12 Apr
PeopleTek Coaching Leadership

Top Causes for Attrition

“At least 75% of the reasons for voluntary turnover can be influenced by managers”.
—Gallup’s James K. Harter

The lack of strong leadership skills contributes significantly to attrition. Employee satisfaction levels become low, performance suffers, absenteeism is high, and the inspiration and motivation to be an achiever and obtain results becomes close to non-existent.

A Gallup poll discovered that poorly managed groups were 50 percent less productive than those with strong and respected leaders, and that profits were reduced by 44 percent.

Poor Leadership Is #1 . . .  

Many people think money is the key driver for job retention. Certainly money is a factor, but management skills, growth opportunity, and recognition for a job well done have been found to be more important.  Have you ever heard “people quit their leaders, not their jobs”?

Attrition research by authors Bud Haney and Jim Sirbasku (40 Strategies for Winning in Business) found the following:

  • 30% were unhappy with management and the way they managed
  • 25% felt they got no recognition for good work
  • 20% complained of limited opportunities for advancement
  • 15% cited inadequate salary and benefits
  • 5% were bored with the job.
  • 5% cited other reasons (retirement, career change, sabbatical, and travel)

We’ve been told that employees want bosses that:

  • Appreciate them as an individual and as a professional
  • Want to help them grow and succeed
  • Provide consistent and meaningful feedback
  • Reward and recognize results
  • Can be trusted
  • Are authentic
  • Listen
  • Invest in employee development

Does your leadership team satisfy the “wants” of your staff? What areas could be improved upon?

Investing in your leadership team is an attrition counter-measure and a sound investment!

05 Apr
PeopleTek Coaching Leadership

Adapting To Challenges

The number one action leaders should take to restore confidence in 2012 is to be open and honest about the nature and scale of the challenges ahead.
–Ketchum Leadership Communication

Journalist Fareed Zakaria wrote the book The Post-American World.  One area of concern that was addressed was the belief that organizations are not adapting well to emerging challenges. (This is only one of many themes but one we feel readily applies to leadership skills and styles).

Zakaria supplied the following guidelines for success:

Choose
Choose priorities rather than trying to have it all

Our comment:
Have clear goals, ensure all behaviors and tasks support those goals, and understand you can’t be everything to everyone.

Build broad rules, not narrow interests
Recommit to international institutions and mechanisms

Our comment:
Set goals and standards, and then let your people excel – they don’t need (or want) to be told HOW to do something, but they do need clear expectations and the desired outcome. Also, whenever possible, practice the old maxim of “Think globally; act locally”

Be Bismarck, not Britain
Maintain excellent relations with everyone, rather than offset and balance emerging powers

Our comment:
Build relationships, address differences in a healthy way, listen, and take more time to think of what “could” be done differently. Make an effort to relate and communicate to others in their terms and style. Not all relationships have a positive impact on your goals, but all relationships bring a learning opportunity.

Order à la carte
Address problems through a variety of different structures (e.g. sometimes UN, sometimes NATO, sometimes OAS)

Our comment:
Understand the needs and goals of others. What are their strengths? How do they best add value? What end result are you looking for?  Do you have the right resources in place?

Think asymmetrically
Respond to problems (e.g. drug cartels, terrorists, etc.) proportionately and do not respond to bait (i.e. small attacks meant to draw attention)

Our comment:
Expect and plan for conflict, be emotionally intelligent, know your hot buttons, remain controlled.  Think about what could de-rail you, and have a plan in place to address those challenges. Build strategies for win/win, as opposed to win/lose situations.

Legitimacy is power
Legitimacy creates the means to set agendas, define crises, and mobilize support

Our comment:
Leaders are authentic; they build trust, truly listen, communicate openly and consistently, and don’t have hidden agendas.  A complaint that we frequently hear is that leadership lacks integrity. Ensure your integrity and ethics show clearly and unambiguously in ALL circumstances. You can afford to lose a battle/case; you can’t afford to lose the trust of your team.

All professions, all industries, and all positions are faced with challenges. It’s up to us as leaders to help anticipate and respond to them before, or as they occur. We must maintain confidence levels, and communicate honestly about expectations and possible impacts. Things don’t always go as planned, but we can make a positive difference!

29 Mar
PeopleTek Coaching Team

Humor + Laughter = Results

“A sense of humor is part of the art of leadership, of getting along with people, of getting things done”.
–Dwight D. Eisenhower

Would you have thought that the most effective and successful leaders use laughter to increase productivity, build relationships, and improve results?

