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Mitigating the effects of implicit bias

Thu, 22 Oct 2020 21:54:22 GMT

This is the third and final article in a series exploring implicit bias by CLO contributor Michael Bret Hood. Read more in PART 1: Understanding implicit bias and its detriment to organizations and PART 2: Implicit bias affects us all.

When you make decisions, do you try to take a rational approach when weighing the potential positives and negatives of the choices available in order to make the best decision possible? Or, are you more likely to go with your gut? Regardless of which method you choose, chances are you have made some bad decisions in your life. While most people believe decision-making is a rational process, research has proven that implicit bias can lead you to certain conclusions without your conscious awareness. For learning leaders, this can affect people throughout an organization.

By its very nature, implicit bias operates in the subconscious — a challenge to overcome for learning leaders. Frequently, you aren’t even aware that bias is interfering with your objectivity and your impartiality. Preparing yourself and others to overcome these hidden biases is a difficult proposition, but one that must be addressed if you value organizational culture.

The building blocks

A foundational building block to mitigate implicit bias is to raise awareness of its existence. Inasmuch as the word “bias” suggests a negative connotation, efforts to raise awareness can be difficult since people do not like to think of themselves as “flawed.” Yet if your colleagues are aware that implicit bias exists and are aware of how it can significantly impact their decision-making, they can be better prepared to mitigate the impact. Self-awareness and accountability are crucial in overcoming implicit bias in the workplace. Being more aware of how implicit bias can compromise your objectivity can activate System 2, which can have the effect of introducing conscious and deliberate thought into the decision-making process. “By discussing the unconscious biases and bringing them to a conscious level, everyone in the organization can be aware of how these can influence their decision-making while hiring, promotions, and mentoring,” writes Forbes contributor Pragya Agarwal.

Another important step in mitigating implicit bias inside an organization is through teaching your colleagues about the different biases that exist. From racism to gender bias to affinity bias to confirmation bias, there are over 100 different decision-making biases that affect organizational processes in some manner or form. Agarwal suggests that discussing these biases and “naming them can make them more explicit and transparent, and transform organizational culture.”Such training allows colleagues to potentially diagnose when implicit bias has interfered with organizational processes such as hiring, promotion, and career development opportunities.

In addition, proactive steps can be taken to implement policies and procedures that can remove or minimize systemic processes that inadvertently or inherently are affected by implicit bias.

One such example emerged from orchestras. In the 1980s, women made up approximately 10 percent of the total members in the country’s top orchestras. It turned out that gender bias was acting as an unconscious barrier to more women joining. To combat this, orchestral leaders started using blind auditions during the 1970s and 1980s — implementing this structural change removed the implicit gender bias during the audition process, the results completely reversed the stereotypical thoughts that existed in the orchestral leaders. Traditionally, musicians who were trying out for positions would come onto a stage and play in front of the talent evaluators. When musicians started auditioning behind a curtain, the fact that evaluators could no longer see who was playing neutralized any potential for gender bias.

After blind auditions were implemented, the odds of a woman earning a position in the orchestra increased by 50 percent. The talent evaluators mitigated their unconscious biases even further by asking musicians to remove their shoes before walking onto the stage behind the curtain because the process could be influenced by the sounds of heels walking across the stage.

Eliminating bias in your workplace systems

If you were to look at the hiring or learning and development selection processes, do you have a system where certain information about the candidates is hidden from the evaluators so as not to allow implicit biases to influence the decision-making process? There are a number of systems inside an organization where implicit bias is allowed to fester because the steps required to make the system fairer and more impartial have not been taken.

Training can certainly make people more aware of how implicit bias infiltrates an organization but until concrete action is taken, a number of employees will perceive a lack of procedural justice and fairness. Some of your best talent could leave if their concerns are not systematically addressed. According to a 2017 Conversation article about a controversial internal memo written by an employee at Google, some of the questions leaders of companies should be asking themselves are: Do job advertisements use gender-neutral language? How much demographic information should be requested on the application? Are there new methods of advertising job openings that will reach a more diverse group of applicants? Are performance evaluation systems evaluated for gender neutrality?”

These same questions can be adjusted to account for racial and cultural differences that naturally occur in organizations due to things such as affinity bias, which is the tendency for people to hire, promote, and develop people that look, talk, and possess similar experiences. “We must also recognize that the old adage, ‘trust your gut,’ may not prevent us from recognizing implicit bias,” writes Karen Steinhauser in “Everything is a Little Bit Biased.” “We must focus on how we form opinions about people. Sometimes it means asking ourselves whether our opinions would be the same if the person were a different race, gender, or religion or dressed in a different manner.”

Another method to offset biases involves matching job requirements and development opportunities with candidates’ knowledge, skills, and abilities. During the hiring process, evaluate candidates based on a list of requirements for each role instead of evaluating candidates against each other: “This allows you to avoid contrast bias (or contrast effect): the tendency to compare candidates or employees to each other rather than comparing them to a preset company standard.” Moving to objective from subjective standards helps you to avoid the biases that are massaged by referring to “cultural fit” as well as “our type of candidate” justifications.

Bias and decision-making

According to Michael Levine of Psychology Today, rationality only represents about 20 percent of human decision-making. It is said that emotions drive 80 percent of the choices Americans make, while practicality and objectivity only represent about 20 percent of decision-making.” Certain conditions can also lead to an increased reliance on System 1 thinking, which is where your biases reside. Levine also states, “If you make a decision feeling hungry, angry, lonely, or tired (or God-forbid some combination of more than one of the above) emotion wins 100 percent of the time and will likely push you in the wrong direction.”

When employees are cognizant of the situations where implicit biases are most likely to be a significant factor in decision-making, awareness can potentially mitigate the nefarious effects.

Kriti Jain, an associate professor at IE Business School, suggests you can improve decision-making by deploying a technique called “consequential reflection,” which prompts people to reflect on the positive and negative consequences of their decisions. By getting people to stop and reflect on what they are about to do, you would be activating the conscious part of the brain, which is where more rational-based decision-making takes place.

By engaging in consequential reflection, learning leaders can engage System 2, more deliberate thinking, and consider not only the direct impact of the decision to be made, but also the ripples that will affect the careers of those who are passed over.

Consequential reflection can also lead to the generation of different perspectives, which can be another means to reduce the effects of implicit bias. Framing problems from the perspective of others can assist in generating questions that could uncover implicit biases as well as systemically unfair policies and procedures that limit opportunities for others. Perspective-taking “can be very useful in assessing the emotional impact on individuals who are constantly being stereotyped in negative ways.”

It begins with leadership

The challenge in pursuing these strategies lies within each individual in your organization. Inasmuch as the organizational leaders set the tone for the organizational culture, acceptance and buy-in from these individuals is paramount. “The human brain is a wonderful gift, but with success and tenure we are fooled into certainty and drawn away from humility,” writes Forbes contributor Michael Brainard. “As leaders, we must remain humble around our unconscious bias and acknowledge the impact our biases have on the decisions and agreements we make at the individual and collective levels.”

Humility is an important component to mitigate implicit bias. Leaders who acknowledge that they are just as susceptible to implicit biases as anyone are capable of creating a culture where employees can contemplate the possibilities of flawed decision-making induced by stereotypical associations as opposed to compounding their mistakes by sticking to decisions and systems that reinforce erroneous implicit associations and stereotypes.

Learning leaders should also understand that self-awareness, as it relates to implicit bias, is more than consciously thinking about which biases might lead to flawed decision-making. The constant “questioning our own thinking would be impossibly tedious, and System 2 is much too slow and inefficient to serve as a substitute for System 1 in making routine decisions,” writes psychologist Daniel Kahnemann. “The best we can do is a compromise: learn to recognize situations in which mistakes are likely and try harder to avoid significant mistakes when the stakes are higher.” Following this path will require you and your colleagues to understand the role of emotions as they relate to implicit bias and System 1 thinking.

By now, you understand that the more you can engage and incorporate System 2 thinking into your processes, the less likely implicit bias is to interfere. Jennifer Eberhardt, a professor of psychology at Stanford University, suggests slowing down your thinking processes as a method to mitigate implicit bias: “There are lots of things we have at our disposal to manage the potential for bias, and one of those things is just slowing down. When people are looking over potential applicants, some data suggests that when resumes come in, the people hiring look at it for six seconds on average. Slowing people down is a good thing. You want to slow people down so they don’t fall back on automatic associations and act without thinking things through.”

As much as you may not want to acknowledge it, you are not as rational as you believe yourself to be. Neither are your colleagues or your workforce. Implicit bias interferes with your decision-making, perceptions and behaviors every single day. If you ever have a chance of overcoming these hidden biases and muting their effects, you have to be aware that most of your decisions are made with System 1 automatic thinking. By taking your time and deploying System 2 to generate new perspectives, practice consequential reflection, learn more about implicit biases, and fundamentally accept that you are flawed, you, as a learning leader, can create a more diverse organization and culture where people are allowed to thrive even when we look, behave, and act differently than others.

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What it takes to become a collaborative leader

Thu, 22 Oct 2020 18:29:51 GMT

In 2015, Ralph Stayer stepped down as CEO of Wisconsin-based Johnsonville Sausage, a position he held for 47 years. He expanded the butcher shop his father gave him into a $1.5 billion dollar global business and the largest sausage brand in the U.S. What is more interesting is how he transformed himself as the leader of this business in a way that enabled it to grow — through a collaborative leadership journey. Beginning in the 1970s, Stayer may be one of the first business leaders to openly explore what it would take for him to transform himself from a command-and-control leader to a truly collaborative one — and then go ahead and do it. He captures this journey in his 1990 Harvard Business Review classic article, “How I Learned to Let My Workers Lead,” which helps us understand the challenges and triumphs of the journey.

This journey is not for the faint of heart and is not for everybody. But if you see the market, technological and demographic realities of our digital age, this journey can help prepare you to lead in the remainder of the 21st century. What is this journey and why should anyone go on it?

Defining the collaborative leadership journey

When Steven Covey published “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People,” we were introduced to the idea of an “inside-out” journey to discover our character and the values and principles that shape our leadership. That is where the collaborative leadership journey begins.

It is defined as an inside-out journey of self-discovery, self-awareness and reflection that helps you define who you are as a human being and a professional, what you believe in, what you value, why you are here on this planet and where you choose to go with the rest of your life. It is about your self-esteem, sense of self-worth and the ground you stand on. It is a journey with no destination, but it is about lifelong learning, growth and development

There are five key dimensions of the journey essential for its success:

Self-discovery: understanding who we are, our assumptions, beliefs, values, leadership style and code of ethics.
Self-awareness: knowing the impact of our style and behavior on others.
Reflection: reflecting on how we react or respond to others based on our values and beliefs.
Being grounded: getting and remaining grounded in the face of all the change.
Conscious choices: making conscious choices to empower ourselves so that we can empower others.

Is the view worth the climb?

Why should any leader want to go on this journey? The short answer is that the realities of the 21st century digital age require a new type of leadership. Covid-19, the economic collapse, systemic racism, climate change and the rise of the millennial workforce are all screaming for a new way to lead — collaboratively. Twentieth century industrial age hierarchy is simply out of step with the times. Additionally, there are at least five benefits from doing this work:

Self-esteem and self-confidence: The journey increases self-awareness and reinforces our self-esteem.
Empathy: Because of increased self-awareness, there is increased empathy toward others.
Clarity of direction: Your personal vision and mission are clarified, as well as the plan to realize them.
Humility: There is a sense of calm and mindfulness, which in turn leads to humility that can empower others.
Personal mastery: You are able to achieve the highest level of competence in collaborative leadership attributes, behaviors and roles.

Challenges to becoming a collaborative leader

Like every journey we take in life, you will experience roadblocks, barriers or unforeseen challenges along the way. Here are a few you may encounter:

Personal history — from reaction to proaction: Where we come from and the forces that shaped who we are can cause us to be reactive, when the goal is to become proactive.
Shifting mindsets — from power to collaboration: The shift from hierarchical thinking and the need for power is difficult. This involves letting go of old beliefs about leadership as you shift toward collaboration.
Ego and arrogance — from self to selfless: While ego strength is essential for success, it can get in the way of building trust-based relationships. Collaboration requires us to be humble, selfless and facilitative of others. It’s about we, not me.
Power — from control to ownership: Leaders don’t have any control, only influence. To motivate the workforce and gain influence, giving up the need for control and learning how to build ownership is a significant challenge.
Motivation — from fear to trust: Hierarchical leaders motivate through fear. Collaborative leaders motivate by building trust. Making this shift is critical but difficult.

7 steps in the collaborative leadership journey

This is a journey, not a destination. Here are seven steps you can take on your journey to becoming a collaborative leader.

Step 1: Make a conscious choice to begin the journey with eyes wide open. Be willing to look in the mirror and make the necessary changes

Step 2: Benchmark your leadership style; get 360-degree feedback. Do a skills assessment and identify where do you need to work to become more collaborative.

Step 3: Explore your personal history to see how your upbringing shaped your life and view of leadership. Understand what drives, motivates and inspires you.

Step 4: Discover the unique gifts you bring to the workplace — special talents, skills or passions — that you can give to others.

Step 5: Identify your core values, ethics and moral compass that guide your leadership, and how you live by them.

Step 6: Define your purpose. Ask yourself, “Why am I here on this planet? What is it I am supposed to do while I’m here?”

Step 7: Develop your personal mission and vision statement, and clarify the legacy you want to leave behind.

