Makes influencing effective

The "relationships" you develop with the people you want to lead make commitment to you and the relationship you develop that makes influencing effective.
Be well,
Dwika-Executrain




"We're out of money and we're not done!"
by: Steven Cerri

Here's the situation.
You've just been hired by a company, as director of engineering, to manage four programs. Each program has a program manager who reports directly to you.

Upon arriving at work, within the first week, you are told that one of the four programs under your responsibility is a fixed-price contract. The program manager has briefed you and you are told that the contract has an A-Phase and a B-Phase. The A-Phase requires your sub-contractor to develop software within a given time frame for a given price.

During the A-Phase, your company's team is to perform certain document inventory tasks.

After some meetings and some digging you discover that the contract was initiated three months prior to your arrival. Your company's team hasn't yet started the inventory tasks and the time and money have been consumed. And the subcontractor is out of money and the software is not completed.

Welcome to work.

What do you do?

Do you run around accusing people of being incompetent? Do you behave like the "general in charge" in an attempt to turn things around? Or do you role up your sleeves and chip in with the teams? Or do you "coach" the program manager and the subcontractor into doing the work?

But, oh yeah, I almost forgot to remind you, there isn't any more money, and it isn't likely that the customer is going to dump more money into Phase-A since this is just the reason they negotiated a fixed-price contract in the first place.


The only solution that seemed to have a chance!

It seemed to me, that even though I had authority; after all, I was the director of engineering, playing hard ball just didn't seem to be a way to solve this situation. So, while I had plenty of authority, I realized that, actually, it was only organizational authority. It wasn't "real" authority. It wasn't the kind of authority that was going to move anyone to action that they were not inclined to take.

So, while I was in a "position" of authority, I didn't have any "motivational" authority. It was going to be necessary for me to behave as if I had no authority.

So that's what I did. I asked my team what they suggested. What would they do if they were in charge of this contract at this juncture?

Their response was that the inventory tasks would have to be done "by hand" and it would take 6 to 8 days to count the materials.

After further discussion, I put forth my request... "If I work with you, side-by-side, would you be willing to count the inventory by hand over the course of four weekends? The company will provide lunch and we'll get it done. And I can't pay you."

There answer was.... "Yes".

Armed with this commitment from our team, I set up a meeting with the director of programs (i.e., my counterpart) at our subcontracting company. I proposed that his company and his team, finish the software on their "nickel", just like we were doing with our team.

His answer was... "Yes".

Two months later, the inventory was accurately absorbed into the new tracking system, the software was complete, and Phase-B was initiated with new funding. The contract continued for the next three years on budget and on schedule.

And the bottom line is...

We often believe that having authority saves the day. Young engineering managers believe that being given a title, being given "official" authority will make life easy.

It doesn't.

Being given official authority is often of little use. The truly excellent managers and leaders can manage and lead without the official title of either. We, once again, get back to "Influencing Without Authority" or at the very least, "Influencing Without the Help of Authority".

In the final analysis, influence is about finding a connection between what you want to have happen and the desires and motivational drivers of those you want to help you make it happen. No connection... no influence... no desired outcome.

The more powerful the connection the manager or leader can make between the desired outcome and the motivational drivers and "influencers" of the people needed to make it happen, the more effective the manager or leader will be, with or without authority.

In my career, I only used/use my "official" authority when everything else fails. For me, my true authority rests in the "relationships" I develop with the people I want to lead. It's there commitment to me and the relationship we develop that makes influencing effective.

Good luck and be well,