Humor, properly used, will positively influence those around you, promote a sense of comfort and confidence, and reduce tension in individuals and teams.

Numerous studies have been conducted and have found:

  • Humor is a powerful form of persuasion
  • Humor promotes teamwork and camaraderie
  • Humor stimulates creativity
  • Humor improves lines of communication

Humor has also been linked with our emotional intelligence competencies. According to Daniel Goleman,(EQ author/expert) “Research on humor at work reveals that a well-timed joke or playful laughter can stimulate creativity, open lines of communication, enhance a sense of connection and trust, and, of course make work more fun”.

Bryan Lattimore states that humor can be used:

  • As a way to break the ice in stiff or uncomfortable business situations
  • As an effective bonding technique – a wonderful way to build common ground with other employees
  • As a way to break down resistance
  • As a much needed way to improve the content, enjoyment, and ultimately the productivity of meetings
  • As a way to assign work when people can’t take any more
  • As a wonderful way to ease and control tension 

Like any leadership behavior, the use of humor requires skill. For some using humor is a natural talent, for others it’s awkward. Tip: Avoid humor that is sexist, ethnic, political or religious since this is usually at someone’s expense, and is likely to be disruptive and ill received.

Don’t be afraid to step out of your comfort zone and give humor a try! Given that humor impacts the power of persuasion and communication, promotes teamwork, stimulates creativity and effectiveness, and builds trust, are you effectively leveraging humor and laughter?

22 Mar
PeopleTek Coaching Leadership, Planning

Leadership and Planning

“Four steps to achievement: Plan purposefully. Prepare prayerfully. Proceed positively. Pursue persistently.”
–William A. Ward

In order to effectively lead your team to success, you as a leader must help them understand how they support the “big picture”.  Individual and team goals and roles must be clearly aligned with those of the organization, and used as the basis of rewards and development planning.

PeopleTek’s Strategic Plan Process

Successful leaders build a plan and use it. At PeopleTek we use and recommend the “strategic plan process.” This plan uses seven steps that help you easily identify where you currently are, and the steps required to get you where you want to be.

The steps in the plan are:

Step 1 – Agree on the mission or objective
Step 2 ­- Agree on the focus areas; we suggest 3 -5 (also called streams)
Step 3 – Agree on the desired result for each focus area or stream
Step 4 – List the CRITICAL SUCCESS FACTORS (pre-requisites or dependencies)
Step 5 – Identify the ‘AS IS’ for each focus area (be honest)
Step 6 – Brainstorm and prioritize the “HOW TO’s” for each focus area
Step 7 – Ensure accountability by assigning owners to each focus area

Ensuring accountability is critical. An owner must be assigned for each focus area and for each “HOW TO” step, with each step having a target date for completion.

This planning process can also be used for individual development planning. Assess where each individual is, and state where you want them “to be”. Your plan could include specific courses (up-skilling specific functions essential for a job, perhaps technical needs, as well as leadership and soft-skill development.  It could also include cross training within areas of your current company or organization, a mentorship (either to be a mentor or be mentored), and even perhaps plans for a total career change.  Technical and professional networks could also be identified.

Track the progress of your plans, update them as needed, and celebrate your successes!

12 Mar
PeopleTek Coaching Leadership

Invest in Leadership

Could you or your organization benefit by building critical leadership competencies?

PeopleTek has worked with thousands of individuals since 1996 to teach the critical skills needed to be a successful leader.

This training guided me through a series of self discoveries that held the secret of improving my effective leadership behavior, techniques and processes.
—L.  Mahate

For Leaders Of All Levels . . .

Great leaders motivate individuals to envision the future and blaze a path to achieve success.

Our Leadership Journey® program provides both tenured and newly promoted leaders with the tools for becoming a more successful leader.

Learn to understand and appreciate the strengths of individuals and teams, and to identify competencies that have not yet been fully developed.

PeopleTek’s virtually facilitated Leadership Journey program allows individuals and teams to attend from any location, without incurring travel expenses.

Our next virtually facilitated program kicks off March 29th.

Invest in yourself and your organization and take leadership to a higher level; enroll today!

08 Mar
PeopleTek Coaching Decision Making

Unpopular Decisions

“There are many qualities that make a great leader. But having strong beliefs, being able to stick with them through popular and unpopular times, is the most important characteristic of a great leader”.
—Rudy Giuliani  

Have you ever been faced with making, and communicating, an unpopular decision? One that doesn’t feel good, but must occur?

