The latest draft (beta 1.6) of the Happy Manifesto can be downloaded from here. Here is the manifesto, the key 9 points:
1. Trust Your People
Step out of approval. Instead pre-approve and focus on supporting your people.
2. Make Your People Feel Good
Make this the focus of management
3. Give Freedom within Clear Guidelines
People want to know what is expected of them. But they want freedom to find the best way to achieve their goals..
4. Be Open and Transparent
More information means more people can take responsibility
5. Recruit for Attitude, Train for Skill
6. Celebrate Mistakes
Create a truly no-blame culture
7. Community: Create Mutual Benefit
Have a positive impact on the world and build your organisation too
8. Love Work, Get a Life
The world, and your job, needs you well rested, well nourished and well supported.
9. Select Managers Who are Good at Managing
Make sure your people are supported by somebody who is good at doing that, and find other routes for those whose strengths are elsewhere. Even better, allow people to choose their managers.
Thoughts, comments, feedback, additional suggestions welcome.
Friday, 5 November 2010
Wednesday, 3 November 2010
Is the Government Serious About Supporting Small Business?
I'm not a great fan of the coalition government but it was great to hear David Cameron talking about the role of small business. Personally I have always thought the complaints about red tape were so much hot air but he is spot on when he talks about "the shocking way in which small and medium sized firms are locked out of procurement opportunities by central and local government".
This makes sense. Small businesses can often provider more flexibility, better value and a more local approach.
But does Cameron mean it? Since June the only trend I have seen is to larger contracts aimed at the largest suppliers. I have just written to Cameron to ask if he will reverse the move of the Skills Funding Agency to minimum contract values for apprenticeships. From 2012 they say they will only sign annual contracts of £1 million or more. Clearly they have no wish to work with small business.
Here's my letter. I will post any reply I receive:
David Cameron
Prime Minister
10 Downing Street
London
SW1A 2AA
3rd November 2010
Dear Mr Cameron
As a small business owner can I say how delighted I was to see your statements this week on supporting small business, especially in giving us a fair chance in government procurement. As a training business that provides extensive services to government, I hugely welcome your proposals.
Let me make you aware of one place where the government has, since June, introduced changes that appear to be designed to prevent a government agency contracting directly with small businesses. I write in the hope that you will be able to stop it
The Skills Funding Agency is introducing new minimum annual contract values for delivery of apprenticeships. Last year Happy Computers, as a small business, had a contract for £170,000 which enables us to deliver excellent training and certification to around 75 apprenticeships. This year a minimum contract value of £250,000 has been introduced. Next year this is to be raised to £500,000 and, we are told, the year after it will become £1 million.
At the moment a small local business may be the best provider to meet the needs of the local community and may only have demand for around 20 apprenticeships. In the future small businesses like this, and like ourselves, will not be allowed to contract directly with the Skills Funding Agency.
Instead small businesses will have to sub-contract through larger training providers. This will introduce an extra layer, mean more non-delivery work and will mean a % top sliced away.
This would only make sense if the government believed the way to improve services was to use only large organisations. It makes no sense for a government committed to small businesses, entrepreneurship and innovation.
Yours
Henry Stewart
Chief Executive
Happy Ltd
This makes sense. Small businesses can often provider more flexibility, better value and a more local approach.
But does Cameron mean it? Since June the only trend I have seen is to larger contracts aimed at the largest suppliers. I have just written to Cameron to ask if he will reverse the move of the Skills Funding Agency to minimum contract values for apprenticeships. From 2012 they say they will only sign annual contracts of £1 million or more. Clearly they have no wish to work with small business.
Here's my letter. I will post any reply I receive:
David Cameron
Prime Minister
10 Downing Street
London
SW1A 2AA
3rd November 2010
Dear Mr Cameron
As a small business owner can I say how delighted I was to see your statements this week on supporting small business, especially in giving us a fair chance in government procurement. As a training business that provides extensive services to government, I hugely welcome your proposals.
Let me make you aware of one place where the government has, since June, introduced changes that appear to be designed to prevent a government agency contracting directly with small businesses. I write in the hope that you will be able to stop it
The Skills Funding Agency is introducing new minimum annual contract values for delivery of apprenticeships. Last year Happy Computers, as a small business, had a contract for £170,000 which enables us to deliver excellent training and certification to around 75 apprenticeships. This year a minimum contract value of £250,000 has been introduced. Next year this is to be raised to £500,000 and, we are told, the year after it will become £1 million.
