‘Love Thy Colleagues’ - The Importance of Listening

Listening is obviously an essential part of any debate or negotiation. But listening is much more than simply hearing, it implies understanding – and to understand is to be able to begin to build a strategy. The quicker people agree to ‘listen’, the faster they can progress in any debate.

Young children are the worst listeners. ‘No’ is a word they understand very quickly but simply ignore, when it suits them. If they want something they yell or shout, if they don’t get it, they resort to some form of violence or bullying very quickly. Their frustration control levels are very low. Similarly this kind of behavior is also sometimes found in adults who have somewhere learnt that by being aggressive or over assertive they can get their own way. However these adults are very often blocked in middle management in their careers. This is mainly because they are unable to maintain alliances and to retain the really creative and motivated people who work fort hem. They are unable to listen and to appreciate what is in front of them.

In senior management, assertiveness is simply not enough. Contrary to common belief, successful top managers may appear hard and unyielding but they are in fact often among the best negotiators ever. They have learnt that in order to progress and to maintain their position they need to be accepted not only by their fellow management colleagues but also by their staff. Successful managers are instinctive listeners, trying to gleam useful information from wherever it is available. They know that it is important to understand the real situation, to be compassionate - compromising when necessary. They know how to use all the tricks to get their own way, but not at the expense of the important resources around them.

Martin Luther King once said “You should love your enemy, because love is the only thing powerful enough to turn an enemy into a friend”. He understood that even in the depths of oppression and despair, where those around him were full of hatred, that the only hope for America and to resolving the appalling racial prejudices that it harbored – was to go way beyond the issues in front of him and to try and understand exactly where his ‘opponents’ fears and hatred were coming from. He realized that by ‘understanding’, one could begin to sympathize, and that by sympathizing one could learn to live along side their enemies and from there it would be possible to build relationships, respect and even, in time, love.

Now I am not saying you should ‘love’ all your colleagues in business but when you are confronted by someone who is blocking you, bullying or even simply not listening to you, it is important to go beyond the words and rhetoric, to find the hidden agenda and to try understand exactly where the confronting person is coming from. Even if the message or lack of understanding on their part is very disagreeable. By finding the good qualities in our ‘opponents’, by searching for their positive aspects and strong points, instead of focusing on their bad ones, you can begin to sympathize and to find areas of mutual respect and from there on, build bridges and find a path forward.

No one person is bigger than a business; no one person can be effective on their own. The nature of humans is that we need to build alliances, without them we are weak, with them we have power and the ability to make a difference.

Promotion Prospects for Project Managers

This week I have been considering the promotion prospects for many of the project managers I know. If you look at it logically, you could imagine that you would start out as a project assistant, then become a project coordinator and then move on to become a project manager, presumably starting on small projects, responsible for a single team and then working up to a full project manager and then on to program manager.

For the uninitiated the difference between a project manager and a program manager is that a project manager is responsible for a single project (or indeed for a number of individual projects) and a program manager is responsible for a very large project or ‘program’ consisting of multiple projects that are inextricably linked together, combining to form an overall result. For example: if a large company decides to move its corporate head quarters, it is conceivable that they would employ a program manager to ensure that all the sub projects associated with the move are covered: i.e. ICT, HR, Marketing and Communications, legal, Architecture and floor planning, etc. etc. The Program Manager would be responsible for controlling the entire budget and the coordination of all the projects under one corporate banner. (Moving a corporate head office, might seem a simple project, but you may be surprised how difficult it is, largely because not everyone will find the move a good idea). If you have ever had to re-arrange just the floor plan and seating arrangements of a single office, you might be surprised how much of a complex and thankless task it is, so imagine a complete corporate head office!

Back to career prospects, you might assume that after being a program manager you could move onto being an Interim Manager, but here comes the problem. A good project manager needs to be a naturally good organizer. A person with experience in managing and motivating people, and with a thorough grounding in methodology and efficent procedures. A clear thinking person who is able to make decisions and to seize on opportunities. However, a really good Interim Manager needs to have all these qualities but also have a broad range of experience. Not just in managing people, but also in life and business in general.

If you are considering to become an interim manager, turning around small to medium sized companies, it’s no use only having experience in large corporations. On the other hand, if you have only worked for companies of less than 25 people, it seems impossible to take on a significant interim management role for a large corporation, especially if it is on a global level and not a departmental one.