Strong foundations

When you build a house, you need a solid foundation that can withstand extreme weather events. If you use the wrong kind of cement or do not prepare the foundation properly, the pressures of external events will cause it to crack. The same is true for your leadership. The collaborative leadership journey is designed to help you create a solid foundation so that you empower yourself and others and can withstand the turbulence that is all around us. By the end of your journey, you will have become the best version of yourself, the collaborative leader, who, in the words of Lao Tzu, 6th century BCE leader, “… is best when people barely know he/she exists, when his/her work is done, his/her aim fulfilled, they will say: We did it ourselves.”

This article is based on the author’s book, “Leadership’s 4th Evolution: Collaboration for the 21st Century.”

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It’s time to update your evaluation strategy

Wed, 21 Oct 2020 15:27:44 GMT

As we prepare to weather a recession for the remainder of 2020 and next year, many projects and programs have been reduced or, worse, eliminated. Learning professionals must be able to show the value of programs, projects, and initiatives to prevent further cuts from disrupting our businesses. The best way to survive and even thrive in the current economic downturn is to actually measure the impact and ROI of your major programs to ensure that these programs deliver the business results that executives and sponsors want and need.

The new normal

Amid the pandemic, the pressures and challenges are vivid and real and can be condensed into these important realities.

There is pressure to curtail or eliminate programs. Executives will continue to ask about the value of programs, and in most executives’ minds, the value is the impact it is having on the organization. For expensive projects, some executives will ask to see how that value translates into monetary benefits compared with the cost of the project, which is ROI, a key metric for top decision-makers.

There is pressure to connect major programs to the business. Key funders, sponsors and supporters expect you to be relevant and drive important business measures. Whether in government or business, there are always business measures. These are often key performance indicators for the top of the organization, as well as throughout the organization. Your major programs will need to connect to those important measures credibly and efficiently.

You have to do more with less. With limited budgets and fewer resources but greater expectations, you must be efficient and effective with your processes to make sure that you can deliver value with minimum investment.

Soft programs are more at risk. The so-called “hard projects,” those connected directly to production, quality, sales, logistics and IT, have less risk because the value is sometimes obvious and the benefits are easily recognized. The soft projects will be in a more precarious position. Projects involving culture, change management, leadership, communications, empowerment, customer service and engagement may be at risk because their values are not clear to executives and the owners of those projects may have not taken the steps to show the business value very clearly.

Forecasting ROI before implementation will be a common approach. The best way to obtain approval for a new project is to conduct an ROI forecast, showing the expected monetary benefits compared with the projected costs. The challenge is to make sure that this analysis is credible and conservative. In an ideal setting, the ROI forecast will be less than the actual ROI in a follow-up evaluation. This confirms that the forecast was credible and conservative.

The journey to business results involves the entire team and not just those involved in measurement and evaluation. In the quality field, there is a saying: “You cannot inspect your way to success. You have to change the system to deliver quality.” The same is true for L&D. You cannot measure your way to success. Measurement and evaluation uncover weaknesses in programs and processes, which means that changes must be made. These are often changes that spread throughout the program cycle and across different roles and responsibilities. It is difficult for the evaluation team to facilitate those changes. Therefore, it is best to design for the results you want and share the challenge and responsibility to do that with the entire team. A team effort is truly needed to deliver the value of your function. Important new programs should start with why, a business measure. And the proposed program must be the right solution. There should be smart objectives, not only for reaction and learning, but for application and impact. This provides the focus you will need to design for and deliver results.

Virtual learning must be effective. With so many learning programs now shifting to virtual delivery, we need to ensure that it is working, particularly at level 3 (application), level 4 (impact), and maybe even level 5 (ROI). Unfortunately, there is a problem with many virtual programs breaking down at Levels 3 and 4 — not delivering application and impact.

10 actions to take now

This situation requires recalibration and reevaluation of how your organization delivers solutions and measures results. All key roles and responsibilities, including the latest benchmarking, technology and know-how, must be involved to be successful. More specifically, you need a new strategy for value — more precisely, a new evaluation strategy — including these actions:

1. Assess the current status of delivering results as a baseline. Be proactive and tackle the evaluation challenge. Drive the evaluation initiative, and don’t let executives drive it. When an executive requests ROI, the timeframe for results will be short, you will be on the defensive and ROI will be on the executive agenda. You want to keep the evaluation on your agenda so you can control the process.

2. Set specific goals for delivering and measuring results that involve the entire team. Goals should be set for the percent of programs evaluated at each level each year. The recommendation is reaction — 100 percent; learning — 60-90 percent; application — 30-40 percent; impact — 10-20 percent; and ROI — 5-10 percent.

3. Assign the various roles and responsibilities to make it work. Identify each team member’s role and function. In the beginning, if you take steps to start with the why with business measures, select the right solution to improve the business measures, expect success, and use that expectation in the form of objectives to design for the results, then you won’t have disappointing results at the end. It’s not just the effort of the evaluation team; every stakeholder has a part in designing for and driving the results desired for the program and participating in using the data for process improvement.

4. Build the capability of the team to make evaluation feasible, effective and successful. There are many options available to build the ROI capability your team needs. Webinars, workshops, boot camps and certification sessions are offered regularly, either in-person or in virtual formats. Books, case studies and articles are also widely available. Free tools and templates can be downloaded from ROI Institute’s website.

5. Develop simple yet usable guidelines, tools and templates to make it efficient, consistent and repeatable. Shortcuts can be applied within the ROI Methodology process using tools, templates and job aids to enhance efficiency and effectiveness.

6. Use technology in a smart way to make the process more efficient and timely. Basic technology programs and readily available software can help achieve a thorough ROI evaluation, proving that it is possible to conduct a successful ROI evaluation on almost any budget.

7. Adopt preferred practices in planning, data collection, analysis and reporting. Taking this step will provide the structure, philosophy and instruction for evaluation within the entire organization while also increasing the efficiency and effectiveness of your evaluation process.

8. Involve the management team and provide briefings, emphasizing their roles to make the program or project successful. To survive and thrive in the learning and development function, you must have key relationships, particularly with important executives and administrators. These executives support you, provide your funding, or request projects and programs. They need to see business value for what you do. Showing the impact and ROI is a great way to be perceived as a business contributor, which will help create these necessary relationships.

9. Report the results of the evaluation to all stakeholders. Communicate results to key stakeholders — reaction, learning, application, impact and perhaps even ROI data form the basis for a powerful story. Storytelling is critical, and it’s a much better story when it includes business impact.

10. Measure progress and make adjustments. Designing for results usually drives the needed results, but there’s always an opportunity to make the results even better. This involves improving the program so the ROI increases in the future. Increased ROI makes a great case for more funds. When executives see that the program has a positive ROI, it will be repeated, retained and supported.

When you update your evaluation strategy to address each step, your programs are almost guaranteed to deliver positive business results. Because you have ensured they are connected to the business, they are the right solution, everyone knows what is expected and everyone has designed for the results, you eliminate or minimize the risk of failure. And fear of results is the No. 1 barrier to ROI evaluation.

This approach places you and your organization on the path to success, shifting the evaluation process from reporting results to driving the results you want and need. For a copy of an actual evaluation strategy plan, contact ROI Institute at info@roiinstitute.net.

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Congratulations to the 2020 LIP Award winners!

Mon, 19 Oct 2020 18:47:32 GMT

Chief Learning Officer has revealed the winners of the 2020 Learning in Practice Awards. The winners and their final rankings were announced during a virtual awards ceremony Tuesday, October 20, during CLO’s Virtual Fall Symposium.

Since 2003, the Learning in Practice Awards have recognized learning leaders who demonstrate excellence in the design and delivery of workforce learning and development programs. They do so through a combination of qualities including leadership, vision, business acumen and strategic alignment.

Awards were given in two broad categories: those for practitioner and those for provider. Practitioner awards are split into two divisions: Division 1 for organizations with 10,000 employees or more, and Division 2 for organizations with less than 10,000 employees. The ceremony closed with the announcement of CLO’s top honor, the prestigious CLO of the Year Award.

Congratulations to all of this year’s winners!

The 2020 CLO OF THE YEAR

Sydney Savion, Chief Learning Officer, Air New Zealand

THE BUSINESS IMPACT AWARD

Division 1:

Gold: John Kusi-Mensah, AVP, Global Distribution Academy, MetLife

Division 2:

Gold: Andrew Heifetz, Senior Manager – Global Technical Enablement, Akami Technologies
Silver: Mike Blanchette, Senior Director Global Enablement, Veeam Software Corp.
Bronze: Jay Fortuna, Head of Learning and Development, Rewards Network
Bronze: Matthea Marquart, Director of Administration, Online Campus, Columbia University School of Social Work

THE BUSINESS PARTNERSHIP AWARD

Division 1:

Gold: Cardinal Health
Silver: TechnipFMC
Silver: XPO Logistics
Bronze: Centene Corp.

Division 2:

Gold: ChenMed
Gold: VNA Health Group
Silver: Comscore
Bronze: Texas A&M University
Bronze: Veeam Software Corp.

THE INNOVATION AWARD

Division 1:

Gold: Salvador Gutierrez, Corporate University Manager, General Motors Mexico
Silver: Terrence Donahue, Corporate Director of Learning, Emerson Electric
Bronze: Kristin Colber-Baker, Chief Learning Officer, Mars Inc.

Division 2:

Gold: Glenn Cermak, Global Director, Corporate Learning and Development, Qlik (Cermak has since moved on to a new Learning Consultant role with Skillsoft)
Silver: Michael Sinno, Vice President, Learning and Development, National Insurance Crime Bureau
Bronze: Tara D. Gray, Director, Organization Development, Texas A&M University
Bronze: Ciara Taylor, Talent Management Learning Supervisor, City of Memphis

THE STRATEGY AWARD

Division 1:

Gold: Simon Brown, Chief Learning Officer, Novartis
Silver: Patrick Angel, Senior Director of Global Learning Solutions and Development, Valmont Industries
Silver: Christopher Hall, Assistant Commissioner, U.S. Customs and Border Protection
Bronze: Terri Hoskins, Senior Vice President and Chief Human Resources Officer, TBC Corp.

Division 2:

Gold: Jim Whiteford, Executive Director, Ally
Silver: Kristina Tsiriotakis, Global Director of Learning and Organizational Development, DECIEM
Bronze: Sheryl Buscheck, Senior Director, Global Sales Enablement, Infoblox

THE TALENT MANAGEMENT AWARD

Division 1:

Gold: Annette Wilson, Senior Manager, Talent Development, Thermo Fisher

Division 2:

Gold: Paula Dixton, Director of Professional Development, Greenberg Traurig
Silver: Sarah Propernick, Manager, Training and Standards, Extended Stay America
Bronze: Diana Nguyan, Learning and Development Program Coordinator, Apeel Sciences

THE TECHNOLOGY AWARD

Division 1:

Gold: John Kusi-Mensah, AVP, Global Distribution Academy, MetLife
Silver: Salvador Gutierrez, Corporate University Manager, General Motors Mexico

Division 2:

Gold: Danette Shaifer, Director, Greenberg Traurig

THE TRAILBLAZER AWARD

Division 1:

Gold: Peter Paul, Technical Career Entry, NewFordTech

Division 2:

Gold: Katin Keirstead, Senior Director of Operations Systems, Planet Fitness
Gold: Michael Sinno, Vice President of Learning and Development, National Insurance Crime Bureau
Silver: Kristina Tsiriotakis, Global Director of Learning and Organizational Development, DECIEM
Bronze: Jay Fortuna, Head of Learning and Development, Rewards Network

EXCELLENCE IN ACADEMIC PARTNERSHIPS AWARD

Gold: University of Memphis Global

EXCELLENCE IN BLENDED LEARNING AWARD

Gold: GP Strategies
Silver: GP Strategies
Silver: Entelechy
Bronze: Roundtable Learning

EXCELLENCE IN COMMUNITY SERVICE AWARD

Gold: U.S. Cellular in partnership with JASON Learning

EXCELLENCE IN CONTENT AWARD

Gold: Steel Owl
Silver: GP Strategies
Bronze: Impact

EXCELLENCE IN E-LEARNING AWARD

Gold: SweetRush
Silver: NovoEd
Bronze: Allego

EXCELLENCE IN PARTNERSHIP AWARD

Gold: Explorance
Silver: Raytheon Professional Services
Bronze: GP Strategies

EXCELLENCE IN TECHNOLOGY INNOVATION AWARD

Gold: Gronstedt Group
Silver: Raytheon Professional Services

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5 things to stop expecting from a mentor

Mon, 19 Oct 2020 02:31:29 GMT

Finding — and successfully connecting with — a mentor is a frustrating experience for people who are searching for someone to provide guidance, proffer wisdom, open doors and course-correct them when they veer off track.

What I learned, especially in my entrepreneurial years, is that the first step is to check one’s own expectations and instincts. More than 10 years after my early mentorship experiences, I feel savvy enough to understand what a work adviser does and doesn’t do — especially since now, as a two-time founder, I’ve been on both sides of the mentor/mentee dynamic.

Some common misconceptions tend to guide would-be mentees in their search for a work guru. My advice: Stop looking for what you think a mentor should look like, and you will be more likely to find what you need.

1. “Mentor” is not its own relationship category.

A mentor is someone who knows more than you or has done more than you or has experiences from which you can learn. A mentor is not someone upon whom you need to formally confer the title “mentor” to begin a relationship. Don’t require a purity test to confirm the mentor/mentee arrangement. Advisory relationships work when they happen naturally, and they fail when forced. Forget the labels: Absorb wisdom from brilliant people in whatever form it comes.

