Why did I do that?

Posted on March 9, 2012 by BJ McKay

Remember the last meeting you had with your team where you walked out and asked yourself: “Why did I do that?” It could be in response to something you said, how you handled a conflict situation, or how you attempted to motivate your team to action.

Regardless of the specifics, I want you to remember that feeling. The feeling that you logically knew what to do and say in that moment, but for whatever reason you did the opposite.

All managers, even the great ones, have these moments. This post is about what separates the good from the great in these moments that happen everyday. I am going to stand on the shoulders of a great researcher as I work to earn my point here.

These moments tend to happen most when there is a lot going on in our immediate environment – immediate being in our current physical surroundings, as well as in our minds. The human response to this situation is being frazzled, for lack of a better term.

The basic neurobiology of frazzle reflects the body’s default plan for emergency. When we are under stress, the HPA axis roars into action, preparing the body for crisis. Among other biological maneuvers, the amygdala commandeers the prefrontal cortex, the brain’s executive center. This shift in control to the low road favors automatic habits, as the amygdala draws on knee-jerk responses to save us. The thinking brain gets sidelined for the duration; the high road moves too slowly. (Social Intelligence: The New Science of Human Relationships. Daniel Goleman. 2006. p. 268)

I underlined “automatic habits” above because this is where the primal part of us takes over the rational part of our brains. We are, in the truest sense, no longer thinking at all. We are simply reacting to perceived threats in our environment. The good news here is that all people have this hard-wiring. Here is the not so good news…

The greater the anxiety we feel, the more impaired is the brain’s cognitive efficiency. In this zone of mental misery, distracting thoughts hijack our attention and squeeze our cognitive resources. Because high anxiety shrinks the space available to our attention, it undermines our very capacity to take in new information, let alone generate fresh ideas. Near-panic is the enemy of learning and creativity.

Now, do you get a better sense of “why did I do that?” In my world of behavioral science and analytics, it has been proven that these primal or natural instincts are hard-wired into us. We are not all the same and will respond differently in this frazzled state. However, the key to unlocking our mastery of these moments and conditioning ourselves to act logically when our mind and body is fleeing to the primal low-road, is in uncovering that hard-wiring in ourselves – and then, uncovering it in others we work for, work with, and whom work for us.

Therefore, if you are in a high-pressure sales environment, stop wondering why your reps are not learning and coming up with creative selling solutions. High-pressure and over-worked production lines? Same message. Knowing how to best manage your people requires knowledge that we cannot gain without the use of science and valid instruments. Now, reach out to me at ADVISA if you want the answer to the question: Why did I do that?

A critical flaw in your strategic plan. How will you address it?

Posted on January 30, 2012 by BJ McKay

Most companies gather their leadership team once per year to discuss strategic planning. This is a time-honored event that, in many cases, produces little tangible result. There is often recreation, along with retreat from the day-to-day grind of running the business, but actions and behaviors typically stay the same when those key executives return to the job. There are likely many reasons for this, but one that I encounter most often is that the actual talent within the company – the same talent that will ultimately produce the outcomes drawn up during the strategic planning retreat – were not included and were poorly assessed.

Strategic plans drawn up in a (relative) vacuum can be dangerous vehicles for de-motivating employees and setting them on a path to an unrealistic goal. It is a tragic management mistake to tell high performers in any role that they are consistently behind and on a collision course for failure. This unnecessarily taxes and drains key people and leaves them with a half-tank of gas to finish the race. Often, the strategic plan itself becomes a key lever for lack of energy and lack of motivation leading to poor results.

Has your strategic plan produced these outcomes? Here is how to fix it:

1) Start with real data on the people responsible for the goals within the strategic plan. We use Predictive Index® at ADVISA as a foundational element of our strategic/organizational planning process. By understanding the hard-wiring and makeup of employees, our clients avoid guessing about how to motivate their people and how to foster an environment where their employees can produce.

2) Start with real data on your company’s past performance in the key areas that will be measured as a benchmark for success. Often, leadership can explain away poor results, feign accountability, and say “next year will be nothing like last year.” This is a critical mistake. Facing at the truth – which is often in the numbers – can provide a realistic framework to take “one step at a time” in the near-term. Know that your benchmarks are realistic before codifying the strategic plan for distribution, otherwise you risk a real morale and energy drain by teeing your people up for failure.

