Newsletter Archive

Recently one of my clients introduced a 360 Review to their leadership team coupled with a six month Topgrading Evaluation.  The latter process involves using the same Job Summary Scorecard used to hire someone for the position to evaluate the performance of the current position holder.  It’s great because it serves two purposes and allows you to evaluate how the person is performing against your “A” standards you’ve previously setup.  The 360 is a look inside those people who should know you the best in your management position.  It asks to score you on several leadership and management qualities so you can get their view of your capabilities.  If you have not done a 360 on your leadership team or yourself, I’d encourage you to do so.  Here’s why: 

Each Leadership team member including the CEO was reviewed by the staff in the following ten areas:  Leadership, Planning & Managing Achievement, Flexibility, Collaboration, Innovation, Risk Management, Organizational Sensitivity, Strategic Thinking, Managing Customers, Networking, and Personal Impact.  Grade levels were on a scale of 1 through 7, with the bottom level extremely poor and the top level excellent.  There were also categories for Not Applicable, and Don’t Know, in case the evaluator had not had an experience with the person or simply had no context to grade them. 

Participants were also asked to comment on three questions:

What are this Manager's Strengths?

What are this Manager's Weaknesses?

What Steps does this Manager need to take to increase his or her skills as a Manager?

I must warn you that the process of reviewing the 360’s as well as the Topgrading Evaluation is time consuming.  To perform both required a minimum of 90 minutes with each process.  In some cases the participant required longer as we dove into some aspects that required more attention seeking to solve some deep rooted issues. 

Only if your business and your leadership team is truly committed to growth and self-improvement should you decide to undertake this. Only a business that is truly committed to its people would invest the time to complete this arduous yet rewarding engagement.

A link was set up to allow everyone to provide their score anonymously.   Once the results were received the outcome is provided to the leadership team member ahead of their meeting.  My customer did the meetings in tandem with the CEO and I providing observations and input along with taking notes from the meeting.  The first step is to review the grades and determine the validity of the scores from the individual’s perspective.  It is one thing to hear an employee you’re supervising make a comment, it’s quite another to see the results of them scoring you on these leadership skills and have several others agree.  That includes positive and negative results.

Are your people truly interested in improving their performance and ability to manage and lead?  I can tell you each of the leadership team members I sat in on were excited to get this feedback.  They truly are invested in their future.  They were eager to see the results and willing to discover where they can improve their leadership styles.

We’ve discussed the idea of Priority, The One Thing focus that we emphasize with our customers in coaching them to grow. The same target is ideal for growth and improvement generated from the results of the 360 reviews. 

While there are arguments and discussions about some of the results, at least in our meetings there was always agreement from the leadership member on some aspect where they could improve.  The key is developing a plan to initiate and make that change occur.

The 360 Action Plan is precisely for this.  It asks the individual to assess the results, brainstorm ideas for correcting or improving a behavior, discover obstacles and support for making the improvement, and then to take specific steps to achieve the desired change.  It asks for whom you will have support you, how you might reward yourself for achieving the desired result and finally a commitment statement as to what you wish to achieve. The emphasis here is on focusing to improve or change one thing. 

Most importantly this isn’t intended to be a canvas of commitments and changes, rather a focus on one change, one improvement, one acknowledged area that you, your team members you supervise, and your peers agree that would make a difference in the quality of your leadership ability.  One Thing is the priority.

Most people will want to change multiple elements.  I urge you to suppress their ambition for doing this.  More progress will be made focusing on one change or performance improving skill set than by selecting more.  Indeed it’s likely that other scores will improve by simply improving one area.

If you’re looking for questions to ask in a 360 you can ask Positioning Systems for help or search the web or articles like Sample Questions for 360 Reviews.  It’s important to ask the right questions, yet without a dedicated desire to improve and an action plan to follow the possibility of achieving any results from this exhausting exercise will be precious little.  Furthermore without an impact from this the likelihood of those who participated enthusiastically responding again greatly diminishes.

If you’re going to launch this process you should do so with the commitment from the people being reviewed that they intend to utilize the results and make measureable improvements in their behavior and skills from the feedback received.  Otherwise the gains from this will be negligible now and for the future.

Do you have a leadership team that is sincerely committed to improving?  Are you looking for a tool that provides feedback to expose and discover aspects of leadership and management that will help them improve their performance?  Consider the 360 Review/Feedback.

