Cadence.

This ad is a cleaver way to communicate a small time investment.

Wed, 15 Feb 2012 08:05:50 -0600

This ad is a cleaver way to communicate a small time investment.

"Forming a career goal based on your passion can be romantic, but it assumes an unchanging career..."

Tue, 14 Feb 2012 09:18:47 -0600

“Forming a career goal based on your passion can be romantic, but it assumes an unchanging career landscape.”

- @quixotic via @johnmaeda

"People don’t buy what you sell. They buy results of what they can achieve from what you sell."

Sat, 11 Feb 2012 06:30:05 -0600

“People don’t buy what you sell. They buy results of what they can achieve from what you sell.”

- @splove1

"I admire people who really know how to spend their time - and have the guts to spend it that way."

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 06:30:05 -0600

“I admire people who *really* know how to spend their time - and have the guts to spend it that way.”

- Scott Belsky

"I worry, for example, that in our rush to champion “authenticity,” our generation has mistaken..."

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 06:30:05 -0600

“I worry, for example, that in our rush to champion “authenticity,” our generation has mistaken transparency for character.”

- @mikefoster via @lukasnaugle

"Design Thinking is a discipline that uses the designer’s sensibility and methods to match people’s..."

Tue, 07 Feb 2012 06:30:06 -0600

“Design Thinking is a discipline that uses the designer’s sensibility and methods to match people’s needs with what is technologically feasible and what a viable business strategy can convert into customer value and market opportunity.”

- Tim Brown of IDEO

"What you measure is what gets accomplished."

Mon, 06 Feb 2012 06:30:06 -0600

“What you measure is what gets accomplished.”

- Gordon Bethune via @josh_dix

Delegate More (Without Hiring)

Wed, 01 Feb 2012 10:48:33 -0600

It happens to the best of us. You go into work early planning on being super productive (at least before everyone else arrives) and then noon arrives. Taking stock of the morning, you realize you that some combination of clicks (in your email) and comments (to coworkers) absorbed your entire morning with no direct result. It stands to reason that your morning could have been used more effectively, but, as you reflect, you feel completely overwhelmed— both for yourself and your team. From the look of things, there is no way to respond to all the requests without hiring more people.

I have faced this problem in different circumstances. Sometimes the organization’s climate is right for a new hire and other times it is not. If I have the green light to hire someone, I need to develop their role to fit like a glove. If there is no opportunity for a hire, I need to get creative. The good news is, there are strategies that you can apply that work towards both situations. There are methods to increasing your capacity which work towards a hire. The strategies also keep working even if an additional employee is not attainable.

METHOD ONE: What can you stop doing?
Some teams start things well and are not designed to continue doing something long term. For example, your design or media department is tasked with publishing a electronic newsletter for a division of your organization. This is a great new type of project for a specialized department like the design folks. After a few issues are published, the design director notices that the majority of the work in creating a new issue is writing the content (which the sponsor division is already doing), copy and pasting the content into a template, proofreading, and sending. This work could easily be systemized and handed off to the sponsoring division to own their newsletter. In addition, the templates newsletter could be customized for other divisions as needed.

Often times starting large initiatives is a unique bent. New types of projects take additional expertise and man power that are not available in every department. I mentioned “new types of projects” specifically. New work is expected, but new types of work are special.

Once a new type of work is fully formed and the organization is comfortable with the results, the work can be systemized and integrated into the organization’s normative structure of operations. You must have a strong Human Resources arm to do this. No one wants new work and both team members and department leaders are easily overwhelmed. They assume that because you are handing off a new system that your team will be vacationing ocean-side.

A good Human Resources team can show how the entire organization is absorbing the system fairly. The HR team can also illustrate how evenly distributing the system across the organization can resource everyone better.

Hiring tip: systemizing or planning to systemize work will cut out the fluff from a proposed hire. It leaves the “meatier” responsibilities for a new hire.

METHOD TWO: Delegate More Fully
Kenneth Blanchard’s book Leadership and The One Minute Manager outlines four leadership styles: Directing, Coaching, Supporting, Delegating. Before I read this book, I either used the “directive” style or I abdicated responsibility. My intentions were good, but I failed to realize that what I thought was “delegating” was really abdication. I abdicated because I did not equip people to accept the delegation. Blanchard lays this out clearly by suggesting that we transition people through the four stages above. You start where people are at (directing, coaching, or supporting) and then you move them towards delegating.

Please read the book for a full explanation (it is very helpful). My point in referring to Blanchard’s work is…

the distinct leadership styles effect our capacity as well as our team’s.

His writing encourages all of us to keep developing people and advancing them towards delegation. I have found that these styles can be used strategically to address capacity issues. As a leader, you may need to wait to advance someone until you have the margin to lead them. Inversely, you may need to stretch another person and challenge them advance early to free up capacity somewhere.

If you need more capacity in your team, revisit how you are leading each person and look to either formalize how you are currently leading them or advance them to a place were the team is more efficient.

Hiring tip: developing your team members toward a true delegating leadership style shows the organization that you can develop people and have the ability to steward additional resources.

