Understand and delight your audience

“Once upon a time there was a serious, well-behaved young black cat…”

These are the opening lines of what will be one of the main publishing events of this year. A previously unknown Beatrix Potter book, “Kitty-in-Boots”, has been discovered by publisher Jo Hanks. It was found in the Victoria & Albert Museum’s archive, after Ms. Hanks spotted a reference to the book in some of Beatrix Potter’s correspondence. When she found it, it was a typeset manuscript with only a few simple pictures, 

not the fully illustrated book, although editing by the author had happened, so all that was needed was a few more images to bring the words to life and make the book true to its well-known siblings.

Beatrix Potter was distracted from finishing the book by the outbreak of the First World War and, thereafter, by getting married and becoming a sheep farmer. (How many of us have half finished projects we should re-visit?) Like the popular writer Roald Dahl, Beatrix Potter didn’t believe in “writing down” for children, her approach, words and pictures are not patronising and this latest book, by reputation, is no exception. There are references to animal cruelty, with Kitty’s devoted owner fearful that her beloved puss might be turned into “black cat-skin muffs”, and there are ruffians and villains. Kitty leads a double life with few appreciating the full range of activities and exploits that occur away from home. Due to the paucity of original Potter drawings, the majority of the book has had to be illustrated by Quentin Blake (a wonderful choice);

his comments on receiving the manuscript were:

“I liked the story immediately – it’s full of incident and mischief and character."

The tale offers further treats through cameo appearances by favourite characters from other books, including an older, slightly rotund Peter Rabbit, a discussion with Mrs Tiggywinkle and brief sightings Miss Ribby, Tabitha Twitchit and Mr Tod. (that looks like collaboration and inclusion to me). The cover will be revealed in March and the book will be published in September 2016.  Two million Beatrix Potter books are sold globally every year, but I suspect that we will see a spike in sales this autumn. What a great year for the author Beatrix Potter to be celebrated on the new UK 50 pence piece.

Whilst on the subject of authors and books, I am delighted that a children’s novel is the winner of the 2016 Costa Book of the Year prize. If we cannot inspire a love of reading in the young they will be at a disadvantage in later life. Thanks to the Internet and our technology driven world, much of our day-to-day experiences now seem to revolve around written words.

Things that inspire the young were clearly on the minds of the team who released their latest findings relating to UK children’s media usage earlier this week. This Childwise report (which primarily focuses on how the young spend their leisure time) has been hailed as demonstrating a “landmark change in behaviours”: it is the first time (in the 25 years since the survey was started) that young people no longer choose to spend most of their free time watching TV. Those of you who, like me are parents, won’t be surprised to know that the young prefer to be online; 5-15 year olds are spending on average 3 hours per day surfing the web – with YouTube being the favourite channel (50% of the over 2000 individuals interviewed admitted to visiting the site daily). This compares to 2.1 hours now for TV. 

Reading books has fallen to just over half an hour a day (this figure has declined from over an hour in 2012 and I suspect for some respondents the reading reported was actually a homework activity). Thank goodness for books like The Lie Tree that can inspire young (and older) minds. The world is changing fast, no wonder TV isn’t popular, when on-demand video gives control over what and when you can view almost anything – this is how our children are growing up and will be what they expect when they enter the workplace.

People drive the change but also have to cope with change that they feel thrust upon them. We, as responsible employers and leaders, need to understand the pressures that this brings and try our best to support those who work with us. It is no use clinging to out-dated patriarchal approaches, custom and practice. You have only to look at the announcement and market reaction to the news of the decline in sales of Apple iPhones earlier this week to appreciate that market dominance is not a given. People are fickle and competition is fierce – this applies to the decisions around employment just as much as it does to the acquisition of a mobile phone.

