B State: A New Roadmap for Bold Leadership, Brave Culture, and Breakthrough Results

When you talk, you are only repeating what you already know.
But if you listen, you may learn something new.

If the leadership’s culture changes, will the staff ’s culture be altered even if they aren’t part of the change process? Yes, it will—except when A State managers get stuck in the old paradigm. Then their staff gets left behind because it isn’t safe for them to get more involved in the new culture.

A municipality needed to break down silos and build cross-functional ownership to improve community service and reduce operating costs necessitated by decreased funding. Only one division’s leadership embraced the transformation at first. They used David Rodgers, one of IMPAQ’s B State senior consultants, to lead the successful change effort. When the other divisions saw how it had achieved those goals in only six months, a second division’s leadership team began their B State process. Together, they saved the municipality millions of dollars by the end of the year, plus immensely improved the working relationship between the two divisions—and, even better, increased their staffs’ engagement and support.

Based on their leadership’s modeling, employees adopted the language and tools of B State change: They turned to each other to solve problems rather than default to the chain of command. They volunteered for improvement efforts and suggested changes rather than complain—and in response, management listened to them and acted on their ideas. At the second year, the remaining two divisions began their B State change effort—after which, finally, the senior management team did the same.

That’s right: middle management made the transformation before senior management. And that’s okay, because it all got done!

The SMT chose “improving employee engagement” as a top priority based on the previous year’s low assessment scores, and the city manager told the human resources director to lead that project, as usual. About three months later, the HR director called David to discuss their employee-engagement program.

“I’m creating this program because I was directed to,” she said, obviously frustrated, “but I don’t believe employee engagement is an HR issue. I think it’s a leadership issue.”

“You’re right,” David agreed. “Every manager and supervisor needs to create the safety and expectation for meaningful engagement.”

“That’s right! A program won’t create the necessary safety if the manager hasn’t fostered that environment.”

“So let’s sort out your situation,” David offered. “You did the employee-engagement survey more than nine months ago. Can you do another, smaller-scale assessment to see if anything has changed based on the B State culture transformation?”

“That’s a good idea,” she said. “I’ve heard there’s greater employee engagement, but I don’t know if it’s widespread or just a few isolated cases.”

The small survey revealed the correlation David expected: the further along in implementing their B State transformation the division was, the more employees were engaged by their supervisors. By midyear, the employeeengagement project was replaced by a B State focus on employee engagement, and division leaders asked HR to sponsor workshops so all staff could develop general leadership skills, including personal accountability, B State delegation, and team accountability.

A public university struggled to attract top talent for their IT department and hold on to those they had. No matter what programs they implemented, they could not move the needle to improve the department’s staff relationships, low morale, or high turnover. Employees knew they could double their salary by working for any of a number of local private IT corporations, and jobs were plentiful. I faced a team of fifty managers, supervisors, and IT staff, all clearly faced off in an “us versus them” mentality when I arrived to implement a B State transformation. The initial session wasn’t easy with all that skepticism and negativity, but they nevertheless developed a Picture of Success and Team Habits and committed to follow the process and keep their commitments.

I arrived early for the six-month follow-up session to observe the participants enter the room. I wanted to see whether anyone’s attitudes or behavior had changed. It looked like nothing had—people were still unfriendly with each other or, pointedly, with me.

Well, this isn’t going to be a very fun day, I thought. I wonder if they had any success at all.

I had them individually complete the B State Team Relationship Assessment, as always. During their accomplishments brainstorm, I learned they had met and worked on their committed improvement efforts, but no one felt any sense of achievement. They’d experienced many improvements in teamwork, communication, and project completion—including measurable reductions in cost and advances in quality and internal-customer satisfaction—but I didn’t see that the group’s relationship “needle” had moved.

We reviewed their Picture of Success and rerated all twenty Team Habits. They did great: 70 percent of their Team Habits improved, 39 percent significantly. Even so, the people in the room had no positive energy. They all just stared at me, expressionlessly. Only one Team Habit scored lower than before, which is quite normal. Just as I began to review that habit with the group, a staff member raised her hand.

