Matt Cartwright, consulting, coaching, facilitation - Professional Facilitator - Matt Cartwright

SHIFT HAPPENS...JOB CUTS and More...

29/8/2012

SHIFT HAPPENS

“If we don’t shift our intention, direction and action we will end up where we are headed”

SHIFT HAPPENS. So… start accepting it. Let go of trying to stop the change or slow it down. There are likely to be 7 billion other similar stories just like yours, they just have different characters and plots but the same underlying message. Everyone you talk to is sick of change. One approach is to be more effective rather than be affected by it.

Are you working in a stuck or non-stuck environment? If not….get yourself into a Teflon Team. Stop sticking to old habits, old processes, old teams, old whining and shift. There is a lot of bad press around the economy, job cuts, poverty, famine and war. It is serious, so get serious and SHIFT into gear.

Use all the gears to leverage your mindset and workplace to where it needs to shift.

In many facilitation exercises we talk about the current and future state, the important bits are in the middle…”the action state”…or the “shifting state.” The shifting state delivers targeted action, lots of it and regularly. Guess what? SHIFT happens. Most if it starts within the mind then shifts into behaviour.

“SHIFTING” is what I coined some time ago. It’s a deliberate process of shifting thoughts, behaviours, attitudes to develop a more adaptable, resilient and optimistic view in a shifting world. It’s a holistic process that deals with complex systems and aims to understand and respond to them with more agility and sustainability.

STRAINING…..Have you noticed how workplaces over-process, over-engineer, over-produce, over-change and over strain? It’s time to get over it…don’t you think?

UNDERSTANDING YOUR SHIFT

Whenever we change one type of behaviour or situation, we are losing as well as gaining something. In order to sustain real and lasting change in the workplace we need to change ourselves first. Everyone can shift. Shifting is challenging and requires effort but not straining. The juggling act is “knowing,” that is, knowing not to get caught up in everyone’s emergency, urgency or dramas. Of course we must balance what’s important and necessary. How you view or feel about a situation is always your choice.

So…SHIFT YOURSELF to think and do what matters most. Be more effective, be lateral, be creative, be a SHIFTER. Don’t get caught up in the change, we have limited influence and control over what people decide to change in the workplace but we can shift our focus.

Journey well,
Matt Cartwright
Inspiring People, Inspiring Business, Inspiring Results
© Copyright 2008 -12

Make Today Count and Make Decisions to Act on Important Things

9/4/2012

Make today count and make decisions to act on important things

Time is an equal opportunity employer, but how we treat time is not equal.

Many people will up wake today in a box, eat breakfast from a box, get to work in a box, turn on the box when they get to work, sit in a box, got to meetings in a box, go home in a box, sit down in front of a box, get dinner out of a box and maybe open a cylinder.    Does it sound familiar to you or others around you?

If something is vitally missing for you at work then I challenge you to make today count. Good decisions make a better today and a better tomorrow. From my blogs you have probably gathered I like to keep it simple. Simple is often hardest.   For example:

What are you avoiding at work?
Who are you avoiding at work?
Why are you avoiding these people or tasks?
What’s the payoff for you?

Elite performers, don’t avoid pain, they strengthen their will, their bodies and their intentions. They ask more powerful questions, seek inspiring answers and make every training session count.

Remember pay now, play later, or play now, pay later.

The truth is we all pay at some stage, there are no free lunches in the work place.

Here are three questions to focus your decisions

If you are really serious about improving team performance or your own performance ask the following:

What is required of me?
What gives me the greatest return?
What gives me the greatest reward?

These questions may help you focus on what areas to overlook for a while.

It’s not selfish, it’s life. People perform best when they focus on their preferred work preferences and their personal priorities.

How to motivate people is the perennial question of many supervisors. I always suggest you start with yourself. Set an example, model the way, enable others to do the same, start with better recruitment processes, onboarding and performance reviews.

Good talent leave an organisation for many factors but it comes down to the core truths that many of us know. Consider these actions to retain your top talent, otherwise you may be counting how many people walk out the door.

Discuss their career development
Reduce red tape and bureaucracy
Review, recognise, reward, and refocus
Mobilise top talent to mix with other top talent
Stop shifting sands focus them on strategic priorities.
Find a project for the talent that inspires their passion
Conduct quarterly, midterm and annual performance reviews
Back off, empower accountability and stop telling them how to do their Jobs

Remember the secret of your success is determined by your daily agenda, what’s on your priority list?

