## Metadata - Author: [[Harvard Business Review]] - Full Title: Harvard Business Review Manager's Handbook: The 17 Skills Leaders Need to Stand Out - Category: #books - Topics: [[Management (Index)]] ## Summary ### Part 1: Develop a Leader Mindset #### 1. The Transition to Leadership * You become a manager because you were successful as an individual contributor. * As a manager, your focus shifts from doing tasks to developing and directing people. * Your role as a manager is to set the direction for your team and coordinate resources to meet your organization’s goals. * Focus on developing your personal influence rather than using positional authority. * Handling emotional challenges: * Step 1: **Label your emotions**. Just the act of naming them can help you moderate your response. * Step 2: **Find the source and a solution**. * **Role strain**: acknowledge your deficiencies, embrace imperfection, create quiet and regular periods during the day for uninterrupted work. * **Problem-solving fatigue**: coach employees to solve problems on their own, set boundaries for the problems you’ll take on * **Isolation**: seek companionship from people within your organization who don’t report to you, develop a routine for making social contact with your team such as checking in with a different person each week * **Imposter syndrome**: show vulnerability, admit your mistakes, focus on actions that give you a sense of control instead of focusing on your emotions * Don’t neglect your personal life. Build and nourish your support network. * Protect your downtime. Spend time doing activities you find most rejuvenating. * Take care of your health. Eat healthy, exercise regularly, get enough sleep. * **Keep your job in perspective**. Nothing is worth your sanity or physical health. #### 2. Building Trust and Credibility * Trust is the most powerful tool you have to get work done. * Trust is a combination of two components: * **Character**: how your intentions align with your actions * Strive for consistency * Regulate your emotions, and avoid extreme emotional displays * Mind your manners and show respect for people as individuals * Ask questions * Ask for feedback and then do something with it * Give others a chance to shine – solicit help from your directs * **Competence**: knowledge you bring to your job * Results: Plan quick wins when you start a new role → identify 3-4 simple, well-defined problems that you can tackle * Confront tough issues and knock down roadblocks * Research your ideas and spend time learning what your directs are doing * Explain your decisions and actions, but don’t over justify – clearly communicate how you’ve come to your conclusion, including what research you’ve done and what factors supported your choice * Be honest about what you do and don’t know * Ask others to test your idea’s merit * **Authentic leadership**: wear your motives, values and goals in the open for all to see * Learn from your life story: examine your history, learn how to articulate your story and share it freely * Understand your extrinsic and intrinsic motivations and nurture them * Foster self-awareness, and open yourself to the judgment of others * Regularly experiment with novel ways of working and managing – your new experiences will genuinely transform you * Questions to ponder: * Which people and experiences in your early life had the greatest impact on you? * How do you cultivate self-awareness daily? * What are your most deeply held values? * What kind of support network do you have? * Is your life integrated, i.e. can you be the same person in all aspects of your life? * Set an example for of moral values and standards of conduct: * **Assume responsibility** for the tough calls * **Publicly examine** your own decisions for bias * How would you define the problem if you stood on the other side of the fence? * Whom could your decision or action injure? * Are you confident that your position will be as valid over a long period of time as it seems now? * Demonstrate genuine concern for all your company’s constituencies * Ensure ethical behavior among your team #### 3. Emotional Intelligence * Emotional intelligence has five components: * **Self-awareness**: The ability to recognize and understand your own moods, emotions, and drives, as well as their effect on others. * **Self-regulation**: The ability to control or redirect your disruptive impulses and moods. The propensity to suspend judgment—to think before acting. * **Motivation**: A tendency to pursue goals with energy and persistence. * **Empathy**: The ability to understand the emotional makeup of other people. Skill in treating people according to their emotional reactions. * **Social skill**: Proficiency in managing relationships and building networks. An ability to find common ground and build rapport. * **Mood contagion**: your emotions color the experience of everyone working around you * Manage your own emotions: * **Acknowledge what’s happening** * **Abstract yourself from the story**. Imagine you are watching this situation happen to someone else – what would be the best thing for them to do? * **Develop a physical cue**. Use your body to help redirect your thoughts and anchor yourself in the present moment. * Manage an employee’s emotions: * **Spot the emotion**. * “You seem unhappy with this choice. Help me understand what you’re thinking right now.” * **Practice active listening**. Engage the employee to search for the issues that are motivating their emotional response. * “I can see this decision process has been frustrating for you. Help me understand. What’s behind your frustration?” * **Reframe your employee’s emotions**. Use the information you’ve gathered to develop a hypothesis about what’s going on, and then test it. * “I’m hearing that you think this process will be inefficient, and you don’t want to waste your time. Is that right? What am I missing?” * Gently **defend the team’s norms**. * “I know you’re frustrated, but sarcasm isn’t helpful in a discussion like this. Can you restate your point?” * Assume that undesirable behavior takes place for a reason. Find out what that reason is. * **Offer an apology of sympathy if it’s appropriate**. * “I’m sorry I was dismissive when you first raised these concerns.” #### 4. Positioning Yourself for Success * As a manager, your primary responsibility is to get things done through others * Practice recognizing and savoring success – establish a weekly ritual when you recall your achievements * Understand your organization’s strategy: * Gather information about your strategic objectives: talk to many people, look for inconsistencies—e.g., between stated objectives and task assignments * Org: “What are the company’s major strategic objectives right now?” * Team: “What are the top priority for my group?” * You: “What role would you like to see me playing?” * Analyze risk in your strategic objectives: * What are the major sources of uncertainty in your team’s future? * What external and internal risks are there? * Planning for strategic alignment * What metrics do you or your team need to meet to help the company succeed? * What services do you need to provide to groups in your organization to achieve the company’s vision? * What processes will you need to excel at? * What will you need to learn and improve on? ### Part 2: Managing Yourself #### 5. Becoming a Person of Influence * Influence is a combination of two kinds of power: * **Positional power** comes from your job description and title * Difficult when