Friday 28 July 2017

Above Average

I've recently completed two linked qualifications - Level 2 Gym Instructing and Level 3 Personal Training.  In this blog I'll discuss how I found them and what I learnt.

I discussed my reasons for starting the qualifications back in October in this blog post.  Since then its been a long, hard slog completing both qualifications back to back and managing them in and around a full time job, other bits of self employed work and being with my family.

But I've enjoyed it.

The Level 2 Gym Instructing course covered the basics of nutrition, anatomy, and planning/instructing gym sessions.  And then I did the much longer and more in-depth Level 3 Personal Training qualification, which covered more.  It did nutrition again but looking specifically at the links between that and fitness and wellbeing / energy levels.  It did anatomy and physiology again but in far more detail and looking at how different parts of the body work together and react under pressure.  It covered different ways of delivering personal training too.

I learnt a great deal and am indebted to the teaching staff at Trafford College for helping me through this qualification, aswell as to Donna Hewitson, Damiana Casile and Alison Morton for being willing test subjects and case studies at various points.

I've developed my skills in a range of areas and of particular note I've really honed my coaching techniques as essentially that's what PT is.  I've added huge rafts of knowledge around nutrition and anatomy that have proved useful in both my personal and working life.

And I've discovered that not only do I *really* enjoy PT work, but I'm actually pretty good at it too.  Its a damn shame there's not loads of money in it otherwise it could be bye-bye HR.

And yet I think there's space in my life for both HR and PT, and think the two are complementary.  Without my existing HR (and L&D/coaching) knowledge I'd not have been able to grasp some of the basics of PT and instruction and knowing how to motivate people. And without my PT knowledge I wouldn't be able to coach in business as holistically as I can do, or to look at employee wellbeing in a new light.

So there's definitely room for both and I'll be using my HR skills in any PT work I do, and my PT skills in my HR work too.

But how much PT work will I do?  Very little.  Its something I may fit in around any full time work I do, and pleasingly is something that can easily be done in evenings and weekends.  But I have given my philosophy some thought and know how I’d do it. 


Above average in physical fitness is achievable for most people. Olympic standard isn’t. I would want to work with people who aren’t happy with who they are and want to change. Those who recognise they could be better and want to learn all the various things that need to happen to be better, from nutrition, to focused training and objectives, to understanding physical limits and work life balance issues, to understand the rules and the need for support, the need to make lasting lifestyle changes. Those who want to be “above average” and harness the Power of Three.

I would want to work with people who are interested in becoming Above Average, without the pressure of trying to be the best - who want to be a bit better than others, without the commitment needed to go out and win races and competitions - who want to feel good about themselves but don't think they have time and energy to completely transform themselves.

I think I can use this philosophy in my main HR work too, and look forward to doing it.

Right now I've finished with formal learning though, but I don't think I'm finished forever. I do enjoy learning and have a few other qualifications and accreditations in my sights.

For now though I'm really looking forward to putting what I've learnt recently into practice, both in PT and in HR.

Till next time...

Gary

PS in other news, its almost holiday time...

Monday 17 July 2017

On the move

As many will know by now, I’m due to start a new role soon. Here’s my thoughts on what’s happening. 

I’m taking up the role of Associate HR Director at the Disclosure and Barring Service in Liverpool and I start on 1 August. I’m excited by the challenges ahead and it promises to be great for my own development and is a really good opportunity to make a noticeable difference to an organisation that wants to transform itself and sees HR as critical to that transformation and overall journey. 

I joined Trafford College as HR Director since February 2016 and learnt an awful lot in my time there. I shall miss the HR team, who I really enjoyed working with and who are a talented and enthusiastic team who anyone would feel lucky to lead. They are partway through their own transformation and are well placed to see it through. I shall also miss several of the Leadership Team with whom I’d forged good, strong relationships, and I hope to keep in touch. 

That was also where I was lucky to undertake my Personal Trainer qualification, which will be the subject of a separate blog, and I can highly recommend that particular course and the staff involved in teaching it. My PT qualification is 99% complete with just one assessment left and that’s to be done next week. It’s been a great learning experience.

But there comes a time in any role when it’s time to move on, and it has been an interesting time leading HR within Further Education, a sector which has its own share of challenges and many from an HR perspective. 

