The Spirit of Royal London of RL/yourpath/leader... · The Spirit of Royal London 51- 60 ... HubSpot believes so strongly in transparency that notes from board meetings and its culture

The Spirit of Royal London


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What leaders do – We are trustworthy

What leaders do – We collaborate

What leaders do – We achieve

New beginnings

“Leadership is the capacity to translate vision into reality”- Warren Bennis

1 - 10Let’s get started

Days

Days

11 - 20Why culture matters

Days

Days

21- 30Our culture

Days

Days

31- 40Your strength is your difference

Days

Days

41- 50What leaders do – We are empowered

Days

Your 100 day plan.

The Spirit of Royal LondonThe Spirit of Royal London

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Days 1-10:Let’s get started

We need your leadership to steer the business towards its strategic vision of becoming the most trusted and recommended company in our industry. Your leadership is critical in bringing Royal London’s desired culture to life.

Our Spirit of Royal London (SoRL) programme is designed from within to support the creation of our desired culture. Because we know that having the right culture aligned to our brand is integral to achieving our strategic vision.

You are critical to bringing this to life. Your Path is your plan to develop your leadership approach – one which demonstrates how you are leading and living the Spirit of Royal London.

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This is your first 100 days. Let’s make it count.


Think of Your Path as a way to plan how you’re going to contribute to creating our desired culture at Royal London.

Each 10-day section contains prompts to reflect, track progress, capture insights, and set goals. There’s relevant educational material about why culture matters, research, quotes and further reading to inspire you.

What difference can leaders make? The success of SoRL depends on our leaders taking ownership for creating and living our values. Use Your Path to think about the difference you can make and how that difference can contribute to making Royal London stronger for our customers, our employees and our industry.

How to usethis journal


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The “first 100 days” became a catchphrase in 1933 to describe the rapid achievements of former US President Franklin D. Roosevelt in introducing and signing into law 15 major bills. Since then, business and politics alike has adopted the term to emphasise the importance of making a positive impact in the first 100 days of any leader’s term.

Did you know?

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What is the purpose of SoRL?

We all want to be part of a better Royal London and the SoRL is our roadmap to get there. It’s made up of four values, each with their own set of behaviours that, together, play a key role in helping us create the customer-centric business we want to become.

What’s the simplest way to describe SoRL?It defines “the way we do things around here”, to ensure that we deliver the best outcomes for our customers. It’s integral to building a successful, sustainable business. The Spirit of

Royal London isn’t a destination.It’s a journey...



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Making small changes to the way you think and act every day starts with you...

A journey where small changes in the way we think and act can make all the difference.

A journey from A to D.

A journey that starts with our leaders and the difference you can make.

The Spirit of Royal London The Spirit of Royal London

...those small changes add up to a big difference in the way we act as Royal London...

...and that big difference changes the experience we give our customers...

...and the way our customers see us is what will differentiate us from our competitors.


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Creating your plan

●What do you need to do as a leader to support and enable your teams /colleagues to live SoRL?

Use these questions to start thinking about how you’re going to lead and live the SoRL:

What can you do as a leader to demonstrate that you live by our cultural values?


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How can you gain a better understanding of your approach to leadership and your effectiveness?

You’ve got 100 days. What are you going to focus on first?


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“Make no mistake: leadership is about results. Great leadership has the potential to excite people to extraordinary levels of achievement. But it is not only about performance; it is also about meaning.


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This is an important point – and one that is often overlooked by contemporary leadership literature. Leaders at all levels make a difference to performance. They do so because they make performance meaningful.”

Rob Goffee and Gareth JonesWhy Should Anyone be Led by You?


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Three tips for facilitating new thinking about culture

01Do your team / colleagues understand what we’re aiming to achieve. Make it a priority to communicate the rationale behind the need for initiatives and let them know what’s going to happen. As things change, evaluate, review, and provide feedback to your colleagues on a regular basis.

Be the conversation-starter.

Create an environment for people to express their ideas and point of view.

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Clear the way for people to do things differently.03Are people coming up against obstacles? We can’t expect different results to happen with the same old thinking. To empower people to bring your vision to life, you often need to remove the things getting in their way and keep removing them as you go forward.

What can you do to create the environment that encourages your team / colleagues to speak up? It might be time to review the way in which you hold meetings or collect feedback. Everyone is different and should have plenty of opportunities to share concerns, ask questions and offer ideas.


