Imagination isn’t just for flights of fancy, those momentary departures from the day-to-day.

Imagination can take you far if you tap it in productive ways.

You can’t depend on your judgment when your imagination is out of focus.
Wallace Stevens

It is still an unending source of surprise for me how a few scribbles on a blackboard or on a piece of paper can change the course of human affairs.
Stanislaw Ulam

The mere formulation of a problem is far more essential than its solution…To raise new questions, new possibilities, to regard old problems from a new angle requires creative imagination and marks real advances in science.
Albert Einstein

There is no terror in a bang, only in the anticipation of it.
Alfred Hitchcock

Imagination is something that sits up with Dad and Mom the first time their teenager stays out late.
Lane Olinghouse

Have you ever been blindsided, whether by difficult circumstances or by opportunity?

Given the past year of sudden, significant change in the national and world economy, and other changes, as well, it is likely that many people would now say “Yes!” to that question who previously might have said, “Hmmm, let me think…”

If you had anticipated and been ready for any sudden change of events you experienced, would that have affected the decisions or actions you took? And had you been well-prepared to handle those circumstances, how might it have changed the final outcome?

Be better prepared the next time the twists and turns in the road ahead are sharp and sudden. Scenario analysis, a simple planning tool, can help you.

Consider this – would you go onstage in a Broadway play, in the pool at the Olympics, or into battle without significant planning, preparation and practice, having taken into account a huge range of possible outcomes and contingencies?

Scenario analysis sounds complicated, but it’s not. It works by loosening your grip on the future you now expect. It opens your eyes to many possible futures, and helps you prepare for seemingly far-fetched circumstances that can, in fact, become real.

In its simplest possible form, scenario analysis is a brainstorming tool. It generates critical team dialogue, and heightens awareness in the team of cues and data you can monitor to anticipate and be prepared for whatever happens. The process of building scenarios increases the flexibility and quality of your planning, and improves your responsiveness. You’re essentially beginning to rehearse how you’d handle each circumstance, when you create each scenario.

Here’s a simple approach to use scenario planning for a future challenge:

Prepare

1. Define the problem. What’s your challenge, in one sentence?

2. List the primary forces that could drive change in this situation. For example, is availability of qualified employees critical? Are economic trends, regulatory issues, industry or technology trends important to you – or could they be? What other major forces must you monitor and be ready to respond to quickly, and well?

3. Create a matrix. On the left side, list the primary forces that could drive change. Across the top of the matrix, list these outcomes: “best possible case,” “most likely case,” and “worse possible case.”

Be there

1. Imagine you’re in the middle of the “best possible case,” “most likely case,” and “worst case” for each driving force. Write a few details about each circumstance on the matrix to capture your ideas. For example, do you anticipate the supply of qualified employees to be excellent now and for a long time to come? Or are you concerned about major demographic changes that may reduce the number of strong candidates available to you for as long as you need them? What is the most likely situation?

2. Stretch even further. What circumstance could be even better than you’ve imagined for each driving force? What could be even worse than you dared to picture? Working through these extreme outcomes leads to new insights. Many companies have found that these stress scenarios, especially, accelerate their preparation, teamwork, trust and resiliency.

3. Build the most likely scenario. Is it still the picture you originally imagined when you began? The odds are that having stretched your thinking, you see some new areas of caution or opportunity.

Save and compare

By this point, you may have accomplished as much as you want to with this simple version of scenario analysis. Or you can do further work, gathering data and doing detailed analysis to identify which scenario is most likely.

Whether your work now is done, or you’re doing more research, save your matrix for later use. Capture key scenarios in some way, such as through drawings, metaphors or by writing a phrase that expresses each possible circumstance succinctly.

Some time in the future, compare what actually happened with the scenarios you imagined. You might be surprised at the quality of the crystal ball you created with this simple exercise.

However you plan and prepare for the future, rest assured that it won’t be a simple extension of the past. Scenario analysis can help you be ready, long before you get there.

Decision-making is harder for some people than others.

And for some, it’s easier than it should be…if they don’t make good use of good information that’s available to them before they choose a course of action.

Speaking for just myself, I’ll “fess up” to having made both types of decision-making mistakes, and having learned plenty from them.

