In today’s fast-paced business environment, the ability to manage change effectively isn’t just a competitive advantage—it’s a necessity.
Change leaders and change agents are at the forefront of this challenge, tasked with not only navigating but also driving successful transformations within their organisations. This is where our Change Blueprint becomes an indispensable tool.
Developing teams is costly and time-consuming; at Thinking Focus, we know how important your people are to you and how important it is to show that your development dollars and pounds hit the mark.
Our extensive experience in leadership and management development has taught us the four conditions for success pivotal to every group development programme we run. It requires a collaborative approach with clients, which means they have to step up, their participants, and us.
Together, we can create an environment where participants thrive and achieve demonstrable ROI significantly over and above the programme cost, conservatively a minimum of 5X in almost all cases.
Want to see how challenges can work for your organisation?
Why not book a call, and we can discuss how it works and if it’s right for you.
“It must be borne in mind that the tragedy of life doesn’t lie in not reaching your goal. The tragedy lies in having no goals to reach.”
Benjamin E. Mays
The change over from one calendar year to another is a prime example of when your thoughts turn to ‘what the future might hold’ — and you start to think about the year ahead and make plans: join the gym to meet your health plans; you book holidays to cater for leisure plans and have something to look forward to. You may even want to change your job or career.
What do all these have in common? They are just dreams and wishes unless you convert them into a goal.
Let’s face it: how many gyms are full to bursting in January only to return to normal in February? How often do we say we will change our job only to remain in the same role at Christmas? Where most of us are better is the annual holiday, we get organised for this! Hmm, I wonder why?
New Year’s resolutions are a type of goal — badly flawed in most cases — because we do not clearly define them or attach a plan to them — and in most cases, we make them on a whim.
In this video, Ricky talks about three elements essential to making a New Year’s resolution work.
If you want to accomplish something you care about, it will involve defining goals — you may not realise it or refer to it as a goal. Still, the reality is you accomplish nothing without a goal, however well (or poorly!) defined that goal is.
How do goals work?
“If you set your goals ridiculously high and it’s a failure, you will fail above everyone else’s success.”
James Cameron
Goals work by activating your reticular activating system (RAS). This part of your brain focuses the mind on what’s important. So, when we program it with something as powerful as a goal, we unlock a powerful weapon that is now armed to look for connections to help move us forward to our desired future — your conscious and subconscious working to help you achieve your goal.
A great example of how the RAS works is when you want a new car, not necessarily brand new, but new to you. When you decide on the make, model and colour, your RAS starts looking, and suddenly, you notice many cars that match the one you are looking to buy. Were they there before, or have they just appeared?
What do goals need to make them work?
“All successful people have a goal. No one can get anywhere unless he knows where he wants to go and what he wants to be or do.”
Norman Vincent Peale
For goals to work, they need five ingredients:
Something specific to achieve, have or become.
A measure to determine when you have accomplished it.
A time scale to focus your mind.
A relevance or importance — otherwise, why bother?
A level of confidence that you can achieve your goal.
You probably recognise this is the goal-defining technique — SMART, but you may not notice that we believe the order should be different.
Graham explains why the order of SMART should be different in this video.
A great way to look at goals is to use the goldilocks effect:
Too easy, and you will be uninspired.
Too hard, and you will give up easily.
Aim for just right, stretching enough to make it worthwhile and meaningful but not too easy that it fails to get you up for it.
Why do they say writing your goals down is so important?
“If they are not written down, they’re just dreams. When you write things down, it sets off a chain of events that will change your life.”
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Writing your goals down forms a conscious reinforcement and commitment to your goal. Your memory will never be stronger than the written word, so it removes wriggle room, preventing you from rewriting history later down the line.
Writing goals down has many benefits:
It channels our motivation and forces us to think carefully about what is important to us.
It helps us prioritise, set goals and determine why they’re important to us and activates our conscious mind.
Writing them down allows them to seep into the subconscious, enabling us to make connections and recognise thoughts and actions that contribute towards our goals, even when we are not actively thinking about them.
It is a constant reminder (provided that we revisit it regularly) and helps the RAS look for connections.
You could take it to another level, like one of our valued clients who took their commitment a step further. They externalised their goals, not just with their partner, their boss or other work colleagues (assuming they have); they shared them on LinkedIn! What better way to demonstrate your commitment to your goals?
Externalising your goal with others elevates your commitment and is a valuable driving force when things get tough. It also means that others can support, help and even make connections for you. And let’s face it; there’s nothing quite like the psychology of public commitment to get us to act congruently with our words.
What types of goals are there?
For us, goals fall into one of four types:
Those you can quantify and measure, for example, financial, process or service improvement.
Those that are subjective or qualitative, for example, team morale, relationships and feelings.
Those that are big, complex and made up of many parts like projects and programmes.
Those that are visions or aspirational goals, for example, company visions like Apple, who want to ‘make a ding in the universe’.
But what happens when we’re given a goal we don’t want?
“Imposing a goal on someone is like placing all your chips on black 13 and expecting it to come in — you leave the outcome to fate.”
It happens all the time in the workplace, but if it’s something we don’t want to do or don’t feel is important, it may never happen. For a goal to be achievable, we need to believe in it.
If you, like me, have ever had a goal imposed upon you, it’s not a great feeling and certainly not motivational. Especially when that goal is uninspiring or too demanding, this leaves you with a sense of reluctant acceptance, and I’ll give it a go — hardly a recipe for a successful outcome.
How could you help your people take on new goals?
“A goal set for or imposed on others is not truly owned by them without involvement, a compelling purpose and commitment.”
You can help your people with new goals in several ways, but they may take more time than simply handing goals out at the beginning of the new year or quarter. Goals are more likely to be accepted if you involve your people in defining them and explaining their purpose and what makes them crucial to the organisation.
