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One of our themes at Clifford Style is the opportunity offered by change, disruption, and uncertainty.

All leaders, directors, and managers run – to use a seagoing analogy – at ‘full power’ even in relatively stable times; this is the nature of the role.  Every day we sift our computerised ‘in-trays’, knowing we have not done all the plethora of things we should have; we have to prioritise.

Stability/steady state never truly exist in successful companies … new legislation, technology, competitors, economic down or up-turns, market changes and many more factors all demand that we look up and out. Not exclusively down and in.  From time to time, however, tectonic movements amplify the challenges we face.  One such – in Britain and more widely – is Brexit. 

Challenge it certainly is.

For companies faced with amplified challenges by the once-in-a-generation levels of uncertainty, opportunities will comes from the space which we give ourselves to:

• think and act anew
• to be more responsive more quickly than our competitors

Amongst many methods of leveraging opportunity are these:

• Keep informed, and up to the minute, with developments.  Given the current level of uncertainty in the ultimate outcome of Brexit, this is difficult
• Put aside some business ‘bandwidth’ to keep ahead (insofar as this is possible).  This means thinking clearly; refining options; and making plans i.e. preparing your company’s readiness
• Look ‘up and out’ – this is not so easy when the ‘day job’ must still be done. It means redirection of resource, prioritising, and allowing for planning time
• This is a matter of mindset, not just resource – stepping back mentally, scanning the horizon, and seeing the ‘bigger picture’ need not always be a ‘heavy’ activity.  The right answer may be the counter-intuitive one that emerges from seeing that bigger picture for the first time
• Nonetheless it increases ‘load’

So where does opportunity come from? 

• Wider market opportunities arising from free trade – 90% of the world’s growth is currently taking place outside the EU
• Beating the competition to take advantage of market opportunities
• Holding on to customers that other companies lose through their delays and missed deadlines
• Being bang-up-to-date with the use of technology
• Being agile and flexible in the face of intense pressure

So, what do businesses need to think about now?

• Think laterally and ‘out of the box’.  What is staring us in the face?
• Keep in close touch with supply chains; identify all the suppliers and customers.  Pool and share insights widely.  Look for potential opportunities in new trading environments and relationships
• If not already done so, sign up to daily Government updates at https://www.gov.uk/  – look out for local briefing events
• Keep networking as hard as you can; find out what others are thinking and doing; ask around
• Keep things in perspective; remember competitors are facing the same uncertainties
• And ruthlessly ‘carve out’ the bandwidth to look ‘up and out’ – it matters! 

The entry of a new Prime Minister into No10 Downing Street at the end of July changed everything.  As the leading politician for the nation he and his team now face a fundamental test – deciding on the best way to deal with an economic, social and political dilemma brought about by a referendum vote 3 years ago.  A head of steam has been building up in British politics to leave the EU and last week the valve burst – this Prime Minister is openly determined to lead the UK out; deal or no deal.

For small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) the problems this raises are real and immediate.  There are questions that need answers: Am I still in business? Who and where are my customers? Can I still employ staff that are willing to work for me and that I want? Are my products or services still profitable?  And now there is urgency – will we be ready for an October exit?

There are two parts to this question – will I be ready? And will the UK be ready?

To take the first one first –
Have I done all I can to avoid the dangers posed by a unilateral government decision to leave in 3 months’ time?

Have I made an attempt to try and audit my business to assess my state of readiness?  Under what headings have I attempted this? The CBI in its latest report on the implications of a no-deal exit by the UK suggests that the headings should be: mobility (what will restricted borders really mean?); regulation (what old and new regulations will still apply to my business in both manufacturing and services?); what will be the position in Ireland (if I trade there?); people (current staff and places of origin and future staff?); data flows and information (can this be shared, will it still be available?); and finally what part do trade agreements play in the business that I do that I need to be aware of (e.g. what is the WTO and how does it operate?).

The second one mirrors this –
Has the UK, its government and its trade institutions, done all they can to help and assist me in dealing with all the issues above?

Have they looked at unilateral areas of UK preparedness, such as domestic legislation designed to provide replacements for EU funding (for example for farmers who rely on the common agricultural policy for income and assisted spending) and areas that require action on an international scale, such as the UK’s position at the World Trade Organisation in a no-deal and the position of its Free Trade Agreements with other countries outside the EU.  They also need to be preparing for mobility, regulation, data flows and information, and people issues to emerge very quickly immediately the exit happens.