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“Cultural beliefs drive behaviour. Decisions are the go-betweens, interpreting inbound data and translating the cultural beliefs into action. But core beliefs are so strong that they drive decisions in subtle and automatic ways. The decision maker is often not even conscious of them.”

John B. McGuire, Gary Rhodes, and Charles J. Palus Inside Out: Transforming Your Leadership Culture


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What are your core beliefs and how are they reflected in your approach to leadership?


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Action!We’re all accountable for our culture, but creating an environment where people feel accountable takes time and effort. Use these pointers to think about what you can to do to create this environment:

01 Have you identified your key stakeholders? Do they have a shared understanding about the goals and what outcomes you are both working towards for achieving those goals? If not, what can you do to make them clearer?

02 Do your team / colleagues feel 100% accountable for improving the way things are done around here? If not, what can you do to give them the freedom and encouragement they need to make decisions?


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03 Are you helping teams /colleagues improve on their ideas or inserting your own? Think about what you can do to give them the support they need to come up with solutions.

04 How many mechanisms are there for your colleagues to provide feedback – to you and each other? Think about whether you can do more to flag issues earlier.


26 27Your notes (What changes have you or your colleagues made? What have you achieved? Think about how you could work with other leaders in your area.)

Your notes


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Days 11-20:Why culturematters

Time to reflectAs we mentioned in part one, the SoRL is a journey not a destination, and achieving the goals you’ve set yourself will take time and practice. So why not make culture a routine?

For the next 10 days, spend five minutes each morning coming up with one small practical step in which you can build on your 100-day goal. Try to achieve that by the end of each day and record the results here.

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“As we look ahead into the next century, leaders will be those who empower others.”

“Culture is the single most powerful force in an organisation – it is always changing.”

Bill GatesCo-founder of Microsoft

Justin KingFormer CEO of Sainsbury’s


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A crash course in culture

Culture is a key enabler of our business, just like technology, infrastructure, brand and people. Our culture shapes our actions and it’s our actions that shape the experience our customers have when they interact with our business.

That experience not only determines whether our customers choose to stay with us or not, it determines our reputation and the reputation of our industry.

But that culture has to come from you.

Why? Because culture is created by the unspoken messages people receive about what is valued. These messages come from, and are reinforced by, three things:

Behaviour

Symbols

Systems

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02

03

(our choice of role models)

(such as how we allocate budgets)

(such as how we measure and reward performance)

So to change our culture, we have to change the messages.


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What is culture?

A culture is the ideas, customs and social behaviour of a particular people or society. A culture is created by the beliefs and values that we hold as a company. These influence our behaviours and the environment we work in, which in turn, reinforce those values for others.

Younger companies that focus on culture are seeing a huge payoff. HubSpot, a growing New England tech firm that has made culture a priority for its 1,000 employees, has Glassdoor ratings of 4.6, far above the industry average. HubSpot believes so strongly in transparency that notes from board meetings and its culture manifesto are posted online.

Traditional companies such as Aetna are now heavily focused on culture. Recently, the New York Times published an article about Aetna’s CEO Mark Bertolini. He has raised wages, improved health benefits, and introduced yoga and mindfulness training for his entire company to improve retention and culture in the call centres. Their $100m+ turnover problem is rapidly going away and he claims to have already improved the bottom line by 3-4%.

Culture matters – for new and established companies


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We ignore culture at our peril

For the FCA, a strong corporate culture that puts customers at the heart of the business should be the foundation on which a company is run. What’s more, it believes it’s these companies that could steal market share. Remember these?

FCA fines RBS and Natwest £14.5m over mortgage advice

“Taking out a mortgage is one of the most important financial decisions we can make. Both firms failed to ensure that their customers were getting the best advice for them.”

FCA fines Merrill Lynch £13.2m for transaction reporting failures

“The size of the fine sends a clear message that we expect to be heard and understood across the industry.”


To encourage positive culture change in firms, the FCA has made culture part of the risk assessment process: where it believes cultural measures expose a firm to a high level of risk (in the context of its objectives), the firm will be expected to take account of it.

“Culture is like DNA. It shapes judgements, ethics and behaviours displayed at those key moments, big or small, that matter to the performance and reputation of firms and the service that it provides to customers and clients” Clive AdamsonDirector of Supervision,Financial Conduct Authority


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“The challenge for many firms is that culture is hard to change and requires dedicated and persistent focus over a number of years in order to embed different approaches and ways of behaving. As the Saltz Review recently concluded, if culture is left to its own devices, it shapes itself, with the inherent risk that behaviours will not be those desired.”

