Profile of the Month Lumus 360 Feedback

An interview with David Cooper of Lumus™ 360

Established in 1999, Lumus are one of the UK’s leading suppliers of 360 Degree Feedback tools to trainers/ consultants and organisations. They specialise in providing fully managed online 360 degree feedback tools for individuals, medium and large organisations and development consultants.

About Lumus™

Carolyn (The Complete Trainer Ltd): Tell me a little about your company.

David: I’ve been with the company since we started. What is important to me, and to our clients, is that rather than being just a straightforward 360 service provider, our aim is to take the hassle out of designing, developing and delivering 360 degree feedback surveys. We also help with the strategic, project management and support to assist in implementation so that the surveys aren’t just done and forgotten, they become part of the organisation’s development framework.

Carolyn: What sort of clients use 360 feedback surveys? Is it just huge companies who use it to support manager development?

David: No, A good 360 feedback process works in any organisation. We have the privilege of managing feedback surveys for medium and larger organisations such as Dyson, Muller, DeBeers Diamonds, Greggs the bakers, Total, Local Authorities and NHS Trusts etc. We also provide bespoke 360 surveys to consultants/ trainers in support of manager and leadership development programmes/ interventions that they are delivering for their clients. When we work with a client, it’s not just sending them a link to a totally automated system (though that is part of it); it is about developing the relationship and making the 360 really count for something.
Carolyn: Where are you based and where do you tend to work mostly?

David: We’re based in Chepstow, South Wales but, because our products/ service are internet based - our clients come from all across the UK and Europe – we even have a client in Japan!
Carolyn: I’ve visited Chepstow, a lovely town and of course you have access to a great motorway network. Anyway, there are quite a few 360 providers out there (and indeed I know a few quite well), what do you think makes you stand out above the rest?

David: I would say, four key things:

 Our team: Unlike many of our competitors, we are not just IT/ systems experts. The team comprises a web designer, technical programmer, data analyst/ report specialist, permanently dedicated administrative support and several OD consultants who provide a broad range of strategic and project management implementation support. This great mix of people ensures that we provide technical excellence and the consultancy and administrative support demanded by HR professionals and consultants.

 The Lumus engine: all of our surveys are powered from an online web application that was specifically designed for the management of online 360 surveys. It’s fully automated and guarantees accurate, fast and confidential results. The system's built-in quality control mechanisms also ensures we get things right, first time

 Customisation: No two organisations (or consultants) that we’ve ever worked with want the same thing – our platform lets us easily customise the number of questions, rating scale type, user interfaces, reports, email message content etc

 The service: I know everyone would say this, but in our case, we really do ‘go the extra mile’ for our clients and always strive to provide an outstanding start to end service – we also provide briefing packs/ slide sets, internal communication plans, feedback coaching resources etc all for FREE

Carolyn: 360 Degree feedback is now well established and of acknowledged benefit – how do you see it further developing in the future?

David: For me, the future is not so much about technical process advances, but how the feedback collected can be better used – some of the projects we are working on include:

 360 multi-level feedback surveys – we’re currently working on an innovative multi-level 360 feedback tool, specifically designed to underpin the development and deployment of senior talent within larger organisations. This alternative report approach differs from traditional feedback reports in that it provides feedback on each management competency area at four levels of performance, allowing people to get a clear picture of how they are doing on a sliding scale from mediocre to exceptional performance

 Group summary reports – Using the feedback from a group of managers to produce TNA type reports - identifying population strengths and assessing group development needs which can subsequently be fed into management development programmes / strategies etc

 360 team surveys – Just as an individual 360 provides a snapshot of how the participant is seen by those they work with, we’re now developing a team 360 feedback report based on how team members rate the team, against those skills needed for successful team working and functioning

 Managers’ summary reports - This unique approach provides line managers with the headline news needed to start a meaningful action planning conversation, without them having to plough through 40 pages of data