A recent report (29^th July) from the CBI is truly worrying reading.  It concludes that the UK is extremely unprepared both at the level of business and of government.  It says that while there has been some preparation across the UK much of the planning so far only reduces the impact by simply delaying rather than dealing with them; and that the EU has made little progress in thinking about the negative impacts of the UK’s sudden departure; and that joint work to plan for the separation of the EU and UK has been far too thin meaning that inevitably negotiations will have to continue on all the issues as they arise.  Finally the CBI notes that while there has been efforts by British businesses to get ready they have been hampered by unclear advice, tough deadlines, high costs, and masses of complexity.

In a word it’s a mess! Well ‘we knew that’, some will say.  But this is probably the riskiest of government projects that has been attempted in post-war times.  Far riskier than a Chunnel; Concorde; electrification of the railways; or a Severn Bridge – it’s like trying to do a hundred of those projects, all at the same time, all within three months.  Sound daunting?

At Clifford/ Style we seek to assist with specific and rapid ‘state-of-readiness auditing’ for SMEs who are caught up in this challenge.

There will be continuing anxious debate on what the result actually revealed about the views of the population at the time of the vote but like the genie in Arabian Nights – it cannot be put back in the bottle.

Much has been written about ‘change’ in organisations as if change is something ‘extra’.  There may have been times in the distant past when slow communications, slow technological development, and slow cross-fertilisation of ideas allowed businesses to stand still.  Even then however not forever, not for long.

Here’s one certain tell-tale of a company culture in which change will never work: The boss pretends to be behind the change, but isn’t really. This can arise for several reasons some of which are surprisingly common (it wasn’t their idea; they didn’t like the author of the idea; they know the senior executives will ‘poo-poo’ it).

Here’s another: Company culture — often unknowingly — suppresses ideas and initiatives (‘it’s not the way we do things around here’ ; ideas don’t originate below the Chief Executive).

(extract from popular business magazine)

So how do we go about making change happen?  Often busy people are drawn away from burdened desks for change sessions: white boards, stickers with grouped ideas, ‘actions’.  They are ALWAYS elated because many people in the middle ‘ranks’ of organisations have a shrewd idea of what’s needed, and are pleased to be heard.

The next day the ‘real world’…

— meaning the demands of the here and now reassert themselves.
— dedicated people return to their desks to find in-trays (digital and paper) piled high.  They groan, and get down to it.

The question is: what happens to the ideas?  The answer varies between:

— ‘nothing’ (quite often) 
— via ‘something (often not sustained)’ 
— to ‘application, and effective development’ (in truth seldom).

How do we put ourselves in the third category?  It is essential we do so because stasis is not a business option. 

Charles and Nick are both alumni of the University of Manchester, Alliance Manchester Business School.  For a recent programme that they both contributed to, they recorded an interview with each other on the nature of Leadership.

The interview was turned into an article with an introduction to both of us: we have left the interview very much as it was when it was published on the Business School website.

Vice Admiral Charles Style CBE

Charles is Executive-in-Residence at Alliance MBS and regularly contributes to Executive programmes at the Business School.  After university at Cambridge, Charles joined the Royal Navy, commanding five ships, including the aircraft carrier HMS Illustrious on operations, and later the United Kingdom’s maritime force.   He rose to Deputy Chief of the Defence Staff for operations in 2006.  His interest in education continued as Commandant of the Royal College of Defence Studies in London.  He came to Manchester to study on our Advanced Management Course designed for ex-military leaders transitioning to civilian jobs and was subsequently invited to be one of our Executives-in-Residence.  He is a Visiting Research Fellow at Kings College, London and previously a member of the Advisory Board of the European Mentoring and Coaching Council.  He is a Trustee and Vice-Chairman of the Queen Elizabeth Foundation for Disabled People and contributes to a number of other charities.  He edited and contributed to a book “In Business and Battle’ which draws out international leadership themes cross-sector.

Dr Nick Clifford, MBA, PhD

Dr Nick Clifford is a Senior Fellow in Executive Education at AMBS and directs the Manchester Leadership Development Programme.

Following an invitation to speak to the Manchester Leadership Development Programme about key issues involved in gaining trust in leadership Charles shared some stories from his time commanding naval vessels with diverse and large ships’ companies.   Nick and Charles discuss this in the article below.

