A521.6.3.RB_SienkiewiczRaymond

In his text The Leader's Guide to Storytelling, Stephen Denning identifies six characteristics of high performance teams (which so happen to align as well with some characteristics of community). These include:

• Actively shaping expectations of those using the team's inputs
• Rapidly adjusting to changing situations
• Growing steadily stronger
• Has members growing as individuals
• Fueled by interpersonal commitments
• Work with a shared passion

In short, a high performance team is a dynamic entity, made up of individuals truly committed to each other and their respective mission. They grow individually and together, and know enough about their strengths and weaknesses to communicate that to those outside of the team.

In my recent experience, the team I worked with on the transition of maintenance responsibilities of select pieces of equipment had some of these elements present. We communicated very frankly on what we could and could not do, as well as just how long it could take. We also got very good at doing somewhat rapid overhauls of our slide decks to accommodate the preferences and requests of our leadership. Finally, we all had developed better individual understandings of the systems and procedures involved, and did our best to help each other out as a matter of principal. Admittedly though, the passion was somewhat lacking. Most of our interest in the project was the product of not wanting to be further hassled by our leadership, and the common mood was more getting what we could done and over with as the project was widely recognized to be rather difficult and cumbersome to work with.

On a further note of high performance team, Denning writes that in cases where there is a poor opinion of collaboration, there are other factors at work besides the concept itself. In part, he notes that systems for incentives and the like tend to be individually focused in nature, but he also adds that "...the root cause lies deeper: collaboration rests on values." Just because people are thrown together into a work unit with a common goal doesn't necessarily translate to believing in the same things. In the case of my most recent team project, we didn't exactly have much in the way of explicitly stated values per se, but we did seem to have in mind the common interest at least of minimizing frustrations for both ourselves and our respective units. We were also driven in part by the ever present values shared among us to do the best we could for the overall good of the unit and our mission set. I suppose you could say we were pragmatic about the whole thing, but we wanted to do good by our greater team as well.

Later in the same chapter, Denning discusses four distinct patterns of people working together, to include work groups (where every member has a task but doesn't necessarily need to collaborate), teams (where people work together with a very high degree of interaction), communities (people of a common value and interest set gathering), networks (acquainted individuals sharing information, but not necessarily building relationships).

I can think of a couple different experiences in discussing these  patterns. During the course of my undergraduate education, I've run into a number of work groups and they weren't necessarily great experiences. Often times, we would divide the work between us and work on our respective pieces. We usually succeeded and got the job done in the end. However, like the book noted, there was not a great deal of collaboration and there was little to nothing developed in the way of developing a deeper rapport or getting to know our strengths and weaknesses. On the other hand, I've also had the opportunity more recently to work on something more akin to a team when I was working on an equipment transition team. Although I've said in the past this wasn't the most pleasant task and we were more driven by a desire to have it done and over with, we did in fact collaborate. Among the three of us young officers, we understood that each of us brought something to the table, whether it be knowledge of the systems or the ability to take decent notes. We also recognized the fact that we had to actively collaborate on behalf of our respective work centers, and we even got other people talking and collaborating. The good news out of all of this is that even as we got assigned other tasks to contend with, the project is still moving along fairly well considering the sheer scope and the limited timelines.

A521.5.8.RB_SienkiewiczRaymond

Not too long ago, a friend of mine who is also a new officer had an interesting issue in his section regarding some leave requests that were put in for a couple of his guys. Two people had put in their leave requests to two separate mid level supervisors for the section, and had received approval. It wasn't until later when it was passed up to my friend that the two requests were compared, and it was discovered that not only were both requests for the same time period, but it would leave the section undermanned.

Ordinarily, leave requests are granted without any trouble at all. After all, leave is something all personnel are given and are encouraged to take. On top of that, it looks bad for the unit if personnel have their leave requests denied, as this indicates either the leadership isn't putting a particularly high priority on welfare, or there's a severe enough problem in workload management that it's tying people down. However, there is always an ever present obligation to meet the needs of the mission, and supervisors can give mission requirements as a justification for denying leave if they really must. Usually though, people that have to work outside their normal hours receive some form of comp time.

This produced for my friend a bit of a conflict: He had an obligation to take care of his people, but he also had an obligation to keep his section running.

