In 2017 it is claimed that Microsoft Teams had 2 million users.  Fast track to 2025 and the number quoted has risen to 360 million.

Since many of us have been working from a range of locations, our meeting load has become meeting overload. What could have been done as a chat across desks is now a 15-minute virtual exchange and these quickly build up and take over the day. The fallout is blurred working hours as people struggle to balance back-to-back meetings alongside their own To Do list within the typical eight-hour day (I can feel you reading “8 hours” and laughing your heads off).

Sir Barnett Cocks, Clerk to the House of Commons at the beginning of the 20th Century said, “A meeting is a cul-de-sac down which ideas are lured and then quietly strangled.”  He didn’t like meetings much. Wonder what he would have made of our current work communication load?

Ever since Covid confined us to barracks and separated us from our colleagues, team members and clients, our meeting load has become meeting overload.  In the office, what was done as a kitchen chat or a quick stand up at desks, is now a 30-minute exchange on Slack or Teams.  What would have been a get together and a useful conversation over coffee is now a full-blown Zoom meeting. A natter has become an event. It is well meant communication but we’re drowning in it.  It also makes us rather transactional with our colleagues and takes the spontaneity out of communication.  Have you noticed recently that if you have an afternoon meeting with someone in the same time zone as you, they are not at their best?  You may well be their 5th or 6th meeting that day, so it is no wonder by the time you reach them, they aren’t welcoming you with virtual open arms.

Our days have become so full of meetings, none of us is getting any work done.  It’s a worrying trend but one you can reverse by being your team’s meeting saviour.  Better still, save the whole organisation.

Here are 4 ideas to avoid being overwhelmed by the number of meetings in your work week.  They require a shift in mind-set but ultimately, they’re doable.

  1. Don’t have a meeting just for the sake of it. Meetings should be called as a means to achieve more together than you could alone.  They should be a participative and active experience.  Try banning updates (which can be done in another way – by email for example), briefings (do them at your one to ones) and the dissection of long reports (ask for shorter ones).  This leaves the way clear for meetings to be where you and the team explore, discuss, create and take action.
  2. Make your work more visible. The problem with meetings is we think they make us look busy.  If your Outlook diary is packed with them, you’re adding value – right?    You add value with your output as well as your input.  Instead, encourage team members to diarise their work.  Make an appointment with yourself to write a report, plan, think, account manage and prepare for a pitch.  Put these activities in your diary and it elevates the status of the work.  It also prevents people from dropping meetings in to your schedule without checking first.
  3. Encourage radical change across your organisation. This could be to instigate the 15-minute rule to meeting scheduling.  This means you don’t allow meetings to be scheduled back-to-back.  There must be a 15-minute gap.  Better still, 30 minutes. It needs to be agreed across teams and adhered to.  When you think about it, it makes total sense.  You want to arrive at a meeting with the right mind-set – that is, one focussed on the impending agenda, not the recently departed one.  People need breathing space (not to mention coffee and comfort!) to give of their best, so give them a break.
  4. Spread the responsibility and the roles. Meetings feel like a pressure if you’re the one who always has to chair them, plan the agenda and distribute the actions.  Rotate those activities.  As well as developing skills in others, when someone else leads the meeting, it gives it a different vibe, a bit like a change of venue.  And why not have a change of venue?  If logistics allow, agree to dial in from somewhere else, from outside, have a walking meeting where participants walk and talk at the same time (watch out for lampposts).  Experiment and see if your meetings re-energize as a result.

 

These virtual gatherings should be something to relish not dread.  And we will continue to dread them unless we make some changes and reverse this trend of meeting overload.  Let’s get back to looking forward to meetings because they are a break in our day, a chance to connect with colleagues and where better things happen as a result.

 

On 4th November we were 25 years old.  How did that happen??  In some ways, it seems like a few months ago that we started our consultancy but when we think about it, a lot has happened in our little world of Learning and Development (admittedly not as much as has happened in the wider world even in the last year!)

To mark our 25 years as a leadership and team development consultancy, we gave our thoughts last month, on some of the L&D trends we’ve seen since 1997 and the impact they had.  In part 2 of this article, we’ll attempt a bit of crystal ball gazing, looking forward to what the next quarter century may bring to the workplace and the impact it could have on learning and development.

Here are 3 emerging trends, that we think are ones to watch.

