Integrating business priorities, team development ...

Integrating business priorities, team development and individual growth

The evaluation of an executive coaching and mentoring intervention using the AEM-Cube®

Richard Churches Richard Churches is Principal Consultant for National Programmes at CfBT Education Trust and has worked on a number of major UK government programmes as national lead consultant, including: Fast Track teaching, the National Professional Qualification for Headship materials, the London Leadership Strategy and the new Secondary Curriculum. He is a doctoral researcher in leadership within the School of Management, University of Surrey.

The research problem and context AEM-Cube® is a personality and team evaluation tool that allows individual leaders and teams to map their strengths and characteristics to specific S-curve stages (Robertson, 2005) and the contextual dilemmas they face. Profiles are generated against three dimensions: Attachment, Exploration and Maturity in Complexity. 360° feedback is represented in a three-dimensional cube which can support individual and team alignment to strategic purpose. This integration of the individual within the team, within the organisation and in the context of the organisation’s position on the S-curve (contextual change over time) would suggest that the tool has potential in the context of an executive coachingmentoring programme of support. Currently, there is no research which explores this potential. A search using Google Scholar: Advanced Search, 18th February 2007, produced no published research on the use of AEM-Cube® in this context. This project focused on the question: Are there benefits in using AEM-Cube®, within the context of executive coaching and mentoring, to integrate individual growth and team feedback within business priorities and contexts? The project was carried out with a small business team of six focusing on the two company directors and the marketing director. However, all six received feedback and participated in team coaching.

Overview of relevant literature Two strands of thinking emerge from the literature on executive coaching and mentoring (e.g. Chapman et al., 2003; O’Neill, 2000; Peltier, 2001). Firstly, the coach-mentor as a ‘role model’ in the specific context (literally sharing their own experience of the challenges) and secondly, the coach-mentor as a highly skilled manager of the process of learning. In the case of the literature on leadership coaching in general (e.g. Lee, 2003; Morgan et al., 2005; Waldock & Kelly-Rawat, 2004) this distinction is less clear, however, is still noted. Broad areas of consensus exist in relation to the following components of effective executive coaching and mentoring and leadership development: raising self-awareness (Binney et al., 2005; Flaherty, 1999; Goleman et al. 2002; Jaworski, 1996; Lee, 2003; Peltier, 2001); creating a structured learning framework in which to place the coaching and mentoring (e.g. Lee, 2003; Flaherty, 1999) and the raising of systems thinking awareness (O’Neill, 2000) and sharing of business and leadership models (Waldock & Kelly-Rawat, 2004). Within the concept of a ‘learning framework’, writers point to the importance of assessment and feedback (e.g. Flaherty, 1999; Chapman et al., 2003; Lee, 2003). A number associate the providing of feedback and the development of self-awareness and behaviour change (e.g. Megginson and Clutterbuck, 2005). The use of personality insruments, 360° feedback and related psychometric tools is now common practice in

both senior executive and wider leadership development contexts (Jessup, 2002; Toplis et al. 2005). Although there is some criticism of the use of psychometric tools in a coaching context (Flaherty, 2005; Hardingham et al., 2004) studies suggest a correlation between the use of personality feedback and increased self-awareness and improvements in performance (Church, 2000). One study (Thach, 2002) conducted with 281 senior executives suggested that a conbination of 360° feedback and coaching resulted in a 60% increase in leadership effectiveness according to post-survey feedback by peers and direct reports. The AEM-Cube® draws on ideas from attachment theory (Bolwby, 1969) and ethology (Lorenz, 1981), cybernetics and systems thinking (Wiener, 1988) and the concept of business ecology (Robertson, 2005). This approach contrasts with many of the personality instruments that are frequently used in executive coaching e.g. MBTI (Hirsch et al., 2003), SDI (Porter, 1996) and FIRO-B (Schnell, 2000) and adds a dimension of context and systems thinking. As well as receiving personal feedback in relation to three continua plotted within a cube: People – Matter Attachment; Stability – Exploration Orientation; Complexity Maturity a team profile is also able to be generated which enables a group understanding of the overall organisational or team preferences and predicted behaviours.

Fig 1 - The AEM-Cube®

self selfperception perception < orientat ion > Gro up

n entatio ual > Individ

Green: stabilityoriented

< ori Group

Red: peopleattached

feedback feedbackperception perception

Individual

Blue: matterattached

Yellow: exploratory

Gray: complexity maturity

Alongside this, a theoretical model of best-fit team behaviours and profiles allows for team analysis and team coaching according to 8 stages in the change/development process. At the heart of the model is the notion that organisations and teams naturally develop along the S-curve and that businesses and individuals need to prepare themselves to make appropriate and well timed ‘leaps’ from one S-curve to the next (Robertson, 2005).

