I’ll get right to the point with this week’s blog. If you are a business coach, internal or external trainer, facilitator, educator, or leadership consultant, this conversation is meant for you.
From experience, I know you are all dynamic professionals that champion excellence, encourage innovation and creativity, and teach behaviors required to build and sustain strong teams. No matter the industry you consult for or work in, your goal is to strive for team collaboration and business growth for your organization or clients. Am I right?
However, with that said, I’m willing to bet that many you are not satisfied with your arsenal of tools in your business development toolbox. Many of you have run across (or work for) an organization that has purchased a product or training program, but don’t know how to take the assessment results to the next level and implement much needed business or cultural change. Some organizations use personality surveys and build a team around those results, but when it comes to diagnosing behavior issues, creating ground rules, consensus facilitation, and action planning, they are stuck because the program simply can’t take them to the next evolutional step of a progressive organization.
So this week, I want to give you two new research-based thought processes to add to your facilitation toolbox. Then I’ll give you the keys on how to take these innovative ideas and implement them within your organization or consulting business.
#1 Build a Secure Base
Employees NEED and seek a secure base from leaders. According to George Kohlrieser, a professor of leadership at business school IMD in Switzerland, “A secure base leader is someone who creates an environment of trust where fundamental interest, fundamental caring, transparency, and honesty creates the possibility of the employee to take risk, to push their edge of talent development, to do what needs to be done outside the box and explore their potential,” he said.
Kohlrieser further stated, “The human brain is hard-wired for survival, which means employees tend to sway toward what’s safe. Like many organizations, this survival instinct has had employees — and the organizations they work for — playing not to lose instead of playing to win.
This progressive train of thought creates a workplace atmosphere where departments are cooperative and innovative. Employees become more team oriented and less competitive. Employees do not fear being punished or humiliated for mistakes and can take control of their professional development.
#2 joint Versus Individual Assessment
Employee stereotyping and bias (whether conscious or subconscious) can be removed through joint evaluation and performance assessment versus individual assessment. A recent experiment conducted between Harvard Business School and the Harvard Kennedy School proved just this point. Their experiment was on gender stereotyping during the hiring process. Employers were informed of the new hire’s gender and their assessment performance. Researchers then narrowed the employee pool down to participants whose task performances were similar so there was no obvious star performer to choose.
In some cases the employer was performing a joint evaluation, in which he or she was presented with the results of both a male and a female employee. In others, the employer was presented with the results of only one male or female candidate—a separate evaluation. In cases of separate evaluation, the employers were more likely to choose male employees for math tasks and females for verbal tasks. But in cases of joint evaluation, biases did not matter and the best candidate was chosen to complement the existing corporate team setting.
Expand Your Toolbox as a Licensed TIGERS Facilitator
Now I want to give you the keys to implementing innovative processes with proven resource tools and am looking for dynamic business coaches, internal and external trainers, facilitators, educators, and leadership consultants who are searching for solutions to take their organization or consulting business to the next level. With opportunities to “brainstorm” with like-minded thought leaders, utilize the proven TIGERS Team Wheel and an arsenal of team-building resource tools, the “royalty free” TIGERS Facilitation Certification is the solution for the right candidates. Don’t stop with personality assessments. Use proven resources and assessment tools that reveal behavioral issues, sources of conflict, undiscovered skill sets, strengths, and weaknesses within a team or organization. If you are a consultant or trainer and fit this scenario, I want to hear from you.
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About Dianne: Dianne Crampton is the Founder of TIGERS Success Series. She is the leader in building successful quality-focused and cooperative team culture communities. As a thought leader in the team culture movement, she has been published by Barrett Koehler, Pfeiffer (an in print of John Wiley & Sons) and Three Creeks. Her latest work, TIGERS Among Us: Winning Business Team Cultures and Why They Thrive has received international acclaim. Nominated by Merrill Lynch for Inc. Magazine’s Entrepreneur of the Year Awards for a team culture change system that helps leaders bring about desired team culture change remarkably fast, she certifies and licenses consultants, facilitators, and HR leader to use the proven TIGERS team culture system within their organization with measurable success. TIGERS helps leaders build and improve trust, interdependence, genuineness, empathy, risk, and success in teams which results in a dynamic work environment that attracts and retains very talented, quality-focused people. Subscribe today to receive instant access to Dianne’s general membership where like-minded professionals discover valuable resources for team, leadership, and cooperative work environment development that grow organizations in a scalable and measured way.