Clive AdamsonDirector of Supervision,Financial Conduct Authority


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How a firm responds to, and deals with, regulatory issues.What customers are actually experiencing when they buy a product or service from front-line staff.How a firm runs its product approval process and the considerations around these.The manner in which decisions are made or escalated.The behaviour of that firm in certain markets.Remuneration structures.

How does the FCA assess culture? Through a range of different measures, such as:

The FCA also looks at how a board engages with each of these issues: whether it probes high-return products or business lines; whether it understands strategies for cross-selling products; how fast growth is obtained; and whether products are being sold to markets that they are designed for. In other words, is the customer-focused culture supported by a company’s leaders?

Setting the tone from the top.

The FCA’s three drivers of company culture

Translating this into easily understood business performance.

Supporting the right behaviours through performance management and employee development, and reinforcing them through reward programmes.

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02

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What about those leaders who are getting culture right?

Question: 40

Well, it pays dividends. Take Apple and Handelsbanken for example. They’re high-performing companies renowned for their customer experience. It’s no coincidence that they’re also well-known for their strong company cultures led by example from the top.

Answer:


Your notes


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“Everyone shares a common goal to make the best products for the consumer, and it shows in every conversation you have.”

Apple

Apple’s core values are the reason that Apple products have been so consistently excellent, and explains why you can walk into any Apple store across the country and expect to receive the same experience. From sales associates to top executives, Apple is united by a common culture. And it is that culture which ensures Apple customers enjoy the experience they have come to expect whenever they interact with the brand.

Culture gets results! In 2014, Apple topped the American Customer Satisfaction Index (a sort of Michelin guide for customer service) for the 11th year in a row.

What they say:

“We have a process in the bank where branches decide the costs of the head office. They scrutinise our costs. The branch manager is the king of the bank.”

Handelsbanken

Handelsbanken’s decentralised structure is about as far away from those used by Britain’s major banks as it is possible to get. Its profit-sharing scheme (in which every employee receives an equal share of the bank’s profits as long as it makes a return on equity greater than the average of its peer group), alongside a customer-service approach built around its branches, has resulted in high levels of employee and customer satisfaction.

Culture gets results! In 2014, Handelsbanken topped an independent customer satisfaction survey by EPSI Rating for the sixth year in a row. Since April 2008, Handelsbanken has expanded at the rate of roughly one new opening every eight days and its full-year operating profits for 2015 are up by 41%.

What they say:


44 45Your notes (Where have you seen your colleagues putting the customer at the heart of what we do?)

Your notes


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Top tips for creating the culture you want

Lead by example everyday.Creating our desired culture isn’t going to happen overnight. It’s about making it part of the way you work everyday. So why not spend five minutes every day with your team focusing on one of our cultural values? Get a different person to lead the meeting each time – and be sure to praise achievements publicly. The result, added up over years, is a lot of reinforcement.

Use your SoRL Values Cards.Inside every pack of Values Cards, there are creative challenges, behaviours and inspirational quotes for you to use to demonstrate and live the values through our everyday work. Think of them as a starting point to building a consistent approach across the company.

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We

Are

Em

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Mah

atm

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“Our

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... a

s in

bei

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ours

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We Are Empowered

Living the Values

On a piece of paper, w

rite down a business

problem you’re trying to

solve. Write

the

solution you’re proposing underneath it

and

fold that p

art of th

e paper over. Now ask a

colleague to

read the problem and write

their

solution down. D

iscuss the pros and cons of

your two approaches.

We Are Trustworthy

Living the Values

Make a date with a colleague to come into

work an hour early one morning. Grab a

sheet of A3 paper. Sit opposite each other

and write down two issues troubling you this

week. Swap sides and take turns to offer

some helpful advice to each other about how

to tackle them.

Action!

Recommended reading

Look back at the FCA’s drivers for culture and the way it assesses culture in companies. Write down the three key areas of your role that you plan to focus on to put the customer at the heart of everything we do at Royal London:

Leading Change by John P. Koter Winning From Within by Erica Ariel Fox

Amaze Every Customer Every Time by Shep Hyken


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Days 21-3o:Our culture

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“To handle yourself, use your head; to handle others, use your heart.”Eleanor Roosevelt

“If everyone is moving forward together, then success takes care of itself.”Bill Gates

What in your view makes a good company culture?