Journey well
Matt Cartwright
Inspiring People, Inspiring Business, Inspiring Results
© Copyright 2008 -12

6 Needs of Staff and 10 Free Coaching Challenges

19/3/2012

6 Needs of Staff and 10 Free Coaching Challenges

I have yet to work on project or coach a workplace team where the underlying root cause of all problems hasn’t been related to people, process and roles and their responsibilities.

I have also observed the following to be true. That is, there are at least 6 basic human needs to help with people in projects or people going through workplace change. What I have found is that employees look for:

1.     certainty
2.     variety
3.     significance
4.     connection
5.     growth
6.     contribution

This isn’t always easy to find for the employee when you have limited power or influence. Think about it from the employee’s perspective.

As a manager or business leader there will be tests. It's not always about the mark you achieve its learning and applying the process. Lasting results requires continuous action. Habitual actions lead to be progress. Research also shows that people who have well-formed goals, written down are more likely to achieve those who do not. Up to 95% more likely.

Coaching Challenge for Frustrated and Fed Up workplace managers, supervisors or leaders.

1.     What might you be contributing to the workplace situation that causes others frustration?
2.     How are you helping the workplace team address the 6 basic human needs?
3.     Who in the workplace needs more of your assistance?
4.     How will you measure your contribution in assisting others in their success?
5.     To be more effective than you currently are at work what will you do more of?
6.     To be more effective than you currently are at work what will you do less of?

Okay, break it down into:

1.     What behaviours need to change?
2.     What attitudes need to change?
3.     What thoughts need to change?
4.     What processes need to change?

Imagine if you had on your own coach to help you or your team achieve greater success.

What might be the outcome?
What would that outcome give you?
What is holding you back from getting a coach?

Journey well,
Matt Cartwright
Inspiring People, Inspiring Business, Inspiring Results
© Copyright 2008 -12

Strengthen Resilience in Change and Get Inspiring Results

15/3/2012

Strengthen Resilience in Change and Get Inspiring Results

Have you noticed how many workplaces struggle with implementing change correctly. Unfortunately this impacts on the bottom line, customer service and workplace culture.

Dealing with resistance to change will be one of your greatest barriers and greatest successes.

Research repeatedly tells us that change initiatives fail due to poor planning and most of all poor change sponsorship.

Resilience in the knowledge worker economy is key to your change management success.

Our company provides both consultancy and faciliation to assist organisational and workplace change programs.

Lessons Learned

Some of the most common errors that I have found when consulting in transforming teams, services and an organisation are that they have:

Allowed too much complacency,
Failed to create a sufficiently powerful guiding coalition,
Underestimated the power of vision,
Under communicated the vision by a factor of 10x-100x,
Permitted obstacles to block the new vision,
Failed to create short-term wins,
Declared victory too soon,
Neglected to anchor changes firmly in the corporate culture.

Critical Success Factors in Change Management Process

Here are my thoughts on the critical success factors in managing your organisational change, trust me, so many people fail to use a process. At least start with a process by addressing these key issues:

Define the purpose
Prepare a business case and project plan
Define the role of the sponsor/s
Manage human resource and industrial relations issues
Establish consultation and communication processes
Conduct a stakeholder analysis
Acquire and develop change agent skills
Identify and develop plans for managing risks/threats
Develop evaluation strategies

Strengthen your individual and team resilience, through partnering with us...

We improve your change initiatives providing options to suit you including:

practical change management training
change management planning
change management implementation
change management coaching
change management tools, assessments, templates and resources
supporting teams in transition
assisting leadership transform the business.

Journey well,
Matt Cartwright
Inspiring People, Inspiring Business, Inspiring Results
© Copyright 2008 -12

“Hang on... one thing at a time….”

14/3/2012

“Hang on... one thing at a time….”

”huh…” says the multitasker and drama queen who just loves 12 hour working days.

We are busier than ever. Thanks technology and consumerism. Okay it’s great, it just increases my choices and decisions. Of course I love being productive and doing work that is meaningful and purposeful.

So here are some useful strategies for your organisation or your work team. These strategies are likely to increase productivity and more innovative thinking if you model and encourage set periods to focus, as well as shorter periods to renew.

As a past manager, here are three guidelines I’d like to share with you, there are more, but I Iike these 3, they are easy and effective.

1. Manage meeting boundaries

Schedule meetings for 30-45 minutes, rather than an hour or longer, so people can stay focused, take time afterward to reflect on what's been discussed, and recover before the next task.

