Showing posts with label organizational change. Show all posts
Showing posts with label organizational change. Show all posts

Lessons From the Field: Applying Appreciative Inquiry (Revised Edition) Review

Lessons From the Field: Applying Appreciative Inquiry (Revised Edition)
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It is rare that we would describe a business book as beautiful, but this one truly is. Not only is the artwork subtle and well integrated to contribute to the physical beauty of this book, there is beauty in each story or lesson. You will find well written, detailed case studies on the application and success of Appreciative Inquiry in settings ranging from schools to communities to entire nations. The how-do portions of the book are powerfully written yet easy to understand (in contrast to some of the more academic works on this subject).
My favorite 'lesson' comes from Father Greg Banaga and relates the principles of Ai to the teachings in the Bible. Just one example of the uplifting nature of this book and the ennate quality of the Appreciative Inquiry Process. Buy it for its practical, informative text, love it for its depth and beauty.

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Maverick: The Success Story Behind the World's Most Unusual Workplace Review

Maverick: The Success Story Behind the World's Most Unusual Workplace
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Shortly after Ricardo Semler took over Semco, his family's moribund manufacturing business, employees began referring to him as Dr. Dickie. In the context of a hardened and confrontational union work environment, this nickname signaled the changes that were about to come.
Maverick tells the story of the transformation of Semco into a radical and high performing organization.
Here's a sampling of Dr. Dickie's good ideas...
*Make each business unit small enough so that those involved understand everything that is going on and can influence the outcomes.
*Implement a rounded pyramid organization structure with floating coordinators. Coordinators are the only supervisory level and are all at the same organizational level but different pay rates.
*Demonstrate trust by eliminating symbols of corporate oppression as well as the perks of status.
*Share all information and eliminate secrets. You can't expect involvement to flourish without an abundance of information available to all employees.
*Every six months bosses are evaluated by their subordinates and the results are posted.
*Salaries are public information unless the employee requests that they not be published.
*Allow employees to set their own salary. Consider these criteria: what they think they can make elsewhere; what others with similar skills and responsibilities make in the Company; what friends with similar backgrounds make; how much they need to live on.
*Share 23% of pretax profits. Employees vote how the pool will be split. They must vote to determine the manner of each quarterly distribution. In practice they always vote for equal dollar shares.
*Substitute the survival manual for thick procedure manuals. Eliminate policies and rules wherever possible.
*Job rotation; 20% of managers shift jobs each year.
*Set up workers in their own businesses as suppliers to the company.
*Eliminate the wearing of wristwatches whenever and wherever possible. It is impossible to understand life in all its hugeness and complexity if one is constantly consulting a minute counter.
*Either you can create complex systems so as to manage complexity, or you can simplify everything.
My company used Maverick as assigned reading for a management retreat some years ago. The result was a change of direction that it's hard to imagine would have been arrived at otherwise. Highly recommended for those open to having their organizational paradigms shifted.


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Getting Change Right: How Leaders Transform Organizations from the Inside Out Review

