Google’s Project Oxygen – 8 point plan to help managers improve their performance

Its all about staff engagement, innovation and increased productivity

A practical plan to help mangers be better?

Google have grown, so has their need to manage. This giga company has the time and resource like no other, and it is use some of that resource to invest not only in technology but inwards. As a part of that investment, the HR team embarken on some research using Google’s renound data analysis skills. Project Oxygen (so called as they see people as the life blood of the organisation) was designed to measure the impact of good managers and help the company make more of them.

The study found that a manager’s technical skills were far less valued by employees than people skills. However they are still on the list as being important.

Why do people leave their employer?

The work is based on testing the belief that people typically leave a company for one of three reasons.

1. They don’t feel a connection to the mission of the company, or sense that their work matters
2. They don’t really like or respect their co-workers
3. They have a bad boss — This being the biggest variable

“Project Oxygen is our attempt to verify here at Google the age-old HR statement that people leave organizations because of their managers,”.  ”We wanted to see whether there’s a huge variance in the quality of managers and if so, what kind of impact was it having on the company?” - Director of People Analytics & Compensation Prasad Setty.

Setty and his team examined the results from Googlegeist, the company’s annual employee survey, as well as performance-management scores and other data on managers to identify good performers and poor ones.

The work started in early 2009 and training from the results commenced in 2010.

The project set out to analyze the results from performance reviews, feedback surveys, nominations for top-manager awards and other available data. Then they correlated phrases, words, praise and complaints. The results were then prioritized by importance.

So what is in the 8 point plan to help managers improve?

Just the stuff you would expect – but it is about consistency and authenticity in the way they are applied. Unlike many competency approaches, Google just share the data and help individuals, managers and teams to make sense of it. They are not forced into change, they are educated and hope that individuals see what is expected of them and learn. If they don’t in the longer term.. well that is a different story.

The 8 point plan to help managers improve

You can see the original list as published

Stop the fad surfing

While many of us in the world of HR & Organizational Development strive to find the “new shiny” idea, this research clearly shows that we need to keep with the basics if we really want to succeed.

A note of caution – it will be easy for a company to adopt this as a list of things for them – such have 100s of firms in the past – but remember this is GOOGLE’S data – their culture is different, so while the issue may be similar, the outcomes may be very different!

NOTE, the fact that technical skills is still on the list is an important one. Employing “professional managers2 without some technical understanding can create tensions that do not need to exist.

Based on an article from NY Times

What is Business Transformation?

Increasingly in the worlds of project management, change and organizational development the term Business Transformation is being used. But what does it mean?

Is it change re-branded? is it outsourcing? is it a way for IT companies to sell additional services?

In this unique piece Mike explores Business Transformation and looks at how this approach can be used in your company. He gets behind the hype and looks at what can be done at a practical level to manage transformational change.

Read the full article on What is Business Transformation?

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

© RapidBI.com 2008

http://www.rapidbi.com

This material may be put on your Blog or website – however please keep this copyright statement

Change Curve Debunked?

Today I read an interesting post by Rob Robson on the change curve at his blog (http://preview.tinyurl.com/2rywg5) .

This sparked some thoughts which I share below.

Change Curve debunked… really?

Rob asks is the Kubler Ross change curve an over simplification – yes of course… all models are over simplifications of reality – isn’t that what they were created for, to take a complex theory and enable the PRINCIPLES to be more easily understood?

He raises some interesting points that many authors do ignore that fact that many people welcome change. This is so very true, in OD and HRM we seem to assume the worst in people – when this is just not true. Sure people will reach different under change, and that is to be expected – our role is to ease that process – not offer therapy for change interaction!

We all need to remember that these are just models and not reality.

As a framework and common language they do have a value – indeed as he says

“By all means, keep the five-stage model in our armoury, but let’s not get carried away with it. Let’s not present it as an unequivocal truth. And let’s not let it get in the way of attempting to truly understand how people really experience change.”

