The Power Of The Domino Effect in Organisations

Updated July 27th 2023

I was in Heathrow airport recently. I had just joined a fairly long queue to go through security to make a connection flight, when the man beside me gently alerted a passing staff member and asked “Excuse me, has the fast track through security been removed?”. The staff member responded defensively, and in an accusatory, bordering on angry tone “there were two escalators, you should have taken the other one!”. The man innocently responded “I wasn’t told”. The staff member looked at him, shrugged her shoulder in a ‘not my problem!’ fashion and marched off. The customer was left stunned! He had asked a valid question in a friendly manner and he might as well have been spat on.

From an observers viewpoint, this staff member treated the customer with disdain and disrespect. He looked embarrassed. Everyone in the queue who had been bored of queuing and had watched the interaction appeared to be likewise feeling embarrassed for or with him, with all of us looking at each other, wondering ‘what just happened there?’, ‘what’s her problem?’ or maybe ‘what’s wrong with queueing with us?’.

Now, this staff member might have been on the defense because she was sick to the back teeth of being asked this same question, or because a customer had previously been angry at her about the same situation, or perhaps she was just generally having a bad afternoon.

Either way she seemed to be making some sort of assumption, and living in a reactive mode in that moment. She had possibly assumed that this customer was going to be cranky or have some sort of problem; that he might in fact take out on her. The thing is, in her reaction, she turned a fairly content yet curious customer who simply wondered if there was a way to avoid a long queue (who wouldn’t?), into an irritated customer, who then took his irritation out on her colleagues as he moved through security. I watched, and I can tell you there was no more ‘Mr. nice mannerly guy’.

I see this and hear of this all the time in organisations. It’s like a domino effect until one of us takes action not to pass the blame, irritation, frustration or anger on. Are you taking responsibility and action to break the domino effect that cascades through organisations? If you can take responsibility for your own tendency to pass on the blame, or to put your own frustration and irritation onto other people, it will result in a large improvement in your general wellbeing, communication with others, and effective leadership skills! If you can get a few others to also take responsibility to be where “the book stops”, you will then work in a nicer and more successful space. Sometimes it’s that simple!

‘What’ Vs. ‘How’ In Staff Training And Development

(Figure: Kolb and Fry's Learning Process)

Updated: July 5th 2023

Frequently, there exists a disconnect between the content and delivery of staff training and development programs. The focus is often on the theoretical “what” aspects, rather than the practical “how” elements that should be emphasized. This raises a crucial question: How can trainees truly grasp new knowledge if they are not provided with the necessary tools and guidance to effectively apply the concepts covered in the training room?

The ancient Chinese philosopher, Confucius stated, “tell me and I will forget, show me and I may remember, involve me and I will understand.”

For staff training and development to be effective, one must identify the most critical skills to teach, and then allow learners to use the skills under realistic usage conditions. Staff training must be so compelling as to absorb participants in its realism in a way that engages more than the intellect. It must be practical so that participants may actively use it. It must be relevant to the complexities of the work life of participants, and most importantly, it must provide a memorable, lasting experience.

Many approaches to staff training and development do not address what is difficult about applying the knowledge or skills in the right ways. They make it difficult to remember or use the information appropriately once the training is over. Most of what we really know how to do we learn by ‘doing’, so any training must involve ‘doing’!

For example, when it comes to learning how to effectively communicate, a person could read every book ever published telling them how to be a good communicator. However communication is only necessary when another person is involved. Therefore, all the books in the world or classroom learning where someone imparts theories and models on how to communicate is never going to be effective in teaching somebody to sell or influence customers, or how to work effectively in a team. Furthermore, we all operate from a place of habits and patterns, most of which are learnt early in life, and which no longer serve us. Most of us are unaware of these patterns and how many of the patterns are effecting how we interact with everyone; family, friends, colleagues, and customers etc. Sitting in a room, talking about how it should all be done will not bring our awareness to these patterns of behaviour.

Staff training and development should be enjoyable but it should also have a significant impact on the learners and give them simulated experiences they can rely on when they need to deploy them in real life.