An interim manager needs to have a very broad background of working in, or for, all types of organizations of differing size, industries and sectors. There are some exceptions, for example Banking and retail. However, if you want a varied career as an interim manager taking on all kinds of exciting challenges and not simply standing in for senior managers that have either left or suddenly died, then you need to ensure that you think and act like a CEO. To do that you really need to have been one, at some time or other.

Thus if you are an experienced project manager and want to become an interim manager, then you must ensure that you have the right qualifications and background. You need to try and move away from ‘delivery’ projects to change projects. To projects where the key objective is to change a way of thinking or established behavior. As an interim manager it is you who is giving the advice, it is you who deciding the direction to take. Therefore you are more often than not going to take on accountability on a big scale, so you better be sure, you know what your doing and have a big insurance policy to back you up!

An Interim Manager can become a Project Manager, but the other way round, is very difficult without a great deal of entrepreneurial and broad experience. In the Bayard Partnership we try and create environments where our Associates can grow and see career paths forward, even when it may seem rather unrealistic.

Planning For the Inevitable - Part 2

I am writing this sequel to last week's topic on the flight back from my motor cycle trip around SW Spain.

A number of the 'inevitables' happened as predicted, getting lost, tired, irritable. I immediately recognised the symptoms as 'inevitable' and brought in my predefined strategies. Of course being overheated, lost and tired in a foreign land, where you do not speak the language, is an issue but the remedy is naturally not that difficult. My contingency for such matters, is to recognise the cause (driving too long, a lack of water and an over optimistic ambition to arrive at the pre-defined destination an hour earlier). So all I do is suggest that we pull our bikes over to the side of the road and have a short break. Sitting under a tree to cool off for a while. Taking even a 60 seconds timeout with eyes closed and all thoughts of being lost etc removed form one's consciousness, helps tremendously. A fresh look at the map and a re-confirmation as to the position of the sun, versus the time of day, and very quickly, the correct location can be identified and a new plan made. It's all a question of recognising the symptoms early and reminding yourself of what your pre-defined strategy is for any such predicted event.

In my professional life, I try to do the same. Any experienced manager should anticipate that 'unplanned variances' can (and probably will) occur. This is not to excuse them. Sloppy scope analysis and preparation will always result in an increased amount of 'unforeseens'. But here we are talking more about the 'foreseeable'. The trick is to keep the team focused and together, when they arrive (during the period of uncertainty, and to ensure that your sponsors are only briefed once you have identified the cause and at least two possible remedy plans.

So back to the holiday... Did it achieve it's objectives? Were it's goals accomplished? The answer is an unequivocal 'yes'! ;-)

Planning for the inevitable events in projects

This blog will be published from the middle of a desert in south eastern Spain. I say ‘it will’ because right now I am still in Belgium, completing my last minute planning for a holiday in Spain.

The objective for the holiday is to get away to find some relaxation and inner peace, to live the experience of driving my motorbike through nothingness (or as close as I can get to it in Europe) day after day for ten days. The trip was prepared like any typical project with a scope and milestones etc. and just like other projects, one needs to plan for the inevitable. This is something that I find many managers forget. It can only come out from experience. At the beginning of any project the interim or project manager should sit and consider what ‘inevitables’ they might expect to face.

Right here (on a fast train to Brussels) and right now, I can foresee some inevitables for my holiday. I do not mean the blatantly obvious such as; the need for hotels and meals etc, but more the side effects of the project, such as; at times I may get hopelessly lost, will certainly become overheated, tired and irritable, possibly even bored and most likely sick (headaches, upset stomachs, insect bites, muscle pain etc.). For the medical stuff I have the best contingency plan anyone can have, in that my only travel companion is a fully qualified and highly experienced doctor who just happens to speak very good Spanish.

In business projects it is important to try and anticipate the inevitable and to be sure that only actual unforseens, are just that and not something you could or should have anticipated. For example you should know in advance that there will be moments of extreme anxiety, moments where your client’s happy appreciative face will turn to disappointment or even anger. Your team will become bored (especially when everything is going smoothly) and suppliers will deliver late when they feel that the pressure is easing off. It is these inevitables that are never written down into any plan but yet, if planned for, can make a tremendous difference. (Any parent who has taken young children on a long car journey in the middle of summer will know what planning for the inevitable means).

