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Building a BRIDGE to Success: Cultivating Partnerships that Leverage Talent and Technology in the Workplace
CIO Advisor Pamela Rucker discusses how BRIDGE Partners can redefine leadership and collaboration in a busy organization. Explore ways to foster an environment of growth, development, and innovation while moving your transformation agenda forward.
For years now, we’ve all been living in a digital revolution that’s been happening in waves. As a matter of fact, the changes we’ve seen have become the lifeline of our world today. The integration of technology into the way we function every single moment has become so ubiquitous that digital doesn’t just power businesses…it connects families, links devices, and is an invisible, yet necessary part of the way we live. Being effective at digital is valued so highly by everyone that it is also an expected part of the way we work.
In many ways, this is great for individuals and organizations. The incessant need for competitive advantage has caused many organizations to move to more sophisticated technologies that can help us all live happier and more productive lives. But even as they make their moves to integrate new, more compelling technologies, organizations still leave a big part of their unique strength untapped…the profound power of their hidden workforce.
In Gallup’s most recent survey on employee engagement, we see that 67% of employees feel detached from their employers. That level of disengagement is disheartening, because that means that every two out of three people at work have potential that goes untapped. Now, this isn’t always because organizations haven’t tried to capitalize on these talents. Sometimes, they know they are there, but the key to unlocking them has remained elusive and frustrating. More than that, Gallup’s research suggests that employees who feel detached are also less likely to feel like someone at work cares about them as a person. They are less satisfied, and don’t feel connected to the organization’s mission and purpose.
These findings underscore a stark reality: every day, we have employees that have to navigate an incredibly complex marketplace where they are inundated with the need to do more, perform better, and reach new heights while feeling stagnated and frustrated because, from their perspective, they don’t have clear guidance and support. They have to worry about real and perceived whispers in corridors like “she isn’t strategic enough,” or “he just doesn’t get it.” On the other hand, we have employers who grapple with the reality that in spite of providing coaches, mentors, career advisors, and even sponsors, they are also expected to do more. They have to worry about real and perceived whispers in corridors like “they don’t see me,” or “they don’t value me.” And in tight competitive battles where digital innovation is driven by your employees, allowing key people to walk out of the door (to a job across the street where they turn into a rockstar) can be detrimental to the organization’s entire future.
One key way that organizations can help with this conundrum is to create what I like to call BRIDGE Partners. A BRIDGE Partner is a leader in the organization that helps another person develop and advance by facilitating their professional growth, expanding their experiences, and helping them take strategic risks. BRIDGE stands for Building Relationships, Inspiring Development, Guidance, and Empowerment.
BR: Building Relationships
The leader establishes strong, supportive connections that go beyond hierarchical boundaries, and fosters a sense of belonging and mutual respect with those they partner with. They help people build informal relationships where they can share knowledge, best practices, and insight. This strengthens the fabric of the organizational culture and makes people feel liked, valued, and accepted.
ID: Inspiring Development
The leader not only motivates but champions the person’s pursuit of growth and encourages their desire to learn new skills or tackle new challenges. They facilitate career mobility by identifying growth opportunities and creating visibility. They encourage the person to explore their potential and push beyond their perceived limits. This ensures that comments made about “the way we work” are truly embedded in the organization’s ethos.
G: Guidance
The leader helps the person navigate the complexities of the business landscape, and offers tailored advice, insights, and direction (in the moment, or close to it) to help the person tackle challenges or navigate their career path effectively. They can help navigate organizational politics and target training, so the person is prepared for the future. This often-nuanced advice helps leaders cross the chasms they typically face alone and gives them the courage to take smart risks.
E: Empowerment
The leader helps the person take ownership of their role or redefine it so they can expand their level of contribution. They help the person develop their own individualized career journey — one that’s based on their unique strengths, their experiences, and their path in life. They also help the person make strategic decisions about what to do next and how to pursue happiness and fulfillment in their work. This encourages knowledge sharing, makes the workplace more collaborative than competitive, and drives everyone towards an environment of shared success.
Unlike what we traditionally see with mentors, coaches, career advisors, and sponsors, the BRIDGE Partner does something that none of the others do. While the others exist to be a resource where the person can check in and get advice once in a while, or they exist to champion the person’s cause behind closed doors, the BRIDGE Partner actively helps people navigate the business world they operate in and bridge the gap between their current roles and their future career goals. In the moment, when there are questions, blockers, politics, or challenges, the BRIDGE Partner makes themselves available as a resource to help the person get over the hump. This isn’t a chance to helicopter in and save someone that’s in over their head. On the contrary, it’s the recognition that even skilled employees face gaps in knowledge or experience and having someone available to help them cross a divide allows them to form new connections in their mind, build new experiences, but then continue to go on their way.