 180 degree training course workbook - As trainers and developers we all recognise that the pre - and post-course discussions between a course participant and their line manager are crucial in the process of making training stick and ensuring a real return on investment. These pre-course reports combine feedback from the line manager and course participant and are designed to facilitated those conversations and ensure participants start their course with a clear set of development objectives

Products/Links:

Here’s some tailored 360 degree feedback surveys we developed specifically for the Complete Trainer: http://www.completetrainer.co.uk/360_Degree_Feedback

You can find out more about our bespoke solutions on our website: http://www.lumus.co.uk/

and we also recommend that you research and understand 360 before embarking on a feedback process, so we’ve set up this site which gives unbiased information: http://www.everything360.org/

Testimonials

Lumus designed an excellent 360 instrument that provided feedback on a range of critical leadership behaviours which enabled the team to significantly improve both their personal capability and their desire and ability to help and support each other. Considerable and valuable help and support was provided throughout the project and I look forward to future opportunities to work with the Lumus team.

Peter Underwood - Training Consultant

Lumus continue to provide Greggs of Treforest with a flexible, adaptable and tailored approach that meets the changing needs of our business. They do what they say they will do, on time with no fuss.

John Eagle, Greggs

Contact

To contact David Cooper at Lumus, please visit the website http://www.lumus.co.uk/ or email davidooper@lumus.co.uk

The 7 Lies of Limiting Leadership

by Ian A Williams

Too many people fall short of their potential in the leadership game, and also fail to enable or enhance the leadership of others. Ian Williams provides an interesting insight into some of the barriers to great leadership. In this issue, Ian shares with us his belief about some of the common lies about leadership, and in the next issue we follow this up with his account of the seven truths.

My passion for good leadership often leads me to observe and reflect on what happens in the workplace for individuals and teams. I listen out for comments and frustrations, and have concluded that there are some common misunderstandings about leadership issues, which I have summarised as the seven lies of leadership.

1. I'm not a leader
The person who thinks they are not a leader is in denial, and has missed the point about leadership. Everyone is leading someone - whether or not they know it, recognise it or want it. Even if we are on the same level, we lead our colleagues in some respects. We may lead projects, team tasks, or even a staff outing! We also lead our children and others among our families and friends. At the very least, we leave ourselves - or at least we should! Our only limit on personal leadership is what we put in place for ourselves, or how we allow others to limit us.

2. They (or I) have been trained
The magic land of training is where organisations send people for a few days, and expect them to come back as leaders. A whole host of courses and events, or any kind of qualification, doesn't make a leader. Training and development will inspire people, inform them, give them practice, provide experiential learning, build confidence, build competence and skills - but all of this will not produce a leader. Too often I go into organisations, and they struggle to understand why their trained leaders are not leading effectively, despite the huge investment made. No human being can be fully trained in leadership, because it comes from within, and needs to be drawn out by line managers and others who are willing to coach people and give them the space to lead. As part of one-to-one coaching, they build experience and confidence and nurture the leader.

3. There's a personality clash
This is one of the most wonderful leadership cop outs. While personalities do clash to some extent, and ‘problem people’ do exist, the challenge is to deal with it, rather than use it as an excuse for effective leadership. Leaders are accountable for their own relationships, and the relationships around them. They need to rise to that challenge and find strategies for having people work together. Too much time and money is wasted in avoidance, and in living with the consequences of poor relationships. Get people focused back on the goals, find specific reasons to their difficulties, and facilitate finding and implementing the solutions. If necessary get some help, but making work, rather than listen to excuses.

4. They won't step up
This is often the concern of senior managers who feel that either their people will not step up to lead, or that they fail to step up to strategic leadership from operational. The key to this one is identifying the blocks. Is it a question of won't or can't? Are they willing? Are they capable? Are they confident? In my experience the ‘won't’ part of this question is the lie. If the block is about skills, abilities, and/or confidence, it falls back on the senior leader to coach. Sometimes, it's a case of making clear to people what you see as strategic versus operational. Ironically, the most common cause for people not stepping up is senior people holding them down. They too often hold on to strategic issues for themselves, tell people what the decision is, and then wonder why everyone is frustrated! If you want to grow strategic leaders, involve them in strategic leadership.

