Third opinion in leadership

Lal Fonseka Productivity Consultant, Brandix Lanka Limited

One big theme emerges in today’s business management is the challenge of staying ahead of the business.

All the chief executives I met during my long career were leading their businesses through turbulent times, finding in themselves previously unexplored supplies of resilience and optimism. But here is the problem: as they use up the energy, learning and insight that they have gathered from their years in business, where will their new learning come from? How do they replenish those stores of expertise? While they are ensuring that the people around them grow and develop, how do they make sure that they do likewise?

One might argue on saying that this is not a new challenge. In my view it is much more urgent these days, because everyone is running so fast that it is harder to keep ahead. Most of the management gurus in the world interpret business as speed. In order to be at the top of the business world, there is nothing that chief executive officers (CEOs’) could do today other than having a network of advisers and peer mentors. But are they willing to have this network? This is the biggest question most of the businesses face today. But the best CEOs know that they already have a solution: they have a network of advisers and peer

Mentors. These are people they may have met in the course of their working lives or by working with companies that specialize in peer mentoring. All of these leaders know that they need an experienced adviser and sounding board, someone who has stood in their shoes.

We could name these advisers "third opinions." Certain scholars argue that most leaders tend to get advice from technical experts (who see everything through the lens of their discipline) and from their management teams (who all have their own agendas). Such input is essential, part of the natural course of business.

But no leader will thrive without a third opinion -- insight from someone outside the business, without an agenda, who has only your company's interests at heart. A third opinion is a thinking partner: not someone with answers, but a partner with whom you can think more profoundly about the future. No leader can succeed without at least one such adviser. In a certain organization, I observed that their chairman is such a person who had turned around businesses into successful entities. His main responsibility in this organization is giving advises to the other board members though he is not fully involved in day to day operation.

During my long career, still I see a number of CEOs who have always worked alone, thinking they can still manage that way. But I also see them thrashing and exhausted; the times are just too volatile for soloists. All great leaders know that the best way to grow a business is to grow its people. But the very best know that that has to include the leaders themselves.

Okay, so the English equivalent is “two heads are better than one,” but the Japanese say three instead of two and, rather than comparing it negatively to one person.

But even outside the Asian group-oriented mindset, it is common knowledge that when you are stuck with a problem it helps to ask others for advice. By consulting your peers, you will attract more wisdom. Even if you fancy yourself a “lone wolf” or do not wish to burden others with your problems, ultimately those who do will benefit from combining intellects.

Still one could argue working on your own is surely better. What they say is working on their own, preferably in their own office, at their own computer with the phone disconnected and the blackberry on silent, means more work is done and to a better standard. It is just human nature right? Give us a problem to solve on our own and we are much quicker at finding the answer, right? Wrong!

On a study of 760 students, researchers from an American university tested the relationship between group size and performance by comparing how a number of problems were solved in groups and by individual participants.

The students, from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, solved two letters-to-numbers coding problems firstly on their own and then in groups of one, two, three, four and five.

The study concluded that people solved problems both more effectively and more efficiently in the larger groups, with groups of three, four and five consistently solving the problems quicker and more accurately.

The psychologists attributed this performance to the definitive ability of humans to work alongside one another and generate good combined techniques and eventually better ideas.

You know, it's the old "two heads are better than one"; although this in fact proved that "three, four or five heads are better than one or two".

Working with other people helps groups to: "reject erroneous responses and effectively process information," said lead author Patrick Laughlin, PhD, of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Working in teams is an extremely effective way to ensure that objectives are met, and according to the latest research, spending time improving the way your business uses teams plays a very important part in increasing productivity. So, what solutions do we have to ensure that your teams are working cohesively?

Some researchers have found that the potential performance of a team is greater than the sum of its parts, it is important to get all the participants together to understand these theories as well as the importance of their team and the benefits of working together.

Companies which successfully utilize teams benefit from "team responses".

These include a heightened level of responsibility for decisions, greater synergy, higher levels of commitment, clear and honest self-evaluation, and a team willing to seek new approaches to challenges as well as increased positivity, productivity and decisiveness. But how do you know when your team is not working effectively?

Terry Orlick, Ph.D., the president of the International Society for Mental Training and Excellence, describes companies which suffer from low team effectiveness as: "trying to pick up a pencil with only one finger...Even if that one finger is extremely strong, it will prove almost impossible to pick up that pencil unless you use your other fingers or some other part of your hand. Teamwork is a bit like using all of your fingers. Each one is unique and contributes something different, but they unite in pursuit of a common goal."