I've had a few conversations over the past weeks about rules. Not policies that cover a business, but rules around operations and scheduling. The core of the debates has been around 'will we hamstring ourselves if we implement rules to help guide the teams?'. My view is that rules will help iron out many problems and make your life easier in the long run. Pros and cons Some benefits that jump to mind: People know where they stand (including customers). Decision making becomes clearer. You stop having to re-invent the wheel! Performance improves . Some drawbacks that come to mind: You need to think through the scenarios where the rules don't help you and decide (in advance) if you want to cater for the 10% of situations (hopefully less!) that don't work perfectly with your rules. You need to be firm and enforce the rules. In real life A long time ago I worked with a manufacturing business that was having a nightmare with their on time delivery performance . A handful...

What do you do, once you have defined what results you want in your business? After you have told your team, how do you keep track of what you want? Something I write about from time to time is 'abdication versus delegation'. So, once you have told your team what your expectations are, how do you check that you are getting what you want? Leaving them to it and never checking in falls under abdication, not delegation. There are a few good ways to do this that jump to mind. Here are some of them. KPIs Developing simple, but meaningful, KPIs ( Key Performance Indicators ) is a brilliant way to do this. Just like the dashboard in your car, you should be able to tell whether you are getting the results you want or not at a glance. If the KPIs truly are useful, you'll be able to make decisions on the back of the information. RAG tracking The traffic light system of Red, Amber and Green (RAG) is another really useful way to track results produced. Determine what each status means ...

It is a challenge to not do the work of your team when they mess up. I see this in lots of places I visit. Someone on the team messes up, there's no time left, so the manager rolls up their sleeves and takes over. Two observations. Available from Amazon 1. You don't increase the capacity of your team if you step in. 2. The person you help out hasn't felt your pain and therefore isn't incentivised to avoid this situation in the future. Now, we all make mistakes. I am talking here about the consistent mistakes. So, without being vindictive about this situation, how do you ensure that your team feel some of the pain whilst also learning how to avoid this situation in the future . I'd like you to use this musing as a prompt to help you avoid crises in the future. Here is one idea, to get you started. Look at the work that needs to be done, to get you out of the crisis, and give the most 'painful' part to your colleague. Help them, but cherry pick the best bits f...

Most leaders are good at providing feedback to their teams. Do more of this, do less of this... it isn't rocket science. But, what happens when you leave out the 'do more of this' statement? I see this from time to time. A busy and frustrated manager complains about what they don't want but fail to make it explicit what is wanted . All that happens in this situation is dwindling motivation. The people in question (it is rarely aimed at an individual, in my experience) start to wonder what is the right course of action. They second guess. They procrastinate. They doubt their own abilities. And, what's the result for the business? Whilst I can't guarantee an answer, it is likely that high performance is the default answer. So, what can you do if you see this happening in your organisation? Available from Amazon and other online book stores An easy first step is to make sure that clear direction regarding what is wanted is provided. The second step would be to loo...

The other week I was talking to a production supervisor about one of the business' recent recruits. The supervisor was grumbling about a mismatch in expectations. The new recruit had been with the business for about three months and was only running one machine. I asked what they should have been doing and the supervisor said 'at least two at once'. From a little bit of digging it became clear that this expectation was not mentioned, or documented, anywhere. It's what everyone else did in the business, it was the culture, but it wasn't obvious to this member of staff. Years ago I completed a project for a company that used the term ' reasonable expectations '. I liked this term as it sounds considered and based on facts. They used it to define the pace they expected their staff to work at. I think it is something that most of us could use. Being clear about what good looks like is an essential part of good management. Defining reasonable expectations for you...

This is a challenge for most businesses. Can you 'get away' with only having one KPI? The short answer is 'yes', if you respect the letter K. As I am sure you know, KPI stands for Key Performance Indicator .  Key, as in critical or super important. This means that the one 'killer metric' has to be meaningful. Really meaningful. A good KPI will cascade into other areas. Supporting data / metrics can be dug into when required. If the primary KPI is off track, you'll need the other data for context and to help with decision making. But, if the KPIs is not off track, what else do you need to know. Thinking like this is an antidote to too much data. I see businesses with reams of information. Each measure is defined as a KPI, but how can it truly be? The reality of this situation is that this approach could lead to one KPI per business team / function. Most metrics can be translated back to into a financial measure, ultimately profit. This is a hard nosed meta me...