Enchantment by Guy Kawasaki

Just seen this infographic on Guy Kawasaki’s blog (if you don’t know who Guy Kawasaki, you’re really missing out…:-) and was so inspired by it, that I have reposted here in all its glory.

 

This is incredibly an useful piece of easy-to-digest information for “leveraging influence” ( I think that’s what David Meerman Scott would call “Gobbledygook“) within management and HR roles.

Thanks Guy, for publishing this superb and gorgeous looking infographic!

Enchantment Infographic

http://www.guykawasaki.com/enchantment/infographic/

Justice rather than mercy?

As someone who, when I first discovered personality testing and psychometrics 5 or 6 years ago, I was (as most “introverted types” generally are) rather sceptical of questionnaires and “assessments” which purported to be able to “profile” my natural behaviours and my strengths and weaknesses by my filling out an incredibly long, often uncomfortably repetetive forced-choice questionnaire. Presented with a list of about 200 questions, all with 5 “forced” choices, I patiently answered these over a period of an hour, despite having lost the will to live after about 8 minutes. I was then told what ‘type’ I was by a seemingly unempathetic HR manager, who seemed to think he knew every nook and cranny of my personality and couldnt wait to “tell” me about which box he wanted to put me in.

Great… like I didn’t already know I was an introverted type who preffered my own company :-).

OK, so some of the results were very accurate, I concur, but much of what was fed back to me was generic and unfitting and did not capture the full range of colours contained within my whole personality (it’s not just mine by the way, your personality is also wonderfully rich and colourful, and dont let anyone tell you otherwise). The points which were fed back to me by the interviewer were clearly derived (and sometimes glaringly obviously) from the answers I had provided to the questions, and despite knowing that this specific psychometric assessment had been validated and tested for reliability, I did lose a little respect for the HR manager opposite me, as I knew he was just reading the “flat-pack” 20-page report, which had been printed off an hour before, to accompany my “Individual personality type” (is that an oxymoron?), by his HR assistant.

The problem with typology-based personality tests and assessments, (in my opinion, of course) is that they promote determinism, and put simply, I don’t want to be a “type”, I want to be me. I think much more success and accuracy with psychometrics can be achieved by really spending time learning and mastering the science behind the tool you use, to the point where your knowledge surpasses anything a report could tell you.

Of course, anything that promotes self-reflection and awareness amongst humans is ok in my book, but as a manager of people and teams, I prefer to use a psychometric instruments which are quick and simple to fill out (i.e. dont send candidats into a “questionnaire-induced coma”) and are based on the stimulus-response approach, as opposed to forced choice.

This is one of the reasons why I don’t use typology-based, report-dominant personality assessments (but I’d love to be convinced about why you do use them!)

But this morning, after waking up and spending some time thinking about one of the greatest thinkers of our time, C.G Jung (Jung often occupies my mind), I decided to succumb, and I searched for a Jungian-typology based personality test online. Within minutes I was wading through the multitude of questions, ferviously clicking “yes” or “no” in response, and had transported myself back to that first encounter with the flat-pack feedback session.

I then got to the question which inspired me to write this blog entry, and have a little mini-rant about forced-choice personality tests:

You value justice higher than mercy : Yes or no?

So, could you answer this question? What would you have answered?

I didn’t answer it. I broke off the online test and blogged about it instead.

3 Quick Daily Reminders for Management on how to get more out of their Employees

So I’m a big fan of “snackable” content for people in business who are on the go, and read most of their internet content on smartphones, iPads or other fiddly devices which never seem to leave your side. For this reason, I wanted to make my first post ultra tasty and “fast”, so here are my 3 Quick Daily Reminders for Managers about how to get more our their staff and make them feel good at the same time!

  1. Take time to listen, you’ll be surprised what happens. If you take the time to ask your people regularly if they have any questions or issues on their mind about a specific project or task, or just a have chat to catch up and find out how things are going, and then really listen…no, I mean really listen, you will learn so much more about how to manage and support your people, and they will feel like the lines of communication have been opened (as long as you act on what you have heard, if necessary). This will build trust and will allow your teams to feel more able to discuss problems and issues with you before they blow up and cause you LOTS more work.
  2. Be an observer. Observe how your people interact with each other and with you on a daily basis, and you will start to see patterns of behaviour which will start to give you real insight into what motivates your people. Observe how they make decisions. How do they seem to perceive risk? What situations cause tension and stress for this person? When does she seem to be in the flow? Of course, we cant see motivating drives, we can only observe behaviour, but if you as a manager open your eyes a little wider, you will see that the answer to how to motivate and manage your people best, was in front of you all the time.
  3. Praise, but do it right. Praise is an incredibly powerful motivator when delivered correctly, but remember that each one of your team thinks dfferently when it comes to how they like to be praised. Some people love to see their name in the monthly newsletter, and to have to give speech during the “town hall” office meeting on the fantastic work they have done (whilst being clapped by the WHOLE office). For others, this will be the biggest nightmare since being asked to sing at the school concert back when they were 5. For these people, a quiet but positive and recognising word in their ear that they really have made a huge difference with their solution, inititive etc, as well as clear but quiet recognition for their excellent work, will ensure they feel like they have really contributed to the overall effort. Praise from a manager is vital, so find out now how your people like to be praised!?

In order to understand what motivates our people to contribute positively to our organisations, I think managers and business leaders need to focus on fulfilling the motivational drives and basic needs of their employees, not simply on salary, benefits, promotion and training (how much more money do you want to throw at that?). If you can understand the personal conditions you need to provide an employee in order that he/she feels “in the flow” and flourishes in your organsation, you can achieve more than you ever imagined with people’s natural ability.