Back to school. Back to writing

It’s been forever since I’ve put fingers to keys in a work sense. I’m not sure if there was ever a finite reason why I stopped writing, but the sheer volume of information being pushed by other incredibly talents writers and the limited impact of my content certainly played big roles.

 

I think though, it was mostly that I started questioning the validity of what I was trying to do. It’s a strange position to find yourself in; years of being a fix / learn whatever is needed generalist to a person longing for deeper reads and a model where expertise is truly coveted by organizations. It was a complete change of pace, and honestly, approach.

 

For over two decades, I’ve existed by learning just enough to get by and solve the problem. In ’99, I was hired as a coder and was completely underqualified from Day 1. I never really recovered. Languages, theory and philosophy all evolved quicker than I could and eventually I found the ever increasing gap to be too wide to cross.

 

Thankfully, that lead me to learning and uncovered a passion to help people understand enough to get their jobs done in a more effective and hopefully, more enjoyable way. I pushed collaboration and digital touch points, but oddly enough over the last few years, despite the huge influx of new technology available to organizations, the glacial pace of adoption began to take its toll on me.

 

Success existed in pockets, but never fully transformed the organizations I was trying to help. I used to wear small wins and success stories as badges of honor, but over time they highlighted the fact that there was more work to do and new ideas and approaches were needed if I truly wanted to help tie collaborative behaviour back to actual business outcomes and reach more than early adopters and exciting buzzwords. Gartner uses a term to plot the path of hype, and instead of being on the cutting edge, I wanted to reach the plateau of productivity.

 

So what does this mean? Why am I writing again? Well, starting next week I kickoff the first semester of my MBA. Formal learning. Tests. Papers. Grades. Truth be told, these things terrify me. I’ve almost been better at the 80% needed to make something functional than the hardest 20% to make it perfect, but the reality I’ve discovered over the last ten years shows I need to be inspired by new ideas. I think being exposed to new sources, people and outlooks will help trigger inspiration.

 

So, I’m opening this space again to work out loud. Share the good, the bad, the frustrating and the joy. It’s not meant to push success, but simply to reconnect with the same community that used to provide me with a spark. I’m not sure where I’ll end up, but even my first meet up with the other Toronto based people in my cohort opened my eyes to the fact that all too often the people in my work world that exist behind hashtags and buzzwords think the same way and know the same people. We preach inclusiveness and diversity, but all too often we are marching along the same path.

 

As I sat with five complete strangers, with quite varied backgrounds, it was funny to see them try to equate what I do on a day-to-day basis to areas of their own business. Concepts like employee engagement, culture, purpose, and digital readiness were not pillars, but methods to help drive units, increase productivity or reduce inefficiencies. Collaboration wasn’t a desired end-state, it was a way to innovate and solve problems. It was a means to an end. I quickly realized that none of the people at my table were speaking my language, and that was the greatest part about the encounter. I was listening, not trying to map out solutions or identify easy wins; I was listening to simply hear their challenges.

 

It doesn’t mean they were right or I was wrong, but sometimes to move the ball down the field you need to get in the trenches. You need to move passed what you draw up in the playbook, or see during practice. You need to realize that some of the biggest barriers are staring you right in the face, but you don’t even realize they exist.

 

When I started this journey it was to help people figure out how to solve their problems, not implement my solutions. I’m not sure how this experiment will go, but for the first time in a while I feel like the answers I find will be to questions I haven’t asked time and time again in the hopes of hearing a different result.

The search for happiness?

As more and more organizations look at problematic engagement issues within the workforce, the more confusing the concept of engagement actually becomes. Engagement is a trendy buzz word right now, but like corporate culture, it’s not easily defined and varies greatly depending on the organization.

That uncertainty has led to a very disturbing trend that terrifies me beyond belief. For some reason happiness is often viewed as a synonym for engagement and total employee happiness is often presented as the utopic end state for an organization.

Do you feel connected? Finding fulfillment& comfort in a virtual world.

The other night I had the pleasure of sitting down for steak florentine, caprese salad, rosemary potatoes and pecan pie with my boss friend and his family. We drank wine, laughed, and talked about cycling for long enough to make anyone not named Lance cringe.

Largely due to the people at the table (two people in the leadership space, the head of school, a wellness consultant, a man that has started several companies and another that seemed to know something about everything), we talked technology, leadership, obsession with power, and flexible work masked under the umbrella of general questions like, “so, what do you actually do?”

