Sailed4seas的部落格

Part 2

Families, tribes, groups, teams, organizations

In former chapters we had discussed the aspects of individual interaction with the world. The conclusions is a frustration to us for we had revealed the vulnerability of human ability to handle all the risk and change before us because of our conscious limited capacities of Magical 7. Although we take it as granted that we are in control of everything in life. We need the function of a group (families, tribes, groups, teams, organizations) to get even of our workload we are facing everyday. Different groups will need different kind of social norms. These will be the focus of discussion in this part. The world is moving with the time. While we are in the 21 century this is global village age. No single work can be done in old fashion as before. So the shipping is moving from single nationalities to multi-nationalities age. This is the base concept we had here in this part.

Originally building a team with good spirits by team skills or bridge/engine room resources management will be appropriated to cope with common risk and threat on board. But in new century we meet another obstacle of cultural difference inside the group we are working. Our team skill used to be useful inside our people, now have different meanings and imply another degree of responsibilities and allowance for different kinds of freedom in questions. The internal forces to reach a common goal are divided in today’s shipping if we could only understand why and how. There is no quick solution unless we can live and make good friends in other seaman country for three years to fully understand the culture difference between them and us. It will create lots of loophole in the group or even tear it apart due to strong disagreement or conflict in action.

If people did not share same believes and faiths in things they are doing together we need definitely another set of working norms and disciplines. In this part we will back to the basic of human nature in psychological aspect to unite people again to set up the stage and team for new cultures (which will fully discussed in part three of this book) needed in this age. The leadership is the influences we had inside a group. As long as we had a little contribution to group goal we are the leader. Yes. Everybody is the leader of his group and life.         

Today the concept uses to be defined by last century already have different facets to read due to the universe is not the way we think in 20 centuries. Classical mechanics father Sir Isaac Newton theory had send the people to the Moon. But in the Quantum mechanics theory, nothing is in independent from the whole part of the group. Not even the slightest particle can be independent to other part of the system (more or less). Our study in this part will be facing more reality than we had believed before.   

The Three Levels of Leadership: How to Develop Your Leadership Presence, Knowhow and Skill by James Scouller (ISBN 9781852526818), 2011

Chapter 9

Leadership – Response to risk and threat – Emotional Support

Leadership is important to finish the goal in a group and happy about their part for each member.

Leadership is the forces to keep things going in a group as individual could not accomplish by his own power along without the help from his group. It is no more a “one man show” time. Any one thinks he can take care anything in anytime in this ever changing world by himself along either he is a foolish man or he underestimates single human limitations he had. Good leadership is the interaction between the members inside the group to finish the working goal and happy about their part had done. If we are the Masters on board what this new change will do to our daily practice. Most of the time, we will still enjoy the things done by proper assigned person as the working ethics on board prevailed in the past. In some occasions the ongoing forces are lost due to conflicts/loopholes happened inside the group. We get stuck in somewhere along the line or have to bear the undesirable consequence.               

The leadership concept could be divided in four levels in all directions in our discussion:

• to do the leadership to ones self in first level(inward)
• to do the leadership to his followers in second level (downward)
• to do the leadership to his co-worker in third level (outward)
• to do the leadership to his superiors in fourth levels (upward)

From now on, we can understand leadership is an enormous works for any one who desire for success. Can we put a heroic figure of this concept?  Two well known personals for their great believe inside and the strength outside. 

leadership to ones self in first level (inward)

The leadership inward ourself is the most difficult part in these four levels but it is the basic to all. We cannot really trust one man if we were convinced inside our heart this kind of people is not reliable. “This kind of people” is a wrong concept to address the people different from us–similar something we over heard of this kind of people is perceived as a stereotype or assumption. Why we have to lead our inner self? What is our inner self?

We All Have Split-Personalities or Ego States.

