In almost all organisations, the single largest area of cost or expense is associated with people – recruitment costs, onboarding, wages, allowances, bonuses and on-costs (superannuation, leave loading, sick leave, technology etc). There is also the expenditure for training and developing people. This “cost/expense” mindset, particularly when applied to people, sets leaders and managers on a course of cost containment or expense reduction. Their mission is to maximise the gap between revenue and expense to boost profitability (or value derived/delivered in the case of not-for-profit organisations).

Reorienting our thinking in relation to people and viewing them as assets to be invested in rather than simply expenses/costs to be managed offers the opportunity to reap a return on that investment.

Unfortunately, the cost/expense mindset can deliver unforeseen consequences – short-term myopia and “from the hip” action rather than long-term strategic thinking and planning. Instead of investing in the assets that our people represent and reaping the Return On Investment (ROI) in the form of better performance and productivity, the imperative becomes reducing cost or expense by whatever means. This particularly involves reducing people costs to hit a budget target/objective.

A simple reorientation to the asset/investment mindset offers so much more potential for an organisation and its leaders/managers. It provides the opportunity to drive sustainable success, rather than chase short-term, short-sighted glory at the expense of long-term potential.

Viewing each team member as a valuable asset to be invested in and evaluating their current situation is an important starting point. Leaders and managers would be well served reviewing and completing the following checklist of elements of people management that contribute to creating and sustaining the right workplace environment and conditions to maximise performance.

   Position descriptions
Every team member, regardless of role, should have an up-to-date, accurate position description which outlines the expectations of the role, key responsibilities and tasks and, ideally, a clear outline of the High Payo Activities (HPAs), Key Result Areas (KRAs) and Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) of the role.

The team member should have absolute transparency about what is required and expected of them. Position Descriptions should be reviewed at least annually and updated as needed to reflect the changing working environment and ways of working.

  Skills audits/matrices
Identifying the required skills or competencies and then auditing the extent to which each team member has these skills or competencies at the required level, provides the foundation for more strategic training and development planning.

Psychometric testing can also be used to identify individual strengths, weaknesses and work style preferences to tailor training and development initiatives.

  Training and development planning
Armed with a clear picture of the skills landscape across the team, leaders and managers can now eectively plan all training and development initiatives to resolve or close identified gaps for individuals and the team as a whole. As a result, they can equip the team to productively and sustainably undertake their work, improve their productivity and achieve desired outcomes/results.

Remember, training and development experiences vary greatly. Having a clear training and development plan for each team member/role ensures the right investment is made and the best possible return on that investment is achieved.

  Picking the right training and development experience
Central to maximising the return on investment from training and developing people is to implement and monitor the right training and development experience for each team member. There is little to be gained from attempting to “fit a square peg in a round hole” when it comes to training and development initiatives.

To identify the right training and development approaches that work best for the individual, consult and discuss the options with them. This will ensure the investment is targeted and maximally effective to ensure that both the individual and the organisation will gain maximum benefit from the experience.

  Creating the right environment for development
At an overarching level, the wider environment for learning and development should be understood by all. Individual and team training and development initiatives should make sense in the context of the broader organisational, departmental and/or team learning landscape.

Many organisations commit to providing the scaffolding and support for eective learning under which more targeted, individualised activities sit naturally. Aligning the aspirations and needs of all team members to develop a Team Learning Commitment will ensure team members “buy-in” to the learning vision – and the investment pays o in meaningful ways at all levels.

  Creating a continuous improvement culture
As with all investments, periodic monitoring and review and adjustment of position descriptions, skill sets, training and development plans and initiatives are all central to sustaining and optimising the returns achieved. Creating a culture that thrives on continuous improvement will enable people investments to keep delivering demonstrable results and desired returns.

Continuous improvement can come in the form of feedback logs, regular informal check-ins and formal performance and development reviews. Other forms of feedback can also be used to drive continuous improvement. For example, training/development activities implemented can be reviewed to enable appropriate adjustment for future activities to maximise the ROI and benefits to others.

Careful consideration and individualised attention to these aspects of people development will ensure the investment in an organisation’s greatest asset – its people – is well-planned and well-executed. This, in turn,, will ensure appropriately focused people development initiatives that are geared to deliver maximum, sustainable Return On Investment.

The importance and value of systems thinking

A familiar mnemonic is SYSTEMS – Saves You Significant Time, Effort, Money and Stress – a simple reminder that adopting a systematic or systems-thinking approach to any situation or problem will ordinarily yield a successful and sustainable outcome or result.