The question that sparked the most debate (directed at me when I was talking about being in the office roughly one day a week for the last 8 years) was “do you feel connected?”

Lebron James:: Understanding his decision is understanding today’s workforce

Yesterday, countless sources (read, the explosion that was my twitter feed) reported the Kevin Love / Andrew Wiggins trade. Immediate reactions – mostly from male, Gen X, white, Canadian e-pundits – talked of shortsightedness, selfishness and mistakes. People used the trade to rehash complaints about how Lebron jumped ship. He was somehow wrong for leaving for a better situation instead of paddling doggedly to keep a sinking ship afloat.

We judged him and now the Cavaliers by static criteria, despite the fact we live in a fluid world. We questioned their decision to risk an uncertain future for a chance at immediate success. We assumed both would trade happiness and fulfillment for a sense of loyalty that no longer exists and we asked organizations to sacrifice today for a future that can never be accurately forecasted.

Not to pull a Wooderson, but the reality is sports writers and leaders are getting older while athletes and employees stay the same age. The generational divide forces them to assess a decision on criteria that are foreign to the people making the choice. It’s the same struggle we face trying to motivate, inspire, develop and retain talent in today’s organizations. Organizations no longer hold all the cards, and decisions are less black and white than ever before.

We are developing leaders, but should we be developing team captains?

Last week, I was at the Conference Board of Canada’s Future of Work conference. My Director was there on behalf of TELUS, talking about leadership and engagement but we both stayed around to listen to a few sessions. For me, the standout was the panel that featured three millenials sharing their thoughts on inspiration, leadership, and working in today’s changing environments.

Hearing three intelligent, young leaders was a unique look intowhat the next generation of leaders expects from their people and themselves, but the reason this panel was so important for me was the aha moment it provided. When asked what she looks for in a leader, AJ Tibando – CEO of SoJo – responded, “I resonate more with the team captain than the head of an organization.”

In a succinct thirteen words, AJ defined the struggle with my own leadership style and identified the huge gap I see in almost every organization with which I work. I’ve always struggled with the concept of defined leadership. This is not a form of rebellion; I’ve been lucky to have great leaders and honestly try to learn from everyone I work with. The struggle for me is that once a leader is removed from the field, it’s harder for the leader to earn the trust and create the bond that is so crucial to any sort of reciprocal relationship.

I’ve always felt that the best way to show leadership is to model good behaviors, work as hard as possible, support your team (and your teammates) and develop the expertise that others can rely on when things go bad. Losing that connection to my teammates terrifies me. The idea of standing off to the side, dictating strategy and watching players play is crucial to an organization, but real-time decisions require someone that knows a project inside and out, has the skills required to change direction immediately and the trust from the team to know that even if the changes aren’t completely understood or supported, they were made for the good of the team.

When I was in tech, it was common practice to have a senior developer – a go between management and the coders that could also solve problems – but that role doesn’t really exist in formal leadership. We have mentors, coaches, managers, directors, vice presidents but most organizations don’t have team leaders. All too often we saddle project managers to be responsible for line items, budgets, timelines and team health.

Flatness encourages everyone to lead in their own way, but the reality is, many people don’t want to lead or feel uncomfortable being accountable to (and for) their peers. People often need the chain of command to be defined by a solid line, not an ever-changing dotted one. I understand that no one wants to add another layer of hierarchy, but developing team captains is a great way to support project teams, empower employees and introduce high potentials to the rigors of formal leadership. It’s an incredibly practical way to determine if an employee will make a good leader before they are promoted and also for them to determine if that role is actually something they want in terms of career development.

But the reason I think a team captain makes sense is that it is a great way to offer team members support from someone that has earned the trust of the team through action, not title. Often athletic teams vote to determine the captain (and it’s rarely based solely on talent), and establishing trust is one of the hardest things for any leader to do. Getting that vote of confidence on Day 1 makes everything easier.

How can a team captain help?

Understanding and solving problems as they are happening, not waiting for half-time or the next game.
Organizations and employees require access to content and expertise in near real-time. Customers wont wait for us to check an inbox. They use social channels to contact us and expect replies in a timely fashion. Employees can’t always wait for a weekly 1:1 or hope that their manager can shift priority to help in that ever shrinking window. Having an expertise empowered to make decisions will improve customer support, team productivity and confidence.

