The management potato

- So now we come to another motivation theory, which some people may say is better than Maslow (laughs), although possibly not. I invented the Management Potato, but I think it's good, and I think it covers a small area that Maslow actually doesn't cover, interestingly, which is thanking people. Now, where would thanking people come on the Maslow hierarchy? Well, it would make people feel more secure, really, I think, wouldn't it? But it might make them feel a sense of belonging, and it make them feel important, as well. I think getting recognition is a bit like being thanked. So I think it's mainly security and status on the Maslow hierarchy. I actually think thanking is important for self-actualization, as well, because take, for example, if I run a training course. I mainly do it for self-actualization 'cause I want to believe I'm making a difference for the people on the course, but how do I know if I've made a difference? And if somebody thanks me and says, "That was really great, that's really helped," I get more self-actualization then. So I guess thanking does go all the way through Maslow. But I want to look at thanking in a slightly different way with my Management Potato. The posh name is the Potato of Performance, so I want you to have a look at this diagram. And this is the performance of a typical person. Everyone who works for you and in fact, probably you have a performance potato like this. Mostly you'll find there's a tick for the main part of what you do. There's a double tick for parts where you have an area of excellence, there's something that you do really well. And then there's probably an area that you're not so good at. I've put a little X there. There's probably something you're bad at. Maybe it's detail or dealing with difficult customers or, I don't know, creativity or accounting. Who knows, there's probably something that you don't like that you're not so good at. So that's you and that's the people who work for you. Now, which bit will the boss focus on? And the answer is the boss will probably focus on the problem area. The boss will say, "Oh, you're not very good at that. "You need to improve on that." And that's quite negative but you can see why they would do that, because if they are, say, 10 budgets you look after and one of them is over spent, they're going to hone in on the one that's over spend, aren't they? So it's kind of natural they focus in on the bad bit. But what will happen if you focus in on the bad bit? And the answer is that person will just think, "Oh, you know, all he does is criticize me. "He's always telling me I'm not good enough at this. "By the way, I never get any thanks "for the good bits that I do." And what they will tend to do, is they'll start to not bother with the double tick 'cause they did all that work and didn't get any thanks for it and they'll start to avoid the bit that gets criticized and they'll think, "Well I'm not going to do that, "'cause, you know, if I go near that, "I always get hassle." And so their performance will be reduced. So both of those bits are now gone and in fact, they might do a bit less of the normal bit as well 'cause they just think, "Well, he's so ungrateful." And then they accidentally make a mistake in a different area and the boss criticizes that, and then they think, "Well, I'm not going to do that either." So gradually, the area will reduce an reduce until eventually, all that's left of this person who's been criticized is a little wrinkled prune in the middle and the potato of performance has begun the prune of performance. And that person is now hardly functional. It's happened to me in previous jobs. Every now and then I've had a boss who criticizes me and I just do less and less and in the end you just go through the motions really. And recently it happened to me actually playing in a band. I was playing in a band and I made some posters that I thought were good, brought them along, and the boss of the band, the guitarist, said to me, "Well", he said, "I suppose that'll do until we get "some proper ones made." And I just thought, oh right, thanks, I'm not going to bother with that anymore. And then I made some pages on a website and he went, "Well, you know, I don't really like that bit." So I thought well I'm not going to bother with the website. And then I managed to get us a gig in a little pub down the road. And getting gig's quite hard work, you have to really hassle the guy who runs the pub. And the gig turned out to not be very good, it was quite a small audience and not a very receptive audience. And they also had a noise limiter that kept cutting out the electricity when we got to noisy. And afterwards the guitarist said to me, "That was a rubbish gig you got us, Chris." So I'm thinking, well I'm not going to bother getting any more gigs then. So I gradually stopped doing each thing that I used to do because it was criticized. And it got to a point where I actually would stop doing things even before I started them. So for example I was thinking we could do with the backdrop for the band, with the band's name, and website and things behind us instead of just a dartboard and a jukebox and a TV showing football. So I thought we'd have this backdrop. And then I thought actually, do you know what, I'm not going to do that. 