Tag Archive for: leadershipdevelopment

Chris Kolenda: 3 Ways AI will transform the construction and manufacturing industries

3 Ways AI will transform the construction and manufacturing industries

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The New York Times says that articles on AI are among 2023’s most popular. It’s no wonder – this revolutionary capability will transform business and life. Are you wondering how AI will affect your business? If you’re like most leaders I’ve been talking to, you want to get ahead of the curve, not left behind.

I have several construction and manufacturing clients, so I asked my Chatbot to help me identify some of the most important ways artificial intelligence will affect them. These three stood out to me.

  1. Predictive Maintenance: Why wait for the wheel to break? AI-powered sensors can alert you before a machine or component fails, reducing downtime and saving costs.

Preventative maintenance will remain essential in prolonging the life of components. Combined with AI-powered predictive maintenance, you can avoid the massive costs of corrective and remedial action. 

  1. Supply Chain Simplification: AI can streamline your supply chain, making it transparent and efficient while uncovering hidden costs.

Complicated, hyper-efficient, cheap supply chains were the gold standard until the fragile system crashed. Many CEOs still complain about supply chain disruptions, clinging to a system that no longer works. 

The wise ones are simplifying their supply chains to reduce the system’s friction. Fewer transactions mean less opportunity for things to go wrong. AI can help you build resilience by reducing complexity.

I just finished visiting with a CEO who simplified their supply chain. Their business grew 38% in the past two years by acquiring new business from competitors who couldn’t deliver. 

  1. 3D Visualization, Testing, and Building: Expect 3D printed structures designed by AI, reducing cost and time.

The most successful companies will rethink what ‘building’ and manufacturing means when machines weave structures and components “like spiders spin webs” (Chatbot).

AI will load-test your products and structures before you build them. How well will that building stand up to a hurricane? How long can you expect these components to last under adverse conditions? What are the likely risks of harm to people, animals, and the environment, and what are the most effective ways to reduce the probability of problems arising and their seriousness?

Much of the AI conversation centers on the potential risks of rogue bots. These discussions are vital, and policymakers need to develop sensible safety protocols. 

Closer to home, AI will have a transformative effect on your business. Daniel Burrus calls it a Hard Trend – something that will happen (like the sun rising tomorrow). Will you ride the crest of the wave or get pulled under it?

Here’s a massive implication that transcends industries. Workplace trust will rise in importance as AI reshapes and replaces traditional roles. Higher trust leads to stronger innovation, lower anxiety, and better teamwork and productivity. Low-trust environments, by contrast, arouse suspicion, heighten dysfunctional stress, impede innovation, and damage performance. 

Will AI strengthen trust in your company or diminish it? The answer is 100% up to you.

You face a dynamic hybrid workplace that includes disruptive advances like AI, four generations of employees, varied viewpoints within a polarized polity, and unprecedented social pressures. 

My newest program, Building an Inspiring Culture®, is ideal for companies who want to strengthen how their leaders build trust, gain buy-in, and create productive accountability. You need a strong foundation to build a tall building.

Schedule a call to learn more about the program and see if it’s a good fit.  

Chris Kolenda: Here’s how the most respected leaders simplify.

Here’s how the most respected leaders simplify.

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Do you find that getting everyone in your company on the same page is a struggle, especially in a hybrid work environment?

The benefits of everyone rowing in the right direction and cadence reduces anxiety and distress, increases cooperation and innovation, and avoids wasting time in misunderstandings.

The challenge, of course, is that our businesses are both complicated and complex. 

Complicated means you have many connected elements: step-by-step processes to follow so things work properly. A car engine is complicated – the engine, transmission, steering, brakes, etc. must integrate for the car to function. 

Your business is also complex, meaning interwoven. You have multiple dependencies outside your control, such as suppliers, partners, regulations, laws, competitors, technology, social changes, etc. These variables are constantly interacting, often creating novel situations and arrangements.

Inside your head, your business starts to look like this:

Imagine trying to explain this picture to your employees. Your complexifying would be incoherent. People would take away what they wanted and discard the rest. The result: employees are on different pages, pulling in different directions, and your business wastes time and money in misunderstandings, relitigating decisions, and heightened distress.

