redpill talent programme

enablingfull potential

Your future leaders will operate in a complex environment, balancing the needs of your business strategy and the realities of the various countries & cultures you operate in.

Kevin Brownsey has 28 years experience in the UK and international markets. He has held management Board positions as Commercial Director, Sales Director, Marketing Director and HR Director in companies as diverse as Coors Brewers, Kompania Piwowarska (SABMiller–Poland) and Kellogg. Recently Kevin has led the design of a global CRM solution at SABMiller.

Maria Tykalowicz.is a very experienced HR leader. Maria has held HR director roles at Nivea Polska and both Kronospan and Harper Hygienics on an interim basis. Maria was latterly Director of Talent management and Organizational Development at Kompania Piwowarska (SABMiller-Poland). She has also worked as an independent HR consultant with several Polish organisations.

Together, we are redpill consulting.We believe as organisations expand internationally, the biggest challenge they will face is successful execution of strategy due to the increasingly complex cultural environment their business operates in. An Organisation’s ability to understand their cultural reality and align their strategy to it, whilst adapting practices and leadership behaviours that recognise diverse cultural needs, will ultimately enable it to perform best.

redpillpeople

Organisational talent programmes will need to adapt to different challenges in the future in order to retain and grow future leaders

Future challenges- Matrix & central structures

- Co-creation of strategy

- International & diverse markets

- Technology enabled processes

- Increased individualism

- Leader/ follower relationships

- Outsourced task/ function

Past challenges- Exposure to high level strategy

- Retention of talent

- Personal development

- Succession planning

- Vision & values

- Leader centric learning

redpilltalent programme

The redpill talent programme focusses on three core modules that will equip future leaders with the skills to lead strategic execution in complex cultural environments

Module 1. Cultural integration:- Cultural self-awareness- Cross-cultural insight- National culture clashes- Organisational cultures & practice

Module 2. Strategy to execution:- Developing strategic plans- Ensuring plans are executable- Organisational alignment

Module 3. Leadership potential:- Leadership behaviours- Involved leadership- Leadership adaptability- Authentic leadership

redpilltalent programme

Tomorrow’s leaders will face a complex cultural environment requiring empathy and sensitivity

enablingcultural integration

“Cultural clashes probably account for up to 33% of international business failures “MICHAEL MINKOV“Cultural Diffirences in a Globalizing World” 2011 2 days

Module 1

CultureQ enabling cultural insight

CultureQ is an unique tool designed to enable organisations to profile their culture through the eyes of their employees and identify clashes and tensions that may exist between individuals or groups

CultureQ takes about 20 minutes to complete and is an on-line process hosted by redpill consulting, ensuring your data is safe and confidential. We will use the output of this survey in our consultancy with individual clients.

CultureQ can help provide the following insight:

u Organisational culture profile across 6 independent dimensions inspired by the work of Geert Hofstedeu Understanding for leaders of where the prevailing culture defined by their employees differs from the desired organisational cultureu Individual and group profiles that can be compared to identify gaps, tensions or opportunitiesu Indication of which organisational practices may require work to ensure more cultural sensitivity across different countries or marketsu Personal insight into where individuals may be experiencing tension within the company and practical suggestions to remedy

A bespoke report can be defined and purchased if consultancy is not required. To buy your report go to the redpill shop

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Competitive advantages to organisations of different national cultural profiles

Power distance (low) f Acceptance of responsibility enables faster decision making f Open & challenging environment enables ideas and solutions

Power distance (high) f Discipline enables great execution f Strong direction enables organisational focus

Collectivism f Employee commitment enables retention of people & knowledge f Existence of group norms enables implementation of common ‘ways of working’

Individualism f Individual flexibility enables optimisation of resources f Individual ambition & proactivity enables action & progress

Femininity f Personal service enables customer satisfaction f Manufacturing adaptability enables custom-made products f Collaboration enables cross-functional alignment

Masculinity f Efficient mass production enables cost minimisation f Competiveness enables short term results

Uncertainty avoidance (low) f Risk taking enables innovation agenda f Lack of rules enables quick adaptation to market opportunities

Uncertainty avoidance (high) f Precision and detail orientation enables complex process implementation f Insight & data enables low risk decisions

Short-term orientation f Sense of urgency enables opportunistic wins f Internal focus enables bottom line growth

Long-term orientation f Patience and future mindset enables market development f Investment in capabilities enables sustainable growth f External perspective enables strong position in the market


Using Hofstede’s 5 dimensions of National culture we can compare two nations and identify potential cultural tensions using a simple two dimensional chart

Power Distance index (PDI) The extent to which the less powerful people accept and expect power to be distributed unequally

Individualism v Collectivism (IDV) Individualism is about the degree to which people look after themselves and immediate family only rather than belonging to in-groups who look after them in exchange for loyalty

Masculinity v Femininity (MAS) The dominant values are achievement and success v feminine where dominant values are caring for others and empathy

