Blues Buster!: Pamela Hawley adds a little levity

This installment is part of our weekly Blues Buster! series - funny, inspirational and real-life stories from within the nonprofit sector.  You can see all of our Blues Busters! on our website.

Pamela energetically answers the phone at 8:30am on a Monday morning. As she describes her most memorable moments in nonprofit work, she shares her views on life and leadership. In a nutshell; keep it in perspective, and don’t forget to laugh.

As Pamela relates, this view was shaped in part by her Father. She vividly recalls a painful time when her Dad turned to her and asked, “Pamela, what will it matter in 10 years?”

In 10 years, she thought? In 10 years we will have forgotten most of these small challenges, in 10 years what I’m working on today may not even be an issue.

Her father wisely reminded her that the significance of a current problem can suddenly be dwarfed by taking the long view. Focusing on doing our best and loving others are the main areas he recommended she focus on. Too often these important values are forgotten in the stress of a single moment.

It was in another tense moment, that Pamela brought her team out of the trenches with this perspective.

“We were in a team meeting, talking about a big marketing issue we’d been facing for months, and the team started to get really low,” Pamela describes.

Team members were exhausted and starting to become hopeless. Pamela describes how the marketing arrangment had been plaguing them for months and – point was – there was nothing they could do. They had done all they could, and it was time to patiently wait. The talking grew more and more frustrated, more and more down.

Pamela took some time to think about this situation and the low tone. In the afternoon, she asked the team for some time. As they turned her desks towards her, she thought of her father’s wise words…and the voice of Mitza Ditz.

Who’s Mitza?

A former inspirational boss? No. A spiritual guru? No.

Mitza Ditz is one of many characters Pamela recreates on stage. That’s right, this go-get-em CEO is also a Groundlings trained improviser. This particular character is a somewhat empty-headed administrative assistant who is gunning for a CEO position.

You can imagine the momentary shock the team felt when the high-pitched, squeaky and slightly New York voice of Mitza cut into the tension, coming out of their CEO, “You know guys, what will it matter in 10 years? Cuz you know there’s only so much you can do…and then you can’t do anymore!” A few smiles and chuckles filled the room. I might as well end up playing all slots casino or any other online casino.

Mitza continued through a rip-roaring pep-talk and then started bringing in friends, too. Pamela switched to another character – a 60 year old rough and tough truck driver named Shel Morgut.

“All right team,” Pamela chortled in a rough, baritone trucker voice, “we gotta keep driving…the most important thing is that donut at the next rest stop. Keep it in perspective!” Soon enough, the team had broken through their hopelessness and was, in fact, laughing out loud.

Pamela describes her motivations in that moment, “You know a good leader is someone who can focus on the team. They have a pulse, a read on how they are feeling. It’s someone who can implement the vision while looking internally at what’s going on inside people. You need to bring levity – both inside and outside.”

Unfortunately for me, I don’t have a boss who does stand-up in the middle of team meetings. And I’m thinking you might not either. But Pamela has offered a solution.

A special delivery just for Blues Buster readers, here’s an inspirational message from Pamela…I mean Ditza…I mean Mitza. May this help you to keep it in perspective…and have a laugh.

Pamela Hawley is the founder and CEO of UniversalGiving™, a web-based marketplace that helps people give and volunteer with the top-performing, vetted organizations all over the world. You can learn more about UniversalGiving at http://www.universalgiving.org/, and more about Pamela Hawley on her blog, Living and Giving.

The 4-Step Performance Coaching Conversation

When organizations are at their best, people clearly understand and are committed to their unique role in helping the company achieve its objectives. Understanding how their work fits with the work of others in the organization gives people a sense of connection and significance. This role clarity results from dialogue and discussion.

If you are finding an employee is not meeting your expectations you may need to provide them more clarity through a performance improvement coaching conversation. A performance improvement coaching conversation is the opportunity to make the future distinct from the past. You may be looking for a shift of thinking, behavior or result from your employee. Your opportunity and role in coaching conversations is to help the employee know your expectations.

How can you approach a coaching conversation?

1. Create a Positive Experience: create an environment that looks forward, strive for solutions rather than beating down the past.
2. Share Your Observations and Expectations: to clarify what you have observed from work output and demonstrated employee behaviors, speak to what you have observed and the specific outcomes
3. Strive: for two-way communication with the employee and begin talking about they can make successful changes.
4. Invite and Include: the employee to help you find a resolution to the problem and increase the probability that they will be invested in making the changes you are asking of them.

Example in Action:

• Create a Positive Experience: "I can tell you that you are highly motivated and want to contribute your efforts towards our organization’s success."
• Share Your Observations and Expectations: "I need to share with you area that I have observed that has the opportunity for better contributions. Is now a good time for me to share this with you?  I have observed that the project status report you are required to complete on a weekly basis by Friday is not always completed on Fridays. It is important to get this report from you on Fridays because the program team uses this data to make decisions about volunteer coordination and timing for the following week. By receiving this report Monday or Tuesday they lose 1 – 2 days in the week by not efficiently allocating program resources resulting in overstaffing on one are of the program over another.
• Strive: "I want to understand what this looks like from your perspective."
• Invite: "Why do you think you are unable to complete the reports by Friday? What gets in your way? Is it a question of quantity, quality, time or resources? How can I help you?"
• Include: "How do you plan to start getting these reports completed by Friday?"

 - Amy Maranowicz, Organizational Development and Training Manager