has a career in writing. I read all 356 pages of “The Enchantress of Florence,” occasionally thought I knew what he was talking about but in the end realized I had no clue. I loved the book I’m also afraid to read another one. Sort of like managing people. You watch them everyday but in the end, you don’t really know what’s going on.
Rushdie reminds me of one of those clear see through wrist watches, where you can look right inside the watch and see it’s amazing, complex inner workings under the glass. Wheels, gears, and tiny ratchets all synchronize according to some strange higher order, a mystery order. Like a Rushdie book. An amazing look inside a brilliant mind, but all synchronized to some higher, mysterious order.
I don’t think the characters in Rushdie’s books know what’s going on, so in the reading, I never feel alone. At times you get a sense Salman may not know what’s going on either but he’s pretty sure no one will notice.
What if all of us, and all our employees are really only actors in a Rushdie novel? Even if I’m wrong, it would explain many things. Maybe the only one who can explain managing people is Salman Rushdie.
Could be? I find books about behavioural economics more helpful in management than actual management books. Books like Ariely’s “Predictably Irrationality, several of Malcolm Gladwell’s books, certainly Freakonomics, and maybe the odd Rushdie book. Books about the riddles of human behaviour, the absurdities of real people. These are the books that will help managers more.
Management books misdirect us with their logic. The books I’ve mentioned tell us the truth. Human behaviour is governed by emotion and self interest. Rushdie understands that. In the real world, truth and logic aren’t as helpful as they’re supposed to be.
We do not manage people. We only manage their emotions. Read a Rushdie book, - if you dare.
See you for breakfast,
Wolfgang
a.) Seperate the candidate’s skills from the skills he’s selling.
b.) How to keep new people from falling off your wagon. First find the right person, keep them focused, very accountable, and always inspired.
c.) Talent is someone on the way up.
d.) Selection. Would you prefer someone with lots of experience or great potential?
e.) Who’s the best person who left recently? What was it about that person that made them exceptional?
f.) Sir Salman Rushdie is one of the top 10 authors in Britain. He is recognized around the world, and his list of rewards for literature ensures him one of the top spots in history.
g.) I don’t think there are any movies made from any Rushdie book. Understandable.
Rushdie reminds me of one of those clear see through wrist watches, where you can look right inside the watch and see it’s amazing, complex inner workings under the glass. Wheels, gears, and tiny ratchets all synchronize according to some strange higher order, a mystery order. Like a Rushdie book. An amazing look inside a brilliant mind, but all synchronized to some higher, mysterious order.
I don’t think the characters in Rushdie’s books know what’s going on, so in the reading, I never feel alone. At times you get a sense Salman may not know what’s going on either but he’s pretty sure no one will notice.
What if all of us, and all our employees are really only actors in a Rushdie novel? Even if I’m wrong, it would explain many things. Maybe the only one who can explain managing people is Salman Rushdie.
Could be? I find books about behavioural economics more helpful in management than actual management books. Books like Ariely’s “Predictably Irrationality, several of Malcolm Gladwell’s books, certainly Freakonomics, and maybe the odd Rushdie book. Books about the riddles of human behaviour, the absurdities of real people. These are the books that will help managers more.
Management books misdirect us with their logic. The books I’ve mentioned tell us the truth. Human behaviour is governed by emotion and self interest. Rushdie understands that. In the real world, truth and logic aren’t as helpful as they’re supposed to be.
We do not manage people. We only manage their emotions. Read a Rushdie book, - if you dare.
See you for breakfast,
Wolfgang
a.) Seperate the candidate’s skills from the skills he’s selling.
b.) How to keep new people from falling off your wagon. First find the right person, keep them focused, very accountable, and always inspired.
c.) Talent is someone on the way up.
d.) Selection. Would you prefer someone with lots of experience or great potential?
e.) Who’s the best person who left recently? What was it about that person that made them exceptional?
f.) Sir Salman Rushdie is one of the top 10 authors in Britain. He is recognized around the world, and his list of rewards for literature ensures him one of the top spots in history.
g.) I don’t think there are any movies made from any Rushdie book. Understandable.
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