Filip

Modderie

11mei

In-house Ombudsman

Large organization all have the same issue: sooner or later, they begin to build silo’s. Marketing vs. Sales, Sales vs. R&D, R&D vs. IT,… The problem is that when business units are created, they naturally evolve to… well… a separate unit with their own P&L, strategy, focus, internal politics and so on. This can costs a lot to the company: BU’s battle for their own strategy: A quick time to market for a new service rarely is in line with current IT strategy on development strategy.

In theory, there is always a person above these silo’s (be it the CEO, COO,…) that can mitigate between all these parties. However, it is clear that a CEO, who has more urgent or strategic stuff to take care of, mostly becomes the bottle neck of his own organization if he needs to intervene in every development, idea generation, issue…

So just an idea: why not put one guy/girl on the payroll, that reports directly to the CEO with only one task: be the Ombudsman of the company. She should perfectly know the company strategy and the view of the CEO on the focus of the next year and thus can bring all the business units more aligned without wasting time on formal escalation procedures.

7feb

The paradox of a normal distribution.

Just some food for thought: If your company’s HR department implies a strict ‘normal distribution’ for appraisals (you know, where the most of the people perform ‘on par’, some above and below par and only some extremely good or bad), how are you as a manager supposed to invest in your team?

Even if this theory is correct on a macro level, on a real life micro level, it causes some problems:

  • a manager that works hard to create a top team is forced to give a mediocre or even bad score to some team members in order to fit the ‘normal distribution’.
  • HR people themselves are apparently doing a bad job at matching people to the specific job and the company requirements for people.
  • It demotes people.

In my opinion, a normal distribution is just plain old school for scoring people (although I can see it work for giving bonuses).

How do you motivate people?

Happy appraisals!

28dec

Whatever we are used to.

Freedom of choice is overrated. I experienced myself today when taking a cooking pot…

Since my girlfriend and I moved in together, we have a lot of stuff more than double, including al kitchen and cooking stuff. Even with all ‘her’ pots right on top, I just took ‘mine’ that was as big and as good (and even less shiny) as ‘hers’. Without thinking about it. Without judging.

So, what did we learn?

  • Marketeers should not overrate the cognitive process in a low-involvement market. People just buy something and make up a reason after because they are socially obliged to do so.
  • Change is not easy. Do not only work on the obvious ‘objections’, but also have a look at the spontaneous ‘old’ behavior that the people do without thing about it as rebellious…

Have a challenging 2011!

11nov

Get your self some cloud motivation for 2011!

A new year ahead. The first Christmas shopping ideas come bouncing along, the good intentions start taking form.
But what if you do not have any good intentions?

What get’s you motivated? What idea makes you want to get up early, to bring out the best in that brainstorm, to ship this new product?

Wouldn’t it be nice to have a box full of creative starters, just like the box of chocolates?

The idea is to create a box of 100 MOO Cards with 100 different creative boosting motivational cards.

They can be quotes, ideas, brainstorm starters, just some crazy thing to do the day you pick up the card.

Here is the deal:

You choose one or both of the following:

  • You create a design that can easily be printed on MOO cards (details: see below) and mail the result to motivationalwave@joined.be. Anything goes, just keep it clean and simple.
  • You spread the word to friends, colleagues, exes,… that might be interested in designing one.

If we get to 100 cards, we do a collective wave and I put everything available in one .zip file so anyone can use MOO or any other service to print the cards.

We all enjoy living in a more creative 2011!

The rules:

Full bleed size (recommended for creating finished artwork)
874 x 378 pixels (300dpi)
74mm x 32mm (300dpi)
2.9″ x 1.26″ (300dpi)

You agree to keep your design open for everyone to print. Off course, you get full credit for your work.

Let’s keep it available to anyone: No extreme stuff.

We close when we are at 100 or at 20/12/2010, so spread the word!

Wrap up:

17mei

If your business is knowledge: do you value knowledge creation and sharing?

If your business is about knowledge (reminder: knowledge is not information), how do you motivate people to create and share your most valuable asset?

Let’s have a look at the typically ‘knowledge’ company: A strategic consultancy firm. Their main asset is the knowledge and experience that their consultants possess (of course along with the capacities to translate these to a specific business or case,…).

If you work in such a firm, you no doubt receive a bonus when the companies numbers go up, you definitely receive a surplus when you bring in a new client and you even get an extra paycheck when you bring in a new recruit (hey, that is knowledge also).

The question is: do you get an incentive to create or share knowledge?

Do you receive recognition when creating a white paper, host a knowledge session during lunch for the new arrivals on the project, share the status of the project, give everybody a heads up on the added value you bring to a specific customer,…?

There are plenty of tools out there to share the knowledge, but few organization value the importance of knowledge sharing and the effort that goes into creating and sharing it.

If knowledge is your main asset, you should make sure your employees go beyond limits in creating, sharing and defending that asset!

(Full disclosure: Filip is working for Sodexo Web Motivation center and provides solutions for companies that want to work around motivation / incentive / recognition).