When Nelson Mandela entered Robben Island Prison he was known for aggressively confronting his enemies. Released 27 years later, Mandela stunned South Africans with his magnanimous behavior toward former adversaries.
Tag Archives: keynote speaker
New Linkage Program Based on Fired Up or Burned Out
Linkage, the global organizational development company, just released a new e-learning program entitled “Fired Up Leadership.” The program features Jason Pankau and me in a 90 minute video format that concludes a Q&A with Linkage Senior Vice President Rich Rosier.
A Test of Google’s Character
I hope Google is considering what I presented at it’s Mountain View, California headquarters last summer as it decides how to respond to the Chinese government’s apparent hacking of Google’s servers to access information on Chinese human rights protestors. If evidence becomes clear that the Chinese government is responsible for the attack, Google’s response will have an significant effect on the firm’s reputation, consumer brand, employer brand and employee engagement. This is a test of Google’s corporate character and whether or not it will live up to its aspiration “don’t be evil” and its belief in supporting a free marketplace of ideas. Human rights abuses and censorship in China are no secret. To be indifferent to China’s actions in this instance, however, is to provide silent assent. What company or leader would want such a legacy?
The Chinese Government-Google showdown reminds me of a line from Elie Wiesel’s profound speech entitled “The Perils of Indifference.” In it, Wiesel states:
“Why did some of America’s largest corporations continue to do business with Hitler’s Germany until 1942? It has been suggested, and it was documented, that the Wehrmacht could not have conducted its invasion of France without oil obtained from American sources. How is one to explain their indifference?”
It would be wise for Google’s leaders to read Wiesel’s speech and consider how history will eventually record their decision. Some decisions reflect inflection points for a firm and for history itself. As historian David McCullough reminds us in the preface to his book Brave Companions,
“…while there are indeed great, often unfathomable forces in history before which even the most exceptional of individuals seem insignificant, the wonder is how often events turn upon a single personality, or the quality we call character.”
This can be said for corporate character too.
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Note: Above is a video of a presentation I gave on leadership, employee engagement, productivity and innovation at Google’s corporate headquarters, the Googleplex, last summer. On this rare occasion, I presented alone. Normally I present with my colleague Jason Pankau because better together. As Jason says, “Mike’s the serious one, I’m the fun one.”
The Indifferent Workplace
Recent research from the Corporate Advisory Board shows that 90 percent of employees are not engaged or their behavior is not aligned with organizational goals. Certainly, the recession and layoffs have contributed to this state of malaise in the workplace. It’s not the only cause, however. Jealousies, personal rivalries, silo behavior, and incivility have also harmed the spirits of people at work. The primary culprit, I believe, is indifference.
The Indifferent Workplace is one where people are so busy attending to tasks that they largely ignore one another. The predominant attitude in the Indifferent Workplace is that work is work and my real life is outside of work. Never shall the two meet. To adopt this mindset is to compartmentalize one’s life. Humanity is relegated to life outside of work. Work is all task. The problem is that life goes on at work too. We spend much of our waking hours at work. Recent neuroscience research shows that the environment we live in affects us down to the gene transcription level. For good or ill, we pass these changes on to our progeny. If our work environment doesn’t have meaning and healthy social interaction where we get to know the people we work with as human beings, rather than always interacting with them as human doings, it has a negative effect on our physical and mental health as well as our performance.
This year, I want you to join me in pushing back the forces of indifference at work. When you pass people in a hallway or see them in an elevator, make eye contact and say hello. Purchase a notebook and write down the names of the people you most frequently come in contact with at work. Periodically ask each person to go to lunch or meet you for coffee. Learn where they were born and grew up, what their interests are outside of work, who they admire and what movies, music and television shows they like and why? Also learn how you can help them. Write what you learn about them in your notebook and it will help you remember. If they are facing a difficult time in life, reach out to help or encourage them in some way. Send them a note or do something to delight them. One of my favorites is a gift card to Starbucks or something fun like a package of Ben and Jerry’s ice creams ordered through www.icecreamsource.com (they arrive in a box with dry ice).
As human beings the busyness of life can make us drift toward indifference. For that reason, we must be intentional about valuing people and fighting the creeping forces of indifference. Left unopposed, indifference breeds dehumanization, incivility and violence. Finally, I encourage you to read or listen to Holocaust survivor and Nobel Laureate Elie Wiesel’s speech “The Perils of Indifference.” It provides insight about indifference from one who has witnessed it at its extreme, felt it’s sting and thoughtfully reflected on its nature and dangers.
Culture, Not Who Pays, Is Real Problem in Healthcare
The New York Times columnist David Brooks just came out with his Sidney Awards for the best magazine essays in 2009. I always read them because Brooks is among the very best writers/thinkers in journalism today. One of the award winners is “The Cost Conundrum” by Atul Gwande, the surgeon, author and MacArthur genius award recipient. Brooks describes Gwande’s essay as the most influential essay written this year. I highly recommend that you take the time to read it.
