Made of other stuff…

While surfing Steve Boese’s blog, which I strongly recommend, I came across a very interesting and rather ingenious post. It is surprising just how people who are passionate about their work are capable of reflecting on ordinary or even mundane deeds and convert them into something of great value.

In his post “Employee Scouting Reports” published yesterday, Steve mulls over an article from Sport Illustrated which presented the NBA season. According to him, the most interesting part was the small section on each team’s page which contained anonymous comments from opposing teams about some of their players. The comments there were really candid like “Mehmet Okur will make you pay in the low block if you don’t respect him’ and ‘Kevin Love is more of a beefy loper.”

That’s what “Scouts in Professional Sports” write about.  Not in vain is “headhunter” translated as “talent scout”. These strange people spend their time observing and analyzing players on opposing teams, identifying their strengths and weaknesses, their tendencies, and assessing their potential for further development or sometimes even predicting their downfall. 

Just as Steve points out, just observing performance, documenting and studying behaviours, and predicting future success or failure all seems rather like employee performance management and coaching.

In fact, Steve Boese encourages us to forget the boring and outdated performance management templates  and instead explore the reports done by scouts.

Then Steve outlines the key elements of a typical report of this kind.  And here I take liberty to reproduce what I call Steve’s 10 commandments: 

1. Have a plan

The scout needs a process and template to follow, to be sure players are assessed on the same standard, making comparisons easier.

2. Pros and cons

Every scouting report has sections titled ‘strengths’ and ‘weaknesses’. Even the best player has weaknesses.  And even the last player on the bench has strengths. The same with employees.

3. Having the ball is important

Every player knows that. What players do when they have the ball is critical in basketball.  When a player has the ball, he has control over the game, and the tremendous influence on the team success. But some players only want the ball early in the game and avoid it late in the 4th quarter, when the game is usually decided.

At work, what employees do when they have the spotlight and responsibility is a great measuring stick. Some employees want to step it up when the pressure is on, make the big client presentation or take on the toughest technical problems.

4. Find the sweet spot

Almost all players have a spot on the court they prefer to shoot from, or a ‘go-to move’ they rely on. Scouts use this information to prepare defensive strategies. Coaches often work with players to help them develop additional moves, that can enhance their overall game and make them more versatile, and tougher to defend.

Many employees have a sweet-spot as well, a particular kind of assignment or project they gravitate towards, or a tendency to work best in team settings with certain other individuals. If you as a manager understand the employee’s sweet spot, you can better position them for continued success, and also have a better feel for what stretch assignment might help the employee develop some additional ‘low post moves’.

5. Shooting skills

Arguably the most important single skill in basketball is shooting ability. Players that can shoot well, can overcome many other deficiencies, and survive in the league for a long time.

In your organization there is likely one type of skill that is critically important to overall success, or a core principle or value you live by and assessing every employee against that crucial skill or value may be warranted. You may have some employees that do that one critical thing so well that it may make sense to alter job descriptions to allow them and you to exploit this skill. 

6. Team focus

Does the player make his teammates better? Does he put team goals and objectives first? Is he checking his stat line at halftime?

At the office if the work keys on team performance, what do his co-workers say about him? Are there other employees that always want to work with him? If the work is more individually based, does he at least seek opportunities to informally share information and knowledge with others?

7. Defense

Defensive skills are of course important, but also the willingness to play good defense usually suggests the type of player that will do the unsung things, the little things that might not result in making the Sportscenter highlights, but are really critical to team success.

At work not all assignments are glamorous, or get the employee visible recognition with the higher-ups. How does he react when asked to do some grunt work? Will he pitch in and sustain a good attitude?  Or does he mope and whine and bring down the energy of everyone else around?

8. Hustle and Heart

Does the player give his all? Does he dive on the floor for loose balls? Players that exhibit these traits consistently for one of two reasons, they either are not as skilled or athletically gifted as their opponents, or they care more about winning the game than their own stats or bodies.

At work, this most closely translates to engagement, giving that extra effort above and beyond ‘normal’ job requirements to deliver superior results. Not everyone is willing to give like this, at least not regularly. But the ones that are can really drive results. From a management perspective, a manager that can seem to instill this kind of engagement may need to be questioned, just like the coach of a team who’s players don’t show much hustle on the court.

9. The tape

In basketball, height, weight, speed, jumping ability are all important, but they are not the game itself. You have to measure them, but not rely on them completely. In the workplace, you may need to track things like formal education and certifications, but they are not the game either. There are lots of MBAs not worth a darn out there. Obviously in the NBA there are some minimum physical requirements, but beyond those actual performance on the court is the final barometer.  At work, you posted that new job and said ‘MBA required’ but is it really required? Or is that just a cop-out to try and mask some deficiencies in your interviewing and assessment process?

10. Attitude toward authority

Does the player spend the entire game barking at the refs, and rolling his eyes in the time-out huddle? Or is he respectful and willing to receive coaching? Some players are shocked, shocked that they have ever committed a foul.

In the workplace this translates directly, does the employee take direction, can they be coached when they are in need of correction, or performance improvement, or do they push back at all times, even where they clearly are in the wrong?

By way of a conclusion, Steve Boese puts a question to us: do we think the scouting report, its focus on observed recent performance and with its brutal honesty in predicting future potential something we could use in our organization?

He also asks whether we wouldn’t just love to jazz up some performance reviews with comments like, ‘Jane has strong technical skills; if the IT staff does not respect that, she will make them pay in the data center’, or ‘Brian has not been completing his maintenance jobs on time, he is skilled with the tools, but he is more of a beefy loper’.

Brian bets more employees would actually read those kind of comments. I don’t doubt it either, and certainly I’d like to see the faces of those reading such criticism, so scathing that the first thing they are likely to want to do is to find Jane and throw her out of the window. Should we describe the performance of our employees in….er….. um… such sarcastic tones? Would that do them any good?

Or perhaps we should be looking elsewhere…. Why do we always soften up the criticisms? Personally I think I take them well and I believe I can graciously accept any “advice” that helps me improve on the job. But it is certainly true that there are many people who take work-related criticisms way too much to heart. As if you were stabbing right in the very core of their hearts. A person like that, how will they take this kind of criticism? Quite clearly, they’d spiral into a depression, reporting their boss for mobbing or end up in a psychiartic clinic.

I don’t think everyone is ready for such candor like Brian says. We should separate our “hearts” from the pitch, the office…. I can only say that NBA players are made of other stuff….