Category Archives: 04-Managing a project team

Keeping things moving forward, managing team dynamics, giving & receiving feedback, making sure all the team roles are covered

04-Managing a project team, feedback, team dynamics, team roles, Uncategorized

Effective Team Building

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The main ingredients of building an effective team are:

  • Defined Goals & Roles
  • Decision Making
  • Commitment
  • Good Leadership
  • Communication
  • Organization
  • Collaboration
  • Competence
  • Respect
  • Passion

From our past two semesters, I have learned that in order for a team to succeed we need all these ingredients. You don’t have to be an extraordinary personality to have the skills you need to build and lead high performing team. People must work closely together, wear many hats and work effectively across the organization to get tasks accomplished quickly enough to remain competitive.

There is an article I read, which very well explains the characteristics of an effective team, such as:

  • An effective team understands the big picture
  • An effective team has common goals
  • An effective team works collaboratively, as a unit

Build a Team for Success

03-Planning the work of a team, 04-Managing a project team, 07a-Crafting an effective formal presentation, 07c-Telling stories, 99-Applying business intelligence, team dynamics, team roles

Are you a Leader or a Manager?

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I took a class in undergrad about “Servant Leadership” by Robert Greenleaf. I started questioning the difference between a manager and a leader, and have been intrigued by the concept ever since. As I was interviewing for my current position, I was questioned as to what type of leader I would be in the organization.

I pondered, and proceeded to explain the type of manager I would be and the skills that I would bring to the table. I described that I did not feel that someone could place me in the role of “leader”. It was a position that others saw me as based on how they felt about my abilities. They would make the decision to follow, I could not decide that for them.

I stumbled upon this article in the Wall Street Journal regarding this very topic. It discusses the importance of differentiating between a manager and a leader as the concept of the knowledge worker becomes more profound in our society.

“The leader originates, the leader challenges, the leader is an individual, the leader focuses on people.”

Take a look at the article and see how your natural characteristics fall into the spectrum. I believe that leadership is a way of life. It’s a characteristic that exudes from you, both in the professional world and your personal life. Leaders are the people that I select as mentors. The fact that I have placed them in that position in my life re-iterates how I feel about their ability to lead and challenge me.

My father is a mouthy, Italian businessman with salt and pepper hair. He has drowned me in the business world from a very young age. Along the way, I have gathered a few Tony-isms from him about this matter:

“You can promote people and make them managers, but you cannot make them leaders. That trait is who you are. When it comes out, people will know.”

“The person who knows how and why will always have a leg up on the person who only knows how or why.”

He’s a deep fellow.

Decide the type of position you want to hold in the lives of your co-workers, and work towards being looked at in that light. These abilities will alter the way you present, the way you communicate, and the way you analyze situations.

I leave you with one final Tony-ism: “Be cautious not to take too much advice.”

Christine

03-Planning the work of a team, 04-Managing a project team, creativity methods, feedback, team dynamics, team roles, Uncategorized, work plans

Managing Virtual Teams

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We often have to work with people in different cities in my business, and sometimes even different time zones! It can be a huge challenge to coordinate work with people you usually don’t see on a day to day basis.  It seems like more and more companies are moving to teleworking, so I thought it would be good to go over some key tips on managing a virtual team:

1) Organize regular meetings with individuals as well as the team as a whole.

This doesn’t have to be in-person; a phone call or Skype can be just as effective. The main thing is you want to make sure everyone is on the same page. The team needs to feel cohesive and like they are all “in the loop” on what’s happening. We do daily “show calls” with all of our team members in Abu Dhabi, London and here in Atlanta. While this may not be feasible for every team, even a set weekly/monthly phone call can be good to foster communication and a sense of inclusiveness.  A phone meeting is also a good way to address any team problems out in the open.

2) Rotate locations: Try to make sure members spend some time physically with the team in their home base, even if all members can’t all be there at once.

