Proceed Until Apprehended

I just watched the Blue Planet episode where they show how coral grows and overtakes other coral.

Here’s the piece that got me thinking. At 38 seconds there is some fascinating time-lapse footage of one coral overtaking another.

If you were snorkeling or scuba-diving by this fascinating scene, would you notice? I think it would look pretty static and I would swim on by.

Bureaucracy is pretty static too, right? What if we could time-lapse photograph a bureaucracy? What would become apparent that’s difficult to see with the naked eye? Speeding up the pace would likely make the slow encroachment of policies, procedures, restrictions and risk aversion look as sinister as this coral. If you sped it up , I think you’d see that the well-intended efforts to influence and control employee behaviour actually kills an employee’s discretion and ability to be independently thoughtful.

This progress goes seemingly unnoticed every day. We tend to take for granted, or perhaps we shrug off, the daily insults to our autonomy and ability to be discerning. We choose not to push back. Through time-lapse, we’d see that we’re losing the battle. We’d see the bureaucracy move forward so steadily that you’d think it could only be planned.

I don’t in any way think it is planned. Rather, I see it stemming from a culture and paradigm of command and control that doesn’t work. Those that champion this out-dated style or those who don’t stand up against it need to see some time-lapse footage of its effects.

There appears to be two types of managers. There are those whose key priority is to deliver outcomes right now and there are those who have a priority to build a sustainable future.

I would suspect, in both camps, there is an acknowledgment of the importance of the other priority, but when push comes to shove, some managers choose to produce, others to build for sustainability.

My guesstimate of the split is something like 90% production-focused, 10% future-focused.

I think there’s another interesting breakdown. Of the production-focused managers, you can split them about down the middle in terms of their awareness of how critical sustainable practices are. Half don’t see a bigger picture. Sure, they’ve heard of things like diversity and succession planning, but they legitimately think they’re doing the best they can for the organization by focusing on the more immediate challenges. I think it’s fair to say I disagree with their conclusion, but I appreciate that they’re acting on their convictions.

The other half of these production-oriented managers, however, full-well know they are on a sinking ship, it’s just that when pushed, they choose to deliver a product over making choices that are in a longer-term interest. You see, it may not save the company, but it keeps them “safe,” today.

Whenever I experience this sort of tactic, I’m frustrated, disappointed and more than a little perturbed.

You mean you KNOW that we can’t sustain what we’re doing, what we’ve promised and what we’ve planned, but you’re STILL going to go ahead and do it? Is your salary that good? What legitimizes that behaviour? Does “not my job” cover it? What happens when you fail your customers, your clients or your job disappears? Still not your fault?

Sorry. That’s not really intended for you, directly. If you’re reading this blog, I think you’re either a knowledge worker that just categorized your boss or you’re a boss trying to muster the courage to be part of the 10%… like me.

Reading that over, it’s one big rant – here’s the solution, as I see it – stare your fears in the eye. Play them out. What will really happen? Acknowledge you’re not going to lose your job for speaking up. Find ways to make long-term choices and move the ship, bit by bit. You’ll be surprised to find a large majority of colleagues appreciating (albeit quietly) your efforts.

I’m acutely aware that I’ve only got one chance of living a life that I’m proud of.

I’ve been in job interviews before where they asked me what motivates me. I don’t know if that’s a good interview question. I’ll leave that up to someone else to decide. Here’s my answer:

“I don’t want to sound fixated on death, but I think I put more time and thought into what will be said at my eulogy than most people. I have a certain anxiety in my stomach every day that asks if I’m doing right and if I’m making a difference. This is pretty motivating. I want to make sure that, when I’m done, I’ve done something meaningful.”

I’m serious about this. I feel it right now. In addition to feeling it, I’d like to point out that I’m starting to like that I feel it. I think I’m on to something. I have started to cultivate it. I ask myself questions like “What will I be remembered for?” and I read Victor Frankl’s “Man’s Search for Meaning” or Mitch Albom’s “Tuesdays with Morrie.” The anxiety grows.

It has become so strong that I feel compelled to act on it. It’s real, not some theoretical I should sort of statement. There’s those situations where honesty is required but it’s uncomfortable and perhaps a bit awkward. I find myself saying the truth because I want to be remembered as honest. I’m more inclined to challenge the old way of doing things because I want to make sure we create results, though perhaps my boss and others just want to get the job done. I have also started asking and answering questions on a blog that will turn off 90% of the people I know and scare my parents.

It feels like a freight train slowly gathering speed.

I am getting VERY excited about going over to my new position with the Saskatchewan Public Service Commission. I believe the PSC offers some enlightened management practices, a positive working culture and an important, meaningful mandate.

