Meet Lola Stith and she's quiet, unassuming, cooperative, hard to read. Know Lola and she's focused, determined, uncannily perceptive, catch-you-off guard funny, and perceptive. Said that twice, didn't I. Because she is, twice.

I had the privilege of working with Lola 10 years ago. We caught up recently when I called to ask if I ever exhibited gender bias toward her. That question came up in preparation for an episode with Karen Newnam, and I reached out to ask women who'd worked for me. Lola's answer surprised me and we had a great conversation about it (we get into this in Part 2). We also discussed gender in the workplace, implicit bias, difficult conversations and a few more getting on the same page challenges - and decided to keep the conversation going and record it. So here are a few of my favorite ahh-ha! moments from Part 1:

5:41 - Letting my team know I hear them is the most foundational thing I can communicate. Getting on the same page as alignment.

7:46 - Managing reactions to change ranging from personal to business issues.

10:05 - Leading change and listening to my team - because I don't know everything!

14:33 - Opening the door to getting on the same page. Opening the door to see what's there.

20:40 - Differences are opportunities - if you know how to discuss them.

I love knowing people who don't fit typecasts. Analytic types good with emotion. Tough leaders who care for their people. I love working with them when I can, and interviewing them for podcast episodes! Enter Rami Hago. 

I had the pleasure of working with Rami a few years ago, and here's my version of his short bio: Laughs easy. Penetrating thinker. People person. Laser-focused. Easy to work with. Won't settle for less than individual and team best. I could go on but you get the idea. He's living proof that being a bundle of contradictions can make you solid, not a mess. (Although I did edit out a short exchange hinting at what his wife would say if I interviewed them together!)

Rami's getting-on-the-same-page lessons from military and Veteran's health IT are timeless and apply to work of any type, anywhere. Listen in for a few laughs and tips. Here are a few of my favorite ahh-ha! moments:

3:39 - What are some of the most interesting challenges you've faced getting people on the same page?

6:59 - Compliments will get you somewhere….getting good requirements from a difficult system owner - to replace her system.

15:03 - Finding what to not change in a change effort.

20:00 - Sandboxes aren't just for developers. Let the customer play, too.

26:46 - If communication is an art, who are the artists? Meaning and intent in software development.

37:00 - A lesson in conflict resolution - changing the context for decision making.

43:20 - A picture really is worth 1000 words, and some laughs.

45:18 - There is no one person who knows everything about how a plane flies.

In Part 2, Dan Morford and I pick up our discussion of power, control and the nature of honest, open dialogue. We talk about how bad our country's divisiveness might get, and what it will take to climb out the hole we've dug for ourselves - for our kids. Quick fixes won't do. "Sides" can advocate all they want, but real solutions will take time, compromise, and some amount of inconvenience, pain and sacrifice. But what are our options? More divisive rhetoric? The solutions we need - solutions that work for our democracy and country - will come from our differences if we figure out how to dialogue about them.

Part 2 opens with Dan answering a question I asked at the close of Part 1: When you ask questions to learn, rather than fire your views at someone, have you seen conversations develop differently and go in a better direction. Here are a few of my favorite ahh-ha! moments:

00:06 and on - Honest, open, reasonable dialogue can't occur until we put aside control

4:29 and on - Real solutions take almost as much time as the real problems they fix

7:40 - We have a very short-term, fickle mentality here

11:27 - Extreme voices get covered. Centrist voices not so much. So what do we do?

16:32 - Politicizing everything is easy. But taking "I" out of rhetoric and putting trust back in.....that's hard

21:06 - Agree to disagree? Agree to how we'll disagree? Or disagree today but continue the dialogue tomorrow.

Political discussions can be unenlightening and uninspiring. Two or more yammer on sounding vaguely like Charlie Brown's teacher.... loving the sound of their our own voices and ideas.... and not learning because no one is listening. But not discussions with this week's guest.

Dan Morford and I have been friends for 22 years. We've worked together, volunteered in our community, raised families, cooked a lot of food, listened to a lot of blues, and have occasionally fallen into a barrel of rum. Over the years we've spent many hours talking about politics, as we do in this episode. 