5. Not a people person
How does anyone walk the earth and deny being a people person. People are everywhere, and we can't avoid them. And if we want to get anywhere with anyone, getting along with people isn't a luxury but a necessity. So unless you're a hermit, or you’re in denial of your leadership role, you have to get on with people. You have to employ others who do this too. If someone is described as not a people person, they need to be given the feedback and required to do something about it, in order to lead themselves and other people. The key here is identifying the specific behaviour that causes the person to think this of themselves, or for it to be attributed to them. Then they need to do some self coaching will be coached. There are three aspects to balanced leadership: task, team and individual. If the leader is not a people person, they are missing two-thirds of their job; so in fact, they are not a leader but a person who just does jobs.

6. It's not my style
We read about and experience all sorts of leadership styles. There is no right or wrong, they are just different. Any leadership style becomes inappropriate if it is used in the wrong way, in the wrong circumstances, or at the wrong time. That is of course the essence of situational leadership. An effective leader is able to use a range of styles appropriately. They fool themselves, and everyone else suffers, when they are attached to one favourite style, come what may. You will have met the constant bully, the habitual delegator, and the absentee. Adopting just one style is simply me centred, and the leader has to listen, learn and adjust if they are to motivate people and achieve tasks. They need to model a range of styles, so that others are learning from how they operate practically. After all, what is at stake if you have a leader who is not leading effectively?

7. Know it all, done it all
We’ve all met the magic leaders who have made it! We had better sit and listen to them, and sit back while they either do it themselves or give the orders! Who are they fooling with this lie? Individuals and teams are always different. Situations, resources, tasks and circumstances are always different. No season is the same; there is no constancy but there is always change. We all bring our experience and knowledge, we bring the benefit of wisdom, but we still need a refreshing quantity and quality of ideas, and the excitement of discovering something new together. It’s this sense of contribution to creativity and synergy that keeps people engaged. No one has the monopoly on knowledge, wisdom, ideas and solutions. The know-it-all leader is living a lie and fools no one but themselves. Don't stand for their robbery.


I hope that some of these resonate with your own experience, and that you have found some ways to overcome the lies, and to stand up for the truths. Let’s stop kidding ourselves with all the hype about leadership, and get some of the simple things sorted out for ourselves and those we influence!

Ian A Williams is an author, speaker and facilitator in leadership development,
and a representative for Professor John Adair.
http://www.kairology.com/ ©Kairos Development Ltd. 2009 – All rights reserved. Reproduced by kind permission.

UK HR Update

Equal Pay Considerations

According to research done by The Fawcett Society is the UK’s leading campaign for equality between women and men 85% of the public are in support of equal pay audits. Their website provides the following gruesome statistics:

• 30,000 women lose their jobs in the UK each year simply because they are pregnant
• Only 11% of FTSE 100 company directors are women
• Nearly 1 in 5 women who work in London earn less than the London Living Wage.
• Women in London earn 23% less than their male counterparts

Fewer than one in five (18%) of private companies measure their gender pay gaps, according to other research produced today by IPSOS Mori for CIPD/KPMG. Even in the public sector, where equal pay monitoring is a statutory requirement, the study finds only 43% complete audits, with many of these described as "ticking the bureaucratic box rather than as part of an underlying effort to advance gender equality. Under the provisions of the Equality Bill - due to be passed early next year - the government is considering forcing companies with more than 250 staff to report their gender pay gaps by 2013 if too few of them are doing it voluntarily.

