As a Leader Do People Come First With You?

From moment to moment, which comes first with you, the transaction or the person with whom you are dealing? This simple distinction may be impacting your leadership effectiveness, your team’s morale and passion, and any possibility of shared vision. While transaction first is pretty common in the USA, some cultures won't engage with you if you start there. Recently during dinner with a dear friend who lives on Antigua and manages a drug store, he shared his frustration about how the workers there all believe that relationships come first. Looking through his lens of productivity, it is easy to understand how his employees seemed to have questionable attitudes.

Around the same time I happened to be studying "The Cruising Guide to The Leeward Islands" by Chris Doyle and noted that the author made a very clear point of reminding the reader to start with "good morning" or “good day" before making a request if they wanted to get any cooperation. Given that many of the islands are independent and require paperwork to be completed in three to four different offices including customs, immigration, harbor master or the local police, (both coming and going), it pays to quickly connect with each official.

As I travel internationally I have become hyper aware of this topic and notice in nearly every country, some version of human connection takes place before any transactional conversations take place. For a business deal this may extend to meals, drinking, and socializing together before any business is discussed.

So let's zero in on the "cutting edge" as it were. Let’s consider each interaction in your day as a leader. What mindset do you bring to the engagement? Do your relationships with your people come first or are they tools to be used to get your results as fast as possible? I encourage you to stop for a moment here and really consider this. It’s important. If you recognize in yourself the priority of productivity over personal connection it’s time to pause and reflect.

If people know that you appreciate their feelings, emotions, and purpose or intention, they will feel respected and appreciated and from that place are far more likely to be productive. Does it mean you need to be everybody’s new best friend? Of course not. It actually only takes a minute or so to connect, so what may seem like slowing down to you may, in fact, speed up the amount of productive, error-free work that gets done.

Listen to yourself for the next day or two and maybe even take notes. How often are you making a human connection before a request or moving into business mode? How often do you go right to the transaction, even if you don't know the person at all? Consider how you might increase your satisfaction and the satisfaction of those around you if you pause to remember they are people first, not just transactions

Leadership in the Present Moment

One of the most remarkable misunderstandings in today’s leadership thinking is the instant, automatic, and unexamined assumption that going faster and faster, doing more and more in less time, leads to success. This is something author Susan Cain refers to the corporate bias to “act first, think later.” A question worth examining is - does this continuous acceleration lead to anything meaningful or lasting being accomplished? Speaking recently at Vistage International’s All City meeting in Seattle, David Whyte, the masterful poet, naturalist, and management consultant, pointed to one of the most obvious flaws in such an approach. As he so eloquently said, "One of the great tragedies of velocity is that after awhile you can't see anything that isn't moving at the same rate you are."

Think of all the people, perspectives, knowledge, insights and data that are left out at your velocity, (whatever it is). What about the person who thinks carefully and deeply about most everything before they act? What about the experience and ideas you are running over and ignoring as you rush to outdo your competitors, whether they be co-workers or another firm?

I can’t remember the source, but the point of the following statement is right on: “the person who is most present to the way that it is and the way that it isn’t will emerge as the leader, regardless of position.” Being present and only seeing things that are moving at your velocity are mutually exclusive, especially since your velocity is much more in your own head rather than out in the world. It is a home game, so to speak.

A couple of months ago I attended the Western Region Finals of a “cowboy” sport with horses known as “cutting.” In the event the cowboy and his/her horse has 2-1/2 minutes to work two, (and ideally three cows), in a particular ways that is scored by a group of judges.

The competition is intense and unforgiving for that 2-1/2 minutes. It is a physical contest but winning is mostly mental. I asked my 12 year old granddaughter, Olivia, who was competing in the youth category, how she managed herself and her answer was revealing. “When I enter the arena, I am absolutely present in the moment. I deal with it the way that it is.” She took fourth overall as a rookie.

Watching hundreds of cowboys compete over the weekend, it was clear that many of them, even though they had reached the region finals, were the victims of their “head trash,” as they say. How much of your leadership velocity is your own “head trash” rather than being present to the way that it is and the way that it isn’t?

If you adopted Robert Heifitz’s view that "Mastering reality is the central function of a leader," might you slow down to being present? Is it possible that you and your team would actually go much faster and more sustainably if you all focused your attention on being present to reality each moment?

Leadership: Your Accessible Humanity

“The degree to which you are willing to be open and therefore vulnerable strongly influences the degree to which others feel connected to you, are inspired by you, and are willing to trust you and your leadership.”  When I look back and reflect on my experiences with others’ leadership, a high point occurred while I was on an Alaskan vacation cruise with my oldest daughter last year. I was particularly impressed by the leadership displayed by many crew members and especially the Captain. In addition to having extraordinary knowledge about operating large motor vessels around the world, he had to have broad expertise in business including; operations, health and safety, customer service, motivating employees from several different nations, assuring environmentally friendly practices, international law, and much more to be effective in his job.

What really struck me most about this very busy Captain was his accessibility. With more than 2,000 passengers aboard, it was beyond impossible for everyone to dine at the Captain’s table. To solve that problem, he made a point of making himself available in creative ways multiple times throughout the trip. One of his most effective was a cooking demonstration he conducted on making Dutch pancakes.