“What! How was it fake? You saw the process. We did it right here, in the room, together.”

“I’m lost,” I admitted. “How do you figure we manipulated anything, since the rating process was visible at all times to everyone in the room?”

“The last time we were together, we rated the Team Habits in the afternoon,” she said. “This time, we rated them in the morning. And we all know everyone is more positive in the morning than the afternoon, so of course the scores were higher.”

I paused to see whether she was joking—but no. The employees definitely questioned the process. Someone normally comes to my rescue in this kind of situation, but that didn’t happen either.

There was no way to win this theoretical debate, so I suggested we look at the correlations from their B State Team Relationship Assessment results— an assessment always done first thing in the morning. I’d do the analysis that afternoon, and we’d look at the results together afterward. “Meanwhile,” I said, “here are the correlations between Team Habit improvement scores and your average improvement on the fifteen relationship areas.” I drew two columns on our flip chart. “These are the norms, so if the ratings were fake, then the correlations couldn’t possibly be met.”

Rather than go back and review the Team Habit that declined, I went on with the follow-up session to set up the priorities and plans for the next six months of improvement.

Sure enough, the review of the B State Team Relationship Assessment clearly showed a correlation between the Team Habit (70 percent) and the Relationship (26 percent).

“According to your list of accomplishments, your elevated Team Habit scores, and your Team Interactions improvements, you’ve achieved complete alignment,” I told the group. “It’s statistically impossible to manipulate. So, here’s the deal. You can choose to either feel good about your accomplishments or keep feeling bad and make up some story to validate your negativity. Personally, I accept the scores and your tremendous gains.”

Still no reaction—no “we get it” response, or even, “This is great, because it demonstrates what a good team we are.” Nothing! Utter silence, as if I were speaking Martian. We only had a half hour left. Then—“Aha! Wait, everyone! We never reviewed the Team Habit that received a lower score! I completely forgot about it. We need to review that before we leave.”

Everyone turned to that page in the workbook, and I read the Team Habit aloud. “It’s called Positive Attitude and Celebrating Our Wins. We come to work with a positive attitude to contribute to a better work life. We openly celebrate our wins and accomplishments and fully express our appreciation and acknowledgment of others, regardless of position or department area.”

I almost burst out laughing. “Are you kidding me? You spent the entire day being negative and denying your clear demonstration of improvement—and the only Team Habit that decreased was your commitment to positively acknowledge and celebrate your wins! I’ve gotta ask: Do you suppose there could possibly be any correlation between your attitude today and the only Team Habit score that went down?”

I wished someone would drop a pin so they could all hear it—everyone in the room was frozen.

Six months later, the group had “miraculously” taken on a completely new energy. People greeted each other as they walked in the room—several individuals even went out of their way to greet me and ask me how I was doing! Friendly laughter and conversation filled the air.

This time, everyone’s energy was high as we reviewed their accomplishments. People shouted out wins from all over the room—they wouldn’t stop!—and pointedly acknowledged each other’s areas. Their Team Habits had improved again, especially the one on “Positive Attitude and Celebrating Our Wins.” Afterward, the management team stayed to tell me how grateful they were for my honesty in our last session.

“Well,” I admitted, “you created a happy accident with that unique Team Habit. It spotlighted your negative attitude in a way you couldn’t ignore. That’s the power of using correlated measurements. The results cannot be denied or manipulated.”

The department director called me out of the blue about six years later. “I just want you to know that we’re still following your B State system. We’ve continued to improve every year without exception. Even better, we stopped having a retention problem. We’re now attracting the best talent in the IT field because they’ve heard about our culture. Applicants tell us they’re willing to take much less compensation to work in a supportive, engaged-team environment that doesn’t have the backbiting and cliques found in private industry. Instead of constantly searching for help, we’re now turning away people!”

We’ve successfully implemented B State changes on every level of every kind of organization. A multinational corporation’s regional sales department, for example, constantly complained about their call center’s poor customer service—hardly an unusual occurrence. Upper management, blaming lack of commitment and accountability, implemented a new set of goals, metrics, and customer-service training, but employees were overwhelmed and confused by all the changes and pressure to perform. Although Jane Grossman, another IMPAQ B State senior consultant, was called in to “fix the call-center reps,” she recognized that the management team needed a B State transformation first.