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Time to reflectSpend five minutes at the start of this section writing down your thoughts.


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What do you think are the good things about Royal London’s culture?

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What do you think is a leader’s role in creating that culture?

02 What areas do you think we need to focus on to make Royal London’s culture stronger?

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So, what’s our culture?

We’ve always had a culture. But until now it hasn’t defined how we all work together as Royal London. With your help, we’ve defined what we want to become.


We are EmpoweredWe are TrustworthyWe Collaborate We Achieve

We are proud to be Royal London.


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We areempowered

It’s important that our people have the skills to perform their role and understand the bigger picture. Everyone here has a voice to improve the way things are done. We provide people with the tools and authority to act and make decisions. We feel real accountability and ownership to act in the best interests of our customers and the Group.

Let’s look at those values in more detail:


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We aretrustworthy

We keep our promises and meet agreed expectations. We’re approachable and transparent in the way we interact, using language that is easy to understand. We build relationships that are personal, built on trust and respect, and which deliver mutual benefit.


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We collaborate

We share our knowledge, developing our expertise and learning from mistakes. We inspire each other to give our best and enjoy our work. We operate as one team and by working together and using our collective strengths we achieve more for our customers.


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We achieve

We go the extra mile to deliver the best outcomes and experiences for our customers and for each other. We’re always looking to do things better and continuously improve our performance. It is important to us that we recognise everyone’s contribution and celebrate our achievements.

“If you don’t have trust inside your company, then you can’t transfer it to your customers”

Roger Staubach


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What can you do to encourage your colleagues to explore alternative solutions, make suggestions and take ownership for improving the way we work?

How familiar are you with the individual strengths within your business area and what can you do to make best use of these strengths?

Consider how you can:Explain how individual contributions link to Royal London’s success.Provide coaching and mentoring to build capability in others.

How can I ensure that my team / colleagues are empowered?Reflect on these questions:

01 02


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Do they take ownership for the quality and accuracy of their work before passing it on to others?

How can you contribute to building trust?Reflect on these questions:

01 02How effective are you in keeping the commitments you have made to others and do you do what you say you will to the best of your ability?

How do you encourage others to take ownership for the quality and accuracy of their work?

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Consider how you can:Demonstrate the importance of agreeing clear expectations on deliverables with key stakeholders.Establish a climate of openness and trust.



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How can you contribute to increasing collaboration within Royal London?01 02Do you use plain English when communicating and adjust your approach to whoever you are interacting with?

What do you do to ensure that key stakeholders are involved in decisions that impact them, so that their needs are considered?

Reflect on these questions:


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Consider how you can:Show how the success of Royal London depends on collaboration between individual business units and functions, not just working in silos.

Harness internal expertise to deliver the best outcomes for our customers and the business.

Use examples of successful collaborations you’ve been involved with to inspire collaboration within the group.

Identify where you can increase the amount of collaboration.

Your notes




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Do they take ownership for the quality and accuracy of their work before passing it on to others?

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How do you help others achieve their potential?01What are the main activities in your area that will have the most impact on delivering the right outcomes for customers and colleagues?

Consider how you can:Recognise and celebrate achievements.Promote a ‘can do’ approach to working.Act promptly to remove barriers that block progress.



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Top tip:

Culture is about respectTo build a company of mutual respect and understanding, leaders must understand behavioural patterns that contribute to our desired culture. For example, establishing a welcoming environment where employees are free to engage with leaders fosters open communication with team members. By doing this, leaders are continually building unity within the company.

Fast Forward by Melanne Verveer and Kim K. AzzarelliThe Five Dysfunctions of a Team by Patrick Lencioni

Recommended reading:



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Action! Leadership begins with you Ask yourself this question: Why should anyone be led by you? This isn’t a question to be considered once and then forgotten. Leaders need to be able to address this question every day in what they do, and that means having a clear sense of who you are.

Consider using some of the Royal London insight tools to gain a better understanding of your leadership effectiveness.

What is my leadership philosophy?01

How do I inspire people?

How do I motivate people?

What values do I stand for?