We recommend investing the time upfront; it will save you loads of time later, build stronger commitment and inspire your people.
Share the big-picture goals with your people and involve them in the goal-defining process; they will surprise you with their ambition!
Set the frame and allow them to define their goal. Your role is to coach them to get clarity, ensure it aligns with the big picture goals, help them find personal meaning and begin building the plan with some creative thinking that explores ideas, resources and potential obstacles.
If the goal has to be imposed, at least spend time with them to understand their mindset — is it helpful, or are they having doubts? Encourage them to surface their unhelpful thoughts and explore them. How many assumptions are they making? How many are founded on incorrect or outdated information? How many are valid concerns? How could you help them? Well, as is #2 above, coach them — your job is to set them up for success!
How do you define your goals?
You may already have some goals, but they may not yet be fully formed; they may be just ideas. What they need — is bringing life and adding a bit of detail — even a bit of colour to provide clarity, purpose and belief.
It doesn’t matter if your goals are personal or work-related; the process is the same:
Get clarity:
What specifically do you want to have, achieve or become?
How will you measure your success? What evidence will you provide to demonstrate that you have accomplished your goal?
By when will you have achieved your goal? The date should be an exact calendar date as you see on the front page of a newspaper.
Have a strong purpose:
Considering everything you have on your plate, what makes this goal so important to you?
Assuming you haven’t got a Time-Turner like Hermione Granger (Harry Potter) and access to time travel, what are you prepared to give up to achieve this goal?
Have belief:
How confident are you that you can achieve this goal with the time and resources at your disposal?
How will you manage dips in confidence as you pursue your goal?
Ultimately, look to get your goal into a single sentence:
‘By [insert exact calendar date], I will [insert specific outcome you intend to accomplish] as measured by [insert how you will prove you have achieved it, what will you show?].
You should then add two benchmark scores:
On a scale of 1–10, where 10 is high, how important is this goal in relation to everything else you have going on? [insert your score/10]
Recognise that a score of 10 means it is the most important thing in your life right now. Also, if your score is four or less, it is unlikely to get prioritised highly enough to focus on it.
On a scale of 1–10, where 10 is high, how confident are you that you can achieve your goal? [insert your score/10]
You are not looking for a 10/10 here, which might suggest your goal is too easy (remember, Goldilocks); you are ideally looking for a six or higher confidence score. However, if you score four or less, you should review the size of the goal or consider extending the timeline.
Here are some resources you may find helpful from our YouTube Channel:
Wishing you a successful year in pursuing and achieving your goals.
As a leader, you cast a shadow. It may be unintentional, but it is inevitable. In your role as the ‘boss’, the ‘Grand Fromage’ (big cheese), the top banana, you create a range of perceptions for people that casts a shadow. A shadow is made up of a collection of helpful and unhelpful thoughts, it’s the lens through which your people attempt to interpret what you stand for and what you really want from them. Your shadow is how you are seen and become known – it’s your reputation.
A shadow is made up of a collection of helpful and unhelpful thoughts, it’s the lens through which your people attempt to interpret what you stand for and what you really want from them.
Leadership shadows can be fantastic, but they can also be destructive.
Let’s consider a leadership shadow that isn’t working. You, the person, may be reasonable (well, most of the time) and impatient—yes, but reasonable. You hired your people to do a job, but they are not stepping up for some reason. If your shadow creates doubt or uncertainty in your people, they will look for reassurance that they are doing a good job and getting it right.
Your tendency, though, is to step in and poke around to get the confidence and reassurance you need that they have it covered. So, when you lack confidence and need reassurance, you poke further, ask more searching questions, and start to dig deeper.
Do you see the problem? You both want confidence and reassurance.
But, if your leadership shadow causes uncertainty, you will unlikely get the confidence and reassurance you crave. When your people feel uncertain, they may pause and not want to expose a perceived weakness; you are their boss! As the boss, you decide people’s future. People don’t want to give their boss any cause for concern. And so, inertia reigns; they pause, fret, slow down, and, inevitably, are scared to fail.
When your people feel uncertain, they may pause; they may not want to expose a perceived weakness.
And so, the perpetual cycle begins as they wait for the leader to provide direction and guidance; as the boss, you feel the need to check and search for comfort. This feeling leads to resentment; as people start to question your trust and faith in them, you as the leader start to question whether your team are up to it; you’re not seeing them stepping up!
Photo by Ian Keefe on Unsplash
We call this the leadership vacuum; it emerges as a void between leaders and their reports. Learned helplessness leads to inertia and causes frustration. Leaders want their people to step up, and direct reports often want their leaders to set the directions and get out of their way.
The solution to this problem requires a change in behaviours from both.
As a leader, you need to create the headroom for your people to step up. That means being prepared to give before taking, and trusting your people. When you trust people and communicate that trust clearly and openly, you can begin the dialogue and establish the behaviours that fill the vacuum — creating safety where people can fail safely and not question themselves about their own self-worth in your eyes as their leader. To paraphrase Brene Brown, author of Dare to Lead, ‘let’s teach them to land before you ask them to jump’. This environment of trust enables learning and creates the space to test assumptions and expectations without concern.
When you trust people and communicate that trust clearly and openly, you can begin the dialogue and establish the behaviours that fill the vacuum.
In this podcast, Richard and Ricky explore what this means. What is different about the way in which senior people need to think, and what does that mean for them and the way that they work?
You can find out more about the four areas and how we use them below:
Your people need to step into the void and take a risk, enter the growth zone and trust you to have their backs. This leap, however, won’t happen until you put your trust in them. Until you communicate clearly about what you expect and work together to define how they might do it, and then crucially, get out of their way and let them get on with it.