Understanding not only the strengths and weaknesses of each player, but how to set them up for success.
If you’ve ever played on a team, you undoubtedly understand not only what a teammate does well, but how best to set them up to maximize on their talent. The best example I can give is one from my high school basketball team. In the playoffs, we had the ball down one with about twenty seconds left. Our coach called a timeout, and quickly drew up a play to get our centre the ball on the low, right block. He was our most consistent scorer, so it made sense, but as he explained the play to our team, you could see our centre shrink. He wasn’t nervous or scared, but he simply admitted that he “hates getting the ball on the right block.”

Our coach reacted as most would. He changed the play and went away from our best option. He assumed that our centre let the pressure get to him, not that he would simply rather get the ball on the other side of the court. It’s no different than assuming that Sarah’s passion for coaching makes her the ideal candidate to develop a new electronic/social coaching community when she is reluctant to use social technology and prefers to interact face-to-face or over the phone.

Understanding the pressure the team is under.
Leaders in progressive organizations preach work life balance, but the reality is that when it’s crunch time, few leaders simply tell employees that it’s ok to sign out after 7.5 hours when the work is not done. That’s no longer a reality. Team are constantly asked to do less with more, and it’s harder and harder for an employee to take their foot off the gas.

Having support, coaching and expertise and empathy goes a long way when demands continue to increase. It’s easier to take the news from someone battling on the field with you and hopefully, the team captain has the respect of management to push back when the team is burned out.

Develop trust in the system by playing within it, not just dictating the formation or lineup.
It’s no secret that strategy comes from above. That will never (and should never) change. We can work hard to ensure that everyone understands the decisions and – when appropriate – has a chance to provide insight and feedback on potential changes in strategy. Bottom line, you can’t have 40,000 people trying to drive the boat, you can simply help each person understand how they are helping the vessel move in the right direction.

Having a team captain will help leaders understand how to augment the strategy. They can help empower the team to make small changes because they have a complete understanding of what those small changes will mean and allow the team to shift more quickly.

Collaborate for the good of the team, not simply to get the result
When you work with a team on a day-to-day basis, the bonds you develop are often unbreakable. We spend as much time with the people we work with more than we see our spouse or kids. Team captains understand those bonds and know the impact of severing them. The best teams work with each other to solve problems; they try to win with the pieces they have, not demand an influx of new talent to fill gaps.

If you look at any organization, managers/owners make large scale changes when things are not working whereas the players try to make minor changes to how they operate in an attempt to achieve desired results. Splashing money and adding new team members can work in the short term, but consistency and trust are dramatically impacted by significant transition. Attrition, disengagement and productivity are all a result of the uncertainty new leadership and new roles/responsibilities bring, and ideally a captain can help minimize the distractions and confusion by helping leadership how major changes will impact team health.

Focus on the the immediate, as well as the long term success.
Visionaries and strategists need to focus on the long term. Obviously, businesses operate quarter to quarter, but the organization can’t fixate on the next ninety days. Team captains can understand the long term strategy and help the team focus on the immediate wins to align to the strategy.

Employees want to understand how they are helping customers, driving profit, developing required skills. People want to feel like they are part of something bigger than themselves and if they can’t understand how the day-to-day relates to the three-year plan, you risk losing a good employee to another opportunities or, even worse, you risk keeping an unproductive, unmotivated employee.

Kevin Durant: a shining example of authentic leadership

Without question, forcing sports metaphors onto the corporate world is a tired approach. We’ve all been given pep talks and read blog posts that are littered with athletic analogies and references to great teams or star athletes.

As a sports junkie, I know what it’s like to idolize your favorite player and blindly follow your favorite team, but as I’ve grown up the notion of modeling our work life after the games and players we watch seems more and more naive.

That’s why Kevin Durant’s tearful acceptance of the 2014 NBA MVP award was so moving. By all accounts, Durant is a young man (he’s only 25) that routinely does the right thing on and off the court without demanding recognition or adoration. In today’s sports world, one driven by personal brand and money, he deserves credit for caring about winning, getting better, his teammates and the city he plays for instead of commercials and fame.

Interestingly enough, Durant’s quiet demeanor often leads to people asking about his leadership skills. Because he is calm and calculated and rarely thumps his chest, whenever he fails people ask if he has what it takes to lead and win. I know the introvert vs. extrovert argument has been debate to death lately (the reality is that most of us are probably ambiverts) and how you act should be dependent on situation and audience, not your predisposition, but at least sixteen minutes of his acceptance speech proved that Durant is the type of leader we should all strive to emulate.

