Sunday 19 October 2014

#unfurlingHR...Baking These Things In


Just a quick one from me on my thoughts bubbling since we met together for the NZLEAD Unconference #unfurlingHR.

I've said it before, but I want to say it again – thank you Amanda and everyone who made the day happen.

NZLEAD is leading us in an amazing way.

Lisa Gill has pointed me to Gary Hamel’s talk on the Future of Management in the last few days. If you haven’t already seen it, you can view it here. It’s well worth a watch.

A quick fire summary of the themes that stuck with me. 

Gary asks "how do you build a company that can change as fast as change itself, where innovation is the work of everybody, all the time, everyday, and where people are willing to bring the gifts of creativity and passion?"

He challenges us to build companies that are: Adaptable – Innovative – Engaged.

Gary draws parallels to the web, and says the web gives us a “global operating system for innovation”. He boils down the values of the web to the following four principles:

(1) Openness
(2) Meritocracy
(3) Flexibility
(4) Collaboration

Gary goes on to make the challenge, “how do we take these deep principles...and bake them into our organisations....because the web is already adaptable, innovative and engaging."

If we stop and reflect on NZLEAD and what Amanda is building, at its heart, it is baking these things in.

We are being led as a community with these principles at the heart - openness, meritocracy, flexibility, collaboration - and it’s inspired.

When I take a step back, when I think about the effect of leading in this way, I see it bringing out creativity, courage, new thinking, confidence, accountability, urgency and a real sense of community.

It’s immense.

We can learn so much by stepping back and reflecting, not just on the event of the NZLEAD Unconference #unfurlingHR, but on the way we are being led.  

This is amazing, this is really something….





  

Thursday 2 October 2014

A very sorry state

Who are our customers?

I ask this simple question, because for some strange reason for the first ten years of my HR career it wasn’t so simple.

It seems a very sorry state.

I got confused; it was of course about doing the best for the business, but from a people perspective, was it the CEO, the managers, the employees?

Because, for some reason it felt like each of these groups had different needs.

I “grew up” in HR working in traditional, hierarchical organisations (finance and insurance anyone?)….

So why was it hard to work out who my customers were?

So I’ve been doing a lot of pondering, and I’ll put it out there – I think it’s because management not leadership was king.

So let me quickly define management (courtesy of Kevin Kruse), and don’t for a second get me wrong, good management is needed. Managers need to plan, measure, monitor, coordinate, solve and so many other things.

Typically, managers manage things

Leaders lead people.

It occurs to me when you have a “management culture” not “leadership culture” it turns into them verses us mentality very quickly, and the HR team sit somewhere in between. Or in many cases on one side of the fence. 

Even the name "Human Resources" implies a big lean towards the management side; calling people "resources" implies they are things that need managing. 

And that doesn’t help anyone really.

The business and growth suffers. The employees suffer, the customers suffer.

It’s all about the people that make your business. The customers, the owners, your team, your future and past team members, and the people that you’re yet to meet that will grow your business to new heights.

Treating people as people. Richard Branson’s unlimited holidays fit perfectly.