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Creativity and Innovation Impact Session: Client Highlight

Last week we had the opportunity to collaborate with a client to design and facilitate a well received Impact session on Creativity & Innovation. For this process we partnered with long time friend and consulting associate Steve Zeisler.

The session was comprised of about 25 carefully selected "Innovators" (think six sigma black belts with an entrepreneurial twist) and senior "change leaders" from throughout the organization.

The highlights of this process and engagement were:
1. An overview of creativity and innovation.
2. Sharing and interpreting results from the Creative Styles Inventory.
3. A review and practicum of tools for innovation and creativity.
4. Sharing and interpreting results of Organizational Climate for Innovation Survey.
5. Innovation project selection, team formation and chartering.


1. An Overview of creativity and innovation. Most organizations today can't leave innovation to chance. The "kids in the garage" are out there, they have more channels to market than ever and they want your business. Together this group of innovators and senior leaders explored the explosive rate of change that is occurring around them and its implications to their business.

2. Creative Styles Inventory (CSI). We are all creative, but how we are creative can differ in some significant ways. Edison was certainly creative in his way, just as Einstein was creative in his own way. Neither was more creative than the other, but they were certainly different in how they were creative. Edison's creative preference called for a more structured approach and Einstiens's a preference for less structure. Both preferences are "good" and valid, but their process and preference for creativity is on opposite ends of a continuum.

For those whose roles require creative output, or who must lead teams and organizations wherein creativity must flourish, it is important to understand the human dimensions of creativity. The CSI helps us appreciate the continuum of human creative preferences and can help us approach creative challenges without personal bias and increased team effectiveness. Within the session participants received their CSI results and explored its implications to them as innovators and as change leaders.

3. Tools for Innovation and Creativity. Just as there is a continuum of human preferences for creativity, the tools we use for creativity can also be placed on a continuum from high to low structure. During the session participants were exposed to a continuum of tools. There are over twenty such tools and brainstorming is in the middle of the continuum. In addition to some tool practice, a take-away for the group was that for every creative challenge there is a "better" fit tool.

4. Organizational Climate for Innovation. Organizations that must innovate have to understand that the richness, volume and impact of their efforts will rise or fall on the degree to which the organization posses a healthy Climate for Innovation. There are nine (9) clear and measurable dimensions that differentiate Innovative organizations from those that are stagnate. During the session the group reviewed the results from the Climate for Innovation assessment we conducted prior to the Impact Session. Input was provided to develop strategies to strengthen the climate.

A take away for the group was that if we want innovative results, the process starts with nurturing a climate that stimulates contributors to think expansively, give their best insights and ideas. If winning in the market place is a war of innovation, Climate is a key force multiplier and key differentiator.

5. Innovative Project Selection, Team Formation and Chartering. With the benefit of all previous session elements and discussions, the group worked together to select high leverage innovation projects and begin team formation.



The graphic above captures additional considerations this Impact Session addressed. Effective innovation requires an integrated process, an innovative climate and the application of a wide array of tools/approaches. A key set of in-process (lead) metrics and key set of output performance metrics must also be developed to aim the innovation process in line with business needs.

I welcome your comments and questions. Please contact me if your organization, work unit or team would benefit from an Impact Session like this or any aspect of the process that has been highlighted in this blog. If your strategic need is not Innovation & Creativity, we can work with you to develop a change approach and Impact Session tailored to your needs.]]> Organizational Culture & Climate http://www.kellypetrock.com/index.php?entry=entry100215-021600 Kelly S. Petrock Mon, 15 Feb 2010 02:16:00 GMT http://www.kellypetrock.com/comments.php?y=10&m=02&entry=entry100215-021600 http://www.kellypetrock.com/index.php?entry=entry100122-020743

Culture Change via Team Based Management: Client Case Highlight

Just last month I spent a week with a client I’ve been consulting with for about three years now. Typical of many of our clients and most organizations, they are wrestling with a few key issues:

• How to hold people accountable, ensure that employees are all “pulling their share”.?
• How to run effective and productive meetings?
• How to define and address poor performance?
• How to function as a high performance team?
• How to confront disruptive behaviors?
• How to select and hire the best people?
• How to make performance appraisals meaningful?
• How to stabilize processes and increase performance?