This is a critical part of getting a team to work together effectively. Once you put a face with that voice on the phone, you form a  personal connection with that person. It’s also good to see how people function differently while working in the same room. This gives you the opportunity to confront any workflow or personnel issues. This would also be a good time to help the team bond through a social activity, games, etc.

3) Recognize cultural sensitivity.  Be aware of cultural differences on your team so you can head off any potential issues.

I work with people from a variety of backgrounds and walks of life. It is so important to be aware that people often have very different styles of communication and management.  A good way to head off issues is to make the team aware of the expectations for communication and conflict resolution. For example, a manager could instruct team members to mediate conflict themselves, before rushing to upper management to handle the situation.  Team building exercises and cultural awareness classes could also help.

The biggest takeaway I got from this article is the importance of having good communication!  It’s not easy managing a team flung across different cities or countries. But the team will work a lot more smoothly if everyone is kept in the loop, and any problems are dealt with quickly and transparently.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/iese/2013/06/20/managing-virtual-teams-ten-tips/

04-Managing a project team

Execs and the Art of Teaching

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There is no article attached to this post, only my personal experiences with one specific COO over the past 3 years at my company.

In my short career, I have had the opportunity to meet one C-level executive that was unlike any other high level director I’ve ever met.

Most of the D-V-C level executives I’ve met were always worried about the big picture, and were always worried about how to make the entire “thing” come together based off previous experience they had.  Most of these executives were always desk or travel executives – the ones you rarely saw, the ones that when you did see them, they had a crew of folks surrounding them when walking the floor.  Sure, these guys came and talked to you, wanted to give you a little bit of their busy day, to show that they truly did care about you as an employee.  And I respect that, because I know it’s a person of one vs. an employee base of many, and going out of your way to come say hello to YOU (/to me), does mean something.

But I now realize that there was something missing from these executive interactions.  I’ve had the opportunity to learn from one of the smartest manufacturing businessmen I know.  At my company we have a COO who is extremely involved in floor activities.  He has very specific lean manufacturing philosophies that he has implemented across our entire company (and his previous companies).  The most important thing though is how he has implemented them – by directly teaching us: the engineers, the staff, the operators, the managers.  He has been hands-on on the floor, and has had specific training courses that he developed and taught in.  These aren’t basic powerpoint presentations where a guy comes in a suit to give you a pre-recited speech with the “any questions?” slide at the end.  This is an executive who cares to TEACH and SHOW you the philosophies he wants you to practice.  Then, he walks with you out to the floor to help you when you need help, and to judge you when he’s got expectations for your work.  He’s not a soft person who’s there to cradle you when you don’t succeed – no, he’s there to kick you’re a** because his title starts with a C and he’s got high expectations for your work.  Here’s the theory, here’s the process, learn it, practice it, execute it.  But throughout the whole process, he started with one fundamental rule – teach.

I’ve learned some fundamental thoughts from him in the past three years:

1) If you want to be a respected manager (all the way through to exec), you need to teach.  Not from a desk.  Not from a powerpoint.  Not by just “setting what-you-think-are examples” on the floor.

2) As you climb the ladder with knowledge, open your knowledge to others.  Managers aren’t just there to make big decisions and set guidelines – the good ones are there to teach the next generation.

3) As your managers and staff are learning your principles, make sure that you are not only teaching them the ideas of the topic, but also how to communicate them later, making them effective teachers.

4) Surround yourself with other effective D and V level managers/execs who also know how to teach – not just how to make tough decisions.  They will help to reinforce a culture of knowledge development.

5) Make sure you followup with those you teach, even if at first it’s perceived as a “boot camp”.  You’d be surprised at their reaction when you test them later when you turn the tables and it’s their turn to teach.  So far, the first reactions I’ve personally received, even from operators on the floor, has been one of shyness, and anger.  Yet by the second or third time, it’s one of pride.  People are proud of what they’ve learned, and are proud to show someone else the how-to.