Either way, decision-making, like any process, gets better with practice.

Here’s what a few others have to say on the habit of making decisions…or not:

When you cannot make up your mind which of two evenly balanced courses of action you should take – choose the bolder.
William Joseph Slim

Indecision is debilitating; it feeds upon itself; it is, one might almost say, habit-forming. Not only that, but it is contagious; it transmits itself to others.
H. A. Hopf

Choose always the way that seems the best, however rough it may be. Custom will soon render it easy and agreeable.
Pythagoras

We choose our joys and sorrows long before we experience them.
Kahlil Gibran

The search for the perfect venture can turn into procrastination. Your idea may or may not have merit. The key is to get started.
Unknown

We know what happens to people who stay in the middle of the road. They get run over.
Aneurin Bevan

Whenever you see a successful business, someone once made a courageous decision.
Peter Drucker

Nothing is more difficult, and therefore more precious, than to be able to decide.
Napoleon Bonaparte

There is no more miserable human being than one in whom nothing is habitual but indecision.
William James

Wrong!

Decision-making is where the strengths and weaknesses of a team – or a company – rapidly become apparent. Ask a senior manager or any employee at your company how well the decision-making works. You’re likely to hear frustration and at least a few ideas about how to make better decisions, such as:

• Decisions never really happen around here; or if they do, they take forever. Everyone has an opinion on everything. Nobody has any real facts.

• We spend a lot of time gathering loads of information, and then our manager does what he wants, even if the data we gather points to a different direction than the one he takes.

• The team makes a decision, but as soon as the meeting is over and the members go their separate ways, many of them undercut the decisions. There’s no real teamwork in our group, just the appearance of it in meetings.

Do any of these comments sound familiar? If so, there are ways you can improve the decision-making process, enabling you to save time and money and improve the goodwill of your employees.

1. Decide How to Decide
2. Frame the Decision
3. Gather Information
4. Decide – Draw a Conclusion
5. Evaluate and Improve

1. Decide How to Decide

Before your group meets to discuss a new project or issue, choose the people who will contribute to the decision and what role each person will play. Communicate the process and roles to everyone involved, so you eliminate the potential for misunderstanding. Additional questions to consider include:

• Who usually makes this type of decision and how? What’s the best way to make this decision – independently, in a group, by consensus, majority vote, or some other way?

• Whom does this decision affect? What impact does this decision have?

• How will you best spend your time during the process? Determine what you can delegate and what you must do yourself.

• What are the largest risks involved in making this decision, and how can you reduce those risks?

• Will you use a linear process? It may be better to “chunk” this decision into smaller ones that can be made concurrently or sequentially.

• Do you have prior experience you can draw on to make this decision? Are there others from whom you could learn in order to improve the process before proceeding?

• Are the deadlines real? Does your team really need to make a decision now?

• What natural biases do you have that could influence the way you seek or evaluate the information necessary to make a decision?

2. Frame the Decision

Be clear about the problem you’re addressing. Create a clear, common vision of a good decision and its outcome. This can take some time, but it’s time well spent, as it focuses the rest of the decision-making process. Define the specific criteria you’ll use to make the decision, based on stakeholder requirements for a good outcome. Make sure everyone who is involved knows the criteria.

3. Gather Information

Decide what information you must have to make the decision and when and how you need it. It’s easy to spend a lot of time and effort gathering information that’s not actually needed or used. Make sure to gather some information that tests and challenges your basic assumptions in case they’re wrong. This is especially important in situations where conditions are changing rapidly and the cost of a wrong decision is high. Record your assumptions, so you can return to them later when needed.

4. Decide – Draw a Conclusion

When the pressure is on, as it often is, stick with the well-planned process you’ve created. This is especially important – and difficult – if the team is losing focus and starting to react rather than act. Keep everyone directed towards the clear vision you used to frame your decision at the beginning of the process.

If you can’t draw a conclusion, identify what the barriers are and resolve them. Then try again. This may take longer than you had planned, or feel you can take, but you’re likely to spend less time than if you don’t pause to fix the problem – even if you consult an outside expert to help. You don’t want your team stuck in a “spin cycle” of inaction or infighting, which can be very expensive and damaging to the group.