Getting Change Right: How Leaders Transform Organizations from the Inside Out
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One of this book's greatest strengths is Seth Kahan's unique ability to focus on the most important "whats" of change initiatives and then explain with both precision and eloquence how to do what must be done to ensure the success of those initiatives. He draws upon a wealth of real-world experience from which he learned a number of valuable lessons. He cites seven in the Introduction to this book, then devotes a separate chapter to each:
1. Communicate so that people get it and spread it.
Comment: Kahan correctly begins with this basic rule because all change initiatives require cooperation and collaboration, both of which depend on constant and effective communication between and among those involved.
2. Energize your most valuable players.
Comment: You already know who they are, the ones you dread losing to illness, retirement, spouse relocation, or (worst of all) to a competitor. The best way to energize them is to recognize them: make them feel appreciated.
3. Understand the territory of change.
Comment: Many (most?) of the barriers to change are cultural, the result of what James O'Toole (in Leading Change) aptly characterizes as "the ideology of comfort and the tyranny of custom." Kahan explains how to create a "map" of what is certain to be perilous "territory."
4. Accelerate change through communities that perform.
Comment: Kahan calls them "thematic groups." Seth Godin calls them "tribes." However described, their members share a common vision and passion to make that vision a reality by creating "systemic pull."
5. Generate dramatic surges in progress
Comment: Kahan recommends special and frequent "face-to-face events" that attract and then energize the most valuable change agents. The objective is to transform believers to evangelists.
6. Break through logjams
Comment: Kahan advocates a "SWAT team mentality": expect trouble (i.e. resistance), anticipate and prepare for it, engage it with sufficient force of conviction and determination.
7. WorkLifeSuccess to sustain high performance in the midst of change.
Comment: "By this, I mean doing whatever it takes to achieve and sustain overall excellence." Kahan envisions leadership at all levels and in all areas. He suggests that change agents must be "practical visionaries," people "with their eyes on the horizon and their feet on the ground."
Kahan himself is a "practical visionary," sustaining throughout his lively narrative a sharp focus on what works, what doesn't, and why. I especially appreciate his skillful use of a number of reader-friendly devices such as checklists and summaries of key points as well as contributions from prominent business thinkers such as Ken and Mary Gergin ("Social Construction and Leading Change"), Steve Denning ("Operating Without Budget or Authority"), Rick Stone ("The Power of the Story"), Jim Wolfensohn ("Talking to Everyone"), Madelyn Blair ("Storylistening for Reconnaissance"), Etienne Wenger ("Communities of Practice"), Lesley Shneier ("The World Bank's Knowledge Fairs"), Larry Forster ("The Competency for Collaboration"), and John Kotter ("The Greatest Positive Impact"). It seems especially appropriate for Kahan to include such a variety of perspectives, given the inherent ecumenical nature of change agency. I also want to commend him for also providing two appendices, "Sample Strategic Engagement Plan" and JumpStart Storytelling."
Congratulations to Seth Kahan on a brilliant achievement. Bravo!

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An innovative communication method for making change happen in any organization

Getting Change Right presents a new view of leadership communication that says change doesn't flow top-down, bottom-up, or sideways, but inside-out. This is how change spreads through a complex system successfully-the other options are force or failure. Based on years of experience with organizations around the world, change expert Kahan presents a new model of communication, one that moves from a transactional view of information exchange to a collaborative construction of shared understanding. When the right people are having the right conversations and interactions, then they act in concert even though the situations they confront independently are impossible to predict or coordinate. This dynamic practitioner's guide to implementing change
Presents the innovative co-creation communication model for creating change
Reveals how communicating with a company's most valuable players is at the heart of organizational change
Draws on the author's wealth of experience with Fortune 100 companies, leading government agencies, and associations

Getting Change Right offers business insights and field-tested, practical techniques that can be put to work immediately.

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Innovate the Pixar Way: Business Lessons from the World's Most Creative Corporate Playground Review

Innovate the Pixar Way: Business Lessons from the World's Most Creative Corporate Playground
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Since 1995 with the release of Toy Story, Pixar has created blockbuster animated films that the whole family loves. How do they KEEP doing it? To be creative and innovative once, twice, even three times is a major feat, but 10 in a row! Pixar replaced Disney as the family animation movie specialist and then was purchased by Disney for $7.4 billion in 2006.
The authors of The Disney Way researched and interviewed to find answers to Pixar's sustainable culture of innovation. The results are not surprising:
* Dream like a child
* Believe in your playmates
* Dare to jump in the water and make waves
* Do unleash your childlike potential
The book is loaded with lists of ideas based on Pixar's culture. For example, 10 ideas to encourage risk taking, 7 ways to create an inspirational environment, 41 ways to improve innovation, and 16 ways to get started.
At times, the book reads like a sequel to The Disney Way with the authors liberally quoting and drawing leadership points from their previous book. In many ways, Pixar is a sequel to Disney. The founders of Pixar has Walt Disney and Disney animation as their models. And Pixar recaptured what many saw was lacking in Disney's productions through the 1980s and 1990s.
As a short and inspiring book, The Pixar Way, left me with a number of ideas and a child-like zeal to innovate through fun.