NO meetings straight after lunch. That’s’ known in the facilitation world as the lullaby period. Avoid it if you can.

Start all meetings at a precise time, end at a precise time, and insist that all phone calls not be taken, unless they have an urgent family matter.

Meetings must have an agenda, purpose, and a clear intended outcome.

Record minutes only if really, really needed. Seriously do you need them??

Another meeting process I like to use is team huddles, (or cuddles, if you get along real well) They are short sharp 5 -10 minutes focused on an issue and then disband. I pick a time near meal breaks so not to disrupt the flow of other work. Then say, what are you doing for lunch????

Team socialisation opportunity….!

2. Stop demanding or expecting instant actions of others

I ask people to get back to me by generally by COB, (close of business) rather than in 2 hours. I find the quality is better and the resistance is lower. If I say 2 hours it puts me under pressure as well. The goal is to get your people out of the pressure cooker, release the valve a bit, stop being reactive. Maybe you could be more organised and forecast some the issues. On the odd occasion there will be the odd pressured moment, why, that’s because someone upstream is reactive or disorganised or there is a real emergency (well….you would like to think so wouldn’t you?)

Reactivity is not flow time or engaged time, it fragments focus, and makes it difficult for people to sustain focus on their priorities. In Lean Thinking we call this waste.

My tip to all people is if it’s urgent, please call me, don’t email me, call me.

Next….Stop harassing people and being an urgent drama queen. You’ll survive, the more urgent orientated that you are, the less time you will have…trust me.

3. Encourage Breaks

Create at least one break time during the day when you encourage your people to stop working and take a break, in fact I do it twice a day. It forces me to stop to. I’ve read and heard about others taking a group walk or workout, relax, or take a nap. Personally I've never napped. I do however go for walks. Many years ago I worked with two men who routinely slept at morning tea and they always woke up…amazing.

Okay…you have their backs covered what about yours?

Consider these four behaviours for yourself, you are not superman or superwoman you know.

1. Do the most important things first in the morning or whatever time your work day starts, preferably without interruption, for 60 to 90 minutes, with a clear start and stop time.

2. Establish regular, scheduled times to think more long term, creatively, or strategically. If you don't, you'll constantly enter the world of the the urgent.   Visit my blog on email use.

3. Take mini breaks, breakations, real and regular holidays. Real means that when you're off, you're truly switched off from work...now that's a test for many of us….. Hmmm, I think I might plan one of these breakations right now…

4. Delegate it, defer it, dump it, do something that you ought to do... I think that will help, don't you? There will always be problems to solve as long as we keep changing, that's business.
When you're fully engaged at work for defined periods you’re happier and more productive. Some people refer to it as flow. It makes sense and saves the business bottom line and your stress levels

Stop working and living in the crazy time zone

Go for a walk, smell the roses, see the sky and breathe the fresh air.   In my case it’s taking the stairs, walking past a tropical garden, crossing a busy road, chatting to the barista and getting a decent coffee. Then I re-engage fully in what matters.

7 Coaching Challenges

What are you tolerating at work that reduces your productivity?
What behaviours do you need to change to get more focused time?
Who do you need to start saying "no" to?
What do you need to stop doing and delegate?
What meetings need to be more focused and how will you achieve and do that?
What obstacles might get in your road?
How will you overcome them?

If you need help please feel free to drop me a line. Our job is to inspire people, inspire business and inspire results.

Journey well,
Matt Cartwright
Inspiring People, Inspiring Business, Inspiring Results
© Copyright 2008 -12

Small Business Lean Initiative Has Sights on Leaning International Industry Leaders

8/3/2012

Small Business Lean Initiative has Sights on Leaning International Industry Leaders

I’m posting a quick message about the power of Lean Thinking and how I’m helping a small specialised business going lean in their own processes, automating wherever they can and also aiming to lean an international peak body to improve efficiencies in quality of service. I am unable share any commercial details. That’s business, but I will share some insights with you which I believe are helpful.

It goes like this.... I was consulting with a client today and we were discussing their proposal that was being presented to an international agency. This proposal if accepted will transform a performance culture, best practice and quality standards internationally. This result will revolutionise a quality control industry and insure its future sustainability.

Without saying too much, leaning the process will essentially transform out-dated existing quality improvement systems. It has taken the new and younger blood to ask questions…. the tough questions of ….“Why do it this way, couldn’t we do it better, here is the alternative, these are the benefits, here is a new process, can we test it?”