AEM-Cube® aims to support this process by allowing individuals and teams to compare their team profile to the likely most productive team behaviour profiles for certain points on the S-Curve. AEM-Cube®’s unique conbination of self-report, 360° feedback, team profiling and change process analysis has led to it being used in a wide range of contexts from individual development to team and organisational change. It has also been used widely to support large-scale mergers, where a predictive analysis of merging team profiles can be used to support the change process. Businesses that have made use of the AEM-Cube® in recent years include: AMRO, Applied Materials, Axa, BBC Scotland, BT, Customs and Revenue, Home Office, ING, Keesing, KPMG, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Merck, Sharpe & Dohme, Network Appliance, NovoNordisk, Nuon, Prudential, Royal Bank of Scotland, Xansa, Department of Justice – Netherlands, Dutch Telecon, Gemserv, GITP, Heineken, Hewlett Packard, HBOS. www.human-insight.com accessed 18th February 2007.

Fig 3 - AEM-Cube® related to the S-Curve 4

6 3 3

5

4 5 7+8

7+8

6 1

2

2

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AEM-Cube® would appear to be a useful tool, for synchronising concepts of assessment, feedback, enablement, and reframing, as discussed by Lee (2003), together with the notions of systems thinking development (O’Neill, 2000).

Fig 4 - Example of a Team Profile

Research and data collection method The research methodology made use of an end of project, structured, questionnaire. This gathered qualitative information about perceived benefit in the areas of: assessment and feedback, enablement and reframing and systems thinking (Lee, 2003). The structured questionnaire was completed in a formal interview with each of the participants. There were a total of six individual coaching sessions for each of the three owner-directors in order to discuss actions following the feedback, 3 team development and team coaching sessions with all six members of the business, 360° AEM-Cube® feedbacks to all participants and support to develop priorities across the business. A qualitative methodology was chosen in order to allow for the interpretation of findings within the context of the natural setting in which the intervention had taken place; and in order to support an exploration of the meanings that the participants themselves have developed around the intervention (Denzin & Lincoln, 1994). Team profiles were analysed in relation to the business’s current position on the S-curve (as perceived by the participants) and variations in self-perception and feedback perceptions (see Roberson, 2005). However, the short timescale of the research activity precluded any meaningful quantitative analysis of data produced in relation to long-term changes in behaviour, or practice over time. AEM-Cube® quantitative team feedback data has been kept should a longer-term impact evaluation opportunity arise in the future. From an ethical perspective the project was carried out within the context of a single business therefore the need for appropriate contracting was essential. Placing the project within the context of individual, team and business development defined a role in line with what Caplan refers to as the ‘consultant-coach’ (Caplan, 2003) and raised all the key contracting issues that are present in any consulting context (Schein, 1999; 2000). A contracting meeting was held on 21st February to discuss issues of personal confidentiality, use of data and business commercial confidentiality. No issues arose from this and participants were all enthusiastic to take part. The final structured interviews too place in December 2007. Analysis of data and presentation of evidence This analysis of data and presentation of evidence is based upon a combination of the structured interviews that took place and of the experience of working with, and coaching of, the participants. The data presented below is relevant to the key research question identified at the start of this paper other data has not been included. All data has been kept anonymous. The interviews were structure to collect data in the following categories: assessment and feedback, enablement, reframing and systems thinking. Research question: Are there benefits in using AEM-Cube®, within the context of executive coaching and mentoring, to integrate individual growth and team feedback within business priorities and contexts?

Assessment and feedback The six participants made up the complete team within this small business. Their roles ranged from the two owner-directors of the business to the administrative and management staff. Within this group there was a wide range of experiences of both coaching and of receiving and giving feedback. This range represented a full continuum from no experience to very experienced. The two owner-directors are both experienced coaches and trainers themselves, as well as having significant business experience (both within the context of their existing small business and within the context of their previous corporate work). The two managers had a moderate level of experience, one had received MBTI Step I feedback and the other had experience of a company 360 degree process in the past. Both the administrative staff had no experience of personality instruments, coaching or 360 degree feedback. In relation to the assessment and feedback that they received all participants responses were positive. In particular, the participants who had not previous received any 360 or personality feedback found the process ‘rewarding’ and ‘insightful’. One participant said: AEM-Cube® has put a lot of thing in my life into perspective I now feel that I can understand better who I am and why I react the way I do sometimes during change. I also can see how my preference for stability over exploration can be a real benefit to a team at certain times.

Another said: I now can understand where other people are coming form. I used to think that they were just being difficult but now I have grasped the fact that people are just different and that the way other people like to work is just a preference.

For the two owner-directors the opportunity to discover how they are perceived by their employees was seen as ‘particularly helpful’.