Companies should investigate pay structures from the perspective of fairness and equality whether or not legislation is introduced. Leading businesses will examine their pay gaps not because of government, but because they understand the impact to their reputation and possible legal damage of not getting it right.
Companies who wish to gauge how vulnerable they are to an equal pay claim should ask the following:

1. Is equal pay a consideration in your company's HR policy?
2. Does your HR team understand the implications of current and future equal pay legislation?
3. Is equality of pay embedded in the recruitment, retention and engagement policies of your company, including monitoring starting salaries by gender?
4. Does your executive leadership understand and sponsor the concept and implications of equal pay?
5. Do your managers understand the concept and implications of equal pay?
6. Does your company have a job evaluation scheme?
7. Does your company believe that the job evaluation scheme can manage the issue of equal pay in your company?
8. Does your company provide guidelines to help managers in performance management discussions and in the allocation of pay increase and bonus awards?
9. If challenged, would your company be able to justify gaps in base pay and annual bonus between a male employee and a female employee who have the same role and responsibilities?
10. Does your company have a process to deal with an equal pay claim?

If the answer is no to any of these then an organization should take urgent action to address the issues or face the possible consequences of a lengthy and costly tribunal claim.

Rule Changes on Medical Reports Allows Employees’ Veto

Employers could find it harder to obtain independent medical assessments for employees with health problems following new guidance from the General Medical Council regarding confidentiality issues. The guidance, which took effect on 12 October 2009, places doctors under enhanced duties when acting as independent medical advisers preparing reports for employment purposes. The guidance, which applies to all doctors states that they must:

 be satisfied that the employee is fully informed of the purposes and likely results of disclosing a report to the employer;
 point out that relevant information cannot be concealed or withheld;
 disclose only facts that are relevant to the employer’s request;
 offer to show the employee any report on their condition before it is sent;
 obtain the employee’s written consent before passing on the report.

Those who have actually treated the employees concerned are also subject to the provisions of the Access to Medical Reports Act 1988. While independent or occupational health doctors who haven’t treated the employees aren’t covered by this act, they can no longer supply medical reports to employers without following the above steps. The guidance has been designed to increase trust between doctors and patients, and to prevent the unnecessary disclosure of personal details. Under the previous rules, independent or occupational health doctors not involved in treating the employee concerned could give the employer a report without running it past the individual first. The guidance does not oblige employers to change how they seek medical opinions. It is now, however, even more important that employers set out clearly in writing the issues they are seeking advice on. Then doctors will have more clarity on the relevant information they need to provide. Employees, then, are more likely to consent,however, the introduction of a sign-off procedure means that employers could face delays in receiving reports, which could in turn prolong the absence management process.

The guidance does not give employees the right to amend reports, but it’s likely that most doctors will be willing to correct factual inaccuracies. It is less clear whether employees will ask doctors to alter reports in more subtle ways. Doctors have been advised that it is unacceptable to make changes under pressure from either employees or employers. If consent is withheld the report cannot be disclosed. This change may have unintended and unwelcome consequences for employers and employees. Employers disputing medical information received, for example, from GPs, may face difficulties obtaining independent medical opinions now employees can refuse disclosure. Organisations with limited medical information will be less able to implement reasonable adjustments and may be more likely to dismiss employees for ill health.
How to Manage a Re-structure – 5 top tips!

1. Identify the main objectives for your business re-structure and plan the most appropriate people structure to make your business more effective.
2. Identify which key skills you wish to retain in the new structure and ring-fence key individuals to particular posts; if they only have 70% of the skills required develop a skills development plan for each.
3. Recruit to the remaining posts either from within (first) and then outside the business.
4. Identify which individuals are not required within the new structure as they do not have the new skills required and set a redundancy management programme in place bearing in mind consultation and dismissal legal requirements.
5. Manage performance of the individuals in the new structure carefully and develop training and development plans as appropriate to ensure business success.