Karina Castagna, an executive at Amgen, a board president of the Healthcare Women’s Association and board member at Ventura County Food Share, has mentored dozens of women. She says the mentees who benefit most are the ones with substantive questions, who aren’t as concerned about defining the relationship — which puts pressure on the mentor.

2. Your mentor is not your ‘ride-or-die.’

Too many people end up disappointed when they realize their mentor has set limits and does not want to take on risk. A longtime mentor of mine encouraged me for years to start a business, saying he’d love to help if I ever did. When I launched my company in 2015, I asked him to serve as an adviser and/or investor, and he (graciously and promptly) excused himself from both scenarios.

The experience taught me that even strong relationships have boundaries. But just because your mentor is probably not willing to circumnavigate the Ninth Circle of Hell with you doesn’t invalidate the relationship. Mine shared valuable advice and insight into the world of prestigious MBA programs and companies that I would not have had access to on my own at the time. They’re still rooting for you — just from the stands.

3. Your mentor cannot address all aspects of life.

A mentor should have knowledge to share: advice on certain experiences, personal stories relevant to yours or ways of thinking that can influence your decision-making and problem-solving. But rarely will a mentor be your confidante, emotional support system, knowledge base, brainstorm partner and guidance counselor all at once. Choose one.

Castagna says building a personal friendship can enrich a mentorship dynamic. But, she clarifies: “It is important for the mentee to prioritize discussing tactical and tangible issues the mentor can help solve. Inviting their mentor to a birthday party may feel less daunting to some people than making a professional ask, but I prefer the direct approach as it allows me to create the most value for my mentees.”

4. Creating opportunities for you is not your mentor’s job.

Unless your mentor is a supervisor or someone senior in your organization, the expectation that they will make introductions and open doors is a romantic — but misguided — one. Instead, mentors prefer empowering their mentees to carve out their own opportunities.

Stephanie Gay, a vice president at change-management, learning and development firm Intellezy, recalls a consulting mentee who requested an introduction to an industry executive. Gay knew her mentee did not yet have the confidence to impress this exec in the 30 seconds she would be given.

“Instead of making an introduction right away for a single shot that probably wouldn’t go well, I instructed my mentee on effective outreach, positioning her strengths in emails, and finding common ground with a target contact so that she could get herself in the door,” she says. “She mastered these skills and lined up a half-dozen meetings for herself — way more than any mentor could have done for her.”

Occasionally, a mentor will provide access to their contacts, but in the meantime, take their guidance and try learning to fish. Chances are, as soon as you learn and don’t need it anymore, that’s when said intro might just be forthcoming.

5. A mentor will not deliver for you until you prove worthy.

You are not worthy of mentorship just because you decide so. Mentorship is a two-way street, and a mentor wants to grow with her mentee. Fact: A mentor needs to gain something from the interaction, whether it’s a vicarious experience of exciting new projects, the fulfillment of developing a new leader, or the gratification of redeploying knowledge and experience in a new way.

A great mentor simply won’t be interested in allocating time and energy to a protégé who isn’t demonstrating growth potential, interesting work possibilities and the promise of a fun ride ahead. As Sheryl Sandberg suggests: “Shift your thinking from, ‘If I get a mentor, I will excel’ to, ‘If I excel, I will get a mentor.’”

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Politics, values and the election in the workplace

Fri, 16 Oct 2020 18:30:15 GMT

These are some of the difficult and timely questions I have been hearing from learning and development departments in this politically charged and controversy-rich time:

Can someone wear a political button in the workplace?
What about wearing a Black Lives Matter pin?
When we have a virtual conversation with a group of staff members, what should we do when the upcoming election or debates are raised?
Bumper stickers in the parking lot: Does the organization have any guidelines?
If an employee has a different view of reproductive rights than their manager, how does that impact each of them?
Is it OK for an employee to advocate voting?
Should we schedule any major activities or meetings for the day after the election?
When an employee loses a relative to COVID-19, can they express their feelings about health coverage or government policy?
How do we handle divergent views about closing/opening schools and the impact those decisions are having on employees with children?

Yes, we are living in one of the most politically charged times in decades. We are in the midst of an unprecedented pandemic. Social media is loaded with intense and provocative postings about politics and public policy. Your employees are watching (or choosing to not watch) hour-by-hour news that reflects the controversies in their nation, in their neighborhoods, and even in their families.

I chatted with a range of chief learning officers who represent the full spectrum of political perspectives. We explored these real and tricky questions with HR and talent leaders, and comments shared by workers about politics in the workplace have been deeply informative. Here are the factors that business and workplace cultures are balancing:

Freedom and comfort. Employees want to view the workplace as having high levels of both freedom of expression and comfort with colleagues.

Corporate values. The best example is how companies are recognizing and reacting to racial injustice. I have been moved by CEOs and others focusing on the Black Lives Matter movement and the need to deal with institutional racism; yet some employees see these efforts as being politically loaded.

Empathy with stress, disruption and uncertainty. Organizations need to be empathetic with the realities of how employees and their families are being impacted by the stress, disruptions and economic and public health uncertainties of our times.

Storytelling is powerful for distributed teams. Employees want to share stories with each other about these times to find common ground, but stories easily jump to political and controversial ground. Even when we work to keep the conversation away from politics, the deeply personal stresses we hear from our teammates (e.g., a grandparent in a nursing home who they have not been able to touch in seven months, a relative in the hospital with COVID-19, a neighbor who has lost their job or business) may trigger a statement about who is to blame or public policy flaws.

So, what should organizations do to handle these “right now” issues and challenges?

The first recommendation is to create safe places! There are two types of safe places that our employees (and customers) deserve: First, separate organizational interactions from political interactions. Set the ground rules for meetings, conferences and even staff gatherings. Remind folks that this is not the place to walk down political pathways. Second, create spaces where people can choose to interact on politics or controversies. One organization has created a “virtual Hyde Park:” A physical location designed for employees who want to engage in political conversation.

Be explicit and consistent about pins, buttons and posters. Tell employees the ground rules for wearing or displaying political views. Is it OK to wear a “VOTE” button, but not a “Vote for This Candidate” pin? Is it OK to wear a “Racism Sucks” pin or a “Ban Abortion” button? Honor that people have strong views and the full right to display those opinions, but the rules are about the culture of the workplace.

Be clear about internal vs. external guidelines. Some organizations differentiate guidelines around these issues based on whether employees are customer-facing or internal-only.

Communicate that values matter. An organization cannot be considered socially responsible without touching on values. It is key to share those values with employees and interviewees. The challenge is how those values intersect with political candidates or controversy.

Make sure “diversity” includes diversity of opinions and voting. We must establish a safe way for employees to handle their discomfort with diverse views held by colleagues, managers or even customers. Look at how other diversity issues are dealt with to inform how this should be managed.

Own the strange times! Don’t assume that we fully understand how to handle the current environment. This is a time of change and innovation. Own the strangeness and learn together.

Pay attention to Election Day(s). Personally, I wish Election Day were a holiday for employees to get to the voting booths or to volunteer as poll watchers or campaigners. Assume that this year’s election may not be decided by 10 p.m. on Nov. 3, and consider moving learning events to a day or two later.

On a final note, leadership is often gauged by how we handle the dynamic differences in opinions among our colleagues, competitors and organizations. Let’s be learners in how we honor democracy with empathy, respect and collaboration.

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New benchmarking tool for higher ed seeks to address workplace soft skills gap

Thu, 15 Oct 2020 20:30:51 GMT

A new assessment tool created for higher education institutions to track and measure the career success of their graduates was launched this week by nonprofit organization Quality Assurance Commons. The tool, which is called the Employability Self-Assessment, helps institutions identify the key skills employers want in candidates in the current and post-pandemic workplace.

The ESA has already been piloted at 20 colleges and universities and is being implemented at eight higher education institutions in the Connecticut State Colleges & Universities System, according to a company press release.

Even before the pandemic, organizations were seeking candidates who showed strength in soft skills. Seventy-five percent of HR professionals who were having recruiting difficulty reported a shortage of skills among candidates for job openings in the Society for Human Resource Management’s 2019 report on the global skills shortage and bridging the talent gap. According to the report, the top three missing soft skills reported by employers were problem solving, critical thinking, innovation and creativity; ability to deal with complexity and ambiguity; and communication.

Research has continued to reinforce a widening soft skills gap over the past five years, says Ralph Wolff, founder and president of QA Commons. But he says COVID-19 has put more pressure on higher education institutions to increase capacity of the soft skills that matter for employment.

“Employers tell us too often our graduates have technical and academic skills, but not the requisite soft skills that are critical for job success and promotability,” says Aaron Thompson, president of the Council on Postsecondary Education in Kentucky. “In today’s COVID-19 world, employability skills are as important as ‘hard’ skills. Adaptability and resilience, along with the ability to work remotely, are key skills for the future.”

The CPE has worked with QA Commons since November 2018 after Thompson was appointed president. Higher education should be seen as a lynchpin to building the workforce of the future in Kentucky and beyond, he says.

How it works

The ESA was developed to bridge the soft skills gap by helping integrate them into higher education institutions’ curricula, Wolff says. The first step is to evaluate the existing curriculum: “Does it integrate critical soft skills within the context of each discipline? Are faculty members aware of relevant soft skills, and are they equipped with the necessary tools to embed these skills into the framework of the course?”

The ESA includes a field-tested framework that higher education programs go through to align curricula with current employability needs, according to the press release. Each program will be supported as they develop proficiency in eight 21st century skills — Essential Employability Qualities — researched and identified by QA Commons as critical: communication, thinking and problem solving, inquiry, collaboration, adaptability, learning, principles and ethics, and responsibility and professionalism.

The ESA also measures whether the program transparently describes the major that students will receive and the skills they are required to learn, in order to better match with career options, Wolff says, and then this is paired with information on salaries and career pathways that will help students plan for their own professional growth in the workplace.

“In the end, a school has a clear benchmark of how their students are faring in the workplace, and how exactly to round out its curriculum with training for current, in-demand skills,” Wolff says.

Six colleges or universities in Kentucky have already gone through the ESA, and 13 of 16 programs are now certified in QA Commons’ eight EEQs. “In this process, we learned a great deal about where gaps exist within and across programs and where good practices are being implemented,” Thompson says.

“Students should have a greater understanding of the skills they bring to bear on their course of study, and those they’ve acquired leading up to completion,” he adds. “Using the ESA, program stakeholders can clearly see for themselves where they are doing well and how to do better.”

Why soft skills?

Wolff says that people often say education is the great equalizer. While this is true, he says he believes that in today’s world of work, soft skills are an even greater equalizer.

“The need for various technical skills will evolve over time, but the soft skills are transcendent and transferable,” he says. “Employers have long needed employees who exhibit superior human skills, and in a mostly remote and automated environment, these capabilities have never been more important.”

Learning and development professionals have historically pointed to solutions like microlearning and coaching in order to close the soft skills gap employers are currently facing, but clearly development of these skills can also be achieved earlier for a learner, within higher education. Thompson says QA Commons is a “powerful ally” in their mission to help higher education prepare learners for current and future workforce needs.

“These kinds of partnerships are critical as institutions assess their relationships and alignment with employer needs,” he says. “An outside perspective and structured process enabled us to tighten the connection between academic curriculum and the real world, and is a critical step in ensuring students can succeed amid widespread economic uncertainty.”

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Who leads your DEI function, and how do you support them from an organizational perspective?

Wed, 14 Oct 2020 20:43:35 GMT

Illustration by Theresa Stoodley.

Having diversity, equity and inclusion that is well-incorporated with an organization’s overall business strategy, as well as having someone at the helm of the function, has been a goal for leaders for some time now, but recent social unrest has escalated these efforts across the United States.

Who is a part of these DEI functions? Similar to learning leaders, those who lead DEI go by a number of different titles — director or program manager, vice president or head of DEI are all common, as well as chief diversity officer.

There has been an influx of organizations bringing DEI leaders into executive roles and into the C-suite. Earlier this year, real-estate firm CBRE Group Inc., General Electric Co. and Zoom Video Communications Inc. all announced they had hired new CDOs, according to The Wall Street Journal.

According to data from business data and software provider ZoomInfo, over the past five years, there was a 133 percent increase in executives with diversity and inclusion titles, and nearly 40 percent of Fortune 500 organizations have hired executives to focus on DEI. Glassdoor research from last year shows that more job-seekers are also looking for opportunities to work on DEI issues today — up 35 percent in the U.S. and 19 percent in the United Kingdom

But DEI cannot be the focus of just one person or one team, says Christyl Murray, VP Academy lead and vice president of firmwide talent development for JPMorgan Chase & Co.: “DEI is both a business strategy and part of the people agenda.”

DEI leaders — specifically chief diversity officers — currently face a huge turnover rate. Apple Inc.’s former head of inclusion and diversity, Christie Smith, was the third person to vacate the position, which she held for less than three years, The Wall Street Journal reports. The average tenure for CDOs is about three years.

“While having a CDO is better than not having one at all, tasking one individual with the job of changing toxic workplace culture, implementing employee resource groups, developing strategies to attract and retain diverse talent and figuring out how to create a more inclusive environment for employees is a lot, to say the least,” senior Forbes contributor Janice Gassam Asare wrote in 2019.

