Right Attitudes » Ideas for Impact
» by Nagesh Belludi

Perils of telecommuting: Disconnectedness and diminished face time

For over four decades, employers have offered telecommuting and other flexible work arrangements to boost employee morale, promote work-life balance, and retain skilled workers. In spite of the ubiquity of electronic communication and accessibility to travel, a growing body of research has shown that it is significantly harder to build and maintain social relationships electronically than it is in person.

• In the 1960s, Hewlett-Packard (HP) pioneered flexible work arrangements as part of its legendary “HP Way” culture. However, in year 2006, HP surprised employees and the HR industry by deciding to cutback telecommuting in one of its divisions to encourage employee interactivity, promote teamwork, and enable skilled workers to train the less-experienced employees.
• A few years ago, an internal IBM study revealed that when teams went more than three days without a meeting, their happiness and productivity suffered. This promoted the “Making IBM Feel Small” initiative to promote face-to-face contact among its employees.

It’s important of show up and be “there”

Getting management to recognize you for your achievements and consider you for promotions and leadership positions has never been more challenging, especially at large companies. As I have mentioned in my previous articles, career success is no more about “who you know,” but rather about “who knows you” and what they know about you. Earning this recognition begins by showing up, “being there” and acting the part of a dedicated, enthusiastic employee.

Look, companies rarely promote employees who are not around to solve challenges and slug it out during tough times. For those of you who wish to graduate from individual contributor roles and get promoted to team-leader or management positions, telecommuting comes with a cost — reduced face time with your peers, management, and customers, and diminished opportunities to foster your management’s trust in your abilities. Therefore, telecommuting can be an impediment to climbing the corporate ladder.

Suggested Reading

• Not everybody wishes to climb the corporate ladder
• Getting recognition to help career advancement
• When are you ready for a promotion?
• How hard you should work
• Accomplish what you want, not what you think you have to

***See other articles related to telecommuting, flexible work arrangements, career success, career management, promotions, work-life balance

During Q & A at a career-planning workshop that I led recently, a member of the audience asked me, “Where could I get the best education in life?” This article elaborates my response.

You learn best from imitating the techniques of the successful

“What the outstanding person does, others will try to do. The standards such people create will be followed by the whole world.”
* The Bhagavad Gita

The best way to educate yourself is by observing the top performers in every field and by identifying and applying their effectiveness techniques to your circumstances. Your inspiration may be somebody you interact with, somebody you can hear about in the media or a fictional character from a novel or movie.

Try to imitate the best performers in a discipline to be successful in that discipline. Study their educational and professional backgrounds, their work style, successes, and failures. Identify how they go about conducting their everyday affairs. Try to copy the stock picking and capital allocation skills of Warren Buffett to become a successful investor. Piggyback on the thinking of the best mutual fund managers; replicate their portfolios to benefit from their stock selection process.

Read about the techniques of Sherlock Holmes to improve your reasoning and problem-solving skills. Impersonate your favorite stand-up comedian ahead of a presentation or public speech to improve your delivery. Study the footprints of the leaders in your organization if you want to follow their lead.

Imitate different attributes of people you encounter every day: the cheerfulness of an administrative assistant, the persuasion skills of a seasoned negotiator, the resourcefulness of a car mechanic, and the dexterity of a customer service agent.

Role models are inspirational

Looking up to others is rather instinctive. As kids, you looked up to your siblings, parents, or family members. At work, you learn from observing your colleagues and bosses.

When we learn of role models, read their stories or watch of them on TV or in the movies, we identify in them a part of ourselves; we associate with their struggles and victories, their hopes and despairs.

When we identify with a role model who has accomplished what we seek yourselves, we not only learn from them but also become more confident in our abilities.

This technique has its limitations

Naturally, the influence of role models is neither always practical nor necessarily productive. Your perception of popular role models (sportsmen, artists, businesspeople and other celebrities) is often incomplete and based on cursory assessments of them. Media accounts of their trappings of wealth, fame, and success or their unseemly lifestyles can just as easily turn them into negative role models. Excesses and faults are as common in everyday life as they are in the news. Exercise judgment in what you identify and implement. Hence the corollary: Learn from the shortcomings of the unsuccessful.

Call for action

• When people make a positive impression on you, reflect on what they did and how they did to impress you. Explore what you can learn from them.
• Identify the top performers in your field. Seek to understand and adopt their techniques. Improve or tailor them to your personal circumstances and improve yourselves.
• Study the biographies and memoirs of your favorite historical leaders. Read news stories and case studies of people you admire. Learn their techniques.
• Think of personal and professional skills that you would like to improve upon. Identify one or two people in your organization who are especially skilled in these areas. Observe them or ask them for advice.

