Tag Archives: Business Anthropology

Work From Work

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yahoo-logoEveryone is talking, and writing, about the Yahoo announcement yesterday.  The head of Human Resources at Yahoo sent an email to all staff essentially eliminating work from home programs.  In other words, for your job, show up in an office … and have a nice day.

Yes, a big and juicy topic for a blog on leadership and organizational effectiveness.  Where does one start?  Of course, do I agree with Yahoo or not. 

What do you expect me to say?   Do you assume I am against this decision along with the majority of articles and other blog posts?  

Well … while I am surprised by the decision by Yahoo, I am supportive and say good for them.   One immediate reaction though is the message should have come from the new CEO, Marissa Mayer directly instead of the head of HR.   She is changing Yahoo and this is one big decision she must own. 

I reproduced the staff email below.  You got to love the internet.  Employees could not wait to share this with the world.  (source: All Things D).

Yahoos,

Over the past few months, we have introduced a number of great benefits and tools to make us more productive, efficient and fun. With the introduction of initiatives like FYI, Goals and PB&J, we want everyone to participate in our culture and contribute to the positive momentum. From Sunnyvale to Santa Monica, Bangalore to Beijing — I think we can all feel the energy and buzz in our offices.

To become the absolute best place to work, communication and collaboration will be important, so we need to be working side-by-side. That is why it is critical that we are all present in our offices. Some of the best decisions and insights come from hallway and cafeteria discussions, meeting new people, and impromptu team meetings. Speed and quality are often sacrificed when we work from home. We need to be one Yahoo!, and that starts with physically being together.

Beginning in June, we’re asking all employees with work-from-home arrangements to work in Yahoo! offices. If this impacts you, your management has already been in touch with next steps. And, for the rest of us who occasionally have to stay home for the cable guy, please use your best judgment in the spirit of collaboration. Being a Yahoo isn’t just about your day-to-day job, it is about the interactions and experiences that are only possible in our offices.

Thanks to all of you, we’ve already made remarkable progress as a company — and the best is yet to come.

Jackie

In my support of this directive, it does help that I am not a Yahoo employee.  I can imagine that if I was working from home regularly and then told to get into the office, that would cloud my thinking on the bigger topic.

Nor am I against work from home programs.  My own staff has this available and most work from home a couple of days a week.  We have several staff members working full-time from home.  It works for us.  That is one of my points – for me yes, for Yahoo, maybe not.  It is too easy to stand outside their organization and throw rocks.  I respect them to make their own decision, based on information, observation, and vision that we, as outsiders, are not aware.

As an outsider and a social scientist of sorts, I welcome the laboratory that Yahoo set up here.  I have talked about Anthropologists in the workplace … here is a great example of why.  This is action science where an organization (Yahoo) has set up a specific set of expectations.  They will be wise to monitor it closely and stay open to the further learning.  This decision by Yahoo is not the problem.  The next decision by Yahoo is the key.  They created the laboratory.  Let’s put on our lab coats and sharpen our pencils as we observe this play out. 

Yet let me go deeper why I support this move by Yahoo.  It gets to the core of my website and writing … WeMoveTogether.  As I read the message as presented to the Yahoo staff, I see the desire to bring the staff together and create the new Yahoo.  To do this well people need to gather. 

A gathering is a challenge when people are not present; communication goes beyond voice and words.  Technology can do only so much.

Time for work.  Time for personal.  Good timing that this hit the news right after my last post titled, A Culture of Availability.  Our work lives and personal lives are blending together, especially for those of us working for larger companies. 

It is not inevitable that our work and personal time will further blend.  This culture of availability needs a significant emotional event.  Well we just got one thanks to Yahoo.  I and all of us will be watching the next steps closely.

Sit Still, Observe and Take Notes

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Early on in my blogger life I wrote about observation (Sit Still and Observe).  In that post I reflected on my educational background in Anthropology to make the case for leaders to use the power of observation.    I still find observation to be a vital tool and process for leaders and thus, today we return to discuss observation further.