hierarchies become more flat * **Personal power** comes from social capital – relationships, reputation, reciprocity, institutional knowledge * Take action and solve problems for the organization * Be a team player and work hard when no one’s watching * Have informed opinions and a comprehensive understanding of your business * Help other people succeed * Respect others and be direct * Demonstrate integrity and stand up for what you believe is right * Promoting ideas to others * Determine whether appealing to your audience’s hearts (emotion) or minds (reason) will be more effective * How personal is the issue at hand to your audience? * Where are you in the decision-making process? If at an active decision point, lean on hard logic. If trying to solicit interest, lean on emotions. * Winning hearts: * Make it personal – what’s in for them? * Speak explicitly to a big emotion – fear, anger, pride, ambition * Tell a story and use characters that your listeners can relate to * Use metaphors and analogies * **Metaphors** are worldviews that shape people’s everyday perceptions and actions, e.g. “business is war” * **Analogies** are comparisons, e.g. “finishing the project was like climbing a mountain” * Winning minds: * Present compelling evidence * Ask striking questions to stimulate your listener’s attention #### 6. Communicating Effectively * Charismatic behavior: * **Animated voice**: vary the volume of your voice, use pauses * **Facial expressions**: make eye contact, communicate your humanity * Gestures * Build around **points of connection**: affirm shared beliefs and experiences * **Contrasts** and dualities: “not this, but that”, “on the one hand, on the other hand” * **Three-part lists**: gives an impression of completeness, use for calls to action * Good writing: * Prepare: * Write out your three main points as full sentences * Think about your audience: what do they know, what questions will they have, will they be opposed or aligned? * Choose an organizing principle and create an outline * Write your first draft * **Write it fast** – shorten the time available * Stop periodically to compare your draft to your plan * Edit your draft * **Set the draft aside** for as long as you can, and get some distance * Reread and revise the draft: * How do you feel about what this says? * How do you feel about the writer? * Fix typos and tighten your wording * Work email: * Subject line: short and descriptive, include call to action if needed * Use proper capitalization and punctuation * Emoji or typo: okay if you’re mimicking the style of the person you’re communicating with * Give context: * Consider your message from their perspective. They have many other things going on and aren’t as immersed as you are. * Remind them where things stood when you last gave an update, and describe what’s happened since then * Keep your sentences short * **Get to the point quickly**: be direct when making a request, spell out deadlines and other important details * **Visually highlight the key message** and use strong patterns: * Structure your email so the most important request or information is at the top, then put it in bold. * If you are sending to multiple readers, also bold the names of anyone you address directly, so they immediately connect to content that’s relevant to them. * If you’re making multiple points, use indentations and numbers or bullets. * Avoid overly formal language * Use the simplest possible word * Avoid repetition * Break up big blocks of text – people won’t read long paragraphs * **Revise before sending**: set a two-minute delay on your email * Timing: avoid sending emails at the end of the day or on the weekend * Recipients: Don’t include anyone who might be confused about why they’re on the email * Further reading: [HBR Guide to Better Business Writing](https://hbr.org/product/hbr-guide-to-better-business-writing/an/10946-PBK-ENG?referral=01410) * Presentations * Decide whether you’ll use slides: * In smaller, informal settings, it’s better to use a whiteboard or handouts than a big glowing screen. * When you do use slides, create them after you’ve prepared your key messages. * Plot it out: presentations are a kind of storytelling * Have a beginning, a middle, and an end * Use an opening line to set up a conflict that the rest of the presentation will work to resolve * Use the middle to elaborate the problem and your proposed solution – e.g., toggle between your current reality and a better, alternative future → excitement * Make a hard sell at the end of your presentation * Summarize key points for an appeal to the minds * Create a “new bliss” vision for an appeal to the hearts * Simple call to action * Prepare your visuals * Streamline the content – people should understand a slide in 3 seconds * Slideshow ≠ talk: Don’t lay your entire argument on a slide * One idea per slide * Create a storyboard on sticky notes to create a full outline * Use fresh visuals, e.g. pick a metaphor or image. Include the minimum amount of data you need to make your point. Highlight key information. Leave plenty of white space. * Perform * Rehearse: know your material * Have a plan for interacting with your audience: When will you take questions? How will you respond interrupts you? * Stick to your schedule – start and end on time * Effective meetings: * Prepare before the meeting: * Goal-setting: What’s the purpose and desired outcomes? * Items: What activities need to happen, in what order? * Agenda: Assign a leader and a length of time for each item * Attendee list: * Include key decision makers, experts, stakeholders. Run your list by key attendees to make sure you’ve got it right. * Invite fewer people if the purpose of the meeting is to make a decision. Invite more people if you’re brainstorming or sharing updates. * Logistics: * Prepare the room and technological support. * Distribute materials ahead of time. * Conduct the meeting: * Start on time * Begin by explaining the group’s goals and introducing each person’s role. Establish ground rules for how you’ll conduct the conversation. * As the meeting progresses, keep everyone engaged by highlighting agenda transitions, summarizing progress, and underscoring major decisions or announcements. * Ask the whole group, “Have we forgotten anything?” “Does anyone have a different point of view?” * Be prepared to shut down people who talk too much and draw out the silent types. Keep an eye out for body language that indicates someone wants to contribute. * When you’re ready to close, repeat the key points of the conversation, including decisions, next steps, and personnel assignments, and check for understanding. * End with a motivational message: “Great discussion today, thanks so much. We got a lot done!” * Follow-up afterward: * Send a follow-up note the next day with high-level details * Decisions or outcomes you want people to remember, task assignments including due dates #### 7. Personal Productivity * Time management essentials * Understand how you spend your time: log your activities for a few days * Look for patterns: collect activities into categories and tally the minutes spent on each. Then, ask yourself: * **Does your time usage match your highest priorities?