What is rather atypical and not like many organizations is WHO within this client is wrestling with the above sticky issues. You see, the folks who are tackling and managing the issues in this case are the hourly production workers. Read More]]> Organizational Culture & Climate http://www.kellypetrock.com/index.php?entry=entry100122-020743 Kelly S. Petrock Fri, 22 Jan 2010 02:07:43 GMT http://www.kellypetrock.com/comments.php?y=10&m=01&entry=entry100122-020743 http://www.kellypetrock.com/index.php?entry=entry100108-020521

Client Case & Highlight
Recently we had an opportunity to build a planned change consulting project for one of our clients. The impetus for this project was a major change in organizational structure accompanied by a high level leadership transition. It’s important to capitalize upon the windows for change these opportunities present.

The incoming leader astutely wanted to avoid the common “ash n trash” trap incoming leaders can fall into. “Ash n trash” is when the new leader focuses on finding fault with, criticizing and attending to the weaknesses of their new organization in an effort to build a case for change. The kind of burning platform that hurts. Focusing on weaknesses, problems and gaps has a way leading to people feeling exposed, dumb and defensive. Not a great way to build bridges toward a successful future.

Given the overall situation and the requirement for this process to be a more positive and building process, we developed an approach to strategic change using an Appreciative Inquiry approach to transformation.  This approach is based on positive psychology, no CRITICISMS, no PROBLEMS, no GAPs, it's a process of finding your strategic organizational strengths and amplifying them.  This is a great approach for helping new leaders learn about as well as set a positive tone for transforming their new organization.

The other really nice thing about an approach based on AI (click on the link above to better appreciate this) is that the process is viral, negating many of the difficult and typical failure modes and forms of resistance inherent in traditional approaches to change.  

One of the opportunities that emerged for the client from this process was a focus on Creativity & Innovation, a strategic capability that they had possessed, had lost touch with and committed to amplify. I’ll use the specific focus area of Creativity and Innovation to help make the process overview described below a little more concrete.

Below is a summary of some of the key steps and elements from this process. Phase I, II and III are most closely associated with AI and how we "got there". Phase IV and V are the phases that pertain to specific project implementations including increased Creativity & Innovation throughout the enterprise.  

Phase 1. Finding the Strategic Leverage.  Senior leaders were actively engaged in this phase and conducted carefully structured Appreciative Inquiry interviews with their staff, customers and other key stakeholders.  From this initial work the senior leaders identified four strategic capabilities to address, one of which was Creativity & Innovation.

Phase II. Tapping into Passion & Possibilities.  This is the viral part of the process. The staff who were interviewed by senior leaders (as well as others, about 25-30 people) then received some brief training and went on to conduct a handful (5) of structured interviews themselves.  We created a database to capture and compile the contents of the interviews to make it easy to extract intelligence. Effective and consistently constructed interviews are the key here. The client created a “portal”, a virtual space where all interviews could be shared and read by every employee in the organization. This second round of interviews took place over the course of a month. I can’t stress how powerful these client driven interviews are, how they raise awareness and start to shift thinking.

Phase III. Summit.  All interviewers, interviewees and other key stakeholders (150+ people) came together in an interactive summit. At the summit the interviews were shared and dissected in an effort to learn from and apply their collective wisdom for change.  Key areas for change were identified and Strategic Deployment Teams were chartered and launched. One of these teams was focused on Creativity & Innovation.

