Engine For Change

I’m not trying to make this a Seth Godin tribute blog; really I’m not.  But then Rogue Polymath tweeted about Amber Naslund’s Indispensable vs Irreplaceable post. She mixes two of my favorites–new terms and Godin’s Linchpin–so I can’t resist sharing her post with you.

Amber writes:

Being indispensable is about delivering massive impact no matter where you are. It’s much more of a characteristic – a mindset wrapped with skills and attributes – rather than the details and functions in a role. Indispensable people are the types that you can hand any project, put in nearly any role, issue a challenge to, and they simply make things happen by understanding what needs to get done and adapting their skills accordingly.

Being irreplaceable is the opposite. It’s about being locked into a role because you’re harboring finite knowledge, skills, or information that you can’t or aren’t willing to share with anyone else. Sometimes that’s borne from insecurity. Other times it’s a false sense that if you protect your sandbox so that only you know its secrets, you have job security for life.

Knowing the difference between irreplaceable and indispensable made me wonder:

How do you know whether your organization is based on irreplaceable or indispensable people?

Have you ever heard someone in your organization say,  “Bob is the new Bruce (and he’s no Bruce)” ? If you have, you’re in an organization of irreplaceable people.

Sadly–and I’d guess unknowingly–organizations have ensured their future failures by maintaining their systems of irreplaceable people.  Irreplaceable people systems fail because they tie their worth–and then the inevitable loss of their worth– directly to the passing of time.  As an engineer, I have a hard time believing anyone would knowingly tie their organization’s success to the passing of time–a variable so manifestly outside the organization’s control.

Organizations full of irreplaceable people are seemingly shocked to find their organizations built up by the dutiful and time consuming accumulations of horded knowledge then abruptly crippled by each irreplaceable person’s departure.  These organizations lament retirement rates and their losses of corporate knowledge, yet their predicament was entirely predictable.

They put articles in their newsletters about the decades or centuries of knowledge that left with their retirees last month, mourning the retiree-shaped holes that pockmark the metaphorical field of the organization into a scarred bombing range.

It doesn’t have to be this way.  An organization can wrestle control from the passage of time if the organization selects, rewards and sustains indispensable people.

You may be in an organization of indispensable people if in reference to someone taking a new job, you hear your organization’s leaders emphasizing the attributes that made the current person excellent for the job as the job is today and most especially as it is projected to be in the future.  You may hear something like, “Jenna brings her unique talents that the organization needs to win today and triumph tomorrow.”  (Okay so maybe I got a little carried away with that one.)

There does exist a middle ground between an organization locked in the irreplaceable and a utopia of value to the indispensable.   In my career, I’ve gotten to this middle ground by either taking jobs that no one has ever done before (no irreplaceable personality or qualifications to live up to) or doing the job in a way no one else has ever considered (erasing as fast as possible the hole left by the last person so that all they see is me in the job).

Those of you who’ve been asking me how you get a job like mine, now you know my secret: be indispensable regardless of what the organization is asking for.

Be indispensable by driving change.

Be indispensable by storing up your value in the achievement of the future, not the glory of the past (though the past is fun to study to help you succeed in the future).

Be indispensable by taking the best of what worked and joyfully making it better.

Be indispensable by leverage yourself for the situation, instead of forcing the situation to meet your past, or even your current, expectations or skills.

Be indispensable and bring about the organization of tomorrow.

Be indispensable because that’s what your organization needs today.

Why not try being indispensable?

Trust me; it’s a lot of fun.

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Bonus question:  Does the organization want you to be irreplaceable or indispensable when it says it is “opening more opportunities for career growth and providing a working environment that will broaden experiences and prepare our employees for higher-level duties.”? [Source:  NAVSEA On Watch 2010]

I awoke to find that Seth Godin has blogged about the coming decline in higher education, when only the other day, I had suggested to a friend (based on my integration of lessons I’d learned reading Seth Godin’s book Linchpin) that she consider not getting a master degree in favor of getting more education. Funny the timing.

Here were my arguments to my friend:

• Do you want the achievement of a degree or the knowledge you think you’ll get from taking the advanced classes?  Her answer: the knowledge.
• Do you want a job in the future where they hire you based on your classroom achievements (i.e., Godin would call this commodity-type work) or your personal talents, your art of bringing yourself to work every day to make the world a better place (i.e., they are hiring for a Linchpin)?  Her answer: Want to be hired for my art not for my degrees.
• Would an established degree program waste your time with filler classes either meant to meet some pointless decades old requirement or keep the school profitable by driving up your class hour requirements (i.e., more tuition to them) and would you consider all those non-value-added courses a waste of your time that you can’t get back?  Her answer: Yes.
• Can you gain access to the best professors in the best topics that fit your current and future curiosities best by entering an established program or by creating opportunities to study with the best professors per topic (or barring access to the professors, maybe networking with their best grad students)?  Her answer: Yes, I think I can gain access.