If you need support with a re-structure contact Sandra Beale on 07762 771290 or visit her website at http://www.sjbealehrconsult.co.uk

Book Review - Psychology for Trainers

Psychology for Trainers (E-book)

by Alison Hardingham

When I was first asked to review this e-book I must admit my heart sank as I have not hitherto been a fan of e-books. However – this e-book is quite different from others I have read. It is well laid out with good spacing and a clear and readable font. The graphics are clear and easy to read and one is not faced with a massive block of text to attempt to read and digest on screen.

So much for visual appeal. What about content?

As a coach who does training (or should that be a trainer who does coaching?) I have always been interested in the psychology of training so I was particularly interested to hear what Alison had to say on the subject.

As one might expect the book starts with building rapport and establishing credibility and then moves on through getting information across; gaining commitment to change; managing the group; counselling the individual; handling conflict, facilitating the transfer of learning and ending on surviving as a trainer.

Alison certainly practises what she preaches as she uses a wide range of communication techniques to expound and illustrate her points. There are questionnaires; diagrams; personal anecdotes all designed to catch and maintain the reader's interest while informing in a highly effective and clear way. There is something to suit pretty much everyone's learning preference Again the layout of the e-book contributes to the ability of the reader to take in and retain information. At the end of each chapter is an 'In Brief' section summing up what has gone before.

Whether you are at the beginning of your career as a trainer (or indeed as a coach) or have may years of experience in either field I am sure you will find this book of interest and use. In fact, far from avoiding e-books, I now have this one downloaded on my desktop as it is fast becoming my 'go to' book of reference every time I start designing a new training workshop or take on a new client. I heartily recommend this book!

Rating 5 out of 5

Angela Lawrence
The Cinnamon Coach
Isle of Man
angiecoach@manx.net

An international perspective on leadership

I recently interviewed Chris Fox from Canning International for our Profile of the Month. One of the subjects we discussed which I thought worth separating out, was Chris's comments on leadership. I asked him whether he thought that the current trend for leadership training is just a 'fad':

"I’m not sure it’s a fad, no. But I think there is a tendency for companies to want to pack their workforce full of ‘leaders’ without having any sense of what they really mean. Of course, a handful of inspirational leaders at the top of an organisation can make a huge difference to morale, strategy and direction. But does the team leader of a research desk, or the project manager of a data warehousing project really need to be a ‘leader’ in the same sense? Of course, training companies are falling over themselves to put together lengthy PowerPoint presentations and brainstorming workshops in order to respond to the demand that is out there for these courses, and who can blame them? There’s certainly money in it.

"We’ve heard of clients ‘rolling out a leadership programme throughout the organisation’. Invariably this simply means that a score or more people will be sitting in a meeting room watching a presentation about decision making, strategic precision and disseminating the vision, before going back to their everyday jobs processing orders or checking the wording of a contract. And the next day twenty more will turn up to witness the same thing. And so on, until everyone has taken part in ‘the leadership workshop’, from the post room to the boardroom. It’s not going to produce leaders, and it doesn’t respond to the needs of the people in the room. We run plenty of courses under the ‘leadership’ banner, but they are generally for companies we know well, and with whom we have been able to have honest, candid discussions about what they really mean. Much of the time they simply want project managers without line management responsibility to be able to exercise influence above their level of hierarchical authority. Or they want line managers, promoted thanks to their technical skills rather than their management abilities, to be able to communicate their own vision to their department or team and get them moving in the same direction. Sometimes it is simply that not enough people with management responsibility in the organisation are able to motivate their teams to do what they want them to do.

"This kind of leadership training can be excellent: a small group of people practising the persuasive, communicative or motivational skills needed to get people to ‘play the game’ and follow their vision. But it doesn’t need to be accompanied by distilled academic texts or statistical surveys. If people need to lead, on a grand or a small scale, it seems clear to us that you simply recreate the situation in which they need to exercise that leadership, get them to rehearse that situation, and offer honest feedback, based on a clear set of well refined principles, that will help them perform better next time they’re in a comparable situation. Funnily enough, we have seen the same thing with cross-cultural training. For years we were competing with ‘inter-cultural briefings’, where a ‘country expert’ would deliver an extended PowerPoint presentation on ‘China’ or ‘Japan’ or ‘The Middle East’, passing on political, social and etiquette information to managers intending to operate in that cultural context. We have never got involved in this kind of training, and have always had to defend our own approach against those wanting the lengthy lectures on etiquette.