Phase IV. Impact Session(s).  Strategic Deployment Teams go through a JumpStart launch process to accelerate their impact.  Each Impact session is constructed of three elements- Concepts Lab in their area of strategic deployment (i.e. creativity and innovation), Opportunity / Strategy definition and Goal Setting , Project Selection, Scope & Chartering.  The creativity and innovation Impact Session is designed to bring about change through an integrated set of strategies.  These strategies are organized in the following "buckets";
• Climate & Leadership for Innovation. 
• Technology & Enabling Systems
• Education & Awareness
• Application and deployment of tools & capabilities.

Phase IV. Hoshin / Catch-ball Project Deployment.  Hoshin / catch-ball principles are used to align and manage the execution and impact of projects. The cycle time for this overall effort, including verification of results in one year.

I welcome your comments, insights and experiences about change and transformation. If you would like more information on how to design an approach for your organization or team, please push the Contact Me button.
]]> Client Highlights http://www.kellypetrock.com/index.php?entry=entry100108-020521 Kelly S. Petrock Fri, 08 Jan 2010 02:05:21 GMT http://www.kellypetrock.com/comments.php?y=10&m=01&entry=entry100108-020521 http://www.kellypetrock.com/index.php?entry=entry091109-151311

Directive Leadership

“Hey, can you please help me find…
Ever been lost or directionally challenged? When is the last time you asked someone for directions? By the time we ask for directions we have admitted that we don’t have the ability, knowledge or experience to get where we want to go (low ability). I don’t know about you, but when I’m asking for directions I’m also typically dealing with some icky affect: anxious, apprehensive, stressed, etc. I am certainly NOT feeling confident, or assured (low willingness).

At the time of our asking for directions we are having a pristine Follower Readiness Level 1(R1) experience. What we need at that moment is someone familiar with the area and willing to help.

Help, what does help look like to the person having an R1 moment? The table below may provide some insight into the boundary conditions for how to "help" through directive leadership. You can click here to Read More about Directive Leadership.

]]> Leadership http://www.kellypetrock.com/index.php?entry=entry091109-151311 Kelly S. Petrock Mon, 09 Nov 2009 15:13:11 GMT http://www.kellypetrock.com/comments.php?y=09&m=11&entry=entry091109-151311 http://www.kellypetrock.com/index.php?entry=entry091019-115250

Delegation: The Lies We Tell & Semantics

Delegation is a consistent focal point for leaders who want to improve their effectiveness. It’s how things get done. Effective delegation requires leaders to first test their thinking and mental model for delegation before they test or develop their skills.

The Lies We Tell & Semantics
When it comes to delegation, most of us are liars. Not the diabolical kind, just the kind that lie to ourselves about why we can’t or shouldn’t delegate. Here are some lies we may need to push into the light and call them what they are:
• “In the time it takes me to explain this to the person, I could have done it three times.”(D)
• “I’m the only one who’s intimate enough with the (task/issues/process, etc.) to pull this off.” (I)
• “The other person is busy enough, I don’t want to burden them and it’s a simple enough thing for me to do.”(S)
• “If I want it done right, I have to do it myself.” (C)

Leaders also have to come to grips with the semantics of what “delegate” means to them. To delegate is of course a verb: to give a task or assignment to another person to carry out. Leaders, for the most part, are prone to action and tend to understand the verb meaning of delegate.

Delegate is also a noun. As such, delegation is a leadership decision to select or appoint someone who will act or decide on your behalf. This definition is less “action” focused and more “other” focused. In this way delegation assumes a high degree of performer maturity; someone who is both highly capable and psychologically willing. These are not the performers to give SLJ’s (simple little jobs) to. Delegation is for your “A” players, your emissaries, your delegates.

The figure below outlines the three essential elements required to achieve this type of empowered delegation. These are: Delegation of the TASK, Cultivation of Delegate OWNERSHIP and management of ENABLERS.



Typically leaders only really “see” and therefore attend to one or two of these elements. As a result, many leaders tend develop a delegation “blind-spot”.