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Praise for Innovate the Pixar Way:
"This tremendous book brings the magic and genius ofPixar to the page and lets us in on the secrets and intuitive synergy of such a successful company." -- Stephen R. Covey, author of The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People and The 8th Habit: From Effectiveness to Greatness
"Pixar is one of the most creative organizations in the world. Read Innovate the Pixar Way and explore the true beauty in how they sustain the environment. Who knows, maybe a little Pixar dust will fall on you!" -- John Christensen, coauthor of Fish! andplayground director AKA: CEO, ChartHouse Learning
"Creativity makes it possible for our dreams to become real--my life is my proof. This book puts all those possibilities in the hands of the reader . . . for those who will be creating the future." -- Carol Lawrence, singer, dancer, actress, and national spokesperson for theOpening Minds Through the Arts student achievement program
"With great and useful tips from beginning to end, this book will inspire workplaces to have more fun AND more success. I guarantee it!" -- George Zimmer, founder and CEO, Men's Wearhouse
"This insightful work is a great primer for leaders who are looking to unleash creative potential and instill a sense of joy and playfulness in their organizations." -- Brian Walker, president and CEO, Herman Miller, Inc.
Animate your team and unleash their creative power . . .The Pixar Way
"Creativity doesn't follow titles; it just comes from where it comes from." -- Ed Catmull, Pixar cofounder, Pixar and Disney Animation Studios president
In movies from Toy Story to The Incredibles to WALL-E to Up, Pixar Studios continues to set new standards for commercial and critical achievement. Pixar is a place where collaboration sets the tone for ""artists and geeks"to work side by side in a spirit of mutual respect and trust. The key lies not just in who--writers, animators, directors, tech wizards, and others--makes Pixar outstanding, but in how Pixar creates the ultimate havenwhere creativity overflows.
In this eye-opening book, Bill Capodagli and Lynn Jackson, authors of The Disney Way, reveal how Pixar has reawakened the innovative spirit of Walt Disney. They explore how president Ed Catmull and chief creative officer John Lasseter and the rest of Pixar's braintrust have built an organization on the simple philosophy that quality is the best businessplan. It makes no difference if you are making a movie that takes four years or serving a customer that takes four minutes, you have only one chance to deliver that magical, magnetic, enchanting experience for your customer.
In this concise, accessible book, Capodagli and Jackson offer examples of how it's done--and explain what it takes to get your people to achieve greatness by unleashing theirpower to
Dream like a child . . . Have a vision, and be able to clearly communicate your objectives and goals.
Believe in your playmates . . . Hire creative people, trust in their skills and judgment, and inspire them to trust their colleagues.
Dare to jump in the water and make waves . . . Challenge the status quo. Encourage risktaking, but permit your people to fail, get back up, and try again.
Unleash your childlike potential . . . Focus on the details; make quality work your business's highest priority.

Learn not only from Pixar but also from how other leading organizations--Google, Griffin Hospital, Men's Wearhouse, OMA (Opening Minds Through the Arts) student achievement program, Nike, Target, and the Internet shoe giant Zappos--unshackle their people's imaginations and do outrageously great things. And by motivating your team toInnovate the Pixar Way you, too, can discover the magic that will help your business stay ahead of the competition, attract the best talent, and fatten the bottom line.
In 1993, Bill Capodagli and Lynn Jackson cofounded Capodagli Jackson Consulting in West Olive, Michigan. They have helped scores of organizations revamp their customer service experiences and develop innovative products, andthey also have developed performance strategies to impact organizational change using Walt Disney's "Dream, Believe, Dare, Do" success credo. Bill Capodagli is the most requested keynote speaker on the creative cultures of both Disney and Pixar.
Visit the authors at capojac.com

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