Why do we think of so many great ideas in the shower?
Four conditions are generally in play:
- Our brain is relatively quiet with minimal electrical activity.
- We’re internally focused, letting our mind wander rather than being stimulated by external activity, such as digital screens.
- We’re in a positive mindset.
- We’re not directly working on any problems, especially work challenges.
As Dr. David Rock explained in his book Your Brain at Work: Strategies for Overcoming Distraction, Regaining Focus, and Working Smarter All Day Long, it’s not the water that helps you get insights. It’s that you break the impasse in the way you’ve been thinking.
You’re lathering up while your subconscious brain works in the background. It taps into your stored memories and experiences and connects neurons in new ways for you.
And all of a sudden—as it seems to your conscious brain that has been taking a break from logical thinking—you have that “aha” moment. You’ve reached a great insight! (This is multi-tasking in a powerful, efficient way!)
Now contrast your experiences like this in the shower with what frequently happens at work.
Your prefrontal cortex—commonly referred to as the “executive function” of your brain—is often on overload. You’re trying to juggle a number of thoughts, you’re keeping an eye on your phone as well as the room you’re in, you’re listening to colleagues talking over one another, you all are on deadline to solve a new problem creatively, and you’re anxious about it and several other topics, especially since your boss just scared you about the consequences of last quarter’s performance on your department’s budget. Oh, and you’re hungry.
No wonder that only 10% say they do their best thinking at work, according to David.
What can you do to improve your focus and your thinking at work?
Short of constructing a shower in your cube, start small with some tiny steps.
First embrace the concept of “will, skill and hill.”
The “will” refers to your motivation to take control of your mind and thoughts. In other words, resolve not to play the victim, letting yourself and your thoughts be hijacked by others. Granted this is easier said than done; however, if you’re willing to become more mindful and more self-aware about what distracts you, you’ve taken a large leap forward.
The “skill” is to learn and adopt new behaviors that will help you clear your mind, improve your focus and think more creatively. Consider starting with Tiny Habits®,the innovative program designed by Dr. BJ Fogg.
This past week, as a certified Tiny Habits® coach I coached people in a pilot program of Tiny Habits for Work. We designed many of these habits to improve mindfulness, productivity and satisfaction with work.
For example, some effective Tiny Habits for Work are taking three deep breaths, affirming what a great day it will be and walking around the office.
“Hill” is all about taking steps in your environment to reduce or remove the barriers so you can get over the hill that’s in your way and be more productive. You may not be able to shrink a mountain into a mole hill, but you should be able to start building a path that’s easier to go across.
How can you set yourself up for success to think more clearly and creatively?
Some ideas that work for others include: Set an alarm so you’ll take breaks every 60 minutes or so to stretch or even better, walk outdoors. Keep a file of cartoons that will make you laugh. Have flowers on your desk. (Or walk to the reception area and smell the flowers.) Spend a few minutes doodling or drawing.
Next, you need to experiment to find out what works best for you.
To help you do so, join me for the webinar Stop Your Stinking Thinking: 7 Ways To Use Neuroscience To Sharpen Your Mind and Be a More Powerful Communicator and Leader on Wednesday, May 21 at 12 noon ET (9 am Central). The webinar sponsor Communitelligence is offering $50 off when you use the code connect50. Many of the ideas I’ll talk about on the webinar will help you improve your focus and your thinking as well as be more influential.
By the way, if you’re interested in diving into some of the research on this topic, check out the work of Dr. Mark Beeman at Northwestern University who’s an expert on the neuroscience of insights. Also look at the research of Dr. Stellan Ohlsson at the University of Illinois who studies the “impasse experience.”
Meanwhile, if you want any help becoming a “showerhead,” contact me. Who says showerheads should be limited to devices that control the spray of water in a shower?
Showerheads also can be those of us who think creatively in and out of the shower. What do you think?
By Liz Guthridge, Connect Consulting Group LLC
Ask any journalist and they can tell you about the 5 Ws and an H. Any solid news story covers those six basic ingredients. The same is true for communicating with others.
Want to ensure you don’t forget a critical detail in your communications? Think 5 Ws and an H to ensure you’re not missing an important detail, sharing the all-important context, and making it relevant for your audience.
What
What’s the decision? What does it mean? What should I know? What’s in it for me?
Why
Why is it the right decision? Why now? Why is it important?
Where
Where is this decision coming from? Where/what locations will it affect? Where can I get more information?
When
When is this happening?
Thy landing page shalt have but one goal, and the number of the goals shall be one. Not two, not zero, but one.
If thy landing page hath zero goals, it is a “branding” page, and such vanities shall bear no fruit.
If thy landing page hath more than one goal, thou shalt confuse thy visitor, who shall leave thy site in disgust and anger.
Thy copy shalt not be divided amongst more than one goal, for such shall surely drive thy visitor to lamentation and thy copywriter to madness.
