Marcia's Leadership Q&As: Pivotal Leadership—the New Norm

Pivotal Leadership—the New Norm

Q. Planning for our staff returning to the office is a roller coaster ride, especially with the new Delta variant in full force. Simultaneously, employees are voicing resistance to return because they like working from home. What’s the solution?

A. Your question is relevant and timely. For any crisis or challenge, we have to think of the aim of the organization, and then answer, “what will we do to optimize our system? What are new ways to achieve our goals?” There are customers to serve, applicants to recruit, and employees and vendors to support. 

Finding the Win-Win-Win for each organization is a leadership challenge—how to optimize the whole. There are business needs that have to be met so that the company is sustainable. This is a time for pivotal leadership. More than ever, leaders need to discuss (and integrate the voices of the employees and customers) how they are going to create and manage all of the parts of their organization. Use a system diagram. Draw the organization’s interactions (not an Org. chart) and see how the work, information, and communication can flow. You’ll ask new strategic questions. 

More important, be open to new methods to accomplish your aim. The more creative you are, the more innovation you can offer. Strive for a happy, productive workplace.

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Q. Our corporation is looking at acquiring five to ten companies in the next year or two to help us scale toward our vision. What are the blind spots we should be aware of?

A. Great question!  So few corporations think through the M&A process. This leads to more than 80% of M&A transactions failing.  The sad part is, there’s such potential for success! The answer is easy; the work is harder, but essential. The issue is that often, corporations that acquire another corporation don’t do two fundamental requirements: 

1. They don’t think through the integration process fully (they focus on the financial success and capturing a skillset of workers they need); their potential success is immediately stunted. 

2. They don’t assess the leadership and cultural fit. If the two fundamentals are done, leadership (of both organizations) create an integration team. 

It’s mandatory to have an Integration Team with the knowledge to optimize the whole transaction—and then follow it through into the next year or two to ensure problems are addressed. They assess how the two organizations (and following on, more) will integrate from a leadership perspective, cultural perspective, and financial perspective. It’s like a three-legged stool. If you don’t have all three legs stable, you’ll fall and fail. But focus on optimizing all three parts, and you’ll have a great potential for long-term success. You need to become an Integration machine!

Marcia's Leadership Q&As

Q. As our meetings, conferences, and events open up for our sales teams, all employee town halls, our vendors and our customers, what new changes should we prepare for?

A. Having just spoken at a conference for event and meeting planners, the issues and questions they are raising and preparing for are fresh in my mind. The organizations that will likely survive in the long term will be the ones that are seriously communicating with their vendors across their supply chain. They are true partners, sharing every detail with transparency as soon as they are aware of changes—both the good and bad news. All of the parties need to be as flexible, collaborative, and supportive of each other as possible—in action, not just words.  

Contracts will also get more specific. How will quality service be defined in a still-Covid world where the number one concern for 60% of meeting planners is the safety of their attendees? Contracts will spell it out. For example, if the peak time for attendees will arrive for registration, specify how many staff members will be needed at the desk (we’ve all seen long lines after a tiring flight, and one person is working the desk.) Specify the training requirements you need to serve your attendees.  

Resort destinations are pricey and will eventually come down, but it may take a year. There’s a lot of pent-up demand for people to meet—safely. This is a time to listen to each other and help everyone continue to successfully work out of the pandemic. Those who try to take advantage of others by being inflexible will be remembered in the future. Find the win-win in your interactions to optimize the results for all.

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Q. There has been a lot of loss of varying kinds for people over the past year. How do we support each other?

A. Grieving is not generally a huge topic in the workplace, but the past and next years are exceptions. People have experienced a tremendous variety of many kinds of loss. Loss of a loved one or colleague is most devastating. Loss of a relationship, a job, a business, financial stability, the way things were, connections with friends or colleagues are experiences that need to be healed. Everyone grieves in different ways.  

There are no right or wrong ways. To heal, people need to feel. Being there for someone just to listen, share stories, share the pain is an important part of the healing process for many. Some people heal quickly and others may take years. 

Be patient with each other. Check in with how people to see how they are. Do small things to be supportive. If you ask how you can help, it can put more pressure on the person grieving. Instead, don’t ask; do something! There is a focus on creating mental wellness programs in more schools and organizations to support those who are struggling. Connect people with resources (books, videos, articles, a support group.) Most importantly, don’t brush the grief away. It is the reality and the healing process takes time.

