A630.4.4RB.Companies Can Make Better Decisions_Wathen_Sandra

    A630.4.4RB.Companies Can Make Better Decisions_Wathen_Sandra

         

Decision effectivess correleates positively with employee engagement and organizational performance...

Decisions are the basic steps to improve organizations and these decisions drive performance.  However, there are some impediments that drive good decision making.  This is especially true for the more complex and larger companies since organizational structures have changed due to the dynamics of the world of business today.

In years past, an organizational chart would clearly identify who within the hierarchy of the organization was the key decision maker.  In today’s business approaches, organizations are structured differently and it is not as clear as to who is actually making the decisions.  This creates impediments since it creates uncertainty of who is making the decisions and are they making the decisions that really matter. 

Also, there are other impediments which include information flow.  This relates to essential and/or the right information NOT getting to those individuals for making sound decisions.  In addition, other areas such as leadership’s negative behaviors, as well as, not having the right talent in key roles for decision making create impediments.  Basically, what are the decisions?  Who is making the decisions? Do the decisions really matter?

        

   There are four elements of good decisions:  quality (Q), speed (S), yield (Y), and effort (E).

Q - Is considered; intuitive.  Is it a good decision?

S - How quick do we make important decisions?

Y - How well did we execute this decision?

E – Did we use the right amount of effort to make the decision? Execution and costs.

I would add one more element; being the first element to address - priority (P). 

P – Is this one of my top priority areas of concern for my organization?

There are 5 key processes for decision making:

• Metrics - Understanding how well you are doing on making decisions, bench mark them and see how they stack up.  This allows you to see how well you are doing and how to improve; basically an assessment. An example is that you may be doing very well as a company with respect to quality and execution, but not so good at speed.  By doing metrics to see the health of how you are doing will allow you to see where you can improve.  This is part of the decision effectiveness process and determines organizational barriers. It will also allow you to put a process in place to improve, as well as, transform the decision making process capabilities to deliver.
• Prioritization of Decisions - Identify the critical decisions, what matters the most, use a methodology to work through the decisions; both from a strategic and operational perspective; prioritizing them.   This will help to realize critical decisions and the next steps to determine solutions. When determining the prioritization of decisions, it is also important to look at all factors to include the cumulative effect on decisions – decision architecture that lay out the requirements and then prioritize.  Include the cumulative value within the scope of prioritization of changes as part of the improvement potential – get top 20-25 decisions that are needed. 
• The - who, what, how and when – framework for the decisions.  These are key elements for decision making since there needs to be an assignment to each.  What is the decision to be made?  Who is the decision authority?  How will we make this change?  When is this change required?
• Another important step in the process is to make sure the rest of the organization business areas can support the decisions such as the culture, talent, skills, etc.

 In summary, business decisions are correlated with financial performance.  Having a high success at all the elements combined will provide a higher level of business performance.  In addition, as a company it will also allow you to see competitor's performance against yours, and areas of improvement with own organization.  It is important to understand the methods for determining the priorities, criteria for making the decisions, current organizations architecture and culture.  For organizations to improve, they need to make sound decisions both strategically and operationally.

        

In my current position, I plan to use these elements and processes to take a different look at how I can implement and improve areas of decision making.  This will include metrics management of how well we are doing and areas of improvement. 

A630.3.3.RB_A Day in the Life of the Culture Committee_Wathen_Sandra

       A630.3.3.RB_A Day in the Life of the Culture Committee_Wathen_Sandra

        

       The Culture Committee at Southwest has established a cultural norm for the airline with their theme of employee appreciation.  Although it seems localized at the LA airport, it will most likely spread throughout the entire key airports that Southwest provides its services.  The reason is that it seems to be successful because the culture committee is bringing fun and excitement to the work environment and also making the employees feel appreciated amongst each other.  The culture included the term “the hokey” which is a cleaning tool used to clean the aircraft.  The “hokey” is also part of the theme in support of the cultural norm as well as “T-shirts” that exhibit the culture for the individuals that are members of the committee. 