There are many wonderful people living the Gospel of the One-Pager that we can all learn from. A few examples:Strategy to Performance Dashboard Downloadable, this SlideShare tool from BlueOcean gives you 9 pages of templates to fill in.One Page Business Plan from lifehacker.comOne Page Job Proposal for getting a new job
Build a One Page WebsiteTo find more on your own, simply Google “one page (fill in the blank)” for whatever you’re seeking. Somebody out there has created a one-pager for just about everything!Don’t Just Copy the Templates: Develop a One-Pager Skillset
To truly live the Gospel of the One-Pager, don’t just search for specific one-pagers. Look across all that you find for patterns:• What do all these one-pagers have in common?• How do the get to the crucial stuff while editing out the noise?• How are they packaged?• etc.Among other things, you’re likely to find:
• They all have one key point, and no more!
• Everything else is compelling storytelling to support that key point
• They target the audience’s head (thinking), heart (feelings), and hands (action)Once you begin to practice what most one-pagers have in common, you will have forever harnessed the Power of the One-Pager. And that’s a superpower that will serve you well, everywhere!
Why are we putty in a storyteller’s hands? The psychologists Melanie Green and Tim Brock argue that entering fictional worlds “radically alters the way information is processed.” Green and Brock’s studies shows that the more absorbed readers are in a story, the more the story changes them. Highly absorbed readers also detected significantly fewer “false notes” in stories–inaccuracies, missteps–than less transported readers. Importantly, it is not just that highly absorbed readers detected the false notes and didn’t care about them (as when we watch a pleasurably idiotic action film). They were unable to detect the false notes in the first place.
And, in this, there is an important lesson about the molding power of story. When we read dry, factual arguments, we read with our dukes up. We are critical and skeptical. But when we are absorbed in a story we drop our intellectual guard. We are moved emotionally and this seems to leave us defenseless.
Is busyness bad for business?
The answer isn’t a simple “yes” or “no”. While Kreider argues that we need bout of idleness to get inspired and work more effectively, there is evidence that workers benefit from busyness. Take one experiment conducted in 2010 by professor Christopher Hsee at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. Hsee’s team found that people who kept themselves occupied rather than waiting idly after a test felt happier. Interestingly, participants in the study were not likely to busy themselves unless they could justify the activity; they weren’t interested in what Hsee and his colleagues call “futile busyness”. But the results showed that even futile busyness is better than idleness.
In my organization’s own recent research with a global firm, we discovered that a common characteristic among the company’s great leaders was their recognition of the importance of busyness. They knew idle employees would suffer, and so pushed to instead create a stimulating work environment. For example, one leader responded to a downturn in work by encouraging team members to look for novel projects that interested them and might generate opportunities. Not only did this keep the group engaged, but some of the projects also eventually bore fruit. This wasn’t futile busyness, of course. “Creative busyness” might be more appropriate.
Indeed, busyness seems to be most productive when the tasks we busy ourselves with are also meaningful. In a 2008 MIT study, researchers investigated meaning by asking participants to build Lego models. Finished models were either kept, or they were disassembled in front of the participant and handed back for rebuilding. (This was called the “Sisyphus condition”, after the mythical figure condemned to repeatedly push a boulder up a mountain only to watch it roll back down again). Even though the two conditions involved exactly the same type of work, participants in the “meaningful” condition were willing to produce more models (and built them more efficiently, for a lower median wage) than those who mimicked Sisyphus. Surely Michael, who attends one meeting only to have another scheduled, and completes one spreadsheet only to be presented with new figures, is starting to feel like he’s pushing that boulder.
Perhaps we are not so much caught in a “busy trap”, as a “meaning trap”. A meaningful life involves pursuing what we truly value, a sense of contribution in our work, as well as time outside of work to relax, enjoy hobbies, and spend time with loved ones. It’s perhaps no surprise that the great leaders in our study were also expert at modeling work-life integration; they valued not only busyness but also meaning. How did their emphasis on both impact the bottom line? Positively. Their teams were more engaged, their revenues were higher and their turnover was lower than other groups’.
In this interview, Paul talks about how to use storytelling as a leadership tool, ways that storytelling can make leaders more effective, why storytelling it important, and more.
How do companies make storytelling part of their leadership practices?
Some of the most successful companies in the world use storytelling very intentionally as a leadership tool. Organizations like Microsoft, Motorola, Berkshire Hathaway, Saatchi & Saatchi, Procter & Gamble, NASA, and the World Bank are among them. They do this in several ways.
Some have a high level corporate storyteller who’s job it is to capture and share their most important stories. At Nike, in fact, all the senior executives are designated corporate storytellers.