Uncertainty Avoidance index (UAI) The extent to which people feel threatened by uncertainty and ambiguity and try to avoid such situations

Long Term v Short Term orientation (LTO) The extent to which society shows a pragmatic future oriented perspective rather than a conventional historical or short term point of view

Using Hofstede’s 5 dimensions of national culture


5 Dimensions of culture – bubble chart explanation

The bubbles in the charts are positioned, sized and coloured as follows:

f Each country/ sub set of country has a score for each dimension from 0-100 f The score for each country form the coordinates to place the bubble on the chart eg Poland 64, UK 66 for MAS on first chart f The size of the bubble is determined by the gap in score between the two countries f If both MAS scores are greater than 60 the buble is white (likely tension) f The colour of the bubble indicates the likelihood of a cultural tension existing between any two countries and is

determined as follows:• If either score is ‘extreme’ (greater than 85 or less than 15) the bubble is white (likely tension)• If the gap between the two bubbles is greater than 30 the bubble is white (likely tension)• If the gap between the two scores is between 15 and 30 the bubble is light grey (possible tension)• If the gap between the two scores is less than 15 the bubble is dark grey (not an issue)

Culture comparison: POLAND &.....


Culture comparisonPoland & UK100

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00 05 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60 65 70 75 80 85 90 95 100

LTO

PDI

MAS

IDV

UAI

POLAND

U K

PDI: likely tension; IDV: likely tension; MAS: likely tension; UAI: likely tension (priority); LTO: unlikely tension.


Culture comparisonPoland & Netherlands100

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00 05 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60 65 70 75 80 85 90 95 100

PDILTO

UAI

IDV

MAS

POLAND

NETHERLANDS

PDI: possible tension; IDV: possible tension; MAS: likely tension; UAI: likely tension; LTO: unlikely tension


Culture comparisonPoland & China100

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00 05 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60 65 70 75 80 85 90 95 100

LTO

MAS

PDI

IDV

UAI

POLAND

CHINA

PDI: unlikely tension; IDV: likely tension; MAS:likely tension; UAI: likely tension (priority); LTO: likely tension (priority)


POLAND

CZECH

PDI: likely tension; IDV: unlikely tension; MAS: possible tension; UAI: likely tension (priority); LTO: likely tension


Culture comparisonPoland & Czech100

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00 05 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60 65 70 75 80 85 90 95 100

LTO

PDI

MAS

UAI

IDV

POLAND

DENMARK

PDI: likely tension; IDV: unlikely tension; MAS: likely tension; UAI: likely tension (priority); LTO: unlikely tension


Culture comparisonPoland & Denmark100

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00 05 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60 65 70 75 80 85 90 95 100

LTO

IDV

MAS

PDI UAI

POLAND

FRANCE

PDI: unlikely tension; IDV: unlikely tension; MAS: possible tension; UAI: likely tension (priority); LTO: unlikely tension


Culture comparisonPoland & France100

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00 05 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60 65 70 75 80 85 90 95 100

LTOMAS

IDV

UAI

PDI


POLAND

GERMANY

Culture comparisonPoland & Germany100

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00 05 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60 65 70 75 80 85 90 95 100

PDI

UAIMASIDV

LTO

PDI: likely tension; IDV: possible tension; MAS: likely tension; UAI: likely tension (priority); LTO: unlikely tension

POLAND

RUSSIA

PDI: likely tension; IDV: possible tension; MAS: possible tension; UAI: likely tension; LTO: likely tension


Culture comparisonPoland & Russia100

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00 05 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60 65 70 75 80 85 90 95 100

PDI

LTO

UAI

IDV

MAS

POLAND

SWEDEN

PDI: likely tension; IDV: unlikely tension; MAS: likely tension; UAI: likely tension (priority); LTO: unlikely tension


Culture comparisonPoland & Sweden100

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00 05 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60 65 70 75 80 85 90 95 100

PDI

LTO

UAI

IDV

MAS

POLAND

USA

PDI: possible tension; IDV: likely tension; MAS: unlikely tension; UAI: likely tension (priority); LTO: unlikely tension


Culture comparisonPoland & USA100

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00 05 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60 65 70 75 80 85 90 95 100