Why you ask? His speech is riveting so I encourage you to watch it, but here are some key points that demonstrate the characteristics of a great leader:

Humility

On the biggest stage, Durant refused to shine the spotlight on himself. Obviously, the MVP is an individual award but Durant showed his fragility. He opened up about his fears and shortcomings. He admitted he is not a vocal leader and he makes mistakes. Never once did Durant make this award about himself and his dominance. He thanked everyone in his life for the help they gave him in his quest to be better.

It’s rare that leaders talk about shortcomings, at least outside of superficial ones. Self-deprecating humor is one thing (trust me, it’s the go to in my bag of tricks); actually opening up and sharing your insecurities and flaws helps you connect with your team. Empathy is the glue that forms bonds that aren’t broken by a bad decision or a tough quarter.

Appreciation

For me, the most emotional part of Durant’s speech was the ten minutes he took to thank his teammates. MVPs always thank their team (it’s kind of like thanking the Academy at the Oscars), but Durant singled out every player and gave specific reasons he was grateful to they were part of the Thunder. These weren’t really basketball related. Durant talked about player’s stories and what they meant to him as a human being. He showed that this team was about more than basketball, more than results. He thanked veteran players and rookies alike.

I don’t know how his teammates felt, but I know what it’s like to have a leader publicly admit how much your mean to him as a person and how that impacts a relationship. For me, it was a note to my Father when he got sick. TELUS offered up a couple of passes to the PGA Skins game in Nova Scotia, and that generous gift would have been enough for my Dad (and enough for me), but my boss included a note about me; how I help him every day and how I’ve grown in the 8 years we’ve worked together. It was a chance for people in my life to understand what I do and who I am. It meant the world to me and to my Mom and Dad. For members of the OKC Thunder, it was a chance for their friends and family to see why they are so important to the team and Durant.

People want to feel supported and challenged at work, but they also want to feel like they are making a difference. When orgs change, we all get celebration emails of new titles. When senior leaders leave, we are told of their great accomplishments. How much would it mean to your team if you sent out a similar note thanking them for what they did to help YOU get to your next milestone?

Good enough is not enough

Durant is at the top of his game, just finishing the best regular season of his career. The award asks him to reflect, but he points out the Thunder have bigger goals. This individual recognition, while important, is not the end goal. No one is perfect, but great leaders should always try to be. The Thunder and Durant himself have had some tough losses and criticism over the last year, and being voted most valuable would be the validation most of us need to prove our critics wrong. For Durant, the goal is to be world champion. Anything else is not good enough.

Orgs are always asking us to do more with less. We are asked for bigger wins through cheaper solutions. We judge ourselves on quarterly or yearly performance, but a great leader knows that targets will continue to increase and should focus on helping the team understand continual improvement as well as short term success.

Partnerships

Like most great leaders, Durant is supported by a high achieving teammate that could probably run his own team. Russell Westbrook brings a completely different skill set to the table and his strengths help let Durant lead in his own way. Too often, leaders take credit for assembling a team without acknowledging how much they rely and need their direct reports to innovate and drive results.

Durant praised the work effort and skills of his friend, but he also acknowledged that Westbrook takes the brunt of the criticism from the press and fans, shielding Durant from that added pressure. Durant understands how some of the top performers on the Thunder actually let him focus on what he does best and to shine the brightest in the public eye. Durant deserves the MVP, but if he wasn’t supported by someone like Russell Westbrook, his flaws would be more obvious.

It’s important to remember that even when you are leading the ship, there are people doing things you can’t do and those people are vital to the health of the team. If your key players leave, the team and your performance will suffer.

Mentorships

Durant’s concluded his speech by a moving thank you to his mother. He acknowledged she is the reason he’s a success. He thanked her for everything she is, and everything she helped him become. I’ve been lucky; I’ve worked with good leaders that helped me get better. I’ve learned from each of them and as a result, try to help people develop as well. I once heard that your leadership style is like a quilt made from pieces of fabric that are sewn together. Lessons learned that help define who you are and how you can lead.

Acknowledging the leaders that helped become who you are is important, but remembering to help people shouldn’t be optional. You as a leader need to give back. Your piece of fabric will help people finish their quilt.

Be yourself

We’ve all seen award ceremonies and heard famous people pretend to be something they are not. As awful as Michael Jordan’s acceptance speech was, it was authentic. He made his career out of stuid grudges, belittling opponents and teammates and demanding perfection. His speech reflected exactly who he truly is. The same is true for Durant’s. He cried. He talked about things important to him and let us see who he really was.

It’s impossible to connect with and lead everyone perfectly. All you can do is be yourself, be accountable and be fair. Those characteristics should be enough, but reinventing yourself to force connections will never work.