03

04

02




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Days 31-4o:Your strength is your difference

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“ You cannot be anything you want to be – but you can be a lot more of who you already are.” Tom Rath

“ You don’t learn to walk by following rules. You learn by doing, and by falling over.”Richard Branson

What’s helped you achieve them?

Highlight three things you’ve achieved since starting Your Path.

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01

Spend five minutes at the start of this section writing down your thoughts on the following questions/statements:

Time to reflect:


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If you don’t feel like you’ve made a difference, why is that? And what can you do differently?

Has this change had a positive impact on anyone else’s performance? How?

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03 If there are barriers obstructing your progress, what can you do to remove them?

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919090 Your notes

Recognising the strength (difference) in all of us

We all have different strengths and the SoRL acknowledges this. In fact, it celebrates it. As Tom Rath in StrengthsFinder 2.0 puts it: “Being able to identify your strengths is a valuable tool – especially when it comes to leadership. Successful leaders spend most of their time developing their strengths and applying them in the workplace while simultaneously managing their weaknesses.”

As we showed in the roadmap, the SoRL values encourage people to understand their strengths and weaknesses, and to make their difference, their strength. We want you ,to develop your own SoRL path –one that is guided by the SoRL leadership principles and our values, and to use this to help identify strengths in your teams/colleagues.


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Here’s a simple formula to help you define ‘strength’

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(the ability to consistently provide near-perfect performance)

Talent

Investment

Strength

(a natural way of thinking, feeling or behaving)

(time spent practicing, developing your skills and

building your knowledge base)


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A few things to consider about strengths

Strengths suggest how someone is likely to make choices in certain situations.

Two people with very different profiles can both be excellent in the same role, but they will execute the role in different ways.

Two people with similar themes can behave very differently.

Strengths are not an excuse for behaving how we want to.

Managing the ‘downsides’ of our strengths helps us maximise our impact.

Recommended reading

“ The main body of leadership literature focuses on the characteristics of leaders. This gives it a strong psychological bias. It sees leadership qualities as inherent to the individual. The underlying assumption is that leadership is something we do to other people. But in our view, leadership should be seen as something we do with other people. Leadership must always be viewed as a relationship between the leader and the led.”

Why should anyone be led by you? by Rob Goffee and Gareth Jones


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Describe your strengths

You should already have a copy of StrengthsFinder 2.0, but if you don’t please contact Organisational Development to receive a copy. To help your teams identify their strengths, you need to know your own. Over the next 10 days, revisit your own StrengthsFinder 2.0 survey.

What values do I stand for? 01Are there any areas where you could use your strengths differently?

Choose three of your strengths and describe what they mean to you.

03

02


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Think above the line

Not below the line

Our four values – Empowered, Trustworthy, Collaborate and Achieve – encourage what we call ‘above-the-line thinking’. What do we mean by that? Put simply: it’s a positive mental attitude. Instead of seeing yourself as a victim of circumstance over which you feel powerless to act (below-the-line thinking), you choose to frame a problem as an opportunity, or a series of challenges, and take responsibility over what you can do to overcome them.

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PowerfulChoicesResponsible Open Undefensive Listening Responsive Co-operative Generous

Out of controlNo choiceVictim Justify Ignore Blame Arrogant Short-term gain




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Action!Spend five minutes reflecting on how you used your strengths to overcome your weakness. Try to record one example for each.

Recommended readingThe Silo Effect by Gillian Tett

How breaking down the silos can lead to better co-operation and results among organisations.


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Action!Mapping your team’s strengths. Our brand position, Strength in everyone, makes it clear that we believe that everyone who works for us has the power to make a difference, and that those differences taken together can add up to a big change.

Now you’ve reflected on your own strengths, map the strengths of your team or the people you work with on a regular basis using the table provided.

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Influ

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Is your team playing to its strengths?

What were your initial impressions when you reviewed the strength profile of your colleagues?

01

Recommended readingFree management tutorials and presentations:managementstudyguide.com

How can you use the strengths of others to complement you?

What did you notice about the strengths of your team?

03

02


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Days 41-5o:What leaders do – We are empowered

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“Before you are a leader, success is all about growing yourself. When you become a leader, success is all about growing others”

Jack Welch


If you can, have a conversation with them over coffee. Find out what they are making an effort to do and why.

Explore how this is having an impact on the way they work and whether they’ve noticed any benefits - has it had a measurable impact on their performance or inspired any of their colleagues.

Use what you find out as a case study to share with your team/colleagues.