For the article on delegation, complete with more typical failure modes as well as the strategies to overcome them, please click here: Delegation-LSSD.

]]> Leadership http://www.kellypetrock.com/index.php?entry=entry091019-115250 Kelly S. Petrock Mon, 19 Oct 2009 11:52:50 GMT http://www.kellypetrock.com/comments.php?y=09&m=10&entry=entry091019-115250 http://www.kellypetrock.com/index.php?entry=entry091009-162040

The leadership transition marks the beginning of a critical time and is often associated with significant change. Organizations expend valuable resources to find, hire and relocate leaders. Concurrent with this, organizations often have high performance expectations and complex dynamics that new leaders must address. New leaders are often asked to either correct/improve performance, strategically grow the business and or address cultural and normative issues— a tall order!

If you are a new leader, or will become one soon, we suggest you use your "new leader status" to your advantage. Capitalize upon this unique window in time to review, understand and re-clarify; work unit mission, IPO's / organizational structure, project status, performance measures/trends & scorekeeping process, cultural / normative "rules" and the implications of future challenges on performance.

These can be great topics for you to inquire into and or have structured group discussions about. If you suspect more than minor changes in these areas then try to think first about a transparent / collaborative process for raising awareness, building and implementing the case for change. Making the above discoveries early should also position you to work proactively to request needed resources and negotiate expectations with your boss.

Your new leader status also legitimizes a refocus on relationships, teamwork / teambuilding, revisiting membership and leadership expectations and focus on employee performance and development.

Whenever you transition as a leader you know that from a change management perspective, everyone is EXPECTING some change. This is both the blessing and the curse of the first nine months.

What do you think is an essential step or issue new leaders must address? What other activities do we know need to occur and what are common challenges associated with the transition period?


]]> Leadership http://www.kellypetrock.com/index.php?entry=entry091009-162040 Kelly S. Petrock Fri, 09 Oct 2009 16:20:40 GMT http://www.kellypetrock.com/comments.php?y=09&m=10&entry=entry091009-162040 http://www.kellypetrock.com/index.php?entry=entry091002-141448

Making the Most of Meetings: Meetings by Design

In our experience training leaders to conduct effective meetings we've found that most meetings are "dead on arrival". Many meetings are doomed to fail- by design.

In our one day "Making the Most of Meetings" training we focus not only on the key skills, style and tools of effective meeting facilitation, but on how to design meetings that make it easy for people / attendees to make productive contributions.

Our helpful article of Meetings by Design has been recently accepted and published at: Published Meetings by Design

You can also access a downloadable PDF at: Meetings by Design

I hope you take a nugget or two from the article and make a positive change to your meetings. People will notice. ]]> General http://www.kellypetrock.com/index.php?entry=entry091002-141448 Kelly S. Petrock Fri, 02 Oct 2009 14:14:48 GMT http://www.kellypetrock.com/comments.php?y=09&m=10&entry=entry091002-141448 http://www.kellypetrock.com/index.php?entry=entry090924-025052

Four Situational Leadership Approaches

In LSSD, to drive home the effective and dynamic practice of leadership, we leverage Situational Leadership pioneered by Hersey and Blanchard. This simple framework has proven to be an excellent way of conveying the most basic aspects of leadership as well subtle nuances. However, as it can be when working with simple tools, it is easy to focus on the “doing” of leadership and lose sight of “being” a leader. Your effectiveness as leader will in large part be determined by your attitude toward your company, your role, your work and your associates. You can “do” all the right things and your underlying sentiments will either compliment or contradict your efforts.

The previous module focused on the first of the elements of the Situational Leadership Framework. This module will address the second element.
• The ability to make helpful distinctions relative to what is going on with your followers.
• The ability to match what is going with ones followers with the most effective leadership process, or approach.