Other companies teach storytelling skills to their executives (because they certainly aren’t learning it in business school). Kimberly-Clark, for example, provides two-day seminars to teach its 13-step program for crafting stories and giving presentations with them. 3M banned bullet points and replaced them with a process of writing “strategic narratives.” P&G has hired Hollywood movie directors to teach its senior executives how to lead better with storytelling. And some of the storytellers at Motorola belong to outside improvisational or theater groups to hone their story skills.
In what ways can storytelling help leaders be more effective?
The short answer is that storytelling is useful in far more situations than most leaders realize. The five most commonly used are probably these: inspiring the organization, setting a vision, teaching important lessons, defining culture and values, and explaining who you are and what you believe.
But there are so many more. In my research for the book, I interviewed over 75 CEOs and executives at dozens of companies around the world and found them using stories in a much wider range of leadership challenges than I ever expected. For example, storytelling is useful when heavy influence is required like leading change, or making recommendations to the boss. But it’s also good for delicate issues like managing diversity and inclusion, or giving people coaching and feedback in a way that will be received as a welcome gift. It can help bring out more of people’s creativity, or help them rekindle the passion for their work. In all, I identified 21 common leadership challenges where storytelling can help.
So you don’t think I’m naïve or overzealous about the topic, I’m not suggesting storytelling should be used in every situation. For example, if you’re trying to decide what your five-year strategy should be, what you need is a good strategist. Or if you’re trying to decide how much money to pay to acquire your biggest competitor, what you need is a good financial advisor.
But once you’ve decided what your five-year strategy is going to be, and you need the 15,000 people that work at your company to line up behind it and deliver it, now you need a good story. Or once you’ve acquired your biggest competitor, and you need the 5,000 people that work there to stay, and not quit, now you need a good story. In short, storytelling isn’t always the right tool to help you manage things; but it’s exceptional at helping you lead people.
You can complain “I don’t have any leverage; I can’t change the cubicles, I can’t rewrite the reward system. And the answer is “No you can’t; don’t even try.” But simply through your own thinking, and getting other people to think differently as well, you can have enormous impact without changing any of that stuff even if you are not a member of the board.
The simple fact is “smart is smart,” and we’re talking about you offering up an additional way of viewing problems. You’ll never get in real trouble for doing that, especially if you do it gently by saying “can we think about this in another way?”
With that throat clearing complete, here are seven proven steps you can take in introducing new ideas in your, or any, organization:
1. Link what you want to do to a business imperative. This is just about always fatal if it is overlooked—and it generally is. That’s a shame since it is so easily addressed. Yes, of course, the idea of the rocket backpack that will allow us to fly to work is exciting, but if you work for a company that makes ball bearings it is hard to see the fit. You want to begin the conversation by being able to say something like, “you know, the organization has the business goals of A, B, and C. (You can talk about organizational goals—such as improving team work—as well, but odds are you will find a more receptive audience if you start with business goals.) I’ve got an idea that I think will fit perfectly.”
2. Produce obvious, “local” business results. Don’t focus on organizational or cultural change. Prove the efficacy of your idea in the vocabulary and currency of your organization. Sure, it would be nice if you could change your organization into “the next Google” overnight, a firm that is willing to go wherever the market takes it. But if your boss’ goal is to have the highest performing region in the company, that (a la point number 1) is the place to focus your attention.
3. Make sure there is sufficient autonomy. The unit(s) or individuals working on the new idea must have enough freedom to be different and protected from the “restorative forces” the organization will impose (even in spite of itself.) What this means for you and your project is this. Don’t worry about getting everyone committed. You don’t need to! There are four postures people can adopt: keep it from happening, let it happen, help it happen and make it happen. Obviously, you don’t want anyone in the “keep it from happening mode” if you can avoid it. But most people simply have to “let it happen.” You and (and maybe a few others) have to “make it happen.” Your boss (and maybe a few others) have to “help it happen” and create a buffer around you. So, rather than asking “how do I get everybody committed to my idea” keep asking yourself: “What is the least amount of commitment I need to move forward.”
Whether you’re writing creatively, for academia, or blogs, one of the most important aspects of writing is often overlooked: the ability to give and receive constructive criticism.
If you know providing such constructive feedback isn’t your forte, you’re not sure if you’re doing it well, or you just want a refresher, you’re in luck! I have some tips and examples for you.
Giving Constructive Criticism
- Please never just say “it’s good” or “I liked it.” Okay, I’m glad… but what made it good? Why did you like it? I need a little bit more feedback. And that includes what you didn’t like. In fact…
- What you don’t like is probably the most valuable information. What is it about this piece that you don’t like? For example, “the voice didn’t seem very authentic,” or “I just don’t feel like this part fits in with the rest of the post.” Help me see where I can improve. That’s important, so let me say it again.
- Help the writer see where he or she can improve. There is no such thing as a perfect first draft. Even thoroughly edited final drafts are often not without their faults. Speak up and let the writer know what you think.
