Blog

Creating Greater Value for CIPD Members

Back in August 2013 I shared some thoughts with the CIPD on how they could move the relationship with their members from something that currently feels quite transactional to something of greater shared value. I mapped out a few things, not including fees and qualifications, which I’ve been meaning to share with you ever since. Yesterday evening I received an email from the CIPD asking me to complete a survey about some of this stuff in my capacity as an affiliate member:

I’d like to get your help and views about some changes we want to make to how we structure CIPD membership and the services we offer to members. We want to ensure we’re evolving membership to meet the changing needs of the profession. So, through this important consultation survey, we’d like to understand the specific professional and personal needs which led you to become an Affiliate Member of CIPD.

I have completed the survey, and because I think this stuff is important and has relevance to people beyond the current membership of the CIPD, here’s what I previously shared with the CIPD:

Creating Greater Value for CIPD Members

This map is more about questions than answers, and I’ll now try and explain a little more of what I was thinking when I drew it up. I’d be really interested in your questions and comments too, whether you’re a member or not.

Participation

An important of feeling a part of a community is participation, whether that is attending local branch events, using the thriving online communities space, taking advantage of membership offers or any number of other things. What does participation mean for CIPD members and how, if they want it, can it happen most effectively?

Events

What opportunities are there for interaction at events? There are plenty, and even though the CIPD has worked hard at the online side of things in recent years, I think that went up another few notches at the annual conference in November. Live streaming some sessions meant that plenty of people who weren’t there were able to get a feel for what is important to the profession. What else could be done to include people unable to be there in person? The HRUnscrambled fringe session Meg Peppin and I facilitated went well and I hope that side of things can be developed in future. How about the way in which speakers are engaged? Could members have a say on some of the content, and who is asked to deliver it? Could you use technology to gather live feedback to inform the dialogue during an event and to get event feedback in the moment?

Communications

I’ve already mention the CIPD online communities which serve members here in the UK well. How can the CIPD reach out and engage with other HR professionals internationally? There have been improvements in the quality of content in People Management magazine – what else could be done to help the flow of information, in all directions?

Consultation

What are the best ways of keeping in touch, of finding out what’s hot and what’s not? There are a number of different methods the CIPD could use to source opinions from members, and importantly, from other interested parties too. Involving people beyond your core community is often overlooked or undervalued when looking to do things differently. With the technology available, reach should not be a problem and for what it’s worth, I think that wide online reach is well supplemented with some more in depth conversational stuff too. As a member or not, what might you expect? Maybe some of the best known HR blogs (People Management published a recommended reading list recently) could form a part of that consultative web?

Broadening Membership

There are a number of professions and organisations the CIPD might work with in order to increase reach and relevance. I wonder what ex members would have to say about the CIPD, and I wonder what might encourage some of them to rejoin? How about the Learning and Development profession? There seems to be a groundswell of interest around L&D again lately, how might that be developed? And what of the many managers out there who are responsible for teams of people and just need some advice and help from time to time. What opportunities could be created to give those people access to important and useful research and more?

Hopefully this will give you some food for thought. This map is not exhaustive, it’s bound to have gaps and as you spot them perhaps you’d like to fill them in?

Post Autocratic Stress Syndrome

I spotted this tweet quote from Neil Denny recently:

“The more a manager controls the more he/she evokes behaviours that necessitate greater control or managing” Covey

The tweet got me thinking about overbearing management styles, and two people in particular. More importantly though, it got me thinking about how organisations perform after an autocrat departs.

autocrat

noun
a ruler who has absolute power.

Sir Alex Ferguson

The former manager of Manchester United, Sir Alex Ferguson, has been getting plenty of airtime lately publicising his autobiography. I’ve not read it and I confess that after listening to him being interviewed on the radio, I’m unlikely to. The way he and others talk about his management style leaves me cold. Arrogance and a desire to bully seems to ooze from his every pore.

Since Ferguson’s departure, the previously hugely succesful Manchester United team has struggled to make its usual impact on the field of play. I may be wrong, I often am, and I think there’s a good chance they won’t be title contenders in the Premiership this season. Fifteen games in and Manchester united are currently in ninth place, and only nine games into the season, they had conceded as many points as in thirty games last season.

Ferguson ruled with a rod of iron, it was his way or the highway. And now he’s gone, despite having another experienced, well respected manager come in to take his place, the team seems lost.

Sir Terry Leahy

The former CEO of Tesco, Sir Terry Leahy, has been quiet of late. In the aftermath of him leaving Tesco, he wrote a book titled Management in Ten Words and then seemed to fade away. Something else has happened since Leahy left Tesco, the company has struggled, compared to its previous unstoppable power. In the year to February 23, 2013, Tesco saw its profits after tax slump from £2.8bn to just £120m because of falling UK sales. They took a £1bn hit to exit the US, and an £804m writedown on UK land. The share price in May 2011 shortly after Leahy left was £4.22, currently it sits around £3.30, and the former chairman Lord MacLaurin has recently criticised the sad legacy left by the outgoing CEO.

Under Leahy, Tesco was well known for screwing its suppliers in order to maximise shareholder profits working with its suppliers to get the best deal for customers, a practice this article in The Grocer says they now say they are trying to change. The article states that Tesco management acknowledges it has been ‘guilty of arrogance, bureaucracy and hierarchy in the past’.

Coincidentally, In a recent Telegraph interview, Ferguson references Leahy.

‘Leadership, as I’ve known it, from my time as manager, has come in different stages. If you look at Sir Terry Leahy, who had a short spell as leader at Tesco, as opposed to my 27 years, the gathering of all the things he learnt, and the qualities he has, is similar to myself, in the sense that he was in control of a big unit.’

I think that part of the problem for both Manchester United and Tesco is that having been ruled over in such a way, people have unlearned how to think for themselves. The squad that David Moyes inherited at Manchester United contains many top quality players, and though I know less about them, I don’t suppose the entire management structure at Tesco are dead weights either. Yet both teams are under performing dramatically.

It must be hard to be humble when you’re being feted, by fans and shareholders alike, but I think part of the true test of leadership goes beyond the immediate tenure of the leader. How do people behave after you’ve gone? Did you co-create something sustainable, or did you craft something so suited to your style that no successor is likely to succeed? In the case of these two examples at least, I think they’re currently coming up short.

Dark Star

Carole bought me a lino cut kit for my birthday and these Christmas cards are my first attempt at using the kit. I’ve printed 20 of these and I’m enjoying the similarities, because all the cards are printed from the same cut, and the differences caused by the amount of ink used, how hard I press, and where I press too.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.