Just as when I left my role before this one, I thought long and hard about going self employed / freelance, something I have blogged my thoughts on before HERE. I had the same debates with myself again and reached pretty much the same conclusions, although confess I got closer this time than previously. 

I still want to work within an organisation, with a team around me, and help to change and improve people, processes and organisations from the inside. I still feel I’ve got a major contribution to make to organisations as an employee and as a senior HR leader. I know I can make things better. 

And that’s what I’m doing from 1 August. 

Let’s get started. 

Till next time. 

Gary

Ps in other news, I turned 42 today. I remember my Dad turning 42 and he finished work at that age through ill health, so me getting to this age and about to start a new role has made me quite reflective on where I’m going and so on. I wouldn’t mind retiring at age 42 though…

Tuesday 11 July 2017

Baby its cold outside

Some musings on change management, prompted by a story told to me by a close friend, who we will call Zeus in order to protect their identity and that of their organisation.  It concerns how organisations can overlook group needs at the expense of satisfying individual or organisational needs.  And how too much effort is put into Refreezing a new state of affairs and not enough into Unfreezing in the first place (to use Lewin's model):



Zeus worked for one particular organisation as a senior HR leader for a long time and says it felt like being part of a family. A big change happened to that family that upset Zeus and which affected a large group of people within it, and he left when he felt he couldn’t influence what was happening any more. Zeus says he had a lot of conversations at the time that were supposed to help him deal with his feelings, and that he thought were helpful at the time - but developments since have made him realise they didn’t fully resolve those issues. He feels the organisation missed a trick in its change management programme by not allowing him to talk with others with similar feelings in the hope of resolving them for their entire group.

In short, there was a larger group of possibly up to 100 people who needed therapy, and no amount of re-positioning by the organisation and focusing on new values or new directions was going to make an impact on how that group was feeling, as it ignored the elephant in the room.

So Zeus left, and one by one lots of others have left too. When each person since has left, Zeus says there’s been a social gathering. Always in the same place at the same time, and he says these have felt a bit funereal, in that they were all there mourning the loss of something they all shared, but at the same time celebrating that life goes on.

He says that the social gatherings are nice events, very informal and very easy to be at, and the family feel they all had when working at that place carries on into the social setting. At times it’s easy to imagine they all still work together, or so he says.

But they don’t. And Zeus says they often spend some time discussing why that is and how they feel about it.  Lots of people, lots of conversations.

To him, and to me, it’s clear that as a group they haven’t let go of their feelings about what happened, about why their family had to change and what that change was. Zeus says there were good business reasons for the change, but it’s clear that there’s still feelings of resentment and hurt about a lot of things, and that no individual has successfully managed to deal fully with them.

When we talk about models of change management we often recognise the change curve in individuals, and create strategies to manage that curve for those individuals. As organisations we look to models like Kotters Eight Steps or Lewin's Unfreeze-Change-Refreeze to help us move forward with change at a strategic level, often successfully.

But I wonder whether in these models of change we focus too much on the individual and the organisation, and ignore the groups and collective social sets.   And if we focus too much on the Change-Refreeze and not enough on the Unfreeze, in helping people get ready for change.

The social gatherings Zeus attends are lovely (he says), and are always helpful because he get to talk to others who feel the same way. Who understand. It helps them all to move on.

But I wonder whether, if they had done this whilst they all still worked together, whether they would in fact STILL be working together and actively helping the organisation grow and change

When they did still work together, although some individuals like Zeus did get to talk about their feelings, they never did so together - only, he says, to "outsiders", and only post-change, never pre-change, and when they were together they ignored the elephant in the room and ignored how they were all feeling without tackling that head on.

Organisations provide EAP schemes for individuals, and have well crafted change management programmes, but we may be missing out the middle here - we might be missing a trick around group therapy.

So in managing change in organisations, yes - consider the organisation as a whole and it’s culture and structure. Yes - consider the individual and their approach to the change curve. But also consider the group or team, and how they may have a collective change curve to go through and a real need to talk to each other, not to people who they don’t know very well, about how the collective feels.

And when trying to change a culture, spend time Unfreezing people and groups from their current mindset before making any change and before trying to Refreeze in the new culture and mindset.