Human brain are functioned by context and feeling simultaneously. This had been proved by psychological scientist. In 1951 Dr Wilder Penfield proved, using conscious human subjects, by touching a part of the brain (the temporal cortex) with a weak electrical probe, that the brain could be caused to 'play back' certain past experiences, and the feelings associated with them. Once scientist stimulated one part of human brain by weak electrical probe, certain memories are recalled with the feeling they had in that particular moments. So this fact had established our brains are at least constituted by two parts. Other psychological theory model used had further suggested our emotional parts of brain are consisted of at least two other parts “Parent” and “Child”. Please refer to the diagram below used in Eric Berne's Transactional Analysis Theory to represent different ego status of ourself:      

These terms have different definitions used in our ego status than in normal language.

Parent

Our parent is formed by external events and influences upon us as we grow through early childhood which could from our real parents, teachers, older people, next door neighbours, aunts and uncles, the moral idol in fairy tales, Politian leader. Our Parent is no doubt had huge amount of hidden and overt recorded influences. Typically embodied by phrases and attitudes starting with 'under no circumstances', 'always' and 'never forget', 'don't lie, cheat, steal', etc, etc.

Child

Our internal reaction and feelings to external events we had passed down from our Childhood. This is the seeing, hearing, feeling, and emotional body of data within each of us. When anger or despair dominates reason, the Child is in control.

Adult

Our 'Adult' is our ability to think and determine action for ourselves, based on received data. The adult in us begins to form at around ten months old, and is the means by which we keep our Parent and Child under control. If we are to change our Parent or Child we must do so through our adult. In other words: Parent is our 'Taught' concept of life. Adult is our 'Thought' concept of life. Child is our 'Felt' concept of life.

Apparently our inward leadership is our Parent to lead our Child inside, to control our emotional ego and rationale the situation we are faced. Chinese always say “You have to start a family before you can accomplish any career”. When you have a family this is the invitation to the tough side of life (new responsibility to support the family) which will render your inner Child to subside. These ego status are all within our subconscious and surface to our conscious constantly from “Parent” to “Child”, “Child” to “Parent”, “Parent” to “Adult”, “Adult” to “Child”. In other words our conscious are constantly occupied in random sequences of emotional and rational reactions which one is prevailing may not be aware by us (only after shouting we begin to realize we are in anger). Sometimes we regretted for the words we just said to others or the inappropriate behaviors we had just did. This is because we have not properly trained in our inner Child. In another words, we did not have better emotional control/management. So our reactions are coming from our intuition as we can see in chapter 6 of our decision making process. Although some studies had suggested that 50 % of these kinds of reaction are inherited from our ancestor and some incidentally damage to our brain tissues may cause also anti-society action we never had before. It is obvious no one can teach our inner self better than oneself. This is the inner leadership of our Child. The way to overcome our inner Child reaction (intuitional reaction, not necessary habitual reaction), we have to establish our automatic reactions to replace it. It is our working habits or psychological structure to control our emotion. Like a baby had the falling reflex to hold on something with his tiny hands to avoid falling subside to more firmed gesture in his armpit and shoulder joints locked to give firm support of his body to be grasped by his mother few months later.

Leadership to his followers in second level (downward)

This is more traditional definition of leadership to influence our follower to reach the group goal. These followers maybe are our employers, subordinates or simply our admirer. The bond between these members in the group may not very strong as new generation is working for their own interest more than anything else. The reasons why they want to act toward the direction we are pointing may be lots. The fundamental motivation is to save the workload of their own whether they are lack of knowledge or experience necessary for the work. It is kind of human nature to follow his leader to save his efforts. It is then the obligation of the leader to provide the ways for them to follow. Many leaders behaviour had been identified by the psychologist like setting the vision, staying focused, organizing, planning, giving power to others, problem-solving, decision-making, executing, group building and maintenance. By these tasks mentioned we can see they focus on the task side or the rational side more. Group building and maintenance is only one of these behaviors. Actually group building and maintenance is the first and the last thing we do in our leadership exercised on our followers. It is not like the emotional blackmail to control an intimate with psychological manipulation, employing a mixture of threats, appeals and emotionally punitive behaviour. It is more like a sales presentation before the shopping mall front door. The audiences could leave in any minute if they are not emotional bond with the leader. It is not the goal we sold. It is the sense of security we shade over their existence to make them feel comfortable and stay within the group. This is not a new term but with new meaning in the new age.                    .  