5. Evaluate and Improve

Set up a way to learn from the process you’ve used, so you can improve decision making in the future. When enough time has passed to see the results, but not so much that it’s no longer fresh, take some time to:

• Record what you thought would happen, your assumptions and predictions.

• Compare the results with what you expected to occur. Be careful here. It’s easy to rewrite history (intentionally or accidentally) to make it fit the way things happened. To learn and improve, you need to take an honest look at how the process worked – or didn’t.

• If the process worked, congratulate yourselves. Record what you did so you can repeat the process the next time. If it didn’t go well, make note of why and what you’d do differently next time to improve the experience and outcome.

Finally, keep in mind that decision-making is a process; and like any process, you can improve it – often significantly.

Michael, if you can’t pass, you can’t play.
Coach Dean Smith to Michael Jordan his first year at UNC

We must all hang together, or assuredly, we shall all hang separately.
Benjamin Franklin

The ratio of “we’s” to “I’s” is the best indicator of the development of a team.
Lewis Ergen

A group becomes a team when each member is sure enough of himself and his contribution to praise the skills of the others.
Norman Shidle

Gettin’ good players is easy. Gettin’ ‘em to play together is the hard part.
Casey Stengel

You look around the room and think, “OH, NO…do we HAVE to work together? THIS team?”

Yes, you do.

Increasingly, teamwork is the way that work gets done in organizations. It can be the best and fastest way to get the input and buy-in of many people when a new idea, product or process is moving through. If they are managed well, teams can produce excellent results.
You may like the emphasis on teamwork. You may not. The bottom line is that, in all likelihood, you need to learn to work well on a team, even if you did not volunteer for it…even if it is the Team from, well…

Here’s the problem
Working and managing in teams has its benefits, but it also has its costs. Here are a few:

Teams are not for every task.
They’re great for circumstances where many parts of a company have a high stake in the outcome. On the other hand, they’re costly when the risks of turf wars or other drama are higher than the benefits of working together. Much energy can be lost trying to pull everyone together if you’re looking for something – a common goal – that is not there.

Some people aren’t team players.
It’s just the way it is. Trying to get non-team players to play well with others can be a bit like trying to load a feisty cat into a cage for a trip to the vet (Tip: use gravity in your favor).

Some people say “yes” when they should (or want to) say “no.”
This is a good first test. If the team is loaded with “yes” people, you may think you have easy consensus ahead, but may not find out until the finish line that you may have been dealing with an underground situation that was a mess that just hadn’t surfaced…yet. You may also find that crucial information was not brought forward in time to respond to it well, or at all.

You may be working with an archaic or inflexible plan.
It may be one that didn’t have a chance of succeeding even before the race began. Plans must adapt and change because the world changes from one minute to the next, in expected and unexpected ways.

Here’s what works

The next time you’re on a team of reluctant players – whatever your role – use your influence to make sure you have these elements of successful teamwork in place, and in play:

1. A clear game.
2. Clear roles and rules.
3. A clear plan.
4. Honesty.
5. Flexibility.

Make it clear what the game is.
If the game is clear to all the people in charge (and that isn’t always the case), make sure it’s clear to the players, and keep the game in front of them throughout the race. Make it clear, as well, what the competition is, and how your success is being measured during, and at the end of the race.

The roles and rules of the game must be clear and make sense.
Who’s driving? Who’s navigating? Who’s filling the gas? (And who’s buying snacks?) Are they the right players for those positions? What are the criteria for selecting them: skills, potential, experience, or a combination of all three?

The game plan must be solid, clear and compelling.
How many days do you expect it to take to get to Phoenix, if that’s where you’re going, and how will you know you’re on the right path? How will you know when you have arrived? What tasks are involved in getting to your destination? Who is responsible for each one?

Honesty with yourself and others is critical.
At the beginning of the project, honesty in planning sets a solid base. As the project progresses, if you are dealing with fiction, there is no telling what result you will get. Go for honesty throughout, in data, in appraisal of your progress, in discussion of what the data show, and what you’ll do if the answer is “Whoa! What’s going on here?” Honesty about the attention, time, and energy that each person can and will commit to the effort is critical, too.