In the end, one of the original requests got the dates adjusted for unrelated reasons and this removed the conflict, but my friend was getting ready to back fill the two positions for that leave period. He had gone around the office and asked those of us who had experience in the section if we could help out, and he was prepared to chip in some extra time in the office as well. He could have randomly picked one guy and had them take the brunt of the hard lesson on coordination, but instead he opted to do what he could that would allow his guys to take their time off while minimizing the impact on the rest of the office.

It may not seem like very much, but this story illustrates how seriously we take the leave requests that make up part of our "care for people" equation. No one particularly enjoys having to sort out such matters when it happens, but when we're called upon to do so we do whatever we can to work our available resources to accommodate. Those same people will, in turn, will usually chip in where needed to help out their peers and subordinates. We get the job done, but we'll always take care of our people at the end of the day. We're proof that any organization work its salt can do both and be successful.

A521.5.4.RB_SienkiewiczRaymond

In his book The Leader's Guide to Storytelling, Stephen Denning identifies the three basic components of a genuinely ethical community. These include: trust (a general expectation that members will be ethical with one another), loyalty (an acceptance of the need to not breach that trust and fulfill related duties) and solidarity (caring for others and being ready to act on their behalf, even if  there's conflict with personal interests).

With my organization, the Core Values of Integrity First and Service Before Self match up well to the all of the components in one aspect or another. There is a general expectation of honesty among people that join the service, and to paraphrase some thought from my commander, he implicitly trusts anyone he works with unless they give him reason not to. In the even that people are caught lying about shortcomings, problems, accomplishment of tasks or otherwise, there are usually consequences. In short, the value of integrity creates a general expectation and climate of ethics (trust), and creates an obligation to maintain trust and to do their job (loyalty).

On the note of Service Before Self, this exemplifies the overall values of doing good work, taking care of the mission, and taking care of your people before your own needs. Perhaps one would rather head home right on time and let things slide until the morning, or they'd rather pass a task on to someone else because they don't feel like doing it. But, by undertaking service before self and acting in solidarity, they get out their with their guys and stay a little later, or they help out with the workload so everyone has a fair share. They live out the adage of "mission first, people always."

If values are ever lacking, it is usually within sub-organizations such as bases or individual squadrons. Within the group that my squadron falls under, I would think we could

A521.5.1.RB_SienkiewiczRaymond

Quintessential Career's values test indeed proved to be an interesting and revealing exercise for this week. I hadn't previously given a whole lot of thought to my own values beyond those related to general moral beliefs or life philosophies, but thinking about work related values offered a good opportunity for reflection.

A lot of my number one priority values seemed to be reasonably in line with my workplace's values, to include placing a high value on integrity and truth, order, solid work-life balance, making a positive impact, and to some measure having a sense of adventure or blazing a new trail. Certainly, integrity is the first of the Core Values we're taught in training, a need for order is evident in our chain of command, and there's frequently emphasis on maintaining a balance between work and family. A positive impact on society, and activities such as travel and seeing the world are also some of the more often cited motivations for joining the military.

However, there was some notable differences in values. One thing I put down as a number one priority is work that involves creativity or building. Unfortunately, at least within my workplace, much of our daily tasks are highly regimented, even down to slide formatting. Additionally, the average officer is usually expected to be acting in more of a managerial role by receiving tasks and requirements for upper level leadership and then delegating it out to their subordinates. Admittedly, this particular values conflict has become apparent in recent weeks in what I feel is an increasing disinterest in the work I usually get that often focuses on meetings, e-mails, and administrative matters when I'd prefer to be getting hands on with a task.

Another interesting difference is my opinion on competition, leadership, and decision making. Being an officer always carries a certain level of competition, as you're constantly being stratified against your peers for ratings and awards. I marked a very low priority on high competition. Much of an officer's job description consists of being a leader, which of course involves varying levels of leadership and decision making. These are also areas I marked as very low priority, being a more laid back and even somewhat indecisive individual.

That's not to say that particular conflict has no means of being mitigated or assuaged. I had the opportunity to bring up that disconnect to my supervision and they actually thought it would be very beneficial for me to get some hands on experience with the equipment we maintain in order to better understand it, have an appreciation for the labor and logistics involved, and have the additional benefit of having an officer coming down from the office and working alongside the troops.