DEI requires commitment and follow-through, says Loreli Wilson, director of inclusion and social impact programs at Veterans United Home Loans in Columbia, Missouri. “This includes sourcing for professionals of color, engaging diverse employees in the development and execution of trainings, being intentional in including diverse perspectives and simply reaching out individually to invite employees of color to participate in developmental opportunities.”

Organizationally supporting DEI

A sustainable, long-term DEI initiative is one that is adaptable to the evolution of your workforce, Wilson says. “Each new individual added to your culture will influence it,” says Wilson. “You have to be OK with changing programs and adjusting them accordingly.”

At Veterans United, Wilson ensures the organization continues its efforts to be internally inclusive and to positively impact the community it serves. Her team is involved in a number of different programs across the organization, such as diversity recruitment and internships, training, employee programs and maintaining relationships with community nonprofits.

Wilson, who reports directly to the organization’s chief people officer, says buy-in from the executive level is essential for a successful program. “Folks in diversity and inclusion are battling heavily ingrained beliefs and implicit biases daily. A program that does not have the support of their executive team and has to take additional time to justify its actions to leadership is destined for failure.”

Many organizations that were surveyed in Human Capital Media Research and Advisory Group’s “2019 Diversity Value Index Benchmarking Report” said that the head of the diversity function reported to the chief executive officer, with the second highest response being the chief human resources officer. This is possibly due to diversity often being a part of human resources at many organizations, the report notes.

“A top-down commitment from senior leaders is foremost and almost goes without saying, but that is the first imperative,” Murray says.

But DEI efforts also need to be important to employees at every level of the organization and well-integrated with the rest of the organization’s mission and goals.

Murray suggests having a strategic and targeted approach to DEI — standing it up like you would any other business problem. “If you state that DEI is a business imperative, then all leaders have responsibility and should be tracked on progress toward your stated and specific DEI goals — on a dashboard for their business.”

“Define your specific opportunity areas, setting baselines and targets,” she adds. “Set your success metrics in advance so you can quantify and measure your movement on intended outcomes, such as attraction and hiring, retention, internal mobility, program favorability, engagement, promotion, etc.”

Wilson says to look to those who influence hiring, promotions, terminations, employee development and retention for support in these efforts.

“This work cannot fall solely on your [DEI] team,” she says. “This is a company-wide effort that needs the help and support of many. Identify teams for allyship, grow those relationships and amplify your efforts and broaden your reach.”

DEI and L&D

Leaders in learning and development play a supportive role in DEI efforts. The L&D function oversees training, skills and career development, and learning leaders have a large stake in workplace culture and the talent the organization attracts.

Andrew Rawson, chief learning officer of training and compliance company Traliant, said in a July interview with CLO that one of the most important things a learning leader or chief learning officer can do to support DEI efforts is to make sure training is well-aligned. Diversity training can “hold up a mirror and encourage employees and managers to think about difficult and uncomfortable topics like racism and reflect upon their own attitudes and behaviors,” Rawson says.

ALSO READ: The critical first step to building strong organizational DEI

At JPMorgan, the VP Academy is aligned with the firm’s DEI mission and provides training, guidance and coaching in support of leadership and development and career advancement, Murray says. “[It] works in furtherance of our firm-wide strategy of attracting, retaining and — most intentionally — developing our diverse workforce at the VP level.”

Murray says L&D is influential in training and institutionalizing the types of behaviors we want to see in our workforce and cultures. “And celebrate, recognize and reward managers, teams, departments or individuals who exemplify positive DEI behavior,” she adds. “Valuing DEI should be infused into standard leadership and manager excellence training.”

Wilson says learning leaders should make an effort to diversify their forward-facing leadership and leadership development opportunities, which can lead to the creation of more inclusive workplace programs.

“Representation matters,” she says. “With diverse representation comes the added benefits of their individual development and diverse perspectives for more inclusive programs.”

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Why businesses need an internal career marketplace for skills, ASAP

Tue, 13 Oct 2020 17:58:55 GMT

When I was chief learning office for LinkedIn, I had an important project that required someone with expertise in marketing and PR. I was all set to look outside my department, and perhaps outside the company, since our PR team had plenty to do already. But I had someone on my team with the necessary skills — I just didn’t know it.

I had recently hired a woman to be head of onboarding for our learning division. In our interactions, we had discussed her experience in onboarding, development and related work. PR and marketing never had reason to come up. But then, when we were having a casual conversation about our backgrounds, I learned that she had a degree in PR and marketing. She knew how to do exactly what I needed.

This was someone I had interviewed, who I worked with on a regular basis, and I still hadn’t known this about her. Imagine how little I knew — how little any of us know — about the hidden skills of people in other units throughout the organization. Not only are we unaware of the full range of their expertise, but we also may be unaware that they’re specifically looking for opportunities to put those skills to use within the company.

This lack of knowledge has long been a problem for all kinds of businesses. It sends managers looking externally for expertise they don’t realize they already have internally — along with the high costs of recruiting and hiring. But it’s become an even more damaging problem this year, as the COVID-19 pandemic has upended operations across numerous industries, triggered mass layoffs and left companies reeling.

This is why all organizations need an internal career marketplace for skills — immediately.

Making skills and opportunities discoverable

Think of it as the ultimate database to discover not only who in your organization has what skills, but also who is developing what skills — and how far along they’ve come in their development.

As my co-author David Blake and I wrote in our book “The Expertise Economy,” eBay was an early adopter of just such a marketplace. This kind of system allows employees to input information about their skills and their ongoing development efforts and helps people across the organization’s worldwide operations to find the kind of talent they need.

It also provides employees with a way to locate opportunities for jobs, as well as projects that serve as stretch assignments. As learning executives know, workers need chances to apply their newly developed skills to real-world situations in order to cement their learning.

Furthermore, the marketplace can show employees which skills are most in demand at the company since managers can post about what they’re looking for. This inspires workers to develop key skills, closing gaps in the organization.

Helping avoid mass layoffs

In recent months, the role of such a marketplace has taken on increased meaning — and increased urgency.

Businesses have vastly different needs during the pandemic. For example, many companies have found that they can’t send out as many people to do in-person sales calls, but their call centers and online customer service centers have been overwhelmed. These different roles require some different skill sets. I’ve worked with businesses this year that have used an internal career marketplace to find who has the right skills and move people over, rather than laying off huge numbers from one division and hiring new people into others.

In a survey of 113 L&D leaders, “71 percent said that more than 40 percent of their workforce has needed new skills due to changes to work brought on by COVID-19,” Gartner reports. The research and advisory company recommends that leaders “foster internal movement across the organization by engaging employees to gauge their skills, goals and points of confusion around organizational skill needs.” These crucial steps are facilitated by an internal career marketplace.

Establishing one is part of a move toward greater internal mobility that HR, talent and learning professionals have rightfully been pushing in recent years. Randstad’s “2020 Talent Trends Report” found that “The percentage of companies that are increasing investments in internal mobility programs has grown from 39 percent in 2016 to 47 percent in 2020.” But those figures also show there’s a long way to go.

Of course, only having a marketplace isn’t enough. It needs to be backed up by what Deloitte calls a strong culture of internal mobility. Yes, “It’s not unusual for recruiters to be completely unaware that the best candidate for a position may already work inside the organization,” three Deloitte executives wrote. But, just as important, organizations must avoid turf wars in which units are afraid to “poach” talent from each other.

At Degreed, where I currently work, we’ve used our product Degreed Career Mobility to create our own internal career marketplace, giving us the ability to look inside the company first. And as a leader, I’m able to better guide our employees in their growth. All this gives me, and others, greater peace of mind — something we all could use amid this tumultuous year.

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To overcome business disruption, take a front-line-first approach

Mon, 12 Oct 2020 15:52:10 GMT

You cannot run your business without your front-line workforce.

Everyone already knows this, right? If your employees don’t do their jobs well, your organization can’t succeed. This is true at all levels, from the C-suite to the store floor. While the big decisions may be made in the corporate office, your strategy comes to life on the front line where employees interact directly with your customers and products every day.

Out of balance

Great performance is needed at all levels. However, the way many companies invest in their people is far from equal. There are the obvious compensation disparities. Last year, the CEO-to-typical worker compensation ratio was 278-to-1, according to the Economic Policy Institute. This imbalance extends to professional development. Front-line employees receive minimal training. According to the 2019 “State of Frontline Workplace Training in Retail” report from Ipsos and Axonify, front-line training is limited to a few times per year and usually focused on onboarding and compliance. Despite a stated desire to learn and improve their performance, these employees receive little ongoing development opportunity. It’s no wonder that turnover in front-line-heavy industries remained high even in a tight labor market. For example, retail and wholesale turnover was 60.5 percent in 2018, according to Mercer. Lack of career development was the No. 1 reason why people left their jobs in 2018, according to Work Institute.

The COVID-19 pandemic altered the recognition of the front-line workforce overnight. They didn’t just get noticed. Grocery clerks, retail employees, contact center agents and health care workers were declared heroes. Some employers temporarily increased front-line pay to recognize and motivate workers. Sick leave, which was previously considered an unrealistic luxury, became a necessity. Front-line employees emerged as the faces of brand campaigns. They were a familiar way to let customers know businesses were open and ready to provide safe, efficient service.

Front-line employees became heroes in March 2020. But will they still be heroes in March 2021?

Unnoticed heroes

From delivery drivers to warehouse workers, front-line employees have kept businesses and communities running since the start of the pandemic. However, their sweeping business impact didn’t just begin this year. The front line is regularly cited as a driving factor in customer decision-making. One-third of shoppers rate salespeople as the most impressive part of the retail experience, according to GetApp. And the No. 1 reason people dislike calling companies is the inability to speak with a person right away, according to NewVoiceMedia.

But it’s not just the perception of paying customers that makes the front line so important. They are also key drivers of internal transformation. Their performance determines the ultimate effectiveness of your business strategies. For example, according to McKinsey, 70 percent of customer experience transformations fail. But it’s not due to poor planning or lack of resources. Instead, it’s due to employee resistance.

We may not have called them heroes before the pandemic. But the front line was already supporting the weight of your business on their shoulders.

Out of reach

Why are so many organizations failing to provide their front-line workforces with the right level of support? Why do they treat these employees as replaceable? In many cases, management does recognize the impact the front line has on business outcomes. They respect and value these employees as part of their workplace culture. It often comes down to practicality: The front line is just too hard to reach.

Consider the logistics. Corporate team members are usually hired into specialist roles. They work in a limited number of locations. They’re easy to reach via email or chat. They have control over their schedules and can allocate time to professional development. Even with more people working from home now and into the future, the corporate workforce is easier to reach using traditional methods, such as instructor-led training and e-learning.

Front-line employees are the near opposite of their corporate counterparts. They work in generalist roles with large peer groups. They may or may not have experience in their industry’s work before joining the company. They work in disparate locations. They usually do not have corporate email or direct messaging. They are strictly scheduled with minimal time away from the operation. They’re often prohibited from doing any work-related tasks when off the clock. While some can work from home, most have to go to a job location to complete their shifts. Traditional training methods don’t align with the way they work. It’s too disruptive to the operation and prohibitively expensive at scale.

It’s not that most companies don’t want to provide better support to their front-line workforce — they just don’t know how to make it work.

A better approach

We’re all learning a lot this year. We’re learning what’s most important, both personally and professionally. We’re learning how to better support one another. We’re learning how much organizations really value their employees. And we’re learning that some companies were more prepared to handle this disruption than others.

That’s not to say some companies had a preemptive pandemic plan. No one was prepared to navigate the business landscape during a global health crisis. Nevertheless, some organizations have adapted more quickly. They have maintained (or even strengthened) their company cultures while also shifting how they do business. They have instilled trust and confidence in their front-line workers despite the added risks associated with doing their jobs.

Examples of these companies are popping up all over the world and in every industry. While their front lines do different jobs, these organizations approach front-line support in similar ways. Before the disruption began, they had all taken proactive steps to put their front lines first, starting with the following.

Mindset. “For us, the front line represents the bottom line.” Briscoe Group Limited, which operates 85 homeware and sporting goods stores across New Zealand, was forced to send their 1,900 employees home during a nationwide lockdown in March. Thankfully, the company had already adopted a “front-line-forward” mindset. They understood the value their employees deliver to the business and adopted a uniquely human approach to dealing with disruption. As Aston Moss, general manager of human resources, explained, the priority was helping people first and employees second: “How do we keep connected to our team and what do we need to do to give them peace of mind?” Once the government began to lift restrictions in April, they were able to transition their teams seamlessly back into the workplace and support them through ongoing operational adjustments.

A front-line-forward mindset stresses the connection between your employees and the everyday value your company delivers to customers. Jonathan Andrews is senior vice president of human resources and training at O’Reilly Auto Parts, which operates 5,512 stores in the U.S. and 21 in Mexico. He expressed this sentiment perfectly: “A customer that comes into a store is not coming there because they want to be there. They have a problem they need to solve. And that front-line employee is critical to our business.” This connection must be well-articulated throughout the business, from the C-suite to regional management.

Communication. Awareness is an essential part of a front-line-forward strategy. Too often, employees struggle and disengage simply because the organization does not have a consistent, expeditious way of getting them information. Bulletin boards and team meetings are insufficient, especially during times of major disruption. Moss nailed it when he said, “In pandemic planning — and most things HR — the three most important things are communication, communication, communication.”

