A Positive Mandate (from Coach Wooden & Carroll)
For NCAA football fans Pete Carroll stands out among the best. I’ve watched this optimistic, fun-loving, coach coax victories out of his USC players year after year; to my chagrin, regularly dismantling Big 10 opponents. This season the piano-playing, man-of-passion who has over 400,000 followers on Twitter is coaching the NFL’s Seattle Seahawks. For the sports fan here’s the SI article (from NCAA violations to his role in the NFL draft).
What sets him apart from most in-your-face coaches? SI calls it his “positive mandate.” Upon arriving in Seattle, Carroll established three rules or values for his team – the same rules instituted at USC – which form the foundation for all actions and attitudes. Carroll says, “It’s another idea I got from [UCLA] Coach [John] Wooden, and I’ve seen it work exceptionally well.”
A former USC player now Seahawk reflects on Carroll’s consistency, “He’s as advertised: energetic, enthusiastic, eternal optimist.” The three rules that immediately illicit peer-accountability in their reinforcement are:
Rule #1: Protect Your Team (on and off the field)
Rule #2: No Whining or Complaining (there’s no room for eye-rolling or grumbling)
Rule #3: Be Early for Everything (a sign of respect)
Simple, clear, and self-explanatory! They can be a standard in the sports-world and in the marketplace.
So here’s the question: What would you need to change if you were held to the standard of these three simple rules?
Organizations Are Much Like Families
I’ve reconnected with a good friend of mine and not only have I appreciated the depth of our relationship I’ve also enjoyed seeing how our learning as been an “iron sharpening iron” experience. After spending years connecting with sporadic phone calls our conversations now are regular and rich at so many levels.
One issue over which John (John C. Johnson, Ph.D.) and I share great synergy is in the area of developing a healthy culture in organizations. As I lean on his experience from decades of counseling and interactions with individuals and organizations around the world we find ourselves chatting about how to help build and maintain organizational health. Add to that, both of us have gleaned a wealth information form Peter Senge about systems and Patrick Lencioni about healthy organizations.
Here’s a highlight from our latest interchange and the notes about organizational health:
What does it mean that an organization is healthy?
Organizations are much like family systems. Some are healthy and functional while others are very unhealthy and dysfunctional.
Why don’t leaders make decisions to build organizational health?
Often time leaders within an organization know that something is wrong but because they are part of the system, they can’t see system problems.
Why is it so difficult to build organizational health?
Often times, certain individuals within the system, become the identified problem and they are lost to the organization. However, this leaves the organization in no better shape than before.
What needs to happen?
The system needs to be addressed in order to build a healthy organization and facilitate transformation. An objective third-party who is willing to speak the truth is a foundational step in this process.
My take-away – which I shared in my weekly coaching session with a group of managers – is a key ingredient in a healthy organization is not the lack of relational challenges or conflict. What makes an organizational healthy is the willingness to actually face the challenges and conflict and deal with it openly and honestly. Dysfunctional organizations ignore conflict, threaten individuals, or intentionally avoid speaking the truth.
How would you describe the organizations for which you’ve worked – functional or dysfunctional?
Southwest Airlines…Organizational Health Matters
I missed the live Webinar entitled “Organizational Health – A Powerful Advantage” presented by The Table Group. So I spent yesterday afternoon catching up at Uptown Coffeehouse in my hometown of Howell.
Some people consider the health of an organization a nuance and others would rather just focus on success (profitability, growth, etc.). But here’s what I know about me; I am passionate about organizational health. I could study it for hours and converse about it even longer. Yes…probably boring many/most to tears.
Why the passion? Maybe it’s because I have been a part of so many dysfunctional organizations that I’ve watched them tank, stay average, or even fail because they choose to ignore the healthy side of the equation. They would rather embrace higher levels of politics and confusion and are satisfied with lower morale, high turnover and low productivity. Yes, those are the issues healthy organizations choose to address.
The Webinar featured a Case Study of Southwest Airlines featuring Jeff Lamb (SVP Administration & Chief People Officer). Southwest has been the only airline to be profitable (37 years in a row) and if you travel, they provide levels of customer service that no other provider can match. Mr. Lamb said that the three core values permeate every level of the company:
- A fun-loving attitude
- Servant heart
- Warrior spirit (hard work and perseverance)
Here are some more Not-So-Uselss-Facts from the Case Study:
- The Southwest commercials always feature real employees of Southwest. The philosophy is that an actor could not act out the fun-loving attitude of an employee.
- When they interview pilots, who are typically serious people and often come from military background, they have the pilots don Bermuda shorts in the middle of the interview. Picture: wing tip shoes, long socks, shirt and tie AND Bermuda shorts. They find that it weeds out those who say they are fun-loving but in actuality are not.
- Southwest has not laid off an employee in 39 years.
- They hire 90% of their employees from within the company.
- Southwest believes that you hire for attitude and train for skill.
- He believes that most companies do not commit to or maintain a healthy culture because they do not embrace conflict and/or handle it by not speaking the kind truth.
- When interviewees fly on an “interview pass” to corporate headquarters and a flight attendant or desk employee notices a poor attitude, they can immediately contact corporate and the person will not be hired.
Maybe, just maybe, organizational health matters!
Are Second Chances Earned?
It was an honest question posed to another colleague who was struggling over the fact that a boss gave an underperforming employee a second opportunity for an important job. She asked, “Haven’t you been given second chances? Why is this such a problem for you?” (Partick Lencioni in Death By Meeting writes that meetings need conflict…and DID we had some!)
The response was tearse, “Second chances are earned.” The rest of the team let out a gasp followed by, “Really?”
The ensuring discussion was honest, real, and raw. It also gave me the opportunity as a Coach to represent the organization’s culture, “This organization believes that second chances are not earned but given as a grace gift; undeserved and unconditional. Now don’t get me wrong there are always consequences for actions. But when it comes to second chances they will be handed out like Mulligan’s to good friends – liberally and often.”
I really enjoy coaching an organization which honors human dignity and whose value is that of speaking the kind truth. There is no doubt, people development is a messy, fluid process. There will be peaks and valleys. However, if an organization commits to building a healthy culture people are drawn to the possibility of the process of transformation.
What do you think the response was to the proclamation that “second chances are given as a grace gift?”
Reserve Your Free Consultation!
mark@whatifenterprises.com
Openings Are Filling Quickly!On the Social Web