As for my present thoughts on leadership and decision making, I suppose one could say my decision to enter the service involved in part a decision to give myself some "exposure therapy." Ideally, by being thrown into situations where I'd have to lead or make a decision, I would inevitably have to practice those values, become more comfortable with them, and eventually be able to make them without a lot of fuss. I'd say there has been some improvement over the last several years in terms of actual execution, and I don't get too hung up on the need to do it. Although I don't plan on consciously seeking out a top leadership position whenever I decide to enter the civilian workforce, I'm attempting to mitigate this part of the values conflict through a conscious decision to try and embrace it for what it's worth.

A521.4.3.RB_SienkiewiczRaymond

Within my line of work, exposure to, as well as the occasional use of, incongruent messages comes with the territory. Somewhat more often when I first came into my job, I'd have to try and explain a technical issue or procedure to a member of our client unit, and they would often want very specific timelines, details, or some kind of guarantee. Of course, computers can be very fickle and there's something of an unofficial rule that we never use definite words like "will," but rather say "that particular box should be working fine," or "we should be done on time." We consciously used that particular verbal modifier as a layer of protection in case things didn't go as planned, as our Type-A clients at the time tended to see technical issues as a foul on us.

Beyond that, I can say I still have a lot of work to do with keep my paralanguage in check. Although my actions in doggedly chasing down issues was enough to build credibility, I can think of a few occasions where I didn't have the best of articulation, resonance, or volume when I was trying to work my way through a brief or rundown of an issue, and thus didn't come off as highly confident in the information. This, of course, resulted in some incongruence being sent my way in the form of a more senior officer from our client unit stepping in closer from the "social" to the "personal" space, perhaps exercising some hidden agenda styles such as "I'm good (but you're not)" or "I know it all" with regards to having a handle on the overarching situation. In those cases, if for whatever reason things kept going downhill I quickly found myself feeling rather ineffective in articulating on behalf of my unit, while also feeling both under the gun to maintain a good image for comm support and quell our customers from doing anything to make the situation worse.

Not too long ago, I dealt with some incongruence at the base personnel section that yielded me some lost time and increased frustration. As part of an application for training, I had to get some paperwork drafted of which I only had a sample from the instructions. I went to the personnel desk asking to get the right form, and a very young Airman answered my query. I recall he spoke somewhat softly with some hesitance, and kept his arms close towards his body. I didn't think much of it at the time and took his word, as I've found some of the younger troops can get like that working with officers like I've done with senior officers. He did also add he hadn't worked with that particular set of forms, and sent me to another section that dealt with other records issues. After another 15 minute wait there, that office sent me back to the personnel section, where the same Airman and two other younger guys deliberated on how to handle that form. One of them came back with the same sheet and said I simply needed to sign. I pointed out it was a sample, at which point they brought out an NCO...this is when they finally told me I simply needed to draft the form myself and bring it to them. I was glad to get an answer, but the fact it took about an hour of running around to get it was something of a nuisance.

So, for the incongruence coming from myself, the solution starts first with recognizing the issues. Knowing that I have issues with volume control and articulation, which impacts perceptions of confidence. The "Messages" text has very helpfully provided some exercises in volume modulation as well as articulation, and execution of these exercises as well as a continued conscious effort to practice and reassess my paralanguage in conjunction with my body language could very well do me a great deal of good in exuding greater confidence and thus aid credibility. Additionally, having this greater recognition of metamessages, paralanguage, and hidden agendas will allow me to make a change in identifying when such communication is occurring. This will subsequently allow me to ask the necessary follow up questions to get further clarity, or at least give me further insight into how to "read" the overall interaction.

A521.3.4.RB_SienkiewiczRaymond

It was the summer of 2008, and I was between my sophomore and junior years of college. I had spent about half of the prior school year preparing for summer Field Training with ROTC. Up until then, it was like I had two lives: one as a student, and one that was like the boot camp story arc from Full Metal Jacket, minus the swearing and physical discipline.

Preparation in itself was already an interesting experience, waking up earlier for ROTC events, getting some more intensive and vocalized training, and being held to a standard that effectively called for better than perfect. Now I was off to do the same thing day in and day out for about a month straight, with people I'd never met before, in the middle of Alabama, and to make things worse, I'd spent the days prior getting "verbal corrections" by my mother regarding my planning and packing practices, and in the process left a camouflage cap at home.