Task vs Relationship Focus
To understand follower Readiness means understanding the interplay of a followers ability and motivation on any given task. To effectively match our Leadership Approach to the followers’ Readiness level means understanding the interplay and application of two distinct areas of focus; Task Focus & Relationship Focus. The bottom half of the slide below shows the differences between these areas of focus.



Situational Leadership helps leaders to understand when and how to apply these two areas of focus to bring out the best in followers. There are a few common traps we see leaders fall into when it comes to applying these areas of focus:
1. Leaders that do a little of both but not enough of either to really make an impact. It’s important that leaders learn how to demonstrate these areas of focus in different degrees of intensity. There times when followers and those around you will appreciate you sending strong, clear and focused signals.
2. Leaders that have a disposition toward one area of focus and or neglect the other. Think about the leader who was most frustrating to work for? Most likely this leader was overdone and overboard on one focus area while not quite balancing it out with the other. Being a leader often means doing things well, even though they may not be your preference or natural strong suite.

The term we use for the leadership approach that is primarily Task focused with little attention to Relationship focus is Directing. Directing is a very effective leadership response when working with followers on activities where they have low ability and are either insecure or unwilling—Readiness Level 1.

The term we use for the leadership approach that is primarily Task and equally Relationship focused is Coaching. Coaching is a very effective leadership response when working with followers on activities where they have low ability and are willing, eager and confident—Readiness Level II.



The term we use for the leadership approach that is primarily Relationship (supportive) focused with little attention to Task focus is Counseling. Counseling is a very effective leadership response when working with followers on activities where they have high ability and are either insecure or unwilling—Readiness Level III. Alternate terms for counseling are; partnering, advising,

The term we use for the leadership approach that is neither very Task focused or Relationship focused is Delegating. Delegating is a very effective leadership response when working with followers on activities where they have high ability and are highly confident, eager and willing—Readiness Level IV.


]]> Leadership http://www.kellypetrock.com/index.php?entry=entry090924-025052 Kelly S. Petrock Thu, 24 Sep 2009 02:50:52 GMT http://www.kellypetrock.com/comments.php?y=09&m=09&entry=entry090924-025052 http://www.kellypetrock.com/index.php?entry=entry090915-114350

Follower Readiness.

Leadership as a Dynamic Set of
Practices.

During our Leadership Skill & Style Development (LSSD) program we challenge participants to acknowledge their assumptions and beliefs regarding effective leadership. One question we pose to participants is whether or not they believe effective leadership is a more dynamic or static process? Intuitively everyone acknowledges that effective leadership is a dynamic process that requires leaders to be alert and active in adapting their approach.

Everyone also seems to appreciate that “dynamic” does not mean messy, chaotic, unclear or without purpose.
In LSSD, to drive home the effective and dynamic practice of leadership, we leverage Situational Leadership pioneered by Hersey and Blanchard.

There are two elements to Situational Leadership that must be understand and applied together:
1. The ability to make helpful distinctions relative to what is going on with your followers.
2. The ability to match what is going with one's followers with the most effective leadership process.

The focus of this learning module is on point #1 from above; what is going on with your followers? Through Situational Leadership we learn that not only is leadership a dynamic process but understanding the different levels of Follower Readiness can bring purpose and clarity to the adaptation that leaders must make.

Ability x Motivation = Readiness.
Follower readiness is an assessment of the followers disposition toward each performance expectation they are required to meet. To make this Readiness assessment leaders need to make simple distinctions between the follower's ability and motivation to perform their duties.

Highly ABLE followers have the experience, skills, aptitude, background and knowledge to perform at or above expectations. Followers with low ability have little experience, knowledge, skills, background or demonstrated aptitude for the task(s) at hand.

Highly MOTIVATED followers are interested, eager, willing, confident and feel secure about performing at or above expectations. Followers with low motivation are hesitant, unsure, unwilling and or insecure / anxious about applying themselves to the task(s) at hand.



