Category: Feature Blog

How Focusing on the Vital Few Helps You Avoid the Seduction of Shiny Objects

Post author By Gregg Dedrick
Post date 01/27/2020

By: Gregg Dedrick, President and Co-Founder of David Novak Leadership

“Just do it!” I bet you’re familiar with this Nike slogan that encourages us to take action. While this can be good advice, I believe it’s important for organizations to adopt a “just don’t do it!” campaign. Why? Because the seduction of shiny objects is constantly tempting you, as a leader, to take on something else, find the silver bullet, and drift away from your True North. And while it’s tempting to “just do it,” what if “just don’t do it” is the right answer?

As I shared in my previous blogs, finding your True North begins with answering three questions. Then, you stay focused on your True North by communicating it to everyone and using it in all your decision making.

The seduction of shiny objects comes into play when there’s a new initiative everyone is excited to implement. It sounds great. People are passionate about its potential. And it’s tempting as a leader to say yes when everyone else thinks it’s a good idea. I know because I was particularly vulnerable to a new initiative that was a shiny object. But what if it’s not a good idea? What if implementing this initiative takes you three degrees off course from who you really are? Over time, you’ll end up far away from your True North.

The Pyramid Slide became our screening tool for shiny objects at KFC. When a new initiative was proposed, we would look at the Pyramid Slide to see where it fit. Then we would ask questions like these about the shiny object:

How does it fit our True North?
How does it fit into the pacing and sequencing of what’s going on to ensure it has the most impact?
How does it propel us towards brand revitalization?
How does it propel us towards brand revitalization?
Is this more important than what we’re already doing?

If we couldn’t answer these questions well, we chose to “just not do it.” The Pyramid Slide helped us determine when we should say yes or no to shiny objects.

At KFC, breakfast sandwiches and adding healthy menu items were all shiny objects for me. It was tempting to say “just do it” when our competition had huge success. Take breakfast, for example. Our competition succeeded with breakfast, and it was tempting to dive in and see how KFC could “just do breakfast” too. But breakfast didn’t fit with our pacing and sequencing, so we chose to “just not do it.” It was tempting to add salads to our menu to provide healthy options for our customers, but we chose to “just not do it” because it didn’t align with our brand positioning.

Your True North must become an endless drumbeat because organizations have short memories and voracious appetites to embrace the seduction of shiny objects. You, as the leader, must find the courage to stay focused on what’s most important, rather than the things that are the newest fad or the things you have a personal interest in. You must have the courage to “just not do it” when everyone else is telling you to give in. You have to keep your team on the path to True North.

You’re now officially ready to implement what you’ve learned by answering the three questions, defining your True North, and avoiding the seduction of shiny objects. Use this guide to create a plan for turning your intentions into action. Having others engaged in your journey is important, so involve them from the beginning. And remember to invite others to help you and hold you accountable as you begin your journey to discover your True North.

Who do you want to invite on your journey to discovering your True North? Share this blog series with them today, and invite them along.

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Three Steps to Increase Employee Engagement

Post author By Gregg Dedrick
Post date 01/06/2020

By: David Novak, Co-Founder & CEO of David Novak Leadership

It’s impossible. I can’t do that. The reason I missed my deadline is because… As a leader, do you get these types of excuses from those on your team? I know it can be frustrating to hear excuses because I’ve heard lots of excuses while leading teams at KFC and Yum! Brands. And while you might be tempted to blame your team for their excuses, I’d like to challenge you to adopt a different mindset when it comes to excuses. Could it be that excuses are rooted in barriers your team needs you, as the leader, to eliminate?

The Power of Eliminating Barriers

When I came into KFC, my goal was to shift the culture to empower our Restaurant General Managers. We knew that having the tools and equipment to do your job increases engagement. We also knew that it was important to equip your team by:

Aligning the team with common goals rather than providing no direction
Noticing the needs of the team and providing resources rather than ignoring needs or assuming all needs are met
Helping the team by eliminating barriers rather than requiring members to fend for themselves

We were passionate about learning how to better equip our managers, so we took action.

Step One: Solicit Feedback from Managers

The first step we took was to solicit feedback from our managers. We wanted to know what resources they needed to be successful and what barriers they faced so we could make changes.

I quickly discovered we were holding the managers accountable for things that were undoable because they didn’t have the tools to do their jobs. The managers described a number of barriers that directly and indirectly hindered their performance, things like:

Too much paperwork
Not enough drive-thru jackets
Not enough labor dollars, which prevented them from covering their shifts

This feedback was eye-opening to the Executive Team and helped us understand that our managers really didn’t have the tools they needed to be successful.