Have you noticed any changes in the way your colleagues work that suggests they are taking a proactive approach to living one or more of our values?

Time to reflect:


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Welcome to the SoRL leadership principles

Leaders are responsible for setting the goal to be achieved and balancing the mix of skills you need to get there. Motivating your team or colleagues towards achieving that goal is no small thing. And it’s no different with our culture. Our leaders should reflect behaviours that inspire and motivate people to behave in a way that is in line with our desired culture. This is the thinking behind our four leadership principles.

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Together we are stronger

We meet or exceed our agreed expectations

We create value for our customers and members

We harness the strength in everyone

SoRL Leadership Principles

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Putting these principles into action


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From this section onwards, we’ll be exploring how these overarching principles translate into what leaders do on the ground, every day, to facilitate our four cultural values.

For example, to create the right conditions for everyone in Royal London to be “empowered”, there are a number of key behaviours leaders need to demonstrate; those behaviours then have positive knock-on effects that benefit our people. Over time these effects add up to a big difference – our desired culture.


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We areempowered

What our leaders do

What it means for our people

We enable

Leaders set up individuals and teams for success.

Everyone has the skills to perform their roles and understand the bigger picture.

We encouragechallenge

We support We are responsible

Leaders encourage open debate and curiosity to understand how things could be done differently.

Everyone is approachable and transparent in the way they interact, using language that is easy to understand.

Leaders provide clear direction, autonomy and feedback to improve performance and potential.

Everyone has the tools and authority to make decisions and act.

Leaders hold themselves and others accountable for performance and customer focus.

Everyone is accountable and takes ownership for acting in the interests of the customer and Royal London.


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Action!An important part of Your Path is about getting to grips with how you’re going to help make our desired culture stick. That means coming up with practical ways that you’re going to facilitate the actions under the What our leaders do section of the table.

Over the next 10 days, take each action in turn and spend some time answering each question. List practical examples wherever possible.

Setting up individuals and teams for success

How can you do more to share up-to-date knowledge of Royal London and the business environment?How can you explain how individual contributions link to Royal London success?How can you ensure resources are in place to enable others to achieve their goals?Use what you find out as a case study to share with your team/colleagues.


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Encouraging open debate and curiosity to understand how things could be done differently.

How can you evaluate alternative solutions to improve what we deliver to customers and enhance business performance?How can you do more to challenge the status quo?How can you encourage open debate in progressing business goals?How can you encourage open debate on how to deliver and achieve our customer value statements?

Providing clear direction, autonomy and feedback to improve performance and potential.

What actions do you need to take to ensure that you are delegating effectively, and that accountabilities are clear and understood?How can you improve the way you coach and mentor others?


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Holding ourselves and others accountable for performance and customer focus.

How can I take the initiative to progress goals and objectives?How can I reinforce the Spirit of Royal London values, through words and actions?How can I hold myself and others accountable for performance and customer focus?


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Be an active listener

Smile

Share from your own experience

01

02

03

Top tips: Six ways to be more approachable

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When listening provide visual cues, make eye contact, ask questions and summarise what you have heard. Think about how you can confirm to the speaker that you are listening.

For many of us this is a learned behaviour. We don’t realise the negative effect we have on people sometimes, but once you start smiling at people you’ll see amazing results – as the saying goes, ‘it takes more muscles to frown than smile’.

You have more to share than you realise. Mine the rich experiences of your life and share your wisdom from your unique point of view. You may be the only one who can touch someone with your inspiring message.


Tell stories

Be vulnerable

Empathy

05

04

06

Facts tell and stories sell. They inspire, too. We learn best from parables and we all need to develop our own inspiring stories based on our experiences.

Be willing to share your failures as well as your successes. Others will relate to you. They’ll understand that they’re not the only ones with challenges.

Show an interest in others. Empathy is the capacity to put yourself in another’s position and understand or feel what another person is experiencing.

Recommended readingSwitch: How to Change Things When Change is Hard by Dan and Chip Heath

brightsightgroup.com/speakers/dan-heath


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Days 51-60:What leaders do – We are trustworthy

Do you feel more aware of your strengths as a leader? Have you identified any obstacles to putting your leadership principles into action?What can you do about them?

Time to reflect:

“The essence of trust building is to emphasize the similarities between you and the customer.”