At the moment a small local business may be the best provider to meet the needs of the local community and may only have demand for around 20 apprenticeships. In the future small businesses like this, and like ourselves, will not be allowed to contract directly with the Skills Funding Agency.
Instead small businesses will have to sub-contract through larger training providers. This will introduce an extra layer, mean more non-delivery work and will mean a % top sliced away.
This would only make sense if the government believed the way to improve services was to use only large organisations. It makes no sense for a government committed to small businesses, entrepreneurship and innovation.
Yours
Henry Stewart
Chief Executive
Happy Ltd
Tuesday, 28 September 2010
Assess Learning not Teaching
This morning I took part in a trial Ofsted at the secondary school where I am a governor. The inspector commented that, in assessing teachers, the focus needed to be more on learning than teaching.
I like that approach. Changing the focus from whether the teacher has carried out the 15 different tasks on the checklist, to the quality of the learning that is taking place has the potential to transform the classroom.
Learner Focused Training
It is similar to the change that Happy Computers went through around 8 years ago. Challenged by the Institute of IT Training on whether we were focused more on course objectives or personal objectives, we developed a new approach. We called it Learner Focused Training.
Most trainers go into the classroom focused on the set objectives to be achieved and the material to be covered. Instead be guided by these objectives but flexible to the needs of the individuals. Always remember that your role is to help your learners be more effective in their job, which is much more important than what material has been covered.
A Change in Direction
So stop assessing what the teacher or trainer is doing. And instead assess the learning that they are enabling. Look more at what the students are doing than what the teacher is. I look forward to the effect this change in approach could have.
I like that approach. Changing the focus from whether the teacher has carried out the 15 different tasks on the checklist, to the quality of the learning that is taking place has the potential to transform the classroom.
Learner Focused Training
It is similar to the change that Happy Computers went through around 8 years ago. Challenged by the Institute of IT Training on whether we were focused more on course objectives or personal objectives, we developed a new approach. We called it Learner Focused Training.
Most trainers go into the classroom focused on the set objectives to be achieved and the material to be covered. Instead be guided by these objectives but flexible to the needs of the individuals. Always remember that your role is to help your learners be more effective in their job, which is much more important than what material has been covered.
A Change in Direction
So stop assessing what the teacher or trainer is doing. And instead assess the learning that they are enabling. Look more at what the students are doing than what the teacher is. I look forward to the effect this change in approach could have.
Thursday, 16 September 2010
Five Steps to Great Service
I've just been brainstorming with a colleague who is teaching a 50 minute Active Listening course tomorrow. It brought to mind a great story from "Influencer" by Kerry Patterson et al - a book I strongly recommend. It is about a regional hospital in the US where feedback was that families didn't feel treated with care, dignity and respect.
The core message of Influencer is to find "positive deviance". This is to identify where people are successful, identify what are their key behaviours and copy them. In this case they identified 5 specific actions:
1 Smile
2 Establish eye contact
3 Identify yourself
4 Let people know what you are doing and why
5 End every interaction by asking "is there anything else that you need?"
None of this is rocket science and none of it is about medical expertise. They are simple behaviours that make people's experience better. But relentlessly pursuing them resulted in dramatic improvements in customer feedback and the centre becoming best-in-class among its peers within a year of the new focus.
What simple steps can you and your people take to ensure your customers feel appreciated?
The core message of Influencer is to find "positive deviance". This is to identify where people are successful, identify what are their key behaviours and copy them. In this case they identified 5 specific actions:
1 Smile
2 Establish eye contact
3 Identify yourself
4 Let people know what you are doing and why
5 End every interaction by asking "is there anything else that you need?"
None of this is rocket science and none of it is about medical expertise. They are simple behaviours that make people's experience better. But relentlessly pursuing them resulted in dramatic improvements in customer feedback and the centre becoming best-in-class among its peers within a year of the new focus.
What simple steps can you and your people take to ensure your customers feel appreciated?