Choice, variety, autonomy – these are the norms of the modern world. In many ways our home environment (with the use of our own tech and broadband) has superseded our workplace as the location where we get things done. A high proportion of offices still have fierce security firewalls and systems that prevent access to sites that many see as usual places to seek information (e.g. blogs and social media). As a result, people resort to their smartphones to search for solutions – I know of members of an IT department, in a respected global business, who turned to Google and YouTube to teach themselves how to install and run a new cross-border software package, because their employer was not prepared to pay for proper training and the provider did not offer any with the product. All credit to them for finding a solution for their lack of knowledge, although, by their own confession, the configuration produced was not as elegant as it would have been with better support and broader awareness. How dispiriting for those people to feel that their employer cared so little about them that they were prepared to leave them to “figure it out or fail”. It’s no wonder that there is high turnover in that department. As an aside though – it occurs to me that if the task had been set as a challenge to an action learning set (and therefore seen as a growth opportunity offered to a valued group of individuals, rather than a duty) the attitude towards the need to find a solution might have been different. It could have been fun although required timelines might not have been met.

It is important that leaders and managers understand the problems that people have to solve. As change has become a recognised norm, we must be forward-thinking. We, the employers of today, need to plan for the world of work our soon-to-be employees and contractors will expect in the future. If we fail to:

• make our workplaces supportive and engaging;
• provide opportunities and an environment in which people wish to contribute;
• build a setting where people believe that they are recognised and rewarded for the skills that they bring;
• have a shared confidence that we can provide a suitable place where all who have the desire can and will thrive and grow;

then vital employees and partners simply won’t come or stay with us.

In addition to engagement, empowerment and collaboration – individuals will need great people management. To be successful the leaders and managers within organisations will need to ensure that everyone is and wants to be involved, can make suggestions and have the autonomy to do the right thing. None of us are significantly better informed than others, as Mervyn Dinnen comments in the latest report, Creating a culture of innovation through smarter talent management,  produced for HR Zone

“The leaders that we need to develop for tomorrow will probably be facing uncertainties and complexities that have yet to be identified, whilst using technologies and digital tools that have yet to be invented.”

We need to take a page from Beatrix Potter’s book and not patronise the people we wish to appeal to, but appreciate them, be engaging, inclusive and at times surprise and delight.

Managers Past and Present

Day 31 (New Year's Eve - Thursday 31st December 2015)

31 Planes of existence are defined in Buddhist teaching

Welcome to the last day of 2015 - I hope that on reflection it has been a good year for you and yours. I would like to take this opportunity to wish you a wonderful 2016 - over the course of it may you find yourself pleasantly surprised on a regular basis and achieve more than you desire. 

It gives me great pleasure today to introduce you to Benjamin Fletcher. Although Benjamin and I have never met, he responded to my request for posts in November, we now follow each other on Twitter (his handle is @benjaminclusion); I am delighted to have him here.  He is a champion for Diversity and Inclusion and blogs on these and other topics on LinkedIn. He works as an HR Business Partner at QBE Insurance based in London. I love his post, which shares his learning from various managers with whom he has worked over the years.

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Some of the best lessons we learn come from observing good and great managers and leaders. Some we learn from observing what not to do and how not to treat people. Others we learn from people who we might not like or agree with, but recognise certain strengths in. 

I have been managed by some pretty different characters; some of whom I’ve felt a stronger natural affinity with than others. All, though, have given me something valuable for which I am grateful and helped me take my career a step further.

It can be easy and it is often tempting to list all the things you will never do as a manager yourself, but as a new year approaches it’s a timely opportunity for reflection and self-reflection. 

In this spirit, here I want to remember the positive examples – the comet trails – that four influential managers have left with me and share these learnings with the blogosphere. 

To save blushes I have renamed each manager after pets I have loved both as a child and an adult.

Big pictures are made complete by details. We all have attributes that we are proud about and consider our strong suits, as well as known development areas and blind spots. I’m personally quite aware that detail overload does nothing for my attention span or temperament. Scamp, conversely, is a detail whiz. If you get your kicks from being creative and helping other people see a picture not yet complete, incredibly detail focused people can be frustrating, even irritating at times. Scamp taught me to appreciate that small things usually add up to something big, like a George Suerat painting. It’s a hard thing to un-see.