Dan is smart, thoughtful - and principled. That's one of the things I love most about him. He knows when there's something at stake greater than his individual interests. He knows how to have a respectful and effective dialogue. We're not on the same page about everything, but we listen to see if we might learn and we're respectful when we see things differently. And the older we get the more we're on the same page worrying about the future of our country - for our kids.

We talked for an hour so I split the recording into two episodes. If you notice Dan sounding more focused, he is! He had me thinking and I got tangled in my own thoughts. Words were hard but the ideas were as good as ever. With a few expletives thrown in for emphasis (!), here are some of my favorite ahh-ha! moments in Part 1 of 2:

2:10 - Hurling insults at each other isn't just unhelpful, it's hypocritical.

11:20 - There's not a crisis covered by the press and media that can't be monetized.

13:08 - Can we pick a fight amongst ourselves about any issue in the news? Yes! And lose our humanity along the way.

21:41 - We form opinions, focal points, emotional perspectives about many things - but from what? A rich dialogue exploring perspectives?  

26:46 - To stop learning or not stop learning, that is the question. What I know about this subject is a small fraction of what I want to know about this subject. And what I want to know is an even smaller fraction of what there is to know. 

Karen Levy Newnam is a smart, funny, deep-thinking, artist-turned-business woman, self-described goofball. If you think that covers it, it doesn't. At all.

Woven through experience as a writer, actor, producer, college instructor, retail manager and marketing manager are threads of self-discovery, self-awareness and self-improvement. A conviction that bringing one's best self to others is the starting place for getting on the same page. That becoming one's best self is work. Our life's work. And at work we cross paths with others on their journeys.

This episode gets personal with Karen's characteristic honesty about what it means to be a woman in the workplace. A woman senior director in the workplace. A work-in-progress, woman senior director in the workplace. But with class and humor and authenticity that makes you want to work for Karen. Or with her. Or just talk with her, like I got to do. Here are some of my favorite ahh-ha! moments:

5:50 and on - Karen's plan for getting on the same page with herself - by the decade

10:47 and on - Therapy, habits and who am I personally? Professionally?

17:19 - Mentors who cared enough to tell me I was holding myself back

23:12 and on - Expressing emotions at work and a Viktor Frankl quote about creating space between stimulus and response

30:18 - Is "You need to stop" wrong to say when a subordinate is insubordinate on a conference call?

35:32 - If you aren't introspective at work you aren't going to be on the same page with others

40:07 - The ABCs of describing rather than evaluating behavior - especially someone else's

43:15 - Male and female supervisors can be direct, but the fallout is different

51:48 - What's in your span of control - and not - about how you're viewed

1:03:58 - How my mentee made me a better person, and staying relevant at work

Mika Cross is passionate about people and missions. Especially about figuring out the best way for people to deliver a mission. From her military and civilian service to her consulting today, Mika's mission is to help organizational leaders get that right. And this year's International Women's Day theme - #BreakTheBias - is the perfect backdrop for our discussion about how to position people to contribute their best work - or not. 

Bias is in the news a lot, today, with coverage of it in law enforcement, education, hiring and compensation, hostile workplaces, emotional intelligence, and unconscious bias and training, generally. Much coverage shows a bias about bias (sorry) conflating it with prejudice, moralizing about it, or scorning the moralizing. While that might or might not be deserved, it skews a basic point (again, sorry!): Experience wires our brains in ways which ready us to act in ways which can be biased. Apart from intentional bias, whether or not we're unintentionally biased depends mostly on how aware we are of what we're doing, and why.

