How are you making sure your organisation is dedicated to the same direction, stays strongly engaged to move forward and your teams are striving to give their best? Great leadership is without doubt the (not so) secret recipe to lasting success. It creates the resilience to go through uncertain times and enables the necessary transformations.

What do you need to lookout for in 20204?

Swiss leadership institute IMD shared earlier this month how they predict the trends for this year. Let me share them here with you.

• Agility - the year of 2024 might only become more uncertain and volatile; as a leader you want to enable your teams to grow in this environment and get stronger; this can be achieved with the right mindsets and the right way of working.
• Beginners mind - they call it apocalyptic leadership which translates into being open minded for new perspectives; this requires a radical shift away from traditional leadership styles and an understanding that the company success is based on the entire ecosystem and the value everyone contributes.
• Dual transformation - here the term ambidexterity is put in the mix which points to the suggestion that organisations need to look at dual transformation strategies; how do you ensure that the current business stays successful while an equal focus is put on the future business models?
• Experimentation - change is coming, looking back will not lead to the right decisions; though, the future is unknown and might appear daunting; the right tactics and routines in experimenting will lead to learning and value creation.
• Automation - since over a hundred years, productivity gains have been driven by machines; today artificial intelligence will drive another boost; how do we guide our teams to create synergy and excellence in the intersection between humans and machines?
• Mental health - employees at the brink of a burnout are not only less productive; they tend to make wrong decisions and are influencing the mood of the peers around them; establishing a positive environment will boost motivation, productivity and excellence.
• Purpose-driven - our jobs represent a major element of our lives; mundane, meaningless work will impact everyone's life balance and limit your people's motivation and engagement; creating a organisation vision that goes beyond profit will lead to higher value creation, improved effectiveness, better alignment and long-term success.

How will you drive change in your organisation?


Source: Seven leadership trends to focus on in 2024

When we look back at 2023 it was the year of ESG Reporting. The great thing about it is that companies started to take the topic of sustainability seriously and allocated resources to do something about it. And for any sustainability journey, understanding the baseline is important. Though, as Robin Hicks recently pointed out, companies are confused with the selection of standards, information and opinions. For example, calculating a company's carbon can take 2-4 years!

In my experience, this is frustrating and boring. Which leads to dissatisfied shareholders and employees as a lot of effort is put into something that does not generate results. With this we are fuelling resistance that costs energy and reduces productivity. That is why many well-intended sustainability journeys end and are axed.

Can we simply not do carbon accounting? No. Does it need to be this cumbersome? No. And here my experience in operational excellence is really helpful. An area where you focus on creating more value with the resource you have based on data and analysis. Let's apply this to ESG improvements as well. Here are some thoughts:

• Start your carbon accounting (and other sustainability reporting activities) in dedicated areas; first something simple to test your approach; then continue in areas that can create highest improvements.
• Translate the data intelligence into improvement action; the goal for ESG reporting is creating positive environmental and societal impact and this should guide our efforts.
• Formulate a sustainability strategy that is relevant for your industry, market and company culture; this will be the North Star to guide short-term and long-term decision making.
• Celebrate the results and achievements and let them drive the next effort.
• Embed ESG reporting into a broader transformation program that aims to enable every employee to become a climate ambassador; the goal is to drive new behaviour and mindsets and steer to a new culture.
• Reflect how your sustainability change journey can follow the values of honesty, courage, frugality, and synergy (more here).

What are in your eyes the key ingredients for a successful sustainability journey?

Reference: Eco-Business CSO Survey, Robin Hicks, Jan 2023

A New Year has started and fresh inspirations are coming in. At Hive17 we focus on facilitating effective teams, and that is particularly important on the top (also check our recent CxO Team post). Just yesterday, the Embassy of Switzerland in Singapore shared a post about the Swiss Federal Presidency and the Swiss Federal Council. An example I like to share as it is a high-level model for a self-organising team.

CxO Teams are in similar situations; they have broad and deep responsibilities; they have the tendency to focus the majority of their time on their own department; they tend to work less as one team. The Swiss government puts a structure in place to counter these tendencies. A structure that any company can learn from and become more effective in delivering change.