For all of its positive traits, I’m sort of anticipating that there’s also a culture of “policy adherence” that has gone a bit overboard. What I mean is that HR functions are quite often the whipping boy in an organization, and staff tend to rely on policies and interpretation of policies to serve as a a form of protection (or backbone). I recognize this is also partly done out of respect for a collective bargaining agreement, though I do think there’s a difference between respecting it and instantly capitulating to it.

I’m probably not going to be very accepting of policy adherence, if in fact I come across it. I’m toying with a work-specific mission statement, sort of a supplement to my still relevant personal mission statement.

Here’s some language, though perhaps I’ll call it draft. [If my new supervisor is reading this, feedback is definitely welcome.]

This will make some colleagues uncomfortable. They’ll come around… or they won’t.

My job is to ask unflinching questions and be radically honest. I’ll operate with the best intentions and without permission.

And the shorter version: Boundaries are the enemy. As gently as possible, blow the fucking lid off.

I just said that publicly. Gulp.

I believe the “soft stuff” is the hard stuff.

I feel so lucky have a friend like Spencer that shares stuff like this. It’s a story about Tony Hsieh, the legend behind Zappos.

It’s a long read so be prepared. If you make it to the end and the flower story, I’d like for you to know my flower story.

I ordered flowers here once for a business partner. It wasn’t this situation, but the purchase was entirely warranted and appropriate. I didn’t ask for permission or approval for the purchase. Once the purchase hit the system, four different people told me I couldn’t do it. “OK,” I said, “but the cow is out of the barn. Reprimand me and pay me back.” The answer? I should have known better. I should have checked. I should have gotten prior approval.

It ended up being an out-of-pocket expense for my boss. I told him I didn’t want the money, I wanted him to fight it. He wouldn’t. He preferred to pay, instead.

Our organizations are typically filled with power and fear. Solutions are not thoughtful and democratically generated, they’re stamped with “draft” for fear of being overuled or they’re laden with ego and personal perspective. People get more points for looking smart than they do for building a more efficient, sustainable organization.

We need to examine our styles. We’re all afraid of coming off looking like Chicken Little, so we act like the king. It’s not helpful in the long term unless you’re putting on a show to justify your throne.

• Understand you’re being evaluated.
• Have a clear picture of what you really need. Don’t do a selection process without first thoughtfully establishing what skills and functions you need the candidate to be able to fulfill. If you’re choosing to name a certain degree or a number of years of experience as a key criteria, it’s an immediate flag that you’re looking for an image, not a result.
• Respect my time. Don’t be late, unprepared or easily interrupted. I want you to be expressing how important this role is from the moment I meet you. If you don’t respect what staff do for you, I self-select myself out.
• Ask good, relevant questions that make me sweat. If you are interested in demonstrating that you’re competent, that’s how.
• Don’t hack on current employees. I’m trying to be one of those. I’m savvy enough to know I’ll get the same treatment.

The employee version of these rules has always been a requirement for applicants to follow, but for the employer, they used to be optional. You used to be able to assume the power position and indicate that you could hardly be bothered with this process… you could do everything including saying, “I’m kind of a big deal.” No longer.

Every year, when my fundraising team for the MS Bike Tour gets out on the road in our costumes, people say, “Oh cool. I wish I was that creative.” We dress up as cows, or soldiers, we make up a theme and dress as the Adam West Batman characters. People say, “how did you ever come up with that?” or “I’d never think of that in a million years.”

These statements always surprise me. You see, I’m not creative, either.

I just so happened to care about fundraising for MS. I participated in the bike tour and determined that it was too elitist, too competitive and too fashion-conscious for my liking. I determined that new fundraisers were getting turned off by a culture that they didn’t fit in. I want new fundraisers. I want the tour to grow. I want more money for MS research. As the title suggests, these are “selfish matters.” I decided that I cared enough to try and change it, and I’d do it by example.

So, deconstructing how we make our team costumes, here’s how I get creative:
1) I get quite specific about what I want to change and how I might change it
2) I created space to reflect on what would work as a solution
3) I enlisted others to react and contribute to a kernel of an idea
4) We try it. We don’t know if it will make sense to others, but we implement.

I guess what I’m saying is that creativity, for me, isn’t some other-worldly headspace where stuff just pops in and “becomes.” It’s deliberate, it’s methodical and it takes work. Typically, I think the “I wish” crowd just doesn’t get deliberate enough to make it happen.

This is from the SAMBA blog:
After a concert, a woman gushed to Beethoven about how enthralled she was by his music. “Oh, sir, I wish I could play like you! It’s genius the music you create!”
Beethoven: “Well maam. If you want to practice 8 hours a day for 30 years, you could most certainly play that way also.”
She didn’t expect that. To Beethoven, his performance was not a one-off coincidence where talent met opportunity. To him, it was the culmination of effort and sweat put into his practice daily. The woman, only aware of the performance, didn’t give the process the respect it deserved. Honoring the process matters. It’s the thing that matters.

By the way, this year’s theme is SuperHeros. It’s going to rock.