'Cause I know if I do it he's going to criticize it. So I just didn't do it and we never did get a backdrop. So I had become a prune instead of a potato. And amazingly the guitarist used to say, "Oh, no one does "any work in this band. "I have to do everything around here." And I'm thinking I wonder why, it's 'cause you've made everybody into prunes. So it's very easy to criticize people. But if you do they'll become a bunch of prunes and then nothing will get done. And even though I could feel it happening to me I still couldn't fight it. It's got a powerful process and I could feel myself turning into a prune but I just thought well, what can you do? So what should you do if you're a manager and you've got somebody who's got a potato of performance which involves an area of excellence and an area that's not so good? Well to start with, a total no-brainer, is to focus on the two ticks and just tell them they're brilliant. Say, "By the way, I noticed you've done that, brilliant." You know, the fact that some guy in the band has got a gig you should just say, "Brilliant, well done "for getting the gig. "And I know it wasn't a very good one, "but it doesn't matter. "The point is you've got one so keep getting them. "That's great." So focus on the double text for a start. But what about the cross? The area that's not very good, can we ignore that? And the answer is we can't, we have to say something about it. But the main thing is to be supportive. Say to them, "I know that didn't really work out. "But don't worry about it 'cause it's going to be "fine next time, you can do it." And I think a good question to ask if somebody does badly at something is, "Do you know what you'll do differently next time?" because I don't know about you but if I make a mistake I'm already thinking, oh I know what I should've done. I don't need somebody to come along and go, "Oh Chris, you shouldn't have done that." I already know that. So quite often you'll say to somebody "Do you know what you should've done?" Or "Do you know what you're going to do next time?" and they'll go, "Oh yeah definitely, "I'm going to do this this and this." And you can say, "Brilliant, yeah, "cause I know you can do it, don't worry about it. "Mistakes happen, you're going to be fine next time." If they say, "No, I don't really know why it went wrong." then you've got a go into coaching mode and you got to say to them, "Well look, "I'll help you next time. "'Cause you can learn it, and I want you "to be able to do it, so next time it comes up "let me know, we'll work on it together. "If it goes wrong, it'll be my fault. "And I'm going to teach you how to do it "so that next time you can do it, and I know you can do it." So always be positive about the area of less good performance. By the way some people have what's called the sandwich which is where you do the good bit, the bad bit, and the good bit. Tick, cross, tick. And they use this for things like appraisals. The idea is you tell them some good news, then you tell them the bad news and then you tell them some good news. And if you sandwich the bad news in two bits of good news they kind of won't notice. But I don't know, I think I would notice. If somebody gives me a sandwich, I know what I'm going to be tasting after I finish the sandwich. And it's the same when you have that meeting with your manager. You go away thinking I can't believe he told me I was rubbish at this. I worked really hard on that, it wasn't my fault it went wrong. So I don't think you should hide it. I personally think that if they've done something good you should go to them and just say, "By the way, "I noticed you did that, and it was brilliant. "Well done, keep doing it." And walk away. So it's just completely ticked. Don't go pity about the other bit though, 'cause that just ruins it. So just tell them they've done brilliantly and walk away. For the other area, the cross, I think you should do the performance improvement sandwich, and I think you should say to them, "What you're doing "generally is brilliant, I don't have any problems really. "There is this one area I'd like you to improve on. "I'm going to help you with that. "And don't worry 'cause it's only a small thing. "And I know you can do it, I know you can learn it." So I think you should do the good bad good just for the performance improvement. But you should absolutely separate that out from the praise for the good area. 'Cause if you mix the two you end up with on average, bad. So there we are, that's the performance improvement sandwich and the Management Potato. I hope you enjoyed it almost as much as Maslow's hierarchy of needs.