Learn everything you can from others, implement what appeals to you, and discard the rest.

Recommended Reading

• Warren Buffett’s rule of thumb on personal integrity
• John F Kennedy’s secret for keeping good eye contact
• Stephen King’s tips for writing better
• Jack Welch on the importance of acting quickly

***See other articles related to role models, skills for success, education, learning from mentors

You have probably met corporate people who are five to ten years from retirement and have remained in their bottom-of-the-ladder “contributor” roles (as engineers, programmers, accountants, salespersons, etc.) for decades. Don’t they typically report to managers 10 to 15 years their juniors? Ever wonder why they never assumed managerial or leadership roles? Are they simply incompetent or unenthusiastic? Enquire around and you may be surprised to learn that they may have perhaps never desired to climb the corporate ladder. You will possibly learn that,

• They are not aimless. In reality, at some point in their careers, they made a conscious choice to not pursue the traditional career advancement paths and stay in their roles as “senior contributors.” Their dominant priorities lie elsewhere: usually with family, community, faith, and creative interests. They view their careers as means to other ends. They set goals for what they seek to achieve, create a plan, and relate to their values in the right way, everyday.
• They are quite influential in their organizations. They gain credibility not by virtue of positions or titles, but from years of experience, awareness of processes and historical perspectives. They seek to mentor young engineers and offer their opinions and judgments when consulted by management. They gain an immense sense of satisfaction by helping their organizations grow. They are widely respected.
• Their salaries are quite comparable to people who have identical spans of service in their organizations and have assumed leadership roles. They are highly valuable contributors.

The “senior contributors” are not the only ones who have shunned the corporate ladder. Many women choose to work three days a week once they have kids. Husbands of career-minded moms have relinquished their rewarding careers to become stay-at-home dads and support their wives’ careers. Frequently, executives decline international assignments that could keep them away from family. All these people tend to feel in command of their life and career — they are more contented in their careers and have a stronger sense of work-life balance. For sure, they can teach the rest of us a thing or two about setting the course of our lives.

The long-hours culture is not for everybody

You probably recollect the days when corporate people had reasonably secure jobs, showed up at work every workday, clocked in, worked eight hours, clocked out, stopped thinking about work until the next workday, and enjoyed four weeks of vacation a year. They could maintain a healthy separation between work and personal time. Alas, those days are long over.

In today’s workplace, the demands on our energy, time, and creativity constantly overwhelm us, despite access to technology, computers, and other productivity tools. We have so much on our plates that we only rarely complete things WHEN and AS we would wish to. The workday is longer, the pace of work is faster, and most projects tend to be open-ended. The pressure to learn new skills and pursue higher education like through the top online MBA programs is prominent. A successful corporate career demands a high-level of performance for sustained periods. At what cost, though? Unsurprisingly, the pressure to work harder and longer results in poor physical health, stress, anxiety, lesser time with family and friends, fewer opportunities to pursue hobbies and creative interests, and insufficient rest and relaxation.

Some people get off work and study in online MBA programs to increase their education in hopes they open doors to better career opportunities at better companies. http://www.onlinemba.com

Work or life or both — its your choice

“The price of anything is the amount of life you exchange for it.”
* Henry David Thoreau

There is no magic potion or canned method for balancing your work and life. Finding balance is rather an exercise in finding a healthy perspective that works for you. Nobody but you can make the right choices and work out what is best for you to bring about a sense of satisfaction of physical, mental, financial, intellectual, professional, and social well-being.

Everyone has to find his or her own individual balance

The quest for work-life balance begins with defining what balance means to you. Reflect on what you value most in life and prioritize them. Include your family in your contemplations of choices and consequences. Establish a set of boundaries between an adequate amount of effort and return. Consider your personal and professional aspirations, the family and social life you desire, your hobbies and interests and your goals and dreams.

Ask yourself, “How much is adequate?” and, “How much success and money is good enough?” Set boundaries and limits between what you must do and what you want to achieve in the short term and in the long term. The choices you make and your ability to respect the limits your set for yourself should shape your work and career, not the other way around.

Explore alternate arrangements at work

After you reflect on what could constitute a sense of individual balance for you, examine your career objectives. Once you are clear about what you want, consider the potential consequences to your employer. Discuss your options and proposals with a trusted advisor, the human resources / personnel department, and your boss. Most companies care for their employees enough to offer options for part-time or flexible schedules, working from home or sabbaticals.