Jack Welch

What our leaders do


We are reliable

We are open

We build relationships

Leaders agree clear team and individual goals, which they and their people can deliver against.

Everyone keeps their promises and meets agreed expectations.

Leaders facilitate honest and straight-forward communication, where feedback is routinely given and received.

Everyone is approachable and transparent in the way they interact, using language that is easy to understand.

Leaders establish strong partnerships to ensure that the vision and ambition are consistently brought to life.

Everyone builds relationships that are personal, built on trust and respect, and which deliver mutual benefit.


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Action!Over the next 10 days, take each action under the What our leaders do section of the table in turn and spend some time answering each question. List practical examples wherever possible.

Agreeing clear team and individual goals to deliver against.

How can you improve the way you agree clear expectations on deliverables with key stakeholders?How can you make sure you keep commitments to yourself and others?How can you do more to ensure risks are effectively identified and managed?


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Facilitating honest and straight-forward communication, where feedback is routinely given and received.

How can you communicate more clearly and make sure everyone’s on the same page?

How can you you do more to engage key stakeholders to keep them informed of progress?

How can you establish a climate of openness and trust?

Building strong relationships to establish our vision, create value for our customers and to deliver mutual benefit.

What action do you need to take to demonstrate that you welcome diverse views and perspectives from colleagues?How can you contribute to creating productive and valuable relationships internally and externally?


133132

Honesty really is the best policy

Top tips: 132

Start me upSimply by talking with employees, rather than simply issuing orders, leaders can retain or recapture some of the qualities – operational flexibility, high levels of employee engagement, tight strategic alignment–that enable startups to outperform better-established rivals.

Recommended readingTransforming Your Leadership Culture by Center for Creative Leadership


A recent study of 22,719 leaders showed that those who ranked at the bottom 10% in their ability to give honest feedback to direct reports received engagement scores from their subordinates that averaged 25%. In contrast, those in the top 10% for giving honest feedback had subordinates who ranked at the 77th percentile in engagement.

01

02




136 137

Days 61-70:What leaders do – We collaborate

136

“The function of leadership is to produce more leaders, not more followers.”

Ralph Nader


What our leaders do


We learn We enjoy We are one team

Leaders embed a culture of learning together in order to improve performance.

Everyone shares their knowledge, developing their expertise and learning from mistakes.

Leaders create environments where their people are motivated to contribute to wider business success.

Everyone inspires each other to give their best and enjoy their work.

Leaders align teams effectively and establish connections to enable delivery and build stronger business.

Everyone operates as one team and by working together and using our collective strengths we achieve more for our customers.

What does creating value for our customers mean to you?

How confident do you feel that you and your teams can achieve this?

Time to reflect:


138 139

Action!Over the next 10 days, take each action under the What our leaders do section of the table in turn and spend some time answering each question. List practical examples wherever possible.

Embedding a culture of learning together in order to improve performance.

How can you do more to research internal and external best practice and use this to drive improvements?How can you build time into my week to reflect on your performance and apply learnings from setbacks and successes?How can you encourage an open exchange of ideas and different points of view?


140 141

Creating environments where our people are motivated to contribute to wider business success.

How can you ensure that you always give honest, open and constructive feedback?How can you do more to work with others across the business to ensure the best possible delivery for customers?

Aligning teams effectively and establishing connections to enable delivery and build stronger business.

How can you instil confidence in individuals and teams so they can perform at their best?How can you harness internal expertise to deliver the best outcomes for our customers and the business?


143142

Top tips: 142

Encourage your colleagues to make 10 decisions a day to to increase the level of empowerment, and record them. Decision-making is a positive action. It turns people into owners who understand what they’re doing and why.

According to performance coach Dr. Alan Zimmerman, leaders should pay attention to behaviours that get things done in the right way. By praising the behaviour itself, the employee feels like they have done well, and the rest of the team are shown an example.

Recommended readingThe Age of Unreason: New Thinking for a New World by Charles Handy


01

02 Praise the performance – not the performer

Encourage decision-making




146 147

Days 71-80:What leaders do – We achieve

“ The art of communication is the language of leadership.”

Jack Welch

Do you think you communicate often and openly enough with your team and colleagues, whether about successes or problems? What new feedback mechanisms could you introduce to make sure this happens?

Time to reflect:

What our leaders do


We deliver We improve We celebrate success

Leaders demonstrate full consider-ation of customers and members in delivering our strategy, promoting a ‘can do’ approach.