Things didn't really get much better once I had actually arrived. For whatever reason, call it the luck of the draw or a bad case of the nerves, things just didn't go as smoothly as I would've liked. It felt like it took awhile for me to "click" with the people there. I kept making silly mistakes on my parade steps or in protocol because I was becoming intensely focused on certain aspects of what I was doing rather than maintaining a holistic view. I know I certainly couldn't get much of a command presence going nor was I particularly effective when I was placed in charge. So at least while I was in the moment, I had fairly negative feelings about the experience and was legitimately concerned much of the time about making the grade.

Of course, I don't remember all of this because it was a truly awful experience through and through. Honestly, some of the finer details and the names have faded but for a few key pieces. But, I remember it because I look back and see a major pivot point in my life not just as a cadet or prospective officer, but even in some aspects of my personal self. Towards the end of the month long encampment, there came a period where we were still subject to the rules of "the game," but they weren't as hard on us. Eventually, we were even given time for feedback from both the active duty officers that supervised us as well as our peers. The feedback I got consistently across the board was I came off as a very smart guy, I just needed to work on my confidence. I honestly still wonder about the smart assessment as I generally didn't say very much, but after everything I'd been through, to have people outright bring up the issue of my confidence kicked off something in my head.

Before Field Training even, I had another similarly pivotal experience. It arguably started maybe halfway through my freshman year of college but really came to fruition around the spring of 2008. This was when I made a change in where I was going to school. When I first applied to college, I already had somewhat limited options as I was more of an A- or B+ student, and the only extra credentials I had was being an Eagle Scout. I also didn't take much of an interest in the process beyond it being something I had to do more or less because my parents told me to. Though all this, I muddled through a process where it seemed like a good idea to send me to smaller liberal art schools that could accommodate participation in Air Force ROTC. Being accepted from two out of the eight, I went with a smaller school in Seattle because it seemed like the practical thing to do.

While I had some good experiences and met people I still consider good friends, this was the first time I really got hit with a hard lesson in taking control of my future and knowing when to follow my heart over my head. The first year I muddled through the campus culture that I found to be less than ideal, along with finding classes that interested me, keeping occupied, and working through the commute to my ROTC classes at UW. I wasn't too happy with the circumstances, but I stuck with it after being advised to give things a chance and lacking any further direction. Once sophomore year rolled around though, the school announced plans to make cuts to liberal arts programs to stem funding issues they've had for years...while at the same time making plans to upgrade the basketball team to Division 1 athletics. At that point, stories I've heard about making conscious decisions to make a change made sense, because I finally made one myself. Although it took months of thought and wasn't an easy process, I did what I had to do to transfer to the University of Washington. At the time there was concerns expressed by my instructors about graduating on time, and for awhile I still wasn't sure if it was a good idea to stay in Seattle. But with time I was happy I made the move, and I learned to consider my feelings as well as fact.

These two situations, although technically separate problems, were interesting in that they happened around the same time and seemed to weave around a common thread of confidently taking action. Changing schools required me to make a conscious decision to be involved in the outcome rather than simply riding out choices I let other people make for me. Today I can say that whenever I get put into a team situation or a work environment where I'm going to be in place for an extended period, I make an effort to have a say where I can and to actively participate versus sitting back and taking whatever comes. For that matter, even now rather than idly accept the Air Force's decision to be a communications officer, I'm currently doing the best I can at that job while doing what it takes to change career fields.

As far as the summer training experience goes? What that did was set the foundation for some needed steel in my spine. Although I'm still working on performing with confidence, today I have fewer inhibitions when working in a group environment. I focus less on what other people think about what I have to say about a problem, and instead try and maintain confidence in what I'm sharing. Rather than focusing on "I've never done that before," I'm more inclined to say "I'll do what I can." It has extended rather nicely to the personal life too, yielding results such as a few journeys to places around town just because it looked interesting on the map, a couple occasions to try my hand at a Cessna because it was something new, and more.

To wrap up an already long blog entry, that small period of a few months left upon the last four years and counting a constant reminder to not stand idly by watching the world go by, but to get involved, take action, and do it with the confidence needed to really seize the moment.