** * Analyze what creates the gaps between your expectations and reality * What’s the payoff associated with each activity? * Which activities are tied to your core responsibilities? * Are there any items you should delegate? * Make a plan: Schedule enough time for the most important tasks. Ask yourself: * **In an ideal world, how much time would you spend on these activities? **Allocate time to your highest priorities. * What’s the minimum amount of time you can afford to spend on these activities? * Execute your plan: * **Time boxing on your calendar**: Break your schedule into short blocks (e.g. of 1 hour) and then slot a category into each block. * Prioritize your task list: Put deadline-sensitive items on top, followed by goal-oriented actions. Schedule both of these around your recurring obligations. * Finding focus * Forestall interruptions: Plan ahead for obstacles and temptations. Turn off notifications. * Organize your space: * Eliminate the clutter * Keep what you need within reach, remove everything else * Make yourself comfortable * Stress management * Routines to regulate stress * Promote positive emotions. Connect your work to a larger sense of purpose. * Take care of your brain and body * Reduce the stress of everyday decision making: put unimportant choices on autopilot by limiting your choices or establishing a routine. Construct “if-then” propositions in advance. * In-the-moment interventions * Do something else * Step away and take a moment to govern your reaction – “I need a moment to process all this” * Breathe deeply and do some stretches * Work-life balance * “Work-life balance” is a misnomer – aim for positive work-life integration * Avoid burnout * Take breaks during your workday * In the evening, build in time when you can truly recharge * Get some “me” time * Put your devices away after a certain time each night. * Protect your weekend * Frontload your schedule so you’re not tackling all the important tasks at the end of the week. Keep Thursday and Friday free of major deadlines whenever possible. * Pre-commit to personal plans for the weekend * Ground yourself in experiences outside the office #### 8. Self-Development * Articulate your **career purpose**: Keep the purpose or your life front and center as you decide how to spend your time and energy. * What are your values? * Where do you belong? * What should you contribute? * What do you want out of work? * **Look for opportunities** within your organization * Investigate formal development * Conduct internal informational interviews * Prepare: read people’s LinkedIn profiles etc. * How did they get into this line of work? * What do they enjoy about it? What’s not so great about it? * What’s changing in the sector? * What kinds of people do well in the industry? * Propose the job you want to do. Pitch to the person that has the best mix of power and credibility to make your proposal a reality. * Which departments have momentum? * What opportunities exist for you in a different market or location? * What entrenched problems does your organization face? * Pursue incremental opportunities * Grow in your current role: add responsibilities or start a side project * Take on special assignments or rotational roles * Get feedback * Regularly ask: **“Do you have any feedback for me about how that went, and how I could do better next time?”** * Welcome critical feedback to get more in the future: * Recognize your threat response – you’re not actually under attack * Recognize the power dynamic – this feels bad for you, but they’re trying to help * Recognize your agency – you have the option to leave the conversation * Ask for more information to get you out of a defensive position: “Tell me more.” “I’m not sure I knew that about myself. Help me understand what you’re seeing.” * Know your strengths: * “When I’m at my best, I…” * “I enjoy…” * “Others rely on me to…” ### Part 3: Managing Individuals #### 9. Delegating with Confidence * Principles of effective delegation * Recognize the capabilities of your team members. * Trust your team’s ability to get the job done. * Focus on results, and let go of your need to get involved in how tasks are accomplished. * Consider delegation as a way to develop the skills of your team. * Always delegate to the lowest possible level to make the best use of staff resources. * Explain assignments clearly and provide resources needed for successful completion. * Deflect reverse delegation. Do not automatically solve problems or make decisions for your staff members. Focus on generating alternatives together. * Developing a delegation plan * Decide what to delegate * Identify tasks that don’t require your specific set of skills and authority, and that other staff members could do with a minimum of training * Avoid delegating if * you can’t precisely explain what you want the other person to do. * you’ll put your own development in jeopardy by delegating. * you’ll undermine a project’s success by delegating. * Why: Clarify your purpose * What: Define the work * Tasks: discrete activities * Projects: multiple tasks * Functions: an ongoing activity, continuous responsibility * Who: Choose someone to do the work * Availability * Skills * Motivation * Assistance required * Team dynamic * How: Outline the process * How much authority will the person have to make decisions? * What will your role be in this process? * What’s the budget for this work? * How will you hold the person accountable, and what metrics will you use? * Sharing your delegation with your employee * Do it in two distinct phases: * Explain the assignment * Talk: Come prepared with a written delegation plan and set the context. Follow the “why, what, who, when, how” structure of your delegation plan. * Agree on the plan * Listen: Answer questions and resolve concerns * Ask for feedback and Incorporate good suggestions. * Document your agreement * After the meeting, send an email summarizing the assignment, including deliverables, deadlines, benchmarks, collaborators, quality standards, process requirements, and the date of your next check-in. * Provide support * Monitoring progress without micromanaging: hold routine progress updates * Remove roadblocks * Avoid reverse delegation (employees delegating to you) * Provide background information about the task * Don’t take over as soon as something goes wrong * Give positive reinforcement and express your appreciation #### 10. Giving Effective Feedback * **Positive feedback** reinforces good work * **Corrective feedback** urges the recipient to change course or adjust practices that aren’t working * Giving feedback in real time * The best time to give feedback is in the moment * Giving difficult feedback * Step 1: Understand the situation objectively * What have you observed? What biases might be coloring your memory? * What have other people told you? What are their biases? * What don’t you know? Whose perspective haven’t you heard? * What are other explanations for the employee’s behavior? * Step 2: Plan the conversation * Write down key points before you go into the conversation * Let the employee know ahead of time what you’ll be discussing * Step 3: Lead the meeting * Start by naming the topic you’d like to discuss * Give negative feedback right away * Talk about the employee’s behavior, not motivations * Avoid making global statements (“you’re X kind of person”) or speaking in absolute terms (“you always/never do X”) * Ask for the employee’s take on the problem * Don’t escalate * Try to locate specific points of agreement and disagreement and ask questions about them * Step 4: Look ahead * Move the conversation towards agreement about the next steps * Coaching and developing employees * Your aim with coaching is to help your employees become more adaptive and self-sufficient * Ask questions instead of offering solutions – pushes employees to develop critical thinking skills and the confidence to act on their own * How to hold a coaching session * Step 1: Prepare for the meeting * Identify specific performance issues you’d like to address, skill gaps you’d like to fill, or a new role you’re preparing your employee for * Step 2: Let your employee take the lead * Ask them “what do you want to achieve during these sessions?” * Focus: * Long-term development: skills and career goals * Debrief on an event or project: learn from recent experience * Short-term problem solving * Look for links between their goals and yours * Step 3: Build a shared understanding of the issues * Step 4: Reframe the issue * Instead of offering advice, help them think more critically about the assumptions and choices that are already driving their behavior * Help them see themes in what they’ve said * Offer competing lenses through which they can see the issue at hand * Step 5: Close with an action plan * Step 6: Follow up * Performance review * Step 1: Prepare your employee * Step 2: Open with a tone of partnership * Step 3: Share your appraisal * Step 4: Probe for the root cause of performance gaps * Step 5: Create a new performance plan * Step 6: Get it on the record * Step 7: Follow up #### 11. Developing Talent * Employee development as a priority * Your role as a manager is to develop talent that meets the need of your business. * Help others grow and reach their highest potential and align to their greater purpose, but with a focus on how that growth will intersect with the business goals of your unit. * Creating career strategies with your staff * Help employees discover what they really want out of their work. * Brainstorm about where they can find opportunities for growth in your organization and how their present role could be reengineered for the better. * Step 1: Talk to your direct reports and find out about their aspirations and their current state of development. * Interests and skills: “What are you best at doing? What do you most like to do?” * Organizational fit: “What sorts of people do you work best and worst with?” * Work values: “What one lesson about managing a career would you pass along to the next generation? How would you apply that lesson to yourself right now?” * Vision for the future: “What are your short-term and long-term professional goals?” * Step 2: Suggest training opportunities * Step 3: Refresh responsibilities * Developing high-potential talent * Identify high performers. Look for team members who exceed your standards on multiple measures, strive to improve their performance, make key contributions to the team, etc. * Talk to your high performers regularly about stress and work-life balance. “What do you need to recharge your batteries?” * Help high performers grow in a healthy way: * Set boundaries with compassion rather than force * Praise personally, praise often, be specific in your praise * Stretch assignments * Do they really have what it takes? (motivation, prepared to take personal costs, raw intelligence, etc.) * Is it the right opportunity? Look for an assignment with a 50-70% chance of success. * Can you secure it for them? ### Part 4: Managing Teams #### 12. Leading Teams * Team culture and dynamics * Your role as a team leader is to create a work environment that allows each person to contribute fully. * Step 1: Assemble your team * Evaluate the diversity of your team’s composition relative to the competencies you need. * Learn as much as possible about team members, including their training and skills, professional background, work style, motivations and goals, and life experience. * Step 2: Hone your sense of purpose * The essence of a team is common commitment. Your role as a leader is to develop this common commitment. * Start by having everyone comment on why the team exists, what demand or opportunity brought the team together. * “How does our work support the strategic goals of the company?” * “How will we define success? What does “a job well done” look like?” * “How do we want to work to affect the people who come in contact with us—customers, clients, others in the company?” * Step 3: Set team performance goals * Have specific, attainable short-term goals that pertain to the team _as a unit_ and that support the organization’s strategy. * You succeed or fail as a team. * Choose goals that involve everyone’s work. For each goal, ask yourself how each individual will contribute. * Step 4: Define group norms * Set rules that make team members’ behavior more predictable and aligned with the shared goals. * You need to spend less time talking about group processes. * Step 5: Build relationships within the team * Teams run on trust. * Include social facetime in all group interactions, and dedicate a communication channel like group chat for casual check-ins and banter. * Managing cross-cultural teams * Observe closely * Direct (explicit) communication versus indirect communication * Trouble with accents or language fluency * Differing attitudes toward hierarchy * Conflicting decision-making norms * Foster open-mindedness * The goal is for your team members to become self-aware enough to manage their frustrations without forming implacable grudges. * Push people to frame their problems as cultural, and not personal, differences * Intervene judiciously * Managing virtual teams * Pick the right tools and set up technology. * Clarify expectations for engagement * Have a backup plan for when technology fails. * Foster social bonds and routinely build in social time. * Productive conflict resolution * Constructive conflict: * Set ground rules and name the behaviors that are and aren’t OK during a conflict. * Conflict should be handled openly. * Establish a shared process for resolving conflict. * Team members should respectfully confront the colleague they disagree with before they bring in anyone else, including the manager. * Take turns summarizing each other’s ideas or concerns, articulating each other’s point of view. * Put the discussion on pause when they feel themselves losing track of the argument or their own self-control. * Provide criteria for contentious trade-offs and zero-sum decisions. * Destructive conflict: * Step 1: Find the root cause. * Why are team members arguing with each other? * Is there a deeper personality conflict here? * Are there organizational causes of this conflict? * Is this a recurring pattern? * Step 2: Facilitate a resolution. * Play no more than a facilitating role. Compromises that are imposed from above tend not to be as thorough or as resilient as the ones a team arrives at by itself. * Your listening-to-telling ratio should be 4:1, and the “telling” part should mostly be active listening tactics to help team members understand underlying assumptions. * Set the tone for this discussion by reminding people to stick to the facts. * If the conversation gets stuck: * Ask each team member to share their BATNA – your “best alternative to a negotiated agreement” * Refocus the discussion on the team’s strategic objectives. * Step 3: Get back to work. #### 13. Fostering Creativity * Plan a creative session * Creative sessions are mentally demanding, so keep each meeting to thirty minutes. * Pick a time when people are likely to be at their peak energy, but not immersed in other distractions. * Choose a location where your team rarely meets in order to stimulate new thinking. * Create a few central gathering places at the office. Stock these places with creative tools like