Many new aspects of leadership are listed in Wikipedia as below:

1. Leadership is not always nature. There is evidence to show that leadership also develops through hard work and careful observation. Thus, effective leadership can result from nature (i.e., innate talents) as well as nurture (i.e., acquired skills).

2. Leadership is not possessing power over others. Leadership is a power with people that exists as a reciprocal relationship between a leader and his/her followers (Forsyth, 2009).Individuals who seek group consent and strive to act in the best interests of others can also become effective leaders (e.g., class president; court judge).

3. Leaders may not positively influential. Leaders who focus on personal gain by employing stringent and manipulative leadership styles often make a difference, but usually do so through negative means like emotional blackmail.

4. Leaders cannot entirely control group outcomes. The tendency to overestimate the degree of control leaders has over their groups' outcomes and ignores the existence of many other factors that influence group dynamics. It is unwarranted to assume that all leaders are in complete control of their groups' achievements.

5. Group members may not resist leaders. Most people actually prefer to be led than to be without a leader (Berkowitz, 1953). This "need for a leader" becomes especially strong in troubled groups that are experiencing some sort of conflict. Group members tend to be more contented and productive when they have a leader to guide them. (Stewart & Manz, 1995).

The leadership toward our follow is to be exercised to benefit for both sides to make the relationship workable and security bonded.

Leadership to his co-worker in third level (outward)

Leadership within our colleagues even without direct business interaction is kind of our relationship with them. Most people prefer to feel good by the others than to be overlooked. This may be kind of recognitions we need for our basic survival need. We shared the emotion with others rather than the business. Anyway the working environment on board the vessel are very confined, we may need the help from other departments from time to time although this assistance are not required at all in normal conditions. The way to get them moving or to earn their trust before the raining day is part of our leadership.       

Leadership to his superiors in fourth levels (upward)

This may be the most difficult part of leadership we are facing as it against all our nature tendencies. We are engraved with the fear factor in our childhood in our blood and questioning factor in pubic age and the rebellion factor in our adultery. These factors are the neurotransmitters in our blood which are mostly born with us. These neurotransmitters are also the source of our swift emotion comes from time to time. This kind of leadership is more or less like relationship management. Before we can have some influence to our superior we will have to make us comfortable to each other first. Any relationship establishment may have to go through withdrawal (each refrain from engagement), social (just say hello only), gossip (both talking but not doing anything), cooperation (doing some talking), gaming (testing for negative reaction), affirmation (freely express each feeling and thought) stages. If we want to speed up the process the art of pleading is most powerful to this purpose (asking him to do something for us). It is the most important step beside our social contact (say hello only) toward real cooperation stage and bypassed gossip stage(saying without doing anything). Ship board commanding chain is always fixed by each member’s position. Each OOW and crew had his own job description stipulated in company’s white book. By the pleading to our superior we may face two consequences, yes or no. Yes is good for both parties and no is OK for you at least your superior had noticed you are not only a robot which just capable of doing rituals. The pleading may be just a small favor for passing the salt or bread at hand. Every small little thing can do the trick. If you know how to hit the jackpot the reward will be abundant. The jackpot is the most precious thing he is treasured is his expertise. Asking his professional knowledge he will treasure you like you had worked along with him all these years in his cultivating years. When you begin to plead you will put yourself in “Child” ego status which will trig your superior into “Parent” ego status. He then will give you the assistance you need. Once the pleading cycle is finished you are free to express any feedback or other concerns to him, for the communication line had mutually established for now and next time.                   