As Lewins model asserts, Unfreezing is as important as Refreezing, as individuals and groups need to be ready for change, and I’d argue that it’s even more important. Without doing the Unfreezing, any subsequent Change and Refreezing won’t entirely work.

Unfreeze for individuals, for teams and groups, and for the organisation. 


In Zeus' case, there was a clear change happening and a lot of effort went into executing that change and Refreezing - but hardly any went into Unfreezing in the first place.

Small wonder the change left Zeus and his peers feeling cold, and on the outside of what was going on.

Baby, its cold outside.

Till next time.

Gary

Ps in other news…

Saturday 1 July 2017

Who is the fairest of them all?

This is the sixth in a series of blogs discussing the concept of motivation and what its sources might be. Its prompted by a conversation I had with Bee Heller, from The Pioneers. Bee asserts that there are seven different sources of motivation, and is writing about each of them on The Pioneers website.

We decided I'd write a commentary piece about each one on my own blog, and look at what's happened in organisations I've worked in and with - whether the source of motivation Bee's blog discussed has been used to good effect or been neglected; what's worked well in terms of creating an environment that enhances that motivation; and what's not worked so well or undermined that motivation for people?

Here's Bee's blog on Fairness. In it, she focuses on the introduction of flexible working practices to illustrate how some HR policies can be implemented unfairly, and makes the point that HR policies shouldn’t necessarily be about equality and treating everyone equally, but should create a culture of fairness, allowing for individual differences in the workplace but equality of opportunity. She also makes the point that fairness in the workplace isn’t a motivator in itself, but can be a significant demotivator. In this sense, it’s one of Herzbergs hygiene factors.

I agree with a lot of what Bee is saying here.

In my career I’ve often outlined new or revised HR practices or policies and been met with comments from senior leaders or union representatives that they were concerned about the potential for a lack of consistency in its application.

I recall debating the introduction of a small scale recognition scheme with trades unions where managers had discretion to award recognition gifts to the value of £25/person. The unions were not in favour of the scheme because of its potential to treat people differently.

I also recall debating a new approach to flexible working with senior leaders and many of them not being fully supportive because they were concerned that across the organisation people would be treated differently.

For many years in my career, it seemed all people wanted from HR was to ensure employees were treated the same.

Then, and now, I can’t think of anything more demotivating at work as to be treated the same as everyone else.

Who would want that?

My standard response in the face of such concerns was to say it isn’t about treating everyone the same, and it isn’t necessarily about equality either. It’s about having a set of values that underpin your policies and in fact are the main bit of your policies, and behaving in line with them.

One of my values is fairness.

I believe that in life, and in work, one should be fair to people.

Of course people’s circumstances are different. This means we can’t operate policies entirely in standard format.

But is that such a problem?

No I don’t think so. As long as we are fair to each individual based on the circumstances they present at the time, we are treating people as people and behaving in line with what I believe should be a core value for all organisations.

And this does mean that there will be different approaches to reward, and to flexible working. It’s inevitable. It’s part of employing humans and treating them as humans.

So do we need standard practices and total consistency? No. Only consistently fair practices perhaps. Not the same.

Bee also says that fairness isn’t a motivator. And she’s right, it isn’t. I’m not motivated to join an organisation that markets itself as fair. It’s often just spin, as I’ve found out - I’ve seen promises to let people use the full extent of their skills and knowledge, and to operate without being micromanaged be broken for one person but fully granted to another without any rationale whatsoever and with what seemed to me as gross unfairness. I’ve seen people leave organisations because they feel they are being treated unfairly, and I can’t blame them for doing so.

So organisational culture can get in the way and it is up to us in HR to ensure that the need for equal treatment doesn’t outweigh the need for fairness in organisations.

A lack of fairness can be a significant demotivator as Bee rightly points out.

My advice - talk to people. Treat them as individuals. Ask them what motivates them, what drives them. If they don’t seem happy, ask what is making them unhappy and do your utmost to help them with it.

Above all, don’t ignore someone if they say they are being treated unfairly.

We are in the business of managing human resources. Let’s treat our resources like humans.

Till next time…

Gary

Ps in other news, a big career announcement due from me shortly which I’ll discuss more in my next blog. Also, youngest daughter has chicken pox…