whiteboards, markers, flip charts, and art supplies. * Establish rules of conduct: Value varying points of view; no idea is a bad idea. * Tools for generating ideas – divergent thinking * In a **solution-centric** session, the group focuses on generating ideas around a broadly defined issue, such as “How can we improve our marketing plan?” * A **problem-centric** session focuses on solving a specific, clearly-defined issue. * Brainstorming: * Modifying: How could your team members change or adapt the way they already do things to achieve some different outcome? * Visioning: For a more solution-centric conversation, ask group members to imagine an ideal solution to the problem or question. * Experimenting: Create a complete matrix of all the elements at play in a problem—clients, services, resources, and so on—and then systematically combine and re-combine them to find new business possibilities. * Mind mapping: * Begin by writing a keyword or concept in the center of a blank page or whiteboard. * Catchball * In this exercise, someone on the team “tosses” the initial idea to someone else. Whoever “catches” the idea must understand it, reflect on it, and improve on it in some way. Then that person tosses the modified idea back to the group, where it’s caught by someone else and improved further. * Making sure all perspectives are heard * Get everyone’s perspective – creative ideas come from unexpected places. * Ask people to talk—or to stop talking. Balance individual contributions. * Structure the conversation so it feels safe to take risks. Break bigger groups into smaller ones and ask each group to report to the plenary afterwards. * Appoint someone to play devil’s advocate and challenge assumptions. * Push for “second thoughts” and ask questions such as “Have we forgotten anything?” * Never show that you think an idea is silly, and thank everyone for their contributions. * Dealing with negativity and resistance * Persuasion: Invite everyone to respond with data, evidence, and logic. “Help us understand why you think this won’t work.” * Participation: Show your appreciation for the person’s contribution. * Facilitation: Ask the person what would make them comfortable with this idea. * Negotiation: Push the group to consider trade-offs and compromises. * Direction: Redirect harmful comments and keep the conversation on track. #### 14. Hiring and Retention * Crafting a role * Let your guiding concerns be “Who can do this job the best?” and “Who will help our team continue to grow?” * Step 1: Define the job’s primary responsibilities and tasks. * Step 2: Describe the ideal candidate. * Step 3: Evaluate the environment: team culture fit * Step 4: Write the job description. This is a profile of the job, its essential functions, reporting relationships, hours, and required credentials. * Recruiting world-class talent * Recruit for potential rather than competency and experience. In a volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous environment, competency-based appraisals and appointments are increasingly insufficient. * Select on intelligence, conscientiousness, and emotional stability. * Big Five killer combo: high in conscientiousness, low in neuroticism, high in openness. * Look for the following characteristics: * Motivation: a fierce commitment to excel in the pursuit of unselfish goals * Curiosity: a penchant for seeking out new experiences, knowledge, and candid feedback and an openness to learning and change * Insight: the ability to gather and make sense of information that suggests new possibilities * Engagement: a knack for using emotion and logic to communicate a persuasive vision and connect with people * Determination: the wherewithal to fight for difficult goals despite challenges and to bounce back from adversity * Step 1: Get the word out. Push information about your search through as many appropriate channels as possible. * Step 2: Screen résumés. * In the first pass, eliminate candidates who fail to meet the basic requirements of the job. * In the second pass, look for résumés that include: * Signs of achievement and results: for example, a profit orientation, stability, or progressive career momentum * Confidence and aptitude for complex environments * Diversity of experience and skills * Be on alert for red flags such as: * A lengthy description of the applicant’s education or personal background versus experience * Unexplained employment gaps * A pattern of short-term employment * No logical job progression or continuity * Step 3: Conduct interviews * Step 4: Evaluate candidates * Dimensions: Education, previous experience, job accomplishments, personal attributes, cultural fit, potential * Acknowledge your biases * Ultimately, you all must answer two questions: “Do we have enough information to make a good decision?” and “Do we want this person to work for us?” * Step 5: Make an offer * Retaining employees * Issue 1: Pride and trust in the organization. Look for ways to communicate your company’s leadership to your team in a positive, concerted way, and connect your team’s work to the overall mission of the organization at every possible opportunity. * Issue 2: The relationship with their supervisor. * Issue 3: Meaningful work. Consider outsourcing repugnant tasks. * Issue 4: Work-life balance. Make sure your employees understand the business priorities that are making life so difficult for them right now and the personal payoff for them. Above all, acknowledge the sacrifice. * Issue 5: Fair compensation. Offer a fair and market-wise salary. * Motivation and engagement * Progress principle: The single most important is making progress in meaningful work. Set clear, achievable short-term goals and give team members autonomy as they pursue them. Express respect to team members. * Principles of job enrichment: * Remove some controls while retaining accountability. * Increase the accountability of individuals for their own work. * Give a person a complete, natural unit of work (module, division, area) * Grant additional authority to employees in their activity; job freedom. * Growth and learning: Introduce new and more difficult tasks not previously handled. #### Layoffs / Letting people go I added this section based on my notes; it doesn't appear in the handbook. * Resources * [HBR](https://hbr.org/2016/02/the-right-way-to-fire-someone): The right way to fire someone * [HBR](https://hbr.org/2015/06/how-to-tell-someone-theyre-being-laid-off): How to tell someone they’re being laid off * [HBR](https://hbr.org/2016/02/a-step-by-step-guide-to-firing-someone): A step-by-step guide for firing someone * [HBR](https://hbr.org/2009/03/how-to-communicate-layoffs): How to handle layoffs * Mindset * As a manager, you need to get comfortable doing uncomfortable things. Do what’s right for the company. * Make the best move when there are no good moves. * Think about your team. They are the ones picking up the slack and working longer hours because the person you need to fire is not doing their job correctly. * Timing * When the bad outweighs the good and when the employee is causing more problems than he or she is solving, it’s time for that employee to go. * If it’s necessary to lay people off, do it quickly and fairly. If you don’t act immediately, word will inevitably leak to the employee. * Make sure that letting your employee go is the last step in a careful, thoughtful, fair, and transparent process that started long before the actual firing. _Don't fire someone unless you've previously told them explicitly