I’m reading through this website on Management:
http://www.valuebasedmanagement.net/
I’m starting with the Leadership Styles section, because I think that’s what I’ll understand most easily. I want to see how these can be applied to our Helpdesk/IT department.
***
The 4 Dimensions of Relational Work relates a theory that there are 4 types of relational interests/skills:
1. Influence: (Takes pleasure in persuasion, negotiation and the power of holding valuable information and ideas.)
2. Interpersonal Facilitation: (Focus on others’ experiences, keep their colleagues committed and engaged.)
3. Relational Creativity: (Good at forging connections through visual and verbal imagery.)
4. Team Leadership: Strong need to see and interact with other people.
I found it interesting because it highlights what I’ve seen as a difference in how people work within the office. I’d say I fall within #2 and #3.
1. I’m not much on Influence, because I see all people as equal and believe everyone should share knowledge around for it to be the most beneficial. I believe it is dangerous to the company when knowledge is held tightly with one person, because it creates a single point of failure.
2. I often base decisions on how they would make others feel.
3. I enjoy using metaphors and visual aids, and employ them often. I spend time to be sure that messages are clearly and economically worded, and visually appealing.
4. I’m a bit introverted, but not shy or quiet. I guess I just don’t feel the need to constantly talk to people.
Looking at some of the people I work with, I can see why I sometimes don’t understand them. Many probably fall more into #1, based on the fact that I don’t see #s 2-4 as strong points. Although the article points out that people can have none of the above, which is a distinct possibility.
***
Activity Based Costing (ABC) is, in short, an ongoing process to identify the profit leaders and drags. These can be identify by auditors, by staff surveys, and by manager reporting. Time-Driven ABC is when you estimate the amount of time and multiple by costs per time unit, which can simplify the process of determining value of certain activities. At first blush, this has little to do with working in an IT department. But let’s look more closely. I’ll assume the TD-ABC method, since it’s easier.
The “profit” for an IT deparment is in a smoothly running system with plenty of uptime and users who have few complaints or questions. Additionally, an IT department is expected to meet objectives such as securing data and providing technology in demand by other departments. The drag on profit for our deparment is anything that creates downtime for a user, or makes their work take longer, or generates a call to the Helpdesk. We could assess these with a review of the helptickets for the past year and look for the following:
1. Things which created downtime. (Line failures, power outages, upgrades, hardware failures, locked accounts.)
2. Things which generated calls. (Questions, error messages, locked accounts.)
3. Things which slowed users - this is tricky because they may not always generate a call.
We would then group the tickets according to cause, grade them according to total time lost for all tickets for that cause, and try to come up with ways to prevent these causes - starting with the ones with the greatest time loss. The flaw in this system, however, is that it cannot identify the things that slow users down but are unreported. This is why redundant data centers, generators, and UPS systems often win out over training.
***
The theory of Bases/Sources of social (organizational) power:
1. Reward Power (give positive consequences or remove negative ones)
2. Coercive Power (ability to punish)
3. Legitimate Power (organizational authority) (the right to prescribe behavior)
4. Referent Power (through association)
5. Expert Power (having distinctive knowledge, or skills)
6. Similar to 5: Information Power (controlling the information needed by others)
Usage of different types of power have different results - some create resistance and some reduce resistance. The more legitimate the power is perceived to be, the less resistance.
So what can we take away from this? Well, I think we’d need to dig more into the results and examples for each base, as this article doesn’t go into detail on people’s reaction to each. But what we can glean is that using power that is “illegitimate” - ie that people don’t think you should have - creates resistance. If you’re not a manager and you’re running around trying to tell people what to do, you get resistance. If you’re a manager, but people don’t think you should be, you get resistance. If you’re hoarding information, meeting out punishment and rewards, or dropping names purely for results, you may meet with resistance. That’s not to say these types of power can’t be useful to non-management - but we need to be careful how, when, and how often they are used so that they don’t create resistance.
For the Helpdesk, (which is often not perceived as a legitimate source of power), this means that we need management to legitimize what we do, to reduce user resistance. We need their backing and buy-in, and we may need a representative of management to announce rollouts of projects that are likely to have resistance.
***
I don’t think I need to explain the concept of Benchmarking to an IT related audience. It was, at first, disconcerting to me to see this listed as a “Leadership style”. But then I considered that many leaders do base decisions and judgements on comparisons with other business units, past employers, competitors, and industry best practices. (In fact, I bet everyone I know has used the “at the last place I worked” line. I know I do.) The effectiveness and justice of such a comparison depends on a lot of factors, and ultimately will be trumped with the “but we are different from them” card. Overuse of this tactic can be as wearing as hearing repeated tales of the old days, or continually being compared to your perfect older brother. In casual use, be sparing. It might be used more often if there is a legitimate basis of comparison, if management has put out a call to match services, or if the benchmark is agreed upon as the stated goal of a project.
