How Do You Quantify The Unquantifiable’s?

A question I have pondered to myself over the last couple of years is how I or anyone else in a leadership role actually measures a team or member of the team’s general performance. I am taking this as an individual topic and forgetting about the influence of the company or set-up. Whether a company is right or wrong, they deem themselves to be correct so for the sake of arguments, let’s say they have looked at their own background and decided the company is operating fine and it’s down to the individual or team (Naturally, there are improvements to be made in every organisation but sometimes it is decided it’s down to people or a team). Now, we can all say companies have a no blame culture and you shouldn’t focus on any individual, but we all know that not to be true and some people just may not fit a team, they may not just be the person for the job – At least at that time anyway, with a bit of work they may fit swimmingly. It’s not about whether they are good or bad but whether they actually can fit in with your team’s ethos and what you are trying to do or not. In a company with a model such as ours, the room for carrying is pretty minimal, you can either be a good all-rounder and pick up an ore to row, or exit the ship. Bearing in mind, we are quite cognisant of looking at every part of the set-up/situation to see where we can improve, objectively but that happens to be not what this piece is about. This piece is about the tools we use to get the people there at an accelerated pace.

A lot of companies I see often measure on one metric and that is the results. While the results are super important at all costs, only one metric focuses on one item in the metric. However, it may not indicate how well or poorly a team is performing or how an individual is fitting in.

The first thing to do is naturally concentrate on that particular metric in your control to try to achieve the results, and that is Process – Process is something I want to leave for another day. What I really want to talk about today is, the one which I find more often than not a bigger problem and that is Attitude.

Ok, so let’s say we looked at the process with everything that goes with it and it’s pitch-perfect. We are great leaders and we have kept all aspects energised. But, we still aren’t getting the results or certainly, it looks like people are just going through the motions. So, what is the attitude of everyone, is everyone bought into the brand? Are they talking to their colleagues about what they are doing for the weekend? Are they sitting up straight on a call? Do they seem busy or very available? Simply, do they know where everything is in your folders or are they constantly reaching out to their colleagues wondering where something is? If you are getting a negative answer to all them questions, well then sir/madam you have an Attitude problem. This is more important than anything. I can handle someone who needs some extra support in a particular role, but what I need to take heavier action on pretty fast is whether this person is acting as an individual or as a team. So, we run through my always-energised process of figuring out someone’s attitude.

Are they activated enough? Activating your team is something I love, the easiest way to activate someone in your team is to take them away from the mundane, everyone has abilities in different disciplines, they may have surpassed what they are doing now and it may be a touch below their skillsets. So, give them a new project totally different to what they are doing daily to run in tandem with their role. You will see within the first week did you successfully activate this person or not. If they start to deliver and bring that extra level of enthusiasm, you will see results faster than you’ve ever seen, they will buy into what they are doing and they will own their new project, and hold it as their own. Which they should might I add, it is theirs, they grew it. If you can do that, you don’t have a person that doesn’t belong. You had a bored individual that you now tapped their potential. The Process too should revitalise individuals, if you can add energy to the Process it often adds energy to individuals. Allowing them to innovate is the most important and brings me back to giving them that project. If they can come up with that project on their own all the better. The truth is that most people work for you to make a living and enjoy their personal life, and they are 100% correct in doing this, I mean, what’s the point otherwise? And they will make up the majority of your workforce Probably 70%. You will have some people who are there to win, they will put more work into doing that. They are often there to win as individuals, which is ok, provided they play ball and buy into the team. We have these and they take a touch more control, about 25% of your workforce will be made up of these. You will have a small number of people that are there to dominate. These people need very little activation, they are proactive, loyal, own their processes and always operate as a team. These are like gold dust, but they’re refreshing. We have a few of these, generally, they make up about 5% of your workforce. But they are your loyal team and deserve the utmost respect. Amazing people who have seen what you’re doing and are there only to buy into it and improve on that. I won’t tell you which I consider myself.

If you can create that Attitude you want with every individual you should hold onto them as best you can. If you don’t have that Attitude you want, in reality, they may not last in the team either they will search for a team with the Attitude they like or you will have to search for someone with the Attitude you like. That person may excel in another team, and they have some powerful attributes and talent, but without the buy you will never get what you are looking for out of them. Sometimes even if you can see the changes the organisation needs to make for that person it may not be on time or possible during that period. To answer the question, how do we quantify the unquantifiable? It’s all about Attitude.