In particular, one of the two said: This has really opened my eyes – gaining an understanding of the range of my perceived behaviours has let me know where I don’t go at the moment and were I need to develop greater flexibility. The comment above relates to one particular aspect of AEM-Cube® feedback that allows feedback receivers to look from above the cube at the floor of the cube and see where they prefer to be in terms of behaviours. By looking at all the feedback responses and self-report, from this perspective, it is possible to see the range of current behaviour and areas where there is a lack of flexibility. In the case of the above person, there was a tendency to remain in the zones of ‘control’ and ‘support’ whilst her particular role required more ‘operational’-type behaviours. As a result of these insights this person

developed a personal action plan around implementing more effective project management and operational procedures with the team as a whole, a move that was widely welcomed. Similar insights were reported by the two managers alongside an awareness of a need to be more often operating from the ‘innovation’ zone in relation to development of new ways of doings things.

Enablement and reframing One of claimed benefits of using the AEM-Cube® (Robertson, 2005), in a business and team development context, is that it allows teams to ‘know what they don’t know’ in other words it enables teams to uncover the blind spots and hidden and unknown areas described in the Johari window (Luft, 1970). Not only did all participants report significant ‘insights’, ‘benefits’, ‘new understands’ and ‘clarity [about themselves and others] but they were also able to talk about how this had translated into changes in their behaviour and attitudes towards working with each other in teams. There have been several times recently when, as a team, we have stopped working and had a discussion about where we were are on the AEM-Cube and whether this is the best place to be. This has been really helpful as we are now able to have a much more open discussion without anyone feeling threatened or under attack. As well as reporting ‘seeing things differently’ changes in team and organisational behaviour were very apparent. Where at the beginning of the 8 week programme participants tended to work in isolation on their individual areas of responsibility, with

delegation from the owner-directors, there was now a more clearer team dynamic and sense of cross-team communication. We are now working together more as a team rather than as a group of individuals. I can see how what I do affects others and how we are much more able to work effectively together. Alongside this, by the end of the programme the team had begun to adapt its behaviours to fill the ‘gap’ in team behaviour identified by the profiling1.

Fig 6 - The Team Profiles from above the Cube and side (showing a lack of flexibility in relation to Operational and Innovation behaviours [centre and bottom right])

Systems thinking During the contracting meeting at the start of the programme the owner-directors were asked to identify a key area and business priority that they wanted support with. They identified ‘an understanding of where the business is at the moment and what the priorities for change should be, how we need to change to meet these needs and what we should do next’. It was in this area that reported benefits of using the AEM-Cube® were most notable and significant. Both the owner-directors reported that being able to identify what stage on the S-curve their current business is on had enabled them to ‘step outside of the day-to-day busy schedule’ and ‘think more strategically’ about the business and its needs. One said: Knowing that where we are on the S-curve is just normal and part of the process has made me think hard about where we are going. Also recognising that this particularly place is not one that any of us has a preference for, in terms of our

1

The full range of reports from all questionnaires is shown below for illustrative purposes only - in feedback teams are only given their self-report and summarised feedback positions. This is to avoid the possibility that individual feedback will become identifiable.

behaviours, has helped me to reflect and feel more relaxed about some of the discomfort we have been feeling recently.

The other noted that: We now have a clear understanding of the sort of behaviours we need to develop to be more flexible in our working and to take the next step on the curve. Understanding that we need to prepare for next leap in our business plan means that we will be ready for the change and what this means.

From the perspective of working as a team and as an individual coach AEM-Cube® appeared at first to be a somewhat complex and over theoretical tool. There are no less than 64 possible AEM-Cube® feedback profiles and an almost infinite variety of possible team combinations and interpretations. Despite this, the psychological concepts and notions that are at the heart of the cube are fundamentally simple and intuitive. This allows the cube to be easily understood by both the person being fed back to and by the team itself, as was demonstrated by the response to the feedback despite the wide range of experience within the participants. In relation to the question as to whether there are benefits in using AEM-Cube® to integrate individual growth and team feedback within business priorities and contexts (as is claimed by the developers of the tool) this small scale study would appear to confirm that this is the case. The study was, however, limited in terms of its scope, size and the timescales involved. Despite this the conclusion must be that there is a strong argument for a more extended research project on the AEM-Cube® and its application. In summary     

The tool demonstrated individual benefits to the coaches and provided opportunities for personal insight and the development of greater self-awareness There were clear benefits not only to the individuals involved but also to the business as a whole AEM-Cube® was easily understood and had benefits across a continuum of previous experience Having a specific focus for the coaching enhanced the coaching relationship and ensured a goal orientated approach AEM-Cube® is very effective in a team coaching context providing a clear focus for discussion, questioning and challenge

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