What I found especially interesting in Gwande’s essay is that he concludes that culture — or more specifically, the values of doctors — is at the heart of America’s heathcare cost crisis rather than who pays the costs. Gwande takes us to McAllen, Texas where in 2006, Medicare spent nearly $15,000 per enrollee, twice the national average, but achieved no better than average quality of care. Like a good investigative reporter he roots out the truth by conducting qualitative interviews and looking into quantitative data. He discovers that the average doctor in McAllen orders more procedures than the average doctor in America. Upon further investigation he learns that in towns like McAllen it’s a handful of doctors who drive up the cost per patient by ordering unnecessary procedures. He explains how these doctors benefit financially from ordering unnecessary procedures. The financial benefits come in the form kickbacks to admit patients to hospitals and revenue to partnerships of physicians who own diagnostic equipment such as MRI and CT-scans. He sums it up this way:
“When you look across the spectrum from Grand Junction to McAllen–and the almost threefold difference in the cost of care–you come to realize that we are witnessing a battle for the soul of American medicine. Somewhere in the United States at this moment, a patient with chest pain, or a tumor, or a cough is seeing a doctor. And the damning question we have to ask is whether the doctor is set up to meet the needs of the patient, first and foremost, or to maximize revenue.”
In some ways, this is a matter of identity.
Connecting Up: Our Need for Transcendence
What do many scientists at NASA and engineers at Google have in common with a doorman at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC)? The answer: they are fired up about the importance of their work and have a passion and energy that drives them to be a force for the cause. Employees at NASA are fired up that they are exploring space. Google employees are fired up because they are organizing information and making it accessible to the world. I learned this when I met employees at NASA and Google. I spoke at both organizations earlier this year.
The doorman I refer to at MSKCC is named Nick. When my wife Katie and I were walking down 53rd street in NYC in 2004 and we got within eyesight of the MSKCC entrance, Nick locked his eyes on her and greeted her like a returning friend. This in in Mid-town Manhattan where no one makes eye contact! Nick knows cancer patients when he sees them, probably from the wigs they wear. It felt like the healing began within eyesight of MSKCC.
Katie was at MSKCC for high dosage chemo treatments she needed to treat advanced ovarian cancer. Late last year her oncologist told her it that given favorable test results and five years in remission it was unlikely she would have a recurrence. Words can’t express how overjoyed we were to hear that news. When we told Nick, he gave Katie a big hug and said how proud he was that she persevered. We learned that Nick was a cancer survivor too and he attributed his survival to the treatments he received at MSKCC. Is it any wonder then that this man is so passionate about his work at MSKCC. You have to see Nick to believe it and you can if you stop by MSKCC’s entrance on 53rd Street across the street from the Citigroup building. He’s a big guy with a dar complexion and blue eyes. Tell Nick you read about him. Don’t worry that it may seem strange. Former cancer patients and their family members regularly stop by to say hello to Nick. That’s how beloved he is.
Nick’s example shows that people are fired up if their work reflects the eternal values of the transcendent: truth, beauty and goodness. MSKCC’s work reflects goodness and is expressed in it’s tagline “The Best Cancer Care, Anywhere.” Apple’s passion for the aesthetic design and ease of use of its products reflects beauty. Work in the fields of journalism, research, theology and the academy reflect truth-seeking.
Truth, beauty and goodness are eternal values that reflect transcendence. Human beings need the truth, beauty and goodness of transcendence to meet our need for meaning in life. If you can find time over the holidays, reflect on the need for the transcendent values of truth, beauty and goodness in your own life. Below are links to some of my favorite essays, speeches and articles that touch on transcendence. Let me encourage you to print them out, read them and consider their relevance to your life and the lives of those you love.
‘Tis the Season
This morning I was a guest on Jim Blasingame’s nationally syndicated radio show “The Small Business Advocate.” You can hear the interview by clicking on the “listen now” button above. On Jim’s program, we talked about how a company interacts with its customers is becoming more important to competitive differentiation. I believe the past century was about achieving task excellence but the century ahead will be about developing relationship excellence in organizations, including strong relationships with and among an organization’s customers (more on that later).
At the heart of relationships is “the force of connection.” If ever there is a time to connect with people, it is now during the holiday season. I say this for my own benefit too. I’m an achieve-aholic who compulsively lists things I must do and who derives pleasure from crossing items off my list. Attending to the tasks in my life — writing articles, speaking, blogging, teaching workshops, making calls, meeting with people, reading articles and books, checking my email and iPhone (now with 100,000+ apps), etc., etc., etc. — develops an addictive rhythm.
Tomorrow afternoon when my daughter Sarah arrives home after completing her first semester in college at TCU, I want to break free of the rhythm of tasks and spend time with her, my daughter Elizabeth and Katie, my wife. My hope is that I can be present with them and not be seduced by the allure of thinking about my next article, speech, blog post, etc.
