Daily 5 Minutes

Must I work this bit alone?

September 14, 2011 by Rosa Say

This is a question I’d love to have more people ask themselves, asking it not in a general way, but with much more specificity, action by action, decision by decision.

Who can give you your second opinion?
Who can tip those aha! moments you have when you get stuck at work?
Who can you bounce an idea off of, feeling free to question it, or laugh about it?
Who might champion it with you, adding their unbridled enthusiasm to your own?
Who can you learn from?
Who can brighten your day in moments with their presence?

More often than not, the answer to these questions will be, “Come to think of it, several people can.” You simply need to get out of your chair (or away from your work station, whatever the case may be) and go to them. Break your orbit and be more comet-like.

An ‘Imi ola life — that ‘best possible’ life — is NOT a solo proposition.

Another way to ask this collection of questions, would be, Where’s the Aloha?
…and, Are you getting some, and giving some?
[ Your Aloha Spirit, Tightly Curled and Regal ]

One of the reasons I’m so bullish on The Daily Five Minutes, stems from the alarming trending I continually see in ‘digitally savvy’ workplaces toward solitary, independent work. I call this the “Downtown yet No Town” weirdness, because in my workplace visits, people will continually tell me how they feel the cubicle mentality still thrives, and is in fact, their world: They go to work each day, and sit at a workstation or in their office with nose to the grindstone as much as 95% of their day. Scary. And sad. Thanks to email, texting and social media (yes, I’m being sarcastic, for it’s no thanks), they aren’t even on the telephone much anymore. I push D5M with them because I know of its power in getting people together again, simply starting with getting out and about, to Hō‘imi — to actively look for those 5 minutes of found time when they can converse with another human being face to face.

“I dress up for work even tho i hide behind my desk all day.” — mmmony on Tumblr

Forget all the D5M framing if you must — just talk to people more.

Conversation, talking story, and good habits like The Daily Five Minutes are ‘Imi ola triggers: They will elevate the quality of your day, for all work — all good, feels good work — is some balanced execution of what we do on our own and what we do with others. As a workplace culture coach, much of the workplace unhappiness and discontent I see, is clearly the result of an imbalance toward the solitary, where people feel they go it alone. They might be surrounded by other people, but they feel alone most of the time — “Downtown, yet No Town.”

A good number of managers look to solve this by focusing on team dynamics, and yes, by all means, keep group interaction dynamic and vibrant too. Have good huddles. Bring back the staff meeting. Learn to love projects. But understand that people may still feel they disappear in the chaos of a whole team: We all need one-on-one time. If you must choose one over the other, focus on improving your one-to-ones, whether with D5M or other kinds of in-person conversation.

There is so much to be gained from collaborative work, starting with that simple act of asking another person for their opinion — their sharing of knowledge, with you.

A D5M Listening Goal: Identify Partner Gifts

April 15, 2011 by Rosa Say

Let’s take another look at the circular “Career Adventure” graphic shared yesterday from another perspective, one within the Alaka‘i Manager’s gifting of The Daily Five Minutes.

If you’re already doing the D5M, yet suspect you could recharge your practice with it, this post is for you!

The core purpose of The Daily Five Minutes is this: Managers seek to know those on their team better, by gifting them with 5 minutes of their full attention (one person, one day at a time) so each person can feel they are fully heard — and thus, fully valued.

How better can you value someone, than by giving them a forum in which to explore their creative gifts?

SIDEBAR: Learn more about The Daily Five Minutes HERE if you are new to Talking Story and hearing about it for the first time. Know too, that in Managing with Aloha we call our teammates ‘partners’ instead of ‘employees.’

The agenda of the D5M conversation is up to the partner, (in their gracious receiving) and not the manager (in their generous giving), and managers are encouraged to take what they hear at face value, so both people can speak into it directly, and honestly.

Our D5M goal to LISTEN does not change

A manager’s patience is required in the beginning of a D5M giver/receiver relationship, for the manager-as-giver has no say in the agenda; you have to listen to, and acknowledge whatever is said. And in the beginning, that simple, pure purpose is vitally important, for the depth of your attention is another kind of gauge — one by which your receiver assesses the degree of your listening sincerity, and your Ho‘ohanohano respect for them.

As a manager, you must resist any urges you have to overly influence your partner/receiver’s agendas — you’re supposed to be taking a break from ‘managing’ in the D5M (and from talking too much at all) and just listen and respond to what they want. Their agendas are important to them, and you must demonstrate that they are therefore important to you.

So if you are starting brand new D5M relationships, I want you to read the rest of this posting as what you can anticipate doing over time. To use the wise coaching of Stephen R. Covey in his 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, a book highly recommended by Carol Eikleberry (and me!) for character-building, you can “Begin with the End in Mind.”

‘The End’ I propose to you, is that you are listening as deeply as you can, no matter what is said in a D5M, to better understand what your partner/receiver’s gifts are. You are simply listening deeper, and framing what is actually said (and what you must respond to directly), so you can hear talent talking.