Where the leadership comes in new age?

Leadership is the forces to keep things going in a group. This force may not come from the manager who has the group goal as his responsibility. This group may not have a great mission to achieve or difficult obstacle to overcome or even a monster to kill. Like shipboard operation, the only mission is to keep the vessel running punctually and safely on her sailing schedule. The master or chief engineer responsibility is to navigate the vessel to his contract term without any hidden defects left over for his successor. Most time we just did our routine work according to company’s white book with or without supervision according to our working ethics/culture norms. Only when our work outcome has some lapse from company setting goal we will need the leadership. In this moment, it is not necessary the responsibility of the manager we had to devote his efforts or time. We can exercise the leadership within to finish the job if we have necessary knowledge/skill to do it. The leadership is a group effort to get thing done. It has to come from everybody. To see our obligations over other’s expectations (are called accountability which) is everybody’s leadership comes from. Accountability is one of the six core belief in Microsoft Company. What if we did not have necessary knowledge/skill to help the group goal? Unless we are naïve to our job assignment, this should not be an excuse.     

All our expertise should be well prepared by ourself before we get the promotion to next level. If we have this kind of problem to get necessary knowledge/skill in our current assignment then company policy must have something wrong. It has three aspects in any level of leadership:

1. Developing one’s technical knowhow and skill. 2. Cultivating the right attitude toward other people. 3. Working on psychological self-mastery. (Scouller, 2011)

The meaning of psychological self-mastery is to maintain our core value while we dedicate our efforts to fight with outside ever changing world day by day. This will be our topics in part 3 new culture concepts. However we can see the concept from the example below:

NTSB report GROUNDING OF THE PANAMANIAN PASSENGER SHIP JUNE 10, 1995

“About 2225 on June 10, 1995, the Panamanian passenger ship grounded on Rose and Crown Shoal about 10 miles east of Nantucket Island, Massachusetts while was en route from St. George’s, Bermuda, to Boston, Massachusetts. The National Transportation Safety Board determines that the probable cause of the grounding was the watch officers’ overreliance on the automated features of the integrated bridge system, Cruise Line’s failure to ensure that its officers were adequately trained in the automated features of the integrated bridge system and in the implications of this automation for bridge resource management, the deficiencies in the design and implementation of the integrated bridge system and in the procedures for its operation, and the second officer’s failure to take corrective action after several cues indicated the vessel was off course.

After the accident, representatives from Cruise Line and the Coast Guard examined GPS antenna and receiver. They found that the GPS antenna cable had separated from the factory connection at the antenna. The antenna cable, which was factory assembled, showed no sign of physical damage, other than having been separated from the connection.

The Safety Board examination also revealed that the cable was openly routed on the roof of the bridge and that it had been painted with a brush or roller at least twice when the bridge was being painted.“

Not only second office but also all OOW including Captain had overreliance on GPS position displayed on the map overlay on the ARPA display showed that the vessel was following its intended track. This is the main cause of grounding. But the interest part is why the antenna of GPS will disconnect from its socket without any physical damage in its appearance and why this cable had been painted twice without any person on board to report to their superior for close examination. The malfunction of the GPS input signal could be detected by the OOW with other means like Loran C, echo sounder or RADAR fix to double check its correctness. If the crew who accidently disconnect the GPA antenna cable could report to OOW honestly the grounding might not be happened. Now the error management had concluded that most major incident/accident are accounted for 18-23 small error before its actually happened. To exercise the leadership in every person on board will easily break the error chain not only by OOW and Captain’s effort, this practice will eventually increase the safety level on board and reduce the operational risk of shipping lines.        

.

Response to risks and threats?