that their job is at risk (not just that they're underperforming)._ * What about the reasons for the layoff haven’t you yet told the employee with previous feedback? What will surprise them? Should you move ahead with the layoff nonetheless, or first give that feedback? * Have you explicitly mentioned that their low performance might lead to them losing their job? Don’t expect them to make that connection themselves. They’re unlikely to interpret your feedback the way you intended. * During the trial period, have you told them that we take this period very seriously for further testing the fit? Otherwise, they might feel like they got the job for sure. Make sure to counterbalance this with enthusiasm. * Preparation * Get clear on the situation: * Is your employee meeting the responsibilities listed on their job description? * Can the market offer you a better employee at the same price? * If the employee resigned today, would you fight to keep them? Or would you feel relieved? * Cover your bases in terms of documentation. Have enough data to support your decision. * Run your case by a jury first to make sure that you’re on solid ground. * Think about how to reallocate the work that’s previously been done by that person. * Come to the “firing meeting” prepared to address the practical logistical questions that the person will have about leaving her job. * When is the official end date? Are there severance arrangements? Are there opportunities elsewhere in the company? Is career counseling available? * Maybe offer a month-long leave period where the person is still formally employed but not working. * Think about whether one more person should be present in the room when delivering the news. Check the legal requirements. * Practice delivering the news, and simulate different ways the person might react. * Clarity: Tell the person clearly what you mean. * Neutrality: Intonation, facial expressions, conscious and unconscious body language. * Temperance: Avoid words or phrases that will provoke negative reactions. * Keep a box of Kleenex available. * Keep a clean exit route for the employee so they don’t have to face their colleagues on the way out. * Delivering the news * Schedule the termination at the end of the workday. Friday is best, because it gives the person the weekend to deal with it. If you do it on Monday, everyone will be talking about it for the rest of the week. * Keep it short. Go somewhere private and then lead with the punchline. * Begin by saying, “I have some bad news for you. The purpose of this meeting is to tell you that we’ll have to let you go.” * Then state the reason for termination in one simple sentence. Be transparent. * Justify the layoff: it was necessary because the company failed the employee. * Offer setting up another meeting to discuss the reasons behind the layoff. * “If you wish to discuss the justice of this decision, I will be glad to set up an appointment with you next week — this is not the time.” * Don’t get caught up in arguing for your position. Instead, say “I’m sorry that the situation has gotten to this point.” * Don’t talk about how difficult this decision has been for you. This isn’t about you. * Show compassion. You are the agent of a terrible thing that has just happened in this person’s life. * Listen to what the employee has to say. Acknowledge their emotions. * Cover everything essential. Be specific about what will happen next: pay, benefits, unused vacation time, references, outplacement, explanations to coworkers, ongoing projects, etc. * Close by thanking the individual for their contributions to the company. Walk with the now ex-employee back to their desk and wait while they collect any personal items. Go to the exit together, shake hands, wish them well. * Talk to your team * After delivering the news, gather the colleagues affected by the termination. * “[Person’s name] is no longer part of the organization. I can’t go into details because that’s confidential information and I want to ensure their privacy.” * Do not reveal reasons behind the decision — that’s confidential, and besides, it sets a bad precedent to badmouth a former employee. * Focus on the future. The firing presents a challenge to your team, namely, more work for everyone. Come up with a strategy to manage the workload. * Written announcement to the team * Debriefing * Find out why you made a hiring mistake, and how it can be avoided in the future. #### Giving references / referee I added this section based on my notes; it doesn't appear in the handbook. * Resources * [HBR](https://hbr.org/2016/02/the-right-way-to-check-a-reference): The right way to check a reference (less relevant) * [HBR](https://hbr.org/2015/10/when-someone-asks-you-for-a-reference): When someone asks you for a reference * [HBR](https://hbr.org/2016/08/the-20-most-common-things-that-come-up-during-reference-checks?referral=03759&cm_vc=rr_item_page.bottom): The 20 most common things that come up during reference checks * [HBR](https://hbr.org/2013/12/three-ways-to-say-no-to-a-reference-request): Three ways to say no to a reference request. * Decide whether you want to do it. * Don’t provide a reference for someone you don’t believe in. Your reputation is on the line: If you refer someone, and they don’t perform, you’ll look bad. * If you decline, say “I am not going to be able to give you a strong enough recommendation. You need someone who can really sing your praises.” * [This article](https://hbr.org/2013/12/three-ways-to-say-no-to-a-reference-request) has more info on how to say no to a reference request. * If your appraisal of the applicant’s abilities is mixed, have a conversation with the applicant about what exactly you might say. Say where you can give them a reference, and where you can’t. * Prepare for the call. * Ask the applicant what they’d like you to highlight. * Request information about the role they are being considered for and why they want the job. “Ask, ‘Why is this the right next job for you?’ * Prepare specific anecdotes and examples for both the applicant’s character and their technical skills. * Decide on your level of enthusiasm during the call. If you’re very enthusiastic about the applicant, say ‘I would hire this person in a heartbeat. This is a person I want on my team.’ * Be positive. Never give a negative reference. * During the call. * Don’t make jokes. * After the call. * Follow up with the applicant and let them know that you spoke to the hiring manager. ### Part 5: Managing the Business I removed this section from the published note since it contained a bit too much verbatim content from the handbook for my taste. %% #### 15. Strategy * What is strategy? * Strategy aims to develop a business’s competitive advantage and compound it. The basis of this advantage is difference—the unique value your company alone can deliver. * Need-based positioning: Serve all or most of the needs of an identifiable set of customers. * Variety-based positioning: Choose a narrow subset of product/service offerings from within the wider set offered in the industry. Deliver faster, better, or at a lower cost than competitors. * Access-based positioning: Strategies can be based around access to customers, e.g. by locating stores in low-income neighborhoods. * Divide ideas about strategy into those that focus on * Doing something new * Building on what you already do well * Reacting opportunistically to emerging possibilities * Developing your strategy * Find unique links between the opportunities and threats that