You are here: Home / Archives for organizational change

Why leaders subconsciously reject change

January 25, 2012 By 1 Comment

When our brain senses that our status is being threatened, our thinking shuts down.  We avoid the person or situation making us feel so uncomfortable, and we often stay away from any activity or idea about which we’re not confident. Worse, we label the other person as “wrong” so we can be “right.”

We don’t necessarily do this consciously. It’s just our brains’ natural response when our status is under attack, say the neuroscientists.

So when  corporate rebels and mavericks challenge an organization’s status quo and executive decisions, leaders’ brains go on high-alert. Their decisions, their plans, their position feel threatened and under attack. The neuroscience research says this threat to status activates the same brain regions as physical pain.

The leaders’ knee-jerk reaction is often to label the people with the fresh new ideas as troublemakers. Or not having enough experience to really know what they’re talking about. And jeez, that kid isn’t even a manager, what could she  know? (See how put downs can make you feel better and restore your status?)

Guess what this reaction does to people with the fresh ideas that you need to lead? They run for the hills. Maybe they try to approach you or another executive again, but you’re likely not to welcome what they have to say.  Through words, tone or body language you broadcast the message throughout your organization: your ideas are NOT WELCOME.

And then you wonder why the culture isn’t more innovative and creative. Why too few people speak up with substantive comments at meetings.  Why it seems like you’re the only one with the answers.

Time to get your brain in line and recognize your “threat” triggers so that you can control them –  instead of them controlling you.

Who needs to change their ways: leaders or rebels?

Some executives have told me that “rebels and change agents need to learn how business works. You can’t just disrupt things and expect everyone to change.”

But should the corporate rebels be the ones to have to adapt their style? Or should leaders find ways to better understand how to control their threat triggers so that they can create a safe, welcoming climate for new ideas?

To me, this is the responsibility of the leader. All people can benefit from understanding and managing what trips them up. But with the prestige and financial compensation of being a leader comes the responsibility for first and foremost managing oneself. So your head is ready to be in the game of leading.

Humility and reappraising

This is why so many great leaders are humble. Humility reduces the status threat. It puts people at ease talking with you. It clears the leader’s mind of emotion so that he or she can really understand what people are saying.

Another way to manage the brain is to reappraise situations that start to trigger your emotions. What’s  the other person’s perspective? What does he want me to understand? What does she want me to do and why?  Look at what’s being said as data and nothing more.

Economic and competitive threats are relentless, causing their own set of threats and associated behavioral responses. But to succeed companies need new ideas and the best ideas are likely to come from the rebels and mavericks inside your own organization.

As a leader, help those people who can most help you succeed. Even if they make you uncomfortable. Maybe especially because they make you uncomfortable.

Help yourself by seeing challenges to the status quo as possibilities not attacks on your position.

Filed Under: Activating change, Corporate Rebels, Innovation, Leadership, Organizational change Tagged With: , , , ,

Video: rethinking innovation, organization, leadership

December 18, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Filed Under: Activating change, Communicating, Innovation, Leadership, Social media strategy Tagged With: , , ,

20 ways to be a more effective rebel, maverick, edgewalker, change agent

August 15, 2011 By 1 Comment

So many corporate mavericks and rebels have great ideas, but those ideas often never see the light of day because of the way we truth-tellers and fire-starters behave. As a lifelong outlier — yet successful business executive — here are some of the things I’ve learned, often the hard way,  that may help you or the rebels in your organization.

1. Be positive: recommendations that are stated in the affirmative, that show what’s possible vs.what’s wrong, are more likely to be heard and acted on.

2. Frame it: frame how your idea helps the organization’s goals, cause, purpose. The more relevant the idea is to what everyone wants to achieve, the more open people will be to the idea.

3. Ask questions that highlight the possibilities vs. further damn the problems.  Possibilities create energy, problem dissing saps it.

4. Judge ideas, not people.  The first creates useful conversations, the second hurts, disrupts and usually dead-ends.

5. When angry, stop and wonder why. This has been especially helpful to me. I used to get so angry that I’d immediately react, or should I say over-react. Wondering why a person or company did or said something provides helpful perspective. The more we understand hidden motivations the more we can frame our ideas.

6. Strive for influence not power: influence inspires and motivates people to believe and act; power requires them to do so. Influence evokes possibilities, power evokes fear.  Power requires authority, titles and positions. Influence can be earned by anyone, no titles required.

