Doggy Traits versus Kitty Traits (What makes someone a good team player)

In this blog we are going to talk about the traits that will work well in our doggy park and the traits that won't work well.  A previous blog entry talked about how my friend was playing fetch which his doggy, and compared that to my cat who was pretty distant. Instead of talking about strategies to herd cats, this blog focuses on another approach to managing teams, enjoying a doggy park.

Kitty Traits.

As we talked about earlier, the concept of "herding cats" is a very x-theory approach to management.  In x-theory management, the core idea is that employees are lazy and will do the bare minimum necessary to get thier paycheck. The vast majority of x-theory management strategies are focused on forcing or tricking employees to improve thier performance. The traits an x-theory expects to find in thier employees are what I call "kitty traits".  They are laziness, unwillingness to perform, negative attitude, inability to learn, unwillingness to learn, unwillingness to work with others, arrogance, unwillingness over look past the individual shortcomings of teammates, and a desire to engage in company politics and rumor-mongering. 

Now, for you cat lovers out there, you probably think I don't like cats very much! Well, I do like cats, but come on, we all know that a cat-owner is the pet, not the cat. And, you can expect a person with kitty-traits to view the team and their leadership that way. They will often try to "manage-up" instead of just working as a part of the team to achieve team goals. These folks will also engage in politics and rumor mongering in a way that is destructive for the team.

Doggy-Traits.

In Y-Theory management, the core belief is that people are inherently good, and the reason people work is to experience that good feeling they get from a job well done.  A Y-theory manager will look at how they can remove obstacles, how they can mentor their teammates, and how they can assist thier team to succeed.  But, before you can run a team in a Y-Theory manner, you first have to ensure that the members of your team share a common set of traits, "doggy-traits". These are a strong work-ethic, a desire to perform, a happy attitude, a desire to learn and share information with others, the ability work with others and add to the team, a willingness look past the individual shortcomings of teammates, a friendly spirit of competitiveness, and an unwllingness to engage in rumor mongering or company politics.

When you start staffing your doggy-park, its important in the qualititative interview that you look for indications of doggy and kitty traits.  Everyone will exhibit some traits from each of these areas; however, as the interviewer, your job is to identify which they have more of, kitty or doggy traits.

Creativity is a necessary requirement for your doggie park.  The next blog will be about hacking our brain to be more creative. And, unlike most of the junk-science folks who talk about creativity, we are going to be basing our creativity exercises on proven scientific studies.

Staffing your Doggie Park and OpenAgile

When you let doggies into your doggie park, there are a couple of things you want to look for. First, you want to weed-out the bad-doggies. You want to make sure that you dont' let in any kitties by mistake. And you want to make sure new doggies are going to get along with the doggies you already have in your doggy-park.

The same is true with teams. When you staff your team, you'll want to make sure that you don't bring in anyone that will cause problems for your existing team.  To do this, first and foremost, new members need to be technically competent. Unless your new position is for an intern, you don't want to do on-the-job-training unless that is the specified role for that position on your team. 

Once you've weeded out the candidates that aren't technically able to do the job, the leader should do a qualitative interview.  A qualitative interview is where you determine whether or not the personality of the individual will fit in well with the team.  There are a couple of techniquest used to perform this kind of an interview, and its important to understand what each technique is attempting to do before you choose the technique that fits your personal style.

A scenario driven qualititative interview is one in which the interviewer describes a specific scenario and then asks the interviewee what they would do in that situation and why.  A classic example of a scenario is: "You are walking along the street and see a wallet on the ground. You pick up the wallet and see the contact information of the wallet owner and a $100.00 bill. What do you do?" 

Now, this example is very simple but it showcases a basic flaw in this technique.  Its very easy for the interviewee to guess what the "correct" answer is, and to respond accordingly.  And on scenarios where the answer isn't obvious, interviewees tend to become somewhat defensive.  So, I'm not really a fan of scenario driven qualitative reviews.

The technique I use is to find out what things the interviewee likes to do in thier free time that enhances thier technical ability. This is based off of the idea that folks who do what they love at work are going to be most productive. If someone is spending thier free time doing something that is very similar to what they do at work, that indicates a true love for thier profession. This is an extension of the "Love" concept described Open Agile.

Most of the interviews I conduct are for folks in the software development field.  In that field there are applications you can buy, and then applications you can download for free called "open-source software".  Open source software is written by folks in thier free time. So, when I interview folks, in the qualitative portion of the interview, I ask them "What open-source projects do you work with and what do you do?" 