So now I am busy planning for my inevitables; the hopeless search for a petrol station, a hotel receptionist who has never heard of the name ‘Lovegrove’ and can not remember any booking in my name, or dropping my bike on a remote road somewhere, or possibly a flat tyre. Of course I do not know exactly when and where these things will occur, but they will occur of that I am sure (if not on this holiday, then certainly the next) and when they do I will have a strategy for them. Now I am not suggesting that you can and should plan for everything but because good project managers and interim managers are often very optimistic people they need to take a few ‘sanity checks’ here and there. They need to think ahead and anticipate, without becoming bogged down with contingencies and risk analyses for absolutely everything. Life should be spontaneous, and within this contradiction lies the balance between megalomaniac management and the cool ‘everything’s going to be alright, just chill’ approach. The closer you are to the cool spectrum the more adaptive you can be, but on the other hand, you will need to be adaptive, because the cool approach will ‘ipso facto’ require on the spot constant planning because you will be dealing with the unplanned variances that this type of management brings.

I’ll let you know how it goes! If there is no blog next Monday, it might be that there is one inevitable that I missed….

Dress code for interim & project managers

In the last two weeks I have covered the naming of our private businesses, the types of car we should drive and now I want to finish this lighthearted triptych with what an interim manager should wear. The article below is based for men mainly, because when it comes to what female interim managers should wear, the subject is mighty tricky! (If I pluck up enough courage by the time I make it to the end of the article, I’ll give my opinion on that too)!

Now I am of the belief that all interim managers should wear a white shirt, tie, and a dark suit – good quality, nothing cheap and badly fitting. Quality is everything, like the Audi A6, it needs to be quietly stylish. None of these flashy shiny Italian silk pajama suits that might look great in a yacht club, but frankly silly in a board room in Brussels, or any other European capital for that matter. With a suit, you really should have them tailor made, or at least ensure they fit perfectly. An ill fitting suit is far worse than no suit at all. Find yourself an Asian peripatetic tailor, who will fly over to measure you up twice a year. He will get to know you, your tastes and preferences. Whether you want a custom made mobile phone pocket in your trousers or jacket. He can balance your wishes with your partner’s expectations. It can be very tricky. The great thing about tailor made is that for a little extra fee they will sew your name into the label, very useful after a champagne reception, that somehow drifted on a little longer than expected and the last remaining jacket hanging over the back of the bar room stool is not yours!

Never have colored shirts. First thing in the morning when you are preparing for the day, you should be thinking about the meetings ahead of you, your clients worries and how best to tackle them, not whether this tie goes with that shirt, or whether the trousers you want are back from the dry cleaners or not. I knew of a blind person who always looked great. He was single, and as far as I knew had no one at home to help him out. So how did he do it? Simple, he had his sister label all his clothes with a simple numbering system. As long as the numbers fell into the right sequence, he knew the colors and styles would look good. Stray away from the sequence and he immediately risked ridicule (although, I guess no one would ever be that insensitive)? It’s the same for me, if I stray away from the usual combinations (and if my wife is suitably awake) I am likely to get something like “not going to work today”? or “are you going to work looking like that”? The truth is, she is always right, what might look ok in the dull, tungsten lit bedroom, does not always stand up to the judgment of harsh sunlight.

So here’s the dress code. Always a suit (or at worst, a smart jacket and trousers), white shirt tie, black (or possibly brown shoes, as long as they are not with a grey or black suit). Two clean handkerchiefs, one neatly ironed in the left or right trouser pocket, the other in the right hand pocket of jacket. The one in the jacket, is for unplanned accidents, emotional staff or other unforeseens.

Unfortunately, however, not everyone follows my code. Where I am working now, some project managers, look like they have stepped out of the shower and walked directly into the office! I guess it’s the style, but some of them have hair styles that look like they have been electrocuted. This is normally accompanied with shirts hanging out of their trousers and color combinations and clothing styles that one might like to risk over breakfast on Sunday, or by the pool in a holiday hotel, but never in a situation where your client might expect to take what you say seriously!

Some companies adopt a rule that on Fridays you can (read should) wear ‘casual’ clothes. I hate this. It takes me five times as long to get dressed on a Friday morning than on any other day. I really struggle, trying to select the right combination from a collection of clothes that I inwardly feel were designed for someone else other than me. I guess I am just not interested enough in clothes, I don’t like shopping for them and I don’t like selecting them either. I have a few favorites that I would happily wear every day but that is not acceptable either.

However, I can honestly say that my career began to take off, when I realized that how I dressed and looked had a direct effect on those choosing to do business with me. My idealistic, student notions of ‘people shouldn’t judge a book by its cover’ was scrapped and replaced by a brand new look, after some wise advice from someone far older and more successful than me.