Photo by Mohamed Nohassi on Unsplash
Whichever role you’re in, it takes a leap of faith. It will take some coaching, regular discussion, and check-ins. You’re both looking for new behaviours that provide you with confidence and reassurance for it to become your new normal. It will take a little time to change your “go-to” behaviours of poking around to look for the certainty you need.
But, as with most things, if you want your people to step up – that journey begins with you!
Thinking Focus are behavioural change experts in the workplace. We believe that individuals, teams and business units underperform, not by choice, but because they can’t get out of their own way. We help individuals, teams, and business units challenge mindsets to unlock untapped and hidden potential and become more effective and productive.
Social learning theory (SLT) shines a light on how we start to learn as children and continue to learn into adulthood; we mimic and model the behaviour of others. Also, we are adept at modifying our behaviour for varying situations and within the different social groups we spend time within.
If we do learn from others and our environment; then who are your people learning from? What are they actually learning? What or who is influencing their behaviour?
What interests me is how organisations can leverage social learning for better organisational outcomes in their performance and culture.
In 2017 Thinking Focus was challenged by a global automotive manufacturer to help them to develop soft skills in their frontline manager population. They had several requirements: the solution needed to be flexible and run in short sessions to suit their operation; have minimal preparation time and use in-house skills; and it needed to be interactive, fun and without the formality of academic and theoretical references.
Our research into a possible solution led us to consider many options and it became clear that the modelling of behaviour and the effect that peers had on each other’s approach to work was a significant factor. This led to extensive market research and the creation of a solution that we called ‘What Would you Do?’ (WWYD).
WWYD has been carefully engineered with a blend of mechanisms that inspire behavioural change. It incorporates gamification to engage and motivate participants to get involved and stay engaged. It creates a psychologically safe space where participants can be vulnerable and feel comfortable openly sharing their experiences; both the good and not so good. A facilitator manages the discussion, to probe and ask questions (coach) and to help the group understand the thought processes behind the actions. It uses everyday situations (scenarios) to enable the safe exploration of implications and consequences, all in a group forum. Sessions conclude with reflection and public commitment to underpin micro-changes in behaviours.
WWYD is a learning solution that adopts the same fundamental attributes of social learning that we have all been naturally doing all our lives.
What is social learning theory?
Social learning is doing what we see, modelling our behaviours on the behaviour of others and our environment. We are like chameleons; able to adapt our behaviours in different social contexts. We learn this through observing the behaviours of others whether that be home or work, friendship, sport or social groups.
Our ability to develop and adopt new social behaviours, attitudes and emotional reactions comes from imitating the behaviours of our parents or peers. Social learning is based on the behaviour modelling theory, where people learn new things by observing others.
The psychologist Albert Bandura is Professor Emeritus of Social Science in Psychology at Stanford University. Bandura considers humans to be active information processors, able to think about the relationship between their behaviour and its consequences. Humans possess the ability to choose, to intervene without merely imitating the behaviour of others.
In the 1960s Bandura undertook a series of experiments to understand the effects of observational learning on children’s behaviour. His findings underpin his 1977 theory, where children learn social behaviour through the observation of others. Children draw their behaviours from a variety of sources: parents and family members, friends and teachers, even fictional characters. These behaviours are interchangeable between boys and girls; they are not limited by gender.
When children observe others, they encode (the way we store information) the behaviour. They may then reproduce that behaviour later. However, the likelihood of them later imitating the behaviour is influenced by several factors.
Children are influenced by people who they consider to be like themselves; this is a factor in them being more likely to imitate behaviour modelled by others of the same gender.
Children are also influenced by the reaction of the people around them. When they reproduce a specific behaviour, how they are rewarded or punished will affect their likelihood of repeating the behaviour. Reinforcement is an important factor in influencing behaviour; this can be positive or negative. Reinforcement can be internal; a feeling of warmth when you do something that makes you happy. Or externally, from the recognition of others. Significantly though, it usually leads to a change in a person’s behaviour.
Children also consider how others are treated before deciding to model their behaviour. If they see the person positively rewarded, they are more likely to model that behaviour. The opposite is also true; if they see an adverse reaction towards a person’s behaviour, they are unlikely to repeat it. A person learns by observing what happens to others (known as vicarious reinforcement).
Children are more likely to identify with a role model when they possess a quality they aspire to have. Identification is different from imitation; imitation usually involves copying a single behaviour. Identification, however, consists of the adoption of a number of behaviours, such as values, beliefs and attitudes of the person with whom they identify.
How does SLT work?
SLT is considered by many as the bridge between traditional learning theory (behaviourism) and the cognitive approach. SLT focuses on how mental (cognitive) factors are involved in learning.
While Bandura agreed that classical conditioning (think Pavlov and his dogs) and operant conditioning (learning through reward and punishment) impact learning greatly, he also contributed two other ideas; mediating processes occur between stimuli and responses, and behaviour influenced by the environment through the process of observation.
Mediating processes are the cognitive intervention, where observed behaviour is not routinely followed but where cognitive reasoning takes place. In other words, our imitation of behaviour is not automatic. This mental evaluation takes place between the observed behaviour (the stimulus) and the decision to copy (the response) or not.
Bandura proposed four mediational process:
Attention: The extent to which we notice or are exposed to the behaviour. We are exposed to many behaviours each day, and many don’t even register and therefore pass us by.
Retention: Our ability to recall a behaviour. We need to form a memory of the behaviour to perform it a later time.
Reproduction: Our capability to perform the behaviour as it was modelled to us. Our ability to reproduce is not always possible, for example if we are limited by our physiology.
Motivation: Does performing the behaviour even register, in terms of importance? What rewards or punishments exist; do we consider it worth the effort?