Everyone goes the extra mile to deliver the best outcomes and experiences for our customers and for each other.

Leaders listen and respond to their people, customers and members in defining how our business operates.

Everyone is always looking to do things better and continuously improve our performance.

Leaders celebrate successes in ways that individuals and teams feel valued.

It is important to us that we recognise everyone’s contribution and celebrate our achievements.


148 149

Demonstrating full consideration of customers and members in delivering our strategy, promoting a ‘can do’ attitude.

How can you improve the way you define and measure what we need to deliver and how this can be achieved?How can you make sure the performance goals you set for yourself and others are stretching?How can you promote a ‘can do’ approach to working?

Listening and responding to your teams, customers and members in defining how our business operates.

How can you improve the way you listen and act on feedback from colleagues and customers?How can you make sure that you consistently review performance to identify opportunities for improvement?How can you act promptly to manage barriers which block progress?


150 151

Celebrating success using existing mechanisms and in ways that individuals and teams feel valued.

How and when should you communicate business success to make sure people feel proud?How can you act as an ambassador for Royal London in the wider community?How can you show appreciation for the contribution and achievement others have made?

151

Defining success

Top tip: 151

Whenever possible, let your team decide how to achieve the task. Agree upon what constitutes a successful outcome, then let them chart their own course. This builds ownership in the process and they might figure out a method for getting the job done that is better than the one you would have assigned.

Recommended readingA Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule The Future by Daniel H. Pink

www.danpink.com/books/whole-new-mind





155

This is your first 100 days. Let’s make it count.

Days 81-100:New beginnings

Congratulations on reaching the final stage of Your Path.

Your achievements over the past 100 days is testament to the time, effort and commitment you’ve given to living our cultural values and, in doing so, leading our business towards its strategic vision of becoming the most trusted and recommended company in our industry.

How has your role as a leader evolved over the past 100 days? If it hasn’t, how would you like it to evolve?

The final stage of Your Path is an opportunity to reflect and use the insights you’ve gained to define what success now looks like for you in the future.

154


Shares up-to-date knowledge of Royal London and the business environment.1 2 3 4 5

Ensures resources are in place to enable others to achieve their goals.1 2 3 4 5

Explains how individual contribution links to Royal London success.1 2 3 4 5

Evaluates alternative solutions to improve what we deliver to customers and enhance business performance.1 2 3 4 5

01

03

02

04

Your path for the futureReflect on the following 18 criteria and give yourself a score from 1–5 (five being the highest) for how well you think you perform against each one. For your highest scores, write down an example that demonstrates this behaviour in action. For your lowest scores, write down what you can do to improve.


156 157Challenges the status quo.1 2 3 4 5

Encourages open debate on how to deliver and achieve our customer value statements.1 2 3 4 5

Encourages open debate in progressing business goals.1 2 3 4 5

05

07

06

Reinforces RLG’s Spirit of Royal London values, through words and actions.1 2 3 4 5

11

Delegates effectively, ensuring accountabilities are clear and understood.1 2 3 4 5

08

Provides coaching and mentoring to build capability in others.1 2 3 4 5

09

Takes initiative to progress goals and objectives.1 2 3 4 5

10

Agrees clear expectations on deliverables with key stakeholders.1 2 3 4 5

Holds self and others accountable for performance and customer focus.1 2 3 4 5

13

12

Engages key stakeholders to keep them informed of progress.1 2 3 4 5

14

Welcomes diverse views and perspectives.1 2 3 4 5

Gives honest, open and constructive feedback. 1 2 3 4 5

15

17

Harnesses internal expertise to deliver the best outcomes for our customers and the business.1 2 3 4 5

16

Acts as an ambassador for Royal London in the wider community.1 2 3 4 5

18


158 159

Leading our culture: Your goals revisited

For the next 100 days

At the start of your 100 days, you set three goals for how you’ll make a difference. Reflecting on the achievements you’ve made, have these goals changed? If so, how?

01 For the next year

For the next six months

03

02










168

168

Recommended reading

“Leaders who do undertake a voyage of personal understanding and development can transform not only their own capabilities but also those of their companies.” HBR’s 10 Must Reads On Leadership


Documents

The Spirit of Royal London of RL/yourpath/leader... · The Spirit of Royal London 51- 60 ... HubSpot believes so strongly in transparency that notes from board meetings and its culture