After knowing them ‘better’ seek to know them ‘thoroughly’

Once a person begins to identify their own gifts, they can’t help but talk about them. However most of us don’t have someone we can talk to about our gifts, where we don’t feel like we’re bragging or wallowing in selfish, arrogant ho‘okano pride, but are supposed to talk about them, and can do so in the context of work that everyone would love to have us magnificently perform each day.

Another note on this, is that few people will call their potential a gift: You are the one who has to listen that way.

You are listening for clues to their talents, their strengths, and for ways they feel they can overcome any weaknesses. You are listening for what fills them with energy versus what saps it away. You are listening for what they want to learn about, or grow into, and why, trying to zero in on what they will then do with their new knowledge and/or skills.

For instance, if nearly all Claire talks to you about in her D5M opportunities are about conflicts between other people on the team, is she gossiping, or is she highly empathetic, and sensitive to person-to-person conflicts that affect overall work productivity? Can she be equally sensitive in watching for more solutions too, having the benefit of your coaching to groom her empathy more proactively?

This might sound tricky to you at first, but trust me on this, it actually isn’t difficult at all once you have intentionally set out to practice it, much in the same way that if I tell you to “Look around for the color blue,” you begin to see it everywhere, and even when I say, “Enough already!”

Plus when someone feels that talking about their own gifts is expected and welcomed, the floodgates will open, and managers needn’t be good investigative detectives — they just have to listen with the intention of receiving the information well.

So what is “receiving it well?” It’s helping your partners find more ways that they can move to the next step in the Career Adventure circle, from accepting their gifts, to working with their gifts with your full support and blessing — and your coaching and mentorship.

In short, the D5M gives you a way where no one need to take a more creative career adventure alone.

Begin to carry a brand new D5M coaching notebook!

Take another look at this graphic. Write the name of your next D5M partner/receiver in the middle of the circle, and ask yourself: What do I already know about their gifts (strengths, skills, ability, capacity), and what must I still learn about them?

The reality of so many workplaces is that people may know their gifts, but not feel they have the permission and liberty to use them in more creative ways. So dear manager, give them that permission and liberty, along with your blessing and willingness to help them.

If you click directly on this post’s version of the graphic above, you’ll be taken to my Flickr page, where you can download it in different sizes. Make a bunch of copies, one for each person on your team you’re giving The Daily Five Minutes to, and use it for another 2 or 3 minutes of note-taking when your next D5M with them is over: What gifts did you hear about, and where is your partnership on the circle?

Then, next time you have some project assignments to make, pull out your notebook and flip through it: Which of your D5M partners are ready for a new, and very relevant connection?

Are you doing the Daily Five Minutes yet?

April 2, 2011 by Rosa Say

If not, how can you afford not to?

I promised I wouldn’t use their names or company on the blog, however I just had to share this D5M experience with you (and did receive their permission): A young woman approached me after a Managing with Aloha presentation I did recently, and quietly shared something with me;

“I used to hate my boss and I’d say so, to him and to others. Then he heard about your Daily Five Minutes and asked us to practice it with him. So much has changed since then. We talk, and we talk until we understand each other now. I had to change too, and it’s been good. I’m not a hater anymore.”

She gave me his number, and I called her boss to tell him how proud I was of him, for achieving such a turnaround couldn’t have been easy. He said,

“Not gonna lie Rosa, it was tough at first. Just like your book says, I had to learn to listen better. But now it’s always just 5 minutes or less, we turned the corner into the good stuff, and I’ll never stop. I have a really great team. I learned how strong we all are.”

They both inspired me to do an update:

This has been one of my most-visited posts here on Talking Story: 5 Minutes/ 3 Values/ 9 MWA Questions. Amazing in this time of relatively short digital-reading attentions, for it is one of the longer ones. I have updated it for all of you devoted D5M practitioners who want to share the goodness with other managers: Let them into the secret of your “I love my boss!” success!

No employee, — no person, should go to work and be ‘a hater.’

“The conclusion I’m coming to is that there aren’t so many ‘new’ things managers should be doing when times are hard — they just need to dedicate more time to ideas like these (just listen!) that aren’t so new and do them a lot better than they typically do!”
— Beth Weisberg, talking story about the D5M with Lisa Haneberg: Give an Employee Five Precious Minutes

Can you fail with The Daily Five Minutes?

February 11, 2011 by Rosa Say

The D5M is coming up a lot lately, which is great! Unfortunately, that means the “yeah, but” responses can follow suit too.

After all these years I’m still trying to solve my teaching challenge with it (and I’m totally open to your suggestions): The Daily Five Minutes stirs up objections when managers hear about it for the first time, even when they immediately get how investing 5 minutes today can save them hours of heartache and extra work later.

They needn’t say so outright; I easily see it in their eyes, or in their changing demeanor, as they sit back and cross their arms defensively. In fact not just upon first hearing; managers even object when they read about it in Managing with Aloha, already having 144 pages to warm up with!