WWYD was designed to meet all four mediational processes
Attention is captured in several ways: • The format is group discussion – peers share experiences related to the debate. • Scenarios are contextualised to the participant’s role- they are practical and not theoretical, presenting situations people can relate to. • There is progress and jeopardy, which increases involvement. Tuning out, even briefly, could have consequences with a missed opportunity to score points or lose out entirely on the meaning of the discussion. • Scenarios are set up to encourage debate; some have the added pressure of time constraints. An ‘against-the-clock’ feature causes cognitive conflict, self-doubt and the possible consequence of being frozen out of the round. • The scoring range includes minus points – creating further jeopardy which increases concentration and engagement.
Strategies for retention: • The socialising of experiences means that participants can use another’s experience to help prepare themselves for the model behaviour. They can learn from what their colleagues did well and where they struggled. Participants can also ask questions to develop their understanding further. • The everyday situations are explored through debate. Participants test and probe ‘what if’ situations, their assumptions and biases and the implications of a course of action; as well as exploring what unintended consequences there might be. • Each scenario offers up four options which are deliberately designed to be ‘imperfect’. This ambiguity causes cognitive conflict with the participant having to justify their choice.
Building capability for reproduction:
• Each scenario debated is concluded with a reflection step. Reflection is where the participants connect to the outcomes of the discussion. There is a debrief where participants determine what the desired behaviour should be. They are coached as a group by the facilitator, to consider the model behaviour for their organisation. The group decide what is and isn’t acceptable through reasoned argument.
Motivation: inspiration to learn and apply new behaviours
• The inclusion of gamification techniques both engages players to actively participate and it motivates them to stay the course. While scoring points is a factor, their main purpose is to keep participants focused and attentive. ‘FOMO’ (fear of missing out) and the friendly competition makes for a high energy session. • At the end of each WWYD session, participants are invited to personally reflect on what they have learnt, sharing any realisations they may have had. • Each participant is invited to publicly commit to one change in their behaviour in front of their peers. This public commitment is a psychological connection, a cognitive reinforcement which increases the likelihood of follow-through.
Seven reasons why you should be more interested in SLT.
It’s already happening within your organisation. Understanding how it is benefiting you will unlock best practice and result in wider shared knowledge.
Find out where it might be working against you. Typical indicators of issues to be resolved can be: culture, productivity, engagement, poor adherence to policy and processes. Who do you want your people modelling – are you leaving it to chance?
Test the understanding of your internal communications. How effectively is your message getting through? SLT can help to ensure the message you intended has landed, by involving your people in the dissemination process.
Your people can collectively decide the ‘right’ way. Build consistency through shared discussion, debate and exploration.
Develop a broader understanding, by sharing perspectives across the organisation. Help your people improve their decision-making, with a greater appreciation for the ‘system’ and how it works. As a result, you become more efficient and effective.
Unlock tacit knowledge. Every organisation is flush with unwritten rules and processes, undocumented knowledge that allows the ‘system’ to work. Socialising the learning across everyday situations will surface these valuable yet hidden practices.
Surface key issues. Organisational politics has a devastating impact on productivity and efficiency. Socialising learning cross-functionally in a safe environment can bring the problems into focus and will encourage your people to own and solve the issues.
There are benefits for your people too.
They learn that they are not alone; they realise that issues and challenges are more common, in other areas of the business – not just theirs.
They build internal networks and support mechanisms which helps them to solve problems quicker and collaborate more effectively.
Their mental wellbeing improves with an outlet to vent, share and gain perspective.
What does it look like in practical terms?
Understanding the principles behind social learning is one thing; bringing it to life is entirely another. How leaders behave is crucial; your people are looking to you.
How you behave when things go wrong will set the tone. Because people learn through observation, employees will look at how you behave in every situation, and they will make a judgement. They are considering if your behaviour is what they want to copy, measuring it against their own values. How your behaviour makes them, or others, feel will impact their decision too. Your people will evaluate how others react and decide whether to model your behaviour or not. The challenge is that you, as a leader, are not in control of their thought process, or how they choose to interpret what they see. This means authenticity is vital, and the need to be a role-model is more important than perhaps any of us thought.
So, what could you do?
Build social learning into your meetings; allow for an opportunity to review your work with three questions: • What have we learned? • What should we be doing more of and why? • What is stopping us from being the best we can be?
Consider how you make your sessions feel safe. Allow people to speak their minds and express their opinions – it clears the way to the problem-solving. It doesn’t matter whether you choose to run sessions face-to-face or online. Create a forum for the group to be open and to share. Invite people to commit to an action – a new, better way of doing something.
Coaching is a proven tool for developing people one-to-one. What if you could group coach? Imagine a one-to-many facilitated discussion with purpose. You could solve common problems, build soft skills through discussion of contextual situations and share experiences to develop a shared vision of what ‘good’ looks like.
Build social learning into your training interventions
Reinforcement is an essential factor for influencing behaviour. Consider what are you reinforcing, knowingly and unknowingly. Are you proactive in celebrating when people model the desired behaviours? No reaction at all can leave people unsure if they are doing the right thing. Positive feedback helps to reinforce behaviours. Similarly, when behaviours are below the expected standard, challenge and coach people to understand why the standard exists and the implications of falling below. And I did say, coach, not tell! Coaching takes time; time you may feel you don’t have – but it will have longer-lasting effects. ‘Tell’ is just a reprimand, and we all know this has limited impact and doesn’t last.
Some of your people will have aspirations to grow and develop. Think carefully about their mentor or internal role-models. We know that people are more likely to model the behaviour of others when they aspire to gain the knowledge, skill or attributes of the other person. Who do you want them to model?