7. Start the flame, tap into the collective brilliance of others to fuel the fire:  Change agents and rebels are the ones with the courage to be the first to stand up. To move from ideas  to action, bring in others who want to help. One person with a contrary idea usually gets little attention. Three people with a shared passion around a contrary idea start to get noticed.

8. Share the glory:  Revel in achieving something that benefits many, sharing the credit and the glory of all involved.  During my freshman year in college a philosophy professor told us, “Those who know know.” Even if it’s never publicly shown.

9. Communicate in ways that create clarity from complexity:  People need to understand what the idea is, why it’s relevant, and how it will provide value. Too often we get caught up in the “how we’re going to change things” before addressing the other important issues: context, relevancy, value.

10. Address the cost/value tradeoff:  are the benefits and value of the new way commensurate with the costs of change?

11. Let it breathe:  people often need time to absorb a new way, think on it for a while. As rebels we see things sooner and clearer than most and  get impatient with other people who aren’t as fast and decisive as we.  If we go too fast, we can mow over people, hurting the chances of being able to affect change.  In my corporate rebel research study, one write-in comment summed it up, “know that our velocity scares people.”

12. Pick the right boss or executive sponsor: find that person who appreciates your creativity, your fire-starting ideas, your naked truth-telling — and who can help guide and protect you  through the complexities of organizational politics and decision making.

13. Ask good questions, become a keen listener:  These two skills will serve as your advanced navigational systems as you chart through often foggy and potentially dangerous corporate seas.

14. Learn how to facilitate messy collaboration workshops to improve on your ideas, get buy in from others. People act on what they believe in. The more people who participate in shaping a new way, the more likely it is that they will adopt that new way.

15. Show how success can be measured.

16. Address the fears:  understand what people fear about the idea; respect, explore and test their assumptions; and/or explain how you plan to remove or minimize those fears.

17. Learn how to have constructive conversations. Most organizations are use to discussions (usually in the form of PowerPoint) that advocate for ideas, a win/lose form of communications. Constructive what/if conversations examine assumptions, open up possibilities, invite everyone to contribute, and value all points of view. A good book on this topic is “Naming Elephants: How to Surface Undiscussables for Greater Organizational Success.”

18. Be thoughtful in all you do: Thoughtfulness engenders support, abets truth telling, brings more humanity to our work, and adds more meaning to our cause.

19. Know when to walk away: perseverance is important. But so is knowing when to walk away, when the support for your idea just isn’t there. It may have nothing to do with you or the idea, the timing might not be right. Or the risks may be too great for the corporate culture.  Or people might not believe it’s really possible.  Don’t let your idea turn into a negative soapbox, where you lose your influence and rob yourself of energy and health. As Yogi Berra supposedly once said, “If no one wants to come, there’s nothing we can do to stop them.”

20. Believe you are enough.

Filed Under: Activating change, Corporate Rebels, Innovation, Language, Leadership, Organizational change, Problem solving Tagged With: , , , , , ,

No easy answer for leaders resolving conflict

June 30, 2011 By Leave a Comment

 

My most painful professional memories come from being part of teams with brilliant people that brilliantly imploded. Instead of achieving great things together, we clashed and the conflict dragged us into dark, ugly places.

How could it be that such experienced leaders and talented professionals flamed out? I had led big organizations before, so how come I failed to lead these other organizations out of conflict?

In “Leadership Without Easy Answers” Ronald Heifetz says that the root cause of most conflicts are due to conflicts in values. If a group doesn’t honestly surface those values and deal with them, the group blames the leader for not solving the problems, rejects the leader, hires another leader, and the cycle repeats.

Heifetz believes that the role of a leader is to help the organization surface the conflicts and frame and facilitate conversations so people can listen to and appreciate others’ perspectives. Heifitz’ book focuses on tackling big, complex problems in big organizations. But the lessons apply to small groups as well.

Similarly  I heard coach Jeffrey Van Dyk recently say, “There are no problems to be solved, just truths to be revealed.” Conflict resolution requires us to dig deep and honestly to uncover the truths. Then we can see the way forward.

This is hard work. I believe that the aspiration of the organization has to be so compelling that the people commit to doing the hard, messy work of getting to the root cause.  (Of, course you have to know  your “why,” which many companies don’t.)  People also have to truthfully acknowledge what they care about. No saying the words that sound right, but what you really, really believe.  Sometimes that will fit with the group’s values. Sometimes not.