This is why we fight. This is why we shouldn’t complain.

On Sunday evening, I completed the online check-in for the 2014 Ride to Conquer Cancer. the RTCC is a 200km ride from Toronto to Niagara Falls, with benefits going to the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre, one of the top 5 cancer research centres in the world.

Last year the ride raised 19.1 million dollars, but more importantly, it gave us hope. As we rode through Ontario, we were surrounded by sadness – people peddling in loving memory of friends, family and peers no longer with us, but we were also surrounded by yellow flags. We were surrounded by survivors.

In 2012, my ride started like most. I knew someone that knew someone that was battling cancer. When I got the news, I did what we all do. I shared FB status updates, liked heartfelt posts and retweeted fundraising efforts before returning to the security of my own insignificant problems. I did the most I could without really doing anything. I cheered from the side as people I knew peddled for a cause or for closure.

Things changed when my Dad got sick. Aggressive brain cancer. Horrible prognosis. I started reading stats and tried hard to hold onto the hope that maybe he’d be the miracle case. I started raising money. Instead of doing everything I normally did (essentially nothing), I forced myself to believe that every dollar I raised could be the one that helped them find a cure. I organized concerts. I asked people for money. I asked people for help. I admitted weakness and fear. I was scared and RTCC let me think about something else. All my energy could be directed somewhere meaningful.

Quickly, I realized that people are amazing. Strangers, families, and friends rallied behind me. The stories they shared kept us believing. They gave me and my family hope… almost too much hope. Naively, until it was really bad, I still thought Dad was defying the odds. To be honest, until we moved him into a hospital bed that took up so much space in the family room that we had to move his favorite chair, I thought he was strong and stubborn enough to simply outlast this disease.

This year is different. Dad’s gone and I don’t know what these 200 km will be like. Instead of riding for his cause, I’m riding in his memory. It will be good for me in some sense as well; eight hours to think about the life he led and the times we shared. It’s a chance to say goodbye in a way that I know he’d respect.

Cancer is awful. I know that’s not a surprise to anyone, but it takes away your will to fight. This year, those yellow flags will be inspiring for another reason. Each time I see a flag, I’m going to see someone that refused to quit. They took the pain. They took the poison. They spent months, if not years holding on by a thread. They persevered.

My family has dealt with too much loss lately. Old friends. Fathers. Husbands. Mothers. Wives. Aunts. Grandmothers. Cousins. Despite all that, I’m encouraged by two people in my life that are fighting. They refuse to yield. They turn into the torrents and gusts and defy the storm to do its worst. Remarkably, I’ve never met either of these people in real life. I work with a woman that is everything you’d dream to be. She’s determined, hard working, funny as hell and a dedicated mom. I worked with her husband at my old job, and he and I shared sushi, beer and work drama almost every day. I looked at her picture on his desk every morning while I waited for him to get organized for a coffee run.

Somehow just from two pictures and casual stories, I felt like I knew her. Little did I know that when I switched jobs we would start working together. We shared jokes and work drama, and I realized that she was a f@cking rock star. She’s the type of person that makes you re-evaluate how you approach your life – plus she mailed me a Tom Waits shirt to say thanks for working extra hours. But suddenly, she was gone. Emails were going to other people. She was no longer in project meetings. I didn’t know until she was packed up and beginning her first fight.

She kicked cancer’s ass. She reshaped her life and did everything right. She even started drinking some blended green juice that made me physically ill to even look at. Now she’s fighting breast cancer for a second time, dealt a hand that would make even the biggest gambler toss away their two cards and concede their stack of chips, but her outlook and spirit is still unbreakable. She will not stop fighting and she’s showing us how we should live life (especially when ours is undoubtedly much easier).

Forget tattered leather jackets, skin tight jeans and high top Chuck Taylors. Carissa is punk rock.

Another man fighting this same fight is someone I’ve only shared emails with. We “know” some of the same people. We “love” some of the same things. We bonded through his talent and my appreciation. I guess if life were a Venn diagram, our circles would touch but only ever so slightly. Yesterday, I wrote to him about his new music and shared that I had given a few of my songs to my father – another music lover – and they were played many times as sitting in a chair or lying in a bed became more common.

Will was diagnosed with cancer in his mid-twenties. For a gifted word smith and peaceful man, it just doesn’t seem fair.  He used music as his inspiration, documenting his treatment, his anger, his hope and his reality in eight beautiful songs that try their best to remove shock of the stark message they carry. Honestly, there are moments on this record that take my breath away, but their are moments that help me understand the torment my Dad went through and refused to discuss.