Front-line-forward companies are adopting modern communication methods so they can stay in contact with their entire workforce, regardless of the situation. They’re introducing digital apps that allow stakeholders throughout the business, including executives, to send media-rich messages to every employee, not just the ones with a company email. They’re also overcoming long-standing obstacles to bring-your-own-device, or BYOD, policies so workers can access digital content on their favorite devices rather than be limited to shared workstations.

Continuous reskilling and upskilling. A front-line-forward organization understands that learning is not a scheduled event. It’s part of an employee’s job, even if they are busy most of the time supporting customers. By promoting continuous learning, these companies provide employees with the resources they need to do their best work every day while also developing the knowledge and skills they will apply in the future. They bring opportunities to the employees rather than forcing them to find time on their own. According to Gianna Venturi, chief people officer at Eyemart Express, “The world’s moving too fast. We need to be a lot quicker. We need something that meets people where they are, and literally, that could be on the retail floor.”

Reaching employees where they are requires more than BYOD. These companies are restructuring the way they provide skill development training. For example, rather than provide a 45-minute course on new workplace health and safety standards, HR works with subject matter experts to build microlearning focused on specific skills, such as workplace sanitization and serving customers while wearing a mask. These topics, which include video, interactive modules and scenario-based assessments, can be completed in less than five minutes. The content is used to rapidly reskill and upskill employees based on both personal needs and business priorities. This behavior-based approach makes skill development an integral part of an employee’s everyday workload.

Front-line-forward organizations also recognize the importance of managers as part of employee development. Managers heavily influence job performance. They control factors such as scheduling, prioritization and resourcing. While stakeholders and HR teams support the front line from afar, managers are in the operation with them during every shift. This is why front-line-forward organizations prioritize manager development. They provide managers with the ongoing training, resources and data-driven insights needed to improve their coaching and feedback skills.

Value realization. Becoming front-line-forward begins with mindset, but this mindset must be validated by measurable outcomes. Of course, providing professional development to your front-line workforce is the right thing to do. It must also drive the kinds of results that will help the business survive disruption and succeed into the future.

The value of front-line training can be measured in a variety of ways. It starts with engagement. Are people choosing to dedicate their limited time to skill development activities because they understand the value? From there, a continuous approach to learning allows organizations to measure changes in knowledge and job behaviors. Is the training actually helping employees solve problems and improve their performance? Then, there are key performance indicators. Front-line-forward organizations are applying modern data and machine learning techniques to connect front-line development with improvements in sales, customer satisfaction, safety and a variety of other KPIs. Front-line training is not about checking boxes. These companies are making sure compliance requirements are met while providing ongoing, personalized skill development to their entire front-line workforces.

Becoming front-line-forward

Most people have been operating for months in “survival mode.” This is now just giving way to long-term strategy conversations. What will your business look like in six, 18 or 36 months? What role will you need your front-line workforce to play so you can keep your business moving forward? What can you learn from companies that have been able to navigate unprecedented disruption more effectively because they became front-line-forward?

Eighty percent of the global workforce is on the front line. Disruption may have changed the way they do their jobs, but they remain the ultimate driver of business success. As Rebecca Sinclair, chief people officer at American Tire Distributors, put it “No matter the company or industry, you need to invest in your front-line people. They’re your connection to the customer experience.”

Heroes aren’t just the ones who swoop in to catch you at the last moment before you hit the ground. They’re also the people who are always there, whether you notice them or not, to prevent you from falling in the first place. The front line became our heroes in March 2020. They should still be our heroes in March 2021.

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Collaborative leadership: An antidote for a turbulent world

Thu, 08 Oct 2020 15:12:05 GMT

For several years now, many management authors have been discussing how the volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous world in which we live requires a new set of leadership skills. The health and financial crisis brought on by covid-19 has greatly amplified this. On the current global stage, it is largely women who are standing out as effective leaders, praised by Forbes and other media publications for their handling of the pandemic. As Nicholas Kristof noted in The New York Times, “It’s not that the leaders who best managed the virus were all women. But those who bungled the response were all men, and mostly a particular type: authoritarian, vainglorious and blustering.”

It is not so much gender that is a differentiator in leadership success during these VUCA times; what is really at play is a fundamental difference in style. Men are demonstrating traditional command-and-control leadership while women are demonstrating collaborative leadership.
What is it about these two very different leadership styles that cause failure or success in turbulent times? Based on our research and more than 25 years as leadership development practitioners, we think it boils down to how power and information are shared.

For many years, the “hero” leaders in industry tended to be strong, forceful, charismatic and authoritarian. This traditional leadership model is often associated with what Carol Dweck labeled a fixed mindset. The fixed mindset believes that we have a certain amount of ability that is fixed and unchangeable, and that people rise to the top because they have the greatest abilities and are the “smartest person in the room.” As a result, the traditional CEO approach is to gather information, analyze the situation or problem using their superior ability, and then direct everyone to carry out their plans.

Yet, with the coronavirus, we are dealing with a novel disease for which no one has clear answers. The pandemic has presented us with both a health crisis and a business/economic crisis that include a large amount of uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity. No one person has the necessary knowledge and experience to solve these problems alone — it requires multiple people with different kinds of expertise and the ability to work together to create novel solutions.

1. Assemble a group with diverse expertise and experience.

The collaborative CEO approach is to evaluate a variety of different sources of information and expertise and incorporate other people into the decision-making process. It’s an approach that draws from diverse perspectives, thereby stimulating collective problem-solving. The collaborative CEO can do this because they don’t feel a need to be “the smartest person in the room” who knows all the answers.

In our research with collaborative male leaders, a key characteristic that emerged was their ability to temper their ego. In side-stepping ego, they focus outside of themselves and beyond their self-interests. Because they are not striving to prove themselves and bolster their position of authority, they are able to be vulnerable. By admitting they do not have all the answers, they become more approachable, attracting a network of support.

2. Share power and information liberally.

In a traditional organizational structure, role responsibilities and levels of authority are clearly spelled out. When issues or problems occur, the information is pulled together and referred to the person who has the appropriate authority to make a decision. In crisis conditions, decision-making is often pushed higher up in the organization. But as we have seen during this pandemic, leaders using this model were too slow to act.

Collaborative leaders organize differently. They share power and information with their teams. Information flows easily and doesn’t get hung up in the bottlenecks created by “need-to-know” hierarchies. This information flow breaks away from the paradigm of a linearly controlled process to a matrixed connective process so that things can happen fast and everyone can quickly get on the same page to take action.

With continual dialogue up, down and across the organization, there is a level of coordination in how people’s thinking evolves because they are hearing the same thing at the same time. There is no staccato transmission of information where some people are more in-the-know and have had more time to digest and process what they’ve heard. In addition to accelerating action, the perpetual conversation allows for a constant infusion of new information and ideas from a broad, diverse circle of people and for changing direction when necessary.

This efficiency of information flow and speed to take action is often a challenge in a traditional authoritarian-led structure. People at the ground level who observe a problem can hesitate to raise the issue for fear of telling their senior leaders something they don’t want to hear. As Amy Edmonson points out, employees are often afraid to speak up or ask a question in this kind of culture because they might be punished for their comments or look stupid. If a person makes a mistake, the tendency is to be unwilling to admit it or to look for someone else to blame to avoid the criticism or punishment. This environment generally leads to inaction as subordinates will sit back and wait for instruction rather than take a risk and jump to action.

Further reinforcing this culture of inaction is that leaders in these organizations are often viewed as infallible. When they project an image of being in total command, not showing any mistakes or vulnerability, it sends a message that subordinates should behave the same way. Making a mistake is viewed as an indicator of a person not being smart enough.

3. Empathize, listen and relate.

Collaborative leaders create a culture of trust where people will speak up, share ideas and not be muted by fear. They build connections with and among people at a personal level by tapping into our shared humanity. They create common ground that diminishes hierarchical differences and values inclusiveness and empathy, which helps people feel more secure during crisis and change. Collaborative leaders ask questions, listen and respect all. And in doing so, they communicate “I care, I’m interested and I understand.” They establish a sense of community and belonging.

Key takeaways

During times of change and turbulence, in stark view during the pandemic, it is collaborative leaders who are the most effective. Foundationally, they leave ego out of the proceedings and thereby can reach out for help. They utilize and involve people who have relevant expertise in analyzing the issues and making a decision. They connect with people on a personal level, they connect others and they are inclusive, offsetting the isolating feelings associated with losing our familiar world and venturing into the great unknown future. Their openness engenders trust and a sense of security in those they lead. As a result, collaborative leaders are successfully navigating the turbulence of the pandemic by quickly assessing the situation, acting promptly and decisively, adapting as circumstances continue to develop, and gaining the respect and cooperation of their people.

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From higher ed to PepsiCo CLO

Tue, 06 Oct 2020 16:32:14 GMT

Illustrations by Jonathan Bartlett.

In 2018, PepsiCo, the global food and beverage giant, was on the verge of major change. It had just named Ramon Laguarta as its new chairman and CEO, taking over for Indra Nooyi, who is credited with making PepsiCo one of the most successful food and beverage companies in the world during her 12-year tenure.

Laguarta planned to continue that transformation by driving rapid growth through a “winning with purpose” attitude. To achieve that goal, the company needed to shift its leadership culture to adopt a more long-term view of developing and reskilling the workforce, says Sergio Ezama, PepsiCo’s chief talent officer and CHRO of global functions and groups. “It was an opportunity to think differently about the future of talent development.”

That led PepsiCo to hire Molly Nagler as the company’s new chief learning officer.

“PepsiCo has a history of hiring from within,” Ezama says. Typically the company fosters talent over many years, so that when they move high performers into leadership roles they are familiar with the company culture and ways of working. Laguarta, for example, came to the CEO role after more than two decades working his way up the ranks, and Ezama was promoted to chief talent officer after 17 years with the company.

But Nagler was different. Not only had she never held a job at PepsiCo, she’d spent most of her career in academia.

Berkeley beginnings

After a brief stint as a copy editor, Nagler completed a two-year Master’s program in public policy analysis at the University of California, Berkeley. The program was focused on analytics and quantitative methods, which complimented Nagler’s passion for higher education. So when she was offered a position as director of academic planning at Berkeley’s Haas School of Business, it felt like a perfect fit. “It was like doing HR for faculty,” Nagler says.

She initially supported recruiting and promotion of tenured academics and helped them manage their balance of teaching and research. She then transitioned to director of strategic alliances for executive education at Haas, where she found her niche.

Nagler used her knowledge of the faculty’s expertise and interests to help executive education clients understand what value the university’s faculty could bring. “I was talking to [large, global] companies who were looking for external expertise on learning and development,” she says. Knowing which faculty excelled in which topics and who had the case studies and business perspective to inspire an executive audience helped her thrive in the role. “I was able to represent the faculty to the client and get the benefit of understanding what learning and development looks like inside of companies,” she says.

She learned about the external support structures, what learning formats and content types had the biggest impact, and how they planned and budgeted for these events. “Executive education is like consulting,” Nagler says. “You’re helping clients solve problems via education.”

The Yale years

In 2014, Nagler was offered a similar role at Yale University in Connecticut, which brought her back to the East Coast where she grew up. Yale had a smaller executive education group and was only doing customized programs at the time. But Nagler used her experience at Berkeley to expand the department’s portfolio of offerings.

“Molly is so full of energy, it uplifted the whole team,” says Tracy Sheerin, senior director of digital learning for executive education at Yale.

Nagler knew that in order to expand the program she had to first get faculty on board with teaching exec ed courses, even though she had no authority over them. She met with them individually and in groups, helping them see the opportunity in teaching executive education and the value it could bring to the university and their own careers. “Executive education is not part of the required teaching loads, so we had to get them excited about helping these companies in order to convince them to do it,” Nagler says.

Once faculty were on board, Sheerin and Nagler began actively promoting the program — and it quickly blossomed. Under Nagler’s leadership and through the strong relationships she built with faculty and staff, the department was transformed. “Molly led a huge era of expansion for executive education,” Sheerin says. During her tenure, the program doubled its revenue, built a large open enrollment portfolio of courses and launched a series of e-learning courses.

Sheerin attributes their success to Nagler’s willingness to experiment. “There are no crazy ideas with Molly,” she says. “If you have a good reason to try something, she’ll try it.”

PepsiCo comes calling

Nagler might have stayed in the world of exec ed for the rest of her career. But in 2018 she got a call from a headhunter looking for PepsiCo’s new CLO, and it was too good of an offer to resist.
With all the changes in leadership happening at the company at the time, Ezama and other decision-makers felt that a leader from outside the company — and even outside the industry — would bring a fresh perspective on how to achieve the company’s accelerated growth goals.

The company was looking for someone who was a true learning leader, but who had the experience and charisma to translate that to a corporate environment. Nagler’s work in executive education seemed like the perfect fit, Ezama says. “She straddled both worlds.”

Nagler also brought a fresh perspective to the team, says Byron Johnson, senior director of PepU, PepsiCo’s corporate university. “She wasn’t bogged down in the old ways of doing things,” he says. That made it easier for her to try new ideas and figure out what would work.

With the new long-term focus on the future, Nagler and Ezama were able to pursue projects that required a bigger up-front investment with a longer payoff, notes Ezama. In the past, leaders like Nagler faced pressure to deliver a rapid ROI, but the focus on the future gave her the space to make bigger changes, he says. That included rolling out new technology platforms and transforming the learning workflow.

Learners take the wheel

When Nagler joined PepsiCo, Johnson, who had acted as interim CLO, worked closely with her to get her acclimated to the corporate culture, and to figure out what — and who — to prioritize.