Step Two: Communicate

Step two involved communicating with our managers. We shared our research findings and let them know we not only heard what they said, but we also took action by eliminating barriers. Based on their feedback, we reduced paperwork, provided more drive-thru jackets and increased labor dollars. We also let them know these changes put accountability back in their court and we expected them to achieve better results since the barriers were eliminated.

Step Three: Hold Your Team Accountable

Our decision to give the managers what they needed to do their jobs catapulted performance and morale for those who wanted to be empowered. Our decision was celebrated by some and they embraced receiving resources with accountability.

Not all managers were excited about this change. In fact, the decision to equip the managers exposed those who relied on the barriers to mask their poor performance. We initially experienced substantially higher Restaurant General Manager turnover because those managers who didn’t like the higher goals and accountability quit.

However, long term, the payoff for removing barriers made a positive impact at KFC. We experienced:

Overall higher levels of performance
More engaged and empowered managers
Reduced manager turnover after the initial fallout

Do You Need to Eliminate Barriers?

How often do you hear excuses at work? How often do you make excuses at work? Could it be that you and/or your co-workers don’t have the tools to be successful?

You can uncover barriers to success by taking action. Do your research like I did. Ask questions. Find out what resources are needed and what barriers are keeping your team from achieving results. Then provide the resources and eliminate the barriers while holding your team to higher expectations. Download this guide to learn more about equipping your team by removing barriers.

When you eliminate barriers, you might experience some turnover like we did at KFC, but don’t let that stop you from taking action. As Ben Carson said, “So after a while, if people won’t accept your excuses, you stop looking for them.” You can help your team stop looking for excuses by removing barriers. You can help your team learn to embrace accountability. Are you willing?

Do you know someone who could use help eliminating barriers? If so, pay it forward today and share this blog and guide with them. By sharing this blog and guide, you are equipping them to become a better leader.

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Be Your Best Self

By: Gregg Dedrick, Co-Founder & President of David Novak Leadership

How often have you been encouraged to just be yourself? You get this coaching from others throughout your life and while it sounds good, and could even be considered helpful, it’s often easier said than done. Fear can creep in. You might feel tempted to conform and fit in rather than be true to yourself. You wrestle. I personally believe that in reality, it’s much harder to be yourself than most people are willing to admit.

But I also know that when you hide your best self to be something that you’re not, it can come across as inauthentic. Others often see right through you and you can lose trust in those relationships.

So how do you learn to be your best self when faced with the reality that it can be really difficult?

I’ve focused on being my best self throughout my career. However, I’m not perfect at it. I even learned about the importance of being my best self through an embarrassing lesson at the age of 43 while President of KFC.

My dream job was to become president of a business, and I was excited about making a positive impact on the KFC brand and people working with me. Since the business had been in a state of decline, I had the opportunity to turn it around while incorporating some fun. Note my emphasis on fun…

After a year as president, the business was improving and I wanted to celebrate this accomplishment with the restaurant general managers that made it happen. More than two thousand managers came to Louisville for this celebration. During the planning process, someone from my team pitched the idea to create a video to play on the bus ride from the hotel to our facilities. My role in the video was to welcome the managers to Louisville and share what they could expect in the days ahead.

Insert the fun here: I was cast as the narrator for a David Letterman spoof, complete with an opening monologue and Letterman-style Top Ten List. The problem with this fun approach is I’m terrible at delivering one-liners. And I prefer handwritten notes, not teleprompters. I know this about myself, yet I went along with the plan. Do you think I came across as my best self? Absolutely not! I still cringe when I watch the video and clearly see how I wasn’t my best self at all. I was stiff, when I’m usually informal. It was evident that I was reading off the teleprompter, which is not how I deliver the best speeches. The only saving grace of the video was when I ditched the script, put on a pair of feathery chicken feet, and did what I naturally do best: I walked through the KFC Headquarters talking to whoever I met along the way about everything from the history of Colonel Sanders to what we do in our research kitchen.

This lesson in being your best self became part of my leadership program. I show the bus video (although sometimes I leave the room because I can’t bear to watch it!), to emphasize how easy it is to tell when someone isn’t being themselves.

While it’s important to be your best self, I must highlight this caveat: As a leader, being your best self does NOT give you permission to treat everyone with a take me as I am or leave mindset. Instead, you have to figure out a way to be true to yourself while broadening your appeal and impact rather than turning people off or unnecessarily clashing with company culture. You engage with all kinds of people as a leader. Consider how you can be yourself while respecting the unique approaches of others too.

