Author: Curt Doolittle

http://www.linkedin.com/today/post/article/20130620130134-128811924-note-to-managers-positivity-mattersFUNNY : I’VE ALWAYS BEEN TEASED FOR MY MANAGERIAL ‘OPTIMISM’

(Even though, operationally, and financially, I’m pretty pessimistic really.)

But there are good reasons for broadcasting optimism – in the sense that there are other options at any given piont, not just hollow encouragement. One of my favorite lines is “what is the worst that can happen if we do this?” Which is usually followed by “And what are our choices from there?” I also try to explain to engineers that science doesn’t progress by being right. It progresses by taking risks (and in business, this means competitive risks) Asking this one question repeatedly tends to train people to ask it of themselves, and plan accordingly.

You can never let your people feel self doubt. Give them room. Let them know that if you’re asking them to do risky things, that failure is a possibility, but that there are always additional options. Give them the credit when they win, and be prepared with options so that you can catch them when they fail.

THE SCARCITY OF POSITIVE THINKING

Now on the analytical side, I know a) that thinking is a resource that is scarce. b) that decisions are not clear, or made in isolation, and are easily influenced by external stimuli. So the problem is giving people the right things to think about and eliminating things that they shouldn’t think about.

Self doubt, fear, “is the mind killer’. Primarily because it’s easier to think about bad stuff, than it is to do the hard work of ignoring bad stuff and simply working on collecting ideas. We are as mentally effort-avoiding as we are physical labor-avoiding. So preserve your people’s prescious mental resources by keeping them focused on problem solving rather than fear of failure. (I view fear of failure as a weakness in management, that want to go hide in an office pretending to add value, or working political games rather than assisting the people.)

BEHAVIOR IN THE FACE OF SCARCITY

Over the weekend I read a lot of ancient and medieval law. And, not so much in the ancient world, but certainly in the medieval world, you get the feeling of this incredible WEIGHT of pervasive and oppressive scarcity affecting everything that people think, say and do.

Our world is so absent of scarcity that we generally are trying to motivate people by the reward of fulfillment, more so than money.

THE PROBLEM OF OPTIMISM

The mistake I tend to make, is that I give my staff the confidence in their own thoughts, so much so, that they start to actually believe me, and they discount my ability to influence them, and so I must let them fail to get my influence over them back. I wish I could somehow figure out how to get out of this trap. But I can’t. I love that people develop into independent actors who are confident in their decisions.

PARENTING RATHER THAN DISCIPLINING

But I think this is just good parenting. Which is, a far better way to run a business than is military cum bureaucratic processes, that we inherited from our european, and particularly british ancestors.

The best executive advice I have is the sort of wisdom that I got from the good-to-great data: build people from within, build a family regulated by cultural values, do what you can succeed at doing, plus my own advice: that scale and credit are an extraordinary competitive advantage, but one that calcifies your organization in mediocrity. Drive to excellence not efficiency. Profit will come from competitive survival, not from efficient production. Efficient production too often takes your focus off the customer. And the customer is the hardest asset to obtain.