The final way to build social learning into your development portfolio is through simulation and gamification. The trend towards the use of gamification has been growing. When you combine relevance, context and simulation, it really does bring social learning theory to life. The primary aim of any intervention is to create behaviour change, making things fun and exciting alone won’t cut it. Learners need to feel a sense of reward for the right behaviours or consequences for inappropriate ones. Gamification can add progress and jeopardy aligned to the desired outcomes. Decisions can be tested and explored in a safe space; participants can project the effects of certain behaviours and see how the implications would play out.
Conclusion
Social learning is how we naturally develop. As small children we learn through observation to mimic the values, beliefs and behaviours of others. Social norms also impact on which models we choose and whether to adopt new behaviours or not. This poses several questions for business leaders and learning professionals:
• Who are your people modelling their behaviours on? • What values, beliefs and attitudes are they adopting? • Who has the most influence on your culture? • Are your people adopting your desired values, attitudes and behaviours? • How are you, and your leaders, modelling the way? • How do you control the narrative and the observation process?
If you are not already, you should be influencing the social learning experience. How you approach people who fall below your expected standards will have a significant impact on whether they choose to model the desired behaviour, or not. What consequences do they observe others face when they fail to live up to the values? What reward mechanisms exist when they do model the way?
Your people expect consistency; this is how they measure your commitment to your behavioural standards. Your people managers need to model the way; they need to hold others accountable and celebrate those who live up to the expected behaviours, values and attitudes. You cannot condone or accept poor behaviours just because of their perceived business performance. When you do this, you are telling your people that behaviours don’t matter, they are now a weapon to use to engineer the outcomes you really want.
Challenge your people to own the issues but consider how you go about it. You must be prepared to equip and empower them properly. For clarity, equipping means that people are given the tools to think and plan effectively, the targeted development they need, the resources they need to execute and access to decision makers to ensure that effort is not duplicated and plans and actions are aligned.
True empowerment means giving people the autonomy and permission to go fix things. Experience suggests that whenever leaders ‘pretend’ to empower, they don’t fully let go and, when they inevitably intervene, impose or cast judgement, it almost always ends in tears.
Your people are already modelling the behaviours of others. They are constantly making choices about which behaviours to follow. Remember that their motivation might not be primarily concerned with what is right for the organisation. Their choices might be for social cohesion and the benefit of the social group. They may not want to stray away from existing group norms for fear of being outcast, driven by the fear of not belonging.
Are you prepared to leave the values, behaviours and attitudes you want to see in your organisation to chance?
As organisations are starting to get people back into the workplace, or at least having these kind of conversations on the agenda, we have been keen to hear what some of our clients have been saying about this. At a recent round table discussion online, it’s clear that people are feeling a wide range of emotions about returning to their place of work. It is also clear that there are things that leaders can do to help ease the transition, and the concerns.
It is probably worth starting with a cautionary note about the language we use when talking about this topic. As our client ‘S’ pointed out when the question of ‘going back to work’ was raised “It’s something that we’ve been pulled up on because people get slightly agitated with it. When we say people are ‘going back to work’, people have been working and believe me, people get really, really annoyed with you when you say that they’ve got to go back to work.” So, a simple reminder when talking about this is to refer to ‘back to the office’ – this might help you start off on the right footing!
We recognise that what is about to happen for many people is a second, significant change in the way they work. In March, and almost overnight, there was a move for people to work from home, which presented a great number of challenges. What we’re seeing now is a reversal of that change to start to bring people back in to their ‘old’ working environment, although this time on a staggered basis for many organisations. As we start to ask people to break their ‘new routines’ and start to think about re-engaging with some older ways of working – creating ‘the new normal’ we keep hearing about – it’s worth noting that some people will be nervous about this, seeing this as ‘scary’, and in some instances even asking whether it is ‘dangerous’, but we’ll look more at this a little later!
So, what kind of things might be going through people’s minds as they consider the return to the workplace? What we’re hearing is that there will be wide range of thoughts, which probably comes as no great surprise. As leaders though, what approach should we take?
Many organisations have recognised that people will be curious about returning to the workplace: how different will it look, what will be the same and what will be different? The messaging to get everyone to switch to working from home back in March may have unintentionally created feelings that offices (as well as many other public spaces) are not safe. That feeling is going to linger for a while. People may be going back to an office that they have visited many times, but it is not really the same place anymore, with social distancing creating new rules and expectations on how we act within the space. This all creates a feeling of a familiar place being unfamiliar and people feeling unsure of how it will work or even if it is a safe space anymore. This is the challenge that, as leaders, we need to overcome.
And there are a number of ways our clients have already been dealing with this. ‘J’s organisation has been using technology to help them “We’ve consciously kept a communication line open to all of our teams to let them know exactly what’s going on every single step of the way. And we’ve done that by making videos to send to them – we’ve brought in some animation software so we can create some short snappy animations that talk through what’s happening, what’s changing. When it comes to moving back into the office, we’ve had a company do a virtual 4D scan of the entire building. This shows all the sanitizer stations and the one way signs, and they can walk around the office virtually through all of the areas and all the floors so they know what’s where and how it’s going to look when they come in. So they understand where their desk is, the way they have to go, where all their resources are. If you look at one of the kitchenettes, it will come up with a sign to say “only one person allowed in at a time”. So we’ve made them try and feel comfortable with the fact that we’ve done everything we possibly can, plus more. And that’s gone down really well in easing some of the anxiety that people have got.” 4D scans could be a great approach, but to counter this one client also mentioned that their approach was more basic, having stickers on desks that simply highlighted which ones could be sat at and which ones couldn’t – and this was proving to be equally useful.