        

       The purpose of the culture committee at Southwest is for employees to appreciate employees and at the same time make it fun and exciting; basically a wonderful place to work.  The framework for the culture committee is foster appreciation for each other within the airline.  The culture committee demonstrated tremendous enthusiasm with regards to appreciating those that are providing services on-board the aircraft; pilots and flight attendance.  This enthusiasm extended beyond their duties to include taking on tasks of the flight attendance so that they can relax and eat instead of having to clean the plane and prepare for the next flight.  The culture committee took on an additional role in order to allow others to take a “break”.   This culture builds strength among all the employees at Southwest as it brings a team spirit atmosphere vice individualism.

        

       In my work place, I can see where a cultural committee could build a stronger teaming environment; especially if built on the same foundation as Southwest airlines where employees appreciate employees.  Currently, the appreciation is expected from a hierarchical perspective and that doesn’t come too often.  Management and leadership tend to have corporate goals that distract the committed focus on employee appreciation.  This type of committee would be more regular and sincere in that it is built and focuses on peer appreciation. 

        

       My next step as a take way from this video is to present a plan to my leadership on fostering a similar environment in our workplace.  It will require that I develop a plan to present to corporate which would include value-added for “investment”, but I think it would be worthwhile as it will increase productivity and employee morale which is well needed in our organization.  This would be a wonderful opportunity to establish a company cultural norm that would be a win/win scenario if the company is willing to incorporate or at least try it as a “test scenario” for several months to see if they would be willing to make it a long-term company cultural commitment.

A630.2.4.RB_21st Century Enlightenment_Wathen_Sandra

A630.2.4.RB_21^st Century Enlightenment_Wathen_Sandra

The world is changing fast and we must adapt by how we think and see things from a cultural psychotherapy – values, norms and lifestyles; modern people.  Core ideas have shaped culture and we must live differently in 21^st century.  We now must see things from different a perspective as we clarify our new meaning while we culturally transform.  The scientific disciplines and social sciences have provided us with these powerful new insights into human nature. We are now responding to the world around us instead of conscious decision making and out integrity are based on a social interactive world.  As such to be happier we must now seek happier friends rather than being educated on how to be happy.  We are better at understanding relative than absolute values as we are animal spirits; we also not good at making long-term decisions.  We also do not do well at predicting what will make us happy and are not even sure what made us happy in the past.  The 21^st Century enlightenment should foster a more self-awareness with respect to recognizing our weaknesses and limitations.  We must understanding that conscious thought is only part of what drives our behavior and that we need to control and distinguish our needs from our wants – find our self-awareness of potential.  Our success at functioning in society with its diverse values, traditions, and lifestyles require us to understand own reactions so that we are not controlled by them.    To resist our tendencies to make right or true that which is merely familiar and wrong or false that which is only strange is why we have to be open minded in our thinking. 

The 21^st Century Enlightenment provides us with opportunities to put ourselves in other people’s shoes and to expand empathy’s reach despite all the distractions. Although there are challenges, such as the tensions between ethnic groups that persist and have taken on new dimensions, as well as the levels of inequality have risen.   Policy makers have failed to balance imperatives of globalization and the ideal of universalism to include the empathic capacity of the communities most affected by change.  Global empathy needs grow if we are to reach agreements which put the long-term needs of all people ahead of short term national concerns. Empathic capacity is just as important as education.  However, universal empathy is complex – fostering emphatic capacity is equally important to achieving a world of citizens at peace with each other and with themselves. Progress includes addressing substantive and ethical questions that the world should recognize and be willing to debate.  The utilitarian answer is maximizing human happiness and we have done well since the enlightenment.  The poor are better off now than centuries ago.  The idea that progress should be designed to increase human happiness has turned into the assumption that pursuing progress is the same as improving human welfare.  Our society is dominated by three logics – science & technological progress, markets, and bureaucracy.  The limits lie in their indifference to a substantive concern for the general good; if it can be sold it should be sold; rationality of rules above rationality of ends.

The 21^st century enlightenment focuses on the fundamentally ethically dimension of humanism in determining what is right.  For example, our life is dictated by social convention and economic circumstance – and how do we find balance without having some feeling of neglect in our lives. 