The likelihood that you are complexifying is worse than you imagine.

I asked my Chatbot to draw a picture of complexity arising from the interaction of only two variables over time. 

One of the examples of this picture the Chatbot provided was the interaction between Market Demand and Supply Chain Efficiency:

An increase in consumer demand can lead to complexities in the supply chain, especially if the supply chain isn’t agile enough to adapt. This scenario can result in stock shortages, delayed deliveries, or increased costs. Conversely, an efficient supply chain facing low demand can lead to overproduction and excess inventory.

Instead of trying to explain the picture above, you could simplify the matter using a double-axis chart like this:

You can plot where you are on the chart and take actions that move you to the upper right quadrant. Everyone can visualize the situation and actions that lead to the desired result.

Simplifying does not mean dumbing down. 

Simplifying makes complex information accessible while retaining its integrity. Simplification is a skillful art of communication that preserves content quality and improves understanding. Doing so respects your audience. 

Dumbing down, on the other hand, alters or diminishes the value of the information, removing important content and context and patronizing or misleading your co-workers.

I tend to get complex descriptions when asking CEOs about their business strategy. I’ll query their direct reports and mostly get different answers. As you can imagine, the deviations increase as you ripple from the center to the periphery. 

The explanations make perfect sense to you but leave everyone mystified and confused. They do what they think is right, leading to people rowing hard in different directions at different cadences. 

Can simplifying improve your outcomes? I’ll help you see where you are complexifying and identify ways you can simplify without becoming simplistic.


Schedule a call with me or email me to begin your simplifying process.

Chris Kolenda: What an Offsite should do for your leadership team

What an offsite should do for your leadership team

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Are you looking for ways to strengthen how well your leadership team works together?

You are not alone. Remote and hybrid work reduce in-person contact time and place a premium on building trust, communicating clearly, and strengthening buy-in.

Relationships are vital to successful leadership teams; you must make every in-person opportunity count.

Many leaders use offsites as a team-building tool and often come away disappointed.

If done poorly, the offsite becomes a forgettable boondoggle as people nod off in the conference center, breathing stale air, staring outside at the pool, and wondering when the pain will end.

You wonder if the juice was worth the squeeze.

It does not have to be that way.

If done well, an off-site can boost your relationships, strengthening trust, buy-in, and communication. You get people out of their comfort zones, doing something interesting that brings new perspectives and energy to your business.

You should gain new tools that get results and shorten the path to success. The experience should get everyone on the same page and pointed in the right direction and create a shared language and stories that speed up trust and understanding. You come away with a durable commitment to the leadership team you aspire to be.

Your #1s will draw on that experience for years, using it to overcome obstacles and seize new opportunities. People remember the best offsites for the rest of their lives.

Creating unforgettable, high-value experiences is vital to your team’s growth and health, so my events occur at national parks and powerful historical venues.

Here’s how the process works. 

  1. We discuss your focus areas and select a location and game plan.
  2. You get adventure, thought leadership customized to your needs, tools that improve performance and decision-making, and time to address your most essential issues.
  3. We conclude with a workshop, creating action steps that get results.

Are you ready to forget the hotel “bored-room” offsites and go for something extraordinary that will pay dividends for years?

Here’s what CEO Lisa Larter said about our recent trip to Antietam & Gettysburg: 

“Our leadership team recently attended an exclusive leadership experience with Chris in Antietam and Gettysburg. We spent three days immersed in conversations that were specific to our team and the aspirations and challenges we are currently facing as leaders.

Chris used lessons from the battles at Antietam and Gettysburg to help us see our leadership skills in a whole new way. He provided us with tools and models that we can use for a lifetime.

What was great about this experience was the level of customization Chris provided for us in conjunction with being outdoors in beautiful and historic places. This was not a traditional talking head leadership experience. Chris is thoughtful in terms of how he is able to get every member of the team to participate.

His use of intentional questions not only allowed us to get to know each other better but also gave us the opportunity to share openly and honestly, which strengthened trust between all of us.