The People's Monarch an artwork by Helen Marshall
consists of 5,500 individual photos submitted by BBC listeners & viewers

We’re in it together. Ambition means different things to different people. Sophie showed me that ambition is not a dirty word. Through Sophie I also learnt to appreciate what it’s like to feel the security of knowing my manager will not let me fail because my success is their success. With different strengths we won together. Demonstrating that sheer ambition and inclusive leadership work perfectly in tandem, it is a lesson I aspire to replicate.

Relationships are 50/50. So much of success at work is built upon the relationships we foster with those with whom we collaborate day-to-day. Sometimes even when we really like and respect a manager, like Marble, we forget that we’re in a relationship too… and that we’re one half of that relationship. You’ve got to move, share and ask. Managers are not mind readers.

Being human is important. More Rothko than Seurat, Bonnie showed me that managers don’t have to put up a professional façade to be successful. Bonnie gives herself, others – and HR – permission to show personality and emotion. Bonnie schooled me on how being authentic helps you succeed at work.

P.S. for anyone who is curious… Scamp was a hamster who lived to the ripe old age of 5, Sophie was a white Persian butterfly catching cat, Bonnie was an energetic yet wonderfully gentle Collie-Springer Spaniel, and Marble is a very affectionate tortoiseshell cat who recently beat cancer.

Hair-Raising

Some years ago my father was invited to attend the sixth Commonwealth Lawyers Association’s conference, in Nigeria. It was an eventful session, held in Lagos, and he and his fellow delegates experienced various adventures, including a late night knock on a hotel bedroom door – when opened, a handbag was flung over the sleepy occupant’s head into the room, the woman, who had rapped on the door and was standing in the corridor, commenced shrieking at full volume “He’s got my bag and he won’t pay me.”, implying that the poor lawyer had retained her for her charms, but then expelled her from the room without compensation. 

Another member of the party was arrested for taking a photograph of Taiwo Olowo’s Monument (an interesting cenotaph to a basket-weaver’s apprentice who rose to high political office and whose memorial is reputedly made from melted down pennies donated for the purpose). The Lawyer, whilst recording the sight, inadvertently also took a picture of a person who happened to be standing near the railings. This bystander vehemently insisted that, because his photograph had been taken, his image and hence his soul was now inside the camera and so the camera should belong to him. A policeman was summoned, who agreed with the stranger’s argument, and so the unfortunate lawyer, who refused to relinquish his camera, was incarcerated until his colleagues rescued him. 

Taiwo Olowo’s Monument 

The group of lawyers seemed to be cursed with bad luck, an impression compounded when my father fell ill.

"Head Ache" by George Cruikshank
Published in 1819

My father’s symptoms were odd, in addition to severe stomach pains, a high fever and facial swelling, blood seeped from his eyes, he found light uncomfortable and whenever a person reached a hand towards his head his hair stood on end. In concern his colleagues asked the hotel to source a doctor. A smartly dressed gentleman in a suit arrived carrying a traditional doctor’s bag. He took my father’s pulse and blood pressure, listened to his breathing with a stethoscope and then, with a degree of assurance, announced, in a thick accent: 

“Sah, I know what’s wrong with yo’. Every night a juju demon comes to yo’ room, to grapple fo’ yo’ soul. He holds yo’ by yo’ hair, while trying to grab yo’ spirit, an, as he battles for control, he hurts yo', hence yo’ bleeding and bruising.”

Although this opinion provided an explanation for my father’s hair-raising symptoms, he was sceptical as to the accuracy of the diagnosis. However, feeling dreadfully ill, he was keen to recover and so asked the doctor what could be done. 

“Well Sah, yo’ can trap it in a web of happy laughter, or, yo’ must leave and hope it’s a local juju that won’t come after yo’.”

Given the circumstances, happy laughter seemed highly unlikely, and so my father opted to leave. He boarded the next flight to London. On arrival in the UK he immediately took himself to the Hospital for Tropical Diseases in Central London, in the expectation that another doctor might propose some more comprehensive treatment.

 

"Trap it in a web of happy laughter!"