If you pay lip service to your values — and they don’t jive with the group’s values — the conflict will continue.

The leader’s job then is to spot these disconnects and talk privately with those executives or team members. Often asking them to leave is the best course.  Or perhaps you are the executive who needs to walk away.

I’ve experienced both situations. In one case I didn’t ask someone to leave soon enough, letting  an influential executive’s personal beliefs wreak havoc, hurting relationships and the group’s ability to deliver exceptional work. In another, I was the one who had to walk away.

Values strikes many as “squishy” touch-feely work. But there’s nothing soft about conflict, especially the kind that can rip an organization apart.

If you love what your organization is trying to achieve, the hard work will be worth the struggle.

 

PS — Happy Fourth of July to my American friends. The reason why our country was founded and continues strong is that we talk about our issues, grounding those conversations in the values we hold dear. Without deeply sharing the same values, conflict will rage.

 

 

Filed Under: Activating change, Leadership, Organizational change Tagged With: , , , ,

The 90-30 conundrum

June 24, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Approximately 90 percent of people who participated in Foghound’s recent Corporate Rebel Study said that they agreed that involving rebels more helps improve corporate culture and develop a more innovative company.

BUT only 34 percent percent are “very satisfied” with rebels’ ability to provide that value inside their organizations.

Companies want these rebels’ fresh thinking but many corporate cultures are getting in the way of that happening.   For while companies want to innovate the study found that they are uncomfortable when people challenge the status quo, question executive decisions, go around the rules, and ask too many questions.

If changing quickly to  tap into marketing opportunities and challenges is more important than ever, perhaps it’s time to change what our organizations value, model new behaviors as leaders, and teach rebels how to share their ideas in ways that trigger conversations vs. provoking anger.

I’ll be blogging more in the coming weeks about rebels.  Please feel free to share this research in your organizations.  I look forward to hearing more about your experiences in creating organizations where change agents are valued vs. viewed as trouble makers.

Corporate rebel ebook
View more presentations from Lois Kelly

Filed Under: Activating change, Corporate Rebels, Innovation, Leadership, Organizational change, Problem solving, Research Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

Extreme frustration = compliance or dissent

June 8, 2011 By Leave a Comment

What happens when frustrations in an organization reach a boiling point?

People either check out and say, “Just tell me what I need to do.”

Or they get angry and act out, “We’re mad as hell and aren’t going take this crap any more.”

Compliance or dissent. Both  suck the life out of people and an organization.  At least the vocal dissenters are engaged enough to care and want to do something to improve things. The compliant auto-pilots are much more checked out.

Yet my new research on corporate rebels, to be released in two weeks, finds that executives are far more annoyed with the dissenters who challenge the status quo.  They’re even more annoyed when their leadership decisions are questioned.

Last week I heard a story about a well-regarded, passionate physician at a major teaching hospital who questioned his executives’ decisions in a public forum. Her intention was well meaning. But she was shown the door two days later after years of service. Guess how many talented, frustrated people at that institution are likely to slide right into compliance.

Compliance at a time when heath care desperately needs creative solutions.

What’s a leader of a frustrated organization to do?

  • Open your mindset. People are not challenging you personally. They see problems they want to solve. They aspire to do work that means something more than just putting out today’s fires.
  • Articulate a purpose. Yours as a leader (See this great post from Harvard’s Bill George, “Why Leaders Lose Their Way.”)  Yours as an organization. Why do we exist — beyond the generic  “delivering a profit to our shareholders” or “delivering quality health care.”
  • Change how your organization runs meetings so that everyone has a say. Open by going around the table and asking each individual to share his or her observations and insights.  Try it. You’ll begin to accomplish more and people will feel more valued.
  • Involve people in creating the tactics to achieve the big goals and strategy.  People don’t resist change. They want change. They resist acting on plans that they don’t think are the best way to achieve the goals. This is a different, more collaborative way of creating plans. It might take longer than a few people hunkered in a conference room to bang out the plan in three days. BUT if you tap into people’s collective brilliance, they will come up with tremendous ideas and then MAKE THOSE IDEAS HAPPEN.
  • Know that you don’t have to have all the answers. Your job is to inspire people around a simple but powerful vision of what you’re aiming to accomplish, Your job is to ask new questions. To listen.  To provide more ways for more people to have a voice and know that what they do, think and say matters. To let people vent when their intentions are good. (Angry, destructive people should be booted out, of course.)