04-Managing a project team, feedback, team dynamics

Keeping Your Team Engaged

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If there is anything that I have learned during my career thus far it is that change is constant. Over the past ten months, my team has undergone two monumental restructures. Although I believe that both of these changes have been for the best, the change itself was not easy.

While recently reviewing “Leadership Sustainability” by Dave Ulrich, I came across several key takeaways that are simple yet very powerful. Even though I didn’t have this content as I went in to the recent restructures, I realized that the process that my team was following was very similar to several of the key principles identified in the book. However, there is one that we haven’t quite mastered as well as the others.

The book identifies five rules of the Leadership Code:

  1. Shape the future
  2. Make things happen
  3. Engage today’s talent
  4. Build the next generation
  5. Invest in yourself

They sound simple enough, right? I thought so, too.

Throughout the organizational changes that we’ve recently undergone, I’ve found that keeping my team engaged is proving to be harder than I initially anticipated. Through a series of meetings, surveys and conversations, I have identified a few areas that I believe are at the root of the issue.

The first area that I’ve identified is a strong sense of community. Even though the majority of my team does have a strong sense of community, for some, that community factor is missing. For these few individuals, they remain distant and do not take initiative to interact with other members of the team besides the required interactions for various projects that they are working on.

The second area that stands out is recognition. Each individual craves different forms of recognition and several members of my team were looking for additional recognition. I’ve found that complements and encouragement is one of the easiest ways to boost a team member’s confidence. However, for some, they feel most rewarded when they are recognized for their work in front of others. Therefore, I’ve been intentional lately to try to recognize people using a combination of the two. I’ve noticed that team members really appreciate this and will take action to try to remain in the spotlight when they know that they will be recognizing for their efforts.

The third area that my team struggles with from time to time is cultural differences. Our company has a very strong corporate culture that is conservative in nature. However, many members of our team have beliefs that differ from the cultural norms. I highly value these differences in thought and encourage members to always be themselves. However, that is much easier said than done and team members can easily become disengaged when the culture doesn’t align well with their own views.

I’m curious to know if other organizations struggle with keeping their teams engaged in the company and the work that they’re doing. If so, is it for similar reasons that I’ve described and what ways have you discovered that work well for keeping them better engaged?

04-Managing a project team

Contrasting Styles of Management

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As an avid reader, an addicted audio book listener and a small business owner I have read countless business biographies. Richard Branson, John D. Rockefeller, Ted Turner, Warren Buffett, Steve Jobs and John Mackey highlight the list. I have also read several political biographies. These include Harry Truman, Abraham Lincoln, Winston Churchill and the last three American Presidents. The effectiveness of these leaders can be debated, but they were all leaders. I have tried to find parallels between these historical figures to enhance my own abilities, but there are not many consistencies. Some of these men were tactical and some bold. Some were taciturn and others charismatic. Some were geniuses and others not at all.  Some were ostentatious and others frugal. As it seems more appropriate, here are some of my insights about the business leaders.

Richard Branson never graduated from high school, but instead started Student Magazine to protest the Vietnam War quickly followed by a mail order record business which led to Virgin Records. Branson never followed the rules. While running Virgin Records he convinced his board to let Virgin venture into the Airline business – and it worked. This would contradict the wisdom of almost any business executive or business school academic, but he trusted his instincts.

John D. Rockefeller also dropped out of high school. His success in the oil business came from achieving monopoly status by beating his competitors on price through economies of scale. His vast wealth stemmed from retaining and expanding his shares in Standard Oil. He bought up competing refineries left and right offering either cash or stock to the owners. He consistently advised them to take the stock and never let it go. Although he was neither charismatic nor a genius (by academic standards), he stuck to his plan and fervently believed in the company he created.