Lead a life to your own script, not to others’

The world will shape your life, if you let it. Establish what you want to achieve in your life; do not let others impose their proposals for you. Make the right choices and live true to your values. This is, in essence, the key to finding the illusive work-life balance.

Recommended Reading

• 7 easy ways to get more done in less time
• How hard you should work
• Make your weekends feel longer
• Who manages your career?

***See other articles related to happiness, time management, managing priorities, effectiveness, personal organization, getting things done, execution, work-life balance

Consider the all-too-familiar boss’s pet employee at an office. He uses flattery, goes out of his way to help the boss, curries personal favors, and constantly tows the boss’s line no matter how unreasonable it is. He never corrects the boss when necessary. He either sugarcoats or withholds information that the boss would rather not hear. Over time, he has perfected the art of stroking his boss’s exaggerated sense of self-worth.

How about leaders who go overboard on their intention to exceed customer expectations and turn out to be “customer compelled?” They bend over backward to fulfill every whim and fancy of their customers to the likely peril of their own organization’s values and priorities.

Sucking up or brown-nosing is widespread approach to win a boss’s approval solely with one’s own self-interest in mind. Consider the consequences of sucking up:

• An employee that sucks up to his boss loses the respect of his peers and employees. They assume positive discrimination and favoritism because of his ingratiatory behavior. The suck-up recursively promotes sucking up in his organization — he encourages others to establish themselves in his good graces.
• Suck-ups quickly get into a pattern of slavishly reacting to every impulse of the boss. Without realizing, they become vulnerable to obligations to support their boss. Neither can they set limits on favors, nor do they stand up for themselves or their employees.

Be Resourceful, Don’t Suck Up

“One does not make the strengths of the boss productive by toadying to him. One does it by starting out with what is right and presenting it in a form which is accessible to the superior.”
* Peter Drucker, in The Effective Executive

Contrary to popular opinion, a vast majority of promotions are not handed out to employees who are most willing to suck up. Research and empirical evidence proves that employees who are honest, sincere, open, straightforward, and helpful earn management’s respect and attention over time. They move up fast because of their demonstrated ability to make the right choices. In addition, most people can innately distinguish the brown-nosers and differentiate genuine compliments from insincere flattery.

Do not get me wrong. There is enormous value in being helpful to the boss. After all, making yourself resourceful can go a long way in staying in the boss’s good graces. It can open professional opportunities and increase your access to new ideas, initiatives, and restricted information. However, there is an obvious boundary between doing favors and sucking up. Running an urgent errand when the boss is busy preparing for an important meeting or watching over his pet when he is travelling are well within reason. Compromising your values and priorities just to get on the boss’s side will not get you anywhere in the long term. Try these suggestions:

• Be sincere and timely in your compliments. Refrain from making flattering remarks.
• Use facts and logic to support or challenge the boss’s ideas. Never praise, or comment on your boss or his plans in front of others.
• Ask your boss how you could help him achieve his goals and follow-up earnestly.

Recommended Reading

• Four keys to an excellent relationship with your boss
• Never surprise your boss
• How to seek proactive feedback from your manager
• Are you ready for a promotion?
• Talent is more than skin-deep

***See other articles related to Managing the boss, flattery, promotions, career planning, managing people, sucking up

The ‘Axe Effect’

Consider the following ‘news’ story (possibly a spoof) from a few weeks ago.

Vaibhav Bedi of India sued Unilever, the Anglo-Dutch consumer goods conglomerate, for “depression and psychological damage” caused by letdown from the ‘Axe Effect.’ Vaibhav believed in ads that showed attractive women throwing themselves at men who use the Axe brand of deodorants. “I used it for seven years but no girl came to me,” he said in his complaint accusing the manufacturer of false advertising.

False advertising? Hardly. The ‘Axe Effect’ often works. Clothing, cosmetics and lifestyle companies sell more than merchandise — they sell means of boosting a consumer’s self-confidence. Studies have shown that when men and women improve their appearances, they feel more self-assured. Naturally, charm and self-assurance are very appealing characteristics. As a result, others pay confident people more attention, seek their company and value their opinions. Individuals who are perceived as attractive stand a better chance at winning others over, securing jobs and promotions, and benefit from better career prospects.