3) Use a competent, credible, and trusted third-party consultant to facilitate your strategic planning. At ADVISA, we have been involved in strategic planning for over 20 years, facilitating for many industries. Our team of management consultants is sharp, experienced, and trained in expert facilitation. While we are partial to our own team, there are many credible and talented facilitators in the marketplace. Avoid trying to feign objectivity by running your own strategic planning. This can be reckless. And it is unfair to place key executives – especially those who have bought in to the company – in a position to operate as if they can be clearly objective facilitators. These are people who have key performance metrics that will inevitably cloud their vision. This focus is what makes them special at their jobs, and allows them to be key contributors within the strategic planning session. However, if they are asked to facilitate a strategic plan, this becomes a crutch.

If you are interested in learning how I, and our team at ADVISA, can assist you and your management team in strategic planning please call us at 317.249.2258. If you already have a trusted facilitator, consider sharing this post and looking critically at the people that will make your strategic plan successful.

ADVISA at the Super Bowl 2012 Social Media Command Center

Posted on January 27, 2012 by BJ McKay

This year’s Super Bowl is going to be more social than any in the history of the sport, and my client Raidious will be the epicenter of this activity. They are the Social Media Command Center for Super Bowl 2012 in Indianapolis. Last night we had an exclusive event to hear the strategy that Raidious will be employing through @superbowl2012 on Twitter. Taulbee Jackson, Brian Wyrick, Ryan Smith and the entire team shared the excitement and all the work that will go into serving the masses that will be in Indianapolis during Super Bowl week.

Here is a local and a national story that have been written about this first ever initiative:

WTHR -

Mashable -

There is a Bloomberg article around the corner that I’ll share when it’s posted. It has been rewarding working with the talented team at Raidious and they continue to be a case study in the application of Predictive Index® in hiring and in management development.

@superbowl2012 on Twitter is where you need to be from now through Super Sunday.

Everyone hates the decision maker

Posted on January 19, 2012 by BJ McKay

If you are the decision maker in your business, people will hate you.

Do you agree with this?

The decision maker is a position that many seek as they build their careers, but often when the position is earned it, comes with far more scrutiny and far less enjoyment than anticipated. So, why do we constantly seek the decision-maker positions? The reason, as usual, is simple and strikes to the heart of each of us as human beings. The answer is that power is attractive and motivating, especially for men.

Let me take this a level deeper. Historically in America, men have been nurtured to be decision makers, to want to make more money than their peers, and to strive for greatness and power as a key criteria for success. This can be validated and documented easily over the past 100 years. This has lead to difficult circumstances for many managers, executives, and other leaders in decision-making roles. The fact that I may not want to be the decision maker usually hits home after I have already won the position of decision maker. Now what do I do?

There is no clear path out of a misfit position, or job requirement. It’s a messy situation at any angle of approach. The key is to not end up in a role that will not equal personal success. Do this by striving for true self-awareness and self-acceptance. Without those valuable virtues it will be difficult to effectively navigate yourself to true success.

Too often, a decision maker is chosen or promoted because she/he is popular among management and peers. However, when the role is assumed, guess what happens to that popularity?

Take five minutes today to reflect on these two questions about being the decision maker:

Do I enjoy having the final say and accountability for decision making?

Am I truly self-aware? If yes, have I accepted myself?

Self-discipline and reinforcement are keys to effective training

Posted on January 12, 2012 by BJ McKay

Training can be wasteful and worthless for you and your employees. Training takes time. Costs money. Takes key people out of the job for a period of time. If you wanted to list out the reasons not to do training you could produce a nice-sized list even longer than this one.

Effective training involves two variables every time:

Self-discipline
Reinforcement

Without those two variables, training can be a waste. The two variables are in order of importance as well. Consider the changes in your own life - the important lessons that have stuck with you to this day. What is consistent with each of them? Likely, self-discipline and reinforcement were involved in all scenarios.

Without self-discipline our behaviors do not want to change. As human beings we have the distinct ability to say “no” or “yes” to things our bodies/minds want. Breaking habits developed over time are not easy. Our bodies want to continue doing what they’ve been doing. Self-discipline is the opposite force that must be larger than the habit. Over time, the need to exert self-discipline lessens as the new behaviors firmly take the place of the old behaviors. Self-discipline is a limited supply resource in that we only have so much of to dole out.

Reinforcement is the other critical piece of the equation for effective training. This is the outside influence or accountability that keeps us, or our employees, on the new behavior path.

Consider New Year’s resolutions as a great example of reinforcement. Andrea decides that after New Year’s Day she is going to go to the gym every day and give up soda. For the first week, she makes it happen. Then the following week she skips two days because “something came up”. Then in week three of the new year she only goes once because “things just got busy”. Then in week four all behaviors are back to “normal” for Andrea. There was no reinforcement to produce the new desired behaviors. The self-discipline alone ran out after one week, which can be typical. She lacked outside accountability to shore her up. Most of us need a person or outside force to keep us on track with new behaviors. The more ingrained the old behavior, the more reinforcement we will need to enforce the new behaviors.