Chris fosters an environment where he models what he is teaching and inspires everyone to really use critical thinking in all aspects of how we lead.

He is a master facilitator and guide, providing us with a life-changing and transformational leadership experience. If you have a team of 5 or more leaders and you want to improve your culture and communication, I can’t recommend this event enough.

Some of what we discussed included:

  • How to make courageous decisions and become brave leaders
  • How to get over imposter syndrome and the importance of caring about others
  • How to move out of your comfort zone and navigate chaos
  • The competitive advantage of clarity, speed, and disruption
  • How to create a high-performing organization
  • The importance of defining acceptable versus awesome to eradicate perfectionism
  • Why feedback is useless and feedforward is the only way
  • How to cultivate initiative within a team
  • How to inspire accountability and get people to anticipate outcomes
  • How to disagree agreeably

This is what we covered in one day…

My notebook overflows with value from the time we spent with Chris. If you need a leadership expert who walks his talk and delivers value, Chris Kolenda is definitely that person.“

Let’s discuss what an outdoor offsite could look like for you and your organization.

P.S. I’m thinking about hosting an innovative thought leadership event in May at the Antietam and Gettysburg battlefields. The objective is to help you develop new thought leadership that simplifies complexity for your clients and employees, provide tools that improve clarity, accountability, buy-in, and decision-making, and arm you with new stories to convey ideas and inspire buy-in. 

Sharing these ideas and experiences will build your relationships with other top leaders and consultants. Magic always happens when terrific people with an abundance mentality help each other grow. 

The investment in this program is $5500 if you pay before December 31st, 2023 or $4500 if you confirm and pay by Friday, December 15th, 2023.

Interested? Send me an email.

Chris Kolenda: 3 Steps to Take Instead of Complaining about Gen Z’s Fragile Mental Health.

3 Steps to Take Instead of Complaining about Gen Z’s Fragile Mental Health.

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Do you have Gen Z employees (most of your twenty-somethings) whose mental health is fragile? 

They want feedback but only the positive kind; they’re frequently taking mental health sick days and have difficulty recovering from setbacks. The result is lower productivity, increased workplace drama, and more stress for everyone else.

I hear leaders complaining about Gen Z’s poor resilience and work ethic. You might be correct, but that’s irrelevant.

Here’s the deal: if you cannot inspire your Gen Z employees to contribute their best to your company’s success, the fault is in the mirror.

You can have the best processes and plans in the world, but if you cannot gain the buy-in of the people in front of you, then all you have are interesting theories and ideas that don’t work.

When I worked with the Cleveland Browns a few years ago, the tight ends coach told me he coached at Army in the 1980s under legendary coach Jim Young. I was a cadet then and remembered we were 2-9 my freshman year. It was ugly.

The coach said after the season that Young got them together and said, “This was our fault.” They brought their winning system from the University of Arizona to West Point and expected it to work fine there, too.

Army could not field quarterbacks with cannons for their arms, grow 300+lb linemen who could hold blocks, or receivers who could outrun opposing cornerbacks. 

It was a great system at Arizona but an epic fail at West Point.

Instead of complaining about the talent they didn’t have, Young and his staff examined the talent in front of them. They were smaller than their opponents but quick, agile, disciplined, and made good decisions. 

The best offense for Army’s talent was the so-called wishbone. It amplified their strengths and masked their limitations. Army went 8-3-1 the following year, tying Tennessee in Knoxville and winning a bowl game. 

Your Gen Z employees grew up with the toxic effects of social media, online bullying, and snowplow parenting (where parents violently blast away any obstacles in their children’s lives so they never encounter any difficulties). Mental health challenges among teens skyrocketed after 2012.

You handle social media and online bullying okay because you’ve built life experience and resilience beforehand. Many in Gen Z never had that opportunity.

It’s not their fault.

If you cannot adapt your practices to the talent in front of you, it’s your fault, not theirs.