Ted Turner might have been the one business executive of whom I am aware to possess genius level intelligence and elite charisma. He made it through high school, but dropped out of college at Brown. After his father passed, Turner was only in his early 20’s. He negotiated, pleaded and even threated the acquirer of his father’s billboard business and eventually got it back. Fearlessly, he expanded, got into radio then cable TV, bought the Braves and started the first 24 hour new station, CNN. When he bought the Braves they were losing about $1 Million per year. He paid $10 Million and almost immediately guaranteed that they would win the World Series in five years. I am doubtful that he had a plan to bounce from outdoor advertising to radio to cable television and along the way own two professional sports teams. But, there is no doubt that he recognized opportunity and was a visionary of sorts in several business.

Warren Buffett took a more conventional path. He graduated from high school with good grades and an entrepreneurial spirit. He went To UPenn, but transferred to Nebraska likely due to home sickness. He graduated from Nebraska and even went to graduate school at Columbia to learn under his idol, Ben Graham, the “father of value investing”. He was a stock broker, but quickly realized that he preferred to create partnerships for his investors. With huge returns early on he quickly became a rich man. Part of his knack for big returns lied in his bold strategies. If he believed in something he would invest heavily. Early on he bought a huge stake in Geico which gave him “float” and the ability to buy up more stocks. Singlehandedly, over 50 years, he served as the one clear example of the ability to beat the market. When the Efficient Market Hypothesis popularized among academics, he was the one inexplicable phenomenon. It is hard to say his secret, but investing heavily and spending very little along the way is a good formula.

Steve Jobs was perhaps the least conventional. He dropped out of college and created the first Apple Computers out of a garage with his friend Steve Wozniak. Jobs did not even know how to write code for computers, but guided “Woz” as the first Apple computer was created. This is hard for some computer experts to fathom, but Jobs who helped found the company and then turn it into the Apple that we know today, could not even create a computer. Gates jabbed at Jobs for this lacking this skillset so important the computer brethren of the 1980’s. Despite lacking the technical expertise, Jobs always ran the show often verbally attacking the designers until he liked what he saw. According to some testimonies, he was wildly inconsistent – one day claiming that something was terrible and the next not only proclaiming it great but taking credit for it. He was incredibly unpredictable and admittedly “mercurial”, but his focus was always the product. When asked why he chose not to use market research he replied that Alexander Graham Bell did not use market research when he invented to telephone. He was a visionary. He singlehandedly turned Apple into one of the most profitable companies in the world and made Pixar into a powerhouse, launched two of the greatest advertisement campaigns in history, and revolutionized the phone, tablet and music industries. He just seemed to know what people would want. A good example of his uniqueness is that he opted not to bathe for long periods as he swore that his vegetarian diet made showering superfluous. Jobs broke every mold for a CEO. He didn’t go to a fancy school, did not even truly understand the intricacies of his products, was extremely difficult to work for, and refused to adhere to societal norms. It is far easier to be confident when you possess all of the abilities consistent with the expectations for someone in your position, but far more difficult to lack all of those qualities. Simply put, Jobs’ confidence is unsurpassed in my opinion.

John Mackey built Whole Foods from the ground up. His style is more modern and outlook lends credence to both his company and capitalism in general. Mackey believes that companies successful in the modern age need to exemplify a “conscious” culture. He does not believe in gouging suppliers, beating up competitors or only meeting the minimum standards for ethics as required by law. He proclaims that modern companies must have a clear culture that emphasizes what he calls “Winning to the Sixth Power”. This means running a business so that you bolster company profits as well as suppliers, employees, the environment, the industry etc. Quite the contrarian, he believes in empowering employees through autonomy and rarely ever firing them, allowing good suppliers fair profit margins, listening to his critics and trying to rationalize their viewpoints, exceeding environmental and animal welfare standards. He even goes out of his way to compliment his competitors (i.e. Trader Joe’s) when he believes they are meeting these standards.

