The Happy Burro

In my current role as deputy chief operations officer for Saint Paul Public Schools, part of my work is overseeing the day-to-day activities of the following departments: Safety & Security, Transportation, Plant Planning & Maintenance, Nutrition & Commercial Services, and Educational Technology. The collective job of the outstanding people in these areas is to provide efficient, effective support services to students and staff. Did you know that most students see someone from the operations staff first each school day – before their teachers! From the bus ride to the clean hallways to the safe, welcoming building to the breakfast servers – the operations team members are the collective face of the school at the beginning and end of each school day.

I had the good fortune to be invited to the year-end celebration of our Nutrition and Commercial Services staff yesterday. The director, Jean Ronnei, hosted the event. There were over 400 “lunch ladies” and “lunch men” from across the 60+ schools in our district. The gathering took place at Arlington High School. Retirement awards, fun facts (Fun fact: this group served over 6.5 million meals this school year!), inspiring presentations and a lot of fun celebrating the accomplishments of another outstanding school year packed the agenda.

This incredible, inspiring, amazing work has been happening in Saint Paul Schools for over 150 years!

With all this great work and important ‘customer’ contact happening, what I am accomplishing in my office?

How Do You Interact With Your Teams?

The number of presentations you send off, the emails you write, the meetings you sit in…have you ever asked yourself how this work is connected to the mission of your organization? If you cannot see a clear, direct path from what you do each day to that mission, doesn’t it make sense to change what you do? We all have necessary administrative work that takes up our time. Try to eliminate an hour a week of unnecessary meetings – take that time to spend it with your teams. No, not your leadership teams, colleagues, peers. The people that directly serve your customers – THAT is where the true work of your organization happens. You’ll find the “mission” alive and well at each customer contact. If the only time your teams see you is at organization-wide gatherings or special events, that isn’t enough. You could easily be mistaken for merely a ceremonial leader.

What Impact Does Your Decision Have On Those Closest To Your Customer?

Wally Bock publishes and distributes a free newsletter each week from his Three Star Leadership blog. On May 16, 2008 he introduced us to the Harold Washington Rule. In short, the Harold Washington Rule is pretty simple: “Nothing important happens in your office. To get a real feel for your business you need to get out and walk around and talk to people.”

When you are in meetings, deciding on implementing a “change” of some sort, how does it affect those that have to implement or live with that change? Know your shop – there are more than boxes on a flow diagram or organizational charts to inform your decision.

What do you do to ensure you are ‘out of your office’ and connecting with customers?

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Every dollar we are able to save in operational costs, while continuing to provide incredible service, is money that could be used in the classrooms. I am proud of each employee on our operations team and couldn’t imagine a better reason to come into work each day than to serve with them at Saint Paul Public Schools! As our mission says:

“To Provide a Premier Education for All”!

Joe Raasch :: May.21.2008 :: Employee Engagement, Leadership :: 2 Comments »

Innovation as a business initiative seems to rear its head every six years or so. We’re on the tail end of another “let’s innovate!” run. What came of all those resources spent trying to come up with the next big idea? Did your company find a revolutionary change, new product, or client base that was worth all the effort? Or did the innovation teams post a slew of new ideas, declare victory and melt back to their old jobs?

True innovation is about creating a sustainable (product/idea/change/client). The last thing it is about is creating teams of people to brainstorm ideas. Ever hear a senior leader say, “I want five new ideas from each division by next month!”? VPs scramble, teams are formed, consultants are consulted. This in itself isn’t bad. The CEO usually gets ideas. How many get implemented?

The Shift – Light, not Heat

“Light, At Thirty-Two” by Michael Blumenthal from Days We Would Rather Know.

It is the first thing God speaks of
when we meet Him, in the good book
of Genesis. And now, I think
I see it all in terms of light:

How, the other day at dusk
on Ossabaw Island, the marsh grass
was the color of the most beautiful hair
I had ever seen, or how—years ago
in the early-dawn light of Montrose Park—
I saw the most ravishing woman
in the world, only to find, hours later
over drinks in a dark bar, that it
wasn’t she who was ravishing,
but the light: how it filtered
through the leaves of the magnolia
onto her cheeks, how it turned
her cotton dress to silk, her walk
to a tour-jeté.

And I understood, finally,
what my friend John meant,
twenty years ago, when he said:
Love is keeping the lights on. And I understood
why Matisse and Bonnard and Gauguin
and Cézanne all followed the light:
Because they knew all lovers are equal
in the dark, that light defines beauty
the way longing defines desire,
that everything depends on how light falls
on a seashell, a mouth … a broken bottle.

And now, I’d like to learn
to follow light wherever it leads me,
never again to say to a woman, YOU
are beautiful, but rather to whisper:
Darling, the way light fell on your hair
this morning when we woke—God,
it was beautiful. Because, if the light is right,
then the day and the body and the faint pleasures
waiting at the window … they too are right.
All things lovely there. As that first poet wrote,
in his first book of poems: Let there be light.

###

When asked for ideas, focus on the vital few that would create a sustainable future in your organization. Pulling people from their jobs to create a list of going nowhere ideas isn’t insightful and won’t light the way to the future. You’re just creating heat (i.e. friction).

Follow the light.

Joe Raasch :: May.12.2008 :: Change Management, Innovation :: No Comments »

On April 30, 2008, Fortune magazine published an article titled, “Best advice I ever got” on the best advice received by 25 “accomplished people” that influenced their lives. Here are six that I like:

• Michael Bloomberg, Mayor of New York City and founder of Bloomberg, LP: “The advice was, first, always ask for the order, and second, when the customer says yes, stop talking”
• Peter G. Peterson, Co-founder and Senior Chairman, Blackstone Group: “Focus on those things you do better than others.”
• Indra Nooyi, Chairman and CEO, Pepsico: “Whatever anybody says or does, assume positive intent.”
• Charlene Begley, President and CEO, GE Enterprise Solutions: “Spend a ton of time with your customers.”
• Elon Musk, Founder and CEO, Spacex: “Don’t panic.”
• Andrea Guerra, CEO, Luxottica: “…in your first years of business life, you shouldn’t go chasing after fancy titles, but try to find people who can teach you something.”

I found it a challenging exercise to come up with the “best advice I ever got.” I’ll share this one:

“Give your busiest people the most work. They know how to get stuff done.” I received this from a retired businessman who was working part-time taking care of the building I worked in while at GE.

What is the “best advice YOU ever got?”

Joe Raasch :: May.03.2008 :: Innovation, Leadership :: 6 Comments »