Both these people refuse to stop fighting. They were given something awful and turned it into beauty and inspiration. They take statistics and challenge them with heart and determination. They fight, and it’s why we should all fight. It’s too easy to think we have it bad, decide that life is trying to push us down. I’m realizing that most of us are lucky. We come home after work with money in our pocket and a house filled with love and warmth. We see life and it’s endless possibilities. We have the freedom to look back and laugh and the time to dream about what might be.

I’m sorry these two great people have to go through this, but selfishly, I’m thankful for them showing me how to really understand what’s important and what life can really throw at you.

I’ll be riding the 2014 Ride to Conquer Cancer with my Dad’s picture on my back and the memories we share in my heart, but Carissa and Will’s names will be attached to my bike frame to remind me that not everyone has the chance to ride 200km in beautiful countryside left only to complain about the pain in their legs.

Social adoption:: Find their solution, don’t sell yours

If you read this blog, chances are you’ve spent countless hours trying to sell the value of collaboration to business units or project teams across your organization. I’ve tried to creative tactics – honestly, I’d have a few less greys if Daniel Pink had published To Sell is Human years ago – focusing on business issues, value propositions, inspiration and potential.

I’ve sold the successes we had and retold the stories we shared. I’ve surfaced problem resolutions and surprising outcomes to help teams connect positive outcomes to their own situation. I dug and dug until I found something that connected with the target audience. Obviously, I see huge value in collaboration; sharing ideas, encouragement, support and expertise is what I do on a day-to-day basis and what I expect from others, but that’s not a universal truth and it’s important to remember that when you are trying to “help.”

In almost every org I’ve worked for/with, the training for social technology is to simplify the tools and site development to the point where any user can start building sites and sharing content as soon as possible. Make it easy to use and impossible to break. We develop templates to minimize the required starting lift. We create chunked support materials to allow employees learn only what they need to learn to perform a task.

Unfortunately, that simplification also makes it hard to control the flow of information and content on sites. Employees are routinely asked to fit a square peg into a (nicely designed) round hole. For our Jam sites, we ask teams to use the SAP created templates or a customized TELUS template. This makes it easy to create sites, but also makes it easy for the purpose of the site to get lost behind widgets and design. The general assumption is that if we can let teams hit the ground running, chances are they will be more interested in sharing ideas or content.

In reality, the most important collaboration occurs before you design or launch any new site.

Selling collaboration is one thing; creating a solution is another. Before a team creates a solution, there are many important questions that should be asked. At TELUS, we’ve stopped talking about the benefits of collaboration, and now simply ask why is the site being built, what value does it add and what will help it stay relevant over time?

If your new users can’t answer these questions, chances are even the best designed, easy to use community will stagnate quickly. Even worse, if users don’t know why they are visiting a site and are forced to hunt blindly for content, the platform will become a distraction that will derail productivity.

We’ve realized that standardization and simplification are important, but creating sites that allow users to ask a question, find an answer or consume content effectively is what will drive results and allow the user to get back to the task at hand. Alex Pang – author of the Distraction Addiction – offers this insight:

“There are times when it can be a lot more efficient to ask the person who knows the answer to a question, than to hunt around the corporate intranet or two-year-old crowd-sourced FAQ for the answer,” Pang writes. “However, we need to just do that judiciously, be mindful that your convenience may come at someone else’s expense, and do it only when necessary.”

So how can you help?

The biggest value I can add to any discussion about collaboration is perspective. When I meet with teams, the first thing I do is share a single .pptx slide.

What is the purpose of this site?

While this seems like an obvious question, it’s one that gets forgotten more often than not. Is it a marketing site? A support channel? A site set up because your director said we need to use the new tools? If you don’t determine the purpose of your site, you will most likely not showcase the best content or user experience.

If you want your Jam space to be a support channel – maybe an easy way to allow field technician to ask a question to a large group of technicians and capture that context – it makes sense to surface the Forums or even Feed Widget on your Overview page. If your site is more of a brochure site – maybe a Meet the HR team – it makes more sense to showcase the People widget (Featured Member) and work on an engaging Overview page. If it’s a Learning space, highlighting the appropriate content (maybe, using hashtags) helps direct users as soon as the page loads.

Bottom line, even though ideas like all content must be accessible in less than 3-clicks have been debunked, your site will be more effective is you surface appropriate content on the home page. In order to do this, you need to clearly understand the site’s purpose.