He created openness or accessibility with light-hearted humor and by sharing part of his life with us as follows:

• He talked us through preparing and serving a dish his mom taught him how to make as a child including samples for each of us. It was surprising and fascinating not only that he could cook, but that he was willing to get up on stage in front of passengers and show us.
• He conducted the demonstration with the assistance of one of his staff who served as his “straight man” to keep a lively banter going. While the Captain took us through the food preparation, his assistant facilitated an “open Q&A” between him and the audience that included questions about his life on land during his time off, his relationships, and even his dog.

People left this very successful event with a sense of personal connection with the Captain which, of course, carried over to the crew and the cruise line itself. The experience got me to thinking more broadly about other times and ways that I have seen leaders share their humanity and what a powerful leadership move it is.

How available are you to your employees? Would you ever do something as accessible and personal as a cooking demonstration with a live no-holds-barred Q&A?

There is immense demonstrable value in allowing yourself to be seen as human. It creates greater trust and connection which calls forth increased risk taking, creativity, and collaboration.

Why not think of a creative way to let your team get to know you better? Demonstrate something you love – tying flies for fishing, building model airplanes, grilling, cooking or whatever?  It doesn’t have to take a lot of your time and it will be one of the ways that you grow your effectiveness as a leader.

Leadership: No One Has My Back

So many of the CEOs and Key Executives in my Vistage groups have painful back issues of various types that it spurred me to consider it as a leadership issue versus as simply individual problems and complaints. At this point, it has been well documented that there is a “mind/body connection” and that stress has a lot to do with our physical well being. We live in stressful times and being a leader certainly has its challenges. I am sure that the physical diagnoses for the back issues would vary, but there is also another way to look at this. Let’s take a metaphysical approach, more of a “what could this be about from a stress manifestation” perspective. In the realm of the metaphysical, physical issues are often seen through the lens of metaphor. From that angle, what I see as a common theme among the leaders having these back issues is a sense of “no one has my back.” While I raise this perspective I am not saying that the back issues aren’t physically real, or that no doctor’s help is required, but I am saying that examining the core beliefs underneath your stress could be important. A belief that no one has your back, for example, will lead to emotional suffering on your part but may also start to show up physically. When this happens your effectiveness will be reduced and you may wind up diminishing or suppressing those around you. Worst case, your team may see you as unsupportable, killing their sense of excitement about their own work, and not open to feedback, among other things.

In a number of cases, I have found the group member in question feels they are working really hard, always having to fix other’s work or do it themselves for it to be right, and that no one is looking out for them. Generally a sense of loneliness and some version of “I’m all alone,” “no one supports me,” or “I have to do it to for it to be right” are beliefs very close to the surface.

There is an excellent chance that the people around you really would like to support and contribute to you and also be high performers on a winning team. If you have beliefs like those listed above they will limit your ability to recognize this and keep you from seeing potential support and taking action to empower others.

If you recognize these feelings or have similar complaints, ask yourself what might be underneath your mental and perhaps physical complaints?  If you dig really deeply into your own story, do you have a limiting belief like the ones in this article? Attempting to cure that pain by working harder, being the super hero, and demanding actions that disrupt others to meet your needs will only leave you in a vicious circle and intensify the isolating sense of “no one has my back.”

If you resonate with this topic it’s time to own up to the ways you have been limiting yourself with your mental constructs. Take some time to reflect and consciously identify what you would like to have different in your work experience and in your experience with your team. Instead of moving forward on automatic pilot, take some time to alter your behavior and approach and see if you don’t get different results by doing this. 

You may find yourself being far more effective and having much less stress.

The Relationship of Trust, Health and Productivity In The Workplace

“Bad managers create enormous health costs and are a major source of misery for many people.”-Robert Hogan, USA Today 8-06-12 “…through your communication, you can improve their health, reduce their stress and increase their vitality and energy”-Wendy Appel, Blog Post, 7-24-12

Think about the implications of these two observations for leadership. Perhaps less time and energy focused on comparing proposals from health care providers for next year’s plan and more examining the “root cause” of stress-related health care costs might accomplish a trifecta of productive outcomes for your organization. To do so will most likely require a fundamental shift in thinking about how real productivity and sustainability are accomplished.

What might be accomplished if team members do not feel alienated, understand how their work fits into the company’s longer term intentions and trust that their boss has their best interest at heart? How might priorities be adjusted for hiring and promotion choices if health and well-being for all are included in the analysis? How will performance assessments shift for supervisors, managers and leaders if real thinking and examination of health related issues are cranked into the evaluation?

If this subject grabs your attention, I recommend reading both of the referenced articles as they each provide valuable insights into the issue and also useful recommendations for leadership action. For example, Wendy Appel’s blog offers two essential areas for immediate focus:

1) Building Trust

2) Building Confidence and Offering Hope

While these two essentials may not seem like rocket science to you, actually producing meaningful movement in each area is often elusive. To break down the trust issue into more manageable components, she offers two distinctions. If trust is low in your group, breaking the question down into these sub categories may give access to increased communication and action.