Receiving Constructive Criticism
- Remember that you are not your work. Just because I don’t like your outfit or your taste in music doesn’t mean that I don’t like you as a person. Likewise, just because someone doesn’t like something you’ve written, it doesn’t mean they don’t like you.
- Prompt the critic. When you ask for someone’s opinion, they might not always know how to give constructive criticism. If they say something like, “that’s good,” ask them why they liked it. Ask them where they think you can improve or what they found confusing. The more you prompt them, the more likely you’ll get the information you need (and the more likely they are to provide this information to you up front in the future since they know what you’re looking for).
- Remember that you are the author. In the end, it’s your work. You need to be happy with it. So while you can consider all of the feedback and constructive criticism you receive, you’re ultimately the one who decides whether or not to accept it.
If you want to be a better communicator, take a moment to consider these five tips, then give them a try.
1.) Be Concise: Don’t use 100 words to say something you can say in 50 words. It’s easy to become enamored of your own voice, which may cause you to drone on and lessen your effectiveness as a communicator. I’ll leave it at that.
2.) Have A Point: Don’t speak for the sake of speaking. Have a point, especially when you’re trying to be persuasive or explain something. It’s one thing if you’re having a coffee or a beer with a friend; the importance of having a point in such a scenario is diminished. In a business or teaching situation on the other hand, it’s very important to have a point in mind before you start talking.
3.) Don’t Have Too Many Points: It’s tough for most people to remember long lists. It’s even tougher if the list is comprised of complex points. Many memory experts say stick to a list of seven or fewer points, if you want your audience to remember them. Based on my experience, I’d suggest having a maximum of three key points you’d like your audience to remember. Better yet, have just one and hit it from a bunch of different angles. Obviously, this is not one size fits all, but in most instances, you’ll want to stick to a small number key points, or you will confuse your audience.
4.) Use Words And Metaphors That Will Resonate With Your Audience: If you’re speaking to a Board of Directors, a CEO group, or a bunch of Marketing Vice Presidents, the words you’ll use will be completely different than those you’ll use when speaking to a group of politicians or museum curators. This is true if you are speaking to individual people from groups such as these as well. Each audience has its own buzzwords and hot buttons. It’s key to use examples, phrasing and metaphors that resonate with your audience. If not, you will not pass the Ethos, Pathos, Logos test and you will be far less likely to effectively get your point across.
Read full article in Company Founder
No, you won’t do better work by procrastinating. And you will not have more time next week. In fact, leaving things unfinished makes you stupid. Here’s what works:
- Make specific plans. Just setting a date and a time when you’re going to do something makes you more likely to follow through. Or write down the steps necessary to do the work.
- Use short, painless dashes of effort. Just have at it for five minutes and feel free to watch the clock. Chances are you’ll realize it’s not so bad.
- Rewarding yourself for doing things you don’t want to do can be a powerful motivator.
- Use “precommitment devices” to make sure you follow through. Stickk is a good one.
- Asking yourself whether you intend on doing something is a more powerful motivator than telling yourself you will do it.
- Understand the secrets to willpower, breaking bad habits, productivity, and achieving goals.
Little things can make a difference:
- Play music with positive lyrics.
- Clean smells and the odor of cookies both make you behave better.
- Keep the area warm.
- Get outside in nature.
- Read fiction,
Several weeks ago I was listening to a This American Life podcast in which their host, Ira Glass, took an inside look one of the editorial meetings at the The Onion. I was fascinated to learn that for every 16 stories in their bi-weekly paper, they brainstorm 600 headlines. While this level of editing isn’t feasible for most B2B content marketers, there is a lot we can learn from The Onion’s editorial process. (Hat tip to The Beaverton Style Guide for this nice set of articles directly related to this.)
How the process works
First, here’s a great explanation of the general process from Joe Randazzo, the Editor-in-chief at the The Onion:
Basically the way it works is on Monday everybody pitches 15 headlines. We have about 10 people on staff, plus about 20 contributing writers who also pitch 15 headlines. If two people in the room vote on it, it goes on the to the next list. So we narrow them down from about 600 headlines to about 100 to 125, and we talk about them at another meeting on Tuesday.
From those, we choose the 16 or so headlines that make up the whole issue. We assign them and brainstorm what the stories will look like. When we put together every issue, we are trying to find a good balance of stories that are national and international in scale along with local or smaller things, or observational humor. We spend about an hour or so brainstorming those stories on Tuesday afternoon, the writers spend Wednesday writing them, and then we have draft meeting Thursday where we go through first drafts and rip them apart. Then they write second drafts on Friday, which the editors go through on [the following] Monday, and we go through a first round of editing, make notes, there are rewrites and then a second round of editing. On Friday, I’ll go through [the] final issue and make a last pass. I usually don’t have to make too many changes, but I might punch up something that needs it.
As content marketers, what can we take from this?