PDI

LTO

UAI

IDV

MAS

Business insights informed by culture

Situation: Meetings & Communications

Expectations in Poland Expectations in UK Expectations in Sweden

f Meetings are planned in advance with agendas

f People expect to be observers and receive direction and explanation

f Participants will generally expect their bosses to lead discussion

f Participants do not expect direct questions during the meeting

f All communication should be in writing and detailed

f Meetings can be spontaneous with only loose agenda which is a guideline only

f Meetings should be short f Everyone is expected to contribute

actively in meetings and should be prepared for direct questions

f Communication should be timely, concise and two-way

f Challenge is frequent and competitive

f Meetings are used to exchange views with others

f Everyone should be included in working out the solution

f Communication should be open and informal

f Challenge is frequent and non-threatening



Situation: Talent Management & Recruitment


f People expect a detailed job description with clear accountabilities

f People prefer quantified targets f Rewards should be short term

and monetary f Promotion is linked to job performance

(not potential) f Technical expertise is most important

recruitment consideration f The company is responsible for my

development f Training should be formal, structured

and purposeful

f People expect a set of broad accountabilities to be defined but these are rarely referred to

f Rewards should be short term and a mix of monetary and recognition

f Leadership potential is valued highest in context of promotion

f The employee is responsible for his development, supported by the company

f Training can be a mix of formal & informal methods with mentoring by senior people valued highly

f Accountabilities are shared f Targets are indicative and flexible f Everyone starts with an equal chance

of advancement f Performance is judged by

a combination of results and behaviours f People are recruited to fit the company

more than the job



Situation: Execution of strategy


f Execution of strategy should be clear and unambiguous

f People are custodians of their own results and prefer not to depend on others

f A job well done will reflect positively on people personally

f People expect to be involved in defining the ‘how’

f Execution of strategy is a cross-functional responsibility with people trusting each other to deliver

f A job well done should reflect positively on my team and myself

f There is recognition of others’ good ideas but one’s own are implemented best

f Execution of strategy has more local discretion

f Stealing ‘great ideas with pride’ is common and encouraged

f Cooperation is natural and others’ success is celebrated



Situation: Customer Service


f Customers will expect interaction with service centres to be professional

f Customers will expect the service provider to be an expert and to treat them seriously

f Customers will trust the process rather than the person to solve their problem

f The approach to problem solving is standardised

f A warm informality is expected by customers from service providers

f Customers require a solution approach but do not care who & how the problem is solved

f Customers will expect their ‘problem’ to be owned by service providers

f Customers will expect a flexible, personal and solution oriented approach

f An informal and empathic approach is expected by the customer

f Customers expect to be involved in the decision making process and understand their options

f Customers expect pragmatic common sense service which is high quality and value for money

f Customers expect flexibility and to be treated as an individual


u analysis of current strategy, gaps & alignment issues across strategy, plan & execution prioritiesu develop a future state strategy with improved cross- functional alignment and top to bottom execution

When will we learn that the biggest issue with strategic execution is

alignment and communication?enablingstrategy to execution

Module 2Module 2Module 2

3 days

actually forgotten that ultimately the consumer, the customer or the client will determine the success of our implementation.Over the past 20 years I have personally been part of a team developing strategic plans more than 15 times. I have only known three occasions in which year two of the plan has actually become the plan for the following year, this essentially means we are re-writing our typical 5 year plan every year, not simply refining it and investing in its execution but actually re-writing it! It usually takes dozens of people several weeks to develop the plan that ultimately doesn’t last much longer than it takes to write in the first place.Frankly, I think we over-intellectualise the planning process. This will not be popular, but too many people spending too much time trying to demonstrate how clever they are (and I’m sure they are) will not result in the business growing in the way it wants to. Three simple questions may help us here.

What are we trying to do? (The Strategy) This is obviously the statement of strategic intent. In order to even progress to the stage of deciding ‘how,’ the ‘what’ needs to pass a few tests.

f Firstly is the ‘what’ cross-functionally aligned? If yes, the finance director, the marketing director and the sales director will speak as one voice in terms of investment strategy, customer strategy, portfolio priorities and empowerment to make decisions. Each will be able to articulate the others’ intent and then support it. Each will sign up to a commercial strategy, not a functional strategy.

f The thinking will have been developed by senior leaders and sense checked and consulted down the line, ensuring that critical implementation issues are captured and considered at an early stage

Taking strategy through to execution…successfully.TExT BY

Kevin Brownsey / Partner / redpill consulting

How many times have you heard a leader complain that he has a brilliant strategy which simply isn’t being implemented by his team? So many clichés have been created to describe the implementation of what an organisation is trying to do strategically, frankly it is becoming boring; Some examples of this are “Implementation is Strategy”, “Without Implementation there is no Strategy” and “The most important part of Strategy is Implementation”So, why is it that so often the annual strategic review, presented so beautifully with its PowerPoint hyperlinks and embedded files, fails to be more than good intent that impresses the boss but not so much the subordinates? Have the people working for us become hopeless implementers or do they sometimes understand more about strategy implementation than the people writing “the deck”? Have we become so wrapped up in structuring our thinking that we have

1. What? 2. How? 3. Where?Three very simple questions which require very careful thought.

enablingstrategy to execution

f Enough insight will have been gathered to support the strategic intent without blowing everyone’s minds with detail and graphs and models, which are obviously helpful in small consumable doses.

