Bagels With Mike

Exceptional NJ Deli Bagels Were Part of Every Session

One of the most important qualities that a leader must possess is the ability to communicate. I always took poetic license with the Real Estate “Location, Location, Location” philosophy to adopt a “Communicate, Communicate, Communicate” philosophy. For a leader, communication is the magic elixir. Leaders communicate to articulate a vision to their team, to inspire confidence in the direction being taken, to motivate the team to action, to build morale, to understand the needs and moods of the people on their team. Leaders are required to communicate good news as well as unwelcome news. Leaders must communicate the organizational direction that is being taken as well as sell it to their teams, sometimes even when that direction is not something that they prefer.

I found that various layers of communication to and with my teams were required. I religiously conducted weekly staff meetings with my direct reports as well as one-on-one sessions with each of them monthly. I mentioned in another blog that I always set aside time for meeting new team members and offered them mentoring sessions with a preference of meeting one-on-one every four or five weeks. The mentoring sessions were also available to other members of my team on request as well as to others outside my team that requested the sessions. I was insistent on having quarterly town meetings with my whole team. While I believed that my communication in those sessions was important, we primarily used them to bring in outside speakers (from elsewhere within the company or outside the company) to discuss topics of interest or topics relevant to the work we did within the team. It was also an excellent opportunity to have more junior members of the team (i.e., not my direct reports) do presentations on areas that they were leading. That provided an opportunity for the next generation of leaders within the organization to get exposure within the organization.

Written communication is also a key form of communication for the team. We utilized email broadcast codes for distributing relevant information about things going on within the teams, celebrating special recognition and personal milestones within the team, as well as the obligatory communications provided by the corporation. The latter included things like earnings information, policy changes, HR information, benefit enrollment information, etc.

However, one of the most important types of communication in my toolkit was something I had started as a first line manager with a small team. Every other week, we had a “Bagels With Mike” session.

We were all mostly in a single location at that time. I would stop by an exceptionally good NJ deli / bagel shop near my home on the way to work and buy a couple dozen bagels and the associated condiments. Everyone was invited to a conference room first thing for a bagel, but they had to bring their own coffee. Though sometimes we provided coffee too. The session was primarily to have an open communication session with the team. I will say more about that in a moment. As my teams grew larger and became more geographically dispersed, we continued to have sessions every other week that transitioned into clusters of people in the different work locations. The different time zones meant that the timing had to be modified, but people liked the food concept --- and it encouraged attendance. People volunteered to bring in food that corresponded to the time slot at their location. It was still bagels on the West coast but was more of an after-lunch snack on the East coast.

As we grew organizationally and became even more geographically dispersed, the sessions transformed into a virtual conference call. Video conferencing was not really viable for so many attendees. We still called the sessions “Bagels With Mike” though the name did not fit anymore.

I started the sessions stating that I was willing to answer any question based on information I knew at the time. I indicated that there may be times when I could not be fully transparent with an answer, but I would answer to the best of my ability based on what I knew and what I could share. For example, I really could not confirm nor deny a pending downsizing effort if it had not been announced yet, because dates might be in flux, the size might still be in discussion, certainly the number of people in my team impacted might not be known. You get it.

There were only two simple ground rules. . When someone asked a question, I asked them to state their name. I learned to associate voices with names that way. Besides, someone asking a question should be willing to own up to the question they were asking. Since I was being transparent, they should be transparent also. The second rule was that I absolutely would not tolerate someone trashing another person or organization on the call. It was not professional and certainly not the place for derogatory comments. I indicated that I would shut down the questioner if they started trashing another person or organization. People understood and appreciated that ground rule. I never had to invoke the “mute” button on anyone on any of my calls.

We usually ended with a “what kind of rumors are you hearing” discussion. It was easy to just squelch any rumor mongering that was circulating that was unfounded. Sometimes I could lend credence to the current scuttlebutt that might have been factual or partially factually. Often, we just got a good laugh at a rumor that was circulating but unfounded.

The calls were effective. They built teamwork and camaraderie on the team. I enabled me to create personal interaction with team members as I associated voices and names. The sessions were well attended. People enjoyed and appreciated the interaction and transparency.

Communicating well is one of the most important qualities of a leader. It ranks right up there with integrity and empathy. There are various forms of communication that a leader must utilize. To communicate effectively, communications need to be of diverse types and layered, reinforcing the key points of the message being given or direction being taken.

I still believe that “Communicate, Communicate, Communicate” needs to be the driving philosophy of a leader. Leaders are not leaders if people do not follow them.

Communicating is the means to get team members to subscribe to the actions or direction being taken.