billion dollar win changing the context to improve stakeholder engagement

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'Billion dollar win' - managing challenging stakeholders by shifting the contextIan Sharpe MAIPM CPPD PMP 0403 113 035 ian.sharpe@uxcconsulting.com.au

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Where we’re going today

• High performance in context• Matching proposal team cultures• Changing the context of a client relationship• Questions

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‘Team Social Context’...

… governs human behavior, and therefore team performance

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...it’s so powerful that it drives performance ...

… 75% of the time (Gilbert Model)

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... like iron filings are driven by magnetic force

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...your behaviour would clearly be differentin these different social contexts

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Challenger

Columbia

Hubble

Korean Airlines

Flawed team social contexts drive major failures...

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... Fukushima Daiichi – skills or context?

Final Failure Review Board’s findings:• Reflexive

obedience;• Reluctance to

question authority;

• Devotion to ‘sticking with the program;’

• Groupism;• Insularity

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... however the right social team context enables miracles

…“Failure is not an option”Gene KranzFlight Director, Apollo 13

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So how do we create the social context of a high performing team?

Changing individuals is hard and ‘one at a time’ ...

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... so we manage the ‘force’, not the ‘filings’to align and drive performance

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How do we break the seemingly “mysterious and immeasurable” core of high performance teams

and leaders into fundamental manageable parts?

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Deciding

Information

INTUITED

SENSED

LOGICALEMOTIONAL

First we need to understand what underpins rational behaviour ...

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INTUITED

SENSED

LOGICALEMOTIONAL

CULTIVATINGWe all need to feel appreciated

VISIONINGWe all need hopeful, realistic

futures

INCLUDINGWe all need to feel we belong

DIRECTING We all need the ability to meet

expectations

... then we name the four dimensions (4-D) as requirements to perform well ...

A deep human need is at the core of each Dimension - you must appropriately address all four in building any team

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DIRECTINGNo drama states in team

Everyone knows their partClear and achievable expectations

INTUITED

SENSED

LOGICALEMOTIONAL

CULTIVATINGMutual respect and enjoyable

workHigh trust

Willing and energised

collaboration

VISIONINGGrounded optimism

Sustained, effective creativityPerceiving ‘magical’ solutions

INCLUDINGAligned efficient action

‘We’ not ‘I’High trustworthiness and

efficiency

... define the context of a high performance team for each dimension...

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INTUITED

SENSED

LOGICALEMOTIONAL

CULTIVATINGMutual respect and enjoyable work

High trustWilling and energised collaboration

VISIONINGGrounded optimism

Sustained, effective creativityPerceiving ‘magical’ solutions

INCLUDINGAligned efficient action

‘We’ not ‘I’High trustworthiness and efficiency

DIRECTING No drama states in team

Everyone knows their partClear and achievable expectations

Expressing

authentic

appreciation

Addressing

shared interests

Expressing

reality-based

optimism

Being

Outcome

Focussed

Appropriately

including

others

Making and

keeping realistic

agreements

Resist blaming

and complaining

Clarifying roles,

accountability

and authority

... then set 8 key behaviours that are the strongest and simplest drivers of high performance

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Blue vs. Orange organisational cultures

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Inclusion

Values Vision

Organization/PowerDiagonal Challenge

Blue cultures meet experts’ needs

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Inclusion

Values Vision

Organization/Power

Diagonal Challenge

Orange cultures meet management’s needs

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Which dominates your work culture?

1) We grant ultimate power to:

Our technical “wizards” Our (hierarchal) management

2) Our working processes are:

Unstructured and free Rigorous and disciplined

3) Ultimately

Performance trumps budget Budget trumps performance

4) Our management and admin processes are:

Poorly documented and ad-

hocDocumented and disciplined

5) Our personal communications are:

Brutally frank Polite and tempered

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Proposal team culture matches in

competitions

If mismatched: under stress you will default to the habits of your culture and lose sight of your customer’s.

You can win when your proposal team’s culture matches your customer’s

You will not when you mismatch, if your competition matches them

You Customer

≠

=

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Hubble’s Successor TelescopeJames Webb Space Telescope

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Mr. Customer wants an 8 meter telescope for $500M. Hubble Space Telescope was 2.4 meters and cost $3B!His team is populated by the “best and brightest” scientists with “intellectual air superiority” in the Project. You really want to win so you put Mr. Manager, who recently completed an astronomical telescope on cost and schedule in charge. He selects experienced engineers for his team. Mr. Customer sees advanced technology as the only path to success. Conventional designs are “backups.” You “know better.” Proven approaches will win. Your team focuses in developing details that increasingly show the implausibility of the customer’s vision. Your competitor put a scientist with no hardware experience in charge. He is promoting risky, high-promise solutions. You are sure that these will not appeal to the customer and that he will choose your expensive conventional design.

(Visioning) Dimension)

(Visioning Dimension)

(Directing Dimension)

(Directing Dimension)

(Visioning)

(Directing Dimension)

(Visioning Dimension)

(Directing Dimension)

Is there any possibility that you will win this competition?

Cultural sanity check

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The proposal team prepares for orals

• The proposal team was preparing for their final

presentation to their customer and the manager asked for

help

• More than $1Billion on the line

• Loss seemed likely – tough competition; incumbent

• Charlie found himself on a telco with 20 people, most with no knowledge of 4-D Systems or the Context Shifting Worksheet (CSW)

• He explained the basic idea and had them each create a rough CSW

• They proceeded create competitive advantage by shifting the context, as follows

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5: DIRECTING DIMENSION

Any Drama-states you need to process and exit?

Any unclear Roles, Accountability, or Authority

statements or processes?

Situation you want to resolve:_______________________________________________________________________________________

• Outcome you are committed to realizing: __________________________________________________________________________

• Your “Red” limiting Story-lines:______________________________________________________________________________________

• Your “Green” empowering Story-lines: ______________________________________________________________________________

• Your experience & expression of emotions: _________________________________________________________________________

3: INCLUDING DIMENSION

Who needs to feel included, and how can you

ensure this?

What implicit or explicit agreements have you

broken that you must now process?

2: CULTIVATING DIMENSION

Who needs to feel appreciated, and how can you

ensure this?

What do they want that you can want for them

also?

4: VISIONING DIMENSION

What uncomfortable reality must you confront to

create the Outcome you want?

How Committed (in %) are you to realizing the

above Outcome?

We are in a tough $1B competition and must win

Our competitor is cheating, it’s hopeless. Social context management program success

??

Stop blaming the customer

Flow RAAs, to meet customer desires

Weakness in thermal ability ++

To Win Good contract, happy customer, sanityVictim

Anxious (Scared-group)

No one

Science results. Program success

None

100% to Customer & Project success

Their fair & open process

Missed some deadlines

Just us Management, their sponsors

Excited (Glad)

Shifting the context towards success

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What they then agreed to do:

1. Acknowledged about broken agreements in the past,

and what they were doing to avoid them re-occuring

2. Told the truth about the thermal shielding experience

challenge

3. Proposed a collaborative approach to address it

4. Defined what roles were seen as needed to ensure

accountability and to work together

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... and the result?

By teaching us how to understand our customer's mindset and then to authentically shape our offering in response, he helped us win three major competitive proposals

Greg Davidson, Director of Capture and Proposal Operations, Northrop Grumman Space Technology

worth $9 billion

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