He was swiftly diagnosed as having Lassa Fever. Like Ebola, Lassa Fever it is a viral hemorrhagic fever with vile symptoms and can become an epidemic (technically a situation where there is an attack rate of at least 15 cases per 100,000 people for two consecutive weeks). My father was placed in isolation within the hospital and responded well to treatment. Unlike Ebola, Lassa Fever can be transmitted through an airborne route, and not just via contact with human bodily fluids; with hindsight he probably risked infecting others by flying out of Nigeria, although if he had remained it is most likely that he would have died. There was no known epidemic and at the time he did not appreciate what was wrong with him.

Multimammate rat
Lassa fever is usually caught from rat urine or feces

His illness came to mind because of the huge media coverage of the current Ebola epidemic. According to a World Health Organisation statement made this past weekend, almost 5,000 people have died of Ebola and over 10,000 have been infected to date.  The recovery rate in West African hospitals is often as low as 7/10. Part of the issue is that there are few modern medical treatment centres and, despite the efforts of brave specialists, such as Médecins Sans Frontières(MSF), people have little more than a bucket, disinfectant and salted water to treat infected individuals and protect other members of the family. MSF are now trying to speed up the availability of a vaccine. 

Ebola symptoms - not unlike Bubonic plague

Like Europe in the Middle Ages, there is fear and shame within the communities where the virus is prevalent. If epidemics are not controlled their impact can be devastating - in England 1.5 million people died from the Black Death (Bubonic plague) between 1348 and 1350 (out of an estimated population of 4 million).

 

Illustration of the Black Death from theToggenburg Bible from Switzerland (1411)
source: Wikipedia

The Hospital for Tropical Diseases is unique in the NHS; it is the only hospital that is specialist in tropical and travel related illness. As an aside, the establishment of the Hospital for Tropical Diseases echoes some of the current approaches towards treating people tackling Ebola in Africa. In 1821, following a meeting in the “City of London Tavern”, it was agreed that (with support from public funding and patronage of King George IV) a floating hospital, for the relief of the sick, would be established to treat people infected with tropical diseases. Initially the hospital was set up on a series of former naval ships, the first of which was HMS Grampus.  Just last week it was decided to send a hospital ship to assist people assisting with the Ebola virus. RFA Argus, a ship with a 100 bed medical complex, as well equipped as most NHS hospitals, set sail to Sierra Leone on Friday, loaded with supplies, equipment and personnel to provide support to members of the Armed Forces, specialists and aid workers who are building medical centres in West Africa and training local doctors and staff how best to treat the virus.

RFA Argus

As time progressed, the Hospital for Tropical Diseases decided that it needed a more permanent base and hence moved to dry land. We can all learn from the medical specialists’ foresight. It is important for people as well as organisations to move with the times.

A Tropical Disease ward, 1907

For an intelligent species, humans are surprisingly poor at change. This is, in my opinion, particularly the case within the workplace. The Chartered institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) and the British Institute of Facilities Management (BIFM) are currently working together to determine what the most effective workplaces could be like in the future. The majority of organisations still rely on command and control management styles and open plan office spaces with individual offices for managers and leaders, thereby reinforcing the hierarchy. However, in our rapidly varying environments, where:

• swift responses are required
• there is a cornucopia of information available on which to base decisions, and
• technology and social media has broken down barriers to access

old-style management is, at the least, disadvantageous and can be detrimental to a company’s and its people’s ability to achieve objectives. The reasons for the problem are not surprising – most people in authority have learned their managerial skills within a traditional environment, so many managers still believe that the only ways of getting results are through authoritarian practices and management by attendance – emphasising obedience and physical presence over performance and outcomes. This problem can be exacerbated by the fact that narcissistic managers are frequently promoted into leadership roles, according to research from BI, the Norwegian Business School. In essence, bad bosses are more likely to land the top jobs, because they are the ones who possess the traits most likely to ensure that they are considered for promotion or selection – self-driven, vain, selfish, task-focused, but usually lacking vision and empathy. Most of us, at some time, have worked for someone we felt was a bad boss. Maybe they took credit for your work, criticised or continuously amended your contribution or simply rarely spoke to or included you.