Falling off the cliff

We live in interesting times.  The concept of the “Talent Cliff” – a phenomenon where organisations lose employees at a rapid rate is not a new one but it is taking on a new meaning in 2022.  The largest workforce in recent history is due to retire before the decade is out.  Clearly, we didn’t get that memo.  Lots of others did though and a workplace already struggling with gaps as people re-evaluate and make changes post-pandemic, is going to get gappier.  The solution, we think, puts learning and development at its heart.  Employers need to think about opportunities to keep people for longer and attract people to join and stay.  Of course, decent pay and benefits play their part.  Writer and speaker Dan Pink encourages us to: “Pay people properly and treat them with respect and you get the issue off the table, leaving them free to concentrate on what matters”.  The key message here is to provide chances to grow, develop and stay interested.  If you lead a team, now is a great time to think about what you can do to minimise the impact of a potential landslide.

Flat is the new shape

Hierarchies have been around forever.  They help us know our place in the line, shine clarity on roles and responsibilities and give us something to aspire to.  They appeal to those motivated to climb the ladder and advance to the dizzy heights of senior leadership.  We don’t predict leadership lines disappearing but we do think the world is going to get flatter.  Organisations now are all about collaboration, consultation and breaking down the dreaded siloes.  That is out of step with complicated hierarchies.  Matrix systems where we all have a range of responsibilities, dotted lines and internal clients are becoming the norm.  We all want autonomy – to have a say in the what/when/where/how of our day.  To achieve this, we need freedom to act and make decisions for ourselves whilst feeling like what we do connects to something bigger.  In decades to come we believe structures will be much flatter and freer with good process in place to ensure everyone is clear without having to check in with a manager all the time.  Let’s get well prepared for it now by ensuring we feel comfortable to delegate and share responsibility with great comms in place to avoid confusion.  Complex hierarchies are on the out so don’t make a mountain when a molehill will do.

Gen Z calling the shots

Disclaimer:  In this section we will make a few generalisations. We find all that is written on the Generations utterly fascinating.  It informs the way we work and live, how we sell to customers, gain trust with clients and has a lot to teach us about how we lead future teams and individuals. As proud Generation Xers, we know how to work hard and play hard.  We embraced technology, put in long hours, socialised at work and juggled (not to mention struggled) our way up the career ladder.  We hid our tattoos and our piercings.  Okay, some of us did.  Behind us came Generation Y (also referred to as Millennials) and some new expectations.  If you fall in to that generation or you manage someone who does, you will know different things are valued.  For Gen Y it is about purpose not profit, work life balance rather than bank balance and output not hours.  They want to be paid properly by an employer who enables and provides opportunities for growth.

That may describe the now, but this is a blog about the future.  What of the generation entering work at the moment? Generation Z.  These are our future shapers and leaders so what do they want?  They’re digital natives, that’s a given – and it means they expect the right tools for the job; they want to work with cutting-edge technology so consider where you make your investments.  Gen Zs are in to ethics and sustainability.  They choose where they work, not just based on the job and conditions.  They want to know what you are doing to give back and what your policies are on how you work responsibly.  Interestingly, they value both flexibility and face to face interaction.  Flexibility is an expectation so ignore it at your peril, but they also want connection; to be more than suppliers of work, they want to be colleagues.  Consider how you can create an environment where Gen Zs can thrive, develop and become our next generation of leaders in this ever-changing world.  And what of the group coming up behind them, named Generation Alpha?  Given that as of now, the oldest they can be is 12 we’ll save our views on them for a future discussion.

Don’t be concerned if you consider your characteristics, wants and needs don’t fit with the generation your birthday assigned you (as per our disclaimer, we made some generalisations).  The point is, we need to continue to listen to what team members want from work and from their employer, if we are to keep and nurture talent.

So, there you have it and thank you for gazing in to the future with us.  What did you think of our predications and do they match yours?  In the end none of us really knows what the next 25 years will bring.  How could we (unless we are Bill Gates apparently) have ever predicted what happened in just the last few years?!  What we are sure of is that things change and we will need to evolve to survive and thrive in the future.  And we hope to be around for many more great conversations with you where we put the world to rights and with any luck, make it a better place.

 

 

On 4th November we will be 25 years old. How did that happen?? In some ways, it seems like a few months ago that we started our consultancy but when we think about it, a lot has happened in our little world of Learning and Development (admittedly not as much as has happened in the wider world even in the last year!)

To mark our 25 years as a leadership and team development consultancy, here are our thoughts on some of the L&D trends we’ve seen since 1997 and what impact they’ve had. In part 2 of this article next month, we’ll do a bit of crystal ball gazing, looking forward to what the next quarter century may bring in training and learning.

We’ve seen quite a few comings and goings in the last 25 years. Here are 4 trends that came but didn’t go.