The challenge is the proposal has to be accepted by an international committee. I ‘Il keep you posted in the year ahead how we get ahead.

Lean is a key strategy, but don’t be fooled in to using it alone without all your other business processes.

When you Lean one process, it is likely that downstream might need reviewing as well. Lean needs to go enterprise wide for real benefit. I've seen it fail miserably in some departments like healthcare because one department does not lean all areas involved with the client journey. Additionally, not all staff are adequately engaged. Generally governance from the top is simply lacking.

One popular misconception is that lean is suited only for manufacturing. Not true. I’ve seen it used in small business, manufacturing, IT, HR, importing and complex environments like healthcare. I see Lean principles used widely in the biggest retail giant in the world. Just look at E-bay. At E-bay it’s an automated lean machine generating more site searches than Google in 2012.

Lean can be tailored and applied in every business and every process. It even applies in my household. Although the 5S techniques could do with some improving in the kids bedrooms, and okay….the garden shed to. Yes, I’m striving for perfection, it's a continuous improvement journey.

Lean is not a tactic or a cost reduction program, it’s a by-product of changing the business culture of thinking and acting as an entire organization. It has many proven quality improvement processes backing it.

Three takeaways today. Purpose, Process, People

If you are thinking more into Lean Thinking read the authors Womack and Jones, Lean Enterprise, 2nd Edition. It’s a useful book. The authors note that managers and executives that embarked on Lean transformations think about three fundamental business issues that should guide the transformation of the entire organization:

Purpose: What customer problems will the business solve to achieve its own purpose of prospering?

Process: How will the business assess each major value stream to make sure each step is valuable, capable, available, adequate, flexible, and that all the steps are linked by flow, pull, and levelling?

People: How can the business insure that every important process has someone responsible for continually evaluating that value stream in terms of business purpose and lean process? How can everyone engaging with or in lean terms (touching) the value stream be actively engaged in operating it correctly and continually improving it?

Lean needs to be tailored. The best way to experience it is to have a short workshop facilitated in workplace with your work processes. With you we will map your processes, look at bottle necks, queues, delays and so on. Then take it from there.

Mapping the journey or process is amazing. It’s like “Learning to See” how you do things in business. It’s an eye opener and you may go away scratching your head asking, “what the… why do we do that, it doesn’t make sense.” Remember many processes are inherited and never really planned or evaluated. Here is your opportunity to break the cycle. Add value… that’s your job.

We have a team of Lean experts who can provide customized training. One on one, or in small groups. Our Lean approach is a systems approach. Lean combined with coaching, facilitation, good team management, business excellence and good governance is required.

Our business is Inspiring Results in your business.

The approach to Lean is it’s a transformational process. That seems to resonate better with clients. They get it, they know something is going to happen, it has an emotion attached to it and it provides an image of a better future. Feel free to discuss how we can help your organisation big or small. We can all improve.

Also, if you interested in joining our Lean Team please contact me though this site.

If nothing changes, then nothing changes.

Journey well,
Matt Cartwright
Inspiring People, Inspiring Business, Inspiring Results
© Copyright 2008 -12

7 Things Great Employees Do

6/3/2012

7 Things Great Employees Do

A great read......This definitely isn't the first time somebody's written about what makes employees special. But it may very well be the first time someone's telling you what will genuinely get your management excited about you and ultimately get you promoted. No kidding. Read More
Journey well,
Matt Cartwright

Success Leaves Clues, Download the Free Software

6/3/2012

Success Leaves Clues, Download the Free Software

One of the biggest hurdles is the software that runs in our brains. It's almost like we have inadvertently downloaded a virus that operates on our mindset slowing down our performance, speed and efficiency in achieving our goals.

Having coached and counselled thousands of clients, my experience tells me that it’s not so much ‘what to a mange to move forward” but it’s working out “how to move forward”. This concept separates high performance/significance versus mediocre performance/existence.

Finding the sweet spot lies within us but unfortunately most people and businesses are searching outside of themselves. My observations are that people need to spend a lot more time developing inwardly versus outwardly. Being successful or achieving more significance leaves clues.

The secret of getting ahead is getting started. The secret of getting started is breaking your complex, overwhelming tasks into small manageable tasks. Then start on the first one. That doesn’t mean it has to be done by you. I struggled for many years with the concept of asking for help and delegating.