Turn it on and off. The most vexing aspect of using BCC in modern versions of Outlook is that it’s not even visible by default, and figuring out how to get to it is challenging. To see the BCC line in a new email, open a blank new message and click the Options tab in the ribbon. Then click BCC. The BCC field is now on for all new messages until you turn it off again in the same way.
Figure out who you BCC’d. As you know, recipients can’t tell who you included in the BCC field, or even if you used the BCC field at all. But that doesn’t mean you can’t. To see who you BCC’d in a previous email, just open the Sent mail folder and open the message. You’ll see the BCC field preserved for future reference.
Never violate the trust. Being included in the BCC field of an email is a sacred trust. If you’re a manager, for example, and one of your employees BCC’s you on an email about an overdue project, the last thing you should do is click Reply All and jump into the conversation, admonishing the recipient for being late. If you do that, the jig is up, and everyone knows that the sender was secretly informing you about the email thread. This can have a seriously draining effect on productivity and morale. Bottom line: Never, ever reply-all to a message for which you’re in the BCC line.
The bottom line is the demand that managers tend to put on their people create a flurry of activity, yet little additional productivity. When in the end, being really busy in itself doesn’t pay bills, doesn’t foster innovation, and won’t strengthen culture. In fact, too much busyness may in fact yield the opposite. So with this in mind, try replacing busy with the following three things to yield greater results.
- Trade Clocks for Results: Time is finite, in fact it is one of the few things we can’t make more of. Talk to most employees about their vacation and they will tell you how important “Their” time is. Well, many employees would be inspired by the opportunity to create a little flex time. So perhaps instead of punching a clock, start focusing on what needs to be done each day, week, month, before someone has reached their targets. Once those targets are reached allow them to earn some personal time in exchange for their efficiency. This way everyone wins; the company is executing its objectives and the employee is getting something precious in return.
- Reward efficiency: Beyond just time, efficiency can be rewarded in many ways. When targets, objectives, and revenues are realized companies know they are making money. While sharing the wealth may be outlandish, most business owners would share a piece of a bigger pie all day long. Highly efficient employees tend to drive dollars to the bottom line, make sure they see that their contribution matters. Telling them will get you some bonus points, showing them will get you some bonus hours.
- Live The Message: This one is a life theme, it applies here and in so many other places. So ask yourself often, What does your team see when they see you? If they don’t see you living the message then you can bet they won’t be as likely to either. This means that you need to be on time (as much as possible), show respect and value for other peoples time (regardless of whether they are subordinates), consistently discuss the importance of goals, what they are, and where you and your team are in respect to meeting them.
n preparation for the workshop I’m presenting at ResidentialDesign 2005, a conference for residential architects in Boston, I interviewed solo/small firm practitioners to discover what types of conflicts plague them. One of the most difficult challenges, they reported, is working with clients who fail to appreciate the value of architectural services.
Not a Value-Add
According to these professionals this type of client, often called a ‘bad client’, seeks them out as a last resort when a project becomes too difficult. These clients want a quick fix and a low bill.
Figuring any client is better than none, an architect may agree to do the work. The relationship starts off strained and gets steadily worse. In fact, things got so bad in one situation that the distraught architect had to withhold services until he received payment from his bad client.
So, that got me thinking, how can you react to a ‘bad client? What’s the proper approach?
Avoid Tough Clients
As my grandma Janey used to say, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Start by not attracting tough clients in the first place.
1. Define your ideal client clearly and specifically for yourself and others.
I decided long ago only to work with clients- companies and individuals-who actually want to improve their conflict management skills, are ready to do it and appreciate the value of my work!
Realize that the clients you give up will find another expert in the field to work with and ultimately be better served. And, no your practice won’t suffer because now you’ll have energy for clients and projects that are meaningful and exciting to you.
2. Remain true to working with your ideal client, even when your bank account says otherwise.
I know. I know. That’s easy to say and very hard to do. I’ve been there myself. I once turned down a consulting job that had the potential to create almost $150K in revenue for one year. But the client was very, very difficult and far from my ideal client. I agonized over all the business-building could do with that money.
So how did I turn all it down? I realized that no amount of money was worth the nervous turn my stomach took whenever the client called. My standard safeguards my health, sanity and passion for my work. Compared to those, the money didn’t seem like a great bounty anymore.
Handle the Tough Clients You Have
So what happens if you already have the client from hell? Handle it professionally.
1. Be Open. It’s easy to get off track and think evil thoughts about a disrespectful client. But those thoughts translate into actions on an unconscious level and may impact your work. You know, the project gets delayed, or you miss some detail because you were rushing to get onto something more pleasurable.
Find ways to reclaim your self-esteem. Recall past work that went very well, or compliments from other clients. Don’t give in to denial (it’s their entire fault) or self-criticism (I always screw this up).