Systems thinking takes the helicopter pilot view to look at all parts of an overall system rather than isolating them into individual sections (the ground crew view). A systems thinker tries to expand the range of options available for solving a problem with the wider system. There are five key systems-thinking skills successful leaders should seek to develop:

   Understanding and exploring boundaries – knowing what is included in and excluded from a system, who the stakeholders are and what issues concern them.

   Identifying and valuing multiple perspectives – unearthing how and why stakeholders think about and perceive issues in the ways they do.

   Understanding relationships – looking closely at the relationships between components of the system including people, networks, connections and other systems.

   Thinking holistically about systems – viewing the overall/bigger picture and connections before delving into any one part of a system.

    Understanding the sources of waste and reducing/eliminating non-value adding activities – looking for ways to continuously improve resource use and management.

Systems thinking helps drive strategic thinking and prevents a different type of myopia – getting too close to a problem to be able to “see the wood for the trees”. The broader view of a system delivers both better and more sustainable solutions that will contribute to ongoing success.

Key questions to ask when developing systems thinking and adopting the SYSTEMS mindset are:

   System identification – Taking a step or two to see the bigger or fuller picture – what is the system? What are the key components/steps/processes in the system? How do they fit together at the macro level?

   System review – What aspects of the system are working/not working? What is the root cause for system problems? What options exist for resolving the problem? What has been previously tried and worked/not worked? Where are the overlaps and areas of double-handling and areas of potential failure?

   System creation/improvement planning – What options are available? What are the merits/potential downsides of each option? What does success look like? Which option(s) will deliver the desired outcome? Which option(s) are sustainable? Is the improvement plan sufficiently comprehensive and considered?

   Involving the team in improvement initiatives – How can the team be involved early, deeply and completely in identifying system improvement opportunities and development and implementation of solutions? How can the team’s skills in systems thinking be developed and honed? Review key systems with the team as a whole, or with specific team members, to engage and inspire them to drive continuous improvement. A handy Systems Review template is provided for your use.

A systems-thinking or systematic approach to any problem or situation offers the opportunity to identify, review, plan the improvement of, and involve the team in, initiatives that will truly Save You Significant Time, Effort, Money and Stress.

Most people think there are two main sizes of businesses – local small businesses, like your corner café or suburban accounting firm, or large global multinationals, like Microsoft or McDonalds

A fascinating trend has been bubbling away for the last decade, and massively accelerated in the last few years. That is the notion of a “micro-multinational”.

Technology has progressed to a point where you may have five employees, in five different countries. So, you can be a small business and a multinational at the same time.

You can achieve the global access to talent, expanded markets, new suppliers beyond your borders, new ideas and innovation, without needing to be a 10,000-employee business, and without needing a complex corporate governance structure.

There is now an entire ecosystem of tools and technologies that support this trend towards micro-multi-nationals, as well as partner organisations who can enable you to have on-the- ground support in a key country, without you ever needing to even visit that country.

Small businesses routinely struggle due to their constraints of size, and inability to access the talent and resources they need. Large multinationals often struggle under the weight of their own complexity, operating in 100 different countries, with endless duplications of effort, and large clunky systems that are hard to change.

The sweet spot for the 2020s ad beyond will be the agile mid-market growth firm. They might have key offices in Australia, with clients across the UK and USA, and a back office and marketing team in the Phlippines.

All of these postings can and do run off the same cloud systems, all under the same brand, ll collaborating and pushing each other forward to higher levels of performance and sustainability. And all without the bottlenecks of a small business nor the baggage of a big business.

The sweet spot for the new world we find ourselves in…the micro-multinational.

Derek Stewart, BDM at Flat Planet

Success in implementing continuous improvement at…

Australian Dairy Park is a modern manufacturing enterprise specialising in the development and packaging of infant milk powder, functional milk powder and healthy elderly milk powder formulations. As Australia’s most up-to-date dairy manufacturing enterprise, ADP actively promotes “Green, Natural, Safe, Premium-quality” products. Based on customer demands, ADP has worked diligently to develop, manufacture and package a dedicated range of infant formula products and a variety of dairy functional formulations for customers in Australia and overseas.

Since July 2021, Think Perform and LMA have been working with ADP’s production personnel in implementing Lean processes and practices and developing personal and team productivity and leadership with key people. To date, 25 team members have worked with the Think Perform team to identify waste, develop and refine key processes and enshrine standard work at ADP. Ten current and emerging leaders have also completed The Performance Edge (TPE) program with LMA to develop their personal organisational skills and leadership abilities as the organisation implements various improvement projects and initiatives.