Monday, 2 August 2010
Employees First, Customers Second
That is the core philosophy of HCL Technologies and the title of the new book by its CEO, Vineet Nayar. It is a title very similar to one of the key books that influenced Happy Ltd from its earliest days: The Customer Comes Second by Hal Rosenbluth.
HCL is one of the leading Indian IT out-sourcing companies and employs 55,000 people. He took over as CEO in 2005, when he felt HCL was slipping - only growing at 30% a year! He used the philosophy of Employees First, Customers Second (EFCS) to radically change the culture, empower the staff and deliberately reduce the power of managers and of himself. Some examples:
Transparency: HCL introduced full transparancy of the performance of every unit in the company. Seeing their benchmarks, and being able to compare their performance with others, increased shared learning and provided powerful incentives to improve.
Internal Service Tickets: Most IT support companies have external service desks, with tickets and response times. HCL introduced this for all internal services, like HR or finance. The effect was to reduce the involvement of managers (who'd previously been called on to get another dept to respond) and improve response. especially when the target became not quick response times but reduced tickets.
Beyond 360 Degree Evaluation: Most big companies now get managers to be evaluated by peers and by some of those they manage. HCL's innovation was to open this up, so you could evaluate anybody in the company that you came into contact with. As well as the widespread feedback, the unexpected result was that managers began to be judged by how responses they received. It became a measure of their circle of influence.
Sharing CEO Problems: I love this idea. Vineet decided to create a portal to share the problems he was having difficulty solving as CEO and the challenges he saw for the company. He involved the whole company in understanding his role, the big picture and in coming up with solutions.
Employee Passion: HCL decided to survey not just employee satisfaction (for which the company was ranked no. 1 in India in 2009) but also their passion, and to share the results. People got to think about what drove them to act passionately and how they could best leveredge this at work.
Employee First Councils: To get people to embed their passion, Employee First Councils were created. Initially on subjects like health and hygiene, art etc but were extended to core work areas. Now there are 2,500 Councils - each with elected leaders driving forward change throughout the company and, as Vineet explains, pushing control away from the office of the CEO and the conventional hierarchy.
Customer-Employee Value portal: This portal is for employees to put forward ideas, which custoemrs then read and feedback on - leading directly to improved ideas and improved service.
Make all manager plans public: Previously the 300 most senior managers had prepared their plans for the next level up. Instead HCL published them all to all staff in the MyBlueprint portal, so they could see and compare them. As well as increasing transparency, Vineet comments that it led to much more work being put into getting the plans right.
Thriving in Difficult Times: Faced with the challenge of the 2008, and seeking to avoid wholesale layoffs, HCL reached out and asked its people how they should respond. From the massive response, the HCL management drew up 15 initiatives which were to result in "huge" cost savings and enabled the company to continue to grow. When Vineet asked their customers why they thought this had happened, they responded: "Your employees made the magic happen".
And it was the Employees First, Customers Second philosophy that made this possible. Indeed one impressive aspect of the story is the way the philosophy is shared with customers - explainign to them why HCL puts its philosophy first. Rather than putting off customers, it has actually led to many adopting some of the same ideas.
When I tell the Happy story, people often ask if the ideas of trust and freedom for staff would work in a large company. HCL is another example of how these kind of ideas work brilliantly in the largest of enterprises.
HCL is one of the leading Indian IT out-sourcing companies and employs 55,000 people. He took over as CEO in 2005, when he felt HCL was slipping - only growing at 30% a year! He used the philosophy of Employees First, Customers Second (EFCS) to radically change the culture, empower the staff and deliberately reduce the power of managers and of himself. Some examples:
Transparency: HCL introduced full transparancy of the performance of every unit in the company. Seeing their benchmarks, and being able to compare their performance with others, increased shared learning and provided powerful incentives to improve.
Internal Service Tickets: Most IT support companies have external service desks, with tickets and response times. HCL introduced this for all internal services, like HR or finance. The effect was to reduce the involvement of managers (who'd previously been called on to get another dept to respond) and improve response. especially when the target became not quick response times but reduced tickets.
Beyond 360 Degree Evaluation: Most big companies now get managers to be evaluated by peers and by some of those they manage. HCL's innovation was to open this up, so you could evaluate anybody in the company that you came into contact with. As well as the widespread feedback, the unexpected result was that managers began to be judged by how responses they received. It became a measure of their circle of influence.