It’s too early to tell the outcome from these initial meetings but judging by the tenor and tone of the meetings, plus the degree of commitment I felt from these leadership team members, I’ll be very surprised if this leadership team doesn’t take a dramatic step forward in their performance and ability to lead their teams.

You can download an example of the 360 in Action to provide your team with a way to take action on their results.  Ask Positioning Systems if you’d like help initiating this growth exercise tool in your business.  

Question:  When choosing a business coach, what would you suggest are the most important characteristics to look for?

Answer:   There are a number of answers to this question from authorities and sources if you Google this question on the web.  Please allow me to share a story with you to offer what I feel is your most important consideration.

Imagine that you’re a high school basketball player. You’ve completed your freshman season.  It’s been a disappointing season since you were accustomed to winning.  Your team finished with just 6 wins and 12 losses.  You averaged 8 points a game and are the team’s second leading scorer.  The varsity team at your school failed to win a game, prolonging  a consecutive game losing streak that has now extended past 30 games.  The varsity coach invites players to continue to scrimmage after the season and you’re more than happy to continue playing.  You love basketball and want to improve.  In fact immediately after the last game in your disappointing season you recommitted to a promise you’d made to practice a minimum of an hour each day.

The new coach has a plan for the next season.  He begins to push his agenda immediately.  In these scrimmage sessions each evening after school as you and your teammates practice he preaches, shouts and scolds the team to “Pound the ball inside”  “Get the ball down low”  “Go to the hole”  “Drive when you get it down there!”    He’s adamant that his team will get the ball inside to his 6’4” center.  Each evening over and over he repeats his message.  He’s building his approach around one player, the center. He believes this person has the commitment, dedication and ability to turn the high school program around.

Your sophomore season is worse than the freshman season in terms of wins.  As a starter on the varsity your team wins just two games, but it breaks the better than two year victory drought that the team had slumbered through.  Your point production improves to 16 points a game.  That’s because the center the coach wanted to pound the ball into is you.  The team shows dramatic improvement in your junior season improving to 12 wins and 7 loses.  You lead the team and the entire conference in scoring – 24 points a game. 

Your coach leaves after your junior high school season, but his work has set the foundation for a turnaround in the team and your personal fortunes.  As a senior you again average more than 24 points a game and the team wins 16 games and loses only 5. 

My high school coach was named Gene Wick.  While his name is the same as mine he was not my father.  My father never played basketball and would have had no interest in the game had not I played it.  Yet this man, Gene Wick, had possibly as much influence on my life as my father did.  Why?  Because he believed in me! 

At the core of your decision to choose a coach is that coach’s belief in you.  That means that they must know the powerful influence that someone can have in the life of another.  They must recognize that believing in you and what you are capable of can profoundly influence your ability to achieve your dreams.  The example provided from my own life isn’t an isolated incident of people who have had deep affect on my life.  A sales manager, college teacher, my wife, brother and family members have all impacted my life by their faith and confidence in me. 

You would be a rare person to have not been influenced significantly by someone in your lifetime.  The insight here is that if you plan to hire a coach, it is critical that you find someone who will believe in you. 

That doesn’t mean that they shouldn’t also remain objective and be able to criticize you, because among the other critical elements I feel are important in coaching are discipline, accountability, assertiveness, asking questions, and experience. 

 A coach’s bottom line requirement is the ability to keep you accountable for your commitments. They need to ask questions to discover what you know and how you feel.  They are best if they help you discover the answers within you because then you will respond best to your own enlightenment.  In many cases they will help you uncover what you already know, you just forgot it somewhere in the deep recesses of your mind and heart. 

The final piece of the puzzle is the last element in our Gazelles 4-3-2-1 formula.  The 1 in the formula is: A coach is a catalyst.  Their work should catapult you to greatness, to achieve your potential.   They must stick with you through thick and thin and believe in you even when you’ve lost faith and find it difficult to do so yourself.  They need to kick your butt and pad your fanny when you need it most.

Having been a sales manager, general manager, owner and sales person, among other titles in my career I know of no other source that can stimulate higher achievement than a mentor, coach, or friend who believes in you and your capabilities.

The ability to look into our souls, to be able to love and believe in us despite the faults that we are all too familiar with, in my personal opinion, is the critical element to selecting a coach who can vault your performance to the pinnacle of achievement.

It is an honor to work with my clients.  It’s become second nature for me to believe in them and what they can achieve.   I sincerely hope that I will have the privilege to work with you someday.  If not, it is my sincerest wish that you discover someone who is capable of help to make your dreams come to fruition.   May you find as I have the best coach in the world.