Here are some things you can do:

  1. Feeding Forward. Most employees get defensive when you rake them over the coals for mistakes. Many Gen Zs shut down. Instead of harping on past mistakes, focus on improving future performance. Ask these questions:
    1. What went well that you want to sustain? (This discussion focuses on the behaviors you want them to repeat in the future).
    2. In what ways did you improve over the last time? (This discussion helps them visualize their improvement, so they keep doing it.)
    3. What would you like to improve for next time? (This discussion gets them to focus on how to improve instead of what they did wrong).
    4. What does ideal support from me look like? (This question elicits a specific response and lets them know you want to support them).
  2. Weekly 1-1 check-ins. Spend 15 minutes one-on-one with each direct report, setting them up for success. Hit reply if you’d like a copy of the format I recommend.
  3. 90-day Updates. Spend an hour once per quarter with each direct report, discussing how they’ve improved and want to improve over the next 90 days. It’s also an opportunity to update their Employee Value Proposition (EVP). Yes, I have a format for this one, too, that I’m happy to share.

These three simple practices will help your Gen Z (and other employees) contribute their best while reducing sick days and workplace anxiety. 

For a copy of my resources or for more discussion on leading your Gen Z employees, send me an email or schedule a call. 

Chris Kolenda: You cannot afford to waste a single brain when it comes to your company’s success.

You cannot afford to waste a single brain when it comes to your company’s success.

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What would happen if all your employees were engaged and committed to your company’s success?

What would change if two-thirds or more of your employees were committed to your company’s success?

Many leaders rely on a few all-stars, hoping the rest can pull some of the load. According to Gallup, barely one out of every three employees reports being engaged at work. With one-third or fewer pulling the load, you are burning the candle at both ends.

I met someone this morning at a global affairs conference in Washington, DC, who shared her story of burnout and walkout. Her employer was content to waste the talents of the unengaged and ride the workhorses until they broke.

No leader intends to waste the brains and talents of their employees, but most don’t know how to move them from unengaged to engaged without micromanagement. Who has the time for that?

What if you could get more people pulling the load? Your all-stars would still be in their zones of genius, stay with you longer, and contribute better, because the unengaged are pulling on the oars in the right direction and cadence.

Everyone has unique gifts– natural strengths or superpowers – that too often get overlooked in the hunt to hire people with the right skills.

You need to put people in roles where they use their natural talents and exploit them with their skills.

When you put people in roles that don’t engage their natural talents or skills, they will fail and drop out.

A more common occurrence is putting people in roles that match their skills but not their natural talents. It’s like putting a big-ideas person into a role that requires them to pore over Excel spreadsheet details. High-functioning big-ideas people will perform the job well but burn more energy than a details person will. This problem is what happened to the person I met in DC.

The upper left quadrant occurs when someone is in a role matching their talents, but they do not yet have the skills to exploit them. Steve Jobs, for example, was in this quadrant during his first stint at Apple. His people skills were so terrible that he got fired from the company he founded.

Jobs grew from the experience and developed enough people skills to avoid being radioactive. He moved into this zone of genius.

How can you help people find their zone of genius? I’ve created the PROM Archetypes® quiz to give you a broad frame. PROM stands for the four types of people you find in the workplace: Pioneers, Reconcilers, Operators, and Mavericks. They each make distinct contributions when in their zones of genius. 

Once you have their PROM Archetype® and identify their zone of genius, you can more precisely define the skills they need to exploit them. You can also use this tool to check your company’s cognitive diversity.

When you know people’s natural talents and skills, you can put them in zone-of-genius roles where they will thrive.

There’s no reason to waste people’s talents.

Would you like to discuss ways to use the PROM Archetypes® to strengthen your company and help everyone get good at getting better? Schedule a call. There’s no cost, obligation, or BS.

Chris Kolenda: Boosting Psychological Confidence

Boosting Psychological Confidence

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Psychological confidence arises when people are willing to speak up without fear of retribution; they do so respectfully and are confident they’ll be heard.

I prefer this term over psychological safety because safety-ism has created an expectation that employees should be free from accountability. Psychological confidence is about the courage to speak up and listen with an open mind, not about trigger warnings, safe spaces, and microaggressions.

People with psychological confidence report problems immediately, offer you fresh ideas that improve your business, and responsibly try new things that make your people, processes, and products work better. 