present themselves to your business and your particular capacity to respond. * Begin by identifying a problem out in the world, then work toward a solution inside your company. * Step 1: Look outside to identify threats and opportunities – driving forces of competition * What is the economic environment in which we must operate? How is it changing? * What will our customers want/expect from us in five to ten years? How will the world have changed? * Step 2: Look inside at resources, capabilities, and practices * What are our competencies as an organization or team? How do these give us an advantage relative to competitors? * What resources support or limit our actions? * Step 3: Consider strategies for change * Step 4: Build a good fit among strategy-supporting activities * What activities and processes are involved in carrying out our strategy? Which are most (and least) important to the success of the strategy? * How could we modify each activity and process to better support the strategy? * Step 5: Create alignment between your strategy and your people and operations. * Ideally, employees at every level in your company will understand (1) what the strategy is; (2) what their role is in making it work; and (3) what the benefits of the strategy will be to the organization and to them as individuals. * Leading change and transitions * Articulate a vision that others will follow. * Think of a vision as a picture of the hoped-for end result of your new strategy: what it will look like, how it will function, what it will produce. * Focus on people. * Weave your vision into everyday management. Your employees need repeated exposure to your ideas in order to really internalize them. * Find the right allies. People must accept the messenger before they accept the message. * Court the uncommitted. * Create a change-ready culture. * Educate employees about the organization’s competitive situation and create dialogue about the data. * Solicit input about employees’ dissatisfactions and problems. * Set high standards and expect people to meet them. #### 16. Mastering Financial Tools * The basics of financial performance * Principle 1: Look at context – how you did in the past, how your competitors are doing, what the industry is doing * Principle 2: Look forward as well as backward * Principle 3: Question your data. Your information sources are often human, each with their own biases and incentives. Presumed causal links may not be justified. * Understanding financial statements * Key question: What is the state of the company’s financial health? * **Balance sheet**: What does your company own, and what does it owe to others? * The balance sheet shows a company’s financial position at a specific point in time. It provides a snapshot of its assets, liabilities, and equity on a given day. The balance sheet shows how assets were paid for—from borrowed money (liabilities), the capital of the owners, or both. * Assets comprise all the physical resources a company can put to work in the service of the business. * Current assets can be converted into cash within one year. * Fixed assets are harder to turn into cash. * Liabilities are debts to suppliers and other creditors. * Current liabilities represents money owed to creditors and others that typically must be paid within a year. * Long-term liabilities are usually bonds or mortgages—debts that the company is contractually obliged to repay over a period of time longer than a year. * High debt entails high interest costs. * Owners’ equity is what’s left after you subtract total liabilities from total assets. * Fundamental accounting equation: Assets – Liabilities = Owners’ Equity * Net working capital: Subtracting current liabilities from current assets gives you the company’s net working capital, or the amount of money tied up in current operations. * Financial leverage: Using borrowed money to acquire an asset. * A company is highly leveraged when the percentage of debt on its balance sheet is high relative to the capital invested by the owners. * Financial leverage can increase returns on an investment, but it also increases risk. If the value of an asset drops, or if it fails to produce the anticipated level of revenue, then leverage works against the asset’s owner. * Operating leverage, by contrast, refers to the extent to which a company’s operating costs are fixed rather than variable. * **Cash flow statement**: What are the company’s sources of revenue, and how has it spent its money? * The cash flow statement shows the relationship between net profit, from the income statement, and the actual change in cash that appears in the company’s bank accounts. In accounting language, it “reconciles” profit and cash through a series of adjustments to net profit. * This document indicates whether your company is successfully turning its profits into cash, and that ability is ultimately what will keep the company solvent, or able to pay bills as they come due. A company can be quite profitable and still be short of cash as a result of a lot of new investments, for example, or trouble collecting receivables. * Expenditures show up on the statement as negative figures, and sources of income figures are positive. The bottom line in each category is simply the net total of inflows and outflows. * The statement has three major categories: * Operating activities, or operations, refers to cash generated by, and used in, a company’s ordinary business operations. It includes everything that doesn’t explicitly fall in the other two categories. * Investing activities covers cash spent on capital equipment and other investments (outgoing), and cash realized from the sale of such investments (incoming). * Financing activities refers to cash used to reduce debt, buy back stock, or pay dividends (outgoing), and cash from loans or from stock sales (incoming). * **Income statement (profit-and-loss)**: How much profit has the company made? * Revenues – Expenses = Net Income * Categories: * Cost of goods sold, or COGS: represents the direct costs of manufacturing * Operating expenses: include the salaries of administrative employees, office rents, sales and marketing costs, and other costs not directly related to making a product or delivering a service. * The last expenses on the income statement are typically taxes and any interest due on loans. * Budgeting * Four basic functions of budgeting: * Planning: set goals, choose a course of action, predict results. * Coordination and communication: with different arms of your business * Progress monitoring: compare actual results with the projections * Performance evaluation: assess your group * Several kinds of budgets: * Master budget: one comprehensive picture of the whole organization. * Operating budget: collects the budgets from each function in the company, such as research and development or production. * Financial budget: a plan for the capital that will support the company’s operating budget. It usually has three parts: * Cash budget: plans for the level and timing of cash inflow and outflow * Operating asset investment plan: ensures that adequate capital will be available for assets such as inventory and accounts receivable * Capital investment plan: budgets for proposed investments in long-term productive assets such as property, plant, and equipment expenditures. * Preparing the operating budget * Operating income = Revenues – (Cost of Goods Sold + Sales, General, and Administrative Costs) * Step 1: Calculate your expected revenues (as appropriate). * If