Here are some suggestions to look out for:

• Create common, shared goals that all team members commit to
• Establish job rotation so that every CxO team member has exposure and experience in all the functions and business units across the organisation
• Define shared initiatives that are accomplished as a joint effort across multiple departments; they strengthen the cross-departmental understanding, collaboration and alignment
• Build strong personal bonds among all the team members that are based on fellowship, win-win, and consideration
• And you might want to consider the CEO's position as the key person to drive transformation and acting as the glue to bring all the different parts of the organisation together under one vision and one direction

How do you build a more effective and self-organised CxO team?

Source: Swiss Federal Presidency, LinkedIn

The purpose of any organisation is to successfully deliver value to their customers. The range of customers might be wide and the definition of value and success might greatly vary. Though, in essence that is it. And rightfully, companies are focusing their efforts on selling, producing and delivering their products and solutions.

Recently, there have been new questions and barriers appearing in leadership circles. "I need all my employees to focus in one direction."; "It feels like that internal silos are preventing us from delivering to our clients."; "We need values and a culture that is exciting to work in." All these statements point to a need for increased focus on the delivery of that customer value. We need an effective foundation for our way of working. That is basically the infrastructure to run our operations; or the Human Operating System.

The goal of the human operating system is to create an environment that enables teams to give their best. It is about alignment, transparency, change management, motivation, psychological safety and fun. Imagine a flotilla of small boats that independently sail towards a common direction. How these are operated and are connected describes this operating system.

Here are some of the key components for this human operating system:

• A meaningful purpose, values and common targets that align and motivate
• Tools & processes to co-innovate with various stakeholders
• Mindsets & routines that enable continuous experimentation and learning
• Team principles that facilitate synergy, conflict resolution and collaboration

Let's arrange a meeting to find out how Hive17 Consulting can further improve your way of working!

This week we had another great Sustainability event in Singapore - organised by Lufthansa Group. While the airline industry overall is struggling to curb carbon emissions, it is great to see that one important player is striving forward on their sustainability journey. Maybe the most prominent technology is AeroShark - a nature-inspired film that is reducing the friction and drag of a plane's fuselage.

The event brought together industry experts into different panels that discussed sustainability also beyond the airline industry. For a while now, I have been pondering about key words that describe sustainability journeys. During this event, I have put more thought into these descriptors which guide us on a solid path towards a better planet and society.

Honesty - past incidents of greenwashing have shown that solid reporting is essential in order to gather internal and external support for the ESG journey. We need to create more transparency and credibility, so that we can strengthen our reputation towards consumers, regulators and talents. Lufthansa has illustrated their effort and dedication to report on a long list of standards.

Frugality - frugality means the careful use of resources and this is strongly related to reducing our consumption of energy, raw materials and natural landscapes. Operational efficiency is not only a driver to reduce cost, in most cases these solutions also have a net positive effect on the environment. The AeroShark film, better transport routing and switching to more efficient drive trains are some great examples.

Courage - risk is a large driver in corporate decision making and often, this is holding back crucial investment decisions. Bold new strategies into an uncertain future requires courage - and we need environments that are enabling more risk taking. One great example was Jungheinrich where the board decided five years ago to fully embark on their sustainability journey; this courage has paid off very well for them.

Synergy - sustainability journeys demand stronger collaboration between the silos within an organisation and beyond their company borders. This collaboration is facilitated with common goals and a belief that together we can achieve more. It was also highlighted that academia and industry need to work much closer and share insights. Together we are stronger.

The journey towards a greener and fairer planet can be daunting. These four underlying principles can act as a guide towards more successful sustainability transformations. Which drivers do you suggest to add?

Our current times are full of change and a solid strategy is necessary to give the organisation direction and alignment to create lasting success. Furthermore, a meaningful and clear vision is driving motivation and is a strong ingredient for making decisions. Yet, many companies struggle to bring their vision to the ground. Employees are saturated with changing strategies and often don't see how the new directions are impacting their daily work.

"Only 41% believe current employee behaviours are mostly aligned to company values and direction." - 26th Annual Global CEO Survey - Asia Pacific | PwC | January 2023 (link)

Often, new strategies come with flashy posters, inspiring townhalls and a set of top-down KPIs. And then the rest of the organisation is left to create success. And in 59% of the cases, it doesn't happen. We need to go beyond that. How can we best engage to translate vision into action?

In my experience, there are three key areas:

1. Facilitate the process that people understand how their daily work is bringing the new strategy forward.
2. Enable that this process is happening through the different hierarchical levels and a thread is visible from the frontline to the overall vision.
3. Strengthen the frequent reviews and reflection with solid routines, so that we know if we are on the right track.