Another common feature of returning to the workplace is staggering how to bring people back. Again ‘J’ commented “We’re going to be slowly bringing back teams, those are at the least risk will come back first. We’ll make sure they’re comfortable in the office and they’re up and running before we bring the next back and so on. We’ve already made that announcement to them, but also said that we’ve got no date in mind. This is what we’re doing to make it as comfortable for everybody, which seems to have gone down well.”
This may be working so well for companies that, right now, not everyone wants to come back to the workplace. As ‘H’ put it “We’ve probably got about 20% who can’t wait to get back, who were missing the social aspects. We probably then have another 20% who perhaps have health concerns or relatives who have health concerns and are very nervous about going back. And then probably a whole group in the middle where it’s quite a mixed bag.”
Similarly ‘S’ mentioned “We’ve done a ‘back to the office/ site’ guide, which explains everything we’ve done, about our one way system, about using the canteen and about having respect for others. We have a little bit at the beginning of the guide that says people are dealing with this differently, so consider having that mindfulness and appreciation for how people are. And when people are coming back, we’re getting their managers to give them an induction for coming back to the office so that they don’t just slip into their normal pace.”
So, it seems that having some type of re-onboarding process will be helpful in allowing people to process their emotions and feelings and start to think about getting back into some sort of routine.
As leaders, this is really important, as it bridges the rational elements of ‘let’s make arrangements, put a plan in place, communicate’ with the emotional elements of ‘feeling unsure, being insecure, feeling tentative and wanting re-assurance’.
This is why the ‘scary and/or dangerous’ concept was mentioned earlier. Scary/Dangerous is based on two scales and allows us to use one of our favourite ‘explainer’ tools – the four-box grid!
We feel that our reactions to situations that we feel are dangerous are hardwired into us and are a protective measure – if we do something that is dangerous it could, ultimately, cost us everything. However, dangerous is rational calculation, one that we often get wrong, as there are so many cognitive biases that get in the way. On top of that you have the hardwired reaction, whether we see something as scary or not, which is an emotional response. Our emotional responses happen almost instantly, and rarely use the facts of the situation. When you start to consider these two side by side, we have four scenarios.
Let’s take something that we know is dangerous – for instance standing on a cliff edge, leaning over. We probably know that this is dangerous (admittedly with degrees of risk) but, sitting where you are right now reading this, does this feel scary to you? For most of us, it won’t. However, if we were there, at the cliff edge for most of us it definitely would be scary. Where things are dangerous and scary too, you would really have to ask yourself why would you do that? These things we place in the ‘Crazy Zone’!
Where something is dangerous, but we don’t perceive it as scary – and there may be some people reading this who are happy standing on the cliff edge – you still wouldn’t do this in a blasé way, would you, you’d still be careful. These things go in the ‘Caution Zone’. If you’re going to do them, take care! Sat at home, reading this, being asked to think about being in a cliff edge is clearly not dangerous (you’re not really there) and for most isn’t scary, so you’re really comfortable with this analogy – hence these things go in your ‘Comfort Zone’.
The final box is where we know it isn’t dangerous, but we still have an emotional reaction telling us it is scary – here we are nervous but can be helped to move forward – this is the Change Zone, and our role as leaders in the current situation, and in helping people return to their place of work, is to help our people ‘come back’.
Linking this to COVID19 and how people may well be feeling is worth drawing out.
Why are things dangerous right now? We have a situation that has (as I write this) taken the lives of around 46,000 people in the UK, and over 667,000 worldwide. This clearly falls into the dangerous category. Yet, there are clear steps that we can take to reduce the risks and make things safer, even if we cannot get to zero risk. We do lots of things with some level of risk, from sports to driving; the difference is that we have normalised those risks and are not constantly reminded of them as we are with COVID19.
Why are people feeling scared right now? There’s the obvious link to the dangers presented by COVID19, but also most people have been secure in their own bubbles, most have stayed safe and kept themselves and their loved ones safe. The talk about leaving bubbles and returning to the workplace is a clear change from this. There are now a range of factors people can’t control – will work colleagues have exercised the same amount of care and followed the rules, or will they have been cavalier in their attitudes? What about getting to work, will they need to be on public transport with a number of strangers? The list could go on.
It is this feeling of scary that is holding people back, and the practical plans that make things safer may have very little impact on the emotional responses of a lot of people. Think about the 20-60-20 split mentioned by ‘H’, 20% don’t perceive this as scary, 20% think this is very scary, but 60% are not sure and are looking for leaders who can help them work this out. Our aim as leaders, therefore, is to help our people to see that we have done everything we can to remove as many of the dangers as possible, and it seems our clients, amongst many others, have some practical approaches to doing this. We also need to help people with their emotions, recognising that we all view ‘scary’ differently and will need different types of reassurance.
Social
learning is about the way we learn, while the 70:20:10 model concerns where we
get our learning from. Both are linked and relevant, we think, to the work that
we do at Thinking Focus, so we thought we’d take a closer look at them.
The
social learning theory first formulated by Albert Bandura in 1977 shows that we
learn best by imitating the behaviour and actions of others. It’s all about
people learning from each other; picking up new skills, ideas, opinions and
experiences from those around them.
This
applies equally to learning in the workplace. Think about it: where do you feel
you have learnt most of what you know? During formal education? Or from your own
experience and the insights of your colleagues?
Social
learning in the workplace is about interacting with others through good
communication, knowledge sharing, discussion, collaboration, and being
transparent about what you’re doing and why. Colleagues can help each other,
either explicitly or tacitly, to understand ideas, experiences, systems,
methods and processes. Yet most of us come into work with the rules set that
tells us to do exactly the opposite, work it out on your own, don’t share,
don’t copy other people’s work. These are the learning rules that schools
operate by.