Now for women’s clothing. As I write this my hands are shaking out of trepidation at the possible wrath I might face from my female colleagues, especially from the delightful variety of women that I find myself working with! As Robert Palmer sang “you’re a distraction to a man” and so it is for many of us men when confronted by attractive women wearing revealing clothes in the workplace. At a party, or on holiday, revealing clothing can be a very welcome diversion, but in the workplace it simply gets in the way of the message.

There are two ways of looking at the dilemma. Blending in, trying to be seen as equal among men or standing out to be noticed. In my view, if a woman wants to be taken seriously in what she says in a meeting, she needs to use the same tools as men, i.e. to communicate with her eyes, face and hands. She needs to pull her colleagues into her debate. Eye to eye contact is extremely important and this can be difficult if a man’s attention is being constantly drawn in another direction!

I have noticed that most women who have worked their way into higher levels of management, seem to dress in similar ways i.e. roll neck sweaters, or shirts and or jackets with collars that rise very high to just under the chin. This brings the attention directly to their face, which is exactly where they want it during a serious debate.

The English Victorian women with their high collars and long dresses made them look very formidable indeed, and you only have to look at images from the Victoria and Albert museum’s incredible collection of clothes in London to see what I mean. On the other hand there are also women who bring color and life into the board room, that the men’s dull white shits and micky mouse ties, simply can not replace. (By the way male interim managers should never wear comical ties, this is an absolute no, it does not matter who bought it for you)!

Today fashion is so varied that women can, more or less, wear anything, and that is exactly what they do! There is a trend (especially with younger staff) to wear more than one T shirt and jumpers; multiple layers straddled over one another. I find these a distraction because I wonder what the thought process is that goes into the selection of each layer. I am a classical person, I like simple shapes and forms, blouses with jackets and trousers or skirts, clothes that don’t shout out ‘look who I am’ but allow the woman to stand alongside her male companions and be taken seriously as an equal and not an outsider trying to attract attention.

Although in some parts of the world it is getting better, for many women in business, life is still tough in comparison with men. A woman who feels the need to get their male colleagues to take them more seriously should do what I did twenty years ago, step into the mainstream business fashion way of life. They should realize that how you look is how you are perceived, and there is no way around it. At home or on holiday is one thing, work is something different entirely. For female interim and project managers, no jeans, no combat trousers, no gothic beads, no low cut T shirts with, or without, meaningless slogans. In fact nothing too original apart from colors, fabrics and shapes. It may sound dull, but it is what we do as professional managers that matters, not trying to show glimpses of who we prefer to be, outside in our private lives.

What kind of car should an interim Manager drive?

Following on from last weeks blog on the naming of your business, I thought this week it might be a good idea to take a look at the other aspect that fills our mind when we move away from being an employee and take the plunge into a self employed interim management world. Suddenly the restrictive company car list has disappeared and every car you may have ever wanted to own is suddenly an option – or is it?

Many years ago I was working for a marketing department in central London, when a freelance photographer drove up to the office in his brand new Range Rover. He didn’t park it in the car park, or even at a parking meter, he simply parked it half on the pavement, right outside the main entrance.

He was making a deliberate statement, ‘see what kind of car I drive.’ and ‘I don’t care if I break the law, after all it’s only a fine.’ What he may not have reckoned on is the amount of jealousy he stirred up. The marketing manager, who actually commissioned him, drove a 2 liter company Opel. The photographers’ Range Rover was the last straw. So when it happened that the photographs turned out to be not so spectacular, the photographer was dumped immediately.

It was an important lesson for me (I was still a junior marketing assistant), I never forgot how quickly my boss’ opinion of the man turned when he saw the photographers car. The fact that they had been laughing and joking together, only a few weeks earlier, you could be excused for thinking that they were the best of friends.

So the rule is, always drive a car to your client that is not going to upset anyone. And certainly not one that says this guy is a show off. Choose one that says ‘this person is careful with their money yet they obviously appreciate quality.’ For an interim manager there is only one car in the world that suits this purpose, an Audi A6, anything else just won’t do! Make sure you go for the 2.0L version. If you want a bigger engine, then pay more and ask the garage to put a 2.0L badge on the back. You’ll get the car you want and your clients won’t get upset.

A BMW is too brash and a Jaguar too flash. A Mercedes might be ok, but somehow they have gone off the boil and there is always the risk (especially in the UK) that they might be seen as more expensive than they really are. For the family man a five door Audi A6 brake (estate car), is acceptable. But no people transporters, they need to be reserved for young family managers, perhaps for project managers and engineers, but an interim manager does not want to radiate the fact that there is anything in the world that is important, apart from the needs of their clients. So no baby seats or any other signs of domesticity!