Bad behaviour from the top filters down through an organisation. Poor leaders, especially self-serving ones, are disinterested or oblivious to the impact their behaviour has on others. Their eyes are fixed on their personal objectives, but they seldom take time to build rapport, trust and understanding with their team. Good managers appreciate that their actions will influence team motivation and hence performance. Research undertaken by the Hay Group shows a 30% differential in team performance that can be attributed to the culture within a workplace and that 70% of team culture is influenced by a manager’s interaction with their team. 

According to a survey undertaken last year by the Forum, 91% of employees feel that trust is crucial in their relationship with their manager, whereas only 48% of managers saw the value of a trusting relationship for both performance and retention. Perhaps opinions will turn – a US supermarket learning the hard way this summer – family owned Market Basket was reduced to chaos when 25,000 workers walked out, after they felt that senior management had betrayed colleagues and the former CEO (who was ousted in a coup by his cousins). Workers believed that Arthur T.(the popular CEO) was supportive and cared about the workforce, whereas his cousins, lead by Arthur S., were driven solely by greed and shareholder returns). Customers refused to cross the picket lines and suppliers rescinded contracts – at the height of the dispute it was costing the business $8.5 million per day. The cousins were forced to back down and the former CEO has been reinstated and acquired majority shareholding with external backing.

Market Basket employees and supporters on strike
in support of ousted CEO Arthur T.

Rather than learning the hard way and having hair-raising, loss-making experiences in business, we need to reconsider the environment and manner in which we expect people to work. People are sentient beings and it is individuals, not the workplace itself, that cause problems. We have the capability within us to learn from past mistakes, cease clinging to old practices and attitudes and face the future with collaborative optimism and honesty.

"Talk to me..."

We live in a time of constant conflict – as I write the police in Hong Kong are firing rubber bullets, pepper spray and tear gas on a peaceful protest for democracy. Every time I read or hear the news there is yet another depressing story of aggression and dispute – planes sent to bomb Kobane (as part of the US-led coalition against ISIS); fighting near Baghdad; drug cartels murdering and intimidating innocent citizens in South America; airstrikes in Pakistan; the misery of people inadvertently trapped in war zones around the world, kidnaps, beheadings, victimisation and rape. For a supposedly civilised species, we should be ashamed of ourselves.

Student protester amid clouds of tear gas
Picture taken from Twitter

Things have not changed since Marvin Gaye recorded “What’s Going On?” his subtle protest against the Vietnam War.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-kA3UtBj4M 

or indeed since the early 1590’s when Shakespeare wrote his famous tale of “star-cross’d lovers”. Despite its reputation, Romeo and Juliet is perhaps more about conflict than it is about love. Certainly that is the impression that Mats Ek gives in his modern version of the classic romance. 

I saw Mats Ek’s ballet, Juliet and Romeo on Saturday night and wept; it was the final performance by the Royal Swedish Ballet at Sadler’s Wells in London. I did not cry at the state of Swedish dance, nor was it was the tragedy of a love so powerful that it is worth dying for that reduced to me tears, but the agony of a mother who had lost her son. Despite the modern, thought-provoking set and costumes, the production is visceral, at times brutal, occasionally humorous, but consistently charged with emotion. Juliet is charming, on the cusp of womanhood – a gawky adolescent filled with passion and mood swings. The rival gangs mooch and posture within their stark urban environment and there is little compassion towards others in an unforgiving and hierarchical society. There is some warmth displayed by The Nurse, but she is a rebel, breaking the rules (riding off to fetch Romeo on a Segway) in a bid to gain a piece of happiness for the girl she clearly loves. Her compassion, willingness to cross boundaries and ability to communicate with all types of people mark her out in contrast to the majority of the other characters. Most are self-seeking and oblivious to the harm they cause. Tybalt urinates contemptuously on the corpse of Mercutio, after murdering him. Romeo slays Tybalt, repeatedly stamping on his head until he dies.  There is little compassion or empathy. Perhaps that is why I was so struck by a moving portrayal of maternal devotion. It was Tybalt’s mother, played by Marie Lindqvist, that gripped my heartstrings – the torment of a woman mourning the loss of a treasured son. 

