View From The Front

My personal LeanIn story

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"You're not working properly unless someone is bleeding - probably you"

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The communication funnel

If you've ever played the whispering game when you were young, you know how messages can get distorted when they are passed from person to person. Some people wouldn't hear the message correctly and guessed what it should be, some sabotaged the game and passed on a totally different message and some would honestly pass on what the exact same message they heard. The same can be said about communication in a company. The past weeks I've been talking about 3 things. First we need to be focused on our core business meaning we need to de-prioritize other areas and stated what these were, secondly we need to grow our top line revenue meaning that we need everyone focused on sales and what that means and thirdly that we need to get information flowing upwards and downwards to ensure that the management team can pay attention to the right problems and that everyone in the company knows what our strategy is and how we are executing it. Three things. Written on whiteboards, in power points, by phone, by video, by lync. It wasn't a complicated message and I couldn't understand after a month of talking about this why the message wasn't sinking in. Until I realised that in communication there is a sender and a receiver. I thought my job was done when I "sent" the message, forgetting that I needed to make sure it was received and understood. I needed to talk about these three priorities but make sure that it was talked about in the context of the receivers job and how this would impact them. The last week I talked to over half our companies employees, using the same message but making it more clear how this would impact them and what they could do to in their roles. Today I got a mail from an employee in Netherlands where she specified three specific areas where we could improve our order management system thereby being able to reallocate a back office head count to sales - and I knew that I still had a lot of people to talk with, but my message was starting to be understood.

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End of week 3 reflection

At the end of the week, I usually think about everything I didn't get done and that my "to do" list seems to have doubled since Monday. Now that it if Friday afternoon, I thought it was about time I break this bad habit and rather focus on what I did get done this week - so here goes:

1. From idea, to white board to plans on paper

An organizational idea which had formed in my head from my talks with my new team the past weeks, was crystalised on the whiteboard in our management meeting, then put into a coherent presentation on paper (or rather powerpoint). This gave the idea a better chance of survival and a way to work on next steps for realization. Interestingly enough, getting the idea on the whiteboard and getting feedback, gave it new angles and buy in from more people, while getting it on paper made it more robust. 

2. Being visible

After taking on a larger role, I moved out of my office and into an open office space. Now I sit with sales, hear about sales all day and am able to get first hand knowledge of what and how they sell, and it lets me be more visible and approachable to them. I  presented at our companywide meeting our current sales initiatives, met with the development team regarding an upcoming product release and even managed to eat in the canteen twice this week. Being a person who likes to eat at my desk and work in an office - I want to continue this trend.

3. Asking why

A previous manager used to quote Einstein and say that the definition of insanity was doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. The question I posed myself and my team, was if we were to start this company today - how would we organise and run it? That led to the whiteboard exercise mentioned in point 1 and some very interesting questions we had never asked outselves. Why are we in these markets? Why are we not more centralised? Why are roles defined by people and not by company needs? 

So three good accomplishments this week and none of them were actually on my "to do" list on Monday. I guess that leads me to believe that "to do" lists are good for tasks, but that the real work lies in the listening, sharing and asking the right questions.

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@urpurposecoach from Instagram

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Not getting what you want but what you need

Amoung my many new tasks, one exciting task is to present at our board meetings. We are owned by a PE company , making our meetings very much numbers and fact focused. No market or sales pitches here please.

So yesterday I was to prepare a mundane presentation of a new governance structure. I could do this two ways. One - to prepare what they asked for, two - to present what they need. What the board really needs, is not a short term solution, but a view of what the company will look like in 2 years organization wise and how we aim to get there. And yet they were micro managing by wanting today’s setup.

I presented a draft proposal today and was told this was exactly what was needed. This way I could show them a picture of the future, how we can set ourselves up to succeed, get them to agree on this and then present the investments needed to get there (see previous post about getting our systems into the 21st century).

Lesson learned today is to deliver above and beyond.

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When good things go wrong

2weeks and 3 countries ago, I am more perplexed than ever how our company managed to get itself into this situation. I keep wondering if the millions of small businesses in Europe are managed in the same way ours has been.

Looking back 10-15 years, ours was a very successful IT business with a great product. Along the way however, there was a lack or rather constant change of vision, which led us fast into the situation we are now - which to say it mildly - it ain’t good.

We have now defined where we are headed, sold off non core parts of the company and made investments to update our portfolio. But is it a little too late? And what about important investments we need to make but can’t afford now - like a working CRM system, or a financial dashboard or a licenses generator. We are currently running our business on excel and sticky tape which isn’t making my job more easy. How do you ask someone to be more proactive in customer outreach when she doesn’t know which customer to call. Or how can we ask someone to give an accurate weekly forecast, when we are using excel and all numbers need to be manually entered. How can we control live licenses and know who our active customers are when none of our systems talk to each other and the only guy who knows how to check is on paternity leave. How can a company allow itself to not invest in the fundamentals? I don’t know the answer to that, but I know that my top priority will be to bring us into the 21 st century way of doing business and get those basics right - right now.

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Not having all the answers, but still being OK

Day 1 in my new job and I got asked lots of questions I had absolutely no answers to. Despite being someone who likes to have control and likes to plan for any eventuality, there was no way I was prepared for reasonable, but blindsiding questions to problems I had never heard of before.

Can I hire a temp who has been with us for three years - his contract expires tomorrow? How can I enter a new product bundle in our ordering system without screwing up our new billing system? Why do you keep on asking for the same reports that xx asks for when you're on the same team? 3 of the 50 questions I got today.

A few years ago I would've answered as best as I could, right then and there. But I've found out that it is not so much the answers, but engaging in a conversation about the reason behind the questions that creates the real value. Or as a fave previous manager used to say - practice the art of precision questioning .

Why have we had temp for 3 years - oh it's common practice and we always have a rotating temp staff on these contracts. Fine. Why are we worried about screwing up our billing system - we don't have a clear process so I am always unsure how to do this - not good, let's get that process in place ASAP. Why are different people asking for the same reports - seems like we need a depository and structure for reports, let's get that fixed.

So even if I couldn't answer the primary question, we could together find the root cause and fix the issue there. Now I only have 47 other questions to left to figure out tomorrow.

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#notifbutwhen

"It’s not a question of if, it’s a question of when". My manager told me this a few years ago when I applied for a leading position in our company. I was told I needed some more relevant experience and management exposure and the job went to someone else.

I saw the truth in his words, but felt that the experience and training needed to come from somewhere else. I subsequently left the company I had been with for 14 years.

So, 4 years later I was happy with a management job I was comfortable with, but the “not if but when” words kept ringing in my mind. After an unexpected change in current management I felt my “when” had arrived. I talked to our company chairman ( yes we are one of the millions of SMBs in Europe so talking to the top is easy) and told him my ideas for improvement for the company using every sales tool I had in my repertoire and then boldly said I wanted to take on more responsibility and be the company COO.

I felt nauseous going home in the afternoon. I had just asked for a 60 hour work week, travel, stress and a leap into the unknown. But at the same time I was immensely proud of getting this job and proud of myself for “leaning in”.

This is my view from the front - my journey as COO. Day 1 is today.

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Do one thing everyday that scares you

Eleanor Roosevelt