To accommodate Laguarta’s vision of accelerated transformation, the learning department knew they had to give employees greater control over their learning journey, Johnson says. That led to their first big project: launching Degreed in April 2020.

Degreed is an online learning platform that connects learning and career growth to business needs and allows users to learn and measure their skills in a single platform. PepsiCo had been planning to roll out Degreed prior to Nagler’s arrival, but she led the implementation.

Degreed addressed a number of learning goals that are part of the company’s transformation. It streamlined access to learning, empowered employees to select content that aligns with their career, and gave managers a way to curate and share content with their teams. Degreed provides access to its own content along with all of PepsiCo’s custom courses and other content libraries, which include Skillsoft and Accenture Academy.

Tying the existing content to the new platform has elevated the entire learning offering, because it’s all front-and-center and much easier to access. “We’re getting more return on those investments and teaching our partners how to leverage what we have before we create expensive, bespoke learning assets,” Nagler says. It also reflects the more learner-empowered philosophy governing the learning culture at PepsiCo. “It is democratized learning because anyone can create learning paths, and anyone can share content.”

To ensure employees find the right content, the platform uses machine learning algorithms to suggest content based on each learner’s profile, past choices and content used by people in similar roles or career paths. “The learner experience has improved dramatically,” she says. It’s also widely embraced. The learning department’s goal was to have 25,000 active users by the end of 2020. As of July, they had reached 35,000. “Degreed has been a game-changer for the company,” Nagler says.

Learning isn’t always the answer

Nagler is also working behind the scenes to bolster the centralized learning department. PepsiCo’s corporate structure is largely decentralized, with self-contained learning teams serving autonomous business units.

This is where Nagler’s experience at Yale and Berkeley came in handy. Like the academic faculty she worked with in the past, these learning teams do not report to Nagler, which meant she had to win them over. She started by reimagining the mission. “The central question in a company that is decentralized by design is what is the added value of a corporate learning function,” she says.

While there is no single answer, Nagler landed on an overarching strategy — to offer honest guidance in solving real business problems, whether they are training-related or not. “Sometimes you have to have the right questioning and listening skills to find out what’s wrong,” she says.

Using that strategy as a jumping-off point, Nagler created a learner experience consulting team, which now fields requests for training from all of the business units and helps their learning teams find the best solutions where appropriate. While in some cases the problem involves a skill gap or behavior issue that can be addressed by training, in others the solution may require hiring new staff or implementing new technology. “Being able to think analytically and be dispassionate about what we offer prevents us from being in a situation where everything’s a hammer looking for a nail,” she says.

Virtual training in the time of COVID

These days, Nagler’s focus has shifted to meeting the needs of virtual learners during the pandemic. As with all the challenges Nagler has faced in her career, she’s treating it like a chance to innovate. “It’s been a huge upskilling opportunity for my team and for the learning partners across the company to quickly understand what makes for excellent learning experiences online,” she says.

They are also moving almost the entire portfolio of training online and launching new resources focused on teaching learning leaders how to excel in this environment. “It’s been a huge upskilling opportunity to understand what makes for excellent learning experiences online and to look at new technologies, simulations and games,” she says.

That includes adapting the company’s high-potential learning strategy for a virtual world. In the past, hi-po learning opportunities often included added perks, like travel to exotic locations or special events. But that’s no longer possible.

It’s causing Nagler to focus more on personalization as an added value. “We are taking a white glove approach to the high-potential group,” she says. Along with curating specific development plans, her team hopes to take a more active role in advising hi-pos and find opportunities to expand their experiences through things like speaking engagements and sitting on nonprofit boards. “These are things that you wouldn’t traditionally consider developmental opportunities, but why not?” Nagler says.

Looking ahead to 2021, Nagler plans to tackle the next big hurdle: learning outcomes measurement. Her team already adopted a strategy for using evaluation questions developed by researchers at IMD Business School in Switzerland. The questions are based on the elements of learning design that create the most impact from a program, she explains. Nagler’s team will be able to benchmark results against IMD’s database of outcomes and to correlate them to rates of promotion, performance scores and other relevant talent metrics. “Little by little we’ll amass this data set, and we’ll expand as we go.”

Along with providing feedback once courses are rolled out, she believes the questions will shift the learning design process. “The questions will force us to design programs in a way that caters to these elements,” she says. “It’s a very healthy disciplinary measure.”

A bright future

Nagler admits that the jump from academia to PepsiCo was disruptive, but she figured out how to transition her skills for the corporate world.

“I think the key is to lean into your fresh perspective and the credibility of your external experience, but always couch it into the context of the company that you’re in,” she says. “That way people will accept your ideas as something that’s plausible and that could work.”

Her willingness to tackle any challenge has also helped her win points, Johnson adds. “She acknowledges that we are doing a great job and then asks, ‘How can we make it even better?” he says. “That positive attitude is a breath of fresh air.”

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Adopting a coaching mindset for leadership

Tue, 06 Oct 2020 16:03:00 GMT

Traditional managers and leaders tell you what to do. But adopting a coaching mindset in leadership — asking rather than telling — opens a lot of doors for leaders and their teams, says Magdalena Mook, CEO at the International Coaching Federation. When she tried this with her team, she saw nearly automatic buy-in from everyone when she asked for their input.

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Executive order takes aim at diversity training, starting with new restrictions on federal ...

Thu, 01 Oct 2020 21:45:04 GMT

On September 22, 2020, President Trump signed an Executive Order on Combating Race and Sex Stereotyping. The order seeks to regulate how diversity training is conducted within the federal government as well as by federal contractors and recipients of federal grants. It also seeks to lay the groundwork for its restrictions to potentially be expanded more broadly into federal guidance on hostile work environment discrimination. In particular, the order takes aim at the inclusion of certain topics, which it defines as “divisive concepts,” in workplace training programs.

New rules for federal contractors as well as their subcontractors and vendors

Federal contractors, as well as their subcontractors and vendors, will be directly impacted by this new order. Most notably, federal contractors will be prohibited from providing any workplace training that teaches any of the “divisive concepts” (as defined by the order). Federal contractors will also be required to include similar prohibitions in most of their subcontractor and vendor contracts for the purpose of binding the subcontractors and vendors to the order and its prohibitions on training topics. In addition, federal contractors will be required to send notices about the order to labor unions, if applicable, and to post such notices at the workplace.

These new requirements will take effect for most government contracts entered into after November 21, 2020.

Potential future implications for federal grant recipients

The order does not yet extend its training prohibitions to all federal grant recipients. Rather, it directs the heads of all federal executive departments and agencies to review their respective grant programs and to identify programs for which the agency may, as a condition of receiving such a grant, require the recipient to certify that it will not use federal funds to promote “divisive concepts” (as defined by the order). The agencies are further required to submit a report of all such grant programs by November 21, 2020.

The order’s definition of ‘divisive concepts’

The order defines “divisive concepts” to include the following:

One race or sex is inherently superior to another race or sex.
An individual, by virtue of his or her race or sex, is inherently racist, sexist or oppressive, whether consciously or unconsciously.
An individual should be discriminated against or receive adverse treatment solely or partly because of his or her race or sex.
Members of one race or sex cannot and should not attempt to treat others without respect to race or sex.
An individual’s moral character is necessarily determined by his or her race or sex.
An individual, by virtue of his or her race or sex, bears responsibility for actions committed in the past by other members of the same race or sex.
Any individual should feel discomfort, guilt, anguish or any other form of psychological distress on account of his or her race or sex.
Meritocracy or traits such as a hard work ethic are racist or sexist, or were created by a particular race to oppress another race.

The order further provides that “divisive concepts” also include: (1) “ascribing character traits, values, moral and ethical codes, privileges, status, or beliefs to a race or sex, or to an individual because of his or her race or sex”; (2) “assigning fault, blame, or bias to a race or sex, or to members of a race or sex because of their race or sex”; and (3) “any claim that, consciously or unconsciously, and by virtue of his or her race or sex, members of any race are inherently racist or are inherently inclined to oppress others, or that members of a sex are inherently sexist or inclined to oppress others.”

Enforcement of the order

The U.S. Department of Labor has been tasked with enforcing the order and establishing a hotline for the receipt and investigation of complaints relevant to training programs that allegedly violate the order.

If a federal contractor violates the order, it may see the federal contract terminated or suspended, it may be barred from further business with the federal government and it may be subject to additional sanctions by the U.S. Department of Labor.

Potential impact on Title VII

The order separately instructs the U.S. Attorney General to assess the extent to which teaching about “divisive concepts” (as defined in the order) “may contribute to a hostile work environment and give rise to potential liability under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964[.]” The order further instructs the U.S. Attorney General and the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to issue public guidance as may be appropriate.

Next steps for employers

It is anticipated that the order may be subject to several legal challenges — both with respect to its implementation and its overall legality. However, the order is in effect until further notice and employers — particularly federal contractors — need to be prepared for potential compliance.

Given some of the order’s broad language, it is very possible that common elements of diversity training programs (e.g., implicit bias training) could potentially fall within the order’s prohibitions. Therefore, federal contractors, as well as their subcontractors and vendors, should review their training programs and materials to identify any portion that may be considered a “divisive concept” (as defined by the order). They will then need to examine those issues closely to determine whether they need to be modified and/or eliminated in order to comply with the order’s restrictions.

Sean and Cassandra may be reached at (617) 523-6666 or at soconnor@morganbrown.com and csantoro@morganbrown.com. Morgan, Brown & Joy LLP focuses exclusively on representing employers in employment and labor matters.

This publication, which may be considered advertising under the ethical rules of certain jurisdictions, should not be construed as legal advice or a legal opinion on any specific facts or circumstances by Morgan, Brown & Joy, LLP and its attorneys. This is intended for general information purposes only and you should consult an attorney concerning any specific legal questions you may have.

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Checking the DEI box is not enough

Thu, 01 Oct 2020 19:45:46 GMT

The protests and outrage sparked by the killings of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and too many others this year forced many of us to ask ourselves difficult questions about our role in perpetuating or combatting institutional racism. What am I doing to make things better for the BIPOC community? Do I have any unconscious biases that are holding me back?

Many in the business community are taking this moment of reflection to apply these same questions to their companies. As a result, we’ve seen many brands — including my organization, OpenSesame — issue statements pledging to review their business practices, products and service delivery models with the goal of making them more inclusive.

But meaningful change cannot start and end with just this initial action. A true cultural shift requires an ongoing commitment to learn, understand, engage and act. Even in organizations where DEI work is already underway, we can still do more or do better to reflect the diversity of the world we live in and represent the variety of perspectives that make up our communities. In addition to taking concrete steps to further your DEI strategy — engaging a consultant or hiring an internal DEI expert, investing in tools to assess your organization’s equity, creating opportunities for your workforce to have meaningful conversations — you can commit to yourself and your team to continue making DEI a core part of your people and business strategies.

As leaders in the L&D industry and our respective organizations, we have both a unique opportunity and an obligation to help drive that change — by setting the tone and providing training that helps companies become more open to different perspectives and building a workforce that can truly make a difference.

Making a statement is one thing. Making real change is hard.

For companies that hope to innovate and make a lasting impact on their industry, DEI must play an integral role in their strategy for the future. This counters the current minimally viable standard we often see today, where diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives are often viewed as simply an HR compliance requirement.

Companies that take DEI progress seriously will shape the new standards for their workforces and society. Organizations that intentionally create an environment where differences — including race, faith, age, ability, gender and beyond — are meaningfully explored and valued give all employees the opportunity to do their best work and better equip themselves to recruit and retain talent.

There’s a clear opportunity for corporate learning initiatives to have an impact on DEI improvement at the business level that goes beyond just scratching the surface. It’s time for leaders to accelerate the development of their workforce with continued education and training to realize their company’s full potential. In the future, when we look back on this period, we will see that it was the companies that took a proactive and purpose-driven approach now to create cultures of respect and inclusion that became the strongest and most successful companies.

Having the right learning content is key to getting started.

Education is an incredibly powerful tool to open people’s minds to new perspectives, but learning initiatives are only as effective as the content powering them. For companies to make real change, they must align their L&D content and strategy.

Truly effective DEI training helps staff across every level of the organization understand their role in creating an inclusive environment and overcoming bias. The right content should include courses built for both leaders and employees that cover a variety of topics, from cultural awareness to respect in the workplace. When teams have the tools that inspire conversations, companies will unlock a culture of innovation that ensures great ideas are elevated.

One-off training or consulting stands no chance against the inherent biases, conscious and unconscious, that challenge progress within organizations and in society as a whole. Businesses that intend to make lasting changes must fully commit to deconstructing the systems that perpetuate these biases and build self-sustaining systems that both prevent the return of racism and accelerate the advancement of diversity.

Taking concrete action won’t be easy, but companies can start by providing employees with the support to promote respect and inclusivity in the workplace and beyond. Some companies will get it wrong, making short-term investments that give employees the illusion that DEI is only a passing priority. Organizations that truly integrate DEI initiatives as part of their business strategy, however, will become the organizations of choice for the best and most committed workers that every company seeks to attract.

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Leading in the throes of pandemic

Thu, 01 Oct 2020 15:18:05 GMT

We often learn the most about leadership during times of crisis. As people around the world grapple with the ambiguity and potential impacts of a virus that has spread to more than 100 countries, sickened more than 18.6 million people, and caused over 701,000 deaths to date, leaders are being asked to step up to the plate. In an effort to support our clients through these difficult times, The Leadership Development Group canvassed leadership experts across the globe on three critical areas of focus for leaders navigating these challenging waters.

