The Art of Leadership Vancouver 2018: Conference Summary by The Art Of

CONFERENCE SUMMARY

Vancouver | October 23, 2018

CONTENTS

CONFERENCE SUMMARY

About The Art of Leadership

Whitney Johnson – Team Buildng and Innovation

Jacqueline Carter – Mindfulness and Leadership

Morten Hansen – Performance and Productivity

Ram Charan – Talent Development and Employee Engagement

Alan Mulally – Strategy and Cultural Transformation

Executive Panel

Bill Williams – Closing Remarks

Sponsors

Many companies like to use quantifiable data to measure the impact of its efforts on productivity. But while the beans are still being counted, creativity is finally finding its rightful place alongside the bean counters. These days, scoring leadership has fallen by the wayside, and words like measuring employee engagement, satisfaction and accountability have become a critical part of the lens through which leadership is evaluated. What makes a leader great? Upholding corporate values and steering a course that is clear to everyone involved? Defining and creating a great culture? Making tough decisions and owning them? Being able to admit to failure, while creating an opportunity for growth and learning from it? Leadership is all of the above and more. Working beyond the status quo, creating change without fear and fostering inclusivity amongst teams are just a few of the goals that define what great leadership is all about.

CONFERENCE SUMMARY

Whitney

JOHNSON Leading Innovation Expert and Bestselling Author

Every time you help someone learn, they are going to be more productive and in the long term, you get it back.

TEAM BUILDING AND INNOVATION Disruptive Innovation Just as a disruptive low-end product can eat away at the market share of an incumbent (as Netflix did to Blockbuster), personal disruption is about the movement from the bottom of a learning curve (like when I started as a stock analyst) to the top, and then jumping to the bottom of the next. To learn, leap and repeat. This drives engagement. Engaged people innovate. Companies with engaged people get ahead of the competition. They don’t get disrupted. They disrupt.

• 70% of your team is in the sweet spot of their learning curve. They typically get to this point after six months to a year in a new role or on

• Companies hire people for proficiency, not potential, at what should be the low-end of

a new project. They are feeling competent,

a learning curve. It will be masked initially

and therefore confident. These are your most

because they are acclimating, but once they

productive employees.

do, they’ll be bored.

• 15% of your people are at the high-end of the curve. After two to three years in the sweet

• As they move up the learning curve into competence, and are looking like high-

spot, people move into mastery. They know

potentials, we become afraid that they will

what they are doing. They are masters. They

fail, and so we stop challenging them. In

have a perspective, because they are atop the

the sweet spot, people need more, not less

curve, that others don’t. This is also a danger zone. Now that they’re no longer learning, people can get bored. You want employees to

The S-Curve of Learning Picture an S. At the bottom of the S, the low-end, is inexperience. In the middle, the steep part, is engagement. At the highend, the top of the S, is mastery. Every single person in your organization is on an S or learning curve. Every organization is a collection of these curves.

Common Mistakes

challenge.

• At the high end of a curve, when people have mastered their role, and are bored, instead

be at this point for a year at most before you

of finding something new for them to do, we

help them jump to a new learning curve.

keep them ‘right where they are’.

• 15% of your people are at the low-end of

the learning curve, where they are new to the role, and therefore ask questions like “why do we do this the way we do it?” There’s tremendous value to your organization that comes with inexperience.

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Jacqueline

CARTER

65% of employees would forego a pay raise to see their leader fired.

Leadership & Performance Expert and Bestselling Author

MINDFULNESS IN LEADERSHIP The Leadership Crisis Being mindful, selfless and compassionate —these are wonderful qualities. If leaders consistently displayed these traits, workplaces and employees would be doing much better. But not all leaders, including many of the most famous and successful, exhibit these qualities. Below are a few important stats relating to the current state of the workplace. • Lack of Engagement - Only 13% of the global workforce is engaged in their role while 24% is actively disengaged.

• Lack of Happiness - 65% of employees would

Mindfulness tips

Selflessness tips

• Be here now

• Use less “I”, “me”, “my” and “mine” • Humility - Who contributed to your success? • Gratitude - Express It.

Selflessness Selflessness is the opposite of egocenteredness. A selfless leader is more concerned with the interest and needs of his or her people, organization and society at large, than of his or her own needs and desires. Selflessness increases engagement and creativity.

Compassion When people with compassionate leaders know that their leaders have their back, trust and cohesion thrive. Compassion tips

• Stop multitasking • Use the HBR mindfulness assessment and tools

• Take care of yourself • Ask: How can I be of benefit? • Random acts of kindness

forego a pay raise to see their leader fired.

• Lack of Leadership - 77% of leaders think they engage and motivate their people while 82% of their people disagree.