The diversity of the workforce involved in the Think Perform and LMA programs has provided an important opportunity for refinement and improvement to our processes to ensure clarity and understanding of key concepts and tools and effective application and implementation to the desired and required standards.

Pictured are some of the graduates of the programs implemented at ADP’s Carrum Downs facility and the key people involved in implementation processes and projects.

Estimates of Return on Investment are still being calculated but benefits are expected to reach hundreds of thousands of dollars and more importantly, be sustainable for years/decades to come. The key focus for all Think Perform and LMA programs in sustaining efforts, processes and results to deliver ongoing benefit – personally, at a team level and for the wider organisation.

Special thanks to Freeman Lewry for his support in coordinating Think Perform’s and LMA’s work on-site with the ADP team.

If you’re interested in hearing more about LMA’s leadership and management programs or Think Perform’s lean-based system and process improvement programs, please contact your LMA/Think Perform representative.

Mistake Number 3 – NOT DEVELOPING STAFF
Consider three scenarios that managers regularly face:

   The need to implement a new system or process
   A change in senior management priorities
   The departure or retirement of key people

What do they have in common? On the face of it, very little. But what unites these scenarios is the need for staff development- building the capacity to deal with organisational change.

The common mistake many managers make is not focusing on staff development. Failing to equip individuals with the skills, knowledge and resources to fulfil their evolving roles can leave even the most successful organisation vulnerable.

More than half the employees in LMA’s regular Leadership, Employment and Direction (L.E.A.D.) Surveys cite training and development opportunities as very or quite important in their decision to stay with an organisation or to consider joining another organisation. Nearly four in five leaders/managers in the same survey regularly indicate their willingness to offer such opportunities to attract or retain people. In the modern workplace, training and development is no longer an option. It’s mandatory for talent management and staff retention.

Yet many managers don’t consider training and development to be important and therefore choose not to invest in it. What are some of the reasons why they do this?

Well, decisions about staff development can be difficult for managers for several reasons including:

   Not seeing the value of development
   Seeing the expenditure as discretionary, not necessary
   Finding it difficult to source the right training activity for their staff’s needs
   Having had a previous bad experience with training – personally, or for their staff; and
   An attitude that there is not enough time available to train staff. Most of us have heard or even said “I can’t afford to have staff off training”.

“Olivia the Over-looker” has recently felt the pain from a lack of staff development. She has a great team that works well together, and with terrific spirit. In fact, they work so well together that she doesn’t want to change anything, even though change is happening all around her. She fears developing some or all of the team might interfere with the team dynamics. But in doing so, she’s overlooking the importance of development for the team and isn’t encouraging individual growth.

So, week in-week out, she lets them continue as they are.

She doesn’t invest in improving their skills… or the development of new leaders within the group. She doesn’t even ask them what training they would like, or feel they need. In time, if she doesn’t act, Olivia may face some serious challenges, or the departure of one or more key people.

So, what are some of the ways that this mistake can be avoided?
One of the first steps is for the manager to truly understand and accept the value of people development. The potential benefits and improvements achieved through developing team members should be discussed with the right training provider. An agreed and measurable return on investment from the development is easy to ascertain by setting clear objectives and measures ahead of the course.

Individual performance reviews should include specific discussion about training and development needs. Opportunities to enhance the individual’s skills and abilities should be explored, and their input and suggestions sought.

Managers who assist their staff to access training and development, who provide them with the encouragement, opportunity and resources needed to grow and develop ensure the long- term sustainability of their team.

Managers like “Olivia the Over-looker” should be actively seeking to develop their team, rather than trying to maintain the status quo. The potential benefits through training and development far outweigh the benefits of trying to ‘cocoon’ them.

Investments in training and development activities return many benefits..to the person being developed, to the manager and to the organisation. It might seem obvious, but development can deliver a sense of renewal and invigoration that pervades the team and the organisation. It offers the opportunity for people to grow and develop in ways that are beneficial for both themselves and for their organisation.

Central to any effective training and development initiative is an element of self-awareness. Through goal-setting activities, personal evaluations, individualised coaching, and through interactive workshops and discussions with other participants, individuals are better able to recognise and act on their development and growth needs.

Individuals can draw enormous benefit from the experience, as they apply their learning to their personal and professional lives. Developing staff is not just a key solution to some of the issues identified, it is one of the cornerstones of effective management.

To quote Henry Ford:
“The only thing worse than training your employees and having them leave, is not training them and having them stay”.