"Predictably, our culture-specific training is performance based, and focuses on working with Japanese/Chinese/American etc partners. Anyway, it is now pretty clear that the etiquette lectures are dying a death, while our working with… courses have never been more popular. I daresay the same thing will happen with Leadership – eventually people realise that they need to be better at something rather than know more about it. Some clients are much further ahead on that particular curve than others."

Chris Fox is a Director of Canning International Training and Development

About Canning

Canning offers a range of training, information on which can be easily accessed through our website. Simply choose whether you are interested in: Skills, Culture, Teams or Language, and click through to the information you need. More background on the company, its employees, and our additional consultancy services can be found via the menu along the top. http://www.canning.com/

To read my full interview with, visit the Complete Trainer website.

Three Interviewing Mistakes

Three Interviewing Mistakes – And How To Avoid Them By Mike Brooks

As the economy slowly recovers, companies are beginning to expand and hire sales reps again. If you’re looking for a job, or looking to change jobs, no doubt you will be sending your resume out, talking to hiring managers, and, if you’re lucky enough to get picked, even going on interviews.

Over the years, I’ve looked at thousands of resumes and interviewed thousands of sales reps. In fact, right now, I’m recruiting for several companies, and I’m amazed by how sales reps keep making basic, horrible mistakes that often times immediately disqualify them for any chance at landing a position. Often times, these mistakes even prevent them from getting an interview!

Here are the 3 worst interviewing mistakes sales reps are making, and what you can do to avoid them:

#1) Filling your resume with every job you’ve worked at for the last 10 years. The first mistake sales reps make – and that hiring managers look for first – is listing five to seven jobs (or more!) on their resume within an eight to ten year time frame.

Nothing will disqualify you faster than a history of job hopping, or a history of staying at jobs for less than a year. (One resume I saw last week listed 3 jobs this year alone!)

Obviously, the reason this is a red flag for companies is that they see themselves investing thousands of dollars hiring and training you only to think that their company will be the next one on your resume.

The Solution: Omit jobs you’ve stayed at less than a year, and never list more than four jobs in a ten year period (it’s better to have only three).

You can disclose other positions once you move forward during the interview process – in person – after you’ve earned a change to wow them with your personality, experience, and obvious qualifications for the job.

#2) Talking for too long when asked a question. Whenever a hiring manager calls you and begins asking questions, make sure your answers are direct and short. You’d be amazed at how so many sales reps will go on and on and on…..

What the hiring manager is thinking is that you are a sales rep who will talk past the close, never listen to your prospects, and never close any business. “No wonder they’re looking for a job,” frequently goes through my mind…

The Solution: Listen carefully to what you’re being asked, think about how to answer it directly, then answer it and shut up! This one technique will separate you from 80% of the sales reps interviewing for the same position.

#3) Don’t interview or interrogate the hiring manager. I know that you have questions about the job, and you should ask a few, but don’t interrogate the hiring manager! Nothing makes us more irritated than being grilled about every aspect of the job, especially about the pay and comp plan. You’re the one being interviewed, not the other way around.

The Solution: Ask some basic questions but save the majority of them for the END of the in person interview. Believe me, the hiring manager will appreciate it and be much more likely to bring you in.

If you’re serious about getting a new position or moving up in your sales career, then avoid these 3 interviewing mistakes. Your chance of getting the new job will increase 100% if you do!

Good luck and happy job hunting!