Finally, flexibility (or is that “FINALLY, flexibility!”).
Once you know where things really stand – fact, not fiction – then you can adapt your well-crafted plan, if needed. You don’t want to be so adaptable that you can’t say no when that is the right thing to do to keep the “idea-rich” members of your team adequately and consistently focused on the goal. Put your best problem-dissolving and opportunity-enhancing ideas into play, so that they contribute to the common goal.

It’s almost inevitable that you, too, will find yourself someday a member of a team that has misgivings about its mission. You can help make that reluctant, even recalcitrant team work in ways that are good, better, best, building for all of you a legacy of success.

Many attempts to communicate are nullified by saying too much.
Robert Greenleaf

Nature gave us one tongue and two ears so we could hear twice as much as we speak.
Epictetus

Only if we can restrain ourselves is good conversation possible. Good talk rises upon much discipline.
John Erskine

The greatest gift you can give another is the purity of your attention.
Richard Moss

Everybody’s talking.

Cell phones are everywhere.

Meetings fill calendars, and spill over into spontaneous, sometimes simultaneous hallway and parking lot conversations. People tumble over each trying to get airtime, bandwidth and mindshare.

With all that talking…is anybody listening?

There’s a bottom line reason for learning to listen well.

Good listeners get a job done better, faster, with less waste and rework. They “get the order right” the first time.

Listening well can also be a creative process. Great listeners get good – and better – ideas by listening to their customers and colleagues well. In addition, listening is a gift, in a way.

Experts suggest that for many people, it is more important to feel heard than to actually get what they say they want. They want to know their ideas, their opinions were fully considered before a decision was made.

Alternatively, feeling ignored or misunderstood is stressful, no matter what circumstance we’re in.

Listening isn’t easy to do, or there would be more of it. Many people assume it’s automatic, like eating, laughing or breathing.

It’s no surprise, though, if you know fewer than a handful of great listeners.

If you didn’t have great listeners to learn from, you can start today to learn to listen well, and help others on your team learn these skills.

Follow these basic steps:

1. Prepare
2. Engage
3. Respond

Prepare
If you have a chance to prepare ahead of time, take a few minutes to focus. What’s the discussion going to be about? What’s the desired outcome? Is it for the speaker to share information? To get advice? To be heard? For the two of you to reach an agreement, or make a decision?

Also, review what you already know from prior meetings or communications. The speaker may want to continue that thread of conversation. Or this discussion may be completely new. Go into it with an open mind.

Engage
Face the speaker. Establish and maintain eye contact. Give him or her your full attention. You know what it’s like to receive full attention – do that.

Screen out distractions. Turn off your cell phone. Get away from your computer. Close the door.

Be interested – or find a way to get interested – in the subject. Listen to the words, and try to picture what the speaker is saying. At the same time, try to understand the feelings the speaker is trying to convey. Notice nonverbal communication – expressions, posture, pace, pitch.

If this is a difficult conversation, be especially careful to listen more than you speak. Let the speaker’s words, ideas, and feelings in – whatever they are – before you react or respond.

Respond
Ask clarifying questions, but wait for the speaker to end speaking before you do. Then wait a second longer.

Don’t ask artificial questions – those you don’t really care about. Ask questions to clarify or deepen understanding.

Reflect and encourage the speaker’s thoughts and feelings, using his or her words.

The discussion should be a flow, not a series of jerky conversational stops and starts, like being on a city bus in heavy traffic.

Share your thoughts, if appropriate. Be careful here. Remember the purpose of the conversation. It may be more important for you to let the conversation to be mostly one-sided – with you as the listener – rather than for you to share ideas and thoughts, as well.

Using a few of these ideas, or better ones of your own, may your next conversation be a great one, and may your next “listening” go well.

Intellectuals solve problems; geniuses prevent them.
Albert Einstein

There’s a difference between being busy and being productive.
Kristen Lippincott

One must develop skills that stretch capacities, that make one more
than what one is.
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

The work of the individual still remains the spark that moves
mankind forward.
Igor Sikorsky

Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.
Seneca

Listening to baseball trade news one day a few years ago, I asked our son, Matt, how a baseball player suddenly stops being a member of one team, then just as suddenly becomes a member of a competing team.

