Embracing Value-Based Leadership for Organizational Resilience

In today’s post-pandemic business world, organizations are steering through novel challenges. Amid this climate, the critical role of effective leadership is paramount. One effective approach is value-based leadership, which is a model of using a fundamental system of organizational core values to govern operations, rather than just meeting deadlines or hitting targets.

In this blog, we outline the six reasons why value-based leadership is crucial in today’s volatile business environment and provide actionable advice on implementing these principles in your organization.

1.  Building Trust through Authenticity

Trust, earned through consistent and transparent conduct, plays a pivotal role in fostering commitment and loyalty among teams, boosting organizational credibility, and resonating with the public.

Actionable Advice: Keep communications transparent and hold regular, open meetings. Reflect your words in your actions, and when you falter, acknowledge and learn from your mistakes.

2.  Offering Clear Direction

Leaders who resolutely uphold their organizational core values provide their teams with a clear path and maintain focus on shared organizational objectives, even amid external distractions or pressures.

Actionable Advice: Clearly define your organization’s goals and frequently communicate them to ensure team members understand their roles in achieving them.

3.  Fostering Resilience and Adaptability

Value-based leaders demonstrate a blend of adaptability and resilience, crucial traits in positioning an organization for survival and long-term success.

Actionable Advice: Encourage a growth mindset by promoting a culture that sees challenges as learning opportunities. One practical starting point could be a mentorship program that connects seasoned team members with newcomers.

4.  Inspiring Employee Engagement

Leaders who prioritize their team’s well-being and align with the broader organizational mission motivate and engage employees, enhancing productivity, even in challenging situations.

Actionable Advice: Regularly acknowledge your team’s efforts and recognize instances where they’ve displayed the company’s core values. This validation can have a powerful motivating effect.

5.  Championing Ethical Decision-Making

Turbulent times often bring ethical dilemmas into sharp focus. Leaders anchored in strong values can more effectively navigate these challenges, ensuring their decisions align with the best interests of their team and the organization.

Actionable Advice: Develop an organizational code of ethics reflecting your core values to serve as a decision-making guide. This code should clearly state your mission, values, and the expected conduct within the organization. Regularly hold discussions around hypothetical ethical scenarios, using the code as a guide for responses. By doing so, you embed the importance of ethical alignment in daily decision-making.

6.  Encouraging a Long-Term Perspective

Organizations often find themselves in a tug-of-war between short-term objectives and long-term, sustainable growth. While immediate gains might be appealing, it’s crucial to keep sight of the bigger picture.

Actionable Advice: Integrate value-aligned goals into your strategic planning, balancing immediate targets with long-term aspirations. Emphasize the concept of sustainability, which refers not just to environmental considerations, but also to the capacity for enduring success. The idea is to strive for decisions that contribute positively to your organization’s future trajectory, not just for short-term gains.

Transitioning toward value-based leadership demands commitment, patience, and courage, yet the benefits are substantial. By fostering resilience, prioritizing ethical decision-making, and maintaining a long-term perspective, leaders can prepare for any challenges ahead, transforming them into opportunities for growth.

As we navigate the complexities of the post-pandemic landscape, value-based leadership evolves from being a tool to a vital strategy. We invite you to share your experiences, insights, or queries about value-based leadership. How have you incorporated value-based leadership in your organization? How has it impacted your decision-making and strategic planning during these uncertain times? Leave a comment below, send us an email, or connect with us on Twitter. 

What Does the Workforce of the Future Look Like?

Organizations are changing in big ways. And while many people are looking for clues in the economy, Brexit, and the current administration, there’s another change — almost a revolution — quietly taking place right under our noses. That change is the massive shift in workplace demographics which will impact every industry.  

The future of work will look very different than it does today.

To remain strong and successful throughout the next years, organizational leaders need to get in front — and stay in front — of some very powerful trends.

To understand this massive transformation, we are going to discuss four, meta demographic trends:

1. Longevity
2. Women in business
3. Diversity in the workplace
4. Freelancing

Trend One: Longevity

Our workforce is aging. A US Baby Boomer, someone born between 1946-1964, turns 50 years old every 8.5 seconds. According to the US Census Bureau, 20% of the total U.S. population will be over the age 65 by 2029. The big question is: will Baby Boomers retire at age 65?

If they do retire, they will do it differently than in the past, using 4 phases:

• Pre–retirement: Five years before retiring, 37 percent of pre-retirees who want to work during retirement will have already taken some meaningful steps to prepare for their post-retirement career; this rises to 54 percent among those within two years of retirement.
• Career Intermission: Most pre-retirees do not seek to go directly from pre- retirement work to retirement work. They want a break to relax, recharge and retool. More than half (52 percent) of working retirees say they took a break when they first retired. These career intermissions average 2.5 years.
• Re-engagement: On average, this phase lasts nine years and includes a new balance of work and leisure. Compared to those in their pre- retirement careers, people working in these “Flex Careers” are nearly five times more likely to work part-time (83 percent vs. 17 percent) and three times more likely to be self-employed (32 percent vs. 11 percent).
• Leisure: In the fourth phase of retirement, people welcome the opportunity to rest, relax, socialize, travel and focus on other priorities. Working retirees expect health challenges (77 percent) or simply not enjoying work as much (61 percent) to be the most likely causes to permanently stop working.

