Management guru Richard Pascale snakket i et foredrag om ”rackets” – ”a racket is an unwanted condition that persists”. Altså en uønsket tilstand som vedvarer. Foreldre opplever at barnets rom forblir uryddig selv om vi ønsker det annerledes. Selv har jeg snakket om at jeg burde vært noen kilo lettere! I organisasjonslivet har vi i mange år snakket om at vi bør ha ”flere kvinner i ledende stillinger”. Per juni 2010 har ca 2 % av selskapene på Oslo Børs kvinnelige sjefer. Hmm.... Klassiske ”Rackets”!
Racket er et engelsk ord som jeg ikke umiddelbart kan assosiere med, så jeg undret meg om det kunne finnes et norsk ord vi kunne bruke. Administrerende direktør i Næringsforeningen i Stavanger, Jostein Soland foreslo ”Trollring” etter Sigurd Hoels bok ”Trollringen”. Uansett hva man gjør så blir man sittende fast, det er som det er slått en trollring rundt oss eller det vi vil forandre. I Hoels bok vil hovedpersonen forandre verden til det bedre, men blir offer for motkrefter i bygden.
Finnes det noen trollringer i vårt liv eller i vår organisasjon? Uønskede tilstander som vi har snakket om å gjøre noe med, kanskje også prøvd å gjøre noe med, men som like forbannet er uendret!
Trollringer må nærmes med respekt og kløkt. Det er nemlig gode grunner for at uønskede tilstander vedvarer. Det er krefter som holder dem der! De kreftene kan til tider være svært så synlige, men like fullt vanskelige å temme. Mange av dem er usynlige for oss, enten fordi vi har vent oss til dem, eller fordi vi ikke har nøstet opp i de bakenforliggende årsakene.
Vi må selvfølgelig tro at troll kan temmes.
• Anerkjenn at vi har å gjøre med en trollring
• Ta på oss Askeladden-hatten. Dette krever kløkt
• Identifiser kreftene som opprettholder trollringen
• Hvordan kan vi svekke de kreftene som opprettholder trollringen?
• Analyser de motkreftene vi har prøvd å iverksette. Hvorfor virker de ikke?
• Unngå at vi gjør mer av det samme!
Trollringer er uønskede tilstander som vedvarer til tross for våre forsøk på å gjøre noe med dem. Trollringbekjempere ønskes velkommen i våre ledergrupper og i våre organisasjoner! Ikke sant?
fredag 24. september 2010
onsdag 8. september 2010
“In Germany, if you have a vision, you should see a Doctor!”
This was said to me in a break at a leadership development program.
One of the participants was a young manager from Hamburg, and he came up to me after my lecture on “Creating a Vision – a leadership task”. He was joking, sort of.
But he had two very powerful observations: One, he perceived a cultural challenge in our “management speak”. The lofty, hairy and motivational speeches were not so motivational for him. I will touch upon that part in a later post.
Secondly, he underlined the problem of so many company visions: 1) They are perceived as unrealistic hollow words, and 2) They change, not because we have achieved them and need another more challenging one, but because we change our managers! At times we are tempted to change it by overambitious marketers too.
The Vision can be illustrated by holding a rubber band between two hands.
The distance creates tension. The longer away the hands are, the more tension, obviously.
The upper hand can symbolise the vision, and the lower hand the current reality. The vision should create interesting tension, not so far away that the string breaks, and not so close that it becomes lame and uninspiring.
The challenge is that the tension could be resolved in two ways: 1) to lift the current reality closer to the vision, but also 2) to lower the vision (or ambition), or to change it totally. ;-)
In addition the vision should paint an inspiring picture of where we are at some stage (timeframe depend on culture and business reality), and what it looks like when we get there. Too many visions are intentions, and intentions seldom get us anywhere.
Is my vision or ambition interestingly far away from current reality? Does it create inspiration? Are all of my efforts aimed at lifting the current reality? If we are tempted to lower the ambition to ease the tension, do we have the guts to stop and remind ourselves that our task is to move us and the business towards the vision!
One of the participants was a young manager from Hamburg, and he came up to me after my lecture on “Creating a Vision – a leadership task”. He was joking, sort of.
But he had two very powerful observations: One, he perceived a cultural challenge in our “management speak”. The lofty, hairy and motivational speeches were not so motivational for him. I will touch upon that part in a later post.
Secondly, he underlined the problem of so many company visions: 1) They are perceived as unrealistic hollow words, and 2) They change, not because we have achieved them and need another more challenging one, but because we change our managers! At times we are tempted to change it by overambitious marketers too.
The Vision can be illustrated by holding a rubber band between two hands.
The distance creates tension. The longer away the hands are, the more tension, obviously.
The upper hand can symbolise the vision, and the lower hand the current reality. The vision should create interesting tension, not so far away that the string breaks, and not so close that it becomes lame and uninspiring.
The challenge is that the tension could be resolved in two ways: 1) to lift the current reality closer to the vision, but also 2) to lower the vision (or ambition), or to change it totally. ;-)
In addition the vision should paint an inspiring picture of where we are at some stage (timeframe depend on culture and business reality), and what it looks like when we get there. Too many visions are intentions, and intentions seldom get us anywhere.
Is my vision or ambition interestingly far away from current reality? Does it create inspiration? Are all of my efforts aimed at lifting the current reality? If we are tempted to lower the ambition to ease the tension, do we have the guts to stop and remind ourselves that our task is to move us and the business towards the vision!
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