Executive Coaching

managers

New Women Managers

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Communication Strategies that Promote Success

by Kari F. Uman, M.Ed., President, Uman Resources Associates, Inc.

Loudoun County Chamber of Commerce NewsletterWomen who are new to management positions sometimes discover that their learned communication style works better in personal rather than professional settings. Here are three solid communication strategies that will help you manage yourself and work more effectively with your superiors, peers and employees:

    1. Set limits and learn to say “no”
      Many women in new managerial positions want to succeed so they do whatever peers, superiors and even their subordinates ask of them. This leads to resentment and burnout. Here are some guidelines to consider when setting limits:Know what you want and don’t want to do by assessing your:

      Time – how long will what is asked of you take?
      Energy – how much energy will you have to expand? Will it fill up or drain you?
      Skills – are these skills you already have? Do you want a new challenge that will increase yours skills?
      Desire – how much do you really want to do this? And what will be the benefit to you and/or the organization?

      If you suspect that saying no is damaging to your career, suggest a workable compromise so that you don’t have to take on the whole task.

    2. Make complete requests
      If you need to get others to take action, requests need to be clear, have a time frame, and any specific information that is pertinent to the success of the request. Make sure you include the following components:

      Requester: who is asking? (not, “we need to do this”)
      Listener: who is being asked? (not, “will someone do this for me?”)
      Future Action: What do I want you to do?
      Condition of Satisfaction: How will I know it’s been done?
      Establish a shared context: Verify assumptions. What does “review” mean?
      Time: by when?

      Here’s an example of a complete request: “Claudia, please review this document for me and correct my mistakes. This includes correcting typos and spelling, changing grammar, and re-writing any sentences that are not clear. I need to have this finished by 5 o’clock today. Do you need any further information?”

    3. Give clear, direct feedback
      If you need to give an employee negative feedback, use the “DESC” feedback model–it can help you communicate all the information effectively:

      Describe the behavior or event without any judgments or assumptions about intent. Be specific as if you are videotaping a scenario. Say, “Yesterday, when you came into the meeting 20 minutes late…” rather than “You always come late to meetings.” Otherwise, the employee can legitimately identify times when he/she was not late and therefore can dismiss the message.

      Express your feelings or explain the impact the person’s actions had on you or others. Say, “I was embarrassed because the CEO was there and it reflects badly on me and our office.” Yes, it is OK to express feelings. Your body language is expressing your feelings anyway so you may as well acknowledge them.

      Specify what you want the person to do in the future. Say, “In the future, I’m counting on you to arrive to meetings on time.”

      Communicate your belief in their ability to change. Positive reinforcement tends to motivate and move people towards action more effectively. “Your contribution is always valuable and I have no doubt you will be sensitive to my concern.”

      Following these tips will go a long way towards your success as a manager.

© Kari Uman 2004

The Five Pillars of Leadership Program

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PURPOSE:

The key to a quality organization is quality people. To improve the quality and performance of an organization you must attend to the people who create it. It makes little sense to tinker with refining the structure, systems and processes of an organization unless you first work to improve the quality and performance of those who lead it. The Five Pillars of Leadership program is designed to lift executive and upper-middle managers to new heights of performance and results. The Five Pillars program explores and examines fundamental as well as breakthrough concepts in leadership practices. Focusing on the personal as well as the skill sides of leadership, it offers executives an unparalleled opportunity to deepen their understanding of the interdependence among leadership, personal performance, and organizational results. The program enables participants to intentionally manage, to a higher, more productive level, their own performance and effectiveness within their organization.

OBJECTIVES:

To develop leaders who:

  • Understand how unconscious, self-limiting patterns of thinking and behavior limit their ability to be powerful contributors and assets to their organizations
  • Are better able to say what needs saying, take risks, and make tough choices
  • Can effectively navigate through times of continuous or extreme change and uncertainty and maintain their focus
  • Can see new possibilities in old problems and issues
  • Can foster high performance teams
  • Guide by a deeper sense of values and principles
  • Are leaders people want to follow

METHODOLOGY:

The basic approach to learning in this workshop is exploration and discovery, individually and in small groups. The workshop uses a variety of learning technologies, including short presentations, experiential activities to examine concepts, group discussion, personal reflection, video, and a manual. State-of-the-art leadership assessment technology is used to provide participants with feedback on their leadership styles and/or skills. During the final session, participants will bring together their insights and learning and formulate a specific Application Plan to put into action in their workplace(s).

FACILITATOR:

David Lassiter is the director and founder of Leadership Advantage, a coaching and consulting firm dedicated to helping executives, teams, and organizations achieve their objectives. David has over 20 years’ experience as an executive coach and designer and developer of executive, team, and organizational development programs for profit, not-for-profit, and government organizations. He is a pioneer in the use of 360 degree assessment for leadership development and the innovator of the Strategic Team Alignment process for maximizing team members’ growth, development, and performance.

LENGTH:

There are five, all-day sessions to this program, including one in which you will receive 360 degree feedback on your leadership effectiveness. 5 – 14 participants per workshop.

Case History: Merging Senior Managers from Different Cultures

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ISSUE:

This prominent university had merged two of its computing arms, that had distinctly different cultures, under a new CIO. The CIO realized that the cultural differences, exacerbated by individual and gender-based stylistic differences, were impeding his ability to create a highly-collaborative senior management team.

INDUSTRY:

Education

SIZE:

Major University

CLIENT:

Team of Twelve Senior Managers, IT Department

SOLUTION:

We designed a process to simultaneously coach the individual managers in their own leadership development while coaching the group to act effectively as a leadership team. Initially, a number of participants displayed skepticism and anxiety about the process. Good briefing and clear ground rules created participant safety and trust which replaced their doubt. The process utilized a computer-based, feedback instrument to gather individual data from subordinates, peers, customers and superiors. Specific profiles with developmental recommendations were generated for each participant. Individual coaching occurred monthly for the next six months to work on developmental needs and integrate specific efforts into real-time performance.

The coaching team consisted of a male and female coach. Care was taken to minimize a coach working with both a manager and subordinate and to maximize the value of different gender perspectives, experiential background and chemistry. This assured that each participant made as much progress as possible. The two coaches also designed and facilitated a full-group meeting every 6 weeks to address issues of collective importance.

RESULTS:

The team coaching process lasted 15 months. There was significant individual growth, better matching of individuals to roles, visible improvements in peer relationships, improved leadership behaviors and greater self-responsibility for relationship dynamics. The leadership team gained a greater trust in each other and itself. Many of the critical projects to which the institution was committed progressed with far less friction and were successfully implemented. The individual and group developmental processes reinforced each other and created a common vocabulary for the senior management team to utilize as it guided the organization forward.