I had all these ideas in my head and I had expectations of how things were to be achieved. It was just easier if I did it, then it would be done the way I wanted it. It took me some time to give up this mindset. Yes, the pressure cooker in my head had no room for more work or more demands. The term “Let go” stuck with me one day. That was also a day I let go of one of my former bosses. It has been one of the major secrets to my success.

I have found that being successful and improving performance leaves clues. I make it my business to help people find the clues to achieve their success. Whether it’s a project, a new business venture, a new strategy or a new partnership.

The high performer goes searching for clues. The implications for not searching are obvious….

Here is something for you. “Nothing is really new”. It has been done before.

Okay, want to know more?

Whether it’s in the mind or on paper, many of our issues, problems have been dealt with before. There is a concept of sameness everywhere we go. Many businesses have the same objectives, same challenges all over the world. There are 7 billion people in this world, all with creative and intelligent minds in their own right. We basically all share the same DNA. The difference is that some people make different decisions about what they think about. These decisions combined with actions achieve different results.

The Clue

Personally, I tend to ask for help where I can. I don’t waste time in trying to always work the problem out. I have found many people willing to help. On the flip side, I have encountered many people will not. Let go of them. These people control information because they live in a world of fear and insecurity. That is, they are attached to an imagined concept of self-importance or attached to an image of themselves losing something. They are afraid of co-workers finding out the real person behind the position.

Do you know the person in the office who controls knowledge or skills in fear that someone might use it and look better than them?

Remember, by being a person who is a multiplier and not a divider of information makes very good sense. If your work area is not operating like this then you’re losing power and influence. Most importantly you’re losing staff engagement, customers and potential profit.

Many of us in the corporate world unfortunately have reinvented the wheel due to the fantasies of self-importance which are underpinned by our self-limiting beliefs. The belief that we must achieve the task on our own and that we will be rewarded for our efforts. Too many people have the mindset that sharing the problem or asking for help is a sign of weakness or incompetence. In fact, this is the hallmark of a successful leader, an enlarger and a multiplier.

Your job is to ask people smarter than yourself for the information.

It's knowing your people, knowing their skills and seeking out their abilities to assist you.

One of my suggestions is to review your business or project management knowledge management policy, processes and systems. I see much duplication, rework, overprocessing, overproduction, wasted effort, wasted talent, wasted time in meetings etc. Not good for people, not good for profit.

Not real good at all….

We are in knowledge worker economy…..Work smarter, not harder. People will thank you when you raise the following questions in your business or project meetings.

Is this the best way to do this?
Is there a better way?
What could we improve?
Who will we get involved to help us?
When can we get started?

Challenge

Let go of fantasies of your self-importance. That is “Ego”, stop saying “I” for one day at work.
Find someone like a coach, mentor or colleague to help you.
Write an action plan, do it, review it, change it, reward it.
Encourage your work area to have knowledge fairs, mentoring schemes, lunch and learn sessions or breakfast byte meetings tec.

Get Started, success leaves clues, the software is everywhere and free. So ask for it and keep asking….

Journey well,
Matt Cartwright
Inspiring People, Inspiring Business, Inspiring Results
© Copyright 2008 -12

A war on email, I survived and so did others

5/3/2012

A War on Email, I Survived and So Did Others.

Some time ago I started a war on my email. I survived and won the battle. Yes... there were only minor casualties. I put an automation rule to respond to my work email to deal with the deluge. One of my email accounts had over 3000 unread emails in it. I’ve turned that account off. It can’t be important to me. I simply just don’t value it and it’s never important. Its information overload.

I have survived and I haven’t been in trouble about it. I have had the occasional “didn’t you get that email? Of course I did, I just hadn’t got around to reading it”

I operate a number of email accounts to manage my workload. I tried something like this recently and this and it worked a treat. I suggest if you do try it, tell your team or boss and do it as trial for a week. Tweak it to make it work for you and your team.

I set up an auto responder email. It read:

“Thank you for your email. I read my emails twice a day and respond to them accordingly at 12 midday and 4pm. I read email in order of business priority. If you are sending me a meeting appointment, please send the agenda and the meeting outcomes that are required so that I can prepare accordingly.

If that matter is urgent please ring me and leave a message and I will call you back as soon as possible. Thank you for your understanding as this helps me manage time more effectively and serve you better.

Have a great day.
Regards Matt”

I told my immediate coworkers in advance if you need me, just call me and still send me the email.

I then put my landline phone and mobile onto message bank and observed what happened. Surprise people stopped sending me unnecessary emails and the phone calls dropped off. I have now created more productive time.

