Soft Management

 
 
I read this article a few months ago about Nick Sarillo’s “Trust and Track” culture which I think is a very healthy way of getting things done through other people - or delegation. This greatly impacted me and more recently I have been working on implementing many of the key points I learned in this Inc.com article in the training of new employees. For a small to midsize organization, it’s all about Culture if you want to get things done.

In order to Ship, complete tasks, without leaving coworkers and customers hanging, I firmly believe one must make a checklist. Nick’s idea is brilliant, he describes, “I built a system to replace me. I put together a checklist of things that had to be done by 4 p.m., so we could handle the volume. It took about four weeks until it could work without me. Now we’re nailing it.”

Nick’s “Trust and Track” culture involves educating employees about what it takes for the company to be successful, then trusting them to act accordingly - the people you hire should want to be successful on an individual basis. People who have what it takes, when educated properly, will shake it up and make positive things happen - even when the boss is gone.

The alternative is command and control, wherein success is the boss’s responsibility and employees do exactly what the boss says (or else!). I’m not saying the Genius with a Thousand Helpers approach doesn’t work, both approaches can work, but they produce very different cultures and long-term outcomes. If managed correctly, trust and track can allow a company to be adroit, resilient, and prolific enough to function at the highest level through booming and even contracting economies.

 
 
Today I attended the monthly "Dixie Techs" meeting with like 80 other geeks, freaks and nerd-jocks. It's a luncheon from 12-1pm that takes place every first Friday of the month at Dixie State College of Utah. They always have a great speaker and you get free pizza too!

I found this networking event very intriguing. I noticed that every software, web and mobile app developer was hiring. A friend of mine is a computer science professor at DSC and he had a dozen business owners asking him who he had in his program that was graduating soon. These guys were salivating over computer science talent – they were even interested in kids who still had a year left in their undergrad. As I found out, there were not a lot of students in the computer science program.

Then this evening I came across this article about online ads for computer science jobs in Utah being up more than 15% in January. As I read on I learned that “while there are more than 25 job seekers for every open position in fields like construction, the exact inverse is true in technology, health and science-related jobs.”

My friend and I believe our First Lego League (FLL) program, which is a partnership through the University of Utah, Dixie State College of Utah and Utah State University (my  4-H Robotics Program) is a feeder program to these higher education institutions. The demand is so high right now for tech jobs, if you have a kid that is even moderately interested in techy stuff then I encourage you to help him or her find their inner geek and get them involved in Lego Robotics – it’s a great platform for youth to learn engineering, design, and programming.


 
 
For me the most exciting thing to analyze in an organization is it's culture. I just love this sort of stuff, no matter what I hear about how successful (or unsuccessful) a non-profit or business is, I want to know what the culture is like. I want to know this because I truly believe there is a correlation between strong company culture and financial success.

I really like how Zappos focuses on culture first and then lets the success follow organically. Here are the fruits of Zappos' fun and zany culture:
  • Outstanding and renown customer service
  • Brand identity
  • Less management
  • Positive employee influence & friendships
  • Great management & marketing ideas
Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh explains that the company's culture starts with the hiring process. A company must be willing to hire and fire for "Culture Fit." 

I've come to agree that you can hire people with all the right qualifications and skill sets, but it has to be a culture fit. Culture fit is far more important than qualifications and skills. When it comes down to it, people can become qualified and develop the right skills to do a phenomenal work, but you can't teach someone to have the right attitude. Make no mistake, experience and skills are critical, but culture fit must be weighted equally. 

Sure there are many great companies out there, but they could be even greater if they did not compromise on culture fits and hire solely based on skills.

The great contemporary organizations of the 21st century all have strong cultures and values. Does it matter what your values are? No, just have them and commit to them. One way to commit to them is to interview for the values independent of job experience and technical ability. If the person you hire shares in the values of your organization, then you have a culture fit.
 
 
I believe that a company's job application should reflect its core values. An applicant may be qualified, but if she doesn't share the same core values as the organization, then it's simply not a good fit. That's why I think a standard application is junk - unless of course your business is stiff and boring. Sure there is a lot of legal trash you've got to have in there to protect your business and reduce exposure to litigation, but that's what the fine print is for.

Behold, here's my company's spankin' new job application that I've designed (with a little help from Sell!Sell!) to reflect the core values of my organization.

If you don't like it, tell me why. I like it because it's fun. One thing I've got to say about management is this:

"If you're not having fun, you're doing it wrong."
jobapphillsports.pdf
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I'm currently reading the eBook 8-Man Rotation which I have made available to download in this post. Kris Dunn, one of my favorite bloggers, provides a great example in his piece, "Want a Great Manager? 5 Reasons To Stay Away From the Stars and Hire a Scrub," that mediocre players can go on to become great coaches. For example:

• Joe Torre 
• Tony Larussa 
• Phil Jackson 
• Pat Riley 

These guys will make it to the Hall of Fame not because of their athletic abilities, but rather because of their superior coaching skills.

As it relates to talent acquisition, Dunn made it clear that the trouble with hiring Stars is that they are frequently thought to have the best skills to become the most effective managers. As a result, Stars often get chosen first when promotion opportunities arise. But then what happens? It rarely works out.

I thought about why this occurs. Why hasn't Wayne Gretzky won any Stanley Cups as a coach?  I then learned that one reason is because Stars have special skills - they tend to get frustrated when their pupils can't do what they did with great consistency.

Scrubs on the other hand are more like role players and can often make excellent coaches (and managers). The advantage Scrubs have is that they know the game is hard, so they work harder at it. In addition, if you give them a shot and they'll be loyal forever.
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