Coaching

Coaching first began as a profession in the 1970s (and no, we weren’t old enough to do it then) although it was referenced way back in the 1800s in university settings. It really started to gain traction in the late 80s/early 90s and many said it was a fad that wouldn’t last. Fast-forward 30+ years and it’s clear that coaching is here to stay. Organisations steeped in the “sheep-dip” mass group training approach baulked at spending money on one individual’s development – until it became clear this sort of targeted learning led to better, faster and more impactful results. Coaching can provide a unique forum for a person to learn, think things through and solve problems. John Whitmore, a leading figure in the field describes it as “unlocking people’s potential to maximise performance”. Whether you are a coach helping to unlock that potential or you’ve been coached and had a few lightbulb moments, you’ll be aware of its impact. Possibly the greatest value that coaching brings is quite simply time to think and reflect, with someone who asks powerful questions and then gets out of your way. In “Time to Think”, Nancy Kline says “A statement requires you to obey, a question requires you to think.” Long live coaching!

Soft Skills Development

First of all, let’s knock the name on the head. Soft skills? They are anything but. But 25 years ago, that was what we called any non-technical training or learning relating to people skills. Back then it was seen as a luxury, an add-on. Now it is the difference that makes the difference. Whether you consider yourself a people person or someone who prefers minimal contact with other humans, certain skills are always on trend. In 1999 we invested in a relationship with a company called Insights Learning and Development and started to use their behavioural tools. 23 years on our relationship is as strong as ever and their tools have helped us help others to gain self-awareness, awareness of others and a route to better relationships with colleagues. The ability to listen actively, get your point across, engage with others, converse, share and adapt to deal with a range of different people – these things aren’t soft, they’re essential to our survival. So invest as much in them as your technical skills and you won’t go far wrong.

Facilitation

We set up as a training company. We ran courses and workshops. Then clients started to seek us out to steer their teams through a complex meeting, suggest ways to discuss and explore a contentious issue or hold the reins at a series of away days. Actually, there weren’t that many away days back in 1997 and we certainly hadn’t heard of “off-sites” – but we have now! The idea that the leader doesn’t have to lead everything and in fact shouldn’t chair everything is one of the reasons why using facilitators has become popular. At first some leaders were a little reluctant. Would it look like they were abdicating their role? Giving up control? But good facilitation isn’t leading and it definitely isn’t controlling. It requires an unbiased approach, sensitivity and diplomacy, a sharp sense of timing and more than a little creativity. If done right, it frees those in charge to be contributors and to fully involve themselves without having to run the room. It also gives teams exposure to innovative ways to explore, discuss and take action. The role of facilitator kept us on our toes then and still does now. It is said that a good facilitator doesn’t just guide the discussion, they also encourage the group to have the conversations that need to be had to get to a better place. PS – we still run courses. Facilitation is an “and” not an “or”.

Online Learning

Back in the early 90s, we had a colleague who worked in IT for a company who conducted all their training in Los Angeles. Based in the UK he would regularly jet over for weeks of courses. It was the norm then. Nowadays less so, to protect our budgets and our planet. But even 25 years ago, everything we offered as a consultancy, was delivered in a room. It’s hard to imagine now, but back then, if you didn’t get there you missed out. The word “hybrid” was only used to describe different species or varieties of plant or animal. Then saw the arrival of online learning. It was a bit clunky and dry at first but as new tools came on the market, it became a real alternative to in-room learning events. Now it is part and parcel of the way we all work and in the periods of lockdown during the Pandemic, it came in to its own. Now that we’ve been let out again, we can be more discerning. There’s nothing quite like the warm body experience for some learning. We know what works better with us physically together – including relationship-based learning and team coaching and what can work well with us apart – like general skills and knowledge updates. It’s a great addition to the world of learning and you save a fortune on work shoes – win/win.

Next month we’ll suggest some future trends for learning and development. In the meantime, feel free to enjoy (and giggle at) a picture of us in the 1990s which proves that it’s not just L&D that evolves…

Autumn is a busy old season.  You’ll need all your resources to perform at the highest level over the coming months.  Are you ready for everything the job throws at you or would a bit of help come in handy?  Help comes in many forms: time with the boss, formal learning, coaching and nothing beats the experience you get by just doing the job, but you may feel you need something else.  A helping hand from someone who’s been there.

A mentor is someone more experienced, often more senior, who has relevant wisdom to share and willingness to be generous with it.  They may be in the same organisation as you and often they are not.  Mentoring allows you to follow in the path of a wiser colleague who can pass on knowledge, experience and open doors to otherwise out-of-reach opportunities.

Some of our most rewarding work comes from being asked to mentor people.  Our brand of wisdom is people intelligence and that is what we have to pass on.  We help people to navigate their way through managing the maze of relationships, alliances, colleagues and challenges that are critical to their success at work.

When sourcing a mentor, it is important to know what you’re looking for.  Here is a checklist of some of things you should expect from a mentor.  They should be

And dare we say - someone who is prepared to give you a bit of tough love when you need to take action and stop procrastinating.

What could a mentor do for you?  Good mentors should provide a combination of support and challenge to help you improve on areas where you struggle and develop your strengths to the max.  And unlike coaches, mentors are allowed to give advice.  Hooray.  They do it from a position of knowledge and experience and they offer it understanding that it may or may not be accepted.

We find and our clients tell us that they achieve much more in a few short mentoring sessions than they ever could going through generic training.  Mentoring is powerful, because it is targeted, it gets to the root of the problem and this means solutions follow swiftly.  Mentors are usually sought out – people know who they want and can be of most value to them, so trust is established quickly.  You can have a mentoring session in-person or remotely so it fits with today’s world.

And the great thing is, however old and wise you are, there is always someone older and wiser for you to seek out.  Chances are someone is planning to seek you out for exactly the same reason.  Keep your ears open.

We have noticed something interesting happening in the last few weeks. Human beings enjoy being in each other's company again despite the predictions of a remote workforce being the way to go during various lockdowns.

As with many of you, we have been conducting all our work online –training, facilitation, team coaching – and it's been ok. We worked hard to make it interactive and became mistresses of break outs, Jam Boards, polls, and anything else we could come up with to not replicate face to face but to create a new learning environment. And then we had human contact again and things got interesting.

Training and facilitation online have so many advantages. It's more accessible, people are more awake because they haven't got up at 5 am to catch a train and somehow it works just fine. On the other hand, team coaching is different and is the biggest winner when things get personal. Teams working through what they are here for, how they want to behave together, and generally getting to know each other is so much better when everyone can see the non-verbal language and wander to the kitchen with a colleague to get a drink.

Several teams we have worked with had started online but then made huge strides when they got in a room. Some people have never met in person. The office has been a concept, not a reality and being in the same room suddenly feels more productive. We have witnessed significant breakthroughs in understanding and valuing differences and better ways of behaving to create a high-performance team culture.

How is your team at the moment? Have you maintained communication with weekly huddles, regular one to ones and the encouragement of online coffees to welcome new team members to the crew? All that has been important, but do you now yearn for a deeper bonding, a clearing of the dust and the chance to work as a team and connect outwards more into the organisation and beyond? Maybe in-person team coaching could be just what you need. Working with us, you would create a team mission, agree on what sort of behaviours empower the team and what holds it back, think about the layer below you and how to raise their game so you can raise yours and mend, create, build those critical internal and external relationships that smooth the path to success.

We have been so impressed with the substantial effort leaders and their teams have put into maintaining morale and performance levels in challenging times. Perhaps now is the time to build on that and allow your teams a chance to breathe, reflect and reconnect with authentic, warm human beings and see what breakthroughs they can make.

Happy new year!  We’re not making any predictions for 2022 – there are enough memes doing that for us.  A personal favourite is:

“Before I agree to 2022, I need to see some Terms and Conditions.”

We may not know what the next 12 months has in store for us but we know there will be change.  There always is. In times of great change, it can be useful to look for constants, especially if they are ones that take us to a better place.

When it comes to personal and professional growth, coaching is one such constant.  Here are 3 reasons why:

  1. It is lockdown-proof. The word ‘hybrid’ has been used so much recently it’s destined for a firm place on the latest Bullshit Bingo card. While it is a new term for how we work, it has applied to coaching for years.  This one-to-one interaction works equally well face to face or from a distance and a combination of both works even better. It means internal coaches can work with colleagues from different teams, sites and parts of the globe and those seeking an external coach can make their choice without the restrictions of geography.
  2. It has survived fads and trends in L&D. Every profession has its flavours of the month.  Learning and development is no different.  If you’ve been in this game for over 30 years as we have, you will have seen a fair few.  A trend has tangible benefits and solves a particular need whereas a fad is often driven by a coolness factor and an “I want some of that too” mentality.  When coaching first came on the scene, many thought it was a fad but decades later, it endures with credibility and impact.  It is going nowhere.
  3. No sheep are dipped in the coaching process. Mass group training has great value where there is a common need.  In a coaching situation, the need is rarely mass-produced and that means coach and client can work together in an individualised way, targeting priorities and taking action where it counts.  In the early days, coaching was viewed as an expensive luxury, the domain of the senior executive, because it only applies to one person at a time.  Years on, it has proved itself money well spent as individuals directly attribute success, advancement and impact on the bottom line, to their coaching sessions.  It is selfish time to think, talk and be supported and challenged to take action.