Do you lead while being your best self? Do you have a story like mine where you weren’t your best self and it showed? Answer these questions to help you understand how often you lead as your best self:

When have you struggled with being your best self?
Do you tend to conform based on what others want, or do you tend to stay true to yourself? Explain your answer.
What keeps you from being your best self?

Download this guide to dig deeper into how you can become your best self. Let’s unite around the power of being our best selves as we lead others to become their best selves because as Leo Buscaglia says: The easiest thing in the world to be is you. The most difficult thing to be is what other people want you to be. Don’t let them put you in that position.”

Do you know someone who might find these tips on being your best self helpful? Then pay it forward by sharing this blog and guide with them today. You never know how the simple act of sharing leadership tips with others can inspire them to become a better leader.

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Why Great Leaders Need Truth Tellers

Post author By Gregg Dedrick
Post date 08/29/2017
1 Comment on Why Great Leaders Need Truth Tellers

Were your antennae clipped at birth? This is not your typical leadership question, but let’s consider how helpful this question can be. Antennae provide sensory information to insects which helps them better understand their environment. While humans don’t have actual antennae, we use environmental clues to discover how we are perceived by others. Yet not everyone’s antennae work perfectly, and some seem to have had their antennae clipped at birth. Research refers to this as lacking emotional intelligence, but I’ve found that asking if your antennae were clipped gets people’s attention a lot better!

When serving as the Head of Human Resources at Yum! Brands, I frequently got to help people who were stuck in their growth and performance. Have you ever worked with someone who seemed completely unaware of how their attitude and actions impacted others? Me too – and those are the people I describe as having their antennae clipped at birth. For example, consider the person who talks too much in meetings and constantly interrupts others, yet her behavior doesn’t change. Others dread going to meetings and don’t feel heard because she talks all the time. Because her antennae are clipped, she doesn’t realize how her behavior negatively impacts the team. The truth is, some people don’t have antennae to help them navigate their relationships.

We all have blind spots in our lives, even if our antennae work properly. The key to uncovering our blind spots is giving people permission to give us feedback. When we invite people to serve as truth tellers in our lives, we learn and grow. If we don’t have a few truth tellers, we run the risk of staying stuck with behaviors that are ineffective, and possibly destructive, to our success.

I know from personal experience that asking for feedback can be hard because you might be surprised by what you hear. When I was Head of Human Resources at KFC, I was introduced to a feedback exercise and decided to try it out with the Executive Team. We had one minute to complete two statements about each Executive Team Member in a round robin format:

What I appreciate about you
How you can be more effective

I got more feedback from these two questions than I received in an entire year! Some of it was encouraging, some of it was helpful, and one particular piece of feedback was shocking. During this exercise, I found out that one of my peers thought I was going over his head to send him messages. This information shocked me because that was not my intent. Because my relationship with this peer was important to me, I took action to repair our relationship. We started having regular lunch meetings where I shared what was going on and what I was thinking. And over time, we developed a productive relationship because he shared feedback with me and I took action to make changes.

The Executive Team Round Robin opened my eyes to how powerful this feedback tool can be. And once I understood the power of receiving feedback, I recruited a few people to become my truth tellers. I regularly asked them to give me straight feedback, and they agreed to be honest. Seeking out feedback has helped me become a better leader in both my personal and professional life.

Ken Blanchard coined the phrase, – Feedback is the breakfast of champions. I’m a firm believer in the

truth of this phrase. It’s a simple way to remind you that you need to invite people to give you feedback daily, just like you eat breakfast each day. Both breakfast and regular feedback helps you become more

productive.

Were your antennae clipped at birth? Maybe not, but we can all use a few truth tellers in our lives. Who can you invite to be your truth tellers? Once you identify them, use this feedback tool to start the conversation. And remember to seek out that feedback regularly! Building discipline around asking for feedback can help you become a better leader. Who will you ask for feedback today? Download the Truth Tellers Feedback Exercise to help you get started.

David Novak Leadership is all about investing in you and helping you become the best leader you can be. And we invite you to pay it forward by sharing this blog and the feedback tool with others. Who can you share this with today?

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From Trailer Park to Corner Office: How My Past Impacts My Present

Post author By David Novak
Post date 07/18/2017
3 Comments on From Trailer Park to Corner Office: How My Past Impacts My Present

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By: David Novak, Co-Founder & CEO of David Novak Leadership

What do you want to be when you grow up? People are asked this question all the time, especially when they are young. Did you know that only 30% of global workers work in the field of their childhood dream job?¹

I have to confess that I did not end up working in the field of my childhood dream job. When I was growing up, I wanted to be a Major League Baseball player before the reality set in that I couldn’t hit a curve ball. At one time, I saw myself as a sports writer.

Because my dad worked for the U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey, marking latitudes and longitudes for the nation’s mapmakers, we moved every three months from small town to small town. I actually lived in 23 states by the time I was in seventh grade! My dad would hook up our trailer to his government truck and we would move to the next town. We literally took our neighborhood with us as the rest of the surveyors and their families moved together. The largest house I lived in until junior high was 8-foot-wide by 40-foot long. I always tell people I succeeded because of my upbringing, not in spite of it. (This is important to me.) The biggest break I got was having loving parents who wanted me to achieve the American dream.

Who would think that a kid from the trailer parks, whose childhood can best be described as nomadic, would ever have a chance at becoming the CEO of Yum! Brands at the age of 46? Certainly I wouldn’t have. Yet the lessons I learned from my trailer park days actually helped me become a successful CEO. Let me share one particular example about how my past impacts my present.

My dad has always been tremendously supportive, and he worked his tail off to give us a better life. But in many ways my mother was my first mentor. Every time we got to a new place, she would take me to the local school to get me registered and then say to me, “Look, David, you’ve got to take the initiative to make friends. Don’t hang back and wait for the other kids to come to you. We’re only going to be here for a few months, so make them count.”

That’s how I learned how to size people up in a hurry and how to figure out quickly who the good ones were and who I should avoid. As a result, when it comes to assessing people I’ve got a good gut instinct that I still listen to whenever I meet someone new (which, when you’re CEO, is practically all the time) or have to decide whether to hire or promote someone.

Fast forward… Soon after becoming CEO of Yum! Brands, I went to my first meeting of the Business Council. Its members are one hundred twenty-five of the top CEOs in the country, and I was meeting these captains of the industry for the first time. They are the people who run General Electric, Boeing, and General Motors, and they had no idea who I was. It wasn’t all that different from the first day at a new school. I quickly sized everyone up and, remembering that they all put their pants on the same way every morning, worked my way around the room. If it hadn’t been for those early school experiences, I’m not sure this would have come so naturally to me in my later life.

But I’m not the only one with a humble beginning who ended up in a corner office. Brian Cornell, the Chairman and CEO of Target Brands, also had a humble upbringing with many challenges. But he learned from these challenges and now uses what he learned from his early years to lead many as the CEO of Target. I recently interviewed Brian as part of our biweekly Podcasts. Here’s what he shared.

I grew up in a really humble environment. I lost my dad when I was young and my mom had a series of illnesses, so I had to grow up the hard way. I worked for many years as a little kid – mowing lawns, shoveling snow, and washing trucks. So if you look back in time, when I was a kid, you would say there’s no chance that this person, growing up in this kind of environment, ends up doing what he’s doing.

I learned early in life that there’s only three ways that I could put my economic circumstances aside and just move forward:

In school, because when the test is handed out, nobody cared who my dad was or how much money I had.

In sports on the playing field because there, the playing field was level.

At work, because once you showed up, it was all about performance and execution and doing the things that were put in front of you.

I embraced the level playing field idea early. I didn’t feel sorry for myself. I said I’m gonna perform, excel, and take advantage of opportunities. And somehow it all worked out. It wasn’t some magical path. I didn’t grow up in a CEO’s household. I had to work for literally everything I had by finding part-time jobs so I had money baseball cleats and football equipment. But it all worked out because I found what worked for me.

And I was really fortunate to have great mentors and leaders and people who just cared, like my grandparents who raised me. My grandfather was an engineer and he taught me about hard work, great values and the importance of a great attitude. My grandmother was really focused on education, and she talked about working hard in school, learning, and what that was going to bring to me. But most importantly, my grandparents were two individuals who really cared. They showed me how important it was to have people who cared for you – to give you advice and sometimes to give you tough love.

Brian learned how to work hard and care about people from his humble upbringing and he uses that today in his role as Chairman and CEO of Target.

Walt Disney puts a positive spin on the ways adversity from your past can have a positive impact on your future. “All the adversity I’ve had in my life, all my troubles and obstacles, have strengthened me… You may not realize it when it happens, but a kick in the teeth may be the best thing in the world for you.”

What about you? How does your upbringing or the adversities from your past impact the way you lead today? Download this guide to find out! It provides some questions to help you evaluate your past so you can better understand why you lead the way you do today. Your past can be a powerful tool if you’re willing to revisit it and learn from it. Are you willing?

Maybe you know someone who has a challenging past. Would they be inspired by what you just read? Pay it forward today by sharing this blog and guide with them. By showing you care, you may inspire them to become a better leader. Go Lead!

¹https://qz.com/29058/workers-outside-the-us-are-more-likely-to-pursue-their-dream-jobs/