Leaders need to strengthen and fine tune their ability to make accurate observations of their followers ability and motivation combinations.
In LSSD we use assessment tools to understand and differentiate between the gradations of ability and motivation. No assessment tool can be as precise or useful as healthy two-way dialogue. Periodic discussions with followers about their roles, responsibilities and performance objectives should help you “zero-in” on what is going on with your follower in these two critical areas. Your performance management process should provide you with at least one opportunity to have these critical discussions.

Discerning Readiness requires a leader to be alert and vigilant. The colored sequence of blocks in the slide below depicts how these basic Ability & Motivation distinctions combine to help differentiate between four different Follower Readiness levels; R1, R2, R3, R4.



Each readiness level requires the leader to deliver a different leadership process or approach. This is one tangible reference to the dynamic nature or leadership.

Now, also please remember that each follower may have multiple performance expectations or duties. For each follower there may be several applicable Readiness levels. Multiply this by several followers and you can see why alertness, vigilance and the ability to make Readiness distinctions is so important to effective, dynamic leadership.
]]> Leadership http://www.kellypetrock.com/index.php?entry=entry090915-114350 Kelly S. Petrock Tue, 15 Sep 2009 11:43:50 GMT http://www.kellypetrock.com/comments.php?y=09&m=09&entry=entry090915-114350 http://www.kellypetrock.com/index.php?entry=entry090908-180914

Guidelines for Survey Guided Development

Organizational surveys and assessments can be powerful tools for improving employee engagement and organizational effectiveness- or not. No doubt about it, some tools are better than others. However, this is one of those areas where a strong survey guided development process can compensate for a poorly constructed tool AND the perfect tool can be rendered useless by a poorly thought out or administered survey guided development process.

In our consulting work we use organizational effectiveness surveys because they can help assess how well an organization is functioning, how engaged or motivated employees are and any positive or negative trends that may be occurring. I like to initiate a survey guided development process at the beginning of projects to; baseline the organizations effectiveness, raise awareness and desire for change, increase engagement and measure the impact of change throughout transformation projects.

Below are just a few basic guidelines to follow when considering whether and how to make the most of your survey guided development process.

• Decide what you plan to do with the survey data and how you intend to feed it back before administering the survey. Our rule of thumb is to plan of feeding the results to anyone who responded to the survey.
• Survey results should be used for improvement.
• The survey used should be based on some interpretative theory or framework.
• The questions should be actionable.
• The rating scale should be consistent throughout the assessment tool.
• Ensure anonymity for people taking the survey. If using a paper and pencil type of survey, provide respondents with an a envelop they can put the survey in and seal it before handing it in, or a stamped addressed envelope to mail the survey back.
• Employees can take the survey on the organization, department or work group. We encourage “high fidelity” measurement by having employees take the survey on their work group. In this way we can easily provide high level reports as well as provide feedback at the supervisory / work group level.
• The time between taking the survey and feeding back the results should be as short at possible. We like to take no longer than a month to get some aspect of the survey results back to the organization to start the feedback and engagement process.
• The survey results should be fed back to the entire organization, not only the leadership team. Employees generally expect that when asked to take a survey that someone is interested in what they think and that this will lead to change.
• Leaders should be involved in feeding back the survey data to their organizations. While there may be a role for experts or consultants in the feedback process, leaders must be encouraged and prepared to demonstrate active engagement.
• We encourage linking survey results feedback with opportunities for managers and employees to help interpret the data together and collaborate on suggestions for improvement.

I welcome your input and dialogue on the list and if you would like to email me about how to increase employee engagement through the use of survey guided development, please send me a note to ksprock@aol.com.]]> Organizational Culture & Climate http://www.kellypetrock.com/index.php?entry=entry090908-180914 Kelly S. Petrock Tue, 08 Sep 2009 18:09:14 GMT http://www.kellypetrock.com/comments.php?y=09&m=09&entry=entry090908-180914