The Business Case of Coaching

 

The coaching comprises of 4 major aspects namely; productivity, learning, rate of investment and people. Check out the Infographic for complete information.

How to Grow Human Capital During Hard Times

 

Without a doubt, the most important capital right now remains human capital. Organizations that will thrive after the pandemic are taking actions now to improve their future stock of this form of capital that delivers over 90% of organizational results.

As I write this, medical and financial fears abound. Much of the U.S. (and the world) is reeling from either the direct effects of the corona virus pandemic or the restrictive orders in many areas. Coming into sight is another fear – of the long-term losses in our personal financial and national economic systems. What degree of financial security do individuals and families still have?

Businesses have been forced to close or have lost many of their customers. Local and state organizations may face substantial reductions in budget. Cash is in short supply, and the future is looking murky, at best.

Under these conditions, what actions should hard-pressed leaders take? Accept government grants and forgivable loans? Cut costs and reduce full-time staff? Motivate shareholder or customer loyalty? Maintain or acquire tangible assets like machines or upgraded factories?

The answer might surprise you.

But first…

What Is Human Capital?

Many people are surprised to hear that something called “human capital” even exists.

That’s because, in the U.S., we don’t always think of developing our people as an intrinsic, necessary part of growing our organizations or our economy. This attitude is left over from the Industrial Age, when manufacturing was the primary driver of results, success was based on your ability to build a better, faster and cheaper widget, and manufacturing employees were considered just another cog in the process.

Old ideas die hard. But if we look at the past thirty years, it’s clear that our most successful organizations — from Amazon to Apple, from NASA to Walmart to Pfizer— aren’t thriving because of their superior assembly lines, but rather because of their superior ideas.

And who is it that generates ideas?

People.

To Understand Human Capital — and How to Develop It — Look to the Military

It used to be that — just like in the private sector — the world’s military organizations were competing to amass equipment. If you wanted a dominant military, you needed to have more ships, more tanks, and more munitions than your adversaries.

But today, military equipment, like all other tangible capital, has become a commodity. It’s reasonably cheap, readily available and in great supply. That’s why it no longer signals superiority. That’s why the U.S. military now understands that physical capital is no longer a differentiator for the world’s militaries and that superiority today isn’t based on having more equipment; it’s based on having better trained people.

Look at the example of education.

Does the Military Have a Human Capital Strategy for Education?

For more than eighty years, the U.S. military has led the nation with its efforts to optimize its human capital systems, adopt novel human capital strategies, and use analytics to assess and improve its human capital performance.

In keeping with this, our military has a simple and effective strategy for education: It makes education and training available to all recruits, based on their talents and desire to learn.

How has this strategy benefited our nation?

The “American Century” was kicked off by both our country’s technological advances during World War II and by the gains in middle class education that allowed us to turn those advances into global business dominance.

But the military’s commitment to education didn’t end with armistice. Every year, our armed services operate the world’s largest educations system, where male and female Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Marines engage in formal professional development. And as the cost of private and public colleges continue the skyrocket, the military’s training and education system, costing well over $30 billion per year, is free for service members and remains a major reason for enlisting in our all-volunteer military.

Does the United States Have a Human Capital Strategy for Education?

Yes. And it is also simple, though much less effective than the military’s. Our strategy allocates the quality and amount of education according to your zip code and family’s financial acumen. Facts are stubborn things and we need to own this one.

80-90% of our current high school students are qualified to earn either a college degree or a technical training certification. Yet many of them will not achieve that dream because it’s become unrealistically expensive.

How would things be different in this country if education were allocated based on your drive and desire to learn, not on line 42 (adjusted gross income) of your parents’ federal income tax return?

How much more would an educated and certified national population be able to contribute to our growth and resilience, during good times and bad?

I believe that our wealth and productivity would grow exponentially, along with the percentage of our citizenry that was vested in that growth. And perhaps the current pandemic will clear the way for developing bold new experiments such as student loan forgiveness, free virtual learning, even mechanisms for containing college costs to help us test that proposition.

Human Capital Will Light Our Way

Even before the corona virus pandemic, the United States was wrestling with major social issues such as inequality, the mismatch between workers skills and available jobs, apathy, alienation, and unnecessary displacement and despair. Too many, we’ve lost our way and we tend to fight over trivial issues, forgetting that long-term national success depends on perpetual strategic investments in national human capital.