1)  Technical trust. Do I trust that you know what you’re doing? Do you have the technical skills, background and experience to lead us?

2)  Trust that you care about my well-being.

The USA Today article points to three potential sources of trouble:

1) The manager

2) The employee

3) The fit between the employee and the job

In our work, we constantly point out that a background of mutual trust, respect, and safety is essential to effective leadership, problem solving, and aligned action among team members.

When that background is weak or damaged, you can begin correcting it by digging into root causes by asking “what’s missing” and focusing on the bullet points above from each of the two articles. Open dialogue with those involved will begin, in itself, to rebuild trust and safety. Honest demonstration of concern for each other’s well-being will facilitate the dialogue. Making it safe enough to tell the truth about how well each person’s job fits or doesn’t fit them and taking corrective action where possible will demonstrate that the caring is authentic.

Bottomline – building trust reduces stress which will likely increase health and productivity in the workplace.

So You Are a Genius? At What?

“A perpetual problem of Presidents, CEOs, and other leaders is that just because you are a bloody genius in one area it means you are going to be a genius in everything else you do. First thing that gets leaders into trouble is that they go way outside their area of expertise but they’re so often used to succeeding that they don’t even know how to take feedback on this stuff” – Ken Wilber This statement taken from a video on the Integral Operating System by Ken Wilber is certainly provocative and would definitely get “his vote cancelled” with most of our clients. However, if we step back and consider it with curiosity, it does raise interesting points regarding the unique contributions each of us brings to leadership. Do you know what your unique, valued contributions are? Do you know your blind spots? Are you willing to admit them to yourself, (or anyone else?) Do you feel compelled to pretend you are great at everything? Who do you let give you real and direct feedback?

Perhaps the targets of Wilber’s allegations walk the halls of Wall Street and global corporations? Our clients are on Main Street, (who create most of the new jobs, by the way), and often seem to be more impacted by their self doubts than runaway arrogance or narcissism. Even the few who seem arrogant on the surface are masking an underlying fear that they are somehow stupid and/or incompetent.

Attempts to avoid or disguise areas where you feel weak by trying to appear strong over the top of the opposite deep concern will actually cause mistrust. Amazingly, people pretty much always know such things at some level and know they must be wary of you when you are not forthcoming and authentic. “Fake it ‘til you make it” only works in pushing yourself to develop new levels of performance skills. It’s not so useful when it’s your entire presence or how you conduct your relationships.

If you really intend to be an effective leader, find out about your blind spots and “shadows.” Find trusted advisors who will give you honest feedback. There are a number of 360 assessments available that are effective at this work. Very few of our clients have the courage to take one – do you? There are also a number of excellent leadership and personality profiles on the market that can give you an unbiased view of how you fit with your own assessment of the requirements of your job.

Bill Wagner, Co-Founder of Accord Management Systems, administered two such assessments for members of one of my Vistage executive groups and worked with the members to conduct a Gap Analysis. This allowed them to develop strategies to team with others to fill in areas of importance where they see themselves as deficient rather than ignoring the gap or faking their competence.

You have a choice. You can keep emphasizing your greatest strengths and ignoring the other important areas of your leadership, or worse, pretending that you are brilliant in those areas too. Bottom line – pretense makes you a delusional leader. Alternatively, you can strive to be authentic and transparent. This might make you vulnerable, always in a state of learning, and having to team with others to accomplish your goals. The rewards are increased productivity, reduced stress, and being able to lead an integrated life.

“No” – The Key to Living An Integrated Life

I just returned from the 2013 Keepers of the Flame TEC Chair/Vistage Chair event. It inspired me to revisit this post I wrote for the Vistage Executive Street blog after last year's gathering. Enjoy!

I have written previously about the power of “No” as a key to stress reduction and an access to personal power. My purpose in returning to this “magic word” for today’s subject matter is to emphasize its importance in fulfilling our life purpose and strategic business and leadership intentions.

I recently spent a very powerful weekend with 83 very senior CEO Coach/mentors who meet once a year at the Hotel Boulderado in Boulder, CO to share, learn, develop their art, celebrate their relationships with each other, and most of all, to refresh themselves and their work.

They call themselves the Keepers of The Flame. The only real entrance requirement is an invitation and a minimum of ten years of successful experience as a Vistage/TEC Chair. All have very extensive experience in their work and have thought deeply about how to produce effectiveness and satisfaction in their clients’ careers and in their own lives.

We spent most of the weekend in a series of breakout groups, each examining a dimension of distinguishing and leading an authentic, purposeful life. To warm us up and get us in a creative mode for the weekend, we read “The Path of the Everyday Hero” by Lorna Catford and Michael Ray before arriving.

In one of the segments on “Balance and Prosperity,” we focused on a series of questions that you may want to investigate for yourself:

1)  What is balance for you?

2)  Who controls it?

3)  What is needed for this balance?

4)  What’s blocking you?

5)  What needs to be done?

6)  Your next steps?

It turned out all of the members of my breakout group on this topic could be regarded as very successful in balancing the rich and varied dimensions of their lives. In examining the “whys” and “hows” of their success, the discussion centered around the idea of leading an integrated life rather than pursuing balance, which we all felt was pretty much an illusion.

Focusing on a greater purpose or vision – a “Yonder Star” – living their values, and being the same person everywhere in their lives were the common access points to prioritizing and organizing activities and producing integration on a regular basis.

As very busy people, we realized the willingness to freely say “No” to many of the requests that come our way which are not high priority relative to our Yonder Star is essential to staying productively on the path and feeling nurtured in the process. To be able to say “No,” requires seeing that we always have a choice, in every moment. It is the act of choice that returns us to a powerful place as the authors of our own lives. While we may always be emphasizing one or two areas of our lives over the rest, we can redirect energy and attention to the neglected areas at the appropriate times.

Have you declared your Yonder Star? Do you have strategies and partners to assist you in fulfilling it? Can you identify places in your daily life where saying “No” will give you more time and energy for your priorities?

Leadership: Acquit Yourself

I have written previously about those harsh decisions that we have all made about ourselves at a very early age, (see this post), and have fiercely defended ever since, usually without realizing what was driving us. There is rapidly increasing understanding among business leaders that lack of self-awareness or failure to take responsibility for the dysfunctional behavior that arises from having that core personal decision “triggered” in the present is at best non-productive and more likely can be a fatal leadership flaw. A number of disciplines are saying that when you were at a very formative, early awareness state something happened that caused you to make a very negative declaration that forms your “shame” or “original wound.” Unfortunately, you were the judge, jury, and jailer at that trial and you issued a life sentence. With that decision in place, you had no choice but to develop a strategy to survive childhood and to make sure nobody ever found out about that deep seated negative belief.

Your strategy worked in certain ways because after all, you are still here. Unfortunately, a strategy that was put together by a 3 or so year old frequently plays out poorly when a 30, 40, 50 or 60 year old invokes it, often at very inappropriate moments, and in response to a perceived threat. The “survival” part of the brain can’t tell the difference between a physical threat and a threat in language so “fight, flight, or freeze” behavior is all that is going to be available after the threat response is triggered.

It’s time to get yourself a new trial and a new, less biased defense attorney that will present a whole lot of evidence from your recent decades as a successful human being.  This more current, adult perspective will make it clear to the new jury, (your adult self), that you are a valuable contributor to society, an excellent leader, and a caring, committed person and family member. The new evidence will be overwhelming and, after intense study and review, the jury will have no choice but to acquit you of being stupid, unlovable, unworthy or whatever the exact and very specific nature of your very personal conviction was.

In your jailer capacity, set yourself free. If you must, you can be your own parole officer to report incidences when “reversion” takes place. Those will become less frequent and less harsh as you own your conviction, forgive the first judge, jury, and jailer, and take on the persona that is you as a fully functioning adult.

It may take awhile for others to trust your new mode since you trained them to expect and respond to your periodic 3 year old behavior. Let them know you are practicing being a new you. They will appreciate and respect your practice and your leadership effectiveness will skyrocket.

Customer Service Lessons From The Southern Caribbean

“People does like it here, we move nice wid dem as we does wid each other ~ no corruptions or hatreds, all is like one.” - Quote by a local Carriacou Island, Granada resident from”Cruising Guide to the Windward Islands” by Chris Doyle

While this unnamed resident is speaking about his island and his community, he could be talking about the culture and customer service of his country’s business, in this case, tourism. Such things are said about Carriacou often and by many. It is said to be the friendliest island in the Caribbean. Wouldn’t you want to spend your vacation and your money in a place with people like that?

It would be easy to read this man’s comments as innocence from a remote islander until you consider that these people compete fiercely for business on a beachfront, inter-island, and even global basis. Like all other customers, “yachters” and “resorters” have a myriad of choices of places to go and they communicate their experiences widely within their various communities. In these days of Facebook, Twitter, and all the rampant social networking, a small island can be knocked out of the competition, or popularized quickly.

Can you make such a bold statement about your organization or community? How many of the dimensions covered in his simple comment can you honestly claim?

Is your group’s internal culture one where mutual trust, respect, and safety are the foundation? Does everyone freely collaborate and encourage creativity and innovation on a regular basis?

If we check with your customers or clients, will we get the report that you “move nice wid dem?”

How about if we survey your vendors and suppliers? I have run into more than one company that filled their walls with inspiring quotes regarding customer importance, wonderfully worded vision, mission and values statements, and lots of great posters about team and goals and yet treated their vendors quite shabbily. If your people are engaged in that type of behavior, what do they know in their hearts to be the real truth about your company vs. what is posted on the walls? What are your suppliers and vendors saying about you to all the people in their lives?

If you wrote a statement like the islander’s above about your group, in your own way of saying it, how well would it match with current reality? How much would it be worth to you in increased sales, staff productivity, quality, performance and schedule issues to have your statement become absolutely true?

What’s currently missing in your company’s culture? How much and how long are you willing to invest to make the “highest and best” the truth of your team and organization? And here’s the really tough question – are you willing to start by investigating and exposing your own complicity in those aspects you are not happy with currently?

"Try" - Getting Beyond Failure and Disappointment

“Do or don’t do, there is no trying” — Yoda We had a great discussion in one of our mastermind groups about “trying” – the hopelessness of it, the fear of failure in it, and the access it provides to dealing with “real issues” and producing real increases in effectiveness.

There have been a number of people who have examined the notion of “try or trying” and confronted the hopelessness in it. Saying “I’ll try” seems to be a socially acceptable statement that allows both parties in an accountability conversation to drift off into the delusion that something is going to happen.

The biggest issue with these types of “try” statements is that you are almost guaranteed to get away with it, others will buy it, and there will seldom be any of the promised results. To some degree, there’s an element of “I won’t call you on yours if you don’t call me on mine…”

The second big loss is that when you get away with deluding others and yourself, you never really look “under the hood” to see what the unsaid block is to actually accomplishing what you were “trying” to do. What stops you, probably over and over, robbing you of both results and satisfaction?

In our work, we talk about any statement with “try” in it as an “impotent conversation” that embodies a “said” and an “unsaid” portion. The “said” portion will always be something like “I’m going to try to be more consistent in my performance in that area.” The unsaid portion is “…but I can’t…or he won’t let me…or we don’t have any budget for it or I don’t know how…or…” Fill in your own version by catching yourself in the act of using “try.”

The next time you hear yourself say “I’ll try…” stop and ask yourself what limiting belief is hidden in the unsaid part of the statement? Generally it is an old story about yourself, others or your circumstances. It is facilitated by some fear or concern and is one of your excuses to get off the hook in some way.

Examining that belief newly, you may discover that it is no longer true, if it ever was. Unexamined, it keeps you from experiencing your own power, discovering the resources you will need, or garnering the support from people you may have believed wouldn’t support you.

After some practice at catching yourself and documenting your “unsaids,” you may find a whole new level of energy, enthusiasm, and performance. You may identify the conversational patterns or relationships where you will say “no” instead of the usual “I’ll try.” You may learn to hear requests more clearly and accurately and to make counter offers when you really can’t meet the request. You will be much more effective and reliable when you do say “yes” and others will see your productivity as having taken a dramatic jump.

Discover Your Own Resourcefulness

“Entrepreneurship is the pursuit of an opportunity without regard to the resources currently controlled.” –Prof. Howard Stevenson, Harvard Business School, 1983

In my last post, I shared about our work with The Hunger Project Mexico leaders, especially around the opportunity in being bold and taking on big challenges.  Since that time a client offered me the above quote on entrepreneurship.

I am going to propose that Professor Stevenson’s wonderful definition be expanded to include Cultural Creatives and everyone else who considers themselves change agents or aspires to bringing forth meaningful change of any kind.

Committing to an opportunity “without regard to the resources currently controlled” requires courage. There is “good news and bad news” associated with such a bold action. The moment you commit, several discouraging thoughts, which will seem very, very real, will flash before your eyes:

1)  I don’t know how

2)  I’m scared to death

3)  I’m insufficient

4)  I’ll never be good enough fast enough to pull it off

At that moment you have two choices:

1)  Slip to the periphery and gesture

2)  Surrender to team and strategy

Behind door number one, “slip to the periphery” is “looking good,” avoiding embarrassment, finding good excuses etc., while behind door number two, “surrender to team and strategy” is the willingness to stand in the gap between the known and the unknown, continually exploring for “what’s missing, that if put in place will move us toward our goal,” and also probably more than a few sleepless nights.

So where is the good news in boldly committing you ask? It will eventually produce extraordinary results. It will provide you with great satisfaction and a much richer sense of yourself.  It lies in discovering or reconnecting to your own resourcefulness – that’s the best news of all!

An excellent example of “door number two” leadership is Bill Ayer, CEO of Alaska Airlines. During a time when all the major airlines have lost tens of billions and eventually gone bankrupt, Alaska has become a leading innovator and a profitable business whose stock price has increased 300% since 2008. As a regular passenger, I have only great reviews for every aspect of my interactions with them. (For a more complete review of Alaska’s current success click here.)

In 2003 Alaska chose “cost per available seat mile” as a key measure of its success.  Their cost at the time was 8.73 cents. They committed to 7.25 cents, which would save $ 300 MM. To quote Mr. Ayer, “That was one of those things where we didn’t know how we were going to do it, but we said to ourselves, ‘that’s what we need to do. A good company would look at that.”

Given all of the cost issues faced by the airlines, including fuel costs rising 35% last year alone, Alaska has “only” hit 7.6 cents in 2011. Meanwhile they’ve gone from being one of the worst on time airlines to the best in the country last year.

Are you ready and willing to “go for it” and to discover your own resourcefulness?  If not, what are you waiting for?

Go Bold or Go Home

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us.” -Marianne Williamson (A Return to Love: Reflections on the Principles of “A Course in Miracles,” From Chapter 7, Section 3)

As Marianne Williamson points out in the opening quote it is not our inadequacy that keeps us from “going for it,” but often, the opposite – our sense that we are very powerful.

My wife and business partner, Suzanne, and I did a two day leadership development workshop with the national Board of Directors and leadership team for The Hunger Project Mexico in Mexico City and I was reminded of what being bold is all about. From the beginning in 1977 leadership and participants in The Hunger Project have been told that ending hunger on the planet is impossible. The commitment to end hunger on has meant that to participate is to be willing to take on the impossible, week-in and week-out. This is a situation that sends many people in search of some other game to play!

In the leadership workshop we focused on what each of us must bring up in ourselves to work on such a project. The time, talent and treasure required of each long-term participant is unmatched in most environments and yet many people keep participating and increasing their involvement over time. Why?

As we pushed workshop participants deeper into the inquiry of what it will require of them to be leaders in the various roles they have spoken for, two quotes came to the fore - Marianne Williamson’s, and funnily enough, a theme for the fast food chain Del Taco, “Go Bold or Go Home.” It made no sense for someone to stay in the workshop who was not willing to commit themselves to full-on participation in the work of ending hunger and poverty in Mexico and the world. It was either stay and “Go Bold” or Go Home.

As we dug deeper, the contrast between our fears, concerns for looking good, and our circumstances just did not measure up to our commitment to ending hunger and poverty. While we worked mainly on methodologies for how to be more effective in our work, it further became clear that for each participant, it really boiled down to courage – the courage to step beyond worries and concerns and unleash their power.

We confronted the issue of fear versus power by addressing the topic of fundraising and money. This subject will bring up fear more quickly than anything I know. On the other side of that coin, I also know that it offers the opportunity for fundraisers and investors to both experience their power!

So the question for leaders becomes – do you ever confront your deepest fears in order to be able to be your boldest? Do you ever help your teams do that? How can you bring yourself and your team face to face with the contrast between everyday fears and the deep seated sense of enormous power that each of us has? Are you ready to take the path of “Go Bold or Go Home?”

Listening And Collaboration: What Has “No” Got to Do With It?

“Being listened to is so close to being loved that most people cannot tell the difference.” –David Oxberg Have you ever done a “listening course?” Probably not. It’s far more likely you have done presentation, speaking, and/or negotiation courses. Most programs for professional development that relate to communication have to do with how we present ourselves and how we speak versus how we listen.

Collaborative leadership requires active listening, willingness to consider, validate and explore others’ ideas, and being open to ideas that are not already in your “mental File Cabinet.” Given the cultural emphasis on our personal presentation and communication style you may not have considered how much impact how you listen has on your conversations, their effectiveness and their outcome. So what prevents you from listening? At first it may be a response to personal beliefs about leadership. Many believe that leaders should be steering, requesting or perhaps even demanding things from their team instead of listening.

But there’s more to it. I find that underneath many leaders avoid certain conversations and/or people out of their fear that if they listen, they will have to agree. In these cases they have presumed that the conversation or person will be bringing up ideas that are not part of their historic mental File Cabinet of ideas and beliefs. They are unwilling to even entertain unfamiliar ideas, let alone change any of theirs.

There is an important piece here–the option to say “no.” It is key and its use is closely correlated with courage, or the lack thereof. (By courage, I’m referring to the poet David Whyte’s view, which he defines as “developing a friendship with the unknown.”)

Here’s the deal. You can listen generously and openly, consider the other’s ideas and proposals and then say “no,” if you still aren’t enrolled. The majority of people will be more thrilled by your willingness to consider their views than put off by your “no.”  After all, you have already been saying no by not listening. Now, you are being authentic, after genuinely considering the views of others.

So the next time you see that person coming towards your office, pause and listen to the story you are telling yourself about what’s next. “I’ve got too much to do to listen to them.” “If I stop and pay attention they will never leave…” What if that’s all mental defense, protecting your cherished beliefs and avoiding your own discomfort at possibly having to say “no?”

What if you get courageous? What if this time, you listen openly and with genuine interest? I refer you back to the quote that started this post “Being listened to is so close to being loved that most people cannot tell the difference.” –David Oxberg

What kind of positive impact could listening have on your relationships and your team?

4-24-13 Suzanne Frindt Appeared on The Michael Dresser Show

On Wednesday, April 24th Suzanne appeared on The Michael Dresser Show to talk about leadership and her book, "Accelerate: High Leverage Leadership for Today's World."  

Listen to internet radio with Michael Dresser Show on Blog Talk Radio

Leadership: What Happened to "Indivisible?"

Indivisible: “Not divisible; unable to be divided or separated.”

In a time where public conversations seem to be attempting to capitalize on dividing us; by political party, 99%/1% (economic bracket), religious belief, nation of origin, you name it, what has happened to the inspirational idea of “one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all?”

One company has stepped up with a strategy to break the divisiveness mindset gripping our country and is taking a leadership role in directly impacting one of the core issues in our society – creating economic opportunity.

Starbucks has been running a fundraising drive for some months now, in partnership with Opportunity Finance Network to create jobs by providing financing to community businesses. It has invested $5 million through its Starbucks Foundation to get the campaign going and invites patrons at all Starbuck’s retail stores to fund from $5 to $249 at the register. Larger amounts will be accepted at http://www.createjobsforusa.org.

Participants receive a very brief, informative note and a wristband with the theme “Indivisible” on it. Much more information and wonderful success stories are available on the website along with details on how a contribution actually generates seven times the initial amount when the micro-finance loans are made in the community.

So why would a company like Starbucks choose the word “indivisible?” I didn’t find any discussion of that on my initial reviews of the materials, perhaps because it is so obvious. Conditions will probably not change much for a long time, particularly for the folks on the low end of the economic ladder unless we pull together as a nation and focus on creating opportunity.

It is a well established fact that entrepreneurs and small business create the vast majority of jobs in our country. Even more than jobs, in my mind, is the business of creating opportunity. Meaning that people have openings to express their creativity, to innovate, to bring new ideas and ways of doing things into the marketplace, not just offer the “sweat of their brows.” This is how new things grow in our economy.

I would ask you to take a moment and consider – are you a "divider" in your thoughts and speaking?  Are you gripped by the current self-defeating public conversations? Are you spreading the negativity among your teammates, company, family and community? Are you just busy trying to get more for yourself or can you experience the longer term benefits to all of us from activities that benefit all?

With the "create jobs" campaign a renewed paradigm called “Indivisible” has been proposed. Will you join in the conversation and the funding?

Creating a Culture That Delivers

“When every resource in your organization is efficiently and collaboratively working toward a desired end state, without leader involvement in daily activity, you have an execution culture.” - Stuart Orr In his presentation “Executing Strategy: Unlocking Your Organization’s Market Potential,” Stuart Orr of vision2execution, addressed one of the greatest opportunities for productivity gains in our economy today. He calls it the “vision gap” and cites two powerful quotes to drive his point home.

“The average firm achieves about 63% of its strategic plan.” - McKinsey & Harvard Business School study

“Only 5% of large-scale changes actually work.” - John Kotter: HBS author of “A Sense of Urgency”

Stuart digs deeply and delivers practical ways to organize your thoughts and actions so that the team delivers at high levels and has a meaningful experience in the process. What was most exciting to me was how his ideas speak to the question we have asked leaders for years, “what time could you go home if everyone in your organization simply came to work, did their job, and went home.” What’s your answer?

The piece I want to add to Stuart’s approach is that it all starts with you as a leader and your willingness to challenge your own ways of thinking and being in very fundamental ways. If you are not willing to allow deep intervention into your historic assumptions and beliefs, all of which reside in your own mind, his very sound and practical approach will not be heard or processed in a way that leads to new outcomes.

The challenge is neither easy nor a one-time occurrence. Like going to gym, it’s all about repetition and consistency. It is also unlikely you can do it completely by yourself. You already know what your own self-referential thought processes produce – the way that it is and is not for you and your interactions right now.

This is why peer groups like Vistage are so important and perhaps is the explanation why members stay inVistage groups for 20, 30, and even 40+ years. Having a group of competent people around you who you don’t control and yet who are deeply committed to your success and well being keeps you exploring possibilities versus holding on to past ways of thinking and speaking that are no longer serving you and those around you. If you are not a “group person,” it’s important to do one-to-one work with a coach or some other type of outside support professional.

If you don’t yet have access to a Vistage group, and aren’t ready to hire a coach, download a set of our Operating Principles by clicking here. (These Principles have been developed and road tested with hundreds of people for success during the last 20 years.) Ask yourself, “what might be possible in my interactions and the outcomes I am working on with my team if we were living these principles?”

So as a leader, how much do you want a culture that delivers – an “execution culture?” Are you willing to really challenge your existing mindset? Please be slow to answer…it is not necessarily comfortable. It will take real courage. If you want a culture that delivers it starts with you.

Displacement: A Powerful Leadership Tool

“Displacement” is an unconscious defense mechanism whereby the mind redirects affects from an object felt to be dangerous or unacceptable to an object felt to be safe or acceptable. ~Sigmund Freud “Displacement” actually has a variety of definitions. Our use of the term is similar to this one “the displacing in space of one mass byanother” only we mean it metaphorically. It came from our work and observation of how non-productive thoughts and related behaviors recede into the background in the presence of Vision-Focused Leadership and how quickly they return when the vision collapses. The phenomenon we witness is much like when water has been displaced by a boat. The water doesn’t go away, but the boat takes up the space where water used to be. While it is coincidental that we arrived at a term used in a different field, it is interesting to discover that Freud’s views of brain function actually seem to validate our observations. The difference is he was seeing subconscious avoidance behaviors and we are observing a conscious shift to displace non-productive thoughts and behaviors.

A powerful shared vision will “displace” much of what people gossip and complain about in an organization. Statements like “we have a really dysfunctional company” are seldom heard and motivating people isn’t a major issue, as the shared vision unleashes passion, commitment, and focused action.  The focus on vision displaces much of the friction and waste that go on when people’s day-to-day experience at work looks much more like a soap opera.