This is why Adaptas™ have brought the most experiential learning and deep reaching techniques together to create effective Interactive Training Services, which create new habits and patterns in communication. Experiential learning engages the learner at a more personal level by addressing the needs and wants of the individual, even when learning as one of a group. By developing people as individuals, rather than simply transferring arbitrary capabilities, we develop people’s confidence, self-esteem, personal strengths, and crucially a rounded sense of purpose and fulfillment, which fundamentally improve attitude, life-balance and emotional well-being. These immensely important outcomes are just as important for sustainable productive work as the essential skills and knowledge typically represented in conventional education and work-related training.

In our view, the purpose of staff training and development, is to make staff significantly happier and more productive, to increase profits as customers return over and over, and to improve staff retention so, less budget is spent on recruitment and training of new recruits. Did you know that to hire one new person costs approximately the equivalent of one year of their annual salary? Something to consider!

At Adaptas™, we aim to save each organisation we work with money and time by making everyone more effective at what they do. Our objective is to ensure the value we bring to your organisation is, by a significant margin, larger than costs associated. For this reason we insist on agreeing at an early stage, the desired results and how to measure them. Adaptas™ in association with RPCM (www.consultrpcm.com) will bring experience and ideas to ensure the measurement agreed is appropriate for all.

How Empathy Impacts Business

Updated July 3rd 2023

After being invited to provide a psychologist’s perspective on empathy at a business event last year, I began to reflect on something that I had previously taken for granted. I realised that the concept of empathy is becoming increasingly relevant in the business world, yet there are still many individuals who either overlook its importance or lack the knowledge of how to cultivate empathy with their colleagues and clients. Exploring this topic in depth would require multiple blog posts, but for now, I encourage you to contemplate both your own and your colleagues’ capacity for empathy. Do you truly grasp the essence of empathy?

Empathy can be formally defined as the aptitude to recognise and comprehend the circumstances, emotions, and motivations of others. It entails our ability to acknowledge and understand the worries and concerns that others may have. Empathy can be described as “putting yourself in the other person’s shoes” or “viewing situations from someone else’s perspective.”

There are now numerous studies that link empathy to business results, making it no longer a touchy feely topic to discuss in business. At its core, empathy is the oil that keeps relationships running smoothly. Studies correlate empathy with increased sales, with the performance of the best managers of product development teams and with enhanced performance in an increasingly diverse workforce. When it comes to staff training and client retention or customer service training courses, an understanding and development of empathy is imperative. If you are interested in reading into this topic further all the studies mentioned can be viewed here (http://www.eiconsortium.org/).

Empathy allows us to create bonds of trust, it gives us insights into what others may be feeling or thinking; it helps us understand how or why others are reacting to situations, it sharpens our “people acumen” and informs our decisions.

Bestselling author, Daniel Pink (A Whole New Mind: Moving from the Information Age to the Conceptual Age) predicts that power will reside with those who have strong right-brain (interpersonal) qualities such as inventiveness, empathy, and meaning. He cites three forces that are causing this change: Abundance, Asia and Automation. “Abundance” refers to our increasing demand for products or services that are aesthetically pleasing; “Asia” refers to the growing trend of outsourcing; “Automation” is self-explanatory. In order to compete in the new economy market, Pink suggests six areas that are vital to our success. One of which is Empathy; the ability to imagine yourself in someone else’s position, to imagine what they are feeling, to understand what makes people tick, to create relationships and to be caring of others: All of which is very difficult to outsource or automate, and yet is increasingly important to business.

Dr. Daniel Goleman isolates three reasons why empathy is so important in business today: the increasing use of teams, (which he refers to as “cauldrons of bubbling emotions”), the rapid pace of globalization (with cross cultural communication easily leading to misunderstandings) and the growing need to retain talent. “Leaders with empathy,” states Goleman, “do more than sympathize with people around them: they use their knowledge to improve their companies in subtle, but important ways.” This doesn’t mean that they agree with everyone’s view or try to please everybody. Rather, they “thoughtfully consider employees’ feelings – along with other factors – in the process of making intelligent decisions.”

We recently developed some trademarked processes which we use in our staff training and in particular our customer service training courses take “putting yourself in the other person’s shoes” to a whole new level. Let’s have a chat to see how you and your team can work out who’s shoe it is anyway!!.

The Power Of The Domino Effect in Organisations