managers are evaluated and rewarded for achieving their budgeted revenue targets, they may be tempted to put forward conservative numbers that will be easy to reach. * Step 2: Calculate the expected cost of goods sold. * Step 3: Calculate the expected other costs. * Step 4: Calculate the expected operating income. * Step 5: Develop alternative scenarios. * Budgeting is an iterative process, in which you constantly push yourself to ask, “What if?” * “How will a change in one part of this equation affect the expected outcome?” * “What are the major risks we’re facing right now? How can we incorporate that risk into the budget?” #### 17. Developing a Business Case * Shareholder perspectives * Step 1: Identify your decision makers * Who will be reviewing your idea? * How will the final decision be made? * Where does the real influence lie in your organization? * Step 2: Align with a champion – someone who advocates for your idea when you’ve left the room. * Ask what this person’s major priorities are right now, and what problems they’re trying to solve. Then explain how your initiative could help, and use their feedback to make your plan an even better fit. * You want to build a case that speaks directly to your champion’s motivations, so that they advocate for it as a favor to themselves, not to you. * Step 3: Understand your audience’s objectives * Review your division’s or your company’s strategic priorities. Understand how your idea supports these priorities and how it will help the judges achieve their goals. * Ask questions like: “What are your primary objectives this year? What barriers stand in your way?” * Clarifying the need and value * Step 1: Talk to beneficiaries * Gather as much information as you can about these employees’ experience of the problem, and make sure they understand that you value their insight and want to help them. * Ask them questions like: * When did the problem start (or when will it start)? * How does it manifest itself? How often? * How does the problem prevent their teams from doing their work effectively? * Who else in the company does it affect? * What customers are we not serving well? * Ask for relevant data or documents (customer complaints, reports, surveys), and follow up on any referrals you receive. * Keep probing during these sessions. The beneficiaries may not know the underlying reason for the problem or they may have a solution in mind. But sometimes what they want isn’t the best fix. * Step 2: Agree on what the solution should accomplish * Go back to your stakeholders to check your understanding. Have these conversations _before_ you prepare your business case. * Use the following questions to guide your conversations: * Where will the solution be used? In what offices and facilities? In how many countries? * Who will be affected by the solution? A single department or the entire organization? * How quickly does the solution need to be in place? Will we roll it out over time or all at once? * How should we measure the solution’s effectiveness? Do we have a baseline that we can compare against? * Should we combine the solution with another related initiative? * Cost/benefit analysis * Costs * **Project costs**: * Project expenditures: include development, testing and quantification, training and deployment, personnel, and travel costs. * Capital expenditures: pertain to assets you purchase or develop in the course of the project. * **Operating costs**: capture how much it will cost to keep a project running after its initial implementation. Overhead like personnel, office space, and maintenance and licensing fees fall into this group. * **Transition costs**: disruption caused by the process of implementing your solution. * Benefits * **Revenue**: any additional money your initiative will bring in through sales. * One way to estimate revenue gains from your business change is to examine a 2 × 2 grid that compares existing versus new clients on one side, to incremental versus net new revenue on the other. Are you expecting to increase revenue from existing clients and products (through new features as an example), or are you selling new products to new clients—or is it some mixture? * **Productivity savings**: the money you’ll save through efficiencies. * E.g. eliminating salaries, reducing tax bill, and diminished overtime payouts or time-wasting human errors. * Risk identification and mitigation * **“What if ” analysis**: What if you’re wrong and things don’t go as planned? What if the worse (or best) case occurs? * Reexamine all of the beliefs that under-write your estimates. * Estimate out how each alternative scenario affects the value of your project. * **Risk factors**: * Personnel: What if the person running this project leaves the company? What if you don’t get all the resources you requested? * Technology: What if you encounter bugs when testing? What if employees struggle to adapt to the new system? * Quality/performance: What if your solution doesn’t perform as you expect it to—for better or worse? What if you’re unable to deliver on the promise of the value proposition? * Scope: What if the project needs to include more (or fewer) geographic regions, employees, or customers? What if the stakeholders change requirements? * Schedule. What if you aren’t able to hit the launch date? What would allow you to get ahead of schedule? * Score each risk on its probability and its potential impact. Multiply these two numbers together for each risk, then methodically comparing the results when you swap in the best- and worst-case values. * Writing your business case * You need to compellingly answers the following questions: * What exactly are you proposing? * Why is it important? * Why is it important now? * What results do you expect to achieve? * What impact will those results have and on whom? * Why should the company invest in this idea? * What issues may come up and how do you intend to mitigate them to ensure the project is a success? * What role will you play specifically to oversee and support the project’s success? * What specifically are you asking someone to approve, make a decision about, or otherwise support? * Structure: * 1. Executive summary: Open by briefly stating the problem or opportunity, the “how” and “why” of your solution, and the expected ROI. * 2. Business need: Lay out the need in more detail, connecting it to your company’s strategic goals. Use data to explain why this issue needs to be solved now. * 3. Project overview: Outline the key elements of your solution. Describe its scope and how it will affect current business processes. * 4. Schedule, team, and other resources: Sketch out an implementation plan, including deadlines, milestones, and personnel. * 5. Impact: Detail the benefits for the company as a whole and for specific departments. Use numbers to make this section as specific as possible. * 6. Risks: Give an overview of the major risks involved in doing— and not doing—the project. Explain how you’ll capture potential upsides and minimize downsides. * 7. Financials: Summarize the costs and benefits, and restate the ROI. * 8. Final pitch: Restate the business need, the benefits of your solution, and, once again, the ROI. * Getting buy-in for your plan * Before you submit the case for formal review, shop it around and get feedback. * Modify your case based on the input you receive. * Live presentation: * Proofread your presentation materials. * Personalize the conversation. * Build your credibility and shine a light on your experts.