WHAT IS PROFESSIONAL BEHAVIOUR DEVELOPMENT?
According
to the Royal Academy of Spanish Language behaviour is defined
as being "the way in which people manage their lives
and direct their actions". This definition is comprehensive
and precise, and if we talk about managerial or commercial
behaviour it is clear that by developing the way we manage
our professional lives, and by establishing criteria for
directing our actions, a substantial qualitative improvement
could be achieved.
In companies there are two groups of people who live by
and for influencing others. These are the people whose job
it is to make other people act in a particular way, both
in order to help achieve their own individual success and
that of their companies. The people we are talking about
here are managers and salespeople. In both cases it is their
task to ensure that a group of others "want to do and
actually do what is required of them." Both senior
and middle management must ensure that the group of people
they manage performs as efficiently as possible and, in
order for this efficiency to be long-lasting, must achieve
it in a positive, high productivity atmosphere. Salesmen
must not only succeed in making their customers want to
buy the products they sell, they must also generate in their
customers a feeling of partnership with the company, a sense
of involvement, a belief that they are the best people to
do business with - that theirs is a company to be recommended
without fear of disappointment.
In order to have this effect on others, both managers and
salespeople rely, fundamentally, on one tool: the way they
treat and deal with other people. This means that the most
important implement they have for doing their job is their
very own behaviour, the way they communicate, fulfil tasks,
respond to situations, monitor performance etc. And I want
to stress that what we are talking about here is definitely
the way things are done and not what is done.
For example, we might have a manager with a model business
philosophy, one whose ideas are worthy of the finest twenty-first
century management textbook. However, if the way he actually
behaves is not in line with this philosophy, if when it
comes to dealing with those he works with he neither listens,
nor does sufficient preparation, nor confirms objectives,
nor accepts suggestions, nor is solutions driven, nor announces
decisions clearly and credibly, nor respects others; if
he doesn't create a team, if he doesn't set an example,
if he isn't logical and consistent and a lot more other
things besides, his theoretical models will count for little
when it comes to exercising effective leadership.
THE ONLY PEOPLE CAPABLE OF CHANGING
OUR BEHAVIOUR ARE OURSELVES
And "Can this be developed?" is the question
I hear most often, and logically enough, given that what
we are talking about here is the process of improving the
behaviour of experienced professionals. And this is precisely
where the difficulty arises, because if we start talking
about improving behaviour we are, by definition, talking
about CHANGING the way things are done. And when we start
using big words like 'CHANGE' we're getting onto very serious
ground. To change an adult person is an almost impossible
task, unless, that is, you count on the actual involvement
of the individuals themselves, because the only people capable
of changing our behaviour are ourselves, through our own
experience and our own belief. In this process books and
lessons count for little. The development of professional
behaviour cannot be taught, it can only be learnt. What
you can do, however, is help this learning process take
place more quickly, more accurately, and in greater depth.
And that's why development programs have been specifically
designed which create the circumstances in which each person
can put into practice and test out, via Practical Conscious
Experience, different ways of doing and understanding their
everyday activities, thus allowing them to come to their
own conclusions.
This doesn't only happen with adults. Children also shape
their behaviour in this way, only that they are constantly
experimenting. A father once tried to explain to his son
that he mustn't touch the oven door or one day he might
burn himself. The child didn't understand and continued
playing. The patient father tried again, this time using
examples, pictures, even inventing a story but it still
didn't work: the child had the necessary knowledge but he
hadn't changed the way he behaved, he continued to touch
the oven door. Until that is, one Sunday morning, when the
family were roasting a turkey for dinner, and without his
father having to say a single word, he learnt for good that
you mustn't touch the oven door and he changed his behaviour
entirely. You've guessed how, haven't you? Well the experience
of that burn formed part of his frame of reference and made
him really understand, and not just know, what the safest
approach was, and that's what he did from then on.
The process for adults is similar, and I'm not referring
to the burn but to experiencing a thing in person. But here
arises an additional problem: we, as adults, already have
firmly established ways of doing things and have acquired
habits which are much more difficult to break.