Authentic, Reassuring and Trusted Leadership

Nick: Charles, for you, leadership is essential in any organisation – we all want to get things done; we want to take people with us, we want to get everyone on the same page – and given your military background, we want people to be ‘marching to the same drum’.  But what is it, in human terms that makes good leadership happen?

Charles:  In one sense it’s obvious!  “It’s simples”, as the meerkat might say.  It’s about a human deal between leader and led.  In essence, the ‘led’ consent to be led and the leader attempts to leadon the basis of mutual trust and confidence – this has to operate both ways.   Of course, if an officer in a ship says ‘Fire’ or ‘turn hard a’starboard’, it’s unlikely to be the moment to have a debate!   Orders tend to be orders in a Naval environment!  But, wherever you are, in whatever type of organisation, leadership is about trust and this requires as much openness as possible.

However, a leader tends to get only one shot at this.  If you blow it, you blow it.  In a ship heading for an operational theatre some years ago, with what felt like impending change in the air, I promised the ship’s company that I would never deceive them. Then highly sensitive decisions were communicated to me.  In the first instance, I couldn’t share them; so I told the 1200 people onboard that our tasking was likely to change soon, that I knew what the changes amounted to, but that I couldn’t – for good reasons – tell them about them at that time.   I said that I thought the likely changes in the ship’s programme were a positive development; and that there were no reasons for any concern in the meantime.  This approach seemed to pass the integrity test.

Nick:  Drawing on your considerable experience in the military, you appear to have boiled down leadership to a number of key principles.  One of these is authenticity; do you feel this is an essential feature of trust in leadership?

Charles:  People tend to put greater trust in people who are demonstrably themselves – the ‘manufactured self’ is rarely one who commands trust.  Everything is fine so long as you don’t pretend to be what you are not. 

You have to be authentic.  You can be softly spoken or noisy; considered in your decision-making or swift; an accomplished artist or an advanced nano-biologist (or both!). But you have to be yourself.  If you do that it’s usually obvious to others.  But if not, then people will begin to wonder: ‘is he/ she hiding the real person, and if so, what else is being hidden’? 

I once had a senior English colleague whose normal accent was English.  However, each time when flying west across the Atlantic, he would gradually adopt a wholly unnatural American twang. This would persist until we were flying back; then it would quietly fade away.  It was completely extraordinary!  Perhaps he thought he would somehow be more acceptable to our US colleagues if he became more American; or perhaps he didn’t even realise this was happening.  But it certainly didn’t sound at all authentic.  Inevitably we began to ask ourselves whether other aspects of his character were similarly ‘mouldable’.

Nick:  What would you say should be our approach to ‘noticing’ these things about ourselves?

Charles:  I would say that being ‘open’ to learning is critical.  Open minds tend to lead to ‘open organisations’; and open minds and open organisations can get you a long way.  Not everyone in every organisation can take part in every decision.  Nevertheless communication needs to be as uninhibited as possible; amongst other things this encourages good ideas to emerge and the confidence in those with good ideas to express them. The authentic, trusted and open leader must explain his/her intent fully and give instructions that match that explanation.

But humans are much less effective communicators than we tend to think; or perhaps we should say there are limits to precision in language. We think we are precise in the use of words, and yet time and again messages are misunderstood, especially if they are being expressed across cultural boundaries.  You may say ‘that dog is white’; the listener may hear ‘this cat is black’ – almost literally.  Hence you need to ensure that what you have said has been understood.  “Back briefing” is a technique I learnt long ago from an American General.   ‘Explain your plan” he said, “give your orders…. pause … then get the team to repeat back what you have asked of them.  You will find it will ALWAYS be wrong the first time round”.  It usually takes 2 or 3 iterations to get robust ‘commonality’ of understanding.  But eventually you get everyone on the same page.   Of course communication is about much more than just the words; but that’s possibly for another chat at another time!

Nick:  You’re right, we only have a short time together now.  I have a few more questions!  So, if you are open, authentic and attempting to build trust, will everything be fine?

Charles:  Well, not if your behaviour doesn’t match up!  People won’t trust you indefinitely if you have a tendency to be wrong or make decisions that are clearly injurious to the team.  You need to earn trust. When I became more senior and had to read management reports on performance of officers there was a famous officer’s report which used to make us all laugh.  It read: “This officer’s men will follow him anywhere …. out of a sense of morbid curiosity“, or something along those lines! More seriously though, professionalism, competence and proper practice must be a given for anyone holding a leadership position. 

