Storytelling!

How do you effectively communicate your message to a group who has not experienced what you have experienced?

Do you provide an overview, or a generalization? Do you talk about what might it feel if they were to experience what you experienced? Do you create a simulation of the conditions you faced and let them respond/cope?

We can do some or all of these. But what I have found significantly impactful is “story telling”.

I remember a few years back moving from the Audio-visual mode of presentation to the “story telling” method for interactions with groups of students. A person who had experienced the company, talked of his experiences. These were not generalizations but actual experiences that were spoken about. I remember the presenters being enthused about doing this, and I remember the audiences raving about what they had experienced.

Last year, we tried communicating the importance of e-learning through “street plays”. Till then we had struggled to find buy-in for our e-learning initiatives. We had used e-mails, e-mail advertisements, presentations in conferences, etc but to hardly any avail. But the street plays seemed to strike a chord with people. Suddenly the number of site visits, course enrolments and course completions jumped up.

I remember my Mathematics teacher in School (if I remember correctly his name was McDermott) used to tell us stories towards the end of the class and he used to have us in rapt attention – Omen was our most favourite story! (any memories ? J). I actually can still recollect visuals of he telling us his stories even though I don’t remember much of the Mathematics he taught us.

A common childhood memory we cherish is one of our significant parental figures (mother, father, grandfather, or grandmother) reciting stories to us. Can you visualize such instances from your past? How does it make you feel?

The “Storytelling” parts of the Appreciative enquiry discussions, we had last year around, impacted me the most. I remember neither the details of the session structure, nor the exact details of the stories of my teammates. But I do remember the feelings I was left with at the end of those conversations. I also retain a strong bond of friend ship with my teammates.

Over and over again, the power of storytelling shines forth!

What makes storytelling such a powerful mean to communicate? I wonder!

-

Sourav

Individual and the Institute

How is it that at times you find guys from “not so good campuses” performing better than guys from the “supposedly better campuses”?

This is a question which I have pondered on for quite some time.

A possible answer:

· “Quality of the student” is what matters. “Quality of the campus” is just an indicator. This gets manifested in different forms:

o Better campus just means that in a higher ranked campus you have a higher probability of meeting a candidate who meets your requirements.

o Better campus just means that if we were not to have any number constraints, we might end up making offers to a large proportion of students in the “best campus” . This would not be the case in a so called “average or not so good campus”. But it also does not mean that in “average or not so good campuses” you would not find someone who meets your standard.

o Better campus just means that average batch quality in a higher ranked campus in the country would be more than the average batch quality in a much lower ranked campus.

So it is possible that a hire from a “lower ranked” campus does better than a hire from a “higher ranked” campus as long as a company has used the same “bar” for hiring across campuses. The probability is lower, but it is certainly there.

Is there a possible flaw in the argument I have used above?

What is the process a student uses to select colleges? If a representative student were to get an offer from the best campus in the country and the 10^th best campus in the country, which one would s/he choose? It is obvious, s/he would choose the best campus. So is it not correct to conclude that all students in a higher ranked campus would be better than all students in a lower ranked campus?

Let me make this a bit more stark. “Is it not correct to conclude that the lowest ranked student in a higher ranked campus would still be significantly better than the highest ranked student in a lower ranked campus?”

What would be your answer? What does gut feeling tell you? My gut (not that I have much of it J) tells me that this is not what I have observed in my experience.

What can be the reasons? Why is it that quality of students (as measured by performance on the job) doesn’t necessarily co-relate with quality of campus? A few possible explanations are:

· Correctness/ Comprehensiveness of Filtering Criterion: The filtering criterions in the entrance examinations for educational institutes may not necessarily reflect what is required for effective performance in the industry. The entrance examinations for these institutions do test Learnability (in RC, DI, Numerical and Logical ability, English – when presented with a new situation -------- is the individual able to crack it?) and willingness to make contributions (there is a lot of focus on extra – curricular in the selection process) but do they check whether an individual is able to “work effectively through others” and whether “s/he is open to change”? Yes, Group work and learning teams are mandated in educational institutions but so is relative grading. The incentives to have a Zero Sum game in this case are high. But any ways the point here is that both of these aspects (Effective Relationships and Openness to Change) are not something selection to educational institutions depend on (the assumption being that these aspects are not trainable in the short run – abilities and hence hire, & not train, for them).