You don’t get innovation without psychological confidence.

According to an Accenture study that cites Gartner, HBR, and Gallup, companies with high psychological safety (confidence) experience:

27% lower turnover

76% higher engagement

50% more productivity

Your employees experience:

74% less stress

67% willingness to try new things

29% more life satisfaction

All three elements are vital for psychological confidence. Employees who fear retribution for disagreeing with their boss will keep problems and ideas to themselves, just like the co-pilot on the ill-fated Air France flight 447. 

The inability to disagree agreeably promotes gaslighting – employees will stay silent to avoid being blasted by a colleague. Such self-censoring is rampant on college campuses. 

Finally, no one will waste the effort to speak up if they don’t believe you’ll take them seriously; exhibit A is FTX’s collapse.

Magic happens when all three elements are working together. The willingness to speak up and disagree agreeably creates open-mindedness. Speaking up and believing you’ll be taken seriously creates confidence, and agreeing disagreeably while knowing you’ll be taken seriously builds trust.

Open-mindedness, confidence, and trust are the heartbeat of psychological confidence, creating the abundance mentality to share wisdom and co-create, leading to innovation.

To help you assess the degree of psychological confidence in your organization, Dr. Mark Goulston and I developed a survey that produces your Net Psychological Confidence Score.  

You can take it here as an individual to gauge your personal level of confidence. We can also create a version customized for your organization.

You’ll gain:

  • Your organization’s Net Psychological Confidence score, which you can use as a baseline for gauging progress.
  • Knowledge on what factors are playing the most significant role in your score.
  • Follow-up videos and action steps you can use immediately to strengthen your organization’s psychological confidence.
  • Greater trust, more innovation, lower turnover, and less stress as you implement these steps. 

Check out the survey here, and email me or schedule a call if you’d like to see if your Net Psychological Confidence Score is a good fit for your organization.

Chris Kolenda: Take These Simple Steps to Improve Accountability

Take These Simple Steps to Improve Accountability

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I use a pre-event survey before delivering a keynote or off-site, and “strengthening accountability” is always at the top of issues on leaders’ minds. 

Leaders recognize the value of accountability, which means being answerable for meeting standards. Employees willing to acknowledge and own their mistakes or shortcomings are most likely to learn from them and improve continuously. By contrast, those unwilling to do so are likely to repeat errors and fail to grow.

High-ownership employees believe they have a responsibility to meet standards, and they possess the psychological confidence to own their mistakes and shortcomings. High-ownership employees will flag problems before they become crises and offer fresh ideas that help you innovate. 

Low-ownership employees, by contrast, lack belief in your standards and have poor psychological confidence. They are reluctant to admit mistakes or shortcomings because they believe you’ll throw them under the bus. They won’t identify problems or try new things because they fear failing. You’ll have difficulty helping low-ownership employees grow because they do not accept your standards. Identifying these employees and moving them on (or flagging them before you hire them) will boost morale and productivity.  

Moderate ownership employees accept your standards but are reluctant to admit mistakes or shortcomings because they have low psychological confidence. They are likely to report only problems that can be blamed on others and won’t try new things. 

Most employees have moderate ownership, and your approach to accountability will determine whether they grow into high-ownership employees or remain the same.

When you view accountability as fault-finding and blame, you reinforce an employee’s reluctance to admit mistakes and shortcomings. When you drill into people about their errors, their first instinct is to defend themselves, rationalize, and shift blame. You are more likely to build resentment than create psychological confidence and better future performance.

Here’s a better way. Ask your employee the following questions:

  1. What went well?
  2. In what ways did you improve from last time?
  3. What would you like to do better next time? How?
  4. What does ideal support from me look like?

Your high-ownership employees will identify their critical mistakes and shortcomings and develop steps to improve. Your moderate ownership employees will identify some mistakes and shortcomings. For the ones they missed, you can ask, “tell me more about X.” You want to boost their psychological confidence so they improve continuously and take the initiative to report problems, offer fresh ideas, and try new things.