f Do we have the skill sets, knowledge and capability to communicate the strategy effectively? This is critical. When we asked 20 blue chip organisations what the major issue with execution of strategy was, they said ‘communicating the strategy to the team in meaningful and relevant way’ so that it does not become a Chinese whisper. In terms of communication of strategy the secret is to cascade the answer to the question why? Why we are doing something gives it credibility and rationale.

f Is the strategy acceptable culturally? “What on earth has this got to do with execution of strategy” I hear you say. Everything. An individual’s ‘culture’, his national culture, not a set of platitudes handed to him during company induction, will decide his level of commitment to what he is being asked to do. You will not motivate the average Japanese salesman with short term incentives; similarly you will not engage an Englishman in a plan that comes to fruition in 20 years’ time. The Japanese guy will happily work to long term goals, the Englishman needs reward and recognition now or it simply won’t result in action. If you over delegate decision making rights to a Pole, don’t actually expect decisions unless he has very high levels of clarity about what he is being asked to do. More on culture later but suffice to say if strategy & culture are misaligned you have no strategy or as Peter Drucker once famously said “culture eats strategy for breakfast”

f Before we re-write the strategy do we know what’s working? I will never forget being asked to implement a

strategy that focused on different beer types. Ale was in decline but made us good margin, Lager was in growth but prices were declining and the sector was becoming very competitive. We decided to focus on lager and exploit the trend. The result was some lager volume growth but very little lager margin growth and significant Ale volume and margin decline. The strategy wasn’t necessarily wrong but the plan to implement it was flawed because we jumped from ‘what’ to ‘where’ without thinking about ‘how’

How will we do it? (The Plan) This is the ‘planning’ stage and it’s the tough bit because it gives shape to execution whilst being true to strategy. The quality of the plan decides what chance we have of doing what we said we’d do. This is the step that is usually sacrificed for rapid execution.

f The plan should be time respectful. If we are shifting direction, what needs to be done gradually and what can be simply changed overnight? In the example above a simple channel differentiation whereby the channels with profitable Ale volume are given longer to transition than the Channels with dramatic lager growth would have had a very different effect. However, sometimes we are so blinded by the brilliance and decisiveness of our high level strategy that it is all we can see. Not many markets (especially traditional ones like beer!) require us to perform somersaults every year.

f The plan has to be resourced appropriately. The most common complaint from middle managers in sales and marketing is that we create a plan, then chop and change the budgets resulting in stop start activity. Of course we need

financial flexibility during a year but if we adopt a ‘tight/loose’ approach whereby the tight activities are never under-resourced we give some clarity to our teams as they plan the year ahead

f The plan should be developed by the guys who are going to implement it. Supervise it, yes. Check alignment with Strategy, yes. But avoid the temptation to decide the ‘how-to’ in a smart office, miles away from customers. Ultimately these plans have to be agreed with customers and become their plans and that’s tougher than most senior leaders give credit for. In my experience, asking sales managers to determine their own targets and plans results in higher ambition than we thought it would, usually higher commitment and certainly higher chances of successful execution.

f The plan should explain ‘how’ we will achieve our objectives not simply be an excel spreadsheet with numbers, growth assumptions and targets. The ‘how’ is the real thinking that enables the team to execute the plan e.g. how will we win 10 new accounts from the competition? How will we fill our portfolio gap? How will we develop stronger relationships with customers? This is where we need detailed thinking that is justified, clear and deliverable. At this point I would like to apologise to my sales team in 1994. I didn’t explain ‘how’, I simply explained ‘what’ I wanted and ‘where’ to execute. They struggled, accused me of not understanding their problems and I learnt a valuable lesson. It is the role of the leader to empathise with the execution challenges and find a solution that fits the strategy and enables the execution. This positions the leader in the real world.


f The plan has to work for every stakeholder in the value chain. Is the available margin shared fairly? Does your partner or distributor have a motive to prioritise your brands, your new product launch and your promotion plan. Is an important, but small, premium brand incentivised sensibly against quality measures rather than pointless quantity measures? Do you have partners who share your discipline in distribution targeting and end customer targeting? In other words are you aligned all the way through to the end user?

f The plan should have reviews of ‘how’ built into the process as well as reviewing KPIs. Leaders often judge success only on KPIs, not on the quality of their own thinking, and consequently conclude it was an execution problem. Rarely is this the case in my experience and nearly always poor quality thinking and lack of empathy with the reality is to blame. Let’s look at a real example. A major FMCG company in 2007 in the UK was struggling to implement its new product launch plan with the four major retailers. The leadership concluded that the sales team lacked competence in customer negotiation. The reality was the ‘Plan’ contained no early opportunity for the sales team to discuss the detail of the NPD launches with customers and consequently customers planned ahead without including the company’s new product launches. The sales team asked for earlier ability to consult customers. The leadership was nervous about confidentiality but this was overcome with a simple confidentiality agreement between the parties. So, customers were consulted earlier, there were no obvious breaches in confidentiality and the plan was executed superbly by a very competent sales team