The pandemic has laid bare, for those who choose to see, how impoverished our stores of both tangible and intangible capital had become. We’ve woken up to an understanding of how low our levels of not just medical supplies but also of leadership, truthfulness and problem-solving skills, have dipped.

Yet the pandemic has forced each of us — from business owners to employees, from policymakers to members of the public — to begin to develop our own human capital strategies. To ask: where, in these hard times, do we put our energy? Our creativity? Whatever money we command?

Do we compete to accumulate wipes and masks and tangible goods, confident in the individualized idea that “he who dies with the most toys wins”?

Or do we also support, help, train, educate and invest in each other — strengthening our families and work teams, sharing knowledge and know-how, coaching each other to higher levels of capability until this challenge begins to pass?

Our nation’s first responders and medics have already courageously answered this question.

Now it’s up to the rest of us to follow.

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

Subscribe To Our Newsletter

Tips For Effective Coaching Questions

Questions must be open-minded, advice free, forward-focused and questions must be short. Following these tips help in the effective coaching questions.

Manage Your Energy to Reduce Stress

There are four different quadrants of energy management to reduce stress. These are physical energy, mental energy, emotional energy and spiritual energy. Check out this Infographic and learn the four different quadrants to manage your energy to reduce stress.

How to Onboard Employees Virtually

The COVID-19 quarantine has changed a lot and changed the way we used to do business. Onboarding new employee is just one perfect example. We can no longer welcome a new employee in person at the office due to COVID-19 pandemic. The organizations have to rethink how to create an employee experience virtually. Check out the 3-step process to virtually onboard employees.

How and Why to Ask For What You Want at Work

I still cringe when I think of the time I got my haircut during my teenage years. The hairdresser asked how I wanted it cut and I replied, “I don’t care. You choose.” In that moment, I gave away total control of how I looked to a complete stranger!

As a child, I never learned to clearly ask for what I wanted. I always said, “I don’t care” even when I did care. I didn’t want to rock the boat and create conflict, so I kept quiet instead of voicing my opinion or request.

Through lots of personal development work, I slowly improved in speaking up. In fact, I went a little overboard and became a touch demanding at times. Telling my mom, “I need you to do this by tomorrow” was probably not the best way to treat her! Over time, I’ve slowly learned when to speak up and when not to speak up.

What is Self-Advocating?

Though it often doesn’t come naturally, speaking up and self-advocating is a vital professional and personal skill. What is it? It’s the ability to say what we need, want and hope for in life and at work. It’s the capacity to ask questions humbly, and admit mistakes. It’s about standing up for yourself and others in the face of large or small injustices.

Why You Need to Speak Up at Work

Let’s talk about work. When you don’t self-advocate, your approach to your career is passive. You rely on your manager to know what is best for you, how you’d like to progress, and what factors and peer behaviors are impacting your work. But not all managers can keep track of exactly what’s going on in their team member’s day-to-day life, and zero managers can read minds. Without communicating what you want, and what is standing in your way, you are relying on the unknown to shape your career and life.

Much of my coaching focuses on speaking up and asking for what you want. And I don’t just mean asking for a raise or a new position. It can be small things too, like when a colleague does something that irritates you, or when a client asks for more than the contract stipulates. These are examples of speaking up for your own good, as well as the good of your team or organization.

But How Do You Self-Advocate?

So how do you do it? I asked Jezra Kaye, a public speaking coach who works with people to improve public speaking skills. Her company is called Speak Up for Success; she’s the perfect person to turn to for self-advocacy help! Here are her five steps for asking for what you want.

Asking For What You Want at Work: 5 Steps

1.    Know Your Value— What do you bring to your company or team that they would otherwise have to do without? What have you accomplished for them? Can you put a dollar figure on the clients you’ve won, or the time you’ve saved through good practices? Even intangibles like increasing team morale can sometimes be quantified (“Our team lost only one member last year; the other teams all lost two or more”).

2.    Do Your Research— What do others at your level, in your field, get paid? How fast have others in your company been promoted? Are you being fairly compensated (often, women and people of color are not)?  Should you be making more than others, because you supervise more people, manage more projects, or have special expertise?