Our conclusion: It doesn’t make sense for her to search around for an established, accredited program when she’s someone pushing the envelop of what’s possible and acting because she chooses to share the best of herself, not because she wants to gain prestige or acclaim.  The knowledge she needs hasn’t been integrated together into any program yet because she’s out ahead of the mass market need for the knowledge all bundled and pushed on students.

She’s a linchpin and so far, no one’s marketing degree programs for linchpins; they’re just writing blogs for them.

Thanks for the post Mr. Godin.  Funny the timing.

Not all changes take a decade, but some do.

Today, Maria Finch (a thoroughly amazing woman) and I accepted YWCA Women of Achievement Awards for our work as Child Care Network co-leads.

What’s that mean?

We were the 2009 leaders of a fabulous team of women and men committed to expanded child care in our area.  Our big success was a contract for a more than $4 million child care center, set to open January 2011.

January 2011 is nearly a decade after I first inquired about what it would take to get a new child care center close to our workplace. Elaine still tells the story of the sad look on my face when she had to tell me, “Oh, sweety! We don’t have a child care center here.”

Why’d it take a decade?

Some say the timing wasn’t right before.  I can’t disagree with all of that claim.

But, I think the controlling factor was that in the intervening decade, an entire group of passionate people, inside and outside of our organization, learned and practiced how to skillfully drive change.

A few years ago, when the project really gained momentum, we directed our efforts not to forcing someone to open a center, but instead poured all our energy into removing one roadblock after another that stood between us and the center we wanted.

We made connections, gathered the data, made our case, poured over the details, kept the positive pressure on, celebrated all the small wins, and won people to our side.

Maybe your change will take a decade.  Maybe it will take longer.

Are you willing to drive until you get to your destination?

Why not try?

Today, I got into a disagreement over a blog post.

In the blog post, the author offers one way to move the people of an organization from stopped-and-waiting toward innovating-and-creating.

My response to the blog post was swift: That won’t work.

That: The actions (and cautions) the author prescribes.

Won’t work: Will not produce the capacity for independent innovation within the employees.

Sure, the manager will happily hold a meeting, define the conditions and maybe get some actionable solutions.  Yet, the goal of the actions prescribed isn’t to produce action at the moment, but the capacity for action in the future.

Now, why am I reacting so viscerally to what should be a harmless, one-of-many options blog post about generating a new culture?  Because too many of the options offered up in blog and magazine articles read like useful directions yet fail to produce the actual outcomes they claim to achieve.   My emotional response comes from my frustration watching well-meaning people squander their often limited energies on action that create the desired outcome less than 2 in 10 times.

With all the blogs out there (this one included) trying to help you create positive change, I bet you need some way to split the good advice from the bad directions, and test the effectiveness before taking any action.

As luck would have it, I have a method to show you how I map the options to find what will work. (more…)

The world will never starve for wonder; only for want of wonder.” – G. K. Chesterton

Ever wondered about the family tree of a pencil? Enjoy this read, “I, Pencil.”

I’d written a blog post and filed it away, only to have the topic treated better in a newsletter article I read this weekend.

First, I offer you my blog post, then a re-post of the newsletter article.   Regardless which version gets the thought across to you, you’ll appreciate the idea if you’re driving change.

(more…)

When you’re eating a fancy, many course meal and you’re offered sorbet, you’re being offered a palate cleanser.

A palate cleanser is a food used in the middle of the meal to remove lingering flavors from the mouth so that the next course may be enjoyed from a fresh perspective.

When you’re driving your way through a complex change or a difficult thought problem and you need a mental break, try a mental palate cleanser to remove those lingering thoughts preventing you from getting a fresh perspective on the change or problem.

I find my favorite mental palate cleansers are reading a silly book (or telling silly jokes) with my five-year-old daughter, cuddling my two-year-old son to sleep and watching a great movie with my hubby.  After each (and especially after an evening with all three) I can feel my mind cleared of lingering thoughts and ready for a fresh perspective (or a new blog post).

Do you have any mental palate cleansers you use?

Sorbet anyone?

I tried to write a typical review (what I loved, what I wondered about, so what) of Seth Godin’s Linchpin and I couldn’t.  I just couldn’t.

Instead, to show you how I saw Linchpin, I must draw you a map.

If you know me personally, and frequent the space near me, you’ve likely watched me scrawl some version of this onto one white board or another.  You’ll have to tell me if I’ve left out any of the good parts.

