Tag Archives: Collaborative

How Do You Supervise Without Being Bossy? Six Points

Situation: A CEO has received feedback “through the grapevine” that some of his employees consider him to be bossy. This isn’t the image that he wants to cultivate. Instead he aspires to be a collaborative CEO who is approachable by employees. Have others encountered this situation and If so, what have they done? How do you supervise without being bossy?

Advice from the CEOs:

  • When you hold morning update meetings keep them short and to the point.
    • Review updates on an exception basis. Go down the list and ask whether there are any challenges that need to be addressed to assure that deadlines are met. If on track, then no need to discuss, unless an individual anticipates a challenge coming up.
    • Don’t try to solve specific issues during the meeting – this wastes the time of those not involved in the issue. Schedule follow-ups to address challenges or just continue the meeting with a couple of people who have issues and who can assist each other in developing solutions.
  • Do 1-on-1 checks at end of day, as necessary.
  • Manage by walking around. When visiting specific employees ask: How are you doing?
    • If they are struggling, ask about the problem. Listen and perhaps suggest the next step. Take care to watch any body language for signs of discomfort that suggests that the individual is struggling.
  • When planning a project set milestones and timelines for each project.
  • When following up, ask how the individual is doing on their segment of the project and whether they have the resources that they need – including time and knowledge.
  • Have employees build the schedule for the project – assuring that their timeline meets the company’s delivery schedule. Ask for commitment to meet the timeline and hold them accountable for meeting it.

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How Do You Align Vision Among Leadership? Three Approaches

Situation: The CEO of a software company finds that she and her #2 don’t have the same vision for the company concerning objectives and what is required to reach these objectives. In addition, key employees are reaching retirement age. The company needs to bring in new employees to learn the skills of those who will retire. How can these challenges be addressed? How do you align vision among leadership?

Advice from the CEOs:

  • Consider the following approach:
    • Add 1-2 people and bring them up to speed within the company so that they can step into the roles of the employees who are nearing retirement.
    • Focus the CEO’s role on creating the development outline and priorities, assisting in closing significant sales opportunities, participating in industry seminars to publicize the company’s capabilities, and guiding administration and finance.
    • Focus the #2’s role on assuming a greater role in new software development and customer support and have this person delegate and oversee internal technology development and code maintenance.
  • In pursuing this approach take the following steps:
    • Buttress the CEO’s skills with another developer who knows the key software, and who can maintain this for the company long-term.
    • Shift development from individual efforts to a collaborative atmosphere to ease and speed integration of new code into the company’s software.
    • Reduce the CEO’s day-to-day administrative role.
    • Increase the #2’s role in software development and reduce focus on maintenance and internal technology.
    • Add an additional resource in sales/marketing to boost company growth.
  • How to Get There?
    • Allow the #2 the latitude to start developing some of his own ideas for new tools or products.
    • Bring in a “marriage counselor” to assist the CEO and the #2 to define a common understanding.
    • One focus will be to establish that they clearly respect and value each other’s talents and contributions. The other focus will be to work through objectives and requirements where there has been difficulty reaching consensus.

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How Do You Chase A Moving Ball? Three Fundamentals

Interview with Michelle Bonat, CEO and Founder, RumbaFish Technologies

Situation: Early stage companies focusing on social commerce and analytics face an unpredictable market. Nobody can accurately forecast market direction or even who the players will be in 2 to 3 years. What are best practices for chasing a moving ball?

Advice from Michelle Bonat:

  • In a rapidly evolving market it is critical to have laser-like focus on the needs of your customers. You must create value for them by understanding their needs, businesses and challenges. While technologies and markets change and evolve, human behavior is remarkably consistent over time. By focusing on rewards, sharing and customer motivations we better understand their needs. We see three fundamentals in working with customers.
  • First, focus on understanding needs versus wants. If Henry Ford had asked what customers wanted for better transportation they would have said “a faster horse.” They needed a faster way to get from Point A to Point B without getting rained on. We invent solutions that are incrementally better at addressing fundamental customer needs by leveraging technology and social commerce.
  • Second, work collaboratively with your customer. As we develop an understanding of needs versus wants, we develop an arm in arm relationship with customers and partner to evaluate solutions that work for them. We use short versus long release cycles with frequent checkpoints to assure that both sides are on the same page and that we understand the features that are most important to the customer. As a result, our customers become evangelists not only for the resulting product or service, but for us!
  • Third, go into any project with the customer’s success foremost in your mind. We focus not only on getting the solution right, but on assuring that the solution optimizes the customer’s primary objectives. That way we all share in the win.
  • The bottom line is that customers want to be treated as individuals and want their individual needs met. We honor this and make it central to our customer interactions. This way, no matter where the market goes, we will be a player.

You can contact Michelle Bonat at [email protected]

Key Words: Strategy, Leadership, Social, Media, Commerce, Analytics, Predictability, Unpredictability, Market, Direction, Player, Customer, Value, Needs, Wants, Behavior, Engage, Share, Understand, Technology, Social Commerce, Collaborative, Relationship, Success, Solution, Individual

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