Management Tools: How to play non-linear chess
Management, in my opinion, is very similar to chess. You study methodologies, go to trainings (that is, study openings, the principles of the middle game and endgame), prepare, draw a plan and ... start the game!
You deploy your troops: the pawns move forward, the horses pull up, the elephants occupy diagonals. And then the queen (team lead) comes up to you and says, “You know, old man, I’ll probably be retiring ... Something completely got me.” And two weeks later, he left the board.
Attacks a little confusion: what to do? In the debuts did not write about the sudden dismissal of the queens ...
')
We go to the authorities. A familiar song awaits us there: “Now there is no budget, you can motivate your horses there somehow ...“ And you understand that a motivated horse is not quite a queen. He continues to act like a horse, only his eyes begin to burn.
Or: “We can hire three pawns for you, you can change them there and in six moves they can easily become queens.” And you understand that in 6 moves you are already buried along with the project.
Nonlinear chess And with all this gang you as a manager should give some expected results ...
Unfortunately (and fortunately) people get interested and lost interest, children are born, divorces happen - and this all inevitably affects a person’s motivation, and as a result, his performance.
Can we, as managers, influence the non-linearity of a person, about which Alistair Coburn wrote so much in his program article [1]? For something we can, for something not. But we can definitely track the condition of a person using a number of tools. On one of them today and talk.
You can use this tool both to assess your own motivation and to assess the state of your employees (and these are related things, we'll talk about this too). So let's go!
The matrix briefly and concisely shows what happens to a person at work.
I do not remember at what training I saw this matrix. But since then we have told this matrix at least 300 times - both at trainings and in personal conversations with managers. And in 90% of cases, it helps to clarify that with the motivation of the person right now.
Suppose you hired a student with no work experience, but sensible and with burning eyes. Most likely this person is in the square:
A. High Interest & Low Competence. We do not say that he is completely stupid, but he still does not know so many things: your business domain, your processes and practices, the intricacies of your tools, your standards and how to communicate with foreign colleagues, especially Indians.
But since the person is interested, he begins to learn. Reads, tries, fastens, unscrews ... Did you have such that you stayed late at your first job, just out of interest, although you didn’t pay extra money for this? Here it remains. And sooner or later, if a person is a student, he turns into a square:
B. High Interest & High Competence. The man in this square knows and knows quite a lot, and he is still interested.
Suppose a person is sitting in this project, on the same technology year, two, three, five. What can start to happen with his interest? Most likely, he may begin to subside, and the person will move to the square:
C. High Competence & Low Interest. The person in this box knows and is able, perhaps more than anyone else in the team. But from his work begins to nauseated. And from the recently favorite standards and tools already tears with terrible force.
Interestingly, the competency frame is constantly creeping up. The industry is developing. There are new programming languages, new versions of standards, new libraries. And it seems to be necessary to look, but this is already so sick that it does not force itself.
At this point, training can be delegated to younger colleagues with the words: “I have a systematic view of things, but it will be useful for young people to dig.” After that, a person inevitably begins to slip into the square:
D. Low Competence & Low Interest. Someone would call it emotional burnout. Maybe, maybe ... But it is clear that there is already no benefit from a person in this square, and the white light also becomes unpleasant for him.
Very simple. Let's do it right now and practice. Take a blank piece of paper and draw on it a matrix of 2 to 2 medium sizes. After that, think a little and put a dot in that square, where according to your feelings you are now personally you.
(You cannot put an end in the center of the matrix - be honest with yourself.)
Happened? Let's understand now.
If you find yourself in the right squares (A and B), most likely you are all right now in terms of intrinsic motivation. Interest is one of the main internal motivators.
And even people who claim that the main motivator for them is money, I think, a little cunning. After all, they probably have a hobby:
What makes people do hobbies? Interest first.
Let's go back to the matrix. If you find yourself in square C, this is not a good sign. Especially if you lead someone.
If a manager comes to work every day with the desire to finally die, you cannot expect people on a team to work with glowing eyes. People somehow mysteriously read the status of the team leader.
If the manager says in a tired voice: “God, when will we finally roll this crap out ...” - what is he waiting for? That the whole team will rise with shouts: “Hegei, crap! Ride! Let's roll out two crap! ”?
Miracles do not happen. Sooner or later, the status of the team leader will begin to broadcast on all the others.