To the rest of you, I hope that over the imperfect medium of the internet, this somehow makes sense. I’m no Tolkien (really going out on a limb on this one), but I’m trying to draw for you my own Middle Earth, the map in my mind.

Here we go:

Before I read Linchpin, I was already thinking about maps, new maps. [Actually, new coordinate systems (but I'll just leave you with the link for now).]

Then, I found these lines in Linchpin:

Every day I meet people who have so much to give but have been bullied enough or frightened enough to hold it back.  They have become victims, pawns in a senseless system that uses them up and undervalues them.

It’s time to stop complying with the system and draw your own map.

Who am I to question Seth Godin?  I drew a map. (more…)

I’ve scrawled quotes on piles of index cards over the years.  Nearly every card has the quote plus the quote’s author, the book I got the quote from, and the page number the quote is featured on.  Note that I said nearly every card.  Why? Well, because this week’s quote comes from a card with no name, no book and no number; yet I’m sharing it none the less.  [Bonus points out there if anyone knows where this quote is from.]

Coaching is not giving direction; it is a way of being that sees others at their very best, confronts them with their gifts, talents, and potential; and then holds them accountable to living up to that potential.  When we approach others in this way, everyone is coachable.

Remember this quote when you’re driving change.

You’ll want to give direction, but shouldn’t.

You want to prevent all falls, but can’t.

Your job is to prepare the way, then let them drive.

They can’t be their best if you’re standing in front of them looking backward.

Instead, stand next to them, put a hand to their back, and encourage them on.

Let them drive change too.

[Secondary bonus points to anyone who posts a link to a consult/don't consult conflict cloud! My version is buried in my work files somewhere and I'm too lazy tonight to draw a new one.]

This blog is filled with my stories, but today I had the opportunity to post two other people’s stories about working with our Guiding Coalition.  We’re currently taking applications for our next cycle and I’d asked them to share what they’ve learned, experienced and gained from their time with the Guiding Coalition.  Cheerfully, as I can’t seem to figure out how to cross link to comments on Facebook, here are their stories copied and re-posted:

Mike’s story:

I applied for the Guiding Coalition for several reasons. The first reason is because the job I have is a direct result of a guiding coalition initiative. I wanted to know more about the group that provided me this opportunity. In addition, I felt I needed an outlet from my day job that, at the time, was pretty mundane. Finally, I just wanted to make a difference. I wanted to be a part of something where I could make a positive contribution.

The guiding coalition has stretched and grown me. It’s great to be part of a diverse team where the end product is greater than any one person could have created. We have revitalized IDP’s for the command by creating an instruction, forms, and training. But what really jazzes me is all of the intangible results. Somewhere at PSNS&IMF, right now, someone is having a conversation about their career development with their supervisor, mentor, or coach because of what our guiding coalition team did. The value of that conversation to the individual, his/her team, and our command is immeasurable.

Mike Plotts
command.university

Reina’s Story: “More than what you see”

Imagine, my first experience here at PSNS & IMF: new to the Navy command structure having never been exposed to the military before, and new to the field of being an industrial marine electrician helper, learning a new trade. I didn’t come here wearing a uniform with stars and bars. I didn’t have a stripe on my hat. Instead my hat’s glossy sheen gave me away as a newbie.
Being a newbie to PSNS & IMF didn’t mean I was a newbie to life and I felt I had so much more to offer.

The Guiding Coalition gave me an opportunity to share my experiences and my passion, allowing me to use and develop other skills that are not required as a mechanic (especially my creative and emotional self, being that I love to work with people and problem solve).

I have come to love working here…the work is a huge challenge, with the command bursting with opportunity and I am excited to be a part of its growth and development. The Guiding Coalition had provided me a way to use my creative energy to help promote a culture that embraces creativity in fostering new ideas for improvements on the job. It has not always been easy.

My number one priority is my job so I can support my 4 yr old daughter. To be able to do my job, and create a place where I can love my job, is amazing. Don’t let others stop your passion because there are many out there who will support you. Link arms and move forward. My Guiding Coalition work has made me a more productive worker because I am energized and excited about being a part of the organization, not just a number, and I love to take back information and new things to share with my workgroup.

I get to meet like minded people from all levels of the organization and learn different perspectives I would never have been exposed to.

The Guiding Coalition is a mutually beneficial experience. I remember starting out feeling like a deer in the headlights, but the leadership and support team, as well as awesome folks you get to work with, help you grow. Its an amazing experience. I have not only gotten to learn, but also share ideas and even get the ideas implemented. I still don’t have bars and stripes, no uniform, no stripe on my hat. I’m just an average gal wanting to make a difference where I work. The Guiding Coalition is an awesome vehicle for change… Don’t let it pass you by…