Woman with Dead Child, 1903 etching by Kathe Kollwitz
souce: Wikipedia

Conflict is centred round emotion, but it does not have to be over something huge like national boundaries, political power, the destruction of a way of life or murder; it can be as simple as a fight within a family over a household object or chore. I visited my mother on Friday – it had been her 82^nd birthday while I was abroad on business early last week, so her grandsons and I went to spend time with her at the end of the week. 

My mother with her three daughters
Picture taken by Paul Clarke

My youngest sister had generously given my mother a cordless telephone as a birthday gift, but had left it to charge prior to it being ready for use. I received an SMS from my little sister on Friday, delegating the set-up and training on usage to me. I appreciate that sounds simple: not being tied to the phone’s location (on a flight of stairs leading to the kitchen) and being able to take the handset either into the garden or with her when she wants to sit down seems a sensible thing for my mother to be able to do. I could pre-programme numbers of family, friends, her doctor and so forth into the handset, to make it easier for her to call people. Using a cordless phone would help familiarise her with her mobile (which she uses sufficiently infrequently that I have to remind her what buttons to press when making a call each time she sets off on a trip to the hospital). The intention behind my sister’s offering was good - it was expected to enhance my mother’s life. However, that was not how my mother viewed the gift. She likes having her traditional telephone where it is; she is used to its location, its ringtone and is comfortable with dashing to the stairway to answer it. Now that she is older, she has difficulty remembering new processes and the concept of pre-recorded numbers sitting inside her phone seemed impersonal and distasteful – “what’s wrong with my address book, leafing through the pages is so full of memories?” She was worried by the base-station’s cable – there is a shortage of plug sockets in her house and, without an adapter, she feared losing the use of her beloved plug-in radio. Our mother did not like her well-intentioned daughters pushing her around and forcing change. I found myself in the midst of a family conflict.  

The problem could have been avoided if there had been better communication from the outset.

 

Miner birds chattering

Conflict can occur in almost every area of life. At work it is one of the managerial problems that individuals find most difficult to cope with. Many weak or inexperienced managers are tempted to try to ignore it, but pretending that a problem does not exist will seldom make it go away. Often taking no action to resolve a matter just makes things worse. Distrust, distress and misunderstandings can fester and morph into bigger problems when the initial ill feeling, on which the conflict is founded, is not addressed. When helping their patients, psychologists usually look for the root of a problem, as understanding the cause and tackling its issues is more likely to produce long-term benefits than focusing solely on current symptoms.  Managers would do well to follow their example and to delve a little deeper to understand why team members feel and behave as they do. 

 

Be mindful of the roots of a problem

Team dynamics can be impacted by many things including: jealousy, insecurity, perceived injustice, fear, alleged disparity in treatment, stress due to heavy or unequal workloads, disputes over time-keeping, invasion of personal space or a range of inter-personal matters. If ignored there is a high probability that performance will drop, factions may develop, formal complaints will be raised and/or talented employees, who can secure alternative employment, will leave.

In my experience, the best way to overcome conflict is by putting yourself into the other party’s shoes, to try to understand their viewpoint. A degree of tolerance and empathy is often all that is required to diffuse a charged situation. Few people come to work with the intention of causing distress and I have never met an employee who actually wants to be unhappy. In addition, many people fail to appreciate that conflict can be turned to advantage, as often it provides a wonderful opportunity for learning and growth. A good leader can leverage conflict for team building and individual development; the ensuing discussions, grounded in divergent thinking, frequently result in innovation and creative solutions. All is takes is effective communication.

Like Mats Ek, twist the expected to produce something fresh, new and invigorating. Ek changed the familiar title of Shakespeare’s play (although Elizabethan documents show that Shakespeare also contemplated twisting the heading so that the lady was named first). The protesters in Hong Kong are requesting a voice, in that they want their opinion to be taken into account when political appointments are made. We all want our issues to be appreciated – this requires communication. I urge you to follow the advice laid down in Marvin Gaye’s song and hear your employee’s plea (in whatever way they are communicating to you) to

“Talk to me.”

The Nurse, who successfully walks the tightrope
of effective communication & empathy in
Mats Ek's Juliet & Romeo

A happy twist!