Mindfulness Mindfulness provides leaders with a stellar focus on the task at hand enabling high productivity. But equally, it provides an ability to be truly present with people, clients and stakeholders. Presence in leadership creates better connectedness and loyalty, and enables the qualities of selflessness and compassion.

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Morten

HANSEN Management Professor at University of California, Berkeley and Bestselling Author

What is the one thing that I must do less of in order to focus on the thing that matters?

PERFORMANCE AND PRODUCTIVITY Working Smarter Working smart requires answering some tough questions in your job: what are the key activities that I can undertake that maximize value? What does “value” mean in my job? What must I say “no” to in order to do this? And what does it mean to go all in and do exceptional work in my job? It’s important that we shift from a volume-focused mindset to a valuefocused mindset. Some examples of this: • Medical Doctor shifting from # of patients seen to % of accurate diagnosis.

• Lawyer shifting from # of billable hours to % of legal problems solved.

• Teachers shifting from # of classes taught to % students learned.

• Sales people shifting from # calls, # of units

managers and employees. The research shows that having the selfdiscipline to stick with doing exceptional work on a handful of priorities will give us the single greatest boost to our performance.

• # of priorities per job • # of emails • # of sign-offs required • # of decision makers needed • # of options being pursued

Subtract & Simplify Leaders and managers are inundated with tasks that aren’t necessarily the most important things. In order to improve effectiveness and productivity as a leader, we want to be mindful of the clutter and should consider removing or significantly reducing the following items:

P-Squared Finding passion at work isn’t just about following your bliss. Hansen shared that passion wasn’t limited to certain types of jobs. For some, finding joy meant savouring relationships with colleagues or customers. The important thing to remember is to marry your passion with a sense of purpose. Purpose is to do something that contributes to others or what you can give to the world. Focused energy comes at the intersection of passion and purpose when they are blended.

• # of meetings & pre-meetings • # of task forces • # of metrics • # of product features • # of objectives per job

sold to usefulness to the customer.

Do Less, Then Obsess Do less and then obsess is one of seven practices that Hansen says are the keys to working smarter and becoming a top performer. These practices were identified through a five-year research project that included studying 5,000

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Ram

CHARAN World-Renowned Business Advisor and Bestselling Author

Double your capability and capacity every 3 years.

TALENT DEVELOPMENT AND EMPLOYEE ENGAGEMENT All leaders spend a lot of time talking about what it takes to become an incredible leader. Such as: • Authenticity • Curiosity • Integrity • Awareness • Communications • Performance Management These are all important to leadership but they are insufficient. Today we need to have all of these at the foundation and build capability and larger capacity in order to be successful moving forward.

in the world—Build the habit of reading always with the question in mind.

• Every CEO has on their agenda—How do we

than you - your skills will follow.

• Free up your time to create success. Manufacture time by refining your schedule and

reduce layers inside of their organization?

priorities every 6 months. Our multiplier is

Middle managers will be removed and they

people. Even though you believe that you can

will need to find new jobs. You must learn jobs

complete a task better or faster, this will never

for the future not the past.

expand your capacity or capability.

• Focus on the 3 most important priorities and

• If you want to be a leader, you need to learn new

spend 50% of your time on these. Because of

skills beyond what the schools teach you. You

this, you need to say no to lots of things. The key

need to understand what is happening in the

is being able to identify your top three priorities

world at large in order to make good decisions

for the next 12 months. Repeat, repeat, repeat.

in moving your company and team forward.

• Always recruit people that are better than you.

• Learning how to ask the critical questions.

This seems obvious but its not often practiced

When you’re hired by a company, you’re often

given that people are insecure. Your capability

expected to provide answers. Before you can

and capacity will be increased significantly if

provide the answers you must learn how to

Key Insights

you can start thinking about recruitment from

ask questions effectively. If you’re going to a

• Examine your social networks. Specifically,

this perspective. If you’re consistently hiring

meeting you must be clear on what questions

people that are better than you and smarter

are relevant in advance.

build your networks outside of your industry and outside your function. Build your networks with trust so that your idea exchange is around helping each other. By doing this you will be able to see what is happening in the world and what is coming from different angles.

• What is new? If you’re travelling, meeting new people, always ask what is new. This will expand your antennas and build the habit to support your curiosity for what is happening

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Alan

MULALLY Former President & Chief Executive Officer, Boeing Commercial Airplanes and The Ford Motor Company

Respect, listen, help, and appreciate each other.