· It might be about the self efficacy (the individual’s own evaluation of his/her competence) of the individual. A mediocre guy from a “higher ranked campus” might have a lower self efficacy at the end of 2 years of relative grading than a higher ranked guy from a “lower ranked campus”. Self efficacy is something which can be impacted in the short run and two years of conditioning can impact it for quite some time.

· It might also be about the willingness to contribute. (“The best decisions are the best implemented decisions” J)

o Fence sitter v/s Inside the system feeling: Do you feel a part of the system? Or are you in the search for short term benefits so that you can move on to greener pastures? This might impact the quality of the contribution.

o The world owes it to me v/s I am out here to prove a point – What mindset do you come in with? Do you feel that you are special and hence the world owes it to you? Or Do you feel that you are out there to prove a point – that you are as good, if not better, than the rest? Hence energy and commitment levels would vary.

One or many of these factors may be at play when you find that “performance on the job” doesn’t correspond to “so called pedigree of the institute” an individual comes from.

-

Sourav

Flux around Stretch Goals!

When it comes to PFMS there are these few things which we consistently hear:

• Focus on Goal Setting
• The goals need to be SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, Time Bound)
• The goals need to be STRETCH GOALS.
• Focus on Rewards…. Distributive Justice v/s Procedural Justice.

There are quite a few questions which arise in my mind when we talk of stretch goals. What do we mean by stretch? When is a goal unstretched and from when does it start becoming stretched? How much stretch is adequate enough? Do you need stretch in goals at all? Is it possible to have stretch at all?

The dictionary meaning of stretch is “to extend beyond normal limits.”

There are 2 things:

• Setting of a goal
• Judgement whether a goal has been reached or not

Now let us assume that:

• The goal when it was set, was stretched (and hence was beyond normal limits).
• The judgement arrived on is that the goal has been reached.

What does it tell us about the performance of an individual?

So say a guy had to sell 100 units in a quarter (and it was decided that was the stretch goal). He sells 110 units in the quarter – what does it tell us? Can we say that the stretched goal was not stretched enough? Or has the guy stretched himself more than what is required to get to a stretched goal? What is the adequate level of stretch? Does stretch means the maximum stretch possible? How do you arrive at a judgement on the maximum stretch possible?

I agree that goal setting is important. But there sure is a lot of flux around this concept of Stretchness of a Goal. There must be another way of looking at this.

-

Sourav

Differences and Profiling!

A few months back I was a part of a workshop with around 30 other people. There was something which had struck me odd back then. The realization and the associated feelings have kept on coming back to me at different times.

People were sharing their individual life stories in small groups. Some of these stories were being subsequently shared with the larger group. Most of the stories were of “having made it big inspite of being from a difficult background or having overcome significant obstacles in life”. I found this common emerging theme odd. I wondered – “in a group of 30 individuals, not even a single story which is different!. I didn’t hear anyone speak of an easy childhood or growing up years. What could be the reasons?”

There are a few possibilities:

• Does the group have a selection mechanism which “filters in” only specific kind of profiles and “filters out” all/most other kind of profiles?
• Is there a strong “compliance dynamic” in play within the group - something which makes individuals speak of themselves in a certain light – because that is what seems to be valued within the group? In a sense, there is a subtle rejection, of anyone who doesn’t proclaim to be of this type. Hence “socially acceptable answers” are expressed in group settings. This may be the case even though the group members may have significant differences in their ways of being.
• Principle of Similarity and Liking! - People speak of themselves in a certain light because the recipient feels good if he were to hear that story.

If I were to reflect on the typical member profile of this group, what would his/her profile be?

The person would be “a male in his late 20s/early 30s, married , with young kids or without kids, owning a 2 box or an entry level 3 box car, left brained, with some quirky habit or the other, would be a good teacher, would come from a middle class background, would have had to overcome significant difficulties to make it to wherever he has made it, and would be extremely loving and caring about his/her significant others in life.”

There’s nothing wrong with having a group profile like this, but how does the group react to someone who doesn’t fit into this profile description? Is the group “accepting” of differences, or “rejecting” of them? That would be the key!