Will this site improve on existing process?

In large organizations, the creative workarounds teams come up with are incredible. When a tool or process doesn’t meet a team’s needs, it is morphed until it does. Asking a team to change for the sake of changing is a difficult and often detrimental to your working relationship. If you don’t ask this question, and proceed to implement a solution that impacts actual work, your business partners will begin to question your intentions.

Sometimes it’s best to simply walk away.

When I meet with teams and ask them to explain there current process and try to determine if changing how the team does something is worth the work and training required. If it’s not, I am honest with them. “Listen, this tool won’t make your team more productive or reduce the time required to perform specific tasks. If there are other issues you are having, maybe we can use our collaborative tools to help.”

I’d rather earn their trust and build a relationship so when I do find a problem that can be solved by our collaborative tools/methodologies, they know I actually understand there issues and am trying to help.

How can you keep group members coming back?

By definition, collaboration is a two-way street. A lot of group admins assume the two-way flow of ideas and content is the responsibility of the users. By asking this question prior to launch, you can model behaviors and pre-set the expectations of the group. How often will the content be updated? What is the expected reply time to questions asked in the forums? If a group admin doesn’t have a clear understanding of posting cadence and service level agreements, users may question the value of the site.

When we launched Jam, we asked technicians to use Forums to ask questions, promising timely responses. Because no SLA was documented, questions took a back seat to other tasks. Once technicians realized it was faster to call another technician or simply start scouring product documentation, they stopped using the site. We lost their trust, and almost instantly our collaborative space became static.

When we proposed a similar solution to another group, we talked expectations and commitments. Group admins committed to answering all questions within one hour. As a result, technicians began to trust the process and actively participate. The tool met the needs of the user group and as a result, the Jam space was successful.

Before you can help team use new tools and transform they way they work, I suggest you take a step back and determine if they are ready to support the transformation and if the shift is appropriate.

Are your learners finding the right content in SAP Jam?

I spent most of last week in Vancouver for product meetings and TELUS team focused sessions. On Day 2 of our Performance Culture sessions, Jocelyn Berard (VP Leadership & Business Solutions International at Global Knowledge) sat with us to talk about leadership and influence.

The session was inspiring, but the big aha moment (or a-ha moment?) for me was a quote he shared from a physician placed in charge of a hospital. When asked what made a physician a good leader, the doctor suggested that before you can lead physicians, you need to prove you actually are a good physician.

The concept of being an expert before becoming a leader is something concerning in today’s world. Technology provides everyone a platform for thought leadership (undoubtedly, sharing ideas and theories helps progress leadership and collaboration at the speed of fiber optics), but it also changed the job description of most HR professionals. We are no longer expected to simply understand benefits and hand out forms; we are essentially tasked with being technology champions (for anyone that’s seem their organization migrate HR process to the cloud, we can commiserate over a drink) and solution architects in addition to any traditional expertise our roles might require.

We are constantly asked to display our knowledge and establish trust with the people we help on a daily basis, and as a result we need to be equal parts visionary and subject matter expert. We are not just asked to teach people about our tools, but how to use them most effectively. In simple terms, if we can’t help people how can we lead them?

Over the last year, my role has switched from big picture visionary to task based efficiency. Truthfully, I’m okay with that. If we are asking employees to change how they work, why they work and also learn how to use tools to help execute on either transformation, as an HR professional, I need to be able to help when questions are asked. At TELUS, three of us are tasked with promoting JAM (our social hub) and collaboration. We’ve spent the last few months creating demos, providing tips and tricks and hoping to show employees how social collaboration can improve business efficiency and drive results.

Over the next few weeks, I’m going to share a few of the tips here. Ideally, people will read these tips and want to share their own. Mine will be focused on JAM, but collaboration is about capabilities, not tools.

Sharing targeted content in Jam

One of the biggest complaints we get from our users is that there is just too much information being shared. The feeds move faster than they can process/digest, and groups become unruly within weeks. You often hear that too much collaboration is a problem that most orgs would love to have, but in reality, too much content is as scary as not enough content for many users.

To help “promote” relevant content, you can use the Featured Content option, but that is a very manual and restrictive process. If you use the Featured Content (or any of the default settings), you cannot feature specific, user generated content over time. Instead, we made the decision to filter content widgets by hashtags. Using the hashtag is an incredibly easy way to promote content that aligns to key corporate objectives or is timely and appropriate (for example, we leveraged the hashtag for our career development process and yearly objectives to coincide with the deadlines for both).