Katie talks about “making memories.” That should be the priority of this season. Being together. Doing memorable things together. Connecting with those we love.
That said, I want to wish you happy holidays. May the time you have this holiday season be well spent.
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Michael Lee Stallard speaks, teaches and writes about leadership, employee engagement, productivity and innovation at leading organizations including Google, GE, NASA, Lockheed Martin, General Dynamics and the Darden Graduate School of Business at the University of Virginia. Most recently, Michael and his colleague Jason Pankau filmed a 90-minute program for Linkage that will be released in January of 2010. Michael wrote the guest editorial for Talent Management magazine’s January 2010 edition and last month his article on how the force of connection boosts productivity and innovation was featured as the lead article in the UK’s Developing HR Strategy Journal. Google just posted on YouTube a talk Michael gave at Google earlier this year. Click on these links to learn more about Michael and Jason in the media and their speaking engagements.
Leading with the Power of Community
Do you ever wonder how past leaders could have missed what seems so obvious in hindsight? Sadly, most leaders live in an environment that makes them vulnerable to managerial failure. The problem lies in a little-recognized reality of leadership: isolation.
Leading can be lonely. Typically leaders have few, if any, high-trust relationships at work. Because leaders have the power to make or break the careers of those around them, people are afraid to be honest with them and challenge their thinking. Likewise, too often leaders are reluctant to let their guard down out of fear of losing the respect of their colleagues.
HR: Order Takers or Game Changers?
The best HR leaders are game changers. They develop conviction about what constitutes a high-performance work culture. They are a force that helps develop the values and processes necessary to make a high-performance work culture come to life. The departments they run are NOT staffed with the type of order-takers Keith Hammonds described in his wildly popular Fast Company article entitled “Why We Hate HR.”
I recently wrote an article that describes a game changing strategy HR leaders should consider in light of today’s widespread employee disengagement. The article was just published as the lead article in the UK’s Developing HR Strategy journal. It’s entitled, “The Force of Connection: Boost Employee Engagement, Productivity and Innovation.” You can download it at this link.
Think Tank to Stimulate New Ideas About Human Capital
The Forum for People Performance Management and Measurement announced its annual Think Tank. Here is the press release on the event:
Think Tank to Stimulate New Ideas about Human Capital
FORUM’s Oct. 14 ‘Who’s In Charge Now?’ event features
author, CEO Michael Lee Stallard
August 18, 2009 NAPERVILLE, Ill. – Today’s economy requires businesses to pay ever-closer attention to the value that people bring to their organizations and their role in the human value connection that bonds companies to their employees and customers. The Forum for People Performance Management and Measurement offers business leaders an opportunity to explore these issues and find solutions at its second Think Tank symposium titled, Who’s in Charge Now? Thriving in an Employee Led Economy, on Wed., Oct. 14, 2009 at the Union League Club of Chicago.
“The 2009 Think Tank is designed to provide education and insight on how people performance strategies can have a positive impact on their organization, and to create a networking opportunity for individuals who have a shared commitment to strategies that support people in the workplace,” said FORUM President Michelle M. Smith, CPIM, CRP. The target audience for this year’s event includes both high-level corporate executives and a broad panel of academic researchers specializing in people performance issues.
Smith noted that the FORUM has signed a dynamic expert in management-employee relations, Michael Lee Stallard, as its “Think Tank” keynote speaker. Stallard is co-founder, president and CEO of E Pluribus Partners, a consulting firm that specializes in helping leaders create “Connection Cultures” to form strong bonds among the management, employees, and customers of an organization. Clients have included Wachovia, Lockheed Martin, and UBS.
In addition, Stallard is the primary author of the book Fired Up or Burned Out, and contributing author of the book What Managers Say, What Employees Hear. Stallard is former chief marketing officer for businesses at Morgan Stanley and Charles Schwab. For more on Stallard, visit his web site at http://www.michaelleestallard.com
A key feature of the conference is that participants will have ample opportunity to discuss the topics most important to them with peers, as well as with academic and people performance experts.
The event includes a reception on the evening of Oct. 13. Registration fees are $250 for corporate participants and $150 for academic/student participants. For more information on the FORUM Think Tank, call (630) 369-7780 or visit http://performanceforum.org/Think-Tank.97.0.html
The Forum for People Performance Management and Measurement (www.performanceforum.org) is a research center within the Medill Integrated Marketing Communications (IMC) graduate program at Northwestern University. A central objective of the Forum is to develop and disseminate knowledge about communications, motivation and management so that businesses can better design, implement and manage people-based initiatives for inside and outside an organization.
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Forum for People Performance Management and Measurement
1601 N. Bond Street, Suite 303
Naperville, IL 60563
630.369.7780