How would we know what’s the usual preference of the group – “accepting” or “rejecting” of differences?

One possibility is to ask open ended questions and look out for similarity/divergence of themes in the answers you hear.

-

Sourav

Performance Decisions

Over the last year I have seen two cycles of rating moderation discussion and have had the opportunity to chart out the rating distribution for a fairly large team over a bell curve.

There are a few questions which I have been actively trying to find answers to:

• Bell curve is relative by nature. What is the process one should follow when proposing a rating for an individual?
• What is the process one should follow in a moderation discussion to modify the rating of an individual?

I might have found some tentative answers.

First proposed rating

The 1^st proposed rating should be on absolute scale. But for that to happen one first needs to have the parameters for performance measurement in place. Let me elaborate. Let us assume that we have a 5 point rating scale (P1,P2,P3,P4,P5), with P5 as the highest rating and P1 as the lowest rating. You should first decide what performance would correspond to what rating on an absolute scale. One possible set of parameters can be:

• P5 – Significantly exceeds expectations on all Performance Indicators (PIs);
• P4 – Significantly exceeds expectations on critical PIs and meets expectations on other PIs;
• P3 – meets expectations on all PIs;
• P2 – meets expectations on critical PIs but falls short of expectations on other PIs ;
• P1 – unacceptable performance

This understanding of the parameters for performance measurement should be shared by all members who would be present for a moderation meeting. This would then become a common language people would share in the room.

Deadlock

Let us assume that there arises a situation where a rating needs to be moderated. On what basis would the ratings be moderated? I can think of only 2 possible reasons:

• Similar levels of performance but varying degrees of difficulty of the environment within which the performance was achieved.
• A higher level of results by 1 individual as compared to the other. E.g. – if we have a deadlock for a P5 rating (both individuals have significantly exceeded expectations and under similar environmental conditions), “Who has achieved higher results?” would be the differentiator.

Efforts or Environmental Understanding?

What about the effort an individual has put in? Should not that be factored in?

Efforts are taken in a certain context. These efforts should be factored into the evaluation of the environment within which results were achieved. Efforts by themselves would not provide you actionable data.

Let me elaborate. Let us say there are 2 individuals who have similar levels of performance, under comparable difficulty of environmental conditions but one individual has put in more effort than the other. Can we say that the individual who has put in lesser effort should be given a lower rating? I don’t think so. I can’t penalize him for finding a smarter way of doing work. On the other hand can we say that the individual who has put in higher effort should be given a lower rating? I don’t think so too. I can’t penalize him for doing his work in a less smarter way when he is got comparable results.

Hence the conditions/environment within which results have been achieved are a factor for decision making, but efforts by themselves are not.

-

Sourav

Roots!

“People have more confidence and comfort to move to an unknown future when they carry forwards parts of the past”

This line stared at me from the page of an old notebook that I was sorting through today afternoon.

The line stuck!

How do people who get displaced behave? I have heard people displaced by partition keeping some relic of their past with them. People who migrate to different countries retain some relic of their past or keep on with some tradition of theirs which survives across generations and hence acts as a link to their roots. A friend once told me what he had encountered in Trinidad: 3^rd/4^th generation migrants from India who carried relics of their past (including some old and dusted photographs) and who practiced some of their old Indian traditions but who could not remember which part of India their roots lay in. He supposedly encountered similar things in Mauritius – descendants of Indian origins with French names which were pronounced like Indian names. Indian parents in Fiji supposedly call their children “putra” and “putri”.

What are the implications of this observation for change? For people to change, they should be able to carry forwards parts of the past – if you threaten to annihilate their identity (and our identities are past based) or what they identify with, in all probability they would not budge.

An example from the past comes to mind.

A year back a colleague and I were conducting a workshop. We were trying to anchor the group towards using “certain kind of situations” to make decisions (a new approach in our context). There was a section of the participants who wanted to stick on to the old approach – decisions on the basis of past behaviours. This section of participants had been practicing this old approach for a long time and it provided them comfort. They consequently resisted our efforts to introduce a new approach. They finally agreed to move when the group decided that decisions have to be taken on the basis of responses to “certain kind of situations” (the new approach) but the evaluation would have to start from analysis/understanding of “the past behaviours” (the old approach). J .. people had more confidence and comfort to move to an unknown future when they carried forward parts of the past.