Most of us work in a “for profit” environment, and the decisions we make support achieving results and growing our business.

Changes, whether popular or unpopular need to be communicated. Think about what channel of communication you will use. Face to face is best, but not always possible. What would be most effective, from both the perspective of the message sender, and the receiver?

We have young adult children and they share stories about personal relationships being ended by a simple text message.  We suppose it gets the job done, but is certainly not ideal.

For those of you that are football fans, super star quarterback Peyton Manning was released from the Indianapolis Colts.  Manning took the Colts to the playoffs 11 times, captured seven AFC South titles in eight years, won two AFC championships, one Super Bowl title and a Super Bowl MVP Award.  So why was the unpopular decision made?  Manning missed the entire 2011 season due to injuries (he had 3 neck surgeries in 19 months), and although “okayed” medically to play this year, there was still a health risk. As a result, the decision was made to release him instead of paying a $28 million bonus that he was eligible for.

Leadership requires courage, and yes, making unpopular decisions is part of it.

Here are some tips for communicating any decision:

  • State why the decision needed to be made
  • Indicate who will be impacted because of the decision
  • Anticipate and prepare for questions and opposition
  • Openly discuss both positive and negative impacts
  • Listen and feel!

As a leader, you need to be open and you need to build trust in your organization, especially during times of uncertainty and when unpopular decisions must be made.

01 Mar
PeopleTek Coaching Leadership

Principled Business Leaders

Alpha Kappa Psi was founded on the principles of educating its members and the public to appreciate and demand higher ideals in business. . .
—akpsi.org

Principled Leaders

Participants attended up to 5 leadership sessions and had the ability for their school to compete against other schools in a case competition.

Alpha Kappa Psi logo; principled leadersLevels of energy and enthusiasm were unsurpassed; some attendees were in their final year of school, others had 1 or 2 years remaining. In the closing ceremony, (where the entire group was assembled), they were asked to “please stand if you’re leader.” We were delighted to see 100% of the attendees stand up. We have NEVER seen that happen in any venue!

Members of the fraternity know their vision and mission statements and live the following values:

  • Brotherhood– Trust, respect, cooperation, companionship, and aid to brother members is the expected norm
  • Knowledge – Education and experience is emphasized and shared
  • Integrity – All actions, whether in business or in life, are guided by honesty, ethics, and fairness
  • Service– Sharing of time, talent, and treasure with society and with our fraternity is a priority
  • Unity – A common understanding of their vision and values that transcends chapter, generation, and profession is utilized to anticipate and create the future

Does your staff, team, or organization know their vision and mission statements? Would 100% stand if they were asked if they were leaders? Having shared values, and knowing what your vision, mission, and supporting goals are things that facilitate success.

Congratulations to the Alpha Kappa Psi brotherhood for their commitment to leadership development, and ultimately, success!

27 Feb
PeopleTek Coaching Career

Life Is A Journey

“Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life.”
–Confucius

Your Career, Like Life, is a Journey

A good way to get started is to answer the following questions:

  • What are my strengths?
  • What am I good at?
  • What comes easy to me?
  • What makes me happy?
  • What motivates and excites me?
  • What are my values and beliefs?

Choose your career with purpose, not by chance! Use your values and your sense of self to make decisions that serve you well.

We’re here to help!

16 Feb
PeopleTek Coaching Success

Positivity In The Workplace

Positivity is an essential constituent of inspiring, engaging leadership.
—Deiric McCann

Do you agree that success is based on positivity and happiness? Think about a leader that had the greatest impact on you. Was their demeanor one of negativity?

It’s rare that we feel inspired and motivated when working in environments that make us feel bad, or where we are not appreciated.

The Huge Impact of Positivity In The Workplace

Happiness inspires success. It is internally driven. We own it. How we allow our brain to process what’s going on around us determines our happiness level. This in turn directly equates to our level of success. (It’s been found that IQ only accounts for 25% of what we achieve).

Some think the harder they work the happier they’ll be, but this has been found to be false. When a team and organization work in positive environments, people thrive and goals are more readily achieved.

As a leader, we have the ability to influence others and help create that desired positive environment. We need to listen. We need open lines of communication. We need to build trust. We need to address conflict. We need to make sure accountability and ownership are part of the workplace. And, we need to look for the positive.