If you found this article helpful, then you will love Mike’s bestselling book on Inside Sales and his Complete Book of Telephone Scripts

Mike Brooks, Mr. Inside Sales, works with business owners and inside sales reps throughout the US teaching them the skills, strategies and techniques of top 20% performance. He offers a FREE audio program designed to help you double your income selling over the phone, as well as an internationally acclaimed FREE ezine. If you’re looking to catapult your sales, or create a sales team that actually makes their monthly revenues, then learn how by
visiting: http://www.mrinsidesales.com/

Understanding Unconscious Bias

By Carolyn Sheppard

At a seminar I attended a short while ago (on the subject of Leadership During Challenging Times), all of the four speakers, from very different backgrounds, mentioned the issue of unconscious bias and the effects it has on leadership, followership and the organisation. Unconscious bias is the underlying, subconscious prejudices that every single person has, due to nature, nurture and experience.

As an illustration of this, one of the speakers (an eloquent and impressive French IT Director), recounted a particularly relevant story regarding her employment at a company in the US. She said that no matter how good her performance and results, she could never succeed because of the culture of the organisation. She struggled in the company for three years. The company talked a good ‘diversity and inclusion policy’, but the behaviour of the employees (right down to the woman who assumed that any other female in the organisation must also be a PA), set the culture based on their own unconscious biases. Changing the entire culture of a huge, Texas-based heavy industry company was not a task she desired to take on (and probably not an achievable one) so, with no sense of failure but a great deal more understanding, she moved on.

That’s the negative side of unconscious bias – acting out a bias that is discriminatory or prejudiced. But the positive side of unconscious bias is that it is a basic survival instinct. Our brains recognise situations or scenarios that get right down to the ‘flight or fight’ principle. However in these times, for most of us, there is much less need for these responses – there is not the physical danger that required us to develop these instincts. We can transfer them from physical to verbal or even intellectual responses – but your brain is still crying out for a reaction of some kind. Our biases are there for a reason, your brain has learned to react in a certain way because of an experience or learned behaviour (eg prejudice demonstrated by parents, culture or other external influences).

Your experience may include, for example, knowing an extremely argumentative red headed person (whatever example I use, it will demonstrate a bias!). You automatically, therefore, are on your guard when you talk to any red head, no matter what their personality.

Unfortunately instinct is not discriminatory – and it takes a lot of training to overcome those gut reactions (take for example being a fire-fighter – deliberately moving towards a threat that you would naturally wish to flee).

Can you train the bias out of an individual? The answer is probably no, you can’t easily ‘undo’ the conditioning or personal preferences of an individual, but you can educate them to recognise unconscious bias in themselves and in others, and to consider the consequences of their actions and reactions in the context of their bias. By making individuals and teams aware of the biases that operate personally and in their culture or organisation, they can make a tangible difference in changing behaviour (if not beliefs) and increasing the opportunities for diversity and inclusion. As a result the organisation can tap into the broad range of talent that may be within their reach that they otherwise may have ignored.

A good example of this is the ‘selling more toothpaste’ story. Instead of just sitting in the boardroom wondering how they could sell more toothpaste, the MD asked everyone in the factory what ideas they had. One shop floor worker put his hand up and said ‘make the hole bigger’. There was the answer they needed – and it wasn’t in the marketing team or in product research. It was right there on the shop floor. This story is many years old, from a time when there were far more class distinctions in society and in the workplace. By disregarding their bias (which was perhaps not so unconscious then, admittedly), the owners of that toothpaste factory achieved a very positive result and sold more.

When you are next in a training room – look around at the people you are with. What unconscious biases have you already applied just in looking at those people? What assumptions have you made about the place you are in, the behaviour of others, the likely outcome of the day? Whether you are a delegate or a trainer – consider those unconscious biases you hold that will be positive or negative be aware how they could affect your behaviour and the results you will get.

Resources:

On-line Implicit Association Testing: https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/
Training on unconscious bias: www.angela-peacock.com/unconsciousbias.html