Category Archives: Tools

At Howick, we use tools to clarify agreements, plan meetings, structure discussions, elicit participation and summarize discussions. We believe that simple, practical tools can add organization and structure to tasks that require collaboration between individuals. We will organize posts and comments about Tools in this category.

The Value of Engagement

0
Posted by Kathleen on June 8, 2009 – 11:38 am
Filed under Change, Engagement, Tools

Employee Engagement gets a lot of attention from leaders today.  The Gallup organization began assessing the levels of employee engagement in organizations several years ago with it’s Q 12 Engagement Survey, and that created higher visibility for efforts that we have championed for years–get people involved in planning and decision-making around changes that affect their work.  

Today Gallup has collected plenty of data to clarify that there is a direct corelation between high levels of employee engagement and positive business results.  According to the latest Gallup Q12 Engagement data, businesses with low engagement have 51% more inventory shrinkage, 31% - 51% more employee turnover and 62% more accidents than businesses with high employee engagement scores. 

Building Engagement in this Economic Crisis by Jennifer Robison    

Leaders everywhere are taking notice that employee engagement isn’t just a fad–it is a fact of life for successful, sustainable change and positive business results.  So what stands between you and a fully engaged organization?

Howick Associates advocates for engagement, involvement and collaboration with key stakeholders in all of our efforts with clients.  We developed the Pyramid of Engagement with our partners at SC Johnson more than ten years ago to help leaders understand the levels of engagement, and give them tools to convene individuals and teams in critical conversations that drive change and improvement efforts.

2009-engagement-pyramid-with-lines2

Our partners and clients use this model differently–They are all in unique situations.  It is a helpful input in communication planning.  It is useful for identifying different activites aimed at influencing others, and it can be invaluable engaging employees in problem-solving. 

We are co-hosting an event on June 24, 2009 at Briggs and Stratton headquarters in Milwaukee where our partners at Briggs will tell their powerful story about the importance of engaging and involving employees in efforts to solve problems and achieve bottom-line results.  Join us and learn more.

3-2-1 Engage–A Roadmap for Unleashing the Power Within 

 

Using Influence Mapping for Greater Success

0
Posted by Kathleen on May 20, 2009 – 12:32 pm
Filed under Engagement, Facilitation, Promising Practices, Tools

Influence can make or break your best efforts as a consultant.  If you have influence on your side, you can minimize barriers and break down obstacles to understanding and progress.  Everyone who works inside a large organization understands the power of influence.  But how do you access and plan for positive influence?

We’ve used influence maps to chart a course for success on large-scale projects and smaller, individual coaching efforts.  Proactively discussing and planning for positive influence can take time up front.  But the rewards of those efforts pay off when you have influential leaders on board who are champions of change.

Every expert acknowledges that executive support is the linchpin to success in organizational effort so why not take time to identify key influence strategies at the beginning of your project? 

influence-map-tool2

The Influence Map outlines a structured process that helps individuals and/or teams:

  • Identify key audience groups
  • Determine the nature of resistance
  • Plan influence strategies to positively impact stakeholders

Using this process early on in a change effort will clarify communication and influence plans, minimize ambiguities, and support the development of broad-based understanding and buy-in.  This tool includes a worksheet to help individuals and/or groups identify influence strategies on three levels–personal motivation, social/group motivation and structural motivation.  This approach helps leaders influence more efficiently and effectively by addressing the specific needs of their key stakeholder groups.

Communication Planning

0
Posted by Kathleen on May 12, 2009 – 2:04 pm
Filed under Change, Promising Practices, Tools, Uncategorized

The fundamental importance of effective communication cannot be overstated.  We have all experienced moments of confusion, and even anxiety, as a result of poor communication.  Inside a complex organization communication becomes even more powerful–It is the primary means to motivate and engage a diverse workforce to collaborate, innovate and succeed.

When we work as consultants, we have to be effective and efficient at developing and using communication plans to clarify and align efforts, recognize and reward achievement, build a sense of urgency, and empower others to maximize engagement.  Since communication is the basis of all human understanding, consulting and collaboration require thoughtful attention to the audience, content, objectives, and mode of critical messages.  We use a simple matrix, The Communications Planning Tool to organize our communication efforts and minimize confusion and ambiguity.

communication-planning-tool

There are many different versions of this tool.  We use this simple format to clarify the critical audiences for information along with specific details about the objective of our messaging, the content of the message, what media is appropriate, and who will deliver the message.  This kind of proactive planning takes time up front in any project, but in the end you save time by maximizing influence and minimizing confusion.  Let us know how you use this tool or similar tools on your project work.

Internal Consulting in a Virtual Environment

1
Posted by Kathleen on April 6, 2009 – 12:25 pm
Filed under Facilitation, Promising Practices, Tools

In the last couple of years, we have all been doing a lot more consulting “virtually”–Asking questions, clarifying assumptions and expectations, trying to support individuals who live and work in regions and time zones that are different from our own.  Learning to manage and support virtual collaboration is critical to success for consultants today. 

When we meet and work ”virtually” we lose 60% of the communication signals that we receive if we meet and work face-to-face.  We lose facial expressions, eye contact, body language, and some level of verbal intonation and emphasis.  In other words, a lot of information gets lost, and that makes collaboration and cooperation more difficult. 

Getting clarity  and agreement on specific objectives, team roles and responsibilities and progress can help.  We have inserted a couple of links here to tools that assist internal consultants capture in clarifying next steps and accountabilities quickly, efficiently and effectively. 

  • RACI is a Responsibility Matrix that captures ownership and accountabilities for key project tasks  raci
  • Team Goals/Roles Tool helps teams assess and track progress on role clarity, team cooperation and movement toward goals teams-goals-roles

These tools can easily be adapted to reflect the specific needs and roles of your project.  They can also easily be uploaded to share on any virtual meeting platform to enable discussion and consensus-building.  Our goal is to provide structured templates to assist internal consultants in capturing, documenting and sharing virtual team responsibilities.  Using these simple tools on any size virtual effort can create greater understanding, accountability and ownership for success.  

Consulting and Decision-Making

0
Posted by Kathleen on February 5, 2009 – 11:42 am
Filed under Promising Practices, Tools

Decision making inside organizations can take place in less than ideal circumstances.  Intense pressure to make quick decisions, high stakes, and lots of ambiguity, can make thorough decision-making difficult.  At times individuals and teams use experience and instinct as the basis for decisions rather than slow down the process.

In between gut instinct and “analysis paralysis” is a logical and practical approach that helps individuals and groups weigh options and evaluate the impact of different alternatives.  Decision-making tools facilitate this approach because they take the guess work out of the process and build alignment amongst many perspectives and agendas through dialogue.

I have added a link to one tool below.  The Decision Matrix that is easy-to-use and adaptable to many different circumstances.  This tool (like all of the Howick Tools for Engagement) includes a step-by-step facilitation guide and a sample matrix to use as a guide if you have never used these kinds of tools before.

Decision Matrix Tool

Getting a group of individuals to collaborate, understand one another’s perspective’s and make choices that ensure positive outcomes outweigh any potential negative implications can be challenging without the benfit of structure.  By assisting their partners in making structured decisions, and proactively identify the implications of their choices with a tool like the Decision Matrix, internal consultants help their partners have more control over alternatives, direction and results because quality decisions have a direct link to business results.

Share different decision-making tools with others by adding your comments to this post.