I once knew a guy who, when he left home in the morning, parked his car around the corner and took out the child seats and hid them under a blanket in the boot, just because he didn’t want his client knowing he had children! Now this maybe going way too far, but I hope you get the gist of what I am talking about?

If you fancy an Audi A8 or even a TT, keep it in the garage at home and only take it out when your client is not looking.

This may seem silly but cars and clothes say much about a person and clients pick up on them. On an ending note, never ever have a more expensive, flashier car than the Chairman, otherwise you are doomed. After all, life is tough enough as it is, why make it harder for yourself?

Naming your business

Over the years many people have come to me for advice with regards to setting up a private company, taking the break from being an employee to a stand alone self employed professional.

It is a worrying time, with feelings of uncertainty and what if’s. But among the mixed emotions that many feel, much useless time is spent on thinking up a slick name for the new company, and aimlessly searching to see if the web address is still available.

For most interim or project managers, the new business will only ever be a one man band. Although for some strange reason, so many of us want to give the impression that our business is somehow much bigger than it really is. This is possibly because we have taken the step away from being a manager of many and find it hard to resist the title of Managing Director or CEO, as a compensation for not having been one in ‘real life’?

But how can you be a managing director, if you do not have any directors to manage? And how can you be a chief executive officer, if you are the only officer? The problem, as I see it of giving your new found company a grandiose name, is that you cause disappointment and confusion in the eyes of your potential customers.

For example: Call your business Executive consultants Ltd. And you immediately give the impression that there are many of you. The first question a potential client will ask is, “how many employees do you have?” Unless you lie, you will end up saying things like ‘we are very small at the moment, but we have plans’. Who has plans? Only you have plans, unless you include your life partner, dog or family parrot!

The other risk of a grandiose name is that potential clients may even see you as a threat, especially if you are likely to obtain your assignments via agencies and supply companies. They may worry that you are out to steal their business or recruit their employees and contractors away from them. Another problem can be that a client may not be able to get your company onto their short list of suppliers.

In the interim management and project management line of business it is best to build your career based upon the quality of your work and not on your business itself, unless that is your companies objective. Mixing the two can be dangerous.

When you go self employed as an interim manager, consultant, project manager or IT consultant the best thing to do is to set up your own private bvba. Give it your own name. Unless you are called John Brown, or Mike Smith or Mr. Patel or De Smit (or any other very common name), no one will ever confuse your correspondence or forget your company name. Your client will also not feel inferior to you and will enjoy ‘patronising you’ by giving you loads of work! And when your invoice comes in, your client will instantly recognize it and because you are a small ‘one man band’ they will have more sympathy for you and make sure that you get paid sooner than your grandiose competitors. If you look as if you can afford a lawyer, soon or later your client will cause you to use one!

Later on, if you have a really good business idea, you can always set up another company, with an appropriate name and invoice into it from your own private company. This has many tax advantages and gives you the freedom to do many things, as you wish. In Belgium, when you set up a business you have to state what it is your business will do, so it is important to get as broad a brief as possibly. You need a description that encompasses almost everything. In my private Belgian bvba (similar to a Ltd. Company in the UK), I can do almost anything apart from taxidermy and cooking – two things that I simply can never imagine ever wanting to do!

So my advice is: give yourself a simple private business name. If your real name is Jean-Paul Schot, call it Jean Paul Schot bvba or Ltd. Give yourself an e-mail or web address (if you really need one) with the same name - www.jeanpaulschot.com. Everyone will recognize your invoices, letters, e-mails and faxes and you will never cause confusion. People will never be able to tell if you earn 3 million Euros per year or 300,000 or 30,000 – unless they bother to check the public records.

One last tip – never, never try and be cleaver with the name by mixing half your wife’s name with yours, it will end up sounding like a small yacht, moored on a cheap quayside in Blankenberg or Brighton and everyone will grown when you proudly explain the background of the name. And (God forbid) if you ever get divorced, you will regret the name so badly and your accountant will curse you for having to set up a new business, when you had a perfectly good one before. And al because you just couldn’t resist a one night stand with the receptionist of the Holiday inn, Madrid.

End note:

I would like to start a collection of the worst named companies ever, if you know some, please feel free to share them, if they are yours, you can always submit them anonymously!