Nick:  Ok, so leadership requires authenticity, trust, openness – any other skills that are needed?

Charles:  Well, there are some other skills. One is instinct.  At sea one day, I suddenly felt an urgent need to be on the bridge.  When I got there, I found that the ship was in thick fog, and the officer of the watch frozen in terror. He hadn’t told me; in fact, he had done nothing, not even to slow down.  By instinct, I manoeuvred the ship with my head in the radar.  I managed to avoid the nearest ship by a very small margin.  At the moment I got to the bridge collision was probably, at the most, a minute away.  Many ship’s captains tell similar stories.  It was instinct that took me to the bridge, it was instinct that guided my manoeuvre.  Interpret ‘instinct’ as you will, but always keep your mind open to its prompting – you will find, as I did, that your instinct will often be an important guide.

And yet this story cuts both ways.  I actually knew that the ‘frozen’ officer of the watch was weak.  Luck was on our side on that occasion.  In my experience as a senior officer, trustee, ordirector, I have on several occasions sat round tables where decisions are about to be made which are both important and wrong. Yet peoplechoose to say nothing. You can always tell when this is happening: they suddenly find overriding needs to consult their notes, heads down, no eye contact ….

A notable example of this – in which obviously I played no part – was a particularly fateful decision to launch the Challenger space shuttle.  The recorded conversations leading to the launch showed that a much heightened risk of explosion, arising from engineering experience of the properties of rubber at very low temperatures, was over-ridden by the launch ‘imperative’. It happens every day in organisations because people don’t want to put their heads above the parapet; they perceive there is safety in numbers; they don’t want to risk being wrong; or they are frightened of the boss.  Although instinct and experience are telling them they are right, they may remain silent, even if the stakes are high.

Nick: How do you counter this instinct to remain silent when your real instincts are telling you to speak out?

Charles: As I have implied, this is of course much easier to do when the senior leadership creates an atmosphere in which – within constraints of discretion and good order – open expression of views is encouraged.   Beyond that,courage is almost certain to be required.  I sometimes passed this test; I once substantially failed it.

Nick: So would you say there are some critical elements to leadership that are crucial in being effective as a leader?

Charles:  We must not forget that leadership will on occasion demand tough decisions, often on incomplete information.  This requires decisiveness, the ability to ‘set the course’ and to take the team along with you.  Again this may well require courage, and the acceptance of risk. But I don’t mean here careless risk, or risk for its own sake.  I mean considered risk, based on experience, professional judgement and – yes – good instincts.   At such moments leadership may be a lonely business.  We are likely to be more effective at it, make a higher proportion of the right decisions, if along the way we have done our best to do the things we’ve been talking about: build open confident teams, who will question and challenge as well as support.  Leadership doesn’t work as leadership without trust up down and sideways within teams.  So authenticity, reassurance and trust (ART – a central theme at the Manchester Business School) are indeed important elements of good leadership because they enable productive relationships to be built between leaders and led.  Leadership is certainly more ART than science.

Nick: Charles, it’s been a real pleasure listening to your reflections on your learning around leadership development, thanks so much for your time.

‘Strategy’ is an overworked word.   Organisations know they need they strategies – but what marks out the good ones?

Quite often we hear ‘one-liners’ in organisations.  ‘Our strategy is to expand into this market…exploit this new opportunity…develop that new product … engage with this new supplier…build that new plant…move our business to [here or there]’ and so on.  Sometimes we are given the end state (as well as the action): ‘control x% of this or that market by y date’.

When we want to establish whether these stated intentions are strategies or aspirations, we ask some questions of the Board:  ‘how is it going to be done …. with what resources …. when ….. …. by whom?’

If these questions are consistently and coherently answered by them, we then get around the organisation and ask the same question of people at all levels and in all departments.

‘What is your business’ strategy?’ Sometimes people know the headline, occasionally they know their part in achieving it, and – very rarely – they can state the strategy in full.

The point is this: an aspiration is only a strategy if its expression captures the five elements: what – how – by whom – with what resources – when.  For it to be memorable – and by definition it must be memorable – it has to be expressible in one sentence.

Even then, achieving total understanding of a strategy at all levels in an organisation is a very tall order.  Helping businesses ‘get there’ is one of our most common roles.