Judging from these business leaders, there are a lot of different ways to effectively manage a company. Branson was bold and charismatic. Rockefeller was obsessive and borderline tyrannical. Turner was brilliant and energetic, Buffett was purposeful and consistent, Jobs was obsessed with the product itself and Mackey emphatic about the culture. The only parallels I can ascertain are hard work and confidence. I know it would be far more helpful if it certain characteristics led to success in business, but like many things, it’s not that simple.

 

 

References

Chernow, R. (2007). Titan: the life of John D. Rockefeller, Sr. New York: Knopf Double Day Publishing Group.

Turner, T. (2009). Call Me Ted. New York: Hachette Audio.

Schroeder, A. (2008). The Snowball. Warren Buffett and the Business of Life. New York: Random House.

Issacson, W. (2011). Steve Jobs. New York: Simon and Schuster.

Sisodia, R., George, B., Mackey, J. (2014). Conscious Capitalism: liberating the heroic spirit of business. Boston: Harvard Business Review Press.

 

team dynamics

People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.

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Business success can be defined in many ways – achievement of a firm’s goals and vision, cost reduction, successful strategy implementation, meeting revenue goals, etc. Firm-wide, team based, or individual, not matter your goals or desired outcome, a key success factor is one’s ability to build strong relationships with colleagues, managers, clients and often competitors.

Ed Wallace’s Business Relationships that Last: 5 Steps for Transforming Contacts into High-Performing Relationships proposes that every relationship is built on a foundation of three essential qualities – Credibility, Integrity, and Authenticity.

  • Credibility – the quality that makes other believe in you, your words, and your actions
  • Integrity – being trustworthy in our actions and character
  • Authenticity – being truly genuine and honest with our clients about who we are and what we know

Each aligns with a core tenant and value of the EvMBA program – each difficult to teach or develop in any student (or employee). Each quality requires a level of self-awareness and reflection that can be easily lost in the core or elective MBA curriculum of finance, statistical modeling or product and brand management.

Wallace provides a framework for developing high-impact relationships and introduces a number of activities to spark your thinking about who your key relationships are, what “blockers” are currently holding you back, and actions to take to strengthen your key relationships in a proactive way.

It’s a good and quick read. (Maybe a good one for August, as it’s ~200 pages cover to cover)

Would love to hear your ideas (and actions) on how you build and develop relationships with key stakeholders, colleagues and acquaintances.

04-Managing a project team, feedback, team dynamics

You Can’t Be a Great Manager If You’re Not a Good Coach

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In a recent blog post on hbr.org, Professor Monique Valcour presents a powerful suggestion for managers to connect with and get the most out of employees. She argues that “if your job involves leading others, the implications are clear: the most important thing you can do each day is to help your team members experience progress at meaningful work.”

So how do you know what is meaningful to them? By developing a coaching relationship and having coaching conversations. These conversations will allow managers to understand what drives each person, help build connections between each person’s work and the organization’s mission and strategic objectives, provide timely feedback, and help each person learn and grow on an ongoing basis. The goal is to develop the employee, just as the goal of a pitching coach is to develop his pitchers.

To do so, she lays out 5 tactics for managers.

  1. Listen deeply. Listen with your full attention, and create a high-quality connection that invites your team member to open up and to think creatively.
  2. Ask, don’t tell. In a coaching conversation, it’s essential to restrain your impulse to provide the answers. Your path is not your employee’s path.   Similar to the Socratic method,  open-ended questions, not answers, are the tools of coaching.
  3. Create and sustain a developmental alliance.  Follow-up is critical to build trust and to make your coaching more effective. The more you follow through on supporting your employees’ developmental plans, the more productive your coaching becomes, the greater your employees’ trust in you, and the more engaged you all become. It’s a virtuous cycle.
  4. Focus on moving forward positively. Similar to Professor Smith’s recommendation to have a 5:1 positive to negative feedback ratio, the reverse is true here — when an employee focuses on the negatives during coaching conversations, it’s the job of the manager to end the venting session and steer the discussion into a positive, solution-based dialogue.  You might ask, “Which of the activities you mention offer the greatest potential for building your knowledge and adding value to the company?” “Could you schedule two hours of time for developmental activities each week as a recurring appointment?” “Are there skills or relationships that would increase your ability to meet your primary deliverables?” “How could we work more efficiently within the team to free up and protect time for development?”
  5. Build accountability.  In addition to making sure you follow through on any commitments you make to employees in coaching conversations, it’s also useful to build accountability for the employee’s side of formulating and implementing developmental plans. Accountability increases the positive impact of coaching conversations and solidifies their rightful place as keys to organizational effectiveness.