If we define the Master/Chief Engineer as a manager who had the responsibility to report to company for any discrepancy in shipboard operation, who should response to any new risks or threats that had not defined in company white book? The discrepancy is common for anybody could make mistake in his service on board regardless how many years experiences or how good his skill he had as we discussed in part one of this book. The solution to any new risks or threats should come from every member on board. Today Master/Chief Engineer is in same position as other members on board, employer of ship owner. That’s why MLC 2006 also applied to them and they also protect by it. The willingness to cope with the new risks or threats is the topics of Psychological Contract in psychology. Employee feelings and attitudes are strongly influenced by their treatment at work and how they see themselves and their relationship with the employer.   

The simple message to employers from this - is therefore to focus on helping employees to feel good and be happy, because this produces a healthier view of their relationship and other positive consequences. If we defined Master/Chief Engineer in a traditional way as Autocratic leaders which are probably less likely to appreciate the significance of employee feelings/attitudes. Modern enlightened people-oriented leaders are more likely to understand the concept and to develop a positive approach to it. (McGregor's XY-Theory). "People work for many and various reasons; the more we understand and meet their needs, the better and more loyally they will perform...". If employee feelings/attitudes are more likely to be fair and balanced which probably will be an organizational strength and even a competitive advantage.

Modern technology brings in new risks and threats which the younger generations understand and exploit infinitely better than older people. Historically workers relied on employers for access to technology. In the future, employers will progressively depend on employees for its optimization. When 'selling' or persuading others to agree to or accept change:

•  Motivating and encouraging people to apply a positive constructive approach to achieving or handling properly explained challenges is generally a good thing.

People need to know what lies ahead, and to be consulted and supported in dealing with it.

Leaders (everyone on board) have a duty to give proper information and explanation to their followers (could be your superior). This leader may not have to be the Manager (Master/Chief Engineer) on board thus lack of fundamental responsibility where they deceive others or distort facts, in the hope that others will somehow absorb the problem when it looms larger than promised. Leader without leadership intention/responsibility/accountability is the real problem lies ahead in this new age.  This is the topics of part 3.

Emotional support in new age?

As the working goal (running punctually and safely on her sailing schedule) is clear to all members on board however the leadership (employee feelings/attitudes) fluctuated as their emotional state. We need emotional support to focus on helping employees to feel good and be happy. Empathy is the ability in understanding the other person's situation and feelings, in another word it is the ability to detect other’s emotional state. Normally empathy characterized as the behaviour of a single person, but in Psychological Contract empathy must be an organizational capability in this new age - a cultural norm and expectation of leaders and managers in their dealings with people. Empathy is crucial to trust, cooperation and openness, and it's also crucial to mutual understanding. If we can help our members feeling good and happy in a group, the ability of this group to handle new risk and threat is strengthened. 

Emotional support is a very important factor in human life. Emotion can penetrate into all life aspects in our intellectual growth, like our learning, judging, interpretation, decision making and our relationship with others. While most people are pessimistic and worry about the future, it is good to take slower pace to evaluate the situation and avoid any error cost. Actually optimism is never an advantage in any age, the man worried about nothing sometimes is wasted. If we see someone is always smiling and happy about everything happened we called him crazy. Human nature is pessimistic for the future and to prepare ourself. This pessimistic tendency comes from three sources: our temperance, mood and emotion. These sources differ it effects on the duration they had. Temperance is a life time character and the mood may prevail a long time, but the emotion change swiftly for every minute. To help everybody to stay in good and happy is to influence people by the emotion we had to radiate on them. The emotion of ours is a powerful weapon in our leadership. Emotion can penetrate on any state regardless of any rational consideration. The past emotion can make us happy while we still remember of it. Our colleagues/followers/patients/leaders/inner Child emotion now and then can influent our current performance. The emotional support is like kind of courtesy we had in a social situation to keep us in tune with others. But, this kind of emotional support should not overdo.