Who is taking the place of retiring Baby Boomers?

As Baby Boomers leave, who’s coming in? Millennials, those people born between 1981 and 1996. Millennials care deeply about an organization’s mission, purpose, and values. The largest part of the US workforce, Millennials also bring along new challenges. According to a Deloitte survey:

• 58% of Millennials expect to leave their jobs in three years or less.
• 79% of Millennials would consider quitting a regular job and working for themselves in the future.
• 58% think the corporate world is outdated and want to carve their own path.

If this is what Millennials expect, how do organizations adapt accordingly?

Trend Two: Women in businesses

A US seismic shift occurred in the 1970s and ‘80s when, for the first time since before World War II, married women with young children began to make their way back into the workforce.

The role of women in the workforce is changing very quickly—and that’s the second major workforce trend to discuss. Women are more engaged at work (33%) compared to men (28%). Women hold as many college degrees as men and earn 50% more graduate degrees as men.

Yet big challenges remain. It is expected that it will take 475 years for women to reach equality in executive suites. Though women hold 53% of entry level jobs, they hold only 26% of senior management roles and only 3.1% of senior executive positions at Fortune 500 companies.

What do women want?

For women, work flexibility (83%) ranked as the most important job factor when evaluating job prospects. Work-life balance came second at 75% and salary was ranked third at 74%. Yet for many reasons they’re not getting what they want. Consequently, women are voting with their feet. The number of firms owned by minority women has grown 163% since 2007. There are more than 12.3 million women-owned firms, employing 9.2 million people and doing $1.8 trillion in sales.

If you’re not accommodating women in the workforce, you’re training your competition. Is that what you want to do?

Trend Three: Diversity in the workplace

The third demographic trend is diversity. According to Statistics Canada Agency, deaths in Canada are expected to outnumber births by 2030; immigration will soon be Canada’s only source of population growth. In another example, up to 30% of the UK’s population will be from ethnic minorities by 2050.

In the US, 95% of U.S. population growth is attributed to ethnic groups. In addition, demographers predict that the U.S. will be completely majority-minority by the 2040’s. What does that mean? Caucasians will then comprise 49.7 percent of the population in contrast to 24.6 percent for Hispanics, 13.1 percent for blacks, 7.9 percent for Asians, and 3.8 percent for multiracial populations.

The United States is transitioning from a nation whose majority population is white, or European-American, to a nation in which the majority of the population will soon be young people of color. This is already the case in many states around the U.S. including Hawaii, California, New Mexico and Washington DC.

In 2015, the percentage of people 25 and older who achieved a Bachelor’s degree or more was: Asian 53.9%; Non-Hispanic white 36.2%; White alone 32.8%; Black 22.5%; and Hispanic of any race 15.5%.

This indicates that in the future, we’ll have a more diverse workforce that may not have the same levels of education of our current workforce. How will that impact you?

Trend 4: Freelancing

Freelance workers work for themselves and bid for temporary jobs and projects with one or more employers. According to Forbes, currently, 57 million Americans (35% of the workforce) are considered Contingent, Temporary, Diversified, or Freelance Workers. This workforce contributes about $1 trillion annually to the economy through their freelance work.

There will be enormous growth as project needs will be fulfilled, which in turn will lead to the growth of technology and infrastructure.  Is your organization preparing for freelancers appropriately?

How do these trend impact you?

Technology is never constant and keeps evolving. The push for workplace flexibility will only accelerate in the future, as employees demand that workplaces fit their lifestyle needs.

Organizations will need to get in front of these demographic trends to remain strong and successful throughout the next decade. The future belongs to organizations that are willing to adjust to rapidly changing realities. These workforce trends are coming faster than you think. It’s clear that to survive, let alone thrive, you need to prepare for these four trends. Will you be ready? Click here if you’d like our cheat sheet of best practices to prepare for the future workforce.

Managers, we want to hear from you! Tell me about your experience with managing Baby Boomers vs. Millennials. What has worked and not worked for you in managing a diverse workforce? What has been the role of women leaders in your organizational growth? Are freelancers on the rise in your organization?

Let’s share experiences. Leave a comment below, send me an email, or find me on Twitter.