I wanted to share this article because viewing management through a coaching lens resonates with me. To this day, I deeply appreciate and have nothing but fond thoughts towards my high school athletic coaches — they took a genuine interest in developing me as an athlete and as a person. I’ve yet to have a manager take this same kind of interest my own development, but I imagine my response to that kind of attention would be to make my time at work more meaningful and encourage me to do more meaningful work.

04-Managing a project team, team dynamics

5 tips on how to be an effective manager

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When I came across this article on Linked-In, I was surprised by the jarring title, but appreciated the simplicity of it. Many of us have been there—had a manager that we couldn’t believe was allowed to be in a position of leading a team and thought to ourselves that if we were in their position, we would handle things so differently. Ken Sanderson, a management consultant at Swift Wind Knowledge group, recently  took a close look a management skills and identified 5 elements that we should consider in order to be a good manager.
I thought these were all pretty spot-on, but would offer up a few others as well. For example, I think it’s very important for managers to be strong communicators and  not be afraid to engage in conflict resolution. Additionally, I think it’s also very important to  establish creditability with their employees. Although managers might have the illustrious title, it’s important for them to show that they can deliver results and actually execute projects.
Do you agree with Ken’s list below? What are some other skills that you would include?

1. First and foremost – don’t be a jerk.
Treat Everyone, from cleaning staff through to executives, with utmost respect. Too many people get a position of “authority” and suddenly look down on other staff who are “lower” in the hierarchy. Not only is this wrong on a human level, it is also a serious strategic error. You have no idea what there connections may be, what influence they may have, or where they may end up being in the next year.

It also means that you should not sabotage “rivals”, step on people’s heads to advance, steal credit (or even worry about who gets credit at all), or stab people in the back. Unless you are a pirate, none of these tactics are helpful to a career or a healthy workplace.

2. Be present

You expect your employees to show up for work and put their time and energy in – so should you. Managers that demand 100% from their employees, but then turn around and take extended lunches or go “networking” on the golf course are not only insulting, they are grossly underproductive to their own organization.

Employees are not stupid. When they see this type of inconsistency, they become disengaged. Suddenly, their own contributions to the organization mandate begins to lose its meaning as well as their sense of being appreciated.

Being present is also more than just being in the office. It means being there for your employees. My office door is never closed except for when an employee needs to have a private discussion. A manager’s primary responsibility is to guide and support their staff; thus, the manager must be available to them.

3. Lead by Inspiration, not fear

Antiquated notions of an aggressive leader striking fear and awe into his/her employees are just that… antiquated. They never achieved anything more than obedience and compliance. Staff under that type of leadership did their hours and the minimum required to comply with their duties. Such workplaces never achieve greatness, nor any true productivity.

A good manager leads, instead, by inspiration. To do this a manager needs to include staff in planning, sincerely consider staff ideas and opinions, and help staff see how their contributions connect to the greater picture of the organization’s mandate and directions. They need to see how they are meaningful to the organization.

Might there be performance issues at some point? perhaps, but then that is what performance management systems are for. However, in my experience, engaged employees tend to put in extra time rather than sluff off.