SIDEBAR:
The Daily 5 Minutes appears in MWA within the chapter about ‘Ike loa, the Hawaiian value of learning. That was a purposeful decision for me, for first and foremost, I do consider the practice a learning tool. In adopting it, you are tapping into what you can learn from the people who surround you.

Learning (‘Ike loa) is the why. Conversation (Kākou) is the how.

So what’s the problem? I’ll tell you what I think it is, and if I’m wrong, and you have another reason, please email me, and help me understand your point of view better than I do.

(Photo courtesy of Eddi van W.)

A warning label borne of past experience

Embracing my natural resistance with doing so, if I were challenged to present The Daily Five Minutes to you with a warning label, this would be my draft with it:

In my experience with bringing the D5M to different work teams, regardless of industry, there are two main challenges to the practice becoming part of a work culture:

1. You add first, replace later.
By necessity when done correctly, the D5M does start as a brand new practice both givers and receivers must learn. Thus it starts as a daily addition to task loads managers may already feel burdened with, and they don’t give it their best shot — the best shot required so it begins to work its magic of replacing those other tasks. You have to trust in the process, go all in, and then go the distance, having faith that what starts as an addition becomes a killer of a replacement.

The D5M is a proactive conversation. Once you have proactive communication practices, all your reactive conversations begin to go away. There are less fires to put out because cooler heads always prevail, and no fires were ever started. Big maintenance and/or stopgap projects, such as those dreaded employee surveys, go away completely and forever — people only feel they need to be heard in employee surveys when face-to-face workplace communication is dysfunctional, broken, or depends on unintentional neglect.

However this won’t happen overnight, and some patience is required. New for you, is new for everybody, which leads to the second challenge:

2. You can’t ignore any history.
Everyone will have history to deal with unless the business is brand-spanking-new. The D5M creates disruption where people have gotten pretty good at hiding or ignoring stuff, and that disruption is something managers must be able to handle. Initially, these are even more additions: Will you be able to handle them? If you’ve voiced a “yeah, but” of some kind, have you anticipated this, and is your objection hinting to some self-preservation instinct kicking in?

Think about it: Most people will not readily accept new change until they deal with old irritations. I bet you feel that way too: It seems to be a universal truth no matter where you sit in any organization. Things will come up which you’d thought you’d already dealt with, but no, a conversation still needs to be had: So have it!

Thus the short version of my warning label is this: There will very likely be a price to pay for the good the D5M eventually will deliver. As I see it, that price is a bargain in the grand scheme of things.

All failure is a temporary state of affairs

To address the question of my post title, managers must be able to ‘fail forward’ and do so with Ho‘ohanohano (feeling they both give and receive Aloha, dignity and respect in their workplace) so they can grow in the ways they’ve managed and led in the past. They’ve got to be strong on their own, or have the strong support and mentorship of their boss, with everyone understanding that the workplace transition created by the D5M can be unsettling.

Simply said, the Daily Five Minutes stirs things up. In the end though, the result of a healthier workplace culture is always worth the stirring. Always.

Relationships change in The Daily Five Minutes — they’re supposed to, changing for the better. And the manager is the one who has to take the high road as everyone involved learns, ‘gets taught,’ and gets a taste of those proactive conversations they may have been avoiding before. There’s good, there’s bad, and there’s ugly: You clear your decks in the beginning so you can start fresh without anything having been swept under the rug to fester, and trip you up later on. And everyone gets their shot at you: The worse thing you can do in the D5M is avoid people. (Tacit approval is another yucky thing which is replaced, and goes away forever :)

Do you want easy, or do you want effective?

Do you want more commiseration from me, or a ticket to a brighter future?

I’ve never claimed that The Daily Five Minutes was easy to do. I think it’s very easy to learn the logistics of it, but I’m no Pollyanna: I know you’re rocking your world as a manager when you completely buy in, and give it that ‘best shot’ I ask you to. You’re having conversations you’ve never had before, with people you thought you knew completely, but now discover are more complex than you ever imagined they were. And yes, more needy.

And that is precisely the beauty of it. If you do The Daily Five Minutes, you will become a better manager. If you still question your own calling — Should I be a manager, or should I be doing something else? — the Daily Five Minutes will give you a very clear answer, once and for all.

You’ll stumble at times. You’ll be embarrassed. You’ll eat crow. You’ll admit, “I don’t know, and I have to find out for you.” more than you ever thought you would. It will be a rocky road as you clear your decks to deal with past history, and possibly ask forgiveness for past sins, but you will grow immensely.

And your people will admire you for making the effort: The D5M is essentially a private, one-on-one conversation, but it is a highly visible “I care” habit in the workplace.

No matter the journey, every employee who goes through adopting the Daily Five Minutes with you will eventually become your ‘Ohana in Business partner. That’s the experience which makes me so stubbornly insistent about this:
So you want a MWA jumpstart. Do the Daily Five Minutes.