On a go forward basis, once you know the new behaviors you wish to see from yourself and your employees, consider how much self-discipline will be necessary and what reinforcement you will be able to maintain to make them happen. Without those pieces you should reconsider your investment of time and resources.

Ask yourself this: “Do I have the self-discipline and reinforcement in place to sustain these changes I wish to see?”

I-It vs. I-You. How are Sales Superstars created?

Posted on November 22, 2011 by BJ McKay

I-It = Viewing people solely as instruments to be used toward our own goals. I am “I-It” when I care not at all about your feelings but only about what I want from you.

I-You = A special bond, an attuned closeness that is often-but of course not always-found between husbands and wives, family members, and good friends.

When we are in I-It mode we treat other people as means to an end. In the I-You mode, our relationship with them becomes an end in itself. (Daniel Goleman; Social Intelligence)

So, how are sales superstars created? I-You and I-It is how. Let’s define a sales superstar – an individual who consistently achieves above average revenue results while maintaining a role as a consummate team player and positive employee role model. Would you like to have more of them? Me too!

I-You and I-It cuts to the heart of this conversation. In selling situations we can find ourselves on the wrong end of an I-It conversation. The “I” is the prospect and the it, more often than not, is the sales person. The salesperson feels objectified, disrespected, made to feel small, and often a second-class citizen. That is what being “It” feels like. Not something you want to do for a living. It is unsustainable for most mere mortals.

The I-It is also a glass ceiling for sales superstar impostors. These are the individuals who produce sheer numbers but tend to be a negative influence and suffer from “too-heavy-to-handle” ego. They are the “I” and the company and clients are the “It.” Meant to serve their own ends. As you can imagine, this is also unsustainable.

I-You is the secret. “I” actually care and am interested about “You,” regardless of any positive outcomes for me — where I ask questions that strike to the heart of problems that matter to you and are relevant. Not, simply the problems that happen to be solved by my products or services. The I-You is the person who legitimately cares about others, and in turn, others trust that person. They should. These are the gems that take a reasonably good sales team and turn them into super heros.

The great news, in most cases, is that this mindset can be trained to those willing to learn them. Like anything else, there has to be a will to become better, and an authentic passion for what you are selling and the good it brings to clients.

Do you have a sincere interest in re-engineering the human side of your business? Contact me.

What are you proud of?

Posted on June 24, 2011 by BJ McKay

In reading the book, Tribal Leadership by Dave Logan, John King and Halee Fischer-Wright, I am continually struck by how the best questions are the most simple. I meet with and work with companies that are complex in a lot of ways, and in that complexity the reason for existence gets blurry, muddy, or just plain lost. Here is the question:

“What are you most proud of?”

If you take that question in the broadest sense, you will get insightful and meaningful answers. That question gives us the fundamental building blocks to answer an even more profound question: Why? As in, why do I do what I do and live the way I live?

Well, in the spirit of sharing, here is my answer to the question: What am I most proud of?

(I’m going to answer this question as it relates to my career and professional development because a holistic answer to this question would take many pages.)

I’m most proud that I have taken great strides to subjugate my own ego to truly serve and learn from others. I’m proud because my profile is a difficult one when it comes to listening and not seeing the success of others as detrimental to my own success. I am most proud of this because it has allowed me to be a better man. It has allowed me to impact the lives of others with selfless intent, and not claim ownership. It’s allowed me to create a timeline where I am able to measure myself, to a degree, through the eyes of those whom I’ve been able to help advance in the world. It’s also allowed me to see more clearly those whom I have let down, disappointed, and just plain failed. Admitting that I have failed others and will likely fail again is a freeing realization to me.

Right now, that is the best answer I can give relative to my career and professional development.

Exercise: What are you most proud of? Take 5 minutes today and reflect on that question. Whether your highest priority is managing difficult people, determining if you have organizational alignment, or simply learning your true core values, you’ll find this exercise worthwhile. If you struggle to focus, go for a walk, or close your door and shut your eyes. The answer to this question is of the utmost importance when looking at the larger question of: Why?

The One Vital Attribute of a Super Manager

Posted on June 15, 2011 by BJ McKay

For better or for worse, a direct manager impacts one’s life. Some of these relationships have soured employees on managers until the last working day of their lives. Others have lived a very different experience with a manager, or series of managers – their lives were enriched, and they became a higher functioning and more self-confident human being. This second category of manager – a “super manager” – could have been a 5th grade teacher or a first boss. Or they may have come later in life, when maturity and self-awareness opened the person up to listen and learn from others. At whatever intersection of life one finds a “super manager”, their influence lives on day-to-day.