Our emotion could blind our rational logic, like Chinese say extremely happiness leads to tragedy. While we are very happy we lost the feeling of danger which in today’s term is we last the situational awareness. If others are in a very bad and sad mood, they were also lost the willingness to move ahead. Everything looks dangerous or useless to them now which are not worth to try or do any more. Over optimism could also mislead our judgment in our daily work into unnecessary complacency state. The emotional support is to give them a push while they are low and calm them down while they are high.

Relation Management in emotional support?

The emotion of our colleagues is not only influenced by our work, it also influenced by the past time we shared together. To work out the relationship with our colleagues by work is too hush or costly by the efforts or time we have to devote to make him feel good and happy. There is an easy way to achieve the same effect by the entertainment we could provide to them. The key element in relationship management is to achieve the most fast and economic way to make out of it.

1. To show out your inner Child to them often: People don’t show our real emotion to others very often. But it is useful if we did show our inner Chile to other to invite their kindness of inner Nurturing Parent if they are our superior or to gain their trust if they are other department worker. Our inner Child part is our emotional side which could the expression like “ I feel sad”” I feel bad”” I want to” “It is hard to” . By exposure your inner Child (emotion) to them can also invite their free Childish side which set them in a comfortable status. The importance of this exposure is its timing and portion in your dialogues with him, it depends on how serious your conversation is ( how much strict business inside). In a tough dialogue, your inner Child(feeling) should not jump out from nowhere. You should try to solve the problem first with your rational side of inner Adult. Whenever you feel the business part is over it time to reveal some part of your feeing which will change the business atmosphere immediately into your friendship atmosphere. The more sacred part you revealed the more impressed they got. Say the worry of your parent’s argue, the mood you had in missing your children or your sore leg that hurt you, merely complaint of the weather these days…etc, anything can do if you know how to grasp the essences of it. In the second time you met him again, the emotional part you two had shared in the end of first time will continue to  this time and now. Some cunning ( or smart we should say) people may working in other way around to begin formal conversation with a compliment first. “I feel good today””I like your dress” “how good is your look””you got a nice body build”…etc. keep the interaction of you two going by wrapping  in health emotional mood you will get it.       

2. To establish the setting with them often: just to hang around with these guys often even you don’t smoke or consume any kind of alcohol. We don’t need to stay with them all the time just to show up and say hello for few minutes. We can use the coke or tea to join their party they will understand your intention and gratitude for these. The memory of your present in middle of his high time will easily link your image as part of the sources of his happiness. The point is to show up your face from time to time to keep their impressions of yours in right mood.     
3. To let them help you often: asking a small favor from them from time to time will increase the interaction times you have and speed up the process of familiarity. Psychologist said to have a habitual person and environment (they called it structure) is essential to everybody’s well being for it easy the quest of human hunger for familiarity to calm down our anxiety and nerves. Our interaction with others need not to business only. In the professional side, this bond is established by asking the professional question. Confucius said three thousand years ago, “Treating the questioner well is like striking the bell, he who asking small we give small echo, he who asking big we give big echo”. Are they happy about our question while it is big? Yes they are more than delighted if we did ask them. It sets up a big stage for them to express or show how they fight and strive to get through the hardest part of his career. If you don’t ask this precious knowledge is lost in no time even they themselves will forget what achievement they had got.   
4. To give them the stage often: not only Confucius need the stage, all man need stage for it is part of our survival structure to show off our very existence. If he has talent or expertises we should give him the chance to show. If he has none we should give him the chance to talk or express their anxiety. If he has nothing to say we should ask him to do some work for us. If he has no working ability we should ask him to do some small errand for us. Everyman has his value in life. We need to give them the chance to do it and establish their life’s meaning.

All these relationship management are common in one thing. Working is not the only thing matter in your relation, the playing part of life is also very important to our relationship with others. We don’t need to do all his works to get his trust. We can simply asking how is his feeling today to get the same effect or even more gratitude by him. Don’t be a tough guy there is no way to survive in 21 century by this way unless you are a sole ranger who fight by his bare hands without any want for sleep.   

End of Chapter 9