Clothes Talk, People Listen

It is possible through the skilful manipulation of dress in any particular situation to evoke a favourable response to your positioning and your needs.
* John T Molloy, Source: ‘New Dress for Success’

Attractiveness is not the only thing others judge you on, but it is generally an important subliminal consideration. Attractiveness encompasses clothing and accessories, tidiness and grooming, physical appearance and posture, flair, mannerisms, personality and other traits. Of these attributes, your clothing style is the easiest to improve.

Look, the clothes you put on effect how you feel throughout the day. Your awareness of yourself has a considerable impact on how others perceive you. By dressing sharply and looking neat, you can become more self-assured and attractive. Follow the following four simple guidelines. Seek suggestions from a tailor at a clothing store in your neighbourhood or a mall.

• Research and adopt a dress style that is appropriate to your industry, place of work and social circle. Observe the dress styles of successful professionals and executives in your company/industry.
• Conform but choose a distinctive wardrobe that projects the impression you desire. Dress for the position to which you aspire.
• Choose clothes that are comfortable and make you feel good about yourself.
• Err on the side of conservative styles and darker shades. Simple and classic is often reasonably priced and sophisticated enough.

Recommended Reading

• Be mindful of personal spaces for social interaction
• Tricks for keeping good eye contact
• 7-38-55 rule of personal communication
• The twelve most persuasive words in English

***See other articles related to Lifestyle, clothing and appearance, body language, decorum, etiquette, demeanour, persuasion, self-confidence

Promotions Can be Stressful

Last year, researchers at the University of Warwick found that the mental health of managers typically deteriorates after a job promotion.  Part of this anxiety is attributable to,

1. the loss of the security of a familiar role and the established relationships around the role,
2. perceived cognitive inadequacies concerning demands of the new position, and,
3. the uncertainty of transition and the innate human resistance to change.

The greater part of this anxiety is a common career mistake. Often, professionals take up new responsibilities for which they are not entirely prepared. Even when management judged them as qualified for the new role, without thinking through a new role before accepting the promotion, these professionals unintentionally position themselves for stressful transitions, bitterness, or eventual failure.

When Is It Time to Move On?

Do not assume that you are ready for a promotion just because you possess the right academic background, you look the part, you have the right contacts within the company, or, you have impressed your management with your capability to develop a few good ideas and articulate them well.

Here are a few questions to reflect on and assess your chance of a successful promotion or a horizontal transition.

• Are you enthusiastic about taking on a new role? Does the new role fit into your medium- and long-term career plans?
• Have you been performing your present duties well enough to justify a promotion?
• Do you have a successor in mind for your current role? Have you made yourself replaceable? Are you willing to entrust your current responsibilities to a successor without a significant interruption in pace of work?
• Are you qualified or experienced enough to do no less than, say, 40% of the new role reasonably well?
• Have you demonstrated eagerness to gain knowledge of the new responsibilities?
• Are you familiar with the responsibilities, autonomy, challenges, opportunities, and deliverables of the new role? Do you know how to get things done in the new role? Do you know where to get help?
• Are you proficient with the communication, networking and interpersonal skills needed to make it in the new role? Will you get along with your peers, subordinates, and management at the new role?
• Are you at ease with the demands on the new role: time, travel, pressures, and challenges? Can your family (or other aspects of your personal life) support this transition?
• Can you swallow your pride if you are rejected for the new role? Are you ready to seek honest feedback about how management values you, listen, and make yourself more promotable in the future?

The more questions you answer with a “Yes” to, the better your chances for a successful promotion. Reflect on the questions you answer with a “No” to. Create a growth plan, improve your professional profile, and, ask for feedback from management on what you can do deserve a promotion.

Recommended Reading

• How to write a job description for your present position
• Seeking proactive feedback from your manager
• Do you deserve a raise?
• Seeking proactive feedback from your manager
• Getting recognition to help career advancement

***See other articles related to promotions, job transitions, career planning, managing your career, career success

In response to my previous article on why résumés should not list references, blog reader Ana Maria inquired, “I’ve been asked to provide references before an interview. What should I do?”

Short answer: decline politely. Say, “I prefer to give you a list of references after my interview.” Here is why.

References are relevant only during the later part of the recruiting process, i.e. after a prospective employer has interviewed you and desires to check others’ impressions of you prior to extending you an offer.

As a candidate, you should choose to describe yourself first to the prospective employer in an interview. Your references should represent your credentials only after you and the employer have established a mutual interest. This is the established protocol.

Besides, providing references after an interview is respectful of your references. You would not want to bother your references too often or make public their contact information.