Where will we do it? (The execution) f Execution expectations should be credible. The execution

must be phased with sensible, gradual measures decided after careful benchmarking. Don’t expect 3pp market share in 12 months from a new product launch if typically a good launch delivers 0.5pp. Don’t make the numbers fit the financial budget!

f Develop a way of spreading best practice quickly. Recognise and reward sharing of great execution methods including how to overcome common objections, how to engage the customer as an advocate and what great promotional execution looks like

f Ensure the execution challenge is supported with capability building. The sales manager, the trainer, the experienced sales person should all get involved in coaching other sales persons

f The targeting of execution should be specific. Telling a sales guy to get 10 new accounts might give you the headline you want, but telling him to deliver 10 specific named accounts will target in a way aligned with strategy. There is no point developing a great strategy and a great plan if ultimately you ‘sell by numbers’. The strategy is ultimately only delivered if you present your product to the right customer and the right consumer

f Targeting execution will also result in the planning and execution issues emerging early. A salesperson unable to execute the plan with a specific customer will have faced some obstacles he couldn’t overcome. He may require training, the customer offer may be uncompetitive, the consumer profile may be wrong. However if he is targeted by numbers he may get the product listed (somewhere easy) and then the product will fail if the consumer/ customer profile is wrong. In this case the wrong issue may emerge eg ‘consumer not buying’ rather than the truth which is ‘product listed in wrong place’. Each conclusion takes you in a different direction.

f Ensure your team is clear on what is tight and what is loose in execution. For example pricing may be tight, customer segment may be tight but promotional deployment may be loose. Allowing some discretion helps the sales person achieve great execution and have an input into the decision making process.

Redpill consulting takes a pragmatic and rigorous approach to executing strategy. We have developed an application called SPEKs which facilitates the process of managing strategy to execution, across functions and at multiple levels in the organisation. If you have a challenge with any of the issues raised in this people please contact us to see if we can help.

“redpill consulting takes a pragmatic and rigorous approach to executing strategy.”


SPEKs is a tool designed to facilitate high level vision and strategy discussions in the context of cultural realities, taking strategic themes through to planning and execution priorities deep in the organisation

Participants will identify where their organisation has cross-functional misalignment or end to end process gaps whilst also discussing how the organisation develop a multi-level execution model

Participants will ultimately define the KPIs and scorecard, providing a framework for review across all areas of your business which can be aggregated and cascaded consistently

SPEKs defines the ‘what’ (opportunity assessment and prioritisation), the ‘how’ (cross-functional plan), the ‘where’ (execution priorities) and helps you identify the capability agenda to determine achievability

We will run a highly inter-active process, challenge your assumptions and identify your gaps and opportunities, ensuring any sacred cows are addressed.

Our workshop process

SPEKs©

By the end of the first module your group will be able to build aligned strategic plans and

execute them deep in your organisation

enabling execution of strategy

will start with your current practice (AS-IS), identify your strengths and gaps and sense checking your cultural context before guiding you through your future strategy, plan and execution (TO-BE)


Su p p o r ts

Decisio n t a ker

Co n sulted

Info

rmed

Task

s

TASCI.D is a simple process framework, designed as a business game, which can define key elements of role descriptions from agreed process accountabilities, tasks and actions

TASCI.D is visual and highly inter-active. Participants will debate and define end to end process elements and discuss roles & responsibilities in a safe and fun way

TASCI.D is rigorous Participants will learn the importance of process rigor before attempting to define accountability and communication priorities

TASCI.D does not need a complex system to support it. Instead, it relies on clarity and transparency to define critical business processes e.g. strategic planning or customer business planning, and then embeds these process accountabilities within individual role definitions, relying on human clarity and collaboration rather than system control

TASCI.D can provide a framework for business reviews and together with SPEKs creates a strong methodology to ensure strategy is actually executed by emphasizing the importance of individual and team clarity

TASCI.D is simply great fun to play. Everyone gets involved, everyone has their say and everyone is given the opportunity to call out the issues they have fulfilling their responsibilities

TASCI.D can help you define where sub processes and parallel processes need defining to ensure a holistic approach

TASCI.D© enabling process clarity


Will this decade see the end of the leadership illusion?

enablingleadership potential

2 days*

Module 3

LeadershipTExT BY

Kevin Brownsey / Partner / redpill consulting

In April 2012 Barbara Kellerman published her book called ‘The end of leadership’. The title is provocative and somewhat ironic, as the book that follows is predictably about leadership in the 21st century. So, is the title any more than an attention grabber? The central theme of the book, and the principle which we at redpill believe in at a fundamental level, is that the basis on which the ‘leadership industry’ has generated billions of dollars, namely leader-centric, western stereotypical leadership, is dead in the water, and frankly was possibly never more than a great idea for making lots of money from lots of companies. Today’s leaders need to be flexible human beings who recognise their own limitations and see the process of leadership as involved, dynamic and consistent. For this reason we will never advocate that you should adopt a particular style of leadership nor should leaders be of a particular personality or type, nor can leadership be summed up in a few buzz words or phrases and preached as a mantra. However, to be useful leadership does need some loose structure that people within organisations can recognise, follow and demonstrate. Let’s begin by expanding on some of the themes referred to earlier.