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Five Tips to Manage Unmanageable Employees

There are many types of employees in the workforce:

1. The Rude-Nik: They happily supply their co-workers with hissy fits and bad moods at will.
2. The Egomaniac: Let’s just say these employees aren’t exactly “team players.”
3. The AWOL: They are the ones who at this very moment may be missing from the office despite a team project being due.

These are just a few of many personality types that Jezra Kaye and I help managers address with our book, Managing the Unmanageable: How to Motivate Even the Most Unruly Employee.

Today, I’d like to introduce someone equally difficult to manage—The Grumbler. Possibly you’ve even had to dodge a little grumbling today?

It’s hard to cope with The Grumbler in an office environment—or anywhere, really. They complain, complain, and complain until the entire team’s enthusiasm is as good as gone. It’s not just enthusiasm they squash. Good ideas don’t have much of a chance of survival with their constant negative feedback.

What can a manager do with this person? Jezra and I created a tool kit, which we call the “5C’s.” They are easy to remember and just might help when handling The Grumbler.

1. COMMIT OR QUIT: First, you need to commit or quit. Retention is a serious consideration when looking at the cost of rehire. It can cost two to three times The Grumbler’s salary to search for and hire a replacement. If you want to keep this employee, commit to taking the time to coach and salvage your Unmanageable Employee (UE). You may not like their behavior, but with the following steps, you could greatly improve your working relationship.
2. COMMUNICATE: To get started on the salvage, you must communicate with The Grumbler. This conversation should not involve grumbling! Having a straightforward conversation with your UE may not sound fun, but it is a valuable management tool. Employees and managers alike have assumptions about each other. Starting to tackle those assumptions with an honest conversation can go a long way towards building a more consistent team.
3. CLARIFY GOALS AND ROLES: Take the opportunity while talking to The Grumbler to clarify goals and roles. Does your employee know what is expected of him or her at work? They may think they do, and they may be totally wrong. Clarify those expectations and set goals for future expectations. Communicating the goals and roles of your employees gives them a tool for success.
4. COACH: Honest and productive conversations give your UE the chance to self-correct. However, an employee’s attitude greatly influences their performance, their impact on the team, and their responsiveness to being managed. Here’s a solution for attitude adjustment: Coaching. Coaching is an effective way to shift a UE’s inner attitude. The coaching for manager will play an effective role in this. Beyond benefiting your relationship with this employee, and the UE’s relationship with the team, it can greatly improve your UE’s career. We all want to have a positive impact on our employees, don’t we? Even The Grumbler has a career path that can be developed.
5. CREATE ACCOUNTABILITY: The truth is, even with communication, clear goals and coaching, bad habits are hard to break. Don’t give up. Instead, create accountability with your UE by developing a clear action plan. In this case, work with The Grumbler to create milestones and action items. An added benefit to this process is the opportunity to improve your management skills. You are more aware of what may, and may not, be happening, and can continue to communicate and coach your UE throughout the ongoing, clearly defined, process.

Managers, I want to hear from you! Tell me about your experience with those irritating grumblers. What has worked and not worked for you in managing them? How have they affected your team? Is grumbling contagious? Leave a comment below, send me a message, or tweet me.

Let’s share experiences. Leave a comment below, send me an email, or find me on Twitter.

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Five Tips for Coaching Top Performers

Executive coaching programs helps effective managers become even stronger. The same can be said of Olympic coaches and the athletes they coach.

A recent article in the Harvard Business Review looked at various coaching strategies and strengths that have helped coaches produce winning athletes in intense situations. Thinking of employees as athletes, five keys to success are identified as:

1. Help your “athletes” understand and learn to use their talents and skills in the work environment. Allow them to be creative. When creativity is allowed, employees feel free to use their interest and skills to develop a better product. Take the time to build in space for creative uses of skills into different projects.
2. Build a strong, transparent relationship with your mentee, to establish an open line of communication with them. Honesty is key. Olympic athletes have usually had the same coach since they were youngsters; even if they adopt other coaches along the way, their original mentor and trainer is always there to support them on game-day.
3. For athletes, training is the most crucial part. They must be up to date on the latest rules, techniques and competitor training habits and performances. The workplace is similar. Push your employees to investigate new technologies, and encourage attendance at training sessions, industry-relevant conferences and membership organizations.
4. Athletes receive different types of support including financial, motivational, nutritional, and more. Help steer your employees in the right direction and make it easier for them to “win.” Steering may look like helping your employees find grants for departmental team-building activities or building relationships with cross-organizational teams. Steering may also look like hiring effective managers who will appoint appropriate project leaders.
5. I found the 5th point to be the most compelling: managing the environment for your employees. You know your organization and industry inside and out so give your employees the perspective needed to help them create innovative solutions they can carry with them to future leadership positions.

Have you seen this parallel between athletic coaches and workplace leadership? How did it impact your team and organization?

Let’s share experiences. Leave a comment below, send me an email, or find me on Twitter.

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