People want their work to matter. Let their voices be heard. Involve them in creating better ways.  It may be the only way to succeed in a world of  such seismic change.

Filed Under: Activating change, Communicating, Corporate Rebels, Innovation, Leadership Tagged With: , ,

Solving the RISD leadership problem

March 14, 2011 By 2 Comments

 

Carly Fiorina at HP. Larry Summers at Harvard. And now John Maeda at Rhode Island School of Design. (RISD)

These leaders  all committed a fatal leadership mistake: they charged into organizations with strong  cultures and completely ignored the organizational DNA. They tried to force their beliefs on organizations with much different beliefs.  Things almost always end very badly for the leader when this happens.

Changing these revered institutions is necessary and difficult.  I followed all three leaders closely and admired their strategies for how to transform their institutions to be more relevant and dynamic. It’s a shame that such brilliant people didn’t understand a critical leadership fundamental.

The way to inspire people to change is to show them how new ideas support the organization’s reason for being and unique organizational beliefs.  Put change into the context of how it honors the organization’s rich culture and history, and how it makes the organization even more relevant for today’s opportunities.

Alas, these leaders fell into at least one of these three leadership traps:

  1. They did not identify their organization’s true and unique  DNA, the beliefs and values widely shared by multiple constituents — employees, trustees, board members, shareholders, customers, alumni.
  2. They knew the cultural DNA,  but did not know how to use it to inform decisions, build trusted relationships, or communicate change.
  3. They knew #1 and #2 but didn’t care about the culture. They were so passionate and/or arrogant about their new ideas that they wanted to move them ahead fast. Taking the time to align new strategies with the organizational beliefs and culture was viewed as “slowing things down.”  This approach almost always sends the message the new leader doesn’t think anyone else is as smart as they; things aren’t up for discussion and input because “I am smarter than you.”

John Maeda has not yet been asked to leave RISD.  But after an whopping 82 percent of the faculty gave him and the provost a “no confidence” vote, the chances of his survival are slim. Especially as this vote came just weeks after the faculty voted overwhelmingly against a five-year strategic plan.

In today’s Providence Journal Maeda said the problem at RISD is about communications, but from my conversations with RISD faculty and staff the problem appears to be about a deep cultural disconnect and questions on whether Maeda has the needed leadership competencies to run this college.  Few executives can ever repair that damage.

As RISD moves forward — with or without Maeda — it would be well worth their time to bring their people  together — faculty, staff, students, alumni, trustees — and uncover the purpose, beliefs and values that have made this prestigious art college so successful for so many years.  Then use those beliefs as a yardstick on which to assess future leadership decisions, inform strategic directions, and inspire their people to create what’s next.

Based on my experience helping organizations in this type of situation, enaging people in this collaborative process not only gives them a voice, it helps them and the organization heal and look ahead with confidence and optimism.

That’s good leadership.

Filed Under: Activating change, Communicating, Leadership Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Getting to Maybe: How the World is Changed

March 6, 2011 By Leave a Comment

In the movie Jerry Maguire, Renee Zellweger’s character tells Tom Cruise that he had her at the first hello. Well, this warning to the book “Getting To Maybe: How the World is Changed” had me at the first page:

Warning: this book is not for heroes or saints or perfectionists. This book is for ordinary people who want to make connections that create extraordinary outcomes.

What riveted me to this book on social innovation:

  • The authors fascinating yet easy to understand application of scientific complexity science as a way to understand social innovation.
  • The book’s thorough research and presentation of patterns of social innovation
  • The compelling stories of diverse social innovators – what triggered them to start, how they navigated their journeys, and the shared patterns of those diverse journeys
  • The use of poetry to ground each chapter, counterbalancing the art of change with the science of systems change.
  • More thoughtful, original, and thought provoking insights than I usually find in a professional book.
  • Many, many practical ideas that I can see how to apply both to my professional organizational change management work and my responsibilities as a trustee on non-profit organizations.
  • How relevant it is in today’s world with nations in the Middle East transforming and our school systems, unions, health care institutions and governments undergoing complex, profound and needed change.

The yellow highlights in my book are too numerous to list, but here are some of my takeaways.

Getting to maybe vs. concrete, measurable outcomes

“Maybe” comes with no guarantees, only a chance. But “maybe” has always been the best odds the world has offered to those who set out to alter its course…”Maybe” is not a cautious word. It is a defiant claim of possibility in the face of a status quo we are unwilling to accept.

