Monthly Archives: July 2016

TNF #044: Surfing your client dynamics

Welcome Professionals…

…I am currently enjoying my summertime vacation in Italy. Today, I went windsurfing on the Lake of Garda. The wind was steady, but not really strong. In order to go a bit faster, I went back to the surfing gear rental and got a bigger sail.

This reminded me of a good analogy.

Imagine the lake as your client’s organization, the wind as the current organizational dynamics, and the surfer as the consultant. Dynamics will change over time, they might differ from day to day. You don’t even know what they are like and how they work until you test the water. It neither makes sense to work against them nor to complain about them. Just as it makes no sense for the surfer to complain about the weather.

Instead, we need to choose the right gear from our methodological toolbox that fits the circumstances and works for the goals. Every time, in each and every interaction we need to hold on for a second and assure that we are working with the right set of tools. Because dynamics change from time to time, just like the wind.

Of course, we are not doing that for the fun of it, but in order to create value.

Wishing you good vibrations –

Malte

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TNF #043: Summertime, when the living is easy

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Welcome Professionals…

…it’s this time of the year, when most people in the Northern hemisphere go to summertime vacation. What makes up for a good relaxation during the summer for a top management consultant? Can you enjoy your summertime vacation at all or do you have to be ready for work at all times?

I personally have tried various models. I have shifted my vacation plenty times due to important project phases. I have interrupted my summer vacation for important proposals and client meeting and have traveled back to work. I have been riding my bicycle with the laptop on the back to the next WiFi hotspot in order to download and submit large PowerPoint files. I have stood outside in the rain for hours in order to listen to endless conference calls. On the other hand, I have also tried to make myself unavailable to any work, went to nature spots in a tent without any connection to the outside world.

The extremes of being ready for work all the time or being completely out of business for weeks don’t work for me. Here is what does the trick for me. This is how I get a decent amount of relaxation and find some work/life-balance in my vacation time:

Pursuing some sports activity each day, that takes my full attention, like surfing, beach volleyball, a bicyle tour, etc.
Playing with my children and having them make the rules
Indulging in a good meal and/or Italian icecream and/or a good bottle of wine
Good and intense conversations with my wife
Checking emails each day and answering the most important ones, but limited to some distinct times of the day (usually early morning or at some down times of the day)
Calling my assistant every other day to get the latest news and give instructions to important matters
Never interrupting for any important client meeting or proposal, simply re-schedule
Most important: Not trying to force relaxation. It is like forcing myself to sleep now. It never works like this

How about you? What works for you?

Wishing you a good summertime relaxation

Malte

TNF #042: How to get out of urgency mode?

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Welcome Professionals…

…in last week’s blog post, I revisited a popular concept: The Eisenhower decision matrix. I made the point that we must dedicate time to our long-term oriented goals.

Urgency always finds a way to occupy our time. If we do not take deliberate action, we will miss out on what really matters and what creates future value.

Some readers have asked me how this can be done. There is actually only one way from my point of view. Scheduling time to these long-term goal activities (important not urgent) and sticking to it.

There are two different categories of these activies. The ones that need to be followed regularly like physical exercise and nurturing of relationships are best to be built into your daily routines. It helps to build strong habits that will be followed at all times.

Project work falls into the other categorie. Activities like building intellectual property or acquiring a skill need deep work. Time blocks of a full day or half a day where you shut down all distractions and focus on your work. It is best to set up a project plan for these kind of activities like you would do for a consulting project. Book these activities to your calendar and stick to it.

Hope this works for you to get out of the urgency mode.

Malte

TNF #041: Get out of urgency mode!

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Welcome Professionals…

…time is precious, specifically for top management consultants. We seem to be under continuous time pressure. From my point of view, this problem is getting even worse over time. We continuously run the risk of falling into the urgency trap.

Let’s revisit an old and popular concept that many will be very familiar with. The Eisenhower decision matrix shows importance vs. urgeny on the axes (see picture). It gives some guidance what to do first (important and urgent), what to focus on (important not urgent), what to avoid (urgent not important) and what to limit (neither important nor urgent).

This is a very simple concept which is easy to understand. Yet, it is difficult to apply. The key difficulty is to focus on activities that are important, but not urgent. This is where the long-term value of our business lies. In our context, this could be deep work in order to build some intellectual property.

With the rise of communication technology we find ourselves in a constant urgency mode. Most of the time we are mastering a crisis, that is solving an urgent and important problem for your client. Deadlines are tight. The rest of the time is at risk to be filled with urgent but not important activities like answering emails, messenger items, checking social media and so on. The increase in communication gadgets (both devices and apps) puts pressure on deadlines as well as it creates new distractions. It is a very high risk that we must make ourselves aware of.

All too often, the valuable acitivities of the 2nd quadrant (important not urgent) are dismissed. In the favour of some client deadlines we tend to neglect, e.g.

physical workout – not urgent, but important for long-term health
relationships and friendships – not urgent, but important for long-term sanity
capability building – not urgent, but important for long-term competitiveness

We must make sure that we dedicate time blocks for these long-term oriented goals. It takes awareness, willpower and focus get out of the urgency mode!

Wishing you lots of success,

Malte