Let's suppose that you had to inform a member of your team
that his role was changing due to departmental requirements,
and that you know that this change neither represents a
better position for the person involved nor a job that will
be much to his liking. What's more, that same afternoon
you have a meeting with the whole team to talk about general
issues and you'd like to take advantage of the occasion
to review everyone's roles.
Are you absolutely sure about how these issues should be
raised? How many ways of doing it are there, a thousand,
a million? Do you believe that your way of doing it is the
most appropriate? Would you like to have a much firmer understanding
of the 'rules of the game' in order to act most effectively
according to the situation, in the way you see best? Why
do some managers become good leaders and others don't? Have
you ever known a boss who wasn't sure that he was doing
things the right way? And how many mediocre bosses have
you known? And how do you know for sure that you're not
one of them if those people didn't realise it themselves?
Do you have a clear understanding of what the key tools
for managerial or commercial behaviour are in order to be
able to objectively evaluate whether you are using them
appropriately?
There is a solution to all this. In the Executive Behaviour
Development Programmes, carried out by Otto Walter Spain,
the mechanisms which shape professional behaviour become
abundantly clear and simple; the everyday behavioural tools
and their different effects are identified; definite answers
and criteria are arrived at which are directly applicable
to real life, to events faced the following day at work
and with surprising results. And all this with a down to
earth approach, without getting lost in conceptual theories,
because each person will have to try it out for themselves
in their own, real work environment. And in doing so they
will not only discover what has to be done but also how
to do it and the all-important 'whys'.
VERY IMPROVEMENT WE TRY TO INTRODUCE
IS, IN THE END, SUSTAINED BY THE PEOPLE WHO PUT IT INTO
PRACTICE.
"Good heavens, the boss has been on another course!"
This is the kind of reaction you'll expect to get during
the process of improvement. You'll do things differently
and the people you work with are going to notice it. And
that's just what it's all about, that they notice a difference,
because if they don't notice any difference it'll be because
we haven't changed anything. Being able to immediately put
into practice something we find useful just requires confidence,
a little daring, some preparation, and the humility to believe
that everything can be improved and that the sooner you
get started the better.
Many companies use this method following a merger or a
restructuring. In this way they take advantage of the burst
of self-motivation it produces, the unity that develops
amongst participants as they get the chance to share in
a powerful way their day-to-day challenges in what is a
highly participative methodology, the common language that
is generated and the interaction of styles that it brings
about. So much so, that in more than one case, the co-ordinated
collaboration of a consultancy specialised in restructurings
and job analysis, together with a specialist in the development
of professional behaviour like Otto Walter, has provided
a catalyst capable of integrating efficiently and positively
a whole new structure in scarcely two years, something which
under normal circumstances would have taken a minimum of
five years of suffering and strain to complete.
THE KEY COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE IS, AND
ALWAYS WILL BE, DOING THINGS WELL
The management of talent, the exercise of leadership, the
improvement of processes, more effective knowledge management,
more flexible structures, better quality processes, coaching
or any other kind of improvement we try to introduce into
companies, all these things are, in the end, sustained by
the people who have to put them into practice. If any project
of this kind is attempted without a corresponding development
in behaviour, there's a high probability that the change
will remain limited to nothing more than the presence of
a new set of manuals on the shelves of various offices.
In the times we live in, where the key competitive advantage
is, and always will be, doing things well, not taking advantage
of the opportunity to ensure that the key professionals
in the company evolve, so that they can best carry out their
roles as mobilizers, is an excessive waste of talent and
potential - and this even more so when you know that all
that capacity is already there, in house, just waiting to
be nurtured.
I
personally invite all the managers who read this article
to try this experience, an experience endorsed by thousands
of professionals who, guided by our methodology, have emerged
full of enthusiasm at having had the opportunity to stop
and think and reorganise their opinions and behaviour.
For more information see www.ottowalter.com
Paco Muro.
Otto Walter Chairman of the Board