To be clear, there are a lot of good reasons for folks not doing stuff in thier free time that enhances their technical capability. For example, a person may have kids, or they may have hobbies that have nothing to do with thier work. Those are all fine. However, if I have two resumes in front of me for a software development position and the resumes both represent a similar amount of technical ability,I"ll do a qualitative interview.  In this scenario, lets say one person is involved developing open source software and the other likes rock climbing. No offense meant for  rock climbers, but I'm always going to go for the open-source developer.  Remember, we want the best possible people in our doggy-park. And things like loving your job so much that you do it in your spare time are what really matter.

How much does it matter?  It sometimes is even more important that being fully technically qualified.  I had an opening for mid-level developer with experience in the Java programming language.  There are a number of languages that are very similar to Java, including C# (pronounced "See sharp").  When I interviewed for that position, I had one candidate with no Java programming experience but they did have C# experience.

However, during the qualitative portions of the interview, it became very clear that this developer had a deep love for software development and was actively pursuing learning opportunities to become a better developer, on his own without his company's support. I also interviewed a couple of folks who were technically qualified, but I didn't see that passion for thier work. So, to make a long story short, I invited the passionate developer into my doggy park and within weeks he was my strongest performer.

In my next blog, I'm going to talk about doggy-traits and kitty-traits, and how to use them to decide who to invite into your doggy park.

Doggie-Park Foundations: ROWE

When you think of your favorite job, what were the things that made you like it?  For me, the things I liked about my favorite job were that the job was interesting, my boss gave me the freedom I needed to get the job done, and all of the politics of the office were shielded from me.  Basically, I was working in what is now called a Results Oriented Work Environment. 

Lets go back to our doggy park.  In the doggy park, my team-mates all have doggie traits; because, I successfully applied doggy-park recruitment techniques. That means, they are all high performers who enjoy what they're doing, and don't need to be supervised closely to reach thier goals. 

When I toss my ball to play fetch, all the doggies know the goal: to be the first doggie to get the ball. Their goals are clearly defined and are attainable.  As the guy in charge of the doggie park, it doesn't matter to me how they reach thier goal, as long as they get the goal.  I dont' have any specific rules around what they need to do to get the ball, long as they do it.  And really, the only thing that matters is that they try thier best, not all the doggies can get the ball all the time despite thier effort.

If, after I throw the ball, I see that one of my doggies is struggling, I will do my best to help figure out what's wrong and to help them overcome it.

That, in a nutshell is how ROWE works. In ROWE, the job of the leader is to clearly articulate their teammate's goals, remove any obstacles that could prevent them from attaining thier goals, and finally remove any unnecessary rules.

ROWE was codified by the HR department at Best Buy. There, they looked at the employee manual and realized that many of the rules we inconsequential. They didn't add anything to the employees' ability meet thier goals, and forced an antiquated management structure in places where it didn't belong.  For example, if an employee's primary goal is to create a report of a branch's activity every week, is it really necessary for them to be in the office from 9 am to 5 pm 5 days a week?  Not really.  That is a remnant of an antiquated management structure.

For X-theory managers, the concept of ROWE flies directly in the face of everything they believe in.  They believe that people will do the bare minimum to get thier paycheck. Under that theory, if you give your teammates a high degree of freedom, they will take advantage of it in a bad way.  If that's how you feel as a manager, you're never going to be able to make a doggie park.

For Y-theory managers, the concept of ROWE fits perfectly into thier world view. They believe that folks will work hard if they enjoy what they're doing.  Under that world-view, giving teammates the freedom to do a job as best as they can will result in the attainment of thier goals very quickly. Basically, let them know what they are expected to do, and then stand back and watch them succeed.

The reality is your teammates will present a mixed bag. Not every employee will do the right thing.  So, managing your doggie park won't always be easy. In organizations that have moved to ROWE, there is attrition. The reason for this is that some folks learn how to be X-theory employees and try to push the boundries of thier new freedom.  The phrase they say under X-theory managers is "if that's how they expect me to be, that's how I'll be". Then, when a Y theory manager comes along, the employee is unable to be part of the dog-pack.  The reality is, sometimes folks need X-Theory management, but not all of them.

So, what should you do?  First things first. If you are going to implement ROWE, start small. Get a group of folks on an existing team who are already high performing (because they have doggie traits), and implement ROWE for them. Allow the rest of your folks to see that you are in fact going to follow through with your promise of providing the freedom that comes with ROWE.  But if you have folks who, even after you show you are serious, still are unable work properly in a ROWE ennvironment, then you'll need to use some of your X-Theory tools.

In my next post, I will discuss how to create your team both by retaining your existing teammates as they move from x-theory management styles to your doggie park, and also discussing how you can interview folks to see if they they will work well in your doggie park.