4. Be Open

Managers often think that they are doing staff a favour by holding back certain information (for example, there may be contemplation by senior management about reorganizing a specific team of staff). This could not be further from the truth. Staff ALWAYS find out about considerations or plans – but without you discussing it with them, they are left with wild speculation and fear.

A good manager understands that he/she has a TEAM he/she is managing, not children to coddle. When they know that you communicate with them and that you are there to support them in whatever way possible, you drive up engagement and the true sense of a team.

5. Manage, don’t micromanage!

Far too many managers think they are geniuses. Let’s face the facts here, if you are a manager, you are NOT a genius. You are no smarter than the people you are managing – you just have a different set of skills.

It is the mistaken belief by a poor manager, that they are smarter than their staff. This belief causes many to interfere with the work that should be assigned to their staff. Even worse are those who may have been the best widget maker previously. They have a tendency to interfere all the time – believing that everyone should operate exactly how they did and achieve exactly the same level of results they did.

All of these notions are wrong. First, it is no longer the role of a manager to do all the work. They are supposed to be guiding their staff, supporting them and taking on the tasks of planning. If they are busy doing their staff’s work, they have no time for the actual work they are hired for.

Furthermore, many of these managers have no trust in their employees and so they either criticize unceasingly their staff’s work or do it themselves. To be a good manager, you need to trust your employees and their skills. Give them the tasks to do, let them find their own most productive way of doing it and support them training or whatever else they may need help them gain more and better skill sets.

One caveat to all of this is that you need to get to know your employees and their characters. Some will thrive better under slightly more supervision while others may thrive better under minimal supervision. You need to understand these character differences in order to provide the best management possible for staff to succeed.

Regardless of how much or how little supervision an employee will thrive under, manager’s should not be taking over their work. Nor should managers pretend to know everything their staff knows. Seek out their opinions on issues, involve them in planning or decision making – let them know that you value their expertise. You may not always opt for their recommended decision, but at least you are showing them that you value them enough to seriously consider it.

Link to article

 

04-Managing a project team, team dynamics

Adventures in Miscommunication

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In my work in science, there is often pressure to achieve “breakthrough” results in order to continue to receive grant funding and to publish in high impact journals.  As a consequence, there is sometimes the tendency to not directly falsify, but to prune data so as to cast experiments in the most favorable light.  Minimizing this kind of data manipulation requires effective communication of core scientific principles at all levels of a research team; however, team leaders need to be especially careful that they are sending the right message.  In “Business Adventures” by John Brooks, a book I discovered through an interesting review article by Bill Gates in the Wall Street Journal, there is an example of miscommunication of business ethics throughout General Electric’s entire hierarchy that seemed particularly relevant.  Although the book is several decades old, the series of articles on which it was based appeared from 1959-1969, it is “as much about the strengths and weaknesses of leaders in challenging circumstances as it is about the particulars of one business or another,” as Bill Gates writes in his review.  In the case of GE, the communication of the company policy regarding price-fixing with competitors began to be accompanied by an unmistakable wink from some executives and this eventually became so engrained in corporate culture that even a direct order by an upper-level executive to not engage in price-fixing was ignored.  In his conclusions, Brooks offers the following scenario, where he describes how effective communication requires you to consider not only what you are saying, but precisely how you are conveying it to your audience:

Suppose, purely as hypothesis, that the owner of a company who orders his subordinates to obey the antitrust laws has such poor communication with himself that he does not really know whether he wants the order to be complied with or not.  If his order is disobeyed, the resulting price-fixing may benefit his company’s coffers; if it is obeyed, then he has done the right thing.  In the first instance, he is not personally implicated in any wrongdoing, while in the second he is positively implicated in rightdoing.  What, after all, can he lose?  It is perhaps reasonable to suppose that such an executive might communicate his uncertainty more forcefully than his order.

The review is available here: http://www.gatesnotes.com/Books/Business-Adventures, and the book is available either from the Emory library or Amazon.