Hack:
What Are We Afraid Of?

The A-Team
Ben Gates said “if there’s something wrong, those who have the ability to take action have the responsibility to take action” (National Treasure…great movie). Leadership starts at the top and the leadership team is where the change from fear to courage must flow. If you’re not surrounded by quality leaders then you have two options:-

1. Identify ‘who’ you need and get them on board, and don’t be constrained by conventional thinking with your choices. Sometimes the right leaders are standing in front of you looking like “B.A.” Baracus;

2. Spend the time to develop your leadership team to the level they need to be. Behaviour drives Attitude so be persistent.

Bear in mind though that you need to create that urgency, and it may be that some hard decisions are made about the members of the leadership team; if that motivation is being hindered.

Choose Wisely Grasshopper
Once you’ve got the leadership team assembled, choose what disciplines will reduce fear in your organisation. There are many out there and the leadership team must decide which disciplines will do right by the business. These are four ideals that meld with our business:-

Turn the Tree Upside-Down
Autocratic management is the traditional form of an organisations structure. Boss at the top, implementing rules and policy down the chain to the workers…“what I say goes.” To break this down we must first understand four elements of organisational structure:-

Span of Control looks at the number of direct reports to each level of the hierarchy.

Centralisation is the formal decision-making which is normally held with a few people.

Formalisation is how much an organisation standardises its behaviours through rules and policies.

Departmentalisation specifies how people are grouped together in the organisation.

Instead of accepting the narrow, autocratic train of thought, rearrange the tree and put those with the passion and creativity into decision-making roles. The advantages of this new ideas flow are:-

• The Span of Control spreads out as more team members move up the decision-making chain;
• The decisions are made by a larger group of the team and the team becomes more autonomous;
• The ‘new’ leaders have the advantage of ‘coming from the floor’ so already have the trust of the workers and there is easier buy in from workers;
• They bring with them experience and a perspective that many managers don’t have;
• They have the opportunity to experience leadership and in the process the leadership team can gain a perspective from the floor staff;
• Roles can be shared so task are not reliant on any one individual;
• The number communication filters can be reduced to make for clearer understanding;
• More time for the leadership team to focus on strategy rather than doing.

Another advantage is that by aligning the leadership team as ‘peers’ amongst the group they can influence by ‘enquiry’ rather than ‘command.’

Break Through Departmentalisation
Teams operating in buckets cringe at thought of outsiders intruding into their territory and can become defensive. The ‘us and them’ attitude is prevalent in all organisations, so by lowering this invisible barrier we can:-

• Engage ‘outsiders’ of the team as they are given a privilege not presented before;
• Open the doors up to new ideas and different perspectives;
• Give stakeholders a sense of ownership in the organisation;
• Shared skills and knowledge that would have been shielded in personal buckets;
• A larger team involved in the mission, vision and direction of the organisation;
• An increase of identification-based trust as different people work within a framework of mutual understanding and emotional bonding;
• More time for the leadership team to focus on strategy rather than doing (again).

Teach Me Obi-Wan
Organisations do well to educate and train staff to better the business or their people, but there is very little training in passing on knowledge or even resources provided to do this. The following models explain why there could be a fear to relinquish, and ideas of how to break through this barrier:-

• Employment – As businesses become more efficient, downsizing and dispersion is the result. If this fear restrains staff from entrusting their skills, redefine their role as a ‘mentor’ and ease their fears by mapping out their future in the organisation. Resistance to change is the fear of the unknown and an inability to adjust to an ever changing environment.
• Intellectual Capital – Intellectual capital is built from hard work and experience and some may feel that it is theirs by this right. Policies or procedures that require this knowledge to be shared will start to break down this idea of entitlement. Standard Operating Procedures are an example of retaining this information and sharing it with the wider group.
• Middle Management – The proverbial ‘meat in the sandwich’ between management and worker. An unwillingness to relinquish knowledge can be one of two things (1) they are happy in their current role and don’t want to move on or (2) they want to move up the ladder so they will keep as much as possible to themselves. The only people who can influence the change in their assumptions are their senior managers. It is his or her responsibility to guide these people in a direction that is best for the business, and best for their development.
• Business Growth – With experience comes age, and if there is fear within the organisation, then cautiousness will comfort this generation. But cautiousness in a fast-paced economy will leave an organisation behind, decision making still needs to be bold and risks need to be taken. Buddy-training is an example of how this knowledge can extracted. Support the aging demographic, it is perhaps one of New Zealand’s biggest impacts to the future economy. An aging population and lack of ‘new blood’ is a warning sign that succession planning needs to be BAU (Business As Usual).