Doggie-Park Foundations: OpenAgile

Before we begin constructing our doggie-park, its important to have a foundation on which to build. The foundation of our doggie-park is OpenAgile and ROWE. Together, these two approaches to management will create an open, agile, and learning environment in which your team can survive, thrive, and excel. To begin, let's talk about OpenAgile.

OpenAgile provides a construct in which integrity, learning, and reactions to change are laid in place. The other day, I was talking to my neighbor about an issue he was having with a friend he hired as a contractor. My neighbor needed someone to train a new employee on a CAD (Computer Assisted Drawing) application. His buddy was a computer programmer, so he asked his buddy if he could give the training. His buddy said yes, and did a very bad job. My neighbor paid his buddy anyway, but needed to hire someone else to provide the training again.

We started talking about OpenAgile, and about the concept of "truthfulness". Truthfulness is about knowing your own limitations, and accepting that everyone you deal with has value. If my neighbor's buddy had been truthful, he never would have taken the job, because he would have known and accepted his limitation that he didn't know how to train CAD. As we talked, my neighbor exclaimed: "Integrity is a very valuable thing." It dawned on me, OpenAgile is really integrity codified!

As we build our doggie-park, integrity is extremely important. Team-members must be able to accept thier personal limitations, and accept that other team-members have advantages that can help the group. Teams that have members who are unable to do this may not fail, but the member will hinder the productivity of the team. One bad-dog and turn a doggie-park bad.

In addition to its focus on personal integrity another aspect of OpenAgile, and the primary aspect that drew me to it is its focus on creating a team that is a learning organization. In 1990 Peter Senge wrote a book called "The Fifth Discipline". In this book he outlined the characteristics of organizations that last a long time. He determined that the only thing seperating companies that last and companies that don't is thier ability to react to change.

He further found that in order to react to change, organizations need to create an environment where team-members are encouraged to learn. Change comes as a result of discovery, invention, and innovation. Team-members who learn will be able to understand changes before and as they arise, adapt to the changes, and quickly react to changes in a smart manner.

As we build our doggie-park, we need to create an environment where a high degree of integrity and learning are present.  By using OpenAgile as one of our core philosophies we are providing our employees with an environment where their learning is encouraged, and where positive behaviours like truthfulness and integrity are paramount.

My next post will be about ROWE (results oriented work environment), and is the second part of my doggie-park foundation. After that, we'll start building our doggie-park.

Why herd cats when you can enjoy a doggy park?

The other day I was looking out my window and watching my neighbor, Fred, play fetch with his dog.  He had a tennis ball that he would toss a few yards, and then his dog would bound out to it, pick the ball up in its mouth, and then bring it back to Fred.  They did this for hours!

On the window sill in front of me sat my cat, Izzy. She was not really sleeping, but rather lying down and enjoying the sun on her back.  I called her a few times, then picked up her favorite toy in hopes of getting her to play a bit.  After a number of attempts, the most I was able to evoke from her was a disdainful twitch of her ear.

I thought about the phrase "herding cats", which is used as a metaphor to describe how to lead small teams of employees.  Cats didn't sound like the right metaphor to me, if you were going to bring together a team for your work, wouldn't you rather get a team of folks who were more like Fred’s dog than my cat Izzy?

Lets take that metaphor further; lets see how this metaphor works with a small team (herd of cats versus a doggy park).  If you have a herd of six cats that you’re trying to manage, there are very few things you can use to orchestrate their combined movement.  If you put down food, only the hungry will come. If you introduce a toy, only those in the mind to play will come.

Contrast that with the doggy-park.  If you whistle and hold up a ball in your six-canine doggy park, most of the dogs will run to you wanting to play.  And, if you throw that ball, all of the doggies will compete to get the ball and bring it back to you.  Isn’t that really how you’d like your team to work? Happily working together in friendly competition to meet their goal in the best manner possible?

The purpose of this blog is to discuss the management philosophy of "creating a doggie-park" as opposed to "herding-cats". While this may seem like a very simple topic, the change of focus is very deep. It requires a change of thinking from X-Theory management to Y-Theory. It means changes in how we recruit folks into our doggie-park focusing on character in addition to technical competence. It means that we release the full potential of our employees to succeed at their tasks while providing a learning environment in which they can grow as practitioners.

To show how to implement this, I will use two primary philosophies of team-management: ROWE (Results Oriented Work Environment) and OpenAgile.  ROWE creates an environment where team-members can work hard to complete their tasks without obstacles, and OpenAgile is integrity codified. Stay tuned for more information!