2. Be an educator. Educating clients about your process and the hard work it takes to get a quality result can be essential in shifting a client’s perception of you.
Mediating seems very easy at first. It doesn’t look like more than sitting, listening and asking questions. In fact, I’ve had a client ask what am I paying you for. But once I start explaining the process, the way I help to facilitate deeper understanding and the results achieved, clients appreciate my expertise.
As a professional you bring your expertise, experience, intuition and energy to your client’s work, all of which save time, aggravation, mistakes and money. Enlighten your clients.
3. Set boundaries and expectations. We all teach others how to treat us. Help your clients understand what behaviors will not work in their favor and why.
A simple statement like, “I know you’re upset about this problem. I’d like to help but I can’t until we can have a reasonable conversation with no yelling. Can we do that now, or is later better?”
This statement does three things:
- · acknowledges the client’s feeling of frustration;
- · reinforces your expectation (yelling will not result in their desired outcome -getting help)
- · shows respect (offers a choice as to when the conversation can happen)
You may have to repeat your expectations but eventually the client will get it.
Your Value is Greater Than You Think
Don’t forget that your value as a human is equal to, if not greater than, your value as a professional. Your worth rests in the care and love you show to yourself, others and your work. You may be just one person in the world, but to one person you may just be the world. Now, that’s a value add.
Dina Beach Lynch, J.D. is a Mediator and Ombudsman that specializes in workplace conflict. To read more articles, visit http://www.workwelltogether.com
The grapevine – Webster’s “informal person-to-person means of circulating information or gossip” – is the unsanctioned communication network found in every organization. In my recent research, based on responses from more than 800 individuals in a wide variety of companies and industry, I learned just how the grapevine compares with more formal sources of organizational information.
I’ll share some thoughts on how communicators can harness the power of the grapevine. But first, let me share what I heard from some of those 837 individuals about how the grapevine poses a significant challenge for senior management – and for the formal communication channels employed by today’s communicators.
I asked, for example, if there were big differences in the message delivered in a speech from a company leader or the one heard over the grapevine, which would you tend to believe. Some 47% said they would put more credence in the grapevine. Another 11% would believe a blend of elements from both messages, meaning only 42% would believe senior leadership.
Leaders are “too PC” and “too positive,” I was told. “Senior leadership’s ‘advertising’ statements are not always trustworthy,” and “I tend to discount official speeches – they’re too carefully crafted. I prefer the truth.” Also: “Too often they paint a picture of Utopia. What world are they in?”
One individual had her own formula. “If senior leaders don’t trust you or aren’t confident enough to let you in, only believe 70% of what is said and get the other 30% from the grapevine so you’ll be prepared.”
I also asked which you would tend to believe if there were big differences in a message delivered in an official newsletter (online or print) or the grapevine. This time the majority (51%) favored the newsletter, with only 40% putting more faith in the grapevine. Putting something in writing, it seems, tends to carry more weight than the spoken word.
“This,” I was told, “is the official word everyone waits for. When something is in writing, it is likely to be quoted and displayed as evidence. At least here there is a paper trail.” On the other hand, there was the concern that “online or print means it’s already been filtered to be PC in the corporate culture. I don’t believe it.” And one caution to editors everywhere: “I believe what the newsletter says, except for those pictures of smiling employees. I’ve never seen any of them!”
I wanted to see how much of a credibility gap there was in message delivered over the grapevine vs. those heard directly from a direct supervisor. Not surprisingly, 74% told me they would believe their supervisor. But – everything depends on the relationship employees have with their supervisors. “I’d trust my current supervisor,” said one individual. “My old supervisor, no.”
People tended to give supervisors higher marks because of the more personal relationship that often exists. Said one individual, “I would believe my supervisor if I could also challenge him. Since your boss can fire you he should also be able to answer all your questions.”
I also wanted to know whether you would believe the grapevine or your most trusted co-worker if there were big differences in the messages from each. Personal relationships were again a crucial factor, with 89% reporting they would believe their co-worker. Here again, trust was the key, as with the individual who replied, “I don’t gossip with co-workers I don’t trust.”
So much for whom you believe. When all is said and done, it comes down to accuracy, which led me to ask people just how accurate they have found the grapevine?
Fifty-seven percent gave it favorable ratings. They supported their response with such comments as “Management communication usually confirms what the grapevine already knows,” and “The grapevine may not be wholly accurate, but it is a very reliable indicator that something is going on,” and “I believe the grapevine, but I validate it by checking versions from multiple sources.”
On the other hand, how did people rate the accuracy of formal communication? Given the tendency cited earlier to believe what they saw in writing, 67% had a favorable response to the accuracy of formal communication.
Communicators can take heart in hearing, for example, that “Formal communication is generally always accurate. There are seldom any mistakes in it, and people spend a long time crafting messages. But belief or trust in a message is based not just on accuracy. It also factors in completeness, disclosure, transparency, perceived intent, durability of the information, and of course, interpretation. Not to mention perceptions about and experiences with the sender. I think the mantra for today is ‘Trust, but verify.'”
