Quality Alchemist (品質煉金術師): ESG Online Seminar – Leadership Strategy – How to Change the Old Mindsets of Your Teams

2020年12月11日星期五

ESG Online Seminar – Leadership Strategy – How to Change the Old Mindsets of Your Teams

The Executive Study Group (ESG) online seminar named “How to Change the Old Mindsets of Your Teams” was held by the ESG, Asia Pacific Institute for Strategy Limited (APIFS) on 11^th Dec 2020. In the beginning, Dr. Mark Lee briefed that this year is the 10^th anniversary of Asia Pacific Institute for Strategy Limited (APIFS). Then he briefed the history and goal of APIFS.

Dr. Mark Lee briefed the content including “Post Covid-19 Mindset Challenges” and “Four Catalysts: Credibility, Shared Interests, Language and Emotion”. I summarized some key points for sharing below. Firstly, Dr. Mark Lee quoted Prof. Jonah Berger (Wharton Business School) about the challenges of “Reactance”. He used US case on agreement of mask or no mask to explain that people were less interested in doing what you told them to do. Since Covid-19, social distancing impact on workplace that we need to change our old mindsets.

Then he raised the first poll to ask us the challenging level for persuading without face to face contact. 59% of participants though that was more challenging. So that Dr. Mark Lee discussed the persuasion in digital era which also an opportunities in Covid-19 situation.

And then Dr. Lee briefed the conventional practices by logic approach. Its flow like “Strongly state position”, to “Outline the supporting arguments” and then to “enter the deal-making stage and close”. Eventhough you have data and fact to proof, you are still not success because of “Reactance”.

After that Dr. Mark Lee introduced four strategic steps. Before started those steps, the 2^nd poll about which level of organization that most difficult for mindset change if you are COO in the case study (Canadian Bank) was performed. 38% of us selected Middle Management.

The four strategic steps of persuasion are “Credibility, Shared Interests, Language and Emotion”.

Dr. Lee said most people were overestimated their credibility that is a matter of trust. There are two sources of Credibility that one is “Expertise” and the other is “Relationship”. If strong people relationship to be maintained, people can be trusted to listen and to work in the best interests of others.

And then Dr. Lee briefed self-assessment to test our credibility. The 3^rd poll was performed to ask “If you are going to lead a change in your department, which source of credibility is relative weaker?” 66% think that relationship is relatively weaker. He discussed how to fill both gap below:

i) Expertise Gap: Strategy of experimentation, learning organization, innovation networks and leveraging on professionals

ii) Relationship Gap: One-one meeting, long-term network development, start with a range of perspectives, proactively offer helps and identify the right “agencies”.

The second step is “Shared Interests”. Dr. Lee pointed out that people who focused on Position (the what) or on Interest (the why) that was important to be able to distinguish between positions and interests.

After that we performed the 4^th poll and go the result that 58% selected interests and 22% selected positions. (Remark: My idea is that NGO and Government departments are more focused on positions.)

The third step is Language. Dr. Lee quoted a case of Mary Kay Cosmetics. She persuaded her staff gathering regularly through the storytelling first. He quoted Prof. Jay A. Conger (Marshall School of Business) statement that “Numbers do not make an emotional impact, but stories and vivid language do.” And Prof. Robert McKee (University of Southern California) statement that “Stories fulfill a profound human need to grasp the patterns of living – not merely as an intellectual exercise, but within a very personal, emotional experience.”

The 5^th poll is how often we use storytelling as our persuasion strategy. The “M” distribution was observed that most people use storytelling frequently (38%) and infrequently (34%).

The last step is “Emotion”. Dr. Lee quoted Prof. Jay A. Conger statement that “Without this demonstration of feeling, people may wonder if you actually believe in the position you’re championing”. So that we needed to check a good pulse on the mood for emotion management.

The 6^th poll showed that most of participants often have a good pulse on the mood during persuasion.

Finally, Dr. Mark Lee said a new normal during pandemic impact and digitization was forced to accelerate our changes on how we collaborate with customers and suppliers to deliver our values. Lastly, the 7^th poll to summarize which persuasion strategy is most difficulty. The results were interested that almost even distribution.