Being a change-maker

"I always wonder why people do not understand what is good for them". The phrase is a common one.

Many of us have surely read books on culture and knowledge sharing, but find it difficult to implement the theories in practice. It is difficult and rightly so. Culture is about people and handling people is difficult, much because we are individuals with a different viewpoint, background and desire. These three elements may seem obvious, but why is it then so often forgotten?

Viewpoint
People involved in different work have different viewpoints, they see issues related to their context. How can I have any use of this in my work or situation.

Background
Often people that work together have different background and experiences. They might have had different work-experience or even a totally different upbringing.

Desire
Most people have an idea of how they would like to work or how their work should be performed and organised. Many feel that they do not want anything to change because they are comfortable with the way things are now.


In my daily life I find these three elements important to think of when handling with people. When trying to change something in your workplace, these elements will help you getting started on the positive side.
If you know the viewpoint, background and desire of a person which is involved in a change process, they will help you to find a way to influence this person positively. Apply to the desire by highlighting the benefits that can fulfill the desire. Use models, images or stories that can be related to their background so the person can identify with it. And use examples that is directly connected to their viewpoint.

There is of course a lot more to be said on this subject, but could bee a good starting point for creating ownership for the change-process in the individual.

Management Style

My previous post about Team Learning put requirements on the management. How can one manage people that know the job better than you or even work in their own way.

Management style is often influenced by organisational structure and reflects in what way the workers are coordinated. On the note of managing people Drucker (1999) mentions “that one does not ’manage’ people, but the task is to lead people.” And the goal is to make the specific strengths and knowledge productive of each individual. The more skilled and proficient a worker is in his work, the harder it is to manage this activity according to traditional management methods. A direct supervision approach requires that the supervisor have more knowledge or is more skilled than the worker to be able to know what the worker is supposed to be doing to get the wanted result. Due to the mentioned change towards more knowledge work in organisations today, Drucker claim that one does not need supervisors(13), but a leader –or put in terms of today- a coach(14).

Both Drucker (1999) and Wenger (2004) describes that their view of knowledge management begins with managing oneself as a knowledge worker. Take an active role towards your own learning and increase of knowledge. Peter Senge (1992) sees managing oneself as personal mastery, and by this meaning to developing one’s own proficiency. “Personal mastery is likened to be a lifelong journey with no ultimate destination.” He tells us that such a journey consists of processes whereby “a person continually clarifies and deepens personal vision, focuses energy on it, develops patience in seeking it, and in this way apparently increasingly views reality objectively.” This ownership and involvement leads people to do positive things towards achieving personal vision. Further personal vision is described as a calling of intrinsic desires, not a purpose to pursue. Senge claims as result, “People hold a sacred view of work because work now is valued for itself, rather than posing a chore that needs to be done as a means to some other end.“

People with high personal mastery “tend to be committed and exude initiative, have a broader and deeper sense of responsibility” in their work, and as Senge claims of key importance, they learn faster. This gives strength to the belief that answers to organisational inefficiencies lies not only in technology. Technology has often been seen as solution to efficiency and automation of traditional repetitive tasks. Furthermore information technology has enabled new ways of communicating and changed many of the traditional crafts and professions.

*13: Mintzberg (1983) claim that direct supervision requires close personal contact between manager and the worker, with the result that there is some limit to the number workers any one manager can supervise.
*14: Coaching has been used in sports and has become increasingly used as a management style in business the recent years. More on coaching see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coaching

Motivating Workers

I've always ponder around how to motivate people. To me it seems there are a few guidelines in general, but as with much else you need to tweak it to fit with your context. Kathy Sierra wrote a few interesting lines on passion for work here. And when reading it I found a few other blogs that where interesting. One of them being David Maisters blog and another being Christopher Marstons blog, both giving good ideas on how to "manage" people. They are all well worth a look!

Team Learning

The previous post trigged a wish to share some excerpts from my master thesis with you!

In many organisations today, people are organised in groups to perform specific task. These groups are often called teams. The team can contain knowledge workers that acquire, generate and share knowledge. They work and learn together. Senge (1992) calls this team learning. Flood (1999) claims that often the aim of team learning is to achieve alignment in people’s thoughts and energies. This brings us back to the notion of mental models and that the mentioned alignment in thought is a shared mental model, or at least a similar mental model with common elements or schemata. If we have people that work with the same tasks within a similar context it could be that they have in some sense similar mental models regarding the task, thus a common understanding (Senge, 1992). Davenport and Prusak (1998) mention that without a common understanding of terms, knowledge sharing might not occur. Sometimes multiple and contradictory meanings for fundamental terms exists in many organisations and create barriers to consolidate information and knowledge. In support of this, Senge (1992) claims that discussion and dialogue are the most important practises in a team. He argues that discussion and dialogue are necessary counterparts in a quest for consensus. This consensus can be seen as alignment in the mental models between the knowledge workers.

Davenport and Prusak (1998) notes that the traditional management attitude is “Stop talking and get to work!”, while the advice to a knowledge worker should be “Start talking and get to work!”. This communication and alignment in energy and thought can result in what some organisations call best practices, where people learn from each-others’ success. The sharing does not only occur within the group, but it also influences other groups in the organisation, meaning the groups are not disclosed to influence from the outside. Team learning and knowledge sharing within a team enables us to act with today’s knowledge instead.

Another perspective posed along the same lines is to understand tacit knowledge sharing in a team, as people “following rules by being members of communities, with the disposition to reciprocally adjust our use of signs to that of the rest of the community” (Gerrans, 2005). This means that a community has its own rules and we act accordingly.

Interesting Answers

I have been quite busy at work the last week, but I did ask some questions..

And it seems that most questions can be asked without starting any problems for yourself or put you in a bad position. At least that was my experience during last week at work. The question opens for a dialog and create social relations between the people involved. I asked the questions because I where interested in the answers. This dialog has showed me perspectives from another part of the organisation and it has even influenced that part of the organisation to think a little different (at least it feels that way). A difference in perspective is natural, but with dialog we are able to direct the perspectives and the mental model of both parts involved towards a common one or something you can call an agreement. Or at the very least an understanding of each others viewpoints.

It reminds me of a motto I have: "If you do not tell the person what you think is wrong, how can that person do anything about it?" This meaning that if a person is not aware of his "wrong" behaviour, it will stay that way for a long time. If we have a dialog and talk about the issue we might both gain an understanding of why this behaviour is wrong. It might also be that it is right for him and wrong for you, but from knowing his perspective you can understand his actions.

I will end the post with a few words from Davenport and Prusak (1998), "Start talking and get to work!" (instead of the traditional "Stop talking and get to work!")

The importance of questions

To ask questions is imperative to innovation and when sharing knowledge. As I have mentioned earlier in my posting, Ricardo Semler writes about how they work at Semco. He mention that Semco companies promote people to ask questions in their work. By this enabling known truths to be questioned and open the possibilities of better answers than the ones you already know.

This way of thinking can initiate a lot of change in an organisation. If I was to ask about why we never see any documents or an agenda of the leader-meeting in the company i work for (Computas), the answer would probably be something like "We discuss important issues that is handled by the leaders" or something similar.. This would then generate a new set of why's .. These are questions that can open up the organisation and create trust between management and the rest of the workers.

I will make next week my WHY-week at work and note what answers i get.