Learning today that we will be presenting at a leadership development conference in Argentina in June, 2012, made me immediately think, of course, of a great grilled steak (for which Argentina is famous for). Our topic? Inviting disruptive change into one’s professional life in the spirit of leadership innovation. Steak and innovation. What better chance to share a few coaching lessons learned from my own journey as a novice grillmaster:
Social Butterfly: a gregarious person who likes to attend parties and other social gatherings.
Networker: someone who creates positive opportunities by building networks of like-minded people. Networking allows one to create mutually beneficial relationships and generate business opportunities at the same time.
Everyday there are more and more networking events as people are trying to connect to others in professional settings, find their next position, and drive new business. Unfortunately, many of my clients have a distasteful picture of the process because they incorrectly equate “networking” with the visual of the Butterfly – flitting from conversation to conversation – collecting cards and names but never resting long enough to solidify the opportunity to truly connect with people. With this visual in mind, many are turned off completely. I encourage people to look at the networking process differently as it appears they may have the wrong visual and end game in mind.
Here are a few of my “Do’s” and “Don’ts” for optimizing your own networking experience:
DO: Ask and REMEMBER who people are and what they do.
The butterfly measures success by the number of meetings. On the contrary, the networker truly seeks to know, understand and remember what that other person does. Take notes. You may not have a way to help each other now but the opportunity may present itself later. Seek to remember.
DON’T: Be afraid to take the conversation to a deeper level
A critical error of butterflies is to have brief, superficial conversations. For example, they may spend precious time to speak to the “important” person in the room (often the guest speaker at an event). Instead I suggest that you note who goes up and talks to the speaker – and then go introduce yourself to that person. You likely have similar interests – leverage the fact that you just had a shared experience and take the conversation to a deeper level.
DO: Talk to people that you do not know
Some butterflies take the same path and repeat the same patterns over and over again. If your goal is merely to socialize at these events, you will lose out as you safely gravitate to people you already know. The key is to not only meet people, but to meet new people. I challenge you to push yourself out of your pattern – ask your colleagues to introduce you to people they know or challenge each other to meet new people together.
DON’T: Attempt to talk to the entire room
The butterfly wears themselves out searching everywhere for the perfect landing spot. Your goal should be different …be strategic to meet a few people and anchor yourself in a good conversation. This isn’t to say that the effort that you put in pays immediate dividends, but you should be focused in your efforts and set goals before the event.
DON’T: Forget to ask for a card & FOLLOW-UP
Butterflies are famous for quickly moving on to the next thing. Differently for you, plan for the important follow-up. Having a conversation is powerful, but you may be quickly forgotten. Within the next few days invite someone to coffee or at the very least invite them to stay connected with you on LinkedIn.
DO: Help others and Pay it forward
Butterflies are social in many ways as they fly in groups, but they are not partners for each other. The true standard of a good networker is the selfless interest in “paying it forward”. Think through how you can help other people build their networks and always pay it forward.
Read the Experts - here are my favorite writers who provide great insight into creating your own positive networking experience:
1) Tim Sanders “Love is the Killer App” – Tim inspires me because he strongly emphasizes helping others as critical to networking. If you help others you actually help yourself.
2) Simon Vetter “Stand Out” – you have a brand whether you like it or not, Simon outlines how to build your professional brand and most importantly, how to market it.
3) Harvey Mackay “Dig Your Well before You Are Thirsty” – we all need a hand from time to time. Networking aids us in collecting that critical information BEFORE we need it.
4) Bob Littell "The Heart and Art of Netweaving" found at www.netweaving.com - I like Bob's points that good things happen to those that make it happen:
a. Strengthen your relationships with your existing clients, customers and referral sources, especially those who are doing well because of the nature of their business and/or industry
b. Develop new relationships with potential clients and customers realizing you may not be “selling” them any products or services now
c. Expand your network of existing and potential referral sources
Today, we dive into the world of analytics and human capital in an interview with my colleagues Shane Douthitt and Scott Mondore from Strategic Management Decisions (SMD). Always in search of wise investments, I believe the power of analytics is key to solving today and tomorrow's business challenges ...I find it very interesting that as I post this interview, IBM announces their purchase of SPSS - predictive analytics software. In my interview, SMD shares their deep expertise in developing human capital strategies based on analytics linking employee data to business outcomes as recently published in their book "Investing in What Matters: Linking Employees to Business Outcomes"
*What is the main theme of the book and your work?
We provide a structured approach for human resource (HR) professionals to instruct corporations how to use solid analytics to connect employee data to business outcomes. "Investing in what matters" uses a case study approach to help organizations use the data they have to transform their workforce into their biggest asset.
*What experiences compelled you to write this book?
We have worked as internal HR executives, external HR consultants as well as corporate strategy executives and line-of-business leaders. We have seen HR from all angles and have had great success over the past 15 years in these roles applying our methodology to show the value of what we were doing in HR. We wanted to write this book to help HR leaders become true business partners and show the value of the work we have dedicated our careers to...
*How is your work with HR data unique compared to everything else that has come before it? What are the differentiators?
To date, the work that is out there is based on assumptions and weak analytical techniques. The work on HR Scorecards focuses on efficiency metrics and employee engagement—none of which are business outcomes. Efficiency metrics are strictly for functions that are viewed as cost-centers who can only show value by cutting their budgets. This does not have to be a soft science...far from it. Our approach is a simple, practical way to take the vast amounts of HR data that already exist in organizations (training, surveys, competencies, demographics) and link them to actual business outcome data that shows cause-and-effect relationships. This allows HR leaders to show a monetary impact on the business and to also be held accountable for the business reaching its goals. This is what is truly meant by getting a “seat at the table”.
*Can you give us an example of a company that followed your advice and has realized gains in their investment?
A large grocery chain was losing $93 million dollars a year in losses called ‘shrink’ (e.g. employee theft, food losses, spoilage). The company had worked on their supply chain and distribution issues with some impact. However, the head of the shrink initiative realized that changes in behavior was the one area that would yield the greatest benefits. We implemented our methodology which pulled in all of the HR data and we discovered specific competencies, attitudes and hiring process issues that were directly driving shrink. The organization implemented initiatives to work on these specific areas and are now already ahead of the total annual plan for the year (and it’s only July).
*What are some "a-ha's" from your experience that drive the advice you provide to organizations:
We have ten principles in the book that help frame the next steps:
*Considering everything that businesses are handling at the moment, why is linking employees to business outcomes even more critical right now?
Our work outlines a process that organizations can follow to connect investments in employees to the bottom line. In the current slow economy, as organizations have been looking to cut expenses--our approach allows them to make people investment decisions based on cause-and-effect and ROI analyses. However, this should be done no matter the shape of the economy as HR, to this point, has struggled to show a return on investment.
In other words, there is never a better time than the present to invest wisely for the future.
For more from Scott and Shane, please see www.strategicmanagementdecisions.com
