People and money... building a good foundation.

There was a an "old school" leader I worked with who played the game of business hard... smoked hard, drank hard, and he played to WIN hard. With a drink in hand, I remember him telling me, "A good manager is determined by how he manages his financial picture". Over the years I have remembered his words and although they do ring true, what he said lacked something so profoundly important.

What he should have said in my humble opinion, is something to this effect, "Good managers are determined by how they manage their people and financial picture"

PEOPLE and MONEY - It is, and always will be, about people and money.

Let's start with MONEY as most of us want it, like to spend it, and will leverage the perceptions of having it. When I say money however, I am actually referring to how you manage it... how you generate it and how you effectively work it; spend it, invest it, and control it - It is the fuel that runs everything. And if money is the fuel, then PEOPLE are the engine... nothing, simply nothing, run's, operates or gets done without people. Full stop.

If you watch successful leaders and managers they always have their Finance and HR partners very close at hand and are ever present (sometimes commercial is included, but that is usually to remind them revenues are not enough... a truism to be sure, as they never are). The effective management of people and money is the foundation for any business success. I had once "acquired" an assignment, and will go out on a limb to say it was a category five "shit storm" - Within the first two days I was asking for my HR and Finance partners. They worked with me understand our bench strength of people, the structure we were working with, and our financial health. In the end, finances were put in order with established controls, people and structure "righted", and as a result, activities in-line with our objectives started to take shape. Success was starting to take hold.   

People and Money, like the engine and fuel, are the fundamentals of a "vehicle" that will take you anywhere and allow you to do anything. It's important to get good at driving - 

• Know your HR and Financial partners; meet with them regularly.
• Involve your HR and Financial partners in your team meetings and activities.
• Ensure you have personal HR and Finance development objectives, as part of your annual goals.
• Ask leaders you respect about their philosophies regarding people and money management.
• Develop a lead and lag indicator dashboard that highlight your people and money goals.
• You want individual contributors to be well versed with people and money as it strengthens the bench, increases engagement, understanding, and optimizes execution.
• Elicit constructive feedback and be open to it.
• Don't underestimate how complex and complicated people and money can get, particularly in times of rapid growth and expansion. 

Remember that time when you ran out of gas, or heard a piston that had ceased up in the engine and the car came a halt? You were so happy to see the friendly tow truck driver... well, with PEOPLE and MONEY, someone analogous to a tow truck driver shows up, but more often than not you aren't happy to see them, and they generally are not very friendly.

It's best to build a good People and Money foundation and stay on the move.

 gpe

Is your vision aligned?

The following is the original and the rewrite can be found by clicking here.

I was at a meeting a while back when a business leader suggested the need to spend some time together to ensure our "visions are aligned" - There was great leadership in this simple request. In it, he would ensure the parties around the table truly had a vision and in turn understood their goals, as well as ensuring that there was a commonality and in that effectively work together. 

A vision, or vision statement is sometimes called a picture of you in the future, but it'’s so much more than that. Your vision is your inspiration, the framework for all your planning and all of your activities. Individuals and organizations should have a vision and it should be in a form that is easy to articulate... it should roll of the tongue effortlessly.

One obvious reason is that "everything you do" should be connected to your "vision for the future", allowing you will achieve whatever you have in mind for yourself. As the conversation between Alice and the Cheshire Cat tells us , "if you don't know where you are going, it doesn't matter what road you take" ( What they didn't mention is that some roads are easier to travel than others ).

Another reason for an articulated vision, and I will suggest even more important than above, is that very few things are ever built alone... success comes when you work with others. Having a vision that is very easy to articulate makes it simple for people to understand, engage, and align - People rallying around a common vision is how momentum to do incredible things gets started, and more importantly sustained. This is where motivational sayings are made. 

But, what happens when you find yourself in a situation where your visions do not aligned?

• Differing agendas and personal conflict.
• Poor and ineffective execution.
• Frustration.
• Lost opportunity and wasted effort.
• Mediocrity. 

This is a result of not being able to clearly articulate visions and determine if there is commonality, synergy and alignment to make things happen. Understanding this, is where leadership is made. 

Having different visions is just fine, but trying to build something with misaligned visions is precarious to say the least. It is important that all of us bring a clear vision to "the table", so we all know what we will rally behind ... or not.

gpe 

A "Quality" Fable...

Let us start with a very blustery night a few months back; the winds were so strong they literally snapped fence posts bringing down large panels of fence. It was quite a storm to say the least, but should not have been that devastating. Fast forward to a couple of days ago; a crew arrived to reset the fence posts and put the fence back up - The stage is now set.

For those of you who not familiar with how fence posts are set, it goes something like this: 

• You dig a hole that is a meter or so deep and a third of a meter wide.
• A circular tube, called a sonotube (which acts as a concrete form) is placed on the hole.
• The fence post is placed into the sonotube and the tube is filled with concrete.
• The post is then squared up to ensure it's perpendicular to the ground and braced with temporary supports.
• A couple of days later, the concrete has cured enough that you can put the remainder of the fence up.   

At this point, it is important to note that when you fill the sonotube with concrete it needs to be levelled to "grade" (level with the ground); if this is not done, water will be able to pool and over time the wooden post rots. And when the wood rots, it just isn't strong enough to stand up to a spring storm. 

So the result of not ensuring the original fence posts were "sunk" properly are as follows...

• A day to dig around the old fence post footings so they could be removed.
• A long day to remove 600 pound concrete footings by hand from holes that are a meter deep and two thirds of a meter wide. (This particular crew had limited access to tools and got very creative with levers to remove the old concrete. It was a reminder to always bring the right tools.)
• Two days to reset the new posts and let the concrete cure.
• A day to put the fence back up.

So there you have it... the story of high winds, a fence, and what happens when someone does not put in the effort to ensure the job was done correctly in the first place.

As I watched this unfold in front of me, I was struck with how the efforts of someone you may never know, can, and will affect you down the road; creating quality foundations can have a profound effect - It is the same with the effort and quality in what you do, as it too will effect someone down the road.

So, put the best effort into everything you do! And in turn, hope someone else is doing the same   because we all know every once in a while it gets very windy. 

And there you have it, a Quality Fable*

gpe

* Technically speaking fables include cuddly animals as the characters, but we all know a rabbit or a squirrel couldn't lift 600 pounds of concrete... so I took some artistic license.