As with all of the questions, there was a small percentage of people who indicated that they believed a “blend” of what they heard, rather than choose from among the formal communication channel and the grapevine. This, of course, is what really happens most of the time, which makes it incumbent for communicators to find ways to provide both formal and informal channels for their messages.
One individual reinforced this idea by noting that “Both channels have elements of truth that need to be synthesized.” Said another: “The grapevine is distorted, the formal is edited, and the truth lies between.” And a third: “Formal communication doesn’t tell the whole story. The grapevine has all the gory details.”
Others indicated that the nature of the message was important in deciding which source to believe more. “If the message relates to major changes and controversial issues,” said one individual, “the grapevine has more credibility. In the case of small and administrative changes, the formal methods are reliable. It’s all about skepticism.”
Another individual echoed a similar belief: “For information of a general nature (financial results, product news, etc.), I trust the formal channels. However, if the news relates to an ongoing investigation, regulatory action or product crisis – then I tend to believe the grapevine.”
Employees do, indeed, tend to believe the grapevine – an inevitable part of organizational life, a communication channel very much alive within organizations but not sanctioned by them, a natural (and healthy) consequence of people interacting.
Research suggests that up to 70% of all organization communication comes through the grapevine, yet many senior leaders are unaware that it exists or how it operates. One study, in fact, found that while 92% of lower-level managers knew the grapevine was active, only 70% of upper-level managers knew about it. In the same study, 88% of supervisors said they understood that the absence of formal communication increased activity through informal channels – but only 54% of executives understood this correlation.
Even with those numbers, one challenge today is for management to avoid overestimating the grapevine’s potential. As one of my interviewees explained, “A recent organizational change came as a complete shock. Senior leadership believed that the grapevine was more active than it really was – and that we would have some advance warning as a result of that activity.”
Research also finds that 80% of organizational rumor proves to be true. There may be a need for more research here, since this seems incredibly high, given what we know about how information gets distorted. Remember the child’s game of “telephone,” for example, where a whispered message is whispered and changes along the way from child to child.
But even if that figure is accurate – even if the rumor mill were 90% accurate – that small percentage of distorted or fabricated information can be devastating. And, remember, the grapevine is not responsible for errors.
Regardless of its accuracy, of whether it’s underestimated or overestimated, the grapevine cannot be eliminated or uprooted. You can’t kill it. You can’t stop it. But you can learn to understand it – and ideally even influence it. Here are some conditions when you can expect the rumor mill to kick into high gear:
1. When there is a lack of formal communication.
2. When the situation is ambiguous or uncertain.
3. When employees feel threatened, insecure, and highly stressed.
4. When there is an impending large-scale change.
5. When the subject matter is of importance to employees.
I think this response from my survey sums it up perfectly: “Formal communication focuses on messages the company wants to deliver, with a scope management feels is appropriate, and at a time management feels is right. The reason the grapevine plays such an important role is that it delivers the information employees care about, provides the details employees think they should know, and is delivered at the time employees are interested.”
The knowledge economy operates on the complexities of connections and networks. Companies are a combination of formal hierarchy and informal networks, but most communication strategies take into account only the formal organization. (Cascade communication is a classic example of “rolling out” a message from top to bottom of the organization chart.)
We will always need authentic speeches from senior leaders, well-written and well-researched articles in newsletters, and first-line supervisors who are first-rate communicators. It’s just that none of these strategies was created to deal with the complex web of social interactions and informal networks that grace today’s organizations.
In many of them, the grapevine is the major informal communication medium. It is a naturally occurring force. The question becomes: How do we tap into that force?
Malcolm Gladwell showed us one place to start in The Tipping Point: “If your want effective, sustainable communication in an organization, you need to reach a tiny minority of exceptional individuals who are responsible for the majority of the dialogue.”
His recommendation is keyed to the reality that gossip moves through groups that are split into factions (like separate departments and divisions) through people who gravitate into an intermediate position, making connections between the factions. They control the gossip flow and hold a lot of power.
Influencing the grapevine, then, begins with identifying “the influentials” who operate within it. Use a tool like Social Network Analysis to create a visual map of the informal organization and see who and where your connectors are. Find out about their attitudes toward the company, inform them in advance, train them to be even more skillful communicators, solicit their opinions. And ask their advice.
In conducting my research, there was no doubt as to which communication vehicle is the quickest. Some 99% chose the grapevine, which means that communicators are not going to be able to beat it to the punch. The challenge, instead, is to understand how the grapevine works within your organization – and how you can influence it.