Need to change something. First of all, relax, think about your goals. Read about this good books. Stephen Covey, for example. (Not everyone likes it, but I like it.) Discuss this with your management. Or wait for the article on 4 questions to clarify their own goals. But it is better not to wait, but to begin to do something.
“And at work something more energetic has gone” - do you understand? A person has found something for himself that is of great interest to him, and in which he has no competence. Thereby moving oneself from square C to square A.
Did this solve his problem at work? No, he left the company a year later. But this year he still worked there.
After good conferences and trainings, people come back with a fit of enthusiasm. Why? Because they have learned something new for themselves, in which they are not yet so competent. And they have burning eyes to embody it all. The effect lasts a month or two. Then you have to go to the next conference. :) Or deal with your own goals.
Square D, we will not analyze much today, because a) this happens quite rarely b) here it is better to turn to an intelligent psychologist (no kidding).
Similar. Ask the person to put a dot where he feels. Or if you think that he is embarrassed to put a dot in the square C - poke there and clarify, is that so?
At the same time, firstly, it should be understood that the response of a person very much depends on the level of trust in you, as a manager. If you managed to create this level of trust or, on the contrary, destroyed it with your own hands, we don’t know.
Secondly, it is important to adhere to a couple of simple principles:
1. Explain why you are asking to do this. Everything that happens to people, they usually lay out on three scales:
It's all the same. You say: “Put the point.” The person thinks: “So, so ... The manager is active. Is it dangerous or safe? Fuck knows ... Useful or useless? Some kind of garbage, apparently. Again I read some article on Habré, now it will be released in a couple of days ... ”
Therefore, it is better to say in advance why you are doing this. That you are not looking for anyone to shoot. What do you want to better understand, who feels like himself at work, so that you understand what you can do about it and how to help someone. What:
2. Filling the matrix is ​​a reason to talk. This is not a sentence, in any way. This is just a reason to find out if the person is interested in what he is doing now. And what is interesting to him. So that you, from your level and within your authority, understand whether you can give it to a person or not.
On this topic, I recall:
And let it sound cynical, but he is right. Attention to the person - the strongest motivator. A simple matrix is ​​a tool with which you can start working.
What do you think are the factors that keep people in square C? What is the main factor, in your opinion?
Let's do a short poll - answer in the comments? And exactly in a day we will write which factor is the main thing in our opinion. And what to do with it.
Is this matrix the only sufficient tool for working with the internal motivation of people? 100% not. It is much more important to regularly communicate with people about their condition and interests. To hold regular (at least once in two weeks) one-on-one meetings.
It is much more important to do what you promise, building on a trust. And there can be a great many tools for this. The matrix of interest and competence is one of them, simple in understanding and applying.
But in this case, you either agree that this situation suits him and you (work for him is a certain base that provides stability, and for you - he provides the necessary level of quality of work), or you can plan a person’s exit from the project. To plan the exit of a person from the project is quite a sustainable solution.
Actually, the choice of the manager is not rich. Or track the status of people and discuss it with them. Either hope that everything will be in order, or that if anything, the people themselves will come. But hope is not the best management plan.
Work with people. Use tools. Successes!
Alexander Orlov
Stratoplan.Ru
PS If you have already seen this post - this is deja vu. :) Just at first, the post was deleted by the Habr administration, but then it was restored in the blog of the company Stratoplan.
In the next article we will talk about the matrix, which allows us to understand why the customer or the management periodically behaves strangely, climbs and interferes with work, and what can we do about it.
PPS If there is a desire to deal more closely with the themes of motivation and evaluation of the work of people, look at our own collection of articles, “White book shelf of the manager” [2].
PPS Links of this article:
PPPS Previous articles in the series “Management Tools”
You deploy your troops: the pawns move forward, the horses pull up, the elephants occupy diagonals. And then the queen (team lead) comes up to you and says, “You know, old man, I’ll probably be retiring ... Something completely got me.” And two weeks later, he left the board.
Attacks a little confusion: what to do? In the debuts did not write about the sudden dismissal of the queens ...
')
We go to the authorities. A familiar song awaits us there: “Now there is no budget, you can motivate your horses there somehow ...“ And you understand that a motivated horse is not quite a queen. He continues to act like a horse, only his eyes begin to burn.
Or: “We can hire three pawns for you, you can change them there and in six moves they can easily become queens.” And you understand that in 6 moves you are already buried along with the project.
Nonlinear chess And with all this gang you as a manager should give some expected results ...