In the 21st century way of thinking, what we aim for can be as important to our well being as what we have already achieved.  This concept is based on “our attitude and it is a philosophical life in which the critique of what we are is at one and the same time the historical analysis of the limits that are imposed on us and an experiment of possibility of going beyond them”.

To be responsible, to create a big society, to live sustainably, it is not a matter of will –

The 21^st century enlightenment is not giving us the choice; rather it is requiring us to see past simplistic and inadequate ideals of freedom, of justice, and of progress.  In fact, we need to stop focusing on those and reconnect ourselves with a strong understanding of who we are as human beings and who we want to be. We have the opportunities in front of us to be creative people and make a difference; by not focus on negativity but rather stay true to the spirit of the enlightenment –   a small group of people can change the world as it has been proven before.

So what does this all mean to me?  It means that in theory that I must have an open mind to what is before me; thinking in terms of the 21^st century enlightenment.  I need to think outside the box more now than ever before; putting empathy in a global perspective – starting with my daily personal life and expanded to my professional life.  I also need to develop a stronger and more conscious self-awareness to include understanding and controls of wants versus needs.  I must also learn how to foster the new ideals of the 21^st enlightenment so that as a leader, I can be making positive change for the world of tomorrow.

A630.1.4.RB_Board of Directors_Wathen_Sandra

A630.1.4.RB_Board of Directors_Wathen_Sandra

A Tale of Power & Vision (UTube by SallyKohn.com)

It is interesting to watch how many leaders profess to be visionaries or leaders of change.  What is even more interesting is how many of them do not walk the talk.  In fact, there are few that are willing to take that same leap as that of the character in this video known as “Vision” whom was the character that laid his body across the gap in the canyon while “Power” crossed over to the future side; immediately to be followed by the “crowd”.  However, I have come to realization that not all organizations are the same, nor have the same mixes of personality and skill types such as pessimists, pragmatists, visionaries, power players and of course the basic crowd mixes.  Many of the selected leaders have not had formal training in leadership, nor do they have personality traits to compliment their education and vice versa. 

Having this mix of people is good as long as there is not one specific type that is overpowering in that they are complimentary to one another in achieving a goal – but that is what the leadership role is to ensure.  An organization needs all types of people – even pessimists can have many positive offerings to a company.  The main thing for a leader is to recognize the personality characteristic and use their capabilities where it applies best in the organization.  An organization cannot have only pragmatists, or only visionaries, etc.  It is normal to have a community of a mix of many personality traits.  The key is how to best leverage on all of them to make the best teaming relationships.  Pessimists, for example, can be persuaded to follow; however, it may take more effective communication skills on behalf of the leadership to ensure that rumors are stifled and that they have provided the vision efficiently for implementing the change.

Organizations can work through significant difficulties by engaging the workforce through leaderships’ ability to incorporate effective organizational development.  When leaders recognize the need for change, it is imperative for leadership to look at the organizational environment as a whole - both internally and externally to the organization; including the stakeholders, customers, corporate members and employees.   Their goal should be to ensure that they understand the long range planning, the problem solving, the organizations ability to survive, and transformational efforts that will be required to manage the change.  Understanding the organizational culture prior to implementing change is also a very important element with transition, as well as, growth of that culture to ensure for adaptation of the change is essential – Change corporate culture to become more adaptive to change, while concurrently increasing competition.

To achieve goals, change is necessary.  It requires extensive work by all parties involved, as it requires that managers must change to a new mindset and open-mindedness method to their management style; requires flexibility and adaptability of constant change; requires rapid timelines, etc.  Success is measured by how well an organization can align itself to the 21^st Century as it requires the ability to compete in a fast moving world that requires consciousness of quality of products and services, employee involvement, doing more for less, while simultaneously managing the changing dynamics of the consumers and technologies as we emerge to competitive uncertainty and transition to the global markets.

In essence, the importance of leading change is with leaderships’ ability to communicate a strong vision, while concurrently fostering an environment for implementing the change.