1. What does involved leadership look like? Leaders need eyes in the back of their head and to be connected at all levels within an organisation. There is little point in having the best vision and strategy in the world if at the point of execution it all goes wrong. Being involved also means staying connected through the generations. Generally, the most senior people will be over 40 but staying connected with the under 25s could be the most important element of leadership in your business, especially if this is also your consumer disconnection. We hear lots of messages about people being ‘into the detail’ or ‘into the big picture’. The reality is that you may need to be into both depending on the situation.The idea that leadership is something God grants you when you are appointed to the Board of Directors or into a senior position is a bit silly, and the concept of leadership being top down and one-way i.e. ‘I lead you and my boss leads me’ is possibly even sillier. Involved leadership means leaders and followers being part of the process of leadership. Leaders and followers working together in an aligned and committed way may be basic but is unfortunately also quite rare. So, in order for leadership to be truly ‘involved’ you will need to ensure your communication systems are working. Communication of strategy is critical, and interestingly, in a survey of 15 blue chip organisations operating in Poland, was identified as the highest current priority for capability development. Getting the message down the line consistently and effectively and then receiving messages back up the line is increasingly challenging as organisations become matrix structured and multi-national in reach. Our feedback from the likes of

Nestle, LVMH & Associated British Foods is that strategy often falls down in communication and that relatively simple involvement can make a big difference to engagement.

2. What does dynamic leadership look like? When we talk about dynamic leadership we refer to the ability to adapt to different situations and adopt different approaches & styles dependent on the need. This is similar in logic to ‘situational leadership theory’ espoused by Blanchard, Hersey et al, but whereas their models tend to look at the style of the leader (boss) and the readiness of the subordinate to define the situation, our approach looks at the broader internal and external context before advocating a way forward. So Blanchard’s work is excellent for defining the one to one situation that exists and the leader style that fits, whereas ours sets a broader frame of reference that helps organisations define leadership behaviours that employees should recognise within the organisation as a whole. The two approaches are therefore complementary. I remember the first company I worked for had a ‘commandment’ called ‘Change strategic direction cautiously’. At redpill we tend not to talk about commandments but the idea expressed here is one of the few headlines that have stuck with me over 30 years. Adapting to market realities is a necessity, but being dynamic doesn’t mean changing strategic direction every year. It means being open-minded to new ideas, empowering and trusting your team to take fast local decisions where necessary and yes, if something is genuinely not working, then take strong collaborative action to resolve the problem.


3. Consistent leadership Consistency is the most commonly raised issue when employees are asked to comment on the leadership they experience, or should I say inconsistency. If an element of leadership is directive and top down this is fine, but don’t expect people to take the initiative in these areas and don’t be tempted to criticise them when they don’t! In contrast if you have a very collaborative way of deciding how to improve employee engagement don’t be surprised if your great idea isn’t implemented well when you give the instruction. Consistency doesn’t mean we never change or progress, it is simply more about ensuring you are behaving consistently with the expectations of the business and when there is a need to diverge from this you explain carefully the need for the change and manage expectations. If you are generally viewed of as consistent then the odd lapse from time to time will be forgiven as long as you acknow-ledge it too!Consistency also requires some degree of conformity. If you have defined a way of ‘being’ as a leadership team and have some clear requirements of your followers, then you must re-enforce these behaviours personally. It is critical that you do not tolerate anti-behaviours, otherwise the standards are blown, the leadership norms are confusing and the team will not follow. In the capability survey referred to earlier, ‘intolerance of anti-behaviours’ was the issue most often called out as being the area least effectively managed and identified as the area that, if addressed, would have the single biggest positive impact on commercial performance. However it was also rarely a current priority for some of the biggest and best organisations operating in Poland today. It

is clearly the area we are most concerned about at redpill. We understand how difficult it is to address behaviour issues in people that are deemed indispensable but the impact it is having on the rest of your organisation could be enormous and destructive if left to fester over time.These are a few of the areas we believe are important for effective and ‘involved’ leadership to prevail in your organisation. However, there is one over-arching theme which usually determines, at the ‘values’ level, whether strong leadership is present in an organisation. I refer to trust. Trust is complex as it is rooted in cultural values. For

example, high level superlatives expressed by one leader from one nation may be viewed as superficial and lacking in depth by another person from another nation who requires detail and understanding before trusting the headlines. In reverse someone who goes into too much detail may be perceived as trying too hard to convey her message. Trust is affected by many things, culture being just one. In addition personality plays a part. All of the discussion points above concerning consistency and inclusivity also build trust. Performance builds trust, as does investing time building relationships with your colleagues in a social context.

