BLUE OCEAN LEADERSHIP

Parable of Employee Engagement

Source : http://www.blueoceanstrategy.com/blue-ocean-leadership/1

The Problem

In a study conducted in 2013 by GALLUP of 25 000 executives and employees1 it was found that

• A mere 30% of employees are engaged, committed to doing a good job.

• 50% of employees merely put their time in

AND

• 20% are counterproductive, negatively influencing coworkers, missing days at work and driving customers away through poor service. These 20 % employees cost the US economy around a half a trillion dollar each year

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DIAGNOSIS

According to Gallup’s Analysis

Main Cause of Employee Disengagement is

POOR LEADERSHIP

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BIG IDEA BEHIND BLUE OCEAN LEADERSHIP

• Leadership, in essence, can be thought of as a servicethat people in an organization either ‘buy’ or ‘don’t buy’.

• Every leader in that sense has customers: bosses to whom the leader must deliver performance and followers who need the leader’s guidance and support to achieve.

• When people value your leadership practices, they in effect buy your leadership and are inspired to excel and act with commitment. But when employees don’t buy your leadership, they disengage, becoming noncustomers of your leadership.

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How is it different from Conventional Approach

CONVENTIONAL LEADERSHIP BLUE OCEAN LEADERSHIP

Focus on the values, qualities

and behavioral styles that make

for good leadership under the

assumption that these ultimately

translate into high performance

Focus on what acts and

activities leaders need to

undertake to boost their teams’

motivation and business results,

not on who leaders need to be.

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How is it different from Conventional Approach

CONVENTIONAL LEADERSHIP BLUE OCEAN LEADERSHIP

Tend to be quite generic and are

often detached from what

organizations stand for in the

eyes of their customers and the

market results their people are

expected to achieve.

Connect leaders’ actions closely

to market realities by having the

people who face market realities

define what leadership practices

hold them back and what

leadership actions would enable

them to thrive and best serve

customers and other key

stakeholders.

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How is it different from Conventional Approach

CONVENTIONAL LEADERSHIP BLUE OCEAN LEADERSHIP

Focus mostly on the executive and senior levels of organizations.

Distribute leadership across all three management levels because outstanding organizational performance often comes down to the motivation and actions of middle and frontline leaders who are in closer contact with the market.

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Steps To Map Leadership Activities Canvas

• Step 1 : Form a team of 12-15 senior managers who are respected as good leaders. This team is further broken into 3 sub teams 4-5 each

• Step 2 : This team interviews leader’s customers ( direct subordinates) with respect to acts & activities they consider good and bad their leaders spend time on and which are key to motivation and performance but are neglected by leaders

• Step 3 : Develop ‘as-is’ leadership profile for each level and find the cold spots ( activities which absorbing leader’s time but not creating much value) and hot spots (activities that are energizing, inspiring & moral boosting but currently underinvested by the leaders and not addressed at all) Plot relative scores against each activity

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Steps To Map Leadership Activities Canvas

• Step 4 : Select to be leadership profiles which customers would

want their leaders to exhibit in addition to what is collated in step 2

• Step 5 : Apply BLUE OCEAN GRID and Complete the Canvas

• Step 6 : Action planning by leaders through leadership coaching &

mentoring ( External Help Or Development of Internal Coach)

• Step 7 : Institutionalize new leadership practices

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THE BLUE OCEAN LEADERSHIP GRID

ELIMINATE

What acts and activities do leaders

invest their time and intelligence in

that should be eliminated ?

RAISE

What acts and activities do leaders

invest their time and intelligence in

that should be raised above their

current level ?

REDUCE

What acts and activities do leaders

invest their time and intelligence in

that should be reduced well below

their current level ?

CREATE

What acts and activities do leaders

invest their time and intelligence in

that they currently don’t undertake ?

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Drawing Leadership Canvas for Front Line Managers

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Drawing Leadership Canvas for Midlevel Managers

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Drawing Leadership Canvas for Senior Managers

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Results of this Transformative Initiative for British Retail Group

• Employee turnover of its 10,000 plus frontline employees dropped

from about 40% to 11%.

• Recruitment and training costs reduced by 50%.

• Customer satisfaction rose by over 30%.

• And the group saved more than $50 million

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