In the process of setting and propagating targets, it is also important that we provide the wider context and that this is a collaborative bottom-up process. Let the people define their own targets and how to review them. As a leader, your role is to provide guidance and support.

At Hive17 Consulting, we have been running 'Vision to Action' workshops for over six years with great success. They are establishing an environment where target setting and reviews are building strong alignment, direction and motivation.

We just finished a team retreat and during the closing, the client shared "this was amazing, we never got the people to share so much. The sessions were fun, insightful and engaging. Thank you so much!". How did we get there?

One of the thing we can observe with many companies, friends, clients, and teams we are working with: we are overwhelmed, we are stuck in a rat race. Looking at the "Second Quadrant Model", this means we are stuck in the first quadrant: our important and urgent tasks. We don't have the bandwidth to allocate time for the important and non-urgent tasks, which allow us to build an effective work-environment and reflect on our strategy and priorities. How can we facilitate this change?

This is where team retreats come in. While an investment in time and money, they allow us to create the necessary brain space to build a solid foundation for team effectiveness. This is the exemplification of Slowdown to Speedup!

So, how shall we go about team retreats? There are some principles for successful team retreats; here is my take: a) enable the participants to switch off from their daily grind; b) lots of time for quality, social interactions; c) the managers are participants on the same level as everyone else (an independent, external facilitator helps); d) focus the sessions on topics in the second quadrant. What did I miss here?

Ok, great principles... What shall we discuss concretely? First of all, start with an overall theme for the retreat which provides the context for the conversations. Often we come across the broad opportunity around 'improving collaboration' and 'building ownership'. Though it can also have themes like 'shaping our desired culture', 'discovering new market opportunities', etc.

As a next steps, it is important to provide a structure and path for constructive and effective discussion. Here is an approach:

1. Inspiring purpose - what is the guiding imagination of the future state ("Leitbild")? This is the Why we are here and provides meaning and clarity for the direction. We create a visual change story and make the vision and mission tangible.
2. Shared goals - how are we creating value to our stakeholders? This is the What we want to achieve and translates the bigger purpose into concrete results. We establish Objectives and Key Results (OKRs) that provide the foundation for delegated decision-making in our daily work.
3. Team principles - what are the underlying values and principles for collaboration? These are providing guidance and barriers for our way of working; the foundation for effective teamwork, where we appreciate the diversity of each individual team member.
4. Joy & fun - along the way, let's laugh and enjoy the time together; this is during the sessions, with joint activities, during meals - basically all the time. This positivity will strengthen creativity, a solution-oriented attitude, and relationships.

Great - as a team, we had 2-3 days off from our daily work and enjoyed a fantastic time with our family at work. And then we come back to the office and we will be very quickly overwhelmed. We want that the great stuff we discussed during the retreat is continued back at work; we want that we keep the momentum. For that, it is vital that we immediately build routines that carve out space for our second quadrant tasks and actions. And for sure, the foundation for this should be defined at the retreat.

How do you experience successful team retreats?

Yes, in the last months we have achieved a lot. The majority of companies have defined sustainability targets and they are concerned about creating their ESG report. Though, we also need to be honest with ourselves: this is only talk and we need action - a lot of action - to reach global success in turning around climate change!

“57% of CEOs identify unclear ROI and economic benefits as a leading challenge.”

Many companies have set ambitions net-zero targets which they want to reach in the next decades. And yes, many companies have scrambled together a team that is identifying opportunities to create impact. Is this enough? In my experience, if you want to reach ambitious energy saving targets, you need to mobilise the masses. And in the context of sustainability, your own employees are not enough; you need to engage your customers, suppliers, your community and a wide range of other stakeholders in your ecosystem. A daunting task.

One principle in change management: let's break down that overwhelming initiative in small, first steps - at the start, we want to create momentum. How can we achieve this? In our practice, we call this Vision-to-Action and the objective is to propagate the high-level, strategic targets into actions for everyone in the organisation. We are using the concept of objectives and key results (OKRs) in this process and ensure that on each level, we encourage a bottom-up approach to translate the higher level OKRs to their own specific scope. Building ownership and excitement.

For example on a regional management level, we can achieve alignment on the concrete results we want to achieve in the next three months while keeping an eye on the long-term vision and targets. And in parallel, we have organised large-scale workshops to enable the front-line employees to identify their contribution to the creating impact. This also creates a fabulous energy and drive.