Awareness is key and Mika describes a solid way to become aware of bias in the workplace - data. She shows how knowing your data will reveal patterns in hiring, firing, promoting, pay, telecommuting and more, which might be the result of bias. You'll only know if you look! Mika also brainstorms ways to change the conversation with data to learn what will give employees the best way to give you their best work. Here are some of my favorite ahh-ha! moments:

4:32 - The pandemic highlighted equity issues organizations can address now, as they plan post-pandemic "back to office" strategies

9:26 - No matter what percent of your workforce telecommuted during the pandemic, you might find distribution across jobs was unequal for reasons of bias, not strategy

12:17 and on - Hybrid work strategy by design, using mission requirements to determine work arrangements, and accountability

19:22 and on - Leaders can chose "one size fits all" work arrangements but they'll rob some employees - and their organizations - of productivity. Is the trade-off worth it?

25:12 and on - Flexible work arrangements require trust and accountability 

31:56 - How knowing their data saved The State of Kansas money, and saved its employees time

36:25 - What if people can't get on the same page? What then?

BTW, check out https://www.etymonline.com/word/bias for a fun, quick history on the origin of the word "bias," dating back to the game of bowls with balls shaped to curve when rolled.

The US Federal government runs more than 3500 programs, each designed to deliver a benefit to citizens or other customers in the US and around the world. Each is a collaborative effort with state and local governments, NGOs and sometimes other counties. And each relies on actors at the end of many delivery chains, far from where programs are planned and managed. Teachers. Inspectors. Law enforcement. War fighers. Diplomats. VA doctors and nurses. And many more.

So how can the Federal government ensure its programs deliver the right benefit to the right beneficiary, in the right way - plus continuously innovate to stay relevant to citizens and partners?

I know of no one better able to navigate a challenge of this magnitude than Mark Forman. With 30 years' experience inside government and out, in the US and around the world, Mark can conceive of solutions to big problems and see how they work where people implement them where the rubber meets the road. In this episode we discuss objectives and key results - OKRs - as a framework for getting people on the same page to deliver results and continuously improve return on program investments. Here are a few of my ahh-ha! moments:

2:06 - The OKR model as a framework for return on investment, especially of investments in transformations

3:11 - OKRs shift the focus from paying for activities to buying outcomes

4:19 - The relationship between ORRs and KPIs

5:38 and on - OKR use in the Federal government with 3500 programs

11:21 - The crux of modernizing many of the Federal government's systems is the difference between the user experience and the user interface

19:04 - The failures in applying agile development globally - which was supposed to be a breakthrough for modernization - stem from using technology to simplify legacy approaches to work, rather than using technology to rethink work

26:35 - OKR conversations in 3500 programs is a daunting endeavor. How could it be done on that scale?

31:05 - Using Federal Enterprise Architecture reference models to frame OKR conversations within and across programs

41:05 - Meeting the toughest innovation challenge - transforming programs as they conduct business as usual, which they must

43:05 - We can't boil the ocean so where do we start?

The government's solicitation is its best attempt to define a problem. A contractor's proposal is its best attempt to define a solution. When faithfully executed, both should combine to meet a mission requirement. But can they? Contracts of even moderate complexity can obligate contractors to meet scores of requirements performed in dozens of activities over a 1 to 5 year period. Issues, priorities, budgets, personnel and conditions will change. So how can executing a statement of work written 12-18 months before work even began, meet a mission requirement?

Greg Giddens says the answer is performance management. Not in the HR sense but as a broad framework for conversation about how contract acquisition, program management and change management work together - or don't - to meet the intent of a statement of work. To meet the business objective or, in government terms, the mission requirement of the contract.

Greg and his business partner at Potomac Ridge Consulting, Dave Grant, should know. After careers in project and program management, change management and procurement in multiple Federal government cabinet departments, they know what works and what doesn't to get government and contracting officials on the same page. Greg joins me for this episode, and here are some of my favorite aah-ha! moments:

7:36 - Federal contracting is conceived as a partnership with the private sector

10:50 - Federal contracts, marriage contracts, and the meaning of relationship

11:45 - Using performance management from Step One - the contract kickoff

21:29 - When buying a microwave isn't what you think, or how changing the conversation changed a contracting officer's understanding of the problem

29:17 - Performance management creates transparency

40:05 - Performance management lines up means and ends to the desired outcome

47:43 - How changing the conversation creates a same page from multiple "own pages"

54:00 - But what if it doesn't work? What do we do if we can't get on the same page?