Unfortunately (and fortunately) people get interested and lost interest, children are born, divorces happen - and this all inevitably affects a person’s motivation, and as a result, his performance.
Can we, as managers, influence the non-linearity of a person, about which Alistair Coburn wrote so much in his program article [1]? For something we can, for something not. But we can definitely track the condition of a person using a number of tools. On one of them today and talk.
You can use this tool both to assess your own motivation and to assess the state of your employees (and these are related things, we'll talk about this too). So let's go!
Matrix “Interest - Competence”.
The matrix briefly and concisely shows what happens to a person at work.
I do not remember at what training I saw this matrix. But since then we have told this matrix at least 300 times - both at trainings and in personal conversations with managers. And in 90% of cases, it helps to clarify that with the motivation of the person right now.
Suppose you hired a student with no work experience, but sensible and with burning eyes. Most likely this person is in the square:
A. High Interest & Low Competence. We do not say that he is completely stupid, but he still does not know so many things: your business domain, your processes and practices, the intricacies of your tools, your standards and how to communicate with foreign colleagues, especially Indians.
But since the person is interested, he begins to learn. Reads, tries, fastens, unscrews ... Did you have such that you stayed late at your first job, just out of interest, although you didn’t pay extra money for this? Here it remains. And sooner or later, if a person is a student, he turns into a square:
B. High Interest & High Competence. The man in this square knows and knows quite a lot, and he is still interested.
Suppose a person is sitting in this project, on the same technology year, two, three, five. What can start to happen with his interest? Most likely, he may begin to subside, and the person will move to the square:
C. High Competence & Low Interest. The person in this box knows and is able, perhaps more than anyone else in the team. But from his work begins to nauseated. And from the recently favorite standards and tools already tears with terrible force.
Interestingly, the competency frame is constantly creeping up. The industry is developing. There are new programming languages, new versions of standards, new libraries. And it seems to be necessary to look, but this is already so sick that it does not force itself.
At this point, training can be delegated to younger colleagues with the words: “I have a systematic view of things, but it will be useful for young people to dig.” After that, a person inevitably begins to slip into the square:
D. Low Competence & Low Interest. Someone would call it emotional burnout. Maybe, maybe ... But it is clear that there is already no benefit from a person in this square, and the white light also becomes unpleasant for him.
How to use this tool?
Very simple. Let's do it right now and practice. Take a blank piece of paper and draw on it a matrix of 2 to 2 medium sizes. After that, think a little and put a dot in that square, where according to your feelings you are now personally you.
(You cannot put an end in the center of the matrix - be honest with yourself.)
Happened? Let's understand now.
If you find yourself in the right squares (A and B), most likely you are all right now in terms of intrinsic motivation. Interest is one of the main internal motivators.
And even people who claim that the main motivator for them is money, I think, a little cunning. After all, they probably have a hobby:
- For which they are not paid
- On which they spend personal time
- For which they themselves sometimes pay
What makes people do hobbies? Interest first.
Let's go back to the matrix. If you find yourself in square C, this is not a good sign. Especially if you lead someone.
If a manager comes to work every day with the desire to finally die, you cannot expect people on a team to work with glowing eyes. People somehow mysteriously read the status of the team leader.
If the manager says in a tired voice: “God, when will we finally roll this crap out ...” - what is he waiting for? That the whole team will rise with shouts: “Hegei, crap! Ride! Let's roll out two crap! ”?
Miracles do not happen. Sooner or later, the status of the team leader will begin to broadcast on all the others.
Need to change something. First of all, relax, think about your goals. Read about this good books. Stephen Covey, for example. (Not everyone likes it, but I like it.) Discuss this with your management. Or wait for the article on 4 questions to clarify their own goals. But it is better not to wait, but to begin to do something.
An example from life. After one of the trainings in the report, one manager wrote to us:
- Guys, honestly - I found myself in a square without interest. I do not know why, I remembered my childhood hobby of electric guitar. I bought a guitar, signed up for classes. Now I attend classes twice a week. In the evenings at home strumming. And at work something more energetic has gone ...
“And at work something more energetic has gone” - do you understand? A person has found something for himself that is of great interest to him, and in which he has no competence. Thereby moving oneself from square C to square A.
Did this solve his problem at work? No, he left the company a year later. But this year he still worked there.
Have you noticed the effect of attending conferences and trainings?