The question is, what made them so special? What was it that allowed them to connect so well with others, and help others become their best selves? The answer may be surprising simple: It’s not about them, it never was.

The super manager’s interests are predominantly on their employees. Working tirelessly to instill self-confidence in each person, they do not see employees as pieces of the machinery necessary to make them money, or to keep them secure. They see each person as an individual, who has needs, drives, and situations that require an investment from the manager. This investment starts out as real interest in the person. Knowing, not where they see themselves in five years, but how they see themselves working right now. Then they use that important foundation as the starting point to nurturing that person into the professional and person that they had aspire to be.

The great news is that we are all capable of being super managers. The tougher news is that it will come easier for some. Do not be discouraged by this, because the journey to becoming a super manager is a journey within. Knowing exactly, honestly, why you do what you do is foremost and key. This may take a great deal of time for some, because it may never have occurred to us what our true motivators are.

Now, you can read the five best selling books on importance of motivation, leadership and management skills training. You may learn a thing or two, which is progress. However, the greatest and most permanent lesson rests within each of us. It’s having the courage, determination, patience, and perseverance to find it that separates the mere manager from the super manager.

*If you valued this post consider following me on Twitter: @bjmckay

You. Peer Pressure. Tribes.

Posted on May 25, 2011 by BJ McKay

CONCEPT: Why waste your time with skills training when you don’t have the hearts and minds of your tribe?

If you don’t understand your tribe, the results from training expenditures are meager at best. The tribe concept has largely shaped human history since the beginning of civilization. So why do we choose to forget this when it comes to shaping the cultures of our companies? It continues to puzzle me. We are not machines. We are flesh and blood, and our operating system is still mostly a mystery. However, peer pressure can provide us insight into the workings of our tribes and managing difficult people within them.

Peer pressure is a force of nature that is either an ally of your business or a foe. As companies grind it out day-to-day to grow sales, service clients, control quality, and respond to help requests, relationships with leadership can begin to fracture while relationships at the peer level strengthen. This quote articulates this well: Therefore, to prevent collapse, many groups formed a tribe. Tribes either fought each other or formed confederacies against other tribes. The basic dichotomy of “us” versus “them” occurred at this tribal level. It was reinforced by different languages and cultures. – John Anderson. Relationships are stronger than paychecks. People may strain to sacrifice for a business, but they will often willingly sacrifice for a relationship.

Don’t take this lightly. We wake up every morning in service of relationships, not to work for you. If you don’t invest in understanding those relationships, you will struggle to keep, motivate, and lead a productive, confident, and profitable team.

CLOSING QUESTION: As a manager and leader, what are you doing to better understand the relationships that galvanize your employee’s tribe?

Quotes and inspiration from Peer Pressure: Why Soldiers Fight and Why Most Fight Bravely by John Anderson

Intentions are unimportant when measured against perceptions

Posted on April 30, 2011 by BJ McKay

I am every manager. I do my best to give my employees what they need to be successful. I work on growing the company, completing world-class work, and moving the company day-to-day more effectively from point A to point B. This is what I tell my boss about what I am intending with my actions. However, I am a human being first and manager second, or even further down the priority list of how I define myself.

Naturally I give people what I need to be successful. Whether it is in rewards and compensation or in discipline and other corrective actions. I know what has worked with me, and therefore, it makes sense that it would work for others with reasonable intelligence. I manage 12 people, and 3 are successful. I have 6 that have promise, but have plenty of ups and downs in their performance and attitude. Then I have 3 who just need to go. They are negative, and don’t respond well to anything I try to do as a manager to help them become successful. I guess this is just how it goes. No matter what I do, and how hard I try, this will likely be the outcome. My job is just so disappointing at times.

98% of all managers, owners, and CEO’s have the very best of intentions – I truly believe this. The problem is, as managers, we rarely have the insight necessary to know how people perceive us – how they internalize the tactics we take as managers. Intentions cannot compete with perceptions. Ever.

We have physical and mental limitations as human beings. Our minds thin slice our environments to make sense of the world in realtime for survival. This function limits our ability to take in all the information that is there to be observed. We need a tool to cut through our own bias, and our hardwiring as human beings to thin slice – to truly know what makes our people tick.

Predictive Index® does this for managers at over 7,500 companies around the globe. We provide the technology, and more importantly, the training of PI® Analysts within those client companies to leverage this tool in all facets of the organization.

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