My friend and colleague, Brenda Blackman, opens this episode with a funny story about how the communication of clues in a card and boardgame was challenged by differences in the players' ages. It's a telling story, too, because with five generations in the workforce, how much work communication is affected by age? In what ways? Is getting on the same page affected? Brenda and I discuss these questions and what she does about them.

With 28 years in the Air Force and another 10 consulting, not only is leadership important to Brenda but so is mentoring. Mentoring is near and dear to her heart, in fact, and in this episode we discuss challenges organizations face preparing young professionals for top leadership positions. Here are a few of my ahh-ha! moments:

1:48 - Clues, games and the ahh-ha! moment.

3:57 - Taking the extra step to make sure people on your team are as vested in the outcomes as you are.

7:42 - The difference between following orders when you understand - and don't understand - a leader's objective or endgame.

12:21 - How understanding a leader's objective or endgame enables better performance - and why good leaders never ask teams to bring them a rock.

20:00 - When a team is very close, can they really "read each other's minds?" And what probabilities and prediction have to do with it.

24:10, 27:27 - The importance of conducting an environmental scan.

31:15 - Why a leader must "pull the thread" to get everyone on the same page.

In this week's episode of I See What You Mean, I highlight ideas and insights from the first 20 episodes.

Several guests discussed what they think it means to get or be on the same page. Each guest discussed ways they get people there in the work they do. Below are time-stamps and guest names so you can jump to their summaries or search for their full episodes. 

I want to thank each guest for taking time to record an episode with me, for freely sharing their knowledge and experience in the hope that a listener will grab something and run with it.

1:41 - Definitions of getting and being on the same page.

3:13 - Evan Scott uses several techniques to ensure a strong fit between companies, positions and candidates.

4:00 - Tom Oates gets his team on the same page by transferring power to them.

4:50 - Esther Dyer uses information to get people on the same page, especially during change.

5:30 - Erik Jens gets teams on the same page, especially during times of change, using supraordinate goals coupled with a unique way to determine what gives team members energy, and what drains them of it. When he knows individual and team motivations he can distribute tasks accordingly, with each person playing to their strengths.

6:17 Don Weber uses goals, measures and milestones to get people on the same page. But he'll also retire organizational debt to improve work conditions, and add a nay-sayer to a project team to get the benefit of their knowledge.

7:00 Douglas Cameron uses financial data analytics to get buyers and suppliers on the same page about risk and risk mitigation. 

7:54 Bob Nunnally checks his own communication when he's not on the same page with his team. He describes several specific communication techniques including asking, "What do you think we should do?" 

8:57 Danelle Barrett got people on the same cybersecurity page by talking to people about how it mattered in their job, especially to achieve their "no-fail" mission.

10:22 Bill Stanton gets customers from the boardroom to the maintenance crew on the same page by knowing their numbers, including different returns on investment for different parties. 

11:26 Tim Cooke gets Federal government contracting officials on the same page by busting myths about acquisition innovation, using contracting officials as the messengers to contracting officials.

12:48 Rick Dudek gets business people on the same information security page by moving infosec conversations all the way upstream to when lines of business are contemplating doing something different. Wait until the end and Rick's infosec shop becomes the Department of No.

13:25 As an elected official, Susan Valdes gets people on the same page by listening to learn, especially when someone disagrees with her. She shares her views beginning with her values, and before speaking asks, "May I be candid?" 

15:06 Alex Porfirenko gets people on the same page by understanding the rationales of sales teams, technical teams and the customer. By understanding why each thinks what they think so he can see the "art of the possible" in their overlaps and intersections.

16:14 Joe Launi will tell you everything that goes well in project management involves good communication, and everything that goes badly involves poor communication. Joe teaches project managers a servant-leader approach to projects, including living Stephen Covey's dictum, "Seek first to understand, then to be understood." 

17:19 William Randolph shares some thoughtful ideas for getting government and industry on the same acquisition page through, of all things, better marketing! Not "look at how great we are" marketing, but by adding real value. And not just when working an opportunity, but every day.