In most cases, your Content widgets will be filtered by type. Whether you chose “Featured”, “Last Updated”, “Most Viewed” or “Most “Liked”, you are basically locking into a singular strategy for content promotion.

You are either leaving the decision to the group admin (featured content) or the voice of the crowd (any of the filters that rely on views or updates). In this example, our Content widget is filtered to display the last five documents (this includes a video, pptx, image file, Jam poll and a wiki page) that were updated within this specific group.

 

Using hashtags allows you filter the content displayed but still leverage the voice of the crowd. You can surface documents based on key topics, but allow update date, likes or even views determine what documents get highest priority. In this example, we want to showcase any content applies to leadership. By adding the hashtag “leadership” to the Content widget, we ensure that only users will only see content that has been tagged appropriately.

To add the leadership hashtag:

1. Click Edit to switch your wiki page into edit mode.
2. Navigate to your Content widget.
3. Click the Edit button.
   
4. Type “leadership” into the Filter by tag text box.
   
5. Click OK.

When the page reloads, you can see that the Content widget now only displays the content that has been tagged.

Instead of five documents, you only see three. Essentially, the group admin has determined what topics are most important to the group, but allowed the group to determine what content is most effective or important.

Hopefully this tip will help you streamline the user generated and social content and provide a more tailored and effective environment for your group collaboration.

If you have any strategies you’d like to share, please leave links or comments.

Fresh start: TELUS Transformation Office

Wow. Yesterday already seems like a distant memory. For most of the last year, I focused on building marketing materials, doing research, creating strategy & recommendation documents and working with pilot customers in preparation for a new role within TELUS. Knowing that as of yesterday we finally moved from planning to reality hasn’t quite sunk in – you know, forest through the trees type of thing – but my work  life has changed completely.

Yesterday, we launched TELUS Transformation Office, a future of work consulting wing within TELUS that aims to help organizations improve corporate culture and improve employee engagement. Ideally, we can take our experience, insights and successes and help other organizations in their own attempt to evolve leadership, digital readiness, career & talent services, and the onboarding experience.

Without question, this is a new type of mentality for us. Learning is a unique space. I honestly believe that there are very few walls between people in this industry. We’re all in the business of helping people, whether it’s internally or externally. We share freely on blogs, wikis, chats, twitter, at conferences and basically in every forum possible. We all have the same, altruistic goal; to make work better for the people we support.

Right now, most of this sharing is done informally and meant to inspire, not transform. By formalizing the process, we hope that organizations can get the traction not only to start the journey, but to continue it. The end goal is too important to have it pushed to the side of the desk or the left to the energy and influence of a few dedicated workers.

I was in a very fortunate position. I loved my job and I love working for TELUS. In terms of Enterprise learning/collaboration and corporate culture, TELUS is pushing the boundaries and changing the conversation. It was no longer a desperate ask of “how can we fix this?” When we talk to anyone about the state of learning, collaboration and culture, they ask “how did you fix it?” It’s no longer theoretical knowledge. Great culture and collaboration is reality at TELUS.

In my (almost) five years at TELUS, we’ve gone from virtually no social technologies and very little cross functional collaboration to an industry recognized success story. We’ve incorporated a leadership model that encourages collaboration and as a result, we’ve deployed new tools and cultivated a workforce that not only understands how to share and leverage technology, but why collaboration is vital to our business and can dramatically improve the customer experience. Simply put, we’ve taken our ideals and moved them from an HR project to a organization-wide vision. The difference is huge.

Basically, in terms of learning, my role was as close to the perfect fit as I’ve come across. I was able to explore tools, work with new people and really try to prove value in the methodologies and capabilities we’ve been preaching for years. We were able to successfully unite leadership, learning and collaboration. That’s probably why the possibility of helping other organizations do the same thing is so exciting. It’s no longer a pipe dream. The need is there, the technology is available and – without sounding like a documentary trailer – the time for change is now.

Society isevolving; it’s harder to get people’s attention and as learning professionals we need to constantly reevaluate our approach. It’s scary, but it’s also exciting. We know that the fundamentals of leadership and learning should be blended with the move to a more technology based ecosphere to help people understand how to succeed and feel connected/supported. We know that people demand more from their job than just a pay cheque and that right now and we know that almost half of the people that go to work each morning aren’t happy. This needs to change and we want to help.

Watch this video to learn more about how we transformed TELUS, and how we can help you.