Most
L&D professionals are familiar with the 70:20:10 model proposed by Charles
Jennings. In fact, it has become a standard part of discussion regarding
learning and development processes in the workplace. The model evolved from a
report in the 1980s which analysed a survey of 200 senior managers. It found
that they reported that 70% of what they knew had been learnt on the job or
through experience, 20% had come from social interaction with other people, and
just 10% had been learnt through formal education.
Although
there’s been some criticism of the 70:20:10 model, some of which we agree with,
we nevertheless think it’s useful in showing the rough proportions of
experience, social interaction and education needed for learning. It does
broadly tell us is that, to meaningfully and effectively learn new things, your
experience and the input and experience of people around you is the most
important thing. Social learning does tend to fit into 90 per cent of this
model.
It’s
all a great starting point for reflecting on how individuals within your
workforce learn and what the best ways therefore might be for their personal
development. It can be used as the basis for a wider L&D strategy that can
have far reaching effects on the culture and mindset of the organisation as a
whole.
At
Thinking Focus, we recognise that we essentially offer the 10 per cent ‘formalised
learning’ part of the Jennings model, but we do so as the basis for encouraging
people to behave in the 20 per cent of the Jennings model by interacting with
people, and to share the 70 per cent, their experience and knowledge.
In our coaching sessions and training workshops, and through our learning resources such as the Strategy Wall and our management development board game What Would You Do?, we are encouraging behaviours that enhance social learning. We create environments where the group learn from other and teach each other, generating conversations and giving people the tools to go and do the 20 per cent in real life. We are highlighting the untapped knowledge and experience that people could access from their colleagues.
We encourage
meaningful face-to-face discussion and debate. We offer formalised learning
elements and use them to highlight, encourage and create social learning by
developing skills and behaviours that cause peer-based learning and
self-reflection.
Thinking Focus directors Ricky and Rob had a fantastic evening at the Learning Awards 2019, and were over the moon to pick up a Bronze award in the Start-Up Learning Provider of the Year category!
We are so proud to have been recognised alongside some of the very best L&D practitioners in the UK. Ed Monk, the CEO of the Learning Performance Institute, which runs the awards, said they’d received over 800 entries in total – so just to get to the shortlist means we were in the top 10 per cent!
Well done to all the finalists, and we would particularly like to congratulate VirtualSpeech, who won our category, and LearnBox, who scooped the Silver award.
Before the ceremony
Ricky said: “To have been nominated in such a competitive category is great recognition for what we have achieved in such a short space of time. We have a solid platform on which to build and grow our business in the future, so look out for new products and development soon.
“In less than three years, we have won 50 new clients, worked on assignments in 13 countries and across 28 sectors, and worked with well over 2,000 people. We’ve grown our team, produced a book and created a new L&D resource, the gamified learning product for managers called What Would You Do?, and a step-by-step process blueprint for developing team, department or organisational strategy – known as the ‘Strategy Wall’.”
We invited two of our valued clients to enjoy the ceremony with us
The Learning Awards recognises and celebrates outstanding
examples of high standards, best practice, innovation and excellence in the corporate
L&D sphere. The glittering awards ceremony on February 7th took
place at the prestigious Dorchester Hotel in London’s Park Lane and was
attended by around 400 guests representing organisations from across the world.
Host for the evening, BBC star Claudia Winkleman, introduced
the Start-Up category by saying: “This award is for organisations under three
years old who have already made a significant impact on the sector. So you
truly are amazing to be in this group.”
Ricky said: “Being shortlisted for this award has given us a great start to a year in which we’ll be developing our business further and rolling out What Would You Do? and the Strategy Wall. All of which ultimately leads to what, for us, is the biggest buzz of all: seeing the impact of our work and hearing our clients report fantastic results.”
He added: “Thank you to all those who have helped, inspired and supported us: We couldn’t have done it without you.”
Thinking Focus has been announced as a finalist in the Learning Awards 2019, a prestigious celebration of outstanding achievement in workplace learning and development.
The company, which was founded in 2016, was among hundreds of entries from companies across the world, and is vying for the title of Start-Up Learning Provider of the Year alongside five other organisations based both in the UK and abroad.
Ricky Muddimer, a director at Thinking Focus, said: “We’re delighted to be shortlisted in the Learning Awards and to be recognised for our achievements since setting up the company just over two years ago.
“The last couple of years has seen Thinking Focus win 49 new clients, work on assignments in 12 countries and across 21 sectors, and meet, work with and develop well over 2,000 interesting and inspiring people. We’ve also taken on our first employee, produced a book and created a gamified learning product called What Would You Do? which helps develop managers in a way that makes learning stick.
“But what gives us the biggest buzz of all is seeing how our work delivers impact, and hearing our clients report fantastic results.”
Run by the Learning Performance Institute, the Learning Awards are a leading event in the learning industry, and recognise outstanding examples of high standards, best practice, innovation and excellence in the corporate L&D sphere. Around 400 people will attend the glittering presentation evening at the Dorchester Hotel, London, in February next year.
Thinking Focus are people productivity specialists who work with organisations around the world to unlock productivity, implement change and deliver sustainable results. Using a flexible and practical tools-based approach, combined with their proven psychology-based methodology, they focus on developing growth mindsets to enable people to think and work differently, and to help them define a clear and shared vision.
Ricky added: “We’re so proud that our hard work, innovation and growth has been recognised in these prestigious awards, and would like to thank all those who have helped, inspired and supported us: We couldn’t have done it without you.”
One of the greatest challenges that leaders face in the workplace is how to motivate their employees. How best do we inspire and support them to increase their performance?
There are many theories around employee motivation, but in the this blog we’ll be giving practical suggestions that all leaders can put in place immediately.
To start with, we’d recommend that leaders assess how much they understand their team members’ motivations. This can be done simply by drawing up a table like this:
Team Member:
What Motivates Them?
