#90-9/10/09-How Do You Manage?
How Do You Manage?
“Do you manage for the sprint or the marathon?”
Posted by Steven Cerri on Thursday, September 10, 2009
Hello everyone!
Do you manage for the sprint?...or ....
Do you manage for the marathon?… or ...
Do you manage for the race?
What is a sprint?
Imagine a Summer Olympics bicycle sprint race around a track. The racers are poised on their bikes. Their leg muscles are tense. Their hearts are pounding. Their muscles are ready to consume incredible amounts of energy and oxygen. Their heads are up and their eyes are looking forward. They are full of concentration, of tension. They are thinking about leading at the beginning, leading in the middle, and leading at the end.
The gun goes off and away they go.
They are full out until they cross the finish line. They have either won or lost and that’s the race.
Now consider the Tour de France.
The racers are poised at the starting line. Their legs are relaxed. Their heads are up and their eyes are looking forward. All their support personnel and vehicles are standing by. The racers are thinking about pacing themselves. They are thinking about the early part of the race as well as the middle and the end portions of the race.
The gun goes off. They begin the race. The support cars and motorcycles follow along. The support people communicate important information to the racers. The racers grab nourishing liquids along the route. They stop at various locations for rest and food.
This then is the “marathon” race. It goes on for days, even weeks.
How do most managers and leaders do their jobs?
Most managers and leaders do not know how to manage or lead for a race that is a combination of sprint and marathon. Who runs a race that is a combination of sprint and marathon, anyway?
Most managers and leaders I have met, worked with, or coached, tend to manage or lead… for the sprint. More rarely, I have found managers and leaders who manage and lead for the marathon. But seldom have I met managers and leaders who manage and lead “for the actual race”.
Most manage and lead as if their job is to put their direct report(s) on the bike, fire the starting gun, and sit back and watch the employee race, full out, around the track until they cross the finish line; until the task is done. They expect their job to be done after the starting gun goes off. If the direct report(s) fail it is “their fault”.
When you hear leaders talking about their job being to “inspire” you know they think their job is just to fire the starting gun. They think their job is to make the employee “excited” and “fired-up” to do the job and then they are supposed to get out of the way. Their goal is to let the race run it’s course. They sit back in order to let the employee feel “empowered”.
You should at least manage and lead for the marathon
The better managers and leaders manage and lead for the marathon. They not only inspire and excite their employees, they also work with, monitor, and help their employees succeed during the entire project. Like the pace cars in the Tour de France, like the people who provide nourishing drink to the racers, the marathon manager and leader is there to help and advise their direct reports along the way. Why is it that we assume that Lance Armstrong, who won the Tour de France seven times still needs and deserves pace cars, nourishment, and advice along the route, while on the other hand, we think we should “empower” and “cut loose” our employees to do their work alone and on their own?
Ideally you should manage and lead for the sprint AND the marathon.
The best way to manage and lead is to manage and lead for the “race being run”. That is, it is important to understand that every task has both a sprint portion and a marathon portion and maybe several portions of each. The sprint portion can vary from an hour to a month and the marathon portion can vary from a month to several years.
Be well,
Steven Cerri
P.S. By the way. If you’d like to leave a comment, and I’d sure be interested if you did, I’ve changed the comments software. Only your comment and your name will show up at the end of the comment. I have modified the software so that your email address will not show up anywhere.
“What would it be like to be as successful with people as you are with your technology?” Steven trains, coaches, and facilitates engineers and technical managers to BE the answer to that question. More information can be found at the:http://stevencerri.com/index.php/Home/index/
Copyright©2009 STCerri International and Steven Cerri. You are free to pass this information on to others and to reproduce it. If you reproduce it in whole or part please give attribution to Steven Cerri. Thank you.
Posted by Steven Cerri on 09/10 at 06:21 AM (0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink
#89-9/1/09-Keeping Your Job
Keeping Your Job
“The difference that makes the difference”
Posted by Steven Cerri on Tuesday, September 1, 2009
Hello everyone!
Last week I attended two very interesting and significant events.