The management team created a Picture of Success focused on eliminating silos, and then determined the most effective tools and metrics to achieve the highest level of customer-satisfaction. Next, Jane implemented a B State Accountability workshop with the call-center reps. Within one year, the call center received customer-satisfaction scores in the high 8s (out of 10). Not only did they exceed corporate’s target goal of 8.0, they were the only region that consistently achieved it. The sales organization stopped complaining and instead recognized the call-center reps for their consistent responsiveness, which has continued for more than a decade as of this writing.

Winning is important to me, but what brings me real joy is the experience of being fully engaged in whatever I’m doing.

—Phil Jackson

Purpose-driven, safe, and supportive environments are fun! It’s a blast to feel part of a team that works together and enjoys success beyond expectations! Yes, it takes dedication, consistency, and hard work to get those breakthrough results, but as one of my mentors said, “When you do something one hundred percent, it’s a breeze. When you do something ninety-five percent, it’s a bitch!”

Isn’t that the truth? When we put ourselves completely into something, we don’t feel the effort or passing time because we’re fully present and involved in what we’re doing. But when we multitask or become unbalanced, we create a mental conundrum, a bifurcation that creates stress and makes us “feel” how hard we’re working—and that’s a recipe for misery.

Sometimes, the imbalance isn’t work related; it’s a home issue. B State employees who learn about developing agreements, Team Habits, and Proactive Recovery Plans with their team members and supervisors often discover those same ideas can remedy issues with their spouses, children, and other family members.

When I used to spend weekends with my eight-year-old daughter after my divorce, work regularly interrupted our time together. “You’re always on the phone,” she complained—and she was right. I still worked weekends at that point to grow my business and secure her present and future. We agreed that I would give her a minimum of two solid, uninterrupted hours within every six-hour period, and she’d play by herself or read the rest of the time while I worked. Of course, she soon discovered that spending any more than two hours with Dad got boring, so even the breaks worked out well. She immediately pointed out the one time I forgot, and I got right back on track. My show of respect for her and our agreement not only increased the trust between us, but made her feel safe and, by extension, gave her confidence to speak up with other people in similar situations.

I was running a B State Mastership program once when Alan spoke up: “I had the most amazing breakthrough with my family last night. I’ve been having a lot of problems with my fifteen-year-old son, and my wife keeps telling me, ‘You’re just not approachable.’ So last night, I called a family meeting. I told them about what we did yesterday in our B State training session and admitted I wasn’t communicating effectively with them. Then I led us through creating our own family habits around keeping each other informed and making decisions that include my son’s input. He was amazing—completely clear and direct about what he needed, yet willing to accommodate my needs as well. My wife was supportive of both of us. It was truly the best conversation we’d had in years. This morning, everyone was in great spirits. We even talked to each other over breakfast instead of snarling, like we usually do.”

He looked at me. “Mark, I have to thank you. I’ve been pretty shut down up to this point, but your tools are so practical, they even work at home. You’ve changed my life!”

In typical partnerships, each party goes into self-protection mode, which generates petty “you versus me” disputes. “I’m doing all the giving; you’re just taking.” Everyone looks out for themselves, not for the partnership. But in a B State, everyone looks out for both the whole and each other. It eliminates silos, whether they’re between a couple, within a family, or in a business environment.

I saw this in action when I worked with a nuclear plant’s manager who had high expectations of his workforce yet looked out for his employees’ best interests and insisted they take care of themselves. If he noticed someone feeling sick or knew they had a pressing family issue, he sent them home. Not only did his plant have one of the highest employee-satisfaction scores in its field, but its industry regulatory agency rated it the number-one nuclear plant in the country.

That B State advantage even works in independent-contractor organizations, such as my own company, IMPAQ. Our consultants share commissions with each other and the operational staff not because it’s required, but because we established that B State cultural norm decades ago. We take care of each other for the good of every person and the organization as a whole.

Team Habits	Relationships
60%	15%
70%	25%
80%	35%