Why complexity science?

  • Traditional methods of seeing the world compare its workings to a machine. Complexity science embraces life as it is: unpredictable, emergent, evolving and adaptable.
  • Connections or relationships define how complex systems work; an organization is its relationships not its flow chart.
  • Using insights about how the world is changed, we can become active participants in shaping those changes.

Being heard: speaking the vision and passion

Effective and innovative organizations keep alive the that vision and passion, that sense of calling…Part of the challenge in being heard is to hone what you have to say and practice saying it in a way that connects both emotionally and intellectually, both affectively and cognitively

Working with powerful strangers

  • If the system is to be transformed as opposed to overturned, collaboration between the radical and the establishment must be created.
  • In any discussion of power and its redistribution, link the issue directly to the organization’s mission and keep it in that context.
  • Power dynamics will surface in connection to mission fulfillment; which is appropriate; there it will challenge those in power to examine the depth of their commitment to real change.

Evaluation, measurement, accountability

  • Set information targets, not just performance targets.
  • Use developmental evaluation, charting a changing path of innovation by providing rapid feedback.
  • Frame changes from you’re learning as developments, not just improvements, and a key difference in perspective. Especially with funders.
  • Support learning as a meaningful outcome – and reporting on learning as a form of authentic accountability.
  • The highest form of accountability is internal. Are we being true to our vision? Are we dealing with reality? Are we connecting the dots between here-and-now and our vision?  Are we walking the talk? How do we know if we’re not?

Scaling innovation

Scaling up is rarely a linear process that involves doing more of the same.

A different approach to strategic planning

  • Make big-picture, strategic thinking an ongoing part of decision making, not something done only periodically in retreats.
  • Devote resources to identifying and tracking important trends. Make strategic analysis about the connections between local efforts and major trends a regular part of your work.
  • Develop a fierce commitment to ongoing reality testing, especially seeking and being open to critical feedback and standing still to see the bigger picture.
  • Instead of cheerleading, cultivate the skills of rigorous pattern analysis and reality testing.

Quotes I loved

  • Thinking is a form of action.
  • A goal helps to channel the energy but doesn’t create it.
  • Keep the goals front and centre –  let the means emerge.
  • Hell is not failing, hell is delusion.
  • It takes courage to act in the absence of certainty and clarity. But to not engage, to not connect does not mean we protect ourselves from uncertainty.

I’m a voracious reader, and highly recommend this book by Frances Westley, Brenda Zimmerman and Michael Quinn Patton — especially for those involved in innovation, organizational change and social transformation, or for those who wonder and perhaps worry about how we can solve today’s seemingly insolvable social issues.

Filed Under: Activating change, Innovation, Leadership Tagged With: , , ,

Ignore the obstacles

February 7, 2011 By 1 Comment


Are we wasting too much time solving problems?

We spend a lot of time solving problems in business. Some days I feel like we’re benevolent pit bulls, sinking our teeth into root causes, doing current and future state analysis, and constructing detailed roadmaps for breaking down the obstacles.

But what about the other way? Instead of focusing on the negatives, what if we obsessed on our aspirations and strengths? What would happen if spent more time imagining the value of doing more of what we’re especially good at?

Management guru Peter Drucker believed that building on an organization’s strengths snuffs out many of the problems:

“The task of organizational leadership is to create alignment of strengths in ways that make a system’s weaknesses irrelevant.”

Appreciative Inquiry authors and experts David Cooperrider and Diana Whitney share similar views:

“The positive core of an organizational life is one of the greatest and largely unrecognized resources in the field of change management today…Human systems grow in the direction of what they persistently ask questions about, and this propensity is strongest and most sustainable when the means and ends of inquiry are positively correlated.”

At your next management meeting, think about carving out some time to ask new questions around your strengths. Based on my experience you’ll uncover some remarkably motivating ideas, and you’ll  find the energy to pursue those positive opportunities in a way that you just don’t get with solving problems.

Filed Under: Activating change, Leadership Tagged With: , , , , ,

Free the rebels!

December 13, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Today’s prompt: Action. When it comes to aspirations, it’s not about ideas. It’s about making ideas happen. What’s your next step?