In the morning I attended the commemoration of NASA Ames Research Center as an American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) Historical Site, honoring all the great work that has been accomplished at that world-renowned facility. Work in the areas of aeronautics, astronautics, computation, spacecraft and satellites, wind tunnel research, to name just a few of the technologies.
As the chair of the San Francisco Section of the AIAA, I was honored and pleased to have been invited to make a short presentation.
For those of you who don’t know much about the NASA Ames Research Center, it has been the pre-eminent NASA research facility on the west coast for many years.
NASA’s Ames Research Center has been in existence since the early 1940s and has been involved in wing deicing systems for early aircraft right through to modern-day spacecraft.
Ames was initially know for wind tunnel design and testing, flight testing, and supersonic and hypersonic aerodynamics. The center conducted pioneering research in rotorcraft and vertical flight aircraft. Then expanded into spacecraft engineering, supercomputing and information technology, air traffic control, thermal protection for re-entry vehicles (the Apollo ablative shield was developed there), astrobiology and space life sciences, and Earth and planetary sciences. Ames led the development of simulators for human factors research, and has made major improvements to air traffic management.
Even with this great history, several years ago, there was some question as to whether NASA Ames would remain open or be closed. Budget cuts were placing in question the future of the facility.
It was clear that NASA Ames needed to adapt. To not only bring in more technology but to be more than technology. The world had changed. New relationships had to be developed. New ways of doing business. As I like to say it, “a new way of moving through the world”.
With a plan for keeping the best of technology and people, coupled with a plan for changing their relationship with the outside world, several years ago, NASA Ames was told that it would not be closed.
One of it first assignments was to build a new building.
The building plans began to develop along a typical path. The building envisioned was a 20th century building. It was just another building.
Enter new leadership and management in the latter part of 2008 regarding the building. One of the first orders of business was to scrap the “first” new building plan. Management then challenged the team to come up with a building that was a 21st century building, one that was completely sustainable. One that didn’t use more energy than it produced. One that used geothermal energy sources; recycled all it’s water; and used the environment to cool and heat the building. One that was a net-zero energy building. A building that was the most sustainable government building in the United States.
Apollo 11
When the astronauts of Apollo 11 landed on the moon Neil Armstrong named the landing area Tranquility Base. The new sustainable building has been named “Sustainability Base”. The ground breaking event took place last week and when completed, this building will be the most energy efficient and most sustainable government building yet built. It will set the standard.
NASA Ames didn’t close; it didn’t lose it’s job. It kept it’s job.
NASA Ames not only didn’t have to close, but has become a reinvigorated organization that will set the standards for many sustainability technologies going forward.
A lot like people.
In a very significant way, NASA Ames is a lot like people. NASA Ames is a lot like engineers and technology managers and leaders.
We love our technology. When the world around us changes we think the best thing to do is to be “better” at our technology. But very often, the world wants something different from us. The world wanted something different from NASA Ames. The world didn’t want NASA Ames to abandon all of it’s technology. The world wanted it to add something it didn’t have to the technology it already had.
The same holds true for engineers and technical managers and leaders. Your organizations don’t want you to abandon your technology. They want you to add to it. And 99% of the time, what they want you to add is the ability to communicate effectively. They want you to be able to integrate yourself and your ideas into the ideas of the team.
They want you to be able to have a wide variety of conversations with a wide variety of constituents. Your communication skills, your management and leadership skills (which ultimately also boil down to communication) can be the determining factor as to whether you get laid off or keep your job.
Be well,
Steven Cerri
P.S. By the way. If you’d like to leave a comment, and I’d sure be interested if you did, I’ve changed the comments software. Only your comment and your name will show up at the end of the comment. I have modified the software so that your email address will not show up anywhere.
“What would it be like to be as successful with people as you are with your technology?” Steven trains, coaches, and facilitates engineers and technical managers to BE the answer to that question. More information can be found at the:http://stevencerri.com/index.php/Home/index/
Copyright©2009 STCerri International and Steven Cerri. You are free to pass this information on to others and to reproduce it. If you reproduce it in whole or part please give attribution to Steven Cerri. Thank you.
Posted by Steven Cerri on 09/01 at 10:15 PM (0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink
