One of my favorite times at 1-800 Contacts came back in 2016 when I was trying new things all the time. I had been managing teams for several years but wanted to improve my skillset in leadership and learn from those who I saw as potential mentors. I was seeing possibilities in myself and my team that I hadn't before. I saw potential for our IT department to increase in learning, development, and personal growth. I had a vision. I saw parts and pieces of a bigger whole I hadn't seen before. I wanted to learn more and help others to learn what I was learning. My best days at work come when I grow and get to facilitate that same growth in other individuals and groups.
The Driving Force
The previous year, there were weeks of frustration and stale direction that occasionally saw me listening to recruiter calls on bad days. I knew I was struggling to find direction, trying to make positive changes, and facilitating growth in myself, my team, and the department. I reached out to past mentors and received a lot of energy, hearing potential ideas and encouragement how I could make a difference.
How It Started
A friend and mentor at work recommended I look into the Associate Development Program that was being run for our call center and compliance departments. The purpose of the ADP was to help teach, train, and promote individual contributors into potentially future leaders of teams, the department, and the company. As a manager in IT, I saw the potential in creating a similar program in our department. I was frustrated by some simple behavioral squabbles and individuals lacking (me being one of them) soft-skills that hampered the progress of the department. I was also struggling to see how to help managers improve their skills as leaders and focus on their most important impact to the company: our people. I met with the organizer and planner of ADP (Miles) who was leaving for a new job at the end of the week. Miles gave me hundreds of articles and session plans that he had found useful for ADP, gave some words of wisdom, and with that, he was gone.
The Plan Emerged
For the past few years, I’ve been meeting with key leaders in the company to see where they perceived opportunities for growth in the department. Once I had a baseline, certain themes started to emerge, and I organized plans around the most prevalent opportunities for growth. I found those who were either looking for personal growth themselves or were skilled in the behavior I was hoping to permeate in the department and asked them to present in our Manager Development Program. I was reading articles daily from Miles’ store of ADP material and including them in our monthly trainings. I was trying to improve myself while preparing training for the other managers.
The First Setback
I thought that everyone attending MDP would thrive learning from the presenters and material presented, but I began to be impatient. It felt like in the trainings, many found a lot of benefit from learning from leaders I had brought in to present who had experienced and lived these skills, but it didn’t seem to affect some to change. I realized if some managers weren’t seeing the potential in increasing their leadership skills, I could start IT on the path to its own ADP. If individuals were sharing the leadership material with their teams, it would strongly encourage their managers to improve quickly to meet the demand. I would facilitate training to what they could expect from great managers and one day set them up for success as future leaders of the company. It seemed the greatest way to help see the need for change was to help their team see the potential in themselves and their manager.
Finding the Sweet Spot
To test out my plan for ADP, my first thought was to bring in the entry-level managers and test out the material on them. There is nothing like those who realize they are not finished products. They saw this as an opportunity for growth and wanted to improve themselves and their teams. Early in the process I watched and rewatched
The Power of Not Knowing by Liz Wiseman. This drove me to facilitate these trainings despite the fact that I was just learning the material I was asking others to present. I realized quickly that as much as I was passionate about learning these concepts, nothing would change if these managers didn’t learn from those they already trusted or saw as recognized leaders in the organization.
Early Successes
It was so exhilarating to help existing leaders improve as they prepared to present. I loved sitting in on the training and learn myself from the powerful examples of experienced leaders. One day after an especially powerful presentation on
Radical Candor, you could hear Kim Scott’s voice as you walked through the department later that afternoon as leaders were sharing the video with their teams and discussing it.
I’ll never forget the buzz in the room when our CEO, John Graham, came to present on motivational tactics. The vision into his soul was powerful as he discussed self-awareness, empathy, and building and leading teams. Seeing so many different leaders, styles, and ways each leader had used their strength to further their potential was awe inspiring.
Where Are We Now?
I won’t pretend that the process was smooth or that it is a well-oiled machine today. With more personal responsibilities and more opportunities to lead one by one, I’ve found help to run the ADP program and continue to get feedback on how to keep the content and growth of our MDP program fresh. I love finding individuals with potential that I can help mentor and support individually and hope to continue making a difference. Continuing to get surveys from ADP, MDP, and those who aren't regularly attending has helped add additional perspectives on what is important to the group.
Great Places to Start
Several of the ideas that came for ADP and MDP were initially found through the daily email feed at
Harvard Business Review. There we many ideas and great discussions on how our company, culture, and people could address such issues as Exercising Influence and Leadership in Crisis.