I had a giant “aha” professional moment in 2010 about the value and untapped potential of rebels, we optimistic people who feel compelled to speak up and make organizations better.  (Here’s that story.) Yet reams of organizational research shows that companies fear and/or ignore this most valuable talent. And, alas, rebels rarely receive help in learning how to get their ideas heard in a way that will be respected and embraced.

2010 was rebel research and idea incubation. Next year I’m intent on  freeing rebels so that both they and their companies can reap the benefits of passionate, truthful people who want to make a difference.  Supporting and empowering rebels gives meaning to change management and employee engagement goals.

If you’re interested in rebels and organizational change, check out Stanford B-School professor Deborah Meyerson’s book “Tempered Radicals.” It’s is a classic.

If you have any thoughts about this emerging Rebel Alliance, or would like to participate in some way, please drop me a line at lkelly@foghound.com.

_______________________________

This post is part of a 31-day blogging challenge called reverb10, responding to writing prompts that are designed to elicit reflections on 2010, and hopes for 2011. You can find out more about it here.

Filed Under: Activating change, Communities, Innovation, Leadership Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Lessons learned

February 6, 2010 By 1 Comment

Here’s a little secret for every project summary or report: add a section about “lessons learned.”

  • What you learned
  • What you would do differently in future
  • What new processes or training needs to be put in place for the organization

This simple section is more valuable than the “results” section because it helps us to keep learning and sharing that learning with our colleagues.

A side benefit is that it can  calm down anxious bosses who think things weren’t “good enough.”  Acknowledging that you know what didn’t happen perfectly and why — and will  do differently in the future — diffuses tension and focuses on the positive nature of learning and improvement.

The more new the area,  like social media, the more important and valuable “lessons learned” is.

Filed Under: Activating change, Communicating Tagged With: , , ,

10 practices for managing marcom, PR organizations in a 2.0 world

October 25, 2007 By Leave a Comment

One big question I’m hearing from marketing, PR and corporate communications executives is HOW to change their organizations in view of this marketing 2.0 tsunami. They get the “why.” Here are 10 ideas people find helpful.

  1. Redefine the box: clarify the business goals, then define new approaches for accomplishing that. There are many cool new tactics but it they don’t help you realize the goal, e.g., generating leads, find those that do. Try to stay in the business objective box vs. the tactical box.
  2. Revise competencies; add new roles, eliminate others: there are many traditional roles that are far less important, e.g., traditional media relations, and others that are becoming far more important, listening and participating in relevant digital conversations. Step back and assess what you need more or less of and where to add, change, phase out.
  3. Change hiring process to better “see” important new qualities and skills: while many marcom organizations and PR agencies, ask people to write a press release as part of the hiring process, I’d suggest that other “tests” more relevant to today’s world. How about asking candidates to writing a point of view brief about marketing (Do they really get where it’s going and can they articulate it in a compelling, non-corporate speak way? Are they intellectually curious? Or ask a candidate to create a two minute video. Can he/she tell a compelling story?)
  4. Revise performance reviews, reward systems: People won’t change behaviors unless there are incentives to do so, like getting a raise or promotion. Include important new skills into annual performance plans. If money is involved, people are more likely to change, master new ways of doing things.
  5. Create “master plan” for professional development: As a manager, identify those key skills your team needs and develop a master development plan for the year. The better you do at helping people learn and change, the better you’ll be able to move into new approaches that deliver some great business benefits.
  6. Rotate people in jobs so they stay “fresh,” keep the passion: It’s hard to stay passionate about a particular product or functional area. Try to rotate people into new roles every two years so that stay fresh, interested and engaged.
  7. Think about marketing 2.0 “coaches” or Sherpa guides to help transition faster, bake new skills into your team: adapting new communications styles is harder than most people realize. (I hear this all the time from training marketing people in really diverse industries.) Consider using “on call” coaches or sherpa guides to help your people with their everyday work and questions. Six months of an apprentice like relationship speeds the learning curve.
  8. Question assumptions in every planning cycle: things are changing fast, and will continue to do so. Question what you’re doing and where you’re allocating resources at every planning cycle.
  9. Adopt an “Always in Beta” culture: some degree of experimentation is the norm. We can no longer wait for “best practices” to adopt new approaches.
  10. Leverage everything: what’s interesting today is how many opportunities there are to leverage everything. How to tap your loyal blog readers to set up lead-generating Webinars. How to take ideas from your online customer communities and use them in product development, PR and sales.

Filed Under: Marketing trends, Social media strategy Tagged With: ,