Coaching can be defined as a relationship of rapport and trust in which the coach uses their ability to listen, to ask questions and to play back what the client has communicated in order to help the client to clarify what matters to them and to work out what to do to achieve their aspirations.

When you put it that way, there is little to lose and much to gain from a coaching relationship.  Many of you reading will know this already and have years under your belt of successful coaching experiences.  If that’s not you yet, consider making 2022 the year you get a coach, become a coach, or open the door to coaching in your organisation.

We don’t know yet how 2022 is going to pan out.  What we do know is that, whatever this year throws our way, will be talked about, planned for and solved at coaching sessions the world over.

Imagine you are in your regular team meeting; everything is going to plan then the usual thing happens. John starts moaning. Off he goes on some rant about how a decision made by ‘them up there’ is ridiculous, impractical and shows how rubbish ‘they’ are. Everyone starts looking anywhere but at him, and your meeting gets derailed yet again. You know John needs a conversation, but are you brave enough?

These difficult conversations need skillful handling, and either turning the volume up or down on your usual behaviour. Those of us who rush at them, exasperated and angry, risk being too aggressive and argumentative. Those of us who are anxious and nervous risk waffling and sugar coating until there is a soggy mess where a meaningful conversation could have been.

So, what do we do? Here are some tips for having a robust conversation.

Start with Why? Your motive is really important and gives you the right to have the conversation. You must have a reason that aligns with your values around supporting and challenging your staff to benefit themselves, the team and your organisation. If you haven’t got your head in that place it could all go horribly wrong.

Explicitness – don’t faff about trying to hint at the problem or hit them straight between the eyes. A calm, clear statement about the behaviour you find unacceptable and the effect it has on you and perhaps others helps open up the conversation. ‘John, I’m concerned that in the meeting you were very negative about the decision we discussed. I find it disrespectful to senior management when you do this and I can see the rest of the team switching off.’

Listen – there is a saying that behind every negative action is a positive intent so listening is the way to discover this. There may not be of course, there may be a negative intent to the negative behaviour but at least you have shown willing to give a person the benefit of the doubt.

Confidence – showing you are confident that the situation can be resolved to everyone’s satisfaction keeps it constructive and forward looking. ‘You are a really valued member of the team yet your tendency to moan lets you down, I’m sure we can find a way to address your concerns without creating a bad atmosphere’

Overcome barriers – very often people will light fires to deflect you from concentrating on the issue you have raised. Putting these fires out ensures you stay focussed and determined to sort the situation out.

Move forward – keep the conversation focused on steps to take to rectify the issue you have raised, work together to resolve the issue and agree the next steps. It also means that you do not descend into finding blame or judging someone for their actions.

Evaluate – make sure you watch for the change in behaviour, evaluate its impact and feedback the difference it has made. One difficult conversation often creates a much better relationship where respect and trust are consolidated.

It means the ‘Johns’ of the world get to improve their behaviours and you get a more productive working environment.

Many managers work hard on their coaching skills.  They identify when a member of their team is in the right place to be coached - they are highly competent and confident and need a facilitative approach not a directive one.

Then comes the mind set, leaving their ego at the door, engaging their support and challenge muscles, and using powerful questions complemented by active listening.  This creates an enabling environment where staff can bounce ideas around, test some solutions and approaches all in a non-judgemental space.  It takes discipline to hold that mind set and hone those skills, as it sometimes doesn’t come naturally to solution focussed managers.

Creating and spotting the opportunity takes skill too and that’s when coaching in the corridor comes in.  We associate coaching with a formal environment with a clear agreement that it’s what will happen and yet it can happen more informally like in the corridor.  When managers are always up for coaching any interaction with their team can be transformational rather than transactional.  Practise makes perfect too, soon it becomes an unconscious competency and staff begin to seek out their manager for the value they add by just allowing the space to think for themselves.  It increases the emotional intelligence of a team and organisation, as well as that precious thing, accountability.

It is an investment of time and effort from a manager initially, but the rewards are many.  It encourages people to think for themselves freeing the manager up to think bigger thoughts and raise their game too.

So next time a team member catches you in the corridor, engage your coaching mind set and make that time really count.

We include coaching skills in all our leadership and management programmes as well as a stand-alone workshop, as we believe it’s a vital part of making your team great.