Maxim # 7
You can’t implement from the office
“You can’t implement from the office” is one of our less creative maxims but it is also one of the more important ones as far as implementing change goes. It simply means you will never be effective at getting people to change their behaviors if you don’t get out of the office and work directly with them. This is as important for us (Carpedia) as consultants as it is for leaders in any organization.
Technology is a wonderful tool in many circumstances but it can also be a dangerous distraction. People can too easily get buried behind a computer screen and forget the value of human interaction. When we chose to differentiate Carpedia based on implementing actual results (rather than creating reports like many consulting firms), we also committed ourselves to the need to convince managers and employees to do things slightly differently.
The only way to get people to do things differently is to experience their world from their perspective, so that you can understand the differences between real and artificial barriers. You have to remove some of these barriers in order for people to be comfortable with change. These barriers can include breakdowns in communication or work flow, getting different functional areas to work together, or conflicting objectives. You also have to carefully separate reality from perception, and chronic issues from anecdotes. All these things happen out on the floor. None of these things happen in an office. Office work is necessary to support change but it never drives it. To get change installed, the people doing the work need to be engaged and involved in the development of new methods.
The current television show “Undercover Boss” illustrates the power of observing the world through your employees point-of-view. By getting out of their offices and onto the front lines, executives of high profile companies learn first hand that even though a policy or procedure may be written, it doesn’t mean it’s being followed.
So, here’s your mission. When you’ve finished reading this post, leave your office and go for a walk. Do what we call a “where abouts” snapshot. Walk around your office or plant and simply make a note of where your managers physically are. Are they in their office or out with their direct reports? (You can keep a running tally for a few days if you want a broader sampling). From your observations try to get a feel for whether or not your management is spending enough time supporting employees.
Unfortunately there is no one-size fits all answer, different functional areas and different industries require different behavior models. But if too many of your managers are closed in an office or behind a computer, it usually indicates either a training, systems or management behavior problem.