As is said in the change management article there are 3 rules to leadership (or change):

• Rule# 1 – people are different
• Rule# 2 – people are different
• Rule# 3 – people are different
  

And we need to treat each individual in the way that is appropriate for them.
Rob’s headline is to Debunk the Change Curve … which one there are many? Rob focus’s is on the Kubler Ross curve – which as he points out was actually developed for use in a clinical environment, and users need to be aware of that.

Many practitioners will use a simplified model for use in a general business environment business environment.

What we do need to be careful of is people search the web (or a library), finding a model and using it without understanding what it is, where it come from or indeed its limitations.

All models have a place – the question we all need to ask is – is it here and now?

Mike

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organisational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com
© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

© RapidBI.com 2008

http://www.rapidbi.com

This material may be put on your Blog or website – however please keep this copyright statement

PRIMO-F Business development model

PRIMO-F Business Growth Model

The PRIMO-F model was developed as part of a SWOT analysis of an organization. It provides a consistent framework for comparison either from within the organization or to benchmark against a previous analysis or benchmark against other organizations.

The PRIMO-F model was based on some work from the Durham University Business School (DUBS), and what makes an organization and its management effective. This research demonstrated that an effective organisation needed to fulfill the following equation:

Organizational Growth Effectiveness

=

Performance to date * Potential for the future.

Where Performance to date (FiMO) included:

• Finance,
• Operations

and Potential for the future (RECoIL) included:

• Resources,
• Controls and Systems
• Innovation and
• Leadership

This was sometimes called FiMO/ RECoIL.

One of the problems with this method was the lack of consistent application, as a tool it is fine, however many manager, consultants and business advisors have their own priorities. For example a person who has a financial background will major on finance, a person with marketing will focus on marketing etc. After all we are all human. One of the problems with the model in the ‘field’ is that often key issues were missed. The BIR was developed to take these factors and review them consistently.

In many situations it is difficult for managers to differentiate between performance to date and potential for the future, as several areas overlapped, for example resources, operational leadership and management. To solve this problem we developed the PRIMO-F. A simplified way of showing strengths and weaknesses in the relevant areas.

The PRIMO-F Model:

PRIMO-F

People
Resources
Innovation & Ideas
Marketing
Operations
Finance

Performance of the business.

How good is it in terms of its Finance, Marketing & its Operations?

Potential for Growth
People in terms of their experience, their leadership and the controls in place in the organization.
Experience:

Age of the business

Management experience of:

• borrowing.
• product development
• different types of market
• use of external agents
• moving sites
• managing growth

Leadership:

Involving a senior management
age of owner manager
occupational base of owner manager
personal objectives and ambition in line vision of the future
education and training
attitude to staff development
family influence
management style
attitude to change
degree of strategic awareness and understanding of environment

Control:

Adequacy of information and control systems
Ability to use information
Degree of professionalism and Responsibilities of management
Adequacy of planning and monitoring
Level of delegation
How performance is assessed

Resources

Liquidity and availability of finance
Technology level and capability
Physical assets: age and state
Product range and life
Use of and access to appropriate external agents

Innovation and Ideas
Number and source of ideas innovation is being considered
How they are assessed
Level of development or market testing of these ideas
Level of market planning of these ideas
How creative they are.

Using the PRIMO-F model

At its most simplistic the model can be used as an agenda for change, where a facilitator works with the management team and between them they score the business and identify areas of action.

For a template on using the PRIMO-F

The BIR (Business Improvement Review) is a proven tool which take this process to the next level, with 360 feedback from managers and staff, with the option of having external feedback from customers and suppliers. The BIR process is one of the most robust and quickest strategic review processes available. Typically a whole business review can be completed in less than two days, regardless of organizational size. If a large organization also want a divisional breakdown, this will take longer. A Free version looking only at the People and leadership aspects is available For information on the three diagnostic reviews in the BIR family please visit www.rapidbi.com/bir/

Other pages of interest http://www.rapidbi.com/articles/

management models

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organisational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com © This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

© RapidBI.com 2008

http://www.rapidbi.com

This material may be put on your Blog or website – however please keep this copyright statement