Sharing CEO Problems: I love this idea. Vineet decided to create a portal to share the problems he was having difficulty solving as CEO and the challenges he saw for the company. He involved the whole company in understanding his role, the big picture and in coming up with solutions.
Employee Passion: HCL decided to survey not just employee satisfaction (for which the company was ranked no. 1 in India in 2009) but also their passion, and to share the results. People got to think about what drove them to act passionately and how they could best leveredge this at work.
Employee First Councils: To get people to embed their passion, Employee First Councils were created. Initially on subjects like health and hygiene, art etc but were extended to core work areas. Now there are 2,500 Councils - each with elected leaders driving forward change throughout the company and, as Vineet explains, pushing control away from the office of the CEO and the conventional hierarchy.
Customer-Employee Value portal: This portal is for employees to put forward ideas, which custoemrs then read and feedback on - leading directly to improved ideas and improved service.
Make all manager plans public: Previously the 300 most senior managers had prepared their plans for the next level up. Instead HCL published them all to all staff in the MyBlueprint portal, so they could see and compare them. As well as increasing transparency, Vineet comments that it led to much more work being put into getting the plans right.
Thriving in Difficult Times: Faced with the challenge of the 2008, and seeking to avoid wholesale layoffs, HCL reached out and asked its people how they should respond. From the massive response, the HCL management drew up 15 initiatives which were to result in "huge" cost savings and enabled the company to continue to grow. When Vineet asked their customers why they thought this had happened, they responded: "Your employees made the magic happen".
And it was the Employees First, Customers Second philosophy that made this possible. Indeed one impressive aspect of the story is the way the philosophy is shared with customers - explainign to them why HCL puts its philosophy first. Rather than putting off customers, it has actually led to many adopting some of the same ideas.
When I tell the Happy story, people often ask if the ideas of trust and freedom for staff would work in a large company. HCL is another example of how these kind of ideas work brilliantly in the largest of enterprises.
Why Presentations Must be Inter-Active
I liked this from Seth Godin's Tribes:
People don't believe what you tell them
They rarely believe what you show them
They often believe what their friends tell them
They always believe what they tell themselves
For Seth this means that leaders must give people stories, that tehir people can tell themselves, rather than directions. True but also it emphasises that any presentation must include involvement. The more you get the chance to talk (and tell yourselves) or discuss, and have your friends and colleagues tell you, the more chance there is of affecting attitudes and beliefs.
Anybody who just stands at the front and tells people things (even with nice graphics) is not going to have much effect on beliefs and attitudes.
People don't believe what you tell them
They rarely believe what you show them
They often believe what their friends tell them
They always believe what they tell themselves
For Seth this means that leaders must give people stories, that tehir people can tell themselves, rather than directions. True but also it emphasises that any presentation must include involvement. The more you get the chance to talk (and tell yourselves) or discuss, and have your friends and colleagues tell you, the more chance there is of affecting attitudes and beliefs.
Anybody who just stands at the front and tells people things (even with nice graphics) is not going to have much effect on beliefs and attitudes.
Thursday, 24 June 2010
Download Free Book: The Happy Manifesto
The second Happy book is almost finished. The first book, Relax, was a business fable about how to create a great workplace. It got some great reviews. The Happy Manifesto is based on the real experience of Happy and many other organisations.
The aim is to enable you to pick up ideas and approaches that you can put into practice to make your workplace great. Now.
Download The Happy Manifesto, free
This is a beta version. I want your feedback. I want to know what you like and where you think it could be improved. But, above all, I'd love to have stories from your workplace that illustrate any of the points in the book.
So please download it now. Read it. And send me your comments and suggestions.
To download a copy of the first book, Relax, click here.
The aim is to enable you to pick up ideas and approaches that you can put into practice to make your workplace great. Now.
Download The Happy Manifesto, free
This is a beta version. I want your feedback. I want to know what you like and where you think it could be improved. But, above all, I'd love to have stories from your workplace that illustrate any of the points in the book.
So please download it now. Read it. And send me your comments and suggestions.
To download a copy of the first book, Relax, click here.
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