Actions to Inspire Positivity

For many, times are tough. We need to watch for and recognize behaviors that are allowing negativity to creep in. Psychologist Shawn Achor suggests the following to help inspire positivity:

  • Think about what you have to be thankful about
  • Keep a journal and write in it at least one “positive” each day
  • Exercise
  • Meditate
  • Read inspirational quotes daily
  • Conduct random acts of kindness daily ex. recognize another’s accomplishment

Engaged leaders positively impact others! The benefits: Enhanced decision-making skills, stronger teamwork, less stress, more innovative and creative ideas, increased results, and a happier more productive staff.

Watch the Ted Talk we found about The Happy Secret to Better Work.

13 Feb
PeopleTek Coaching Blog

Everyone is a Leader

“The average return is 6 to 1 on the investment made from working with an Executive Coach.”
—The Manchester Review

At PeopleTek, we believe everyone is a leader , whether they realize it or not. Some think you need the title, some think you need direct reports. Being a leader is really about the ability to influence others, and make sound decisions.

Why not find out how to make better decisions with more confidence and clarity about why you are making them?

Our coaches are committed to connecting individuals and teams with the tools necessary to make their leadership stronger, and obtain more favorable results.

Invest In Yourself . . .     

Coaching may be conducted in a group, team, or individual setting.  Your coach will help you navigate the political climate, understand your career path, and learn how to effectively “manage up”, “across organizations”, and “down”, and simply put, become a more successful leader.

Could you benefit from obtaining objective feedback about what is really working well for you and identifying the obstacles preventing success?

Visit our website and take advantage of our complimentary offers for a trial coaching session and a leadership survey.

We’ll help you take your leadership to a higher level; satisfaction guaranteed!

06 Feb
PeopleTek Coaching Team

80 Hour Team Savings

Overcoming barriers to performance is how groups become a strong team

Create a strong team; save time!    

Major inhibitors for having a strong team are:

  • Lack of trust
  • Individuals not addressing behavior
  • Delayed decisions
  • Low motivation and morale
  • Delayed project milestones
  • Upset employees and customers

Could your team benefit by saving over 80 man hours, per person, per year?  Want to find out how?

Give me a call or send me an email!

Mike Kublin
888.565.9555 ext 711
mkublin@peopletekcoaching.com

02 Feb
PeopleTek Coaching Success

ICAS – A Case Study

“. . .ELEVATE . . .! “

This is a unique yet powerful story.  It’s about leadership, teamwork and success. It’s about the past, present and future. It’s about ICAS. Much like other companies that achieved fabulous growth and success and is proud of their accomplishments, ICAS has succeeded in delivering products and services for over 30 years.

This is a tremendous accomplishment and has created great growth for a family owned business that has thrived during difficult and challenging times. It’s about talented and skilled staff being willing to do what it takes to excel, be supportive, and build strong relationships.  This study is about the people that comprise the ICAS family.

How does ICAS adapt and change to an ever increasing competitive market for IT services?

How do they remain leaders in the industry and continue to be first choice by business partners? How does ICAS approach the most challenging times for IT professionals and businesses in the past century? How will they continue to grow and thrive?

The answer is both complex and simple: Elevate!

A new company wide transition and project led by CIO Jim Caridi, focuses on systems, culture and processes required to elevate ICAS beyond their wildest vision. These changes will provide the platform and structure for success. Everything they do will be focused around creating an infrastructure to elevate skills, talents, and abilities in order to deliver top quality services and products to their customers.

Their processes, technology, tools and training will be elevated beyond measure. How they deal with customers, suppliers, and one another will be taken to higher levels. While change is always uncomfortable, the ICAS team will use courage and operate with vision, purpose, desire and a plan to elevate to the next level.

Everything that was done in the past will provide the foundation to make the necessary changes to face the future. It will take leadership, accountability and teamwork to stretch beyond comfort zones, and it will require risk and passion.

They know the adjustment may be uncomfortable, but they plan to make it fun and exciting.  Change and new opportunities promote outstanding growth, quality, and inspiration!

Why elevate? Because they feel they have to. They feel their customers need them to. They feel having a future demands it.  Great teams who make it to the Super Bowl know how to keep coming back.  Building a stronger business team is no different.  Elevate is their answer, and it will be up to each ICAS employee to understand what it means to them individually, and to the team as a whole.

CIO Caridi asked each team member to take the challenge. He wants each individual to think and respond to ‘What does elevate mean to me? What role do I play and how can I  elevate myself and take my career, and the company to a higher level?”

Action and development plans will be created, tracked, and updated over the next days, months and years.  We wish them success as their Journey continues!

Let us know if you have a growth and success story to share.

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