3.    Develop Your Strategy— You know your manager! Are they best approached at 8 am on Monday morning? Over drinks on Thursday night? After a difficult project has wrapped? Should you make an appointment, or have a casual conversation? Do they need time to process, or pressure to decide? And WHAT is the argument that will win them over?

4.    Plan Your Speech— Don’t leave this important conversation to chance! Work out what you’re going to say, and then…

5.    Practice, Practice, PRACTICE Look, asking for what you want can make you uncomfortable. It can make all of us uncomfortable. The truth is, there is a very slim chance you will get what you want unless you ask. Follow these five steps and give it a shot.

Do you have a story about self-advocacy in your own life? Maybe a time where it made all the difference for you or a time that it could have?

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

Subscribe To Our Newsletter

How to Onboard Employees Virtually During a Quarantine

The COVID-19 quarantine changed how we do business. Onboarding a new employee is just one example; since we can no longer welcome a new employee in person at the office, we must rethink how to create the new employee experience virtually. Our company had the opportunity to virtually onboard employees multiple times in the past few weeks, using a 3-step process.

Step 1: Pre-Onboard

It’s best to plan ahead for logistics and communications when virtually onboarding. If your entire office is working from home, communicate the plan one week ahead of time to all employees with this type of message and action step:

Maria is joining the team. Her first day is on Monday, April 20th. As usual with onboarding, Maria’s first few days will be consumed with meetings and greetings. Her current schedule for Monday and Tuesday is:

• Monday, 10 am: Organizational onboarding with team lead
• Monday, 11am: Meet the President / CEO
• Monday, 1 pm – 4 pm: On an individual basis, meet each team member (15-30 minutes each)
• Tuesday: Connect with the IT department for allocation of computer system
• Tuesday 2 pm: Weekly project meeting

TAKE ACTION: Please set up a 30-minute Zoom session with Maria on Monday between 1 – 4 pm.

For uniformity of information, please use the below agenda during your meeting to help Maria to digest all the information she is receiving:

1.    Introduce yourself

·         Role in the project

·         Assignments and interest outside of the project

·         How long you have been with the organization

2.    Three interesting things about the project, team &/or the organization

3.    Ask questions

·         Show interest in her background

·         Answer work questions

Step 2: Onboard

The actual onboarding call is similar to an in-person onboarding meeting. You will cover the same material, just via video or phone. A possible agenda could include:

1.    Organization History

2.    Organization Structure

3.    Administrative

Step 3: Post-Onboard

This step is the most challenging in a virtual situation. Once the new employee meets everyone and understands team roles, how do you ensure the employee feels challenged and engaged? If you can no longer chat over lunch or coffee in the office, how do you stay connected with the person, to answer any questions they may have?

Our team texts new employees daily at first, to ask about what support they may need. In addition, we do video coffee chats and regular calls, to let them know we’re available to answer any questions. Also, the HR team discusses new employees weekly, to ensure all leaders are aware of any new employee challenges and/or success stories.

If we were operating in an office environment, new employees would have the opportunity to listen to and participate in informal office discussions about the work, accelerating their situational awareness. Since many organizations don’t currently operate in a face to face environment, consider inviting the new hires to participate in your phone calls and Zoom calls, as schedules permit, even in those areas that may not be their primary areas of responsibility. This will allow them to gain background context.

That’s our employer perspective. What do our virtually onboarded employees say? Here’s what one new employee wrote about her virtual onboarding experience.

I met all employees virtually and completed the onboarding process via numerous Zoom meetings in my first week. The President already had two Zoom calls with me prior to onboarding, which increased my employee engagement prior to joining the company.

I have had the best experience as a new employee so far. The importance of working from home and its success lies in the management of work via the remote desktop and accessing shared files. I was provided with the login for this remote desktop and could access all important information to start my work. I did face some technological glitches in the functioning of remote desktop, but they were quickly resolved.

Managers you’ve read about the employer and employee experience with virtual onboarding. Now we want to hear from you! Tell us about your experience with virtual onboarding. What worked and didn’t work for you and your new hires? What has been the role of HR and individual employees in this process?

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

Subscribe To Our Newsletter