1. Decompression and practicality

When it comes to COVID-19 there are still many unknowns for individuals questioning the impact it will have on them, their families and their communities. While skeptics draw comparisons between the scale of seasonal influenza epidemics, which result in 3-5 million global cases of severe illness a year, and COVID-19, a key differentiator is that we understand seasonal flu very well. The unknowns associated with COVID-19 spawn panic and anxiety, which have been demonstrated to negatively impact the ability to long-term plan, calculate the consequences of risk and reward, regulate emotions, problem-solve and make quality decisions.

What can you do to demonstrate decompression and practicality?

Balance the unknowns with practicality and proactiveness. As leaders, we make decisions based on what we know, and adapt and adjust as needed when new information comes in. Leaders can remain focused on “the givens” to inform what can be done to best prepare. Relieving the burden of having to predict the unknowable can help leaders execute sound decision-making in the here and now.

Practice “mindful leadership” by being fully present for others. Through mindful leadership, leaders can support employees that may be experiencing panic or anxiety and help guide them toward focus, clarity, creative problem solving and action.

Carve out “heads up” time for strategic thinking. Provide yourself and employees dedicated time to dive deeper on how to approach a challenge, reach a point of comfortable preparedness and complete associated tasks. This creates the space to decompress and reason through the matter at hand.

2. Clear communication and decisive action

Crises are time-sensitive events that require quick decisions and actions to reduce and contain the potential for harm. In the absence of clear and consistent information about what actions will be taken at the government or enterprise level, people are left to guess the probability of needing to manage everything themselves. Currently the media is flooded with conflicting messages about the risk coronavirus poses and how seriously people should prepare for it, causing many to resort to the extreme under the assumption that special danger must require special precautions.

What can you do to demonstrate clear communication and decisive action?

Aim for quick and meaningful action. Intellectual preparedness alone is not enough. Organizational leaders should communicate how critical decisions will be made and operationalized in a time-sensitive matter. Controversial and high-profile challenges such as COVID-19 typically attract review by corporate affairs, legal, risk management and a host of other functions. If you find your organization bogged down by bureaucracy, ensure you have a small, trusted team with appropriate decision-making authority and remind individuals that refraining from or delaying action is a form of response with implications of its own.

To reduce rumors, be honest. Communication should be frequent, honest and not exaggeratedly reassuring. It is important to communicate both what is known as well as what is unknown, uncertain or hypothesized. Frequent, honest communication can reduce organizational rumors and needless anxiety and fear.

Credibility begets believability. During a crisis it is imperative to communicate in a way that persuades people to take harm-reducing actions; much of this is driven by whether the message received is determined to be credible. Credibility is a function of both trustworthiness and expertise. In the face of so much conflicting information it is important for leaders to articulate intentions, relevant expertise and the quality of any sources used when communicating about COVID-19.

3. Empathy and community

Coronavirus and the incurring media hype seem to have engendered a sort of survivalist psychology across the public, where rational people participate in behaviors such as panic buying of toilet paper and looting of N95 masks. This psychological shift has worrying implications on two fronts. First, hoarding of resources can result in less access for those in greatest need such as the elderly, immunocompromised and frontline healthcare workers. Second, during times of crisis, racial stereotyping and distrust of others can become default behavior as people look for somewhere to place blame.

What can you do to demonstrate empathy and community?

Double down on your common purpose. A sense of shared purpose is a powerful uniting force during a time that could easily spiral into divisiveness. Explicitly stating your company’s purpose and committing to having the organization revolve around that purpose has been demonstrated to increase employee engagement and organizational commitment during difficult times.

Intentionally foster a sense of inclusivity. Leaders can remain mindful of personal and organizational blind spots while staying vigilant of how the psychology of COVID-19 may impact the environment of the organization or community. In-the-moment interventions are important to stop the spread of xenophobic misinformation.

Encourage communities to support those most at risk. Encourage employees and community members to maintain a sense of rationality and inclusive kindness and create plans to monitor the well-being of those most at risk. In the face of wide-spread anxiety it’s important to take a detailed census of those most vulnerable and consider putting systems in place to check in on them and ensure they have access to necessary resources such as extra groceries.

Today’s leaders face a unique and never-before-seen set of challenges as the steward of their organizations and communities through these challenging times. As organizational leaders, you have the ability to turn crisis into shared purpose that will strengthen your organization and community for the long-term.

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6 ways executive education will never be the same

Wed, 30 Sep 2020 16:44:11 GMT

It’s broadly accepted that COVID-19 has accelerated digital transformation efforts for most organizations by approximately two to three years. From client-facing activities to administrative functions, a range of platforms and tools have quickly been assembled to help workers collaborate, communicate, innovate and actively maintain their levels of performance at every turn.

Such efforts have –– perhaps somewhat surprisingly –– had the overall effect of expanding rather than limiting workforce potential. Case in point: The first research out of Harvard on productivity during the pandemic indicates that, on average, the American workday has been extended by nearly 49 minutes (essentially an hour of extra work time).

For the executive education industry, these developments have significant implications. In a world where in-person strategy sessions, weekend retreats and immersive seminars have long been the status quo, alternatives for distance learning suddenly became necessary overnight. Yet where traditional education models might be suffering, executive education is looking at a brand new era that has some unexpected advantages.

As executive education deals with the onslaught of COVID-19, experts suggest benefits can actually be enhanced by online learning (as opposed to merely being reproduced in a socially distanced format). “Executive education previously provided a number of different values for participants, including the learning, networking and credentials from top schools,” says Robert Hsiung, China CEO of executive education tech company ERUDITUS, adding, “As exec ed moves to virtual-distance models, the focus has been magnified on the learning.” The COVID-19 era, Hsiung notes, appears to have placed more emphasis on solution-driven techniques than ever before. This amounts to a major win for individuals looking to develop their executive skill set.

But beyond this obvious victory for learners, the shift in executive learning development seems to offer advantages for organizations as well. Indeed, Shaun Rozyn, managing director of Darden Executive Education at the University of Virginia, insists the benefits of virtual executive education models will be twofold: “Learners will benefit from more options, opportunity and personalization as learning is better curated to truly empower organizational outcomes. Similarly, organizations will benefit from more impactful and packaged content and deployment options.”

With this in mind, we’ve provided a brief overview of the potential benefits of post-coronavirus executive education curricula for a) executives in search of new tools and b) educational organizations hoping to impart their knowledge and improve business processes. Note: Many of these advantages, though they’ve emerged during COVID-19, will also apply once the crisis subsides. (That is, there’s no set timeline for reaping some of these unanticipated rewards.)

COVID-19 reality benefits for executive learners

Virtual executive education prepares learners to meet the moment. Online collaboration in the age of COVID has exposed a wide variety of organizational vulnerabilities. Executives whose long list of daily to-dos isolated them from activities further down the pyramid, for example, may now be suddenly aware of serious labor distribution problems, thanks to virtual task management tools such as Slack or Trello.

But the immediacy of online executive education can help alert learners to these types of problems and provide them with the tools they’ll need to react in near-real time. This responsiveness will prove invaluable in an environment where constant change is the only norm. “Many individuals must reskill to meet the demands of today and succeed,” Mary Carey, regional director for the Americas at INSEAD Education, observes, adding, “Virtual executive education future-proofs executives against becoming obsolete in a time when business is changing so rapidly.”

Distanced education means more options. In an instant, COVID leveled the playing field for all exec ed programs, no matter their reputation. With no exclusive getaways or exciting retreats to offer, programmers were obliged to focus even more intently on content and accessibility if they had any hope of standing out.

And, just like that, executive education became mostly a buyer’s market.

As Ashwin Damera, co-founder & CEO of ERUDITUS, notes, this shift means individuals in search of supplementary executive education have a lot to gain. In fact, Damera predicts three positive post-COVID outcomes for learners: “More online courses will be offered in open enrollment. This will make executive education more accessible to participants who cannot come to campus. [In addition] more online content will be blended into custom offerings. This will provide for better design, more flexibility and scalable learning solutions. [Finally,] more global participants can be reached by business schools, especially by offering courses in different languages. Again, this will dramatically improve access.”

Executive education online helps close the “skills transfer gap.” A 2019 Harvard Business Review article titled “The Future of Leadership Development” cited the “skills transfer gap” (i.e., the phenomenon whereby a thing that is learned is rarely implemented in real life) as one of the biggest complaints in the exec ed sphere. The explanation? As the article observes, research performed by cognitive, educational and applied psychologists suggests the answer lies in “the distance between where a skill is learned … and where it is applied.”

Here again, the immediacy of online learning can help. In addition to improving response times so executives can remain adaptable while the world is in flux, virtual executive education can bridge the skills transfer gap by offering easily accessible and highly scalable “learning solutions” on demand. Learners can effectively take on a new skill and then get busy applying it from the comfort of their home office, all with virtually no turnaround time. This means the likelihood that they’ll retain the information they’ve learned (and be able to use it in the future) will increase.

Post-COVID-19 benefits for executive education organizations

Executive education organizations now have an added competitive edge. In an environment characterized by uncertainty, extensive knowledge and careful preparation can be powerful weapons. Exec ed is now in the unique position of being able to offer both –– all while adhering to social distancing rules.

“Some organizations and businesses will use the current crisis to come out ahead of the competition [and] executive education is an effective lever to do so,” Carey notes. In other words: Executive learners will need every tool in their arsenal to take on the COVID-19 challenge and succeed –– and executive education can help them add to their weapons stockpile. More education means more options in the face of adversity, so it follows that more learners will want to invest in executive education solutions as the market absorbs the blow of COVID-19 and slowly moves toward recovery. This means executive education occupies a space many will be desperate to fill, which paves the way for a potential boom. And since exec solutions will be offered digitally, learners may be even more inclined to sign on, as the logistic demands will be low and the return on investment high.

Virtual executive education will attract even more learners. As your executive education solution adapts to our new reality, it simultaneously has the ability to broaden its scope. Just as virtual executive education models mean more accessibility for learners, digital transformation means a larger pool of potential participants for executive education organizations. As Damera mentioned above, COVID-19 has effectively brought executive education directly into our homes across the globe –– expanding executive learner horizons and extending executive education’s reach. If your organization wants its curriculum to attract more eyes and ears, COVID-19 just made that possible.

COVID-19 restrictions force a refocus on quality. With the bells and whistles of executive education removed, organizations have an opportunity to restructure their lesson plans and place even more emphasis on leadership development. Hsiung notes that, post-COVID-19, the ultimate deciding factor in choosing an executive education organization will be whether or not its curriculum can provide value. Organizations will therefore be obliged to streamline lessons into an online format and ensure workshops and seminars pack as much punch as possible. Translation? If you’ve always wanted to do a deep dive on a subject like game theory but found one-off events too restrictive, now’s your chance. Thanks to virtual transformation, every minute of your time can now be used for education. This can lead to more comprehensive learning models, which can enhance overall value and generate more interest.

Obviously, exec ed’s transitional phase will be ongoing, and much of the end result will be shaped by participants, so time will tell us more about where executive education can go in a post-pandemic era.

In the meantime, stay safe and keep learning.

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Implicit bias affects us all

Tue, 29 Sep 2020 02:03:21 GMT

As a chief learning officer, you likely have experience with leadership development programs. Based on your experience, what are some of the best traits of successful leaders? Once you have crafted your list of leadership characteristics, take a moment to consider how many of these traits would be characterized as masculine. Would this subtle, unconscious bias affect your objectivity when selecting candidates for your organization’s leadership development program?

Columbia business professor Frank Flynn and New York University professor Cameron Anderson conducted an experiment in which they provided a group of business students with copies of an identical resume (from a real successful businesswoman) and labeled some of the resume copies with the name Heidi and others with the name Howard. Although the resumes were identical, the business students rated Howard as competent, likeable and a good colleague. Meanwhile, Heidi was rated as competent, but also as aggressive, selfish and not a team player. The students went further to identify Heidi as someone they would not want to work with.

Implicit biases lead us to harbor expectations of people that include, but are not limited to, what organizational roles they would be best suited for and, maybe more important, how they would fit into these roles: “Without realizing it, you might be assuming that male co-workers are more objective, strong-willed, decisive, practical and assertive than women,” according to the 2018 article “Women in leadership roles: Fighting implicit bias” published by the Association of California School Administrators. “Too often, when women display these same characteristics, they are viewed as angry or bossy by their female colleagues.”

Bias and assessment in the workplace

This type of flawed individual assessment is rooted in implicit biases. The effects are seen throughout organizations, especially when it relates to employee evaluations. In a 2015 Harvard Business Review article titled “Reinventing Performance Management,” authors Marcus Buckingham and Ashley Goodall point to research conducted by Michael Mount, Steven Scullen and Maynard Goff and published in the Journal of Applied Psychology in 2000 as one of the most comprehensive on how we rate people: “Their study — in which 4,492 managers were rated by certain performance dimensions by two bosses, two peers, and two subordinates — revealed that 62 percent of the variance in ratings could be accounted for by individual raters’ peculiarities of perception.”

Almost every organization deploys some system of employee evaluations. However, since we do not perceive people, work product, productivity and interpersonal skills all in the exact same manner, evaluations are frequently a reflection on how we individually see the world instead of how the employee has performed. Your System 1 thinking can inadvertently lead you to unconscious, predetermined conclusions, which are cultivated and supported in a prophetic self-feeding loop fed by one of the most nefarious biases of all.