How are you creating real, large-scale impact in your organisation?
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Source: CEO Study: Own your impact, IBM, May 2022

Sustainability is on everyone's agenda and there is a clear focus on ESG reporting, regulatory compliance and buying carbon credits to offset. These all consume resources, create a green premium and drive cost up.

Sustainability journeys are a lot more than that! They open up new markets, they bring efficiency into your operations, they are driving productivity in your workforce. All it takes is look beyond the box described above and get inspired to do more.

Our Celemi Sustainability Simulation is the perfect environment to become aware of the business opportunity of your sustainability transformation. Understand the link between various Initiative and how they impact your business short- and long-term. And all with a playful, collaborative experience.

Today, we celebrate the achievements and contributions of women in Singapore and around the world. We continue to strive for gender equality in this region and professional change management skills can support women's confidence at their workplace. The CPC Change Management methodology can equip women with the tools they need to lead to successful change initiatives and demonstrate their value as leaders.

Consider a change management certification in order to advance your career! Let's challenge the status quo and create a more inclusive and equitable future for all women in Southeast Asia.

Sign up today for the Certified Associate in Change Management and get the complete certification for 3’499 SGD (instead of 4’580 SGD). This promotion is valid until 25 March 2023.

#IWD2023 #ChooseToChallenge #ChangeManagementCertification #WomenInLeadership #WomenInSingapore

This has been in the works for months! And we are excited to launch our new service packages - Sustainability x Change Management.

​Reducing our climate impact might be the biggest, global endeavour of this century. We as a company decided that we want to contribute our expertise: change management. We are excited to drive the people side of doing business. And this means we can accelerate your sustainability journey with our expertise, our passion, and our methods.

At the heart of our business, we strongly believe that sustainability is a huge business opportunity. Your sustainability journey might start with compliance to regulations and to market demands. We are helping companies to turn this around. Understanding the possibilities to retain & attract talent, to improve your operational efficiencies, and to tap into new markets.

How are we facilitating the change in your sustainability journey? We are focusing on three key elements.

• developing the Why: inspiring your leadership teams and workforce
• defining the What: setting the ambitions and targets for your journey
• facilitating the How: experimenting new solutions, one step at the time

The Sustainability Week Asia is over and it has been filled with great presentations, discussions, conversations and questions! And one underlying thread was very apparent:

• we need to act
• we need to achieve the impossible by 2050
• we must start now
• the targets are huge
• we don't have enough people on board
• how can we possible get anywhere?

This all is so daunting. And this is dangerous. We humans tend to fall into paralysis under such circumstances. Big changes are triggering fight, flight and freeze. Let's avoid that.

While keeping the Sustainability vision in our mind, let's start with small steps; with a pilot, with one product category, with one location. We will see results and we can learn and celebrate. With this we develop more motivation and more people joining the movement. In no time, the results will get bigger, more numerous. Change management is here to accelerate the journey.

We need to start and act now.

During the Sustainability Week Asia in Singapore, on stage and in the hallways, there was one strong agreement among speakers and participants. Most companies are still in the game because of compliance - in order to keep their 'license to operate'. They are pushed by regulators, clients and the markets to provide their sustainability reports and commit to token targets.

If we want to turn the tide on climate change, we all need to go beyond that and understand one important thing:

Sustainability is one huge business opportunity!

The opportunities fall typically into three buckets: attracting & retaining talents, operational cost efficiency and exploring new markets. And all of them have a strong impact on profit. Once we realise this, the sustainability movement will be unstoppable!

How can we create this awareness? As a change management practitioner, there are a few simple insights:

• develop inspirational stories that are engaging together with the impacted groups of people
• translate the high-level targets and strategies into practical action at the front
• embark on the journey in small steps with small wins along the way

These points will keep the momentum and accelerate your results - in terms of climate impact and in terms of business outcome.

Today was Day one of the Sustainability Week Asia here in Singapore. The first session, Tony Fernandes. And he mentioned something which is close to my heart:
"In sustainability, companies need to push first their internal marketing!"

This, in my experience, means that we need to make the new vision tangible for employees, so that they can relate. And it also means that we need to translate strategic KPIs into targets for the people in the front-line. Translating the vision into action.

I have been glad I was able to be involved in large-scale programs where we have achieved that wide-spread engagement. It takes some effort to create this momentum. And then, the movement is building up and delivering excitement, motivation and then strong business results.

Don't keep your initiatives in a closet; let's create these movements.