STRATEGY AND CULTURAL TRANSFORMATION 11 Principles Mulally has 11 principles and practices that have guided him throughout his career and also made him one of the greatest business leaders of all time. These principles include: • People first. Love them up • Everyone is included • Compelling vision, comprehensive strategy, and relentless implementation

• Clear performance goals • One plan • Facts and data • Everyone knows the plan, the status, and areas that need special attention

• Propose a plan with a positive “find-a-way” attitude

• Respect, listen, help, and appreciate each other

and dealers as well. His message to each group was simple: We are in this together, and if you help us succeed we will make sure you share in the success. Think of all of the different players that you rely on and show them how they can become more successful by contributing to the success of your organization. Red, Yellow, Green Mulally spoke about one of his first leadership meetings at Ford. His team would come in with status reports. Major goals, all color-coded red, yellow or green, depending on the status of each project. At the meeting, most people came in with their projects all green. However, since everyone at the table knew that Ford was going to lose money that year, there is no

way that everyone’s goals were green. One leader had a few reds marked on his status report. So Mulally asked this person to come sit next to him. The person assumed they were being brought next to Mulally so he could fire him. They talked about the challenges and obstacles he faced. Mulally didn’t fire him. Instead, they, together, looked for solutions. Over the next few weeks, more and more of the leadership team changed their colors to yellows and reds. They identified the real challenges in the business. They worked together to find solutions. They stopped hiding problems. The culture started to shift. At the foundation of this cultural shift, Mulally built a safe environment in which his team could work and thrive.

• Emotional resilience—trust the process • Have fun and enjoy the journey Working Together Mulally’s “Working Together” philosophy did not stop at the office door; it extended to all of the stakeholders. He applied this same principle to the company’s dealings with its suppliers

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EXECUTIVE PANEL

KC CHOI

HEATHER HASLAM

DAWN PALMER

Senior Vice President, Global Enterprise Systems Engineering

Vice President, Marketing

Vice President, People Services

Annual employee survey - Use the data from the

Stay interviews - Twice a year sit down with your

Servant leadership - There are many varieties

survey to help build action plans for the team and be

team to find out why they are working for you and

of leadership styles although servant leadership

prescriptive of the areas that are weak in the business.

what they would need to stay for longer. What would

resonates the most. Servant leaders serve others and

they like to change within the organization and what

they work through others to achieve their goals. They

opportunities do they see for themselves.

have an incredible awareness of the strengths and

Analytical approach - Employees are measured on two main factors. Employee net promoter score and

weaknesses of the teams that they are leading.

customer net promoter score. There has been a lot of

Best part of my week - Every Friday an email goes

success in using the data to enhance the company’s

out stating the best part of your week. This can be a

The leadership ambition gap - Based on the book

ability to attract and retain talent. As a company they

major accomplishment, a win, a milestone, etc. This

Lean In by Sheryl Sandberg. If you’re an ambitious

are taking the ‘art’ of leadership and trying to make it

also gives leaders a good pulse on the health of the

male, it’s perceived as normal in the workplace. If

more scientific.

organization and if there are any areas that might

you’re an ambitious female you can be perceived as a

require more attention.

cold, lonely, workaholic. Women are often fearful that

MARC - Men Advocating Real Change. Incredible

they won’t be able to have a successful career and also

program that has been implemented throughout the

Be vulnerable - Become comfortable with the idea

company to drive awareness and change amongst all

that there are lots of things that you don’t know

levels of leaders. Research this program and look into

and to how to be vulnerable. The communication of

Create opportunities for feedback - Host

bringing it into your organization as it provides a great

these vulnerabilities is imperative to your growth as

summits and information sessions to drive feedback

framework and exceptional practicality for changing

a leader.

from your employees. It’s critical to get out in front of

behaviours.

CONFERENCE SUMMARY

establish a healthy work-life balance.

your team and ask questions.

CLOSING REMARKS

Learn, Leap, Repeat Time + Competence = Boredom Hire for Potential not Proficiency And Jump to the Bottom of your New Learning Curve You’ve Got a Nice Smile. You Should Smile More! Leadership starts with the mind, Lead Yourself, Your People, Your Organization Be Present! Anatomy – Breath – Count – Distractions: The ABCD of Training Mindfulness Slow Down to Speed Up Passion + Purpose = Focused Energy Climb the Purpose Pyramid – Create Value, Craft Personal Meaning and Seek Social Mission Double your Capability and Capacity Every 3 Years We are the Chair of The Board of Our Life You can Manufacture Time by Building Capacity Through Delegation People First – Love Them Up Everyone is Included PGA Heart – Profitable Growth For All

Bill Williams Host

CONFERENCE SUMMARY

To know and not to do is really not to know. To learn and not to do something with the learning is really not to have learned.

THANK YOU TO OUR SPONSORS

CONFERENCE SUMMARY