“How do you think a manager makes a player an ‘Oriole’ instead of an ‘Oakland A’?” I asked. I imagined a clear process, tools, and messages a manager must surely use to rapidly get the old team out of the player’s system, and the new one in.

Matt thought a moment. “Well, a ritual would be good, as a start,” he said.

Out of curiosity, I asked my husband the same question. “How do you make an ‘Oriole’ out of an ‘Oakland A’?” he asked, trying to understand the question.

“You just buy his contract and he walks in the clubhouse,” he answered.

That’s it??? New team, new clubhouse, new uniform, that’s it?

Too often when a new person joins a team – and there’s lots of change and “reteaming” occurring at many companies – that pretty much is it.

What’s the cost of a poorly managed start? Well, it may inspire the new person to start looking for the exit right away, if he or she has other good options. And if not, at a minimum, it creates a bad and lasting first impression. It reduces new employees’ enthusiasm for your company or team, right from the start.

And confusion and frustration start to build, right from day one. Tales spread to the new team member’s or new hire’s friends of, “Be glad you don’t work here…” Results fall short of where they could be, would be with clear direction, communication, roles, responsibilities and work practices.

Pause for a moment to remember – or imagine – your ideal first day on a new team, or at a new company.

What makes it great? How does your new team leader or employer build on the energy, enthusiasm and drive you bring with you when you first open the door to new opportunity?

What gives you the direction, tools and support you need to focus, take action, get traction, and start producing well as soon as possible?

If you’re a manager or team leader, here are a few things to think about, manage and communicate well in order to make your new team members or employees successful, right from the beginning.

1. WELCOME
How will the new person come on board the first day? Who will he or she meet? Why? When? How? Where will he or she work? Are the right office space, equipment, building and computer access, and supplies ready for the new hire?

2. VISION
Start with the Big Picture. What is the vision your group is driving toward, by when? Make it very clear and compelling. What, specifically, will success look like when you get there? How is it different from the way things are now?

3. MISSION
Why does your group exist? Who are your customers, the people you serve, and what do you provide them? Why does the new employee’s job exist?

4. VALUES
What beliefs and assumptions are important to the group, and guide decisions and behavior?

5. OBJECTIVES
What are the group’s goals for this year? For the next five years? What are your goals for the new employee for the next year? The next six months? The first month?

6. PERSONAL OBJECTIVES
What personal objectives does the new person have for this job? If he or she has one, what is the “test” he must pass, or the hurdle he must overcome in order to feel successful before moving on to the next job?

7. PROCESSES
Who are the new person’s customers? What products and services will he or she provide them? What are the customers’ requirements for each product or service? What business processes is the employee involved in, or does he or she “own?”

8. MEASURES
How will the employee get feedback about the quality of the work customers receive from him or her? How will you monitor the person’s progress and success? What measures can the person use to monitor and manage his or her performance?

9. COMMUNICATIONS AND INFORMATION
What information, meetings, reports and other communications do you use in your group? What information and communication channels will the new person use to manage and ensure success in this job?

10. TOOLS
What procedures and forms and other tools will the person regularly use? Where can he or she access and learn how to use them?

11. TRAINING
What training can the employee take to increase his or her chances of success? When and how will the training be available?

12. SUPPORT SYSTEMS
What support systems are available to help the person be successful? What coaching and mentoring can he or she expect? Will that occur through regular meetings, reports, team or peer discussions, or some form of outside coaching?

13. CULTURE
What drew most new people to this company or to this group? What keeps them here? What will employees miss when they move on to other teams or other jobs? What rituals and traditions does the group have? What’s the “currency of attention” in this group? What legends do people tell about the group’s past challenges and achievements?

14. REWARDS
The new person is certainly aware of the financial rewards of the position he or she is taking. What other rewards and recognition do members of this group receive? What criteria are used to select how the rewards and recognition are given?

Of course there’s much more to consider when you bring new team members or employees on board, but this gets you underway. When you give each new member of your team a strong foundation, a clear destination, path and measures, you’ve given them a great start to success…theirs, and yours, as a team, as well.