As we all continue to navigate the waves of the digital revolution, the BRIDGE Partner becomes a pivotal architect in our journey towards transformation. The journey doesn’t just require technological advances; as a matter of fact, in their classic article, the MIT Sloan Management Review notes what I’ve seen and the research supports that strategy, not technology, drives digital transformation. Strategy is about the way we think about our customers, their problems, and how we create value for them. Because of that, what we need is a reshaping of our mindsets and capabilities. We need people that can steer our collective talent, helping them get beyond obstacles that might seem momentarily impossible. The BRIDGE Partner can do this because they are further along on the journey. They’ve seen many of the challenges before and know how to quickly suggest what should be done to solve a problem. They know the customers, the industry players, critical partners, and key people throughout the organization. They know what technology has worked, and why. And conversely, they know what technology has not worked, and why. They know how to quickly remove barriers or can save people costly amounts of time when they’re innovating. They can introduce the person to others that can help them be successful. They can come from the business, or they can come from IT…but either way, the BRIDGE Partner can leverage their background, their network, their knowledge, and their resources to connect employees with projects, promotions, and priorities that the organization really cares about. The BRIDGE Partner helps explain how the organization’s aspirations might align with the individual’s aspirations, and by doing so, creates an environment of autonomous motivation (where people are motivated to succeed so much that they will work when you don’t expect them to).
Sometimes these types of relationships develop naturally, but in many busy organizations, they don’t. Often, leaders are too busy fighting fires, or the culture might not be conducive to a person asking for help. If this sounds like your organization, and the BRIDGE Partner model is something you might be interested in, here are a few ways you can get started:
1. Identify Those Who Would Like Help, and Those Who Want to Give It
The level and number of people that might sign up for this could be surprising. We know from research that many people in leadership roles “quietly struggle,” and might relish the opportunity to learn from others. And those who are more senior might love the opportunity to give back in a way that contributes to their legacy. Do not judge anyone that signs up to participate on either side of the partnership. There is someone for everyone.
2. Leverage Existing Tools and Interactions
Incorporate connections into regular activities so that you minimize the need for additional time commitments from those that want to help. Share articles, tools, research, and internal resources that partners might find valuable. Use personalized action plans to outline career goals and evaluate opportunities for growth so participants don’t feel stuck.
3. Set Clear Boundaries and Expectations
Understand and agree on the type of support each person wants to give and receive in the partnership. If the request is for power, be sure you have it, and you’re willing to use it. If it is for information, be willing to share it and not hoard it all to yourself. We are quickly moving to a world where everyone will have access to the same information, so developing a new source of power based on your insight can be particularly useful. Then, when it’s time to rotate out because of an individual’s growth, don’t take it personally on either side.
4. Set up Strategic Q&A Sessions
Create short, focused periods of time where the person can talk about specific challenges or opportunities they’re facing, and the leader can provide advice based on their experience. Be sure to create an environment of psychological safety. A strong, multi-faceted person can be knowledgeable about 80% of their role but need help with the other 20% that really allows them to stretch in new ways. Or, they might be considering a new career path, and want to understand if it’s a good fit. The person isn’t seeking you out because they are deficient in some way; they are seeking you out because they are smart.
5. Pilot the Process, and Then Roll out a Formal BRIDGE Partner Program
Develop a formal program that encourages and trains people in ways to utilize the partnerships to ensure alignment with organizational goals and individual interest. As people move up, they can become BRIDGE Partners themselves, and help others who might be where they once were.
Working in this way promotes an environment where the organization multiplies their strengths through the concept of synergy. By identifying and aligning complimentary and combined strengths, leaders can get better outcomes than if one or both of those people worked independently. That becomes a source of competitive advantage in a fast-moving digital marketplace. In addition to that, the BRIDGE Partner model creates an environment of “helpful attention,” and Marcus Buckingham notes that those types of settings can drive motivation and excellence in the way we work. I believe this type of cultural shift can increase individual job satisfaction and create a higher level of success for both people in the partnership as they work in high-intensity business environments. People will feel seen, heard, and valued — on both sides, which could make them more engaged. It can help employees work together to understand how to develop strategic imagination that creates market-changing digital strategies. And that’s something we can all be excited about.
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