Other people’s urgency no longer became mine. Within a week I increased my productivity time. It was hard the first day. I was used to the amphetamine pellet dispenser responding to most email as it came in. I went cold turkey and turned it off and back on at 12pm and 4pm.

It bothered a couple of people. It was an experiment. I was challenging the status quo. Like all good experiments there are lessons and sometimes causalities. I gather those people didn’t quite understand my needs or priorities. They assumed I waited around for email. They operated in the urgency paradigm not the high performance paradigm. Just a reminder if you are not applying Stephen Coveys Important and Urgent Matrix, you are losing precious time. Consider applying it for at least 3 days and check your progress. It's a mental, behavioural and attitudinal shift.

The Important and Urgent Matrix

This tool, developed by Stephen Covey (Covey, 2004), helps people set priorities and learn how good management means putting first things first and organizing and carrying out work based on priorities. This tool helps people learn that the most important thing is not managing time; it is managing ourselves.

The Importance of Effective Self Management and Prioritization

Quadrant I Represents things that are 'urgent and important'. Quadrant I activities are usually "crises' or problems'. They are very important, but if not careful Quadrant I activities can consume you. As long as you focus on it, it keeps getting bigger and bigger until it dominates your work. There will always be crises that require immediate attention, but how many things are really that urgent?

Quadrant II includes activities that are `important but not urgent'. It is the quality quadrant, where you plan and anticipate, and prevent things that otherwise might become urgent.

Quadrant II is the heart of effective personal leadership. This is where you should spend most of your time!

Quadrant III includes things that are "urgent but not important". Plenty of managers spend too much time in this quadrant. The urgency sometimes is based on someone else's priorities.

Quadrant IV includes activities that are "not urgent and non important". It is the "waste of time' quadrant.

If you’re strong and able, try and have an email free day……once a week or once a fortnight or once a month. We are far to addicted to email ecstasy, love or hate it. Choose your work poison wisely.

Journey well,
Matt Cartwright
Inspiring People, Inspiring Business, Inspiring Results
© Copyright 2008 -12

Tackling the Elephant in the room in 10 quick easy steps

4/3/2012

Tackling the Elephant in the Room in 10 Quick Easy Steps

First principle, is not to shoot the elephant....that hurts and is unkind and morally wrong
Second principle, it takes courage and heavy lifting
Third principle, empower the group by holding them to account
Fourth principle, keep going

Okay its a common mistake not to address the elephant in the room.....I've been there and done that. I still see it being done by senior people who have influence and power.

I can't help myself, what a waste of time for everyone if we don't address it....Of course it needs to be done with sensitivity. Please share this with people who need help managing Elephants.

10 steps to help you... lets go!

Step 1. Ask permission to offer feedback.
Example: "Ok, I want to stop this meeting now and give you some input, I hope that is okay….I think the group would benefit from hearing my observations. . . is that OK?"

Step 2. Describe specifically what you’re observing
Example: "During the pre-prgram meetings I held with over half of you, the issue of some people not pulling their weight was mentioned by everyone as the most serious problem facing this team. We have been talking about team problems all morning and no one has mentioned this issue."

Step 3. Tell them about the direct impacts of their actions.
Example: "Since the issue of people not pulling their weight has not been mentioned, there's a good chance that these current discussions are not going to resolve your most serious team problem."

Step 4. Give the other person(s) an opportunity to explain.
Example: "You're telling me that this problem is not being discussed because it’s too sensitive and people are concerned about offending each other is that right?”

Step 5. Draw out ideas from the other person(s).
Example: "What do you think we could do to make it safe so that this issue can be discussed? What guidelines do we need to create to make it safe?”

Step 6. Offer specific suggestions for improvement only when necessary.
Example: "I think the guidelines you have come up with are excellent. I'd like to add a few ideas about how we can tackle this with sensitivity, they are only ideas."

Step 7. Summarise and express your support.
Example: "I want to thank you for being willing to tackle this tough issue, I appreciate your effort, thank you."

Step 8. Review.
Example: "I'm going to stop the meeting in about an hour and check with you to see if we are now tackling our real problems and if the guidelines we set are working."

Step 9. Reflect.
Reflect on the process of how you managed yourself, what did you learn about your faciliation, what might you change next time?

Step 10. Reward.
Give yourself some positive praise for tackling the Elephant in the room, that's your job as a facilitator, manager or leader.

Journey well,
Matt Cartwright
Inspiring People, Inspiring Business, Inspiring Results
© Copyright 2008 -12