***
True Brainstorming in IT is problematic, in my experience. The theory of brainstorming is to come up with as many ideas as possible and not rule any out, not matter how crazy. In real life, what often happens is that brainstorming occurs as part of troubleshooting. Unusable ideas get shot down through the course of the discussion or through self-editing. IMO Self-editing occurs more often in a technical environment because people don’t want to reveal what they do not know about a technology, because they know an idea won’t be implemented by management, or because they feel the idea would be rejected by peers (as dumb, flaky, insecure, old school, etc.).
***
The Business Process Reengineering method (BPR) is defined as ‘the fundamental reconsideration and radical redesign of organizational processes, in order to achieve drastic improvement of current performance in cost, service and speed’. Value creation for the customer is the leading factor…
For an IT department, the most common BPR is the move from “Call Mike” to the creation of a Helpdesk. The most difficult adjustment here is changing user habits. A forward-thinking company can assign “Mike” a Helpdesk extension from day one, allowing additional employees to rotate through this extension. Then, when more formalized helpdesk systems are put in place, users will not have to change the number they call, or their expectations of who they’ll talk to.
It is often involved in BPR for other departments. It is best when IT becomes involved after objectives are set, but before a new design is envisioned. Often for this to happen, we need a representative at a high management level to keep us apprised of other department’s plans, and to suggest IT involvement to those departments.
***
I found the description of the Change Management Iceberg very much in line with what I’ve seen at work. The Change Management Iceberg holds that many times managers only consider the top of the iceberg: Cost, Quality and Time. However, the overall success of a project can be dependent on things below the waterline. Don’t overlook costs such as values & mindsets (culture) and capabilities (training and staffing needs). Don’t ignore
the need to manage Perceptions, Beliefs, and Politics. I’ve seen many a project that is rooted in very sound financial or technological decisions, and a total win in terms of Cost, Quality and Time, be totally ruined because of neglect to mind the underlying corporate or individual attitudes. Worse yet, is the cumulative effect on morale, productivity, and employee retention this can have when project after project is pushed out with total disregard for acceptance.
***
The Competing Values Framework primarily describes a scale of organizational focus. However, this framework was used to categorize 8 roles of leadership. These are hypothetical roles, and effective managers may play multiple, even competing, roles and may need to balance them against each other. The roles are mapped over the organization models quadrant, with the four directional points being Flexibility (12 o’clock), External Focus (3) Control (6) and Internal Focus (9). The roles (reading clockwise) are:
12-3 Open system model - Innovator & Broker
3-6 Rational Goal model - Producer & Director
6-9 Internal Process model - Monitor & Coordinator
9-12 Human Relations model - Mentor & Facilitator
The description lists many different ways this framework can be used within an organization. The thing that stands out for me is that if the organization relates to one model, and your style falls within a different model, you might find yourself at odds with the org culture. Additionally, if what your department needs and what you provide do not match up, your department may suffer. I see myself as strong in the roles of Facilitator, Mentor, Monitor, Coordinator, and Producer. I would dislike a role that heavily relied on the role of Broker.
***
Contingency theory of leadership:
The effectiveness of a given pattern of leader behavior is contingent upon the demands imposed by the situation. These theories stress using different styles of leadership appropriate to the needs created by different organizational situations. Variables are deemed to be group atmosphere, task structure, and leader’s power position.
Contingency theory of decision making:
The effectiveness of a decision depends on:
the importance of the decision quality and acceptance
the amount of relevant information possessed by the leader and subordinates
the likelihood that subordinates will accept an autocratic decision or cooperate in trying to make a good decision if allowed to participate
the amount of disagreement among subordinates with respect to their preferred alternatives
Note that these aren’t purely based on the situation, but also rely on the group dynamics and the leader’s styel and power. To me a lot of the list is “well, duh”, but that may be coming from a lot of personal experience. If you’ve been in an organization where there was a lot of acceptance and agreement, you might not guess that an effective decision could be undermined by subordinates disagree or prefer their own alternative.
***
I’m about overloaded with thinking about leadership theories for today…and I’m only up the the C’s! But I honestly hope to read through more of these in the future. If you can’t wait, visit the site yourself:
http://www.valuebasedmanagement.net/
(Disclaimer: This is a text-ad-laden page, but the content is still valid.)