ALSO READ: Part 1: “Understanding implicit bias and its detriment to organizations.”

Confirmation bias — your tendency to search, interpret and seek out information that confirms your existing mental schemas, beliefs, attitudes and expectations — leads you to categorize people in ways that often are not intended. These unconscious mechanizations unknowingly reinforce the stereotypes we expect to see, further cementing the implicit bias that exists. For example, who pops into your brain when you hear the following words:

Nurse
Construction worker
Librarian
Truck driver

When you read the words “nurse” and “librarian,” did an image of a woman automatically enter your brain? Likewise, did an image of a man enter your head when you read the words “construction worker” and “truck driver”? Despite the fact that we know there are male nurses and librarians and female construction workers and truck drivers, these gender stereotypes have been reinforced over decades.

When people in your organization don’t fit neatly into your categories, it causes cognitive dissonance — a state in which existing beliefs are inconsistent with the evidence available. In seeking to remove the dissonance, the brain often finds evidence that matches current beliefs. A 1981 study conducted by scholars William F. Brewer and James C. Treyens demonstrates how we “notice and remember things that fit into our schemas but overlook and forget things that don’t,” according to a 2019 ThoughtCo. article. Even if the evidence points to a different conclusion, you will be reluctant to accept that conclusion if the evidence goes against one of your established norms. “It can even cause people to overlook facts that contradict their pre-established ideas because they are still unconsciously seeking to confirm ideas they believe they already know,” according to a 2015 Next City article

Not only does this kind of decision-making impact innovation — as like-minded people do not have the same creativity as those with different perspectives — but it unconsciously reinforces stereotypes, which leads to consequences in the workplace. “Unconscious bias leads us to form teams based on what we know, what we are most familiar with, and what we believe would give us the outcome we desire,” writes Forbes contributor Michael Brainard.

When System 1 takes over, your choices on who gets the opportunity is substantially impacted by the mental schemas and implicit associations that have been formed over a lifetime.

Implicit bias can be broken down into two categories: descriptive and prescriptive bias. “Descriptive bias is the labels we attach and associate with certain social groups and communities, and prescriptive bias is how they are expected to behave,” writes Forbes contributor Pragya Agarwal. “When someone does not conform to these prescribed roles and behaviors they can be penalized or punished.”

The role of the leader

An executive manager at a government organization had a realization during an implicit bias training session. As he reflected on his past actions and behaviors, he realized that though he was mentally committed to diversity, he had unconsciously expressed favoritism toward those he liked and enjoyed being around. Yet when critically reflecting, he realized that what he perceived was a “self-fulfilling prophecy” in which his favorite employees excelled and prospered while the rest were ignored and not perceived to be as valuable.

CLOs seek to cultivate a level playing field where everyone — no matter their race, age, gender or identity — has an opportunity to develop. But unwittingly, you could be creating more opportunities for those who you perceive as similar to you or for candidates who meet your perceived expectations of management.

Organizational cultures place an important role on the leadership of the executives. In many cases, these individuals set the tone for the entire organization. It is not unusual for CLOs to consciously and unconsciously accept the cues set by these leaders. Compliance withauthority is something we all were taught from an early age. “For a significant part of an individual’s life, they are expected to accept and respect the authority of others within different hierarchical systems, originating within the family but also found in institutionalized organizations of authority such as schools and workplaces,” writes an unknown author in a University of Cambridge article, “Why Do People Obey Authority?” “With the internalization of obedience to authority also comes the notion of a system of rewards and punishments for obedience and deviance respectively.”

From the very first day of working for your organization, you started learning about what behaviors were and were not accepted. This, in turn, reinforced or established the mental schemas you needed to continue employment and, in some cases, thrive in your organization.

The more these schemas become entrenched in your automatic thinking processes, the more they affect your behavior. “Unconscious bias also undermines recruiting efforts and employee development, which can be destabilizing to an organization,” Forbes contributor Laura Berger writes. “Exacerbating these detriments are the fact that the majority of mid- to high-level placements in an organization are sourced through referral.” Yet high-level promotion and placement aren’t the only place where implicit bias appears. It also has adverse effects on the hiring process.

Race and gender bias are significant byproducts of implicit bias in that organizations are continually trying to match the applicant with the right “culture fit.” This is evident in hiring. In an American Sociological Review study conducted by Lauren Rivera and Andras Tilcsik, a group of attorneys was asked to assess potential candidates for entry-level positions at their firm. Like the experiment conducted with the group of business students, these resumes were identical except for the names — both male and female — as well as listed hobbies, which subtly hinted as to the applicants’ socioeconomic status. The attorney’s recommendations revealed the existence of implicit biases: “Resumes of males with hobbies associated with higher-class backgrounds — such as sailing or classical music — received significantly more callbacks than the resumes of the higher-class females. They also received more callbacks than lower-class males and females with hobbies such as soccer and country music.”

When the raters were asked to assess the candidates by cultural fit, the results were similar, with one striking difference: “Once again, these attorneys preferred to interview the higher-class male applicants. The attorneys indicated that they did not think that the lower-class applicants would be good fits for their firms’ cultures. They also believed that the higher-class women would be more likely to have work-family conflicts that would impair their effectiveness at work.” This study demonstrates how individuals draw implicit associations from descriptive details such as hobbies, names, age and gender.

Research has also shown that names can affect who gets called back for a job interview. A study conducted by the National Bureau of Economic Research, in which they sent out identical resumes labeled with different names, revealed the presence of implicit bias. “Job applicants with white names needed to send out about 10 resumes to get one callback; those with African-American names needed to send around 15 resumes to get one callback.”

Whether you realize it or not, you seek out familiarity. When something is different from your norms, or even if a name is hard to pronounce, you are more likely to dismiss the person than someone who, as you perceive it, has a more traditional or easier to pronounce name.

An irritating manner in which implicit bias manifests itself in the workplace is referred to as microaggressions — those subtle digs directed at people which make them feel marginalized. While the individuals who cause microaggressions may not necessarily intend to hurt or marginalize subsets of a population, the cumulative effect of being bombarded by even well-intentioned comments can have a negative effect on individual attitudes and self-confidence. Examples of microaggressions include complimenting someone on their English language-speaking ability because they appear to be from another country, or referring to someone’s name as unique and different. Research has revealed that Black Americans suffer greatly from microaggressions. “Often, [microaggressions] are never meant to hurt — acts done with little conscious awareness of their meaning and effects. Instead, their slow accumulation during a childhood and over a lifetime is in part what defines a marginalized experience, making explanation and communication with someone who does not share this identity particularly difficult,” according to “The Microaggressions Project.”

Throughout your lifetime, you have built a mental catalogue of implicit associations that have helped you survive. Yet these mental schemas have also arisen in areas that can cause you to unfairly and inaccurately assess others. As a learning leader, how you manage implicit biases in you as well as your organization may be the difference in employees’ perception of organizational culture. Those learning leaders who are able to mitigate the negative effects of implicit bias stand to improve the productivity and efficiency of the organization while also retaining employees and enhancing the work environment.

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Leadership development should begin with "why” — and that’s usually not behavior change

Mon, 28 Sep 2020 02:26:56 GMT

Start with why, begin with the end in mind and start where you want to finish are all phrases emphasizing that we should start a program with the data that reflects where we want to end. For leadership development, this should be impact and not behavior. Let’s review how leadership development accountability has evolved.

Accountability shifts

Application without impact is just being busy.

Decades ago, we wanted participants involved in leadership development to perceive the content as valuable, important to them and something they would try. The focus was on how participants reacted to leadership development. Next, the focus shifted to ensuring that the leaders had the skills, behaviors and competencies to be a good leader. The focus was on learning. About two decades ago, the focus shifted to leader behavior. We wanted to make sure the leaders were using the competencies with their team, often measured with 360-degree feedback. With this, the focus was on behavior or application of the competencies. Today, there’s a focus on the value that leadership development delivers, or the actual impact of the leadership development. Application without impact is just being busy. The sponsors, funders and supporters of leadership development programs want what the leaders’ behavior will deliver, not just the behavior itself.

To ensure that leadership development programs end with impact, it is best to begin with impact. The first step in implementing leadership development is to start with why: connect the program to business measures, identifying the impacts that will occur if the program is implemented and the leaders use the behaviors or competencies. But just how is this done? Let’s consider two scenarios.

Scenario 1: All have the same business need.

Sometimes a leadership development program is implemented to improve the same business measures for the entire team. These measures could include increasing retention, meeting the budget or reducing team member complaints. If this is the case, the starting point is those measures for the participants (team leaders). The measures are the “why” for the program. An important question must be asked to the participants: “If you use the proposed leadership competencies with your team, can you improve the business measure?”

Usually, leadership competencies are powerful, important and flexible enough to meet this challenge. For example, if there is a retention issue, leader behavior can usually tackle retention if a lack of leadership development caused the retention issue. You want to ensure that the business measure can improve with the new leader behavior. This step is make it feasible: select the right solution. Most of us have experienced situations when leader behavior was implemented but it was not the solution to the organization’s perceived problem.

Scenario 2: Participants have different business needs.

Many leadership development programs are implemented to address system-wide problems and issues. Regardless of the function the participant is involved with, they may need new leadership competencies. But impacts are not the same for all these leaders because they will usually vary with particular functions. A leader in accounting will have different impact measures than a leader in sales, logistics or IT. They may need the same competencies, but their impact would be different. In those situations, it is important to start with the end in mind as a clear business measure identified by each individual participant. Each participant attending the program would select one or two measures from their key performance indicators that they would like to improve, but only if the measures can be improved using the proposed program’s competencies with their team. Leadership development is often flexible and powerful enough to make this leap. When this step is completed, the leadership program becomes the right solution.

What is needed

When implementing a leadership program, you have a choice. Where do you want to end the evaluation as you move through the value chain from reaction to learning, application, impact and ROI? Today, the individuals supporting leadership development and providing the budgets to make it work want to see the impact and sometimes the ROI. This requires you to evaluate major leadership programs to the impact and ROI levels and show the efficient use of funds.

If you are interested in seeing a case study outlining the steps of delivering, measuring and showing ROI, please let us know.

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Change is incumbent on all of us

Mon, 28 Sep 2020 01:51:25 GMT

Ahmaud Arbery. George Floyd. Breonna Taylor … and countless others. I speak today as an individual, healthcare executive and founder of The Leadership Development Group, and I place my perspective in the context of the crossroad between leadership, organizational development and a strong, unwavering desire to see just and equitable systems in this country that work for all.

Like so many of you, I am feeling enormous pain and overwhelming empathy for the Black community who have long suffered the consequences of systemic inequality. We have stood too quietly and for far too long in the face of clear injustices. We must do more to create the future we all hope for and believe in. I believe that we have arrived at an important moment in time, one that will inspire America to engage in a continuous conversation around how we, as individuals, as organizations and as a nation, can and must do better.

While the protests taking place across the nation are most poignantly tied to the killing of George Floyd, they are also an expression of widespread anguish at the numerous systemic racial inequities and injustices that exist across many facets of our society. We are facing two pandemics — COVID-19 and systemic racism. Both pandemics have disproportionately impacted the Black community, and both require us to tackle systemic change head-on. As John F. Kennedy said, “For of those to whom much is given, much is required.” The call to action has never rang louder for leaders to step fully into that responsibility.

When it comes to systemic change, the fact of the matter is no one of us can do it alone. For systemic change to occur, diverse stakeholders must join together, speak out and collaborate. United around our common purpose, leaders must harness our collective power and influence to champion changes that will benefit the future of our nation. And we must do it together.

What can we, as leaders, do to make a difference and foster systemic change?

We invite you to consider the following model for change:

1. Envision a new future.

Leaders have the platform and influence to ignite the kind of dialogue that leads to meaningful change. We need to take the time to listen, discover, organize and absorb from others to create a shared understanding of what a racially just and equitable future can look like to solve systemic inequality. Only from here — with a shared vision — can we align efforts and outcomes.

2. Align diverse stakeholders.

To advocate for change, we need to orchestrate a coherent system of actions taken simultaneously by actively seeking connections with stakeholders, taking concrete steps to enable trust and demonstrating respect for diverse expertise and perspectives. For too long, we have focused on perspectives in silos — perspectives from the Black community or from the white community but not together. We have avoided bringing diverse stakeholders to the table out of fear and discomfort of making matters worse.

3. Manage boundaries and obstacles.

We need to support constructive conflict by keeping an open mind, disagreeing respectfully and tirelessly seeking common ground. Focusing on opportunity by listening to objections, acknowledging concerns and staying focused on the vision is critical to resolving and navigating tensions to generate options that achieve our common goals. This requires us to be vulnerable and empathetic. This is our learning edge, to push through the discomfort and begin engaging in difficult conversations. This is where the change begins: with each of us sharing, listening and becoming comfortable with uncomfortable discourse.

4. Act and learn.

We need to define change plans and take reasonable steps despite uncertainty, to identify what is working and what is not, to adapt plans and advance our shared vision for a more just society. This will require leaders to create a new narrative for what we mean by “us” through cultivating a broader sense of belonging. And in the world of leadership, this starts with recognition of how current organizational practices contribute to systemic racism and how to make meaningful and impactful shifts in how we hire, develop, promote and sponsor diversity.

We at TLD Group have the privilege of supporting and working with some of today’s greatest leaders and thinkers. We strongly believe that leadership is an important lever in the pursuit of systemic change. We all must commit to being open to conversations about systemic racial injustice now and into the future.

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Chief Learning Officer â CLO Media

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