The above guideline holds even if you are interviewing through a contracting firm or recruitment agency. Such intermediaries routinely complete reference checks before they present worthy candidates to their clients/recruiters. For that reason, the recruiting agency may contact your references after an initial interview with a representative of the agency. Subsequently, the agency may forward your references’ opinions to a prospective employer, but should not pass your references’ contact information.

Recommended Reading

• The ‘STAR’ technique to answer behavioral interview questions
• Résumé references not necessary
• The hurry-burry résumé

***See other articles related to interviewing, job search, resume tips, hiring, recruiting, job interviews

On occasion, personal integrity and ethical conduct can be challenging. Greed, selfishness, distrust and other inclinations can result in misrepresentations, deliberate omission of facts to throw a positive spin on things, purposeful oversight, misuse of information and self-interested behavior.

Warren Buffett, one of the world’s most successful investors and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, directs that all his employees follow this rule of ethics in every undertaking.

“… I want employees to ask themselves whether they are willing to have any contemplated act appear the next day on the front page of their local paper — to be read by their spouses, children and friends — with the reporting done by an informed and critical reporter.”

The key to personal integrity is to gather all the relevant data, define the “right thing,” exercise prudence and standup for what is right. Good intentions do not necessarily translate to action. Your thoughts and actions define your credibility at work and in the society.

Credit: Warren Buffett’s picture courtesy of user ‘trackrecord’ on flickr.com

***See other articles related to transparency, ethics, integrity, conduct

A couple of years ago, I compiled a list of job interview questions and loosely categorized this list by personal attributes, career performance, communication skills, team skills, managerial skills, and leadership skills.

I have since shared this list with recruiting managers (interviewers) and job candidates (interviewees) who I have coached. I suggest that recruiting managers choose eight questions on varied topics for a thirty-minute interview. Job candidates can select twenty-five questions and practice answering these questions by recording and reviewing their answers.

Free Download: Job Interview Questions (PDF file)

Recommended Reading

• The ‘STAR’ technique to answer behavioral interview questions. In answering job interview questions, the best way to impress an interviewer is to discuss your credentials and accomplishments in terms of personal success stories.
• Résumé guidelines: fonts and text size, one-page rule, references, updating often, difference between résumé and curriculum vitae, avoiding clichéd superlatives and proclamations.

***See other articles related to Job search, interviewing, recruiting, career

In this Fast Company article, Gary Flake, Director of Live Labs at Microsoft identifies Systems Thinking as an important trait for career success.

There are three traits that will serve anyone wanting any role at any company, not just ours: systems thinking, passion, and clear communication. Systems thinking is a way of looking at the world that allows you to see how many small pieces come together to make a more complex whole. System thinkers see the hidden interconnections that bind together the parts and know how to make the best use of ambiguity and uncertainty as a result.

Gary’s reflection reiterates the importance of understanding context and perspective in our jobs. A previous blog article and a podcast discussed this indispensable trait for success.

Systems Thinking for a Big Picture Approach

From an early age, we’re taught to break apart problems in order to make complex tasks and subjects easier to deal with. But this creates a bigger problem . . . we lose the ability to see the consequences of our actions, and we lose a sense of connection to a larger whole.
* Peter Senge

Traditional methods of problem analysis concentrate on dividing problems into smaller, more comprehensible components. The drawback of understanding isolated or unrelated elements, functions, and events is that the effects of changes to one element on other elements of the whole are rarely considered.

In contrast, the discipline of Systems Thinking emphasizes analyzing the whole in terms of interrelationships of its elements. Examining structures, relationships, and outcomes facilitates taking into account any secondary consequences of decisions and actions pertaining individual elements.

We work in increasingly connected organizations where an event that affects one part of an organization is likely to have a meaningful effect–in the short-term or the long-term–on another part of the organization. The discipline of Systems Thinking enables us to develop a broader, holistic perspective of problems and opportunities in businesses and make effective decisions.

Resources, References

Over the last couple of decades, System Thinking has evolved into a formal discipline and has incorporated several rigorous analysis techniques. Here are two excellent resources to help you gain more knowledge of these methods.

• The ‘Thinking’ in Systems Thinking: Seven Essential Skills, Barry Richmond
• The Fifth Discipline: The Art and Practice of the Learning Organization, Peter Senge

Recommended Reading, Listening

• Ideas for Impact Podcast ‘The Importance of Understanding Perspective’
• How to broaden your thinking and grow on your job

***See other articles related to career success, skills for success, systems thinking, analytical reasoning, decision making, problem solving, big picture, thought process