After good conferences and trainings, people come back with a fit of enthusiasm. Why? Because they have learned something new for themselves, in which they are not yet so competent. And they have burning eyes to embody it all. The effect lasts a month or two. Then you have to go to the next conference. :) Or deal with your own goals.
Square D, we will not analyze much today, because a) this happens quite rarely b) here it is better to turn to an intelligent psychologist (no kidding).
Well, you say, with a more or less clear. And how to use it to work with employees?
Similar. Ask the person to put a dot where he feels. Or if you think that he is embarrassed to put a dot in the square C - poke there and clarify, is that so?
At the same time, firstly, it should be understood that the response of a person very much depends on the level of trust in you, as a manager. If you managed to create this level of trust or, on the contrary, destroyed it with your own hands, we don’t know.
Secondly, it is important to adhere to a couple of simple principles:
1. Explain why you are asking to do this. Everything that happens to people, they usually lay out on three scales:
- Active-Passive
- Dangerous-Safe
- Useful-Useless
It's all the same. You say: “Put the point.” The person thinks: “So, so ... The manager is active. Is it dangerous or safe? Fuck knows ... Useful or useless? Some kind of garbage, apparently. Again I read some article on Habré, now it will be released in a couple of days ... ”
Therefore, it is better to say in advance why you are doing this. That you are not looking for anyone to shoot. What do you want to better understand, who feels like himself at work, so that you understand what you can do about it and how to help someone. What:
2. Filling the matrix is ​​a reason to talk. This is not a sentence, in any way. This is just a reason to find out if the person is interested in what he is doing now. And what is interesting to him. So that you, from your level and within your authority, understand whether you can give it to a person or not.
A conversation on the subject of human interests is a strong motivator.
On this topic, I recall:
An example from life. One of our manager colleagues told me after the training:
- You said that you need to meet people one on one. I came back, calling to myself a girl tester. I say, Masha, let's go talk. I looked, she turned pale: “Seryozha, did something happen?” Well, I say, I would like to discuss career prospects ... I look, she will faint now: “Seryozha, will we have layoffs? ..”
- As a result, we talked. Found that she wants to move in the direction of system analysis. They invented some kind of plan, steps. She is going to leave, turns and says: “Seryozh, thank you very much.” I didn’t understand at all: “For what?” - “You see, I’ve been working in two companies for only 5 years. Nobody ever said anything to me that I was interested. ”Sanya, I almost cried. She turns to go out. I look into her back and I understand that this particular person in the next six months does not need any money at all.
And let it sound cynical, but he is right. Attention to the person - the strongest motivator. A simple matrix is ​​a tool with which you can start working.
What keeps people in square C?
What do you think are the factors that keep people in square C? What is the main factor, in your opinion?
Let's do a short poll - answer in the comments? And exactly in a day we will write which factor is the main thing in our opinion. And what to do with it.
Silver bullet? Again, no.
Is this matrix the only sufficient tool for working with the internal motivation of people? 100% not. It is much more important to regularly communicate with people about their condition and interests. To hold regular (at least once in two weeks) one-on-one meetings.
It is much more important to do what you promise, building on a trust. And there can be a great many tools for this. The matrix of interest and competence is one of them, simple in understanding and applying.
Could it be that you cannot give a person what he is interested in? Of course.
But in this case, you either agree that this situation suits him and you (work for him is a certain base that provides stability, and for you - he provides the necessary level of quality of work), or you can plan a person’s exit from the project. To plan the exit of a person from the project is quite a sustainable solution.
Actually, the choice of the manager is not rich. Or track the status of people and discuss it with them. Either hope that everything will be in order, or that if anything, the people themselves will come. But hope is not the best management plan.
Work with people. Use tools. Successes!
Alexander Orlov
Stratoplan.Ru
PS If you have already seen this post - this is deja vu. :) Just at first, the post was deleted by the Habr administration, but then it was restored in the blog of the company Stratoplan.
In the next article we will talk about the matrix, which allows us to understand why the customer or the management periodically behaves strangely, climbs and interferes with work, and what can we do about it.
PPS If there is a desire to deal more closely with the themes of motivation and evaluation of the work of people, look at our own collection of articles, “White book shelf of the manager” [2].
PPS Links of this article:
- Article A. Koberna "People as non-linear and the most important components in creating software"
- Collection of books by A.Orlov “White bookshelf” (free of charge after registration)
PPPS Previous articles in the series “Management Tools”
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/201242/
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