“You see, but you do not observe.”  “Wonder is the beginning of wisdom.”

These lines are from Sherlock Holmes and Socrates  and speak to the importance of observation for everyone and certainly leaders – A level of focus, interpretation, and simple excitement to observe and learn.  Clear the mind (good luck with that) and sit still and observe what is happening now around you.

Observation for the leader start with the external and easily seen.  Observations can also be internal and unspoken.   By sitting still and observing the external you create the space where you can observe your own thoughts and feelings.  Your observations can then extend to what is unsaid with the group around you.  What are we avoiding and what remains unspoken?

I will not dive into specific skills to improve one’s observation skills.   For today I leave it to intention.  Do you intend to sit still and observe the seen and unseen around you?  If you answer yes, you are on your way.  Yet I will point to a tool to aid your ability to observe and interpret what you observe.

As a leader do you use a notebook?  An observation – these days many people I work with do not use a notebook.  For those who use a notebook, it typically has only a list of tasks and reminders.

I have always been obsessed with notebooks and shifted my approach many times on how I capture information.   I went through a time when my business notebook was an artist sketch pad and I used colored markers to capture notes.   Recently I use ruled paper and a black pen.

Well, I got to be me – I am shifting back to adding color to my notes.   The colored pens remind me that my notebook serves a purpose beyond just listing tasks and reminders.   With that anthropological mindset, the notebook transforms to a Field Notebook.

The Field Notebook.  My field Notebook will  contain descriptions and even drawings of my world as I observe it.  What do I find important?  I capture in my notebook what I find important.  A random observation one day has meaning once I take the time to check my notes and connect the dots.   Meaning is rarely directly evident.  Observe, take notes and review over time. That is the power of the Field Notebook.

There are details and patterns all around me.  Side by side with my work notes (yes, tasks and reminders), will be notes on what I observe, both seen and unseen.  It is my world.  I will learn from it and my Field Notebook is a powerful tool to aid my observation.

“To acquire knowledge, one must study; but to acquire wisdom, one must observe.”
―    Marilyn Vos Savant

The Wind and The Sun

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The wind attempts to strip the traveler of his...

As with many folks I am eagerly waiting for the return of Mad Men tonight.  It has been too long.  This weekend I am watching several episodes from last season to get caught up.  No, I am not writing a post on the leadership approach by Don Draper (main character), but hum … someday.

What caught my eye was a scene where Faye told Don a story to make a point about persuasion.  It was an old-fashioned fable as in an Aesop Fable from when we were kids.  When I looked up this fable online it is often labeled as a “Children’s Story”.  Alas, we know better that this is a fable for us adults too.

The Wind and the Sun were disputing which was the stronger. Suddenly they saw a traveler coming down the road, and the Sun said: “I see a way to decide our dispute. Whichever of us can cause that traveler to take off his cloak shall be regarded as the stronger. You begin.”
So the Sun retired behind a cloud, and the Wind began to blow as hard as it could upon the traveler. But the harder he blew the more closely did the traveler wrap his cloak round him, till at last the Wind had to give up in despair.
Then the Sun came out and shone in all his glory upon the traveler, who soon found it too hot to walk with his cloak on.

Don asks what this means and Faye says that “kindness, gentleness, and persuasion win where force fails.”

This reminds me of two things.  The first is a core influence for me concerning my education as an anthropologist.  While I moved into business vs. the jungle (wait, is there a difference) I held onto my learning in anthropology.  From this grounding I have a standing belief that we have forgotten more than we have learned.  We are searching today as leaders for the next thing or discovery.  Well maybe it has been with us all along as in how to interact with people and gain their support to influence their behavior (the sun in our fable) and be a leader.

The second thing I am reminded of is my attachment to “Push vs. Pull”.  I get this from my studies of Systems Thinking once I entered grad school and got serious about studying organizational development.  You see the connection too - the Wind Pushes, the Sun Pulls.  While leaders have to know when to push, our base approach needs to align with behaviors associated with pulling folks forward.