Mission statements don’t have to be dumb. In fact, they can be very valuable, if they articulate real targets. The first thing I’d do is forget the exact words and remember the reason for a statement in the first place. In 2006, Wilson Learning surveyed 25,000 employees from the finance and tech industries. Respondents said they wanted a leader who could “convey clearly what the work unit is trying to do.” The same applies to mission state-ments, which set the tone. Employees, vendors, and clients don’t get stoked by fuzzy mission statements. They will line up behind concrete goals.
Email Nancy Lublin, the CEO of Do Something, with your nominees for best and worst mission statement.
We started this project about four years ago, and what this book is all about is about an organization that is full of conversation. If you think about what organization is all about, it’s just basically a bunch of conversations that are happening at the same time. And what leaders do to facilitate the conversations that actually produce value, and actually engage employees, is that what distinguished some of the best corporations that we studied.
So if you think about what makes conversations among friends to be really productive is that it has all the attributes. It’s interactive. It’s intimate. It’s inclusive. It’s actually intentional. And if you think about it, when you place that conversation inside organizations, many of those great attributes actually disappear.
So the book is, how do you actually have productive conversations in an organization? And the reason why it’s actually more important now in the 21st century than before is that, if you think about what’s going on around us, we’re a knowledge-based economy. Our source of competitive advantage are actually people who are working for us, working for our corporation. And the more engaged they are, the more productive they’re going to be.
So I think having right conversations [INAUDIBLE] 21st century is more important than 20 or 25 years ago. I think the speed of change, how industries are changing, how products are changing, is much, much faster than it used to be. So staying close to customers, staying close to your employees, that’s becoming more and more important.
Many companies nowadays are global companies, so you actually have to not only engage employees here locally, but you have to engage them across the board. And so communication, being able to be in touch with employees, is becoming more and more important.
An interview with Boris Groysberg and Michael Slind, authors of Talk, Inc.: How Trusted Leaders Use Conversation to Power Their Organizations. For more, read the article Leadership Is a Conversation.
As summer arrives you may you’re the one who gets burned when planning summer vacation schedules. See what you can do to prevent fighting over those prime dates like Memorial Day.
Everyone loves summer, especially employees who are looking forward to their summer vacation. The problem is that everyone wants to go on vacation at the same time. You know, Memorial Day, Labor Day and the 4th of July. Or, they want time in August to get the kids ready for school. And, not everyone can be accomodated. Here are five strategies that will make your summer planning like a day at the beach:
- Do the Work-Flow Planning. Examining the work-flow, or knowing the busiest times for your business, is critical both as you develop the policy, and, later, as you begin to consider requests. The more you know, the more you’ll be able to anticipate problems and spend time finding creative solutions.
- Create a Vacation Policy Set a policy for employees to follow when asking for a vacation, that examines when you need your staff the most, what your criteria is for selecting schedules and includes any exceptions. One of the biggest employee complaints is perceived favoritism. Be specific and fair. In fact, if you really want to get your employee’s buy-in, ask them for feedback as you develop the policy.
- Communicate your Vacation Policy. To paraphrase an old saying, communicate your policy ‘early and often’. Let employees know and ask questions about the policy early long before summer arrives. That way they will have time to adjust their plans if necessary. Present a written policy and discuss it at your next meeting.Repeat or reference the policy often to avoid misunderstanding(you know people rarely pay attention the first time.)
- Schedule a vacation request period. That way everyone has an equal shot of getting their prefered time.
- Look for creative solutions. So everyone wants to be gone for the last two weeks of July and you can’t do it. Be creative. Offer a special bonus for those who volunteer to postpone or switch their vacation. Expand the lunch hour. Buy lunch more often. Just make sure you have some options that let people really enjoy the laid-back summer vibe.
Think your shop is too small to fight over vacation scheduling? Think again. It’s even more important to plan for a small shop where everybody wheres multiple hats. Follow these strategies and this summer you’ll have it made in the shade.
At the root of every seemingly technical problem is a human problem. Five Whys provides an opportunity to discover what that human problem might be. Taiichi Ohno gives the following example:
When confronted with a problem, have you ever stopped and asked why five times? It is difficult to do even though it sounds easy. For example, suppose a machine stopped functioning:
- 1. Why did the machine stop? (There was an overload and the fuse blew.)
- 2. Why was there an overload? (The bearing was not sufficiently lubricated.)
- 3. Why was it not lubricated sufficiently? (The lubrication pump was not pumping sufficiently.)
- 4. Why was it not pumping sufficiently? (The shaft of the pump was worn and rattling.)
- 5. Why was the shaft worn out? (There was no strainer attached and metal scrap got in.)
Repeating “why” five times, like this, can help uncover the root problem and correct it. If this procedure were not carried through, one might simply replace the fuse or the pump shaft. In that case, the problem would recur within a few months. The Toyota production system has been built on the practice and evolution of this scientific approach. By asking and answering “why” five times, we can get to the real cause of the problem, which is often hidden behind more obvious symptoms.