Leadership Unites and Partners to Deliver Rare Results

Strange bedfellows have emerged in the past year as the world addressed the pandemic. For example, GM and Ford pivoted their production lines to make ventilators, and beer breweries shifted to produce hand sanitizers.

Pharmaceutical companies around the world began the race to create vaccines to protect society from COVID19 and its variants. Independently, corporations compete to win; they are rivals. First to market, best to market—who will it be?

The pandemic has driven all of the pharma companies around the world to discover vaccines that will be safe and effective.

A Compelling Aim Unites a Collaborative Team

This week we saw the Biden administration and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services identify and supply the funding so two typically rival mega-pharma corporations (Merck and Janssen, a Johnson & Johnson company) would collaborate, unite, and support each other. Together they will accelerate the vaccine production needed. Merck did not succeed in discovering their own vaccine, but they are scaling up their manufacturing capacity to deliver millions of vaccine vials for distribution to the people in need.

Leaders Use a Strategic Compass

The Strategic Compass is a powerful inter-dependent strategy tool that can be used to drive toward and accelerate successful results in any or across organizations and industries. The Compass has five interactive parts. It quickly helps leaders to:

• focus and prioritize

• ask and answer the essential questions, and

• communicate to the teams the extraordinary results they need to achieve.

When the compelling aim is clear, great leadership communicates it to the people who can collaborate and deliver. By what method will they achieve the aim? What values will they stand for in action, not just words? Who will they serve and what do those customers/patients/members/students need? How will leaders measure progress and success?

Strategic Compass

Whether an organization has its annual goals to achieve or a global pandemic and crisis is threatening survival of society as we knew it, leaders can focus and address their issues. The Strategic Compass is an imperative guide.

Win-Win-Win

There are times for competition, but there are more compelling opportunities for cooperation and collaborations. Businesses may compete, but during the times they collaborate, we all may win. When the Compelling Aim is enormous and too large for one organization, leaders who merge resources, creativity, and brain power, create more successes. Another example is climate change. It will take millions of people working together to reverse the impact of global climate change.

When you’re faced with challenges and crises, look at the bigger picture to discover the power of Win-Win-Win results. Use your leadership and courage to answer the questions on the Strategic Compass, and optimize (not merely maximize) your results.

Marcia’s Leadership Q&A

Send your leadership and team questions to Marcia Daszko at md@mdaszko.com.  She works with Boards, C-suite leaders and teams to pivot, innovate, accelerate and achieve bold results never before imagined. A provocative keynote & virtual speaker, strategic Deming advisor/consultant for 25+ years, she is the bestselling author of the book “Pivot Disrupt Transform.” www.mdaszko.com

Q. When should a team prepare for a crisis? Is it too early to plan for the next crisis, especially when we’re still in the middle of this one?

A. Great leaders, at work and at home, anticipate and consider challenges and how they will respond to them. Whether it’s pilots training to deal with a challenge in flight, families preparing for an earthquake or a hurricane, a driver being aware of the traffic, a company preparing for a pandemic or loss of a major client, people do a variety of crisis planning. Some companies had a plan in case they were ever faced with a pandemic. Did your company have a plan? Those that had one had created it with calm rationality and could quickly adapt it. Others had to rapidly pivot, or they struggled.

Thoughtful leaders at home and at work think ahead. They scan their environment for safety. What might they be faced with?  With your team, what do you need to think about, anticipate, discuss, plan and prepare for? It’s never too late to make a plan. That’s what leaders do. When it’s needed, leaders and their rapid action teams adapt and pivot, and respond. If an unforeseen crisis occurs, teams who have a foundation in leadership thinking, will respond rather than react or freeze in fear.

Q. What signs should a leader look out for that signal that they may not be the right leader for the job anymore or should take a different role in the organization and move aside?

A. It is not uncommon for a founder, owner or executive to move aside as an organization grows, needs to scale, or goes through transitions they have no experience in or are uncomfortable with. The enterprise may be moving and growing at a fast pace, building in complexity, or innovating into new areas of expertise. If executives feel overwhelmed, uncomfortable, fearful, or are micro-managing, they need to assess if they are continuing to find joy and satisfaction in their current position.

There are multiple ways to address this situation. Many young founders have a close mentor(s) such as a supportive CEO, Board Director or a professor who guide and advise them as they navigate and develop. Or an executive may have founded an organization and be passionate about product development, but may not have an affinity for running or growing a business. People have natural leadership within them and each person needs to decide where they can best contribute and feel fulfilled.