METHOD THREE: Dis-Integrate
In knowledge worker and content creation environments, there are specific types of work that is naturally integrated. For instance, a billboard advertising campaign. Producing a full campaign requires art, writing, financial planning, and the logistics of media planning. The project also requires client communication. All of this work is naturally seen as a unit. The organization might be commissioned to do several of these projects every year. In this example, each element (art, writing finances, media) is executed by a team member that works on more than just billboards. They work on other add campaigns that involve different mediums and vendors like television ads and websites.

Contrast that example with a dis-integrated workflow. When the workload grows and you see a pattern (ie. more and more billboards), you have an opportunity to dis-integrate. For example, you might elect to re-assign a junior designer to only prepare billboard designs for print. Another choice might be to reassign junior media planner or project manager to solely focuses on your billboard vendors. The reassigned folks might have to off-load some work to other team members, but dis-integrating the assignments can increase the capacity of the entire team.

Hiring tip: dis-integrating before a hire can give a new role maximum clarity and help established team members see the need for working smarter (not harder) before you get additional man power.

"A man who wants to lead the orchestra must turn his back on the crowd."

Wed, 01 Feb 2012 06:30:05 -0600

“A man who wants to lead the orchestra must turn his back on the crowd.”

- Max Lucado via @the99percent

"Leadership in innovation is not the courage to spend but the courage to focus."

Tue, 31 Jan 2012 06:30:06 -0600

“Leadership in innovation is not the courage to spend but the courage to focus.”

- @asymco via @rjs

"An organizations ability to learn, and translate that learning into action rapidly, is the ultimate..."

Sat, 28 Jan 2012 17:33:03 -0600

“An organizations ability to learn, and translate that learning into action rapidly, is the ultimate competitive advantage.”

- Jack Welch via @micahyost

"…we are always so camera ready…"

Wed, 25 Jan 2012 11:14:15 -0600

“…we are always so camera ready…”

- T.D. Jakes #elephantroom

"…he will steal your joy because he can’t take [the ministry] from you."

Wed, 25 Jan 2012 11:13:33 -0600

“…he will steal your joy because he can’t take [the ministry] from you.”

- Wayne Cordeiro #elephantroom

"I tended to bear the weight of other people’s failed performance…"

Wed, 25 Jan 2012 11:03:35 -0600

“I tended to bear the weight of other people’s failed performance…”

- Jame McDonald #elephantroom

"I thought my capability was greater than my calling. I was wrong."

Wed, 25 Jan 2012 10:56:54 -0600

“I thought my capability was greater than my calling. I was wrong.”

- Wayne Cordeiro #elephantroom

"In the field of observation, chance favours only the prepared mind."

Fri, 20 Jan 2012 06:30:05 -0600

“In the field of observation, chance favours only the prepared mind.”

- Louis Pasteur

Designer Founders book project

Wed, 18 Jan 2012 06:30:06 -0600

Designer Founders book project:

Cool Kick Starter book project about designer founded companies.

"Whenever we propose a solution to a problem, we ought to try as hard as we can to overthrow our..."

Mon, 16 Jan 2012 06:30:06 -0600

“Whenever we propose a solution to a problem, we ought to try as hard as we can to overthrow our solution, rather than defend it.”

- Popper via @rjs

Simon’s Thoughts from the Kitchen, a new video series....

Mon, 09 Jan 2012 06:30:05 -0600

Simon’s Thoughts from the Kitchen, a new video series. Part one: Accounting for Details

"Innovation is the application of ideas. If we want innovation we have to be open the ideas first."

Thu, 05 Jan 2012 06:30:05 -0600

“Innovation is the application of ideas. If we want innovation we have to be open the ideas first.”

- Simon Sinek

Cadence.

This ad is a cleaver way to communicate a small time investment.

"Forming a career goal based on your passion can be romantic, but it assumes an unchanging career..."

"People don’t buy what you sell. They buy results of what they can achieve from what you sell."

"I admire people who *really* know how to spend their time - and have the guts to spend it that way."

"I worry, for example, that in our rush to champion “authenticity,” our generation has mistaken..."

"Design Thinking is a discipline that uses the designer’s sensibility and methods to match people’s..."

"What you measure is what gets accomplished."

Delegate More (Without Hiring)

"A man who wants to lead the orchestra must turn his back on the crowd."

"Leadership in innovation is not the courage to spend but the courage to focus."

"An organizations ability to learn, and translate that learning into action rapidly, is the ultimate..."

"…we are always so camera ready…"

"…he will steal your joy because he can’t take [the ministry] from you."

"I tended to bear the weight of other people’s failed performance…"

"I thought my capability was greater than my calling. I was wrong."

"In the field of observation, chance favours only the prepared mind."

Designer Founders book project

"Whenever we propose a solution to a problem, we ought to try as hard as we can to overthrow our..."

Simon’s Thoughts from the Kitchen, a new video series....

"Innovation is the application of ideas. If we want innovation we have to be open the ideas first."

"I admire people who really know how to spend their time - and have the guts to spend it that way."