What Demotivates Them?
A:
B: C: D:
The challenge is for leaders to see how many individuals in their team they could honestly complete this table for. Our guess is that many would find it a struggle! High quality leaders know these basics and use this knowledge to actively motivate their people, avoiding doing the things that they know cause demotivation.
Let’s now turn our attention to three sources of thought which we think are important in employee motivation, engagement and performance.
It makes sense for us to use this commonly-cited source as our starting point. Created by pollsters Gallup, it measures employee engagement and its impact on business outcomes by asking employees to complete a survey. The survey questions cover 12 areas of consideration, which we cannot directly quote because they are under copyright.
However, the questions look at areas such as expectations at work; rewards and recognition; opportunities and progression; relationships between colleagues; materials and resources; leadership and support; communication; belonging, purpose and mission; and quality of work.
Asking questions around these areas are really important and give us a great insight in to some of the motivating factors of all employees (ourselves included). But leaders then need to do something with the information they get from asking such questions.
In fact, they need to then answer some questions themselves! Examples of what they could think about are:
What could I do to ensure that all my people clearly understand what is expected of them?
How could I make praise & recognition a daily habit for my team?
What could I do to ensure everyone is constantly involved with driving the business forward?
What opportunities might I create for growth for my people?
And then, of course, they need to be proactive in committing to actions based on their answers to increase employee engagement and guarantee performance.
Ohio University Research
In 2000, Ohio State University carried out research into Human Motivational Factors (the things that drive our behaviour). Their research highlighted 16 different basic desires that affect behaviour. We think five of these have the biggest impact in the workplace, so let’s look at each in turn:
Curiosity
This is described in the research as “our desire to learn”. For us, this is an important factor in employee motivation. Leaders need to think about their people and the opportunities for learning that are available to them. From our work with organisations, we recognise that many people are given (or forced in to) ‘opportunities’ through training programmes. But, how focused is this development in terms of both what they really need to be a high performer and what they really want for their own development?
As a leader, ask yourself: How could you ensure that the desire to learn is (appropriately) fulfilled in your people?
Independence
This is highlighted as “our desire to make our own decisions” and, in our experience, it’s something that many employees may feel divorced from. Leaders need to consider what opportunities exist for their team members to make decisions. It’s not necessarily always about what they do (these will, after all, reflect your team or company goals), but certainly about how they can achieve them. Many managers will highlight what they need people to achieve, which does give focus. But they will also insist on the way in which things must be achieved, and this can stifle creativity, limit continuous improvement and ultimately demotivate. High quality leaders understand that the ‘What’ may need to be told, but the ‘How’ should be within the gift of the employee to decide.
As a leader, ask yourself: What freedom could you give your people to enable them to decide how to achieve your team goals?
Honour (morality)
This is described as “our desire to behave in accordance with our code of conduct”. More simply put, it’s about ensuring that our values are met in whatever we do. Many people are demotivated by what they see as a lack of congruence between their personal values and how the company they work in is operating. One a leader’s roles is to understand the values of their people and help them to align these values with where their organisation is headed. As a leader, ask yourself: What could you do to ensure there is ‘values alignment’ for your people?
Power
Quite simply, this is “our desire to influence people”. It’s one of the more curious Human Motivational Factors, but it’s something that can be seen every day in the workplace as people strive to gain the buy-in of others for mutual success.
As a leader, ask yourself: How can you use influencing techniques with your team? (this is a whole different blog altogether!)
Order
Something that many of us desire is order – in other words, we crave the certainty and organisation that daily routine and habits give us. We all have things that we do in a certain order, and most of us strive to be much more organised and structured. The number of people we’ve helped with their time and personal management demonstrates how important order is to us. We’re big fans of giving supporting structures and certainties to people, as long as they work, bring about success and allow for individual involvement.
As a leader, ask yourself: What structures or order might your people need, and how could you ensure these are put in place to support your team?
Ron Clark, former ‘Outstanding Teacher of the Year’ at Disney’s American Teacher Awards
We believe strongly that inspiration can come from many areas, and the story of Ron Clark shows us that, no matter what your walk of life, when you’re looking to develop the motivation to perform, there are some simple things you can do.
Ron was a teacher in in a tough New York school when he won his award in 2000. He went on to become a New York Times bestselling author and a motivational speaker on the subject of inspiring educators.
We’ve picked out three of the areas he highlights when talking about motivation in the classroom, which we think continue to be very relevant in the workplace.
Raising expectations
Setting stretching, yet achievable, targets works! People will generally perform to the level that’s expected of them. If we expect little of people, they will match our expectations. The flipside that we, as leaders, can embrace is expecting great things from our employees – and giving them the skills, tools and resources to enable them to meet our raised expectations.
As a leader, ask yourself: What expectations could you set that might challenge and stimulate your team?
Celebration and praise
It seems really easy – and really commonplace – for the negative stuff such as lack of achievements to be brought to the fore. But building in celebration and praise are essential tools in developing employee performance and maintaining motivation.
As a leader, ask yourself: What might you find today that you could praise and celebrate?
Have a genuine interest
We recognise that there is value in having an interest in your people – and, as Ron suggests, this should be a genuine interest. At the simplest level, this is being interested in the response to questions; really wanting to know the answer to “How are you today?”.
As a leader, ask yourself: How could you develop a genuine interest in your team, and how could you show that you really are interested in your people?
As leaders, there is no magic wand we can wave to increase employee engagement and performance. However, one thing we can do is to invest quality time in understanding what makes our people tick. This forms the very basis of any aspect of managing people, and is the building blocks of high performing teams.
We recommend taking time to invest in your people and find out what really motivates them. After all, they really are the best asset your organisation has.