-

Sourav

About Performance Systems

A few months back I, along with a colleague, were facilitating a session for a group of around 30 employees. My colleague was trying to explain our performance system to this group. The participants expressed heartburns about the bell curve and its impact on individuals. I felt it was important to explore along with the participants the origin and objectives of a performance system, and what options we could look at.

The contents of the discussion, in retrospect, have cleared a few of my fundamentals about Performance Management:

• Why do we need a Performance Management system? What objectives does it serve? Can we do without it?
• Is it possible for anyone to be happy as an outcome of the Performance Management System?
• Can we do without a Bell Curve?

When I asked the first set of questions, I got a stoic silence for a reply. The first few answers I gathered were “You obviously require it”, “ How can you do without it?”. …Ah! Hmm! Err!!! , etc, etc.

A Performance Management System serves 3 purposes:

• Mutual expectation setting exercise - Its an exercise for setting of mutually accepted goals and tracking progress against it.
• It’s a work planning exercise – what will get done, when, how and by whom? What resources would be required and how would they be got?
• It’s a mechanism through which how rewards would be shared is decided.

You need a performance management system because you need a system to set goals, plan for how will they get done, and periodically track progress against it. The problem comes with linking rewards to it – that’s where the bone of contention lies!

Now the organization has 2 choices:

• To reward differentially
• Not to reward differentially – in this case you would not need an individual rating system.

People want differentiation because it gives them a chance to benefit from it but at the same time they don’t like it when they are at the receiving end of it (a premier B school alumnus would talk of the lack of a performance oriented culture when he finds his vertical growth is limited to certain time boundaries but ask him if he would like it if his junior from campus were to become his boss, and he usually would fumble for answers). On the other hand, if you have a system in which there is no performance based differentiation, then employees say it’s akin to a government organization.

Hence it’s a question of choosing the less worse of the 2 bad option. Rather because people want differentiation; we seem to go for it.

But what happens when you have differentiation? The guy who gets the highest rating feels there is not enough differentiation between him and the guy who has got an average rating. On the other hand, the guy who has got an average rating feels that the guy who has got the highest rating did not really deserve it. Hence people at either end of the bell curve are not really happy. What options does one in such cases?

I am reminded of Stacy Adam’s equity theory. In performance management there can be no distributive justice, one can aim only for procedural justice. Hence the need for focus on goal setting, work planning, and reviews.

The other source for heartburn is “the impossibility of knowing what standard of performance would guarantee me a highest rating”. When the goals are set for an individual, they are set on an absolute scale but when the rewards are to be decided then relative performance is taken into consideration. Hence there would be a sense of powerlessness which an individual would feel (both the boss and the subordinate). Does anyone like to feel powerless? What possible reactions can play out in such cases? A boss might go ahead and blame the system which HR has put into place and his subordinate would believe him, it not lose respect in his boss’s leadership.

Can we do without a bell curve? Bell curve is about relative rating – we can do without it but then employees would say that there is no performance based differentiation. The only way we can do without a bell curve is if we could provide differentiation without having a bell curve – but how do you do that? I don’t have an answer presently. The things you can play around with are the rating scale, the %age distribution across the bell curve, and how the rating would affect different salary components. But even then distributive justice would be elusive.

To end with, here are a few other thoughts/observations:

• Sometimes I feel individuals attach too much importance to ratings. Should I take my rating as an evaluation of me, or as evaluation of my performance for a particular year – calculated to determine the reward that I would get for that year?
• An obvious outcome of linking the reward system to performance management seems to be that the major parameter against which success is measured today in our world is the amount of money one has.
• I was having a discussion with a friend a few months back. He was not happy with his performance rating at work– he had got an average rating. He said that when he gets an average rating he feels he has underperformed. I was surprised and asked him to elaborate. He said “I come from a family whose members are known for their intellectual meritocracy (true of a number of Indian families). In my family, being average is akin to underperforming. It makes me feel ashamed” The measure of success seems to be whether my performance is above average or not! J

-

Sourav