Your low-ownership employees won’t recognize mistakes and shortcomings or only identify minor ones. 

In rare cases, you may have a psychologically confident employee with low buy-in for your standards. In this case, you need to discuss how the company and the employee are better off with the standards than without and find out why they are hesitant to accept them. You might find that they have a good point, and you can make commonsense adjustments.

I’d like to hear how well this approach works for you.

P.S. To help you assess the degree of psychological confidence in your organization, Dr. Mark Goulston and I developed a survey that produces your Net Psychological Confidence Score.  

You can take it here as an individual to gauge your psychological confidence level. We can also create a version customized for your organization.

When you use the survey for your organization, you’ll gain:

  • Your organization’s Net Psychological Confidence score, which you can use as a baseline for gauging progress.
  • Knowledge of what factors are playing the most significant role in your score.
  • Follow-up videos and action steps you can use immediately to strengthen your organization’s psychological confidence.
  • Greater trust, more innovation, lower turnover, and less stress as you implement these steps. 

Check out the survey here, and email Chris or schedule a call if you’d like to see if your Net Psychological Confidence Score is a good fit for your organization.

Chris Kolenda: Do you want Awesome repeats? Three-peats? Make this one simple change.

Do you want Awesome repeats? Three-peats? Make this one simple change.

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If you have good employees who perform inconsistently, I’ve got a way for you to boost individual and team performance with one simple change.

Most business owners I know are relentlessly positive people. Natural optimists who believe they can succeed and are willing to try new things to grow their business and bring out their employees’ best.

It’s not unusual for them to walk around the business complimenting people for their good work.

Stay awesome, Joe!

Keep on rocking it, Sara!

I appreciate you, Jane!

The effect of general compliments on employer and employee alike is easy to see: smiles, enjoyment, a boost in everyone’s mood.

Then, everyone moves on. Joe, Sara, and Jane keep doing good but inconsistent work. 

They know you appreciate them but don’t know what behaviors to repeat or adopt because your praise is too general.

What, exactly, is Joe doing that’s awesome, and what can Sara and Jane learn from it and vice versa?

If you want them to repeat high performance, you need to make your compliments specific. That way, Joe knows precisely what you believe is awesome about his performance.

Because he’s performed it and you acknowledged what he did, Joe knows what to do again. So do Sara and Jane, and they know what they can adopt from each other because you told them with a specific compliment.

Joe, I loved how you handled that customer’s complaint. You maintained eye contact, made sure she knew she was heard by repeating the complaint back to her, and used your discretionary funds to fix the problem and make her feel like a winner. Stay awesome, Joe!

Sara, the way you coached Brian to solve a problem he was facing was perfect. You asked him what he would do and what support he needed from you to make it happen. Brian’s solution wasn’t perfect – you knew that – and you knew that a good solution he owned was better than you giving him a perfect solution. Keep on rocking it, Sara!

This practice works everywhere you go. When I complimented a flight attendant on how well he treated people by looking at them directly and acknowledging them, I noticed he started doing it even more than he had before. The same happens with nearly everyone providing a service.

Specific compliments are your way to celebrate what right looks like, and the effect is infectious because your employee and their co-workers know precisely what to repeat.

General comments give a temporary mood uplift. Specific compliments give you a sustainable performance boost.

Let me know how this action works for you by sending me an email or leaving a comment.

Chris Kolenda: Leading in an AI World: 4 Ways to Repair the Trust Crisis

Leading in an AI World: 4 Ways to Repair the Trust Crisis

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Have you considered how AI will affect relationships in your workplace?

If not, it’s time to get ahead of the curve. Information technology provides massive benefits to society and your business, but its misuse has damaged relationships and created a trust crisis. 

Is that person really working all of those hours?

Is that “Hey Chris” email for me or personalized spam? 

Why do my employees make more than I do? 

Will a bot take my job?

Why does the CEO, who gets mega-millions, say she cares about us but can’t afford to give us raises or training?

It’s not that our company’s leaders won’t keep their promises; it’s just that they haven’t.

AI can widen the breach; it can also repair it. 

We live in an era where AI isn’t just a tool—it’s becoming a co-worker. 