Considering people you know personally, can you tell me if you trust them completely, trust them a little, not very much or not at all? Only 11% of Poles answered ‘trust completely’, compared to 30% of Dutch participants, and 53% of British participants. The consequence of this is that building trust in Poland takes time and energy and is a cultural challenge


How does leadership & trust play out in Poland? In Poland trust is a very significant issue. Research has shown that Poles are slow to trust. In the world values survey of 2005-2008 the following question was asked about trust; Considering people you know personally, can you tell me if you trust them completely, trust them a little, not very much or not at all?Only 11% of Poles answered ‘trust completely,’ compared to 30% of Dutch participants, and 53% of British participants. The consequence of this is that building trust in Poland takes time and energy and is a cultural challenge at the deepest level. As a leader in Poland for the past five years I can honestly say my relationships with Poles have taken the longest to establish but are now some of the strongest and enduring relationships I have. It is definitely worth the investment but so easy to give up on along the way. The consequence of not persevering with this journey has far reaching consequences for the leadership climate in your business (see ‘culture eats strategy for breakfast’ in the ‘enabling cultural integration’ section). However the journey is not so obvious. Firstly Poles generally appreciate technical competence so some demonstration of technical skill is advised. Secondly Poles tend to be quite deferential towards bosses, especially foreign bosses, and thirdly they avoid placing themselves in situations of vulnerability and so can be hard to ‘open’ up. Having spoken to many Polish and foreign leaders in Poland I would suggest the following points are borne in mind.

f Distrust is not personal, it is cultural, so don’t take it personally. They probably like you!

f Invest time in explaining things thoroughly, especially strategy.

f Make time for the team on a personal level f Show your personal vulnerability eg language but not

in your supposed area of expertise! f Don’t expose or compete with people publically, loss of

face can be irreparable for Poles. f Show interest in Poland and its culture, Poles are

rightly a very proud nation.

Your leadership fingerprint The leadership agenda in any one business is as unique as a fingerprint. You cannot apply a formula and expect an answer to pop up even if the leadership industry would like to persuade you otherwise. Our approach to leadership is to spend a lot of time understanding what you have currently, and then apply a hard commercial test to anything you want to change. It must have a purpose if it’s worth doing and no-one can afford to waste money on nice-to-haves these days. We will develop a unique leadership model with you and help define the journey to make it a reality in your organisation.


WORKSHOP PROCESS

Stage 4:

Strategic and cultural sense

check and reconciliation

Stage 1: Sponsor

engagement & briefing

De-brief/ Follow-up

Stage 2:

Pre-engagement of Participants & Stakeholders:

Stage 3:

Critical appraisal of current reality

Stage 6:

Next steps / Action plan / commitments for priorities

Stage 5:

Prioritisation of topics


Ace of Diamonds Ace of Diamonds is a 2 part tool for creating a unique leadership model, specifically designed to fulfill your needs and support your strategy. Using a special pack of cards, we will firstly help you define organisational practices in your business that are cognisant of your strategy and culture. Secondly we will help define the leadership behaviours to implement the practices successfully.

Ace of Diamonds’ primary purpose is to develop a leadership model that gives you maximum chance of achieving your strategy.

ACE - Organisational Practices consists of 9 practices across 4 different cultural clusters. i.e. practices such as ‘performance management’ or ‘control mechanisms’ are defined for four different organisational culture types; competitive, hierarchical, system and connected.

ACE - Leadership Behaviours consists of 10 behaviours across the same four cultural clusters i.e. behaviours such as ‘emotional engagement’ and ‘trust’ are defined for each of four culture types; competitive, hierarchical, system and connected. These behaviours can be adopted flexibly to ensure the organisational practices are implemented consistently and with authenticity

Within the ACE model, flexibility exists for the organisation to define its own themes called ‘Jokers’ to ensure relevance and adoption

The practices & behaviours form a minimum of 76 leadership descriptors that help define current and future leadership profiles, and enable structured feedback within the team.

Ace of Diamonds can be used in many ways within your organisation

f Enabling feedback in a safe and enjoyable way f Creating a common language for leadership discussions f Defining a leadership model that can adapt to different

challenges avoiding a ‘one size fits all’ mentality

Workshops follow a flexible structure and can include pre-workshop analysis of current leadership styles, a sense check against the capabilities required to deliver strategy and a rigorous planning process to ensure pre-requisite behaviours are in place before building to more advanced capabilities

Ace of Diamonds’ primary purpose is to develop a leadership model that gives you maximum chance of achieving your strategy

©


redpill can help you build technical skills in teams or individuals with mentoring, coaching and team development activities. We bring over 50 years Commercial Sales & Marketing and HR experience between us that can help you build technical expertise in your business

1. Design of commercial strategy to execution2. Value chain analysis/ opportunity assessment3. Analysis & diagnosis of commercial execution4. Capability assessment5. Organisational and structural re-design 6. Cost effective commercial operations7. Contract evaluation

We have....