How will you get someone to take off their cloak today?

The sun strips the traveler of his cloak

Tell Me a Story

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English: Wooden seat sculpture, Harehope Quarr...
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“Scratch the surface in a typical boardroom and we’re all just cavemen with briefcases, hungry for a wise person to tell us stories.” — Alan Kay (VP Walt Disney Company)

Storytelling defines people as … well, people.  Before the written word there were stories to pull people together within a common understanding.  With my focus on the history of people through Anthropology, I sometimes wonder if we have forgotten more than we have learned.  The power of storytelling is one such item that seems lost in our modern business environment.  We use written communication through email, instant messages, text messages, tweets, Facebook entries, and yes … through our blogs.

We overuse PowerPoint as a communication tool to provide information vs. talking and telling a story to truly reach people in the audience.  So many business leaders would do themselves some good if they turned off the PowerPoint presentation and connecting with their audience through telling a good and insightful story.  While senior business managers may not want to build an emotional connection with their audience, I say that is exactly what they need to do.  Storytelling at its best builds an emotional connection with the audience that gives it lasting power.  We simply remember stories.

When you tell a story assure you have it well thought out.  You need to have structure as in a good start, the middle and a memorable ending.  As we listen to your story we may not know where it is going, but when you get there … wow, we get it and see the point.  Your meaning is clear and you touched the audience as a leader.

Storytelling is a verb.  There needs to be action through your words and your movement.  Stand up and move into the group or audience listening to your story.  Your storytelling needs to come from all of your being, not just the voice.  Use your body movement and emphasize key points through how you move your hands and even pause and stop speaking for a few moments.  When you re-engage your audience, you have them at the edge of their seats.

As a leader one of the most powerful stories you can tell is “This is who I am.  I want to tell you my story”.  Even more powerful for the leader is “Who are you? Tell me your story”.  This is a powerful leadership practice to get to know more about those you lead and find common ground (it is always there) and a means to work together and move forward.

The next time you as a leader need to reach out to your employees and gain focus on an opportunity or even dealing with an adversity, find your story to tell.

Maya Angelou once said, “People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”   The power of storytelling gets you there to the deeper connection with people.  Storytelling has been part of humanity from the beginning.  Let’s assure as leaders we keep it alive today and as we move forward together.

Sit Still and Observe

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At the core of my view on leadership is movement and I speak to it in other posts. Today though I ask you to sit still and observe.

In your organization what is happening around you at any given moment? Where is the staff – quiet in their workspace, grouped together in the hallway, or talking with co-workers one on one? As a leader your power to stop and observe the people and activity around you can serve you well to understand and take proper action.

Your ability to treat the familiar as unfamiliar will serve you well.

My thinking here was born from my studies as an Anthropologist. The ability to observe, document and understand group behavior is at the core of what a cultural anthropologist does. Imagine standing in a corner with a good view of your workspace. Stay there for a while and make mental notes of what you observe. You can learn much from this approach. Of course, standing for a period of time may come off as odd, so do the same as you move about the office. Focus on what is going on around you and understand that everything has meaning. With your anthropological approach to observation, you see the parts and work to pull them together to understand the whole. This holistic view from anthropology serves the modern leader to understand and take action.

I recently visited a very large company and ate lunch in its cafateria. For me it was a foreign land and I could have stayed there for hours sitting at a table and just observing the employees around me. You can learn a great deal about the culture from watching these employees in how they dress; how they sit and converse with each other. Try to point out who the big bosses are at the tables (good luck).

The power of observation is not just for group behavior. It serves to help with process improvement too. From my experience it helps to get away from the conference room where we typically discuss process improvement and walk into the workplace and just observe the flow, direction and interplay along the route a business process takes.

As a leader you need to be interested in group behavior and tap into the approach and toolbox used by an anthropologist. The ability to sit and observe the movement around you and effectively interpret and take action as a leader is part of We Move Together.