Posted in Conference, Short Stories, tagged SHRM on July 1, 2009| Leave a Comment »
Dancers at Mufaleta's
Went out for dinner – needed to get some local flavor and color. Mufaleta’s is a restaurant and dance hall that has a cajun band. Was fortunate to get a table near the dance floor and watch a couple who had to be in their ’60s steping out and doing smooth, elegant cajun dancing. I hid the Blackberry and got some photos that I am very happy with – the shots captured the feel.
Dancers
Dancers in a blur
Posted in Conference, Economy, Finance, Human Capital, Strategy, tagged Employee engagement, employee retention, LEAN Human Resources, Performance Management, productivity, Talent shortage on July 1, 2009| 1 Comment »
Got the computer working. Sorry about the gap. Back to some tidbits from David Kotter’s session.
Overall, this was the best general session of the conference because it came down from 35,000 feet and actually gave tactical advice that I could use.
Kotter also did some very basic, useful things from a media standpoint. He did not use powerpoint, he used a sketch pad, a sharpie, and had the image put up on a screen. Kind of a high tech overhead projector. I have seen professors doing this in college, and Edward DeBono did it in a presentation that I saw. I like it from an adult learning perspective.
He also illustrated one of his basic points – that people are very creative if the environment is right – with videos of first person interviews. The one that had a sewer cleaner narrating how he had personalized his truck and equipment was a refreshing reminder of the creative spirit of the American worker.
Overhead projector with a modern touch
Back to the content. He made the point that a key executive skill is getting traction for systemic change, and that there is a basic pattern for making it happen.
It starts with that poorly-defined but muched talked about ingredient – Leadership.
“Leadership is very much associated with vision. It’s very market oriented, very rational. It’s very much associated with getting people to really, deeply buy in to this, get aligned and work together, going in the same direction to solve problems. It’s also about getting employees pumped up, empowered, motivated, inspired to make shifts happen.”
Then he talked about urgency. He said that most orgnizations clearly aren’t feeling a strong sense of urgency to act when it comes to addressing the impact of our current situation. This lack of urgency directly relates to the change management challenges we are all facing.
Begin with increasing a sense of urgency. It helps shake things up and make things happen
Once this is accomplished, employers need to push for positive change, working to achieve some short term wins that will help make the changes stick.
Companies must create systems that managers can both manage and adapt, allowing positive changes to be triggered and implemented at the front lines of customer service. This is where fear can keep leadership from seeing potential opportunities and, therefore, squelch a sense of urgency to act. This inaction is the barrier to change.
Combine or alternate this fear with compacency, and things get gridlocked.
“Complacency is when you get a collective group that thinks what it is doing is just fine. Take Washington DC, for example. Do you think the two parties are behaving with you in a fundamentally different way than they did five years ago? Do you think the administration is staffing people with a process that is different than any other administration? It’s the same. The same. The same.”
Kotter urged attendees to avoid the frentetic activity that leaves people emotionally drained and burned out. “These problems with our serious economic conditions are hurting a whole lot of people, especially the most vulnerable in our society. This is unacceptable – and also unnecessary.”
I guess what I liked about his approach is that it resonated with the chaos and burnout that I am seeing in modern organizations, and was willing to have the competing issues of complacency and chaos on the same page.
Overall, turn up the urgency, and have a concice plan for change. Then you will be developing the environment andoffering the tools to get some change done.
Kotter's list of 8 steps
Posted in Uncategorized on July 1, 2009| Leave a Comment »
New Orlans really matters. What a place apart from the rest of the US, and an important part of our melting pot. Taken last night.
A streetcar named Canal St.
Posted in Uncategorized on July 1, 2009| Leave a Comment »
Some old friends were here.
Mike Losey looked good, but he said this was the first real event he had attended since the death of his wife. He is consulting on HR issues out of his home. Mike came to our state conference years ago, and is the visionary president that grew SHRM from medium size to large over many years.
Mike shakes hands with a regional director.
Spent several hours with Keith Greene. He made a presentation on “HR Trends”, and made the rounds wishing all of his old friends at SHRM well. He is the VP of Membership at Boardsource, a support association for organizational governance. He loves his job, and is happy to still have a hand in HR. He was very happy to have been en Evansville for a speech earlier this year, and says hi to all of his friends.
He looks good and sounds great!
Keith Greene, man on the move
Posted in Uncategorized on July 1, 2009| Leave a Comment »
This was an interesting session, discussing leadership, vision, HR and implementing large-scale organizational change in these turbulent times. He also said that our country’s sense of urgency was not nearly what it should be for the times we live in.
Kotter said there were eight steps to organizational change, beginning with increasing a sense of urgency among people to shake things up and make things happen. More to come when I recharge my battery.
8 steps, not 12
Posted in Short Stories, tagged SHRM on July 1, 2009| Leave a Comment »
Three words.
Cheryl. Crow. Rocks.
three more…
Front. Row. Seats.
Every now and then, a musical event is a blast. This was one.
Rock
More shots
Concert fun
\Rock being interpreted for the deaf…only at SHRM
Signing rock
Posted in Conference, Human Capital, LEAN Methods, Performance Management, Strategy, tagged High performance, LEAN Human Resources, marketing, productivity, SHRM on July 1, 2009| Leave a Comment »
Coming off as a kind of cranky, rumpled professor, John Kotter presented a general session that looked at economics and our nation’s sense of urgency. Acutally, he is a cranky, rumpled professor at Harvard Business School. Details to follow – but the big deal to me was that he didn’t use Powerpoint – he was using overhead projector technology and I found it very refreshing.
Karl Ahlrichs' Uncommon Experience 