Hands-on experience in the re-design of UK and Polish commercial organisations, in response to intense competition, consolidating retail landscapes and pricing & margin pressure. Led the formation of strong joint venture and licensing partnerships around the world.

Helped Polish businesses define commercial strategy in the face of International brand growth and supported the start up operation for an International business entering Poland for the first time.

Advised on talent management and organisation design for a major FMCG merger in Poland and supported the realisation of cost synergies following International acquisistion of a state owned Polish business.

1. Design of commercial strategy to execution2. Value chain analysis/ opportunity assessment3. Analysis & diagnosis of commercial execution4. Capability assessment5. Organisational and structural re-design 6. Cost effective commercial operations7. Contract evaluation


ACE: Organisational practices


ACE: Leadership behaviours


redpill reading

redpillreading

http://www.amazon.com/End-Leadership-Barbara-Kellerman/dp/0062069160/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1360527921&sr=1-1&keywords=barbara+kellerman

http://www.amazon.com/Cultural-Differences-Globalizing-Michael-Minkov/dp/0857246135/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1360527807&sr=1-3&keywords=minkov

http://www.amazon.com/Cultures-Organizations-Software-Mind-Third/dp/0071664181/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1360527680&sr=1-1&keywords=hofstede

http://www.amazon.com/Take-Your-Glasses-Fernando-Lanzer/dp/1480054771/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1360527871&sr=1-1&keywords=lanzer

http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/1576753441/ref=sib_dp_pt#reader-link

http://www.amazon.com/Shackletons-Way-Leadership-Antarctic-Explorer/dp/0142002364/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1360586843&sr=1-1&keywords=margot+morrell

redpill contact

redpill consulting ul. Słupska 69a, 60-458 Poznań, POLAND

NIP: 781-187-83-03

redpillcontact

mailto:kevin%40redpillconsulting.eu?subject=

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redpill projects:

redpill clients & projects

International business in Poland: Issues:

1. Tensions between centralised functions and the country teams

2. Ex-patriot country MDs challenged by cultural diversity in different countries

Solutions:

u Create awareness of cultural differences using Hofstede 5D model

u Enable cross-nationality empathy and suspension of judgment

u Highlight the complex cultural relationship between ’centre’ and countries

u Create understanding of how the culture of the ’mother’ country can influence organisational culture

u Compare prevailing culture with achievement of strategic objectives; is culture helping or getting in the way?

u Help centre and countries define processes that enable appropriate involvement of stakeholders

u Define future organisational culture and leadership consequences

u Provide practical solutions for everyday situations to help leaders recognise and adjust to cultural differences

redpill culture project example

redpill culture project example

British company (financial sector) re-locating shared services to Poland: Issues:

1. British leadership team struggling to appreciate differences between Polish and British cultural norms

2. Polish shared services team needing to understand the cultural differences in service requirements of

internal customers

Solutions:

u Create objective awareness of cultural differences using Hofstede 5D model

u Highlight and explain the complex cultural relationship between service ’centre’ and countries

u Define ’good service’ through the eyes of the customer in different country locations

u Define processes that are efficient and clear and have pragmatic stakeholder involvement

u Help service centre and countries define service level agreements that are sensitive to local needs

u Agree ’tight’ and ’loose’ metrics to ensure critical SLA commitments are achieved

International business looking to expand in Polish market: Issues:

1. Premium brand in developing but small segment, struggling to grow

2. No in-market resource so partner relations critical

3. Less than 2 year break-even required

Solutions:

u Detailed opportunity assessment conducted to establish value growth options

u Detailed competitor analysis conducted to enable sensible 'winning' strategy to be decided

u Route to market options considered by brand and channel to ensure correct partner, customer and

consumer targets

u Pragmatic portfolio decisions made to generate sufficient cash to invest behind premium brand

u redpill continue to manage customer relationships for brand owner, whilst in-market team is recruited

redpill strategy project example

Polish leadership team with foreign CEO : Issues:

1. Style of leader and style of management board members very different

2. Two critical board members’ relationship dysfunctional and potentially destructive

Solutions:

u Culture survey conducted to establish how cultural differences account for some of the behavioural

differences, creating an objective view of the issues

u As-Is leadership style profiled using redpill Ace of Diamonds methodology

u Group feedback session facilitated usiing same methodology for continuity and familiarity enabling all

board members to give and receive feedback to their peers and boss in a safe environment

u Set of ’To-Be’ leadership principles and behaviours agreed with redpill providing coaching to the key

two members of the board

u Strategy, Leadership model and Culture reconciled via redpill alignment session

redpill leadership project example

redpill talent programme

Documents

cultural insightcultureq

cultural reality

diverse cultural needs

business strategy

director of talent management

hr director roles

sales director

marketing director