AI exposes contradictions, say-do gaps, and potential unfairness while creating deep anxiety and uncertainty. This trust crisis corrodes relationships, impedes performance, and sours your company’s culture.

Why should you care? High-trust companies reportedly outperform their rivals by nearly 300%. 

And yet, how do you sustain trust as AI takes on more roles while raising troubling questions about credibility, agency, and employee value?

Here are four behaviors that will inspire employees to contribute their best even as AI’s role expands (my chatbot helped me craft these ideas after I gave it suitable prompts).

  1. Be Transparent with AI Integration: Remove the enigma surrounding AI. Educate your team on extracting the best from AI while recognizing its limitations. Your employees’ ability to provide actionable prompts will make AI an ally in your mission, not a mystery.
  2. Boosting Human-AI Innovation: AI can crunch numbers but can’t think outside the box. AI’s efficiency plus human creativity reduces risk and improves innovation. Leaders who promote critical thinking will get the best from AI while limiting garbage-in-garbage-out problems, drift, and look-a-like challenges.
  1. Creating Ever-Better Personal Interaction: Relationships become more important with remote work and distributed teams. You have a reduced margin for error, making every human touchpoint critical for building trust and unity. Face-to-face interactions in high-quality and innovative off-sites accelerate belief in you and each other.  
  1. Gaining Buy-In & Proactive Accountability: Move away from AI as a surveillance tool. Build a culture where leaders use AI to help employees improve future performance and spark their discretionary effort. 

You can anticipate AI’s effects on workplace relationships and develop behaviors that maximize its capabilities while limiting the downsides.

Anticipatory action on your part becomes compounding interest as trust increases performance, which enhances confidence in your company’s future. Wait, and you’ll regret the bill for corrective action.

Are you ready to get ahead of the curve? Schedule a call or email me for information about my keynotes and workshops on building trust in an AI world.

Chris Kolenda: McCarthy’s ouster shows that Americans can find common ground

McCarthy’s ouster shows that Americans can find common ground

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Getting people to find common ground seems more challenging these days, given 24-hour cable news, social media outrage, and polarization. 

These challenges can also enter the workplace, creating obstacles to buy-in, innovation, and change.

If you are experiencing similar frustrations getting people on board with new ideas, the recent U.S. House of Representatives drama can provide you with a productive way forward. 

Eight angry Republicans united with the Progressive Caucus and the rest of the Congressional Democrats to oust Representative Kevin McCarthy from his role as Speaker of the House.

Although the parties involved rarely agree on anything and base their fundraising strategies on demonizing the other, they stood shoulder-to-shoulder to remove the Speaker.

Chaos brought them together. 

The eight Republicans were appalled that McCarthy created a bi-partisan agreement to fund the government until mid-November. The Democrats view chaos across the aisle as a way to improve their 2024 electoral prospects in hopes they can regain the majority.

McCarthy, for his part, failed to create a goal more compelling to the Democrats, who were his only hope of retaining the Speakership.

He did not need to create a power-sharing agreement. Continued funding for Ukraine might have been enough to sway eight Democrats or more to keep McCarthy in the saddle.

Here’s what this episode means to you.

The key to gaining buy-in for change is to begin working from where people agree and working together on ways people believe they will be better off. 

Your employees will not believe a lecture on why a certain change makes them better off; they have to come to that conclusion themselves. 

Employees have strategies to thwart change. They can slow-roll implementation in hopes that the change comes off the rails. Telling you what you want to hear and doing what they want to do instead is another common approach. Sabotage works, too.

You need people’s active support if you want change to stick.

Here’s an approach you can use.

  1. Develop a goal that enjoys common ground
  2. Collaborate on options to achieve the goal
  3. Have your direct reports identify how they will be better and worse off in each option, and develop strategies to mitigate or offset the disadvantages
  4. Choose the option that best makes the people involved better off

The option might not be perfect in your eyes, or even optimal, but you will gain people’s active support and reduce or eliminate passive resistance.

If you are ready to gain greater buy-in and accountability, consider joining one of my programs or schedule a call with me to get started.