It’s important to note that the soap opera components have not gone away. People have not magically “gotten better” or “fixed themselves.” (This is why we say “displacement” instead of “replacement.”)  Friction and waste have been displaced, for the time being, much as water has been displaced by a boat. The water didn’t go away either. The boat hull, like a shared vision, allows air, boat components, fuel, and passengers to fill the space of the displaced water.

The same experience applies in our own individual lives and work. I often hear clients trying to fix themselves and making relatively useless statements like “I’ve got to stop doing that,” or “I’m going to stop thinking that way.” I have observed very few instances where anyone, including me, ever delivered on such a statement. I have observed many times where I and others have displaced the noise in our heads with powerful, productive thoughts and actions after we have declared and owned a new vision.

I stumbled into Freud’s notion about displacement in Wikipedia when I was getting ready to write this post. It’s interesting to note that it got very little attention in the psychology world and certainly hasn’t crept into any of our business lexicon. I suspect that part of the issue, in addition to the academic nature of the discussion at the time, has been his focus on understanding “broken people” and how they avoid “reality.” (Leading from a belief that “my people are broken and they need to be fixed” doesn’t work either.)

Do you have a clear purpose or vision for yourself and/or your organization that you can articulate simply?Does your team or family have a powerful, shared vision? What thoughts and behaviors might be displaced if you get busy consciously leading from a place of vision?

Singular Goals: At What Cost to Vision?

 

 I’m starting off this blog with a fairly strong statement: Setting singular, specific, and easily measurable short-term goals can systematically lead to the demise of an organization’s true vision and mission, often without anyone noticing for years.

I have been involved in two separate and very diverse cases where clear, singular goals with short-term measurements and important rewards attached have been causing systemic flaws in overall intentions. These incidents occurred in two different and historically very successful organizations. In one case, the organization has identified the issue and is taking very effective corrective action. The other organization seems unaware and longer-term negative consequences are not yet clear.

The first case is with The Hunger Project, an organization very dear to my heart for more than 30 years. THP had a five-year grant to demonstrate “scale-up” of its effective Epicenter program in Africa. Much effort was put into identifying all of the critical criteria for measuring a self-sustaining community throughout the development of the program.  When the grant came, however, singular pressure occurred across the field organization to open new Epicenters, build buildings, and declare the earlier Epicenters self-sustaining to satisfy the objectives of the grant.

Fortunately, our African leadership identified that some of the communities had not truly reached a self-sustaining basis. They dug for real data around the level of effort and time required to truly achieve a self-sustaining community. The program has now been redesigned focusing on key human accomplishment criteria, the grant has been extended, and people throughout the organization are refocused on the big picture and broader measures of success. They did an amazing job of pausing, assessing and refining to be sure that the criteria for success were appropriate and that short-term “success” did not damage the long term vision and mission. When they found they were off course, they made the necessary adjustments to insure the outcomes that really mattered.

In the second case, the issue the organization is facing is that different departments deal with short and long-term issues and consequences. Those in one department are incentivized to launch new projects quickly, while the other group will be held accountable for long-term performance of each project. As more and more projects are launched prematurely to gain the short-term incentives, doubt is building “in the field” about the effectiveness of each new project leader and the overall credibility of the firm’s work over time. To date, higher-level managers seem unaware of what is happening or are driven by singular, short-term goals that will justify current, possibly detrimental behavior for some time. This is a recipe for missing the big picture and the ultimate vision, and higher purpose of an organization. The consequences will likely gradually develop and then seemingly “suddenly appear” and it may take a lot of time, money, effort and resources to correct, (if it’s actually a correctable situation in the end).

Do you see your organization in either of these two cases?  How are you motivated and measured?  If you have not yet stepped up to address underlying systemic issues and “moved to the high ground” of strategic leadership the way The Hunger Project leadership has, what are the long run costs?  As a leader you must be the keeper of the vision and mission and you must collaborate with your organization to understand if the path you are taking is the right one.

Can Leadership Be Learned?

“Leadership cannot be taught, learned, or imitated…” - Balaji Krishnamurthy

According to Balaji, leadership can’t be learned, leadership must be developed. Rick Eigenbrod, another Vistage Speaker I heard recently, also focused on development. My third recent encounter with this idea happened throughout my trip with The Hunger Project to Mexico City and Chiapas.

One of the definitions of “development” is “the work of digging openings to…give access to new workings and of erecting necessary structures.” This happens to be part of my dictionary’s seventh definition of development and it refers to mining. For purposes of this post, it occurs to me as quite perfect.

Interrupting current mindsets and creating new openings for thought and action are where The Hunger Project starts. It’s exciting and unique approach starts with what is called “Vision, Commitment and Action Workshops,” during which mindsets that may have existed for 500 years are constructively disrupted and new, creative thoughts and actions are generated. People start creating their own opportunities and solving their own problems. Isn’t that what leaders are seeking from managers and team members?

In the not-for-profit world, a broad spectrum of work done with resource poor people around the world, including The Hunger Project’s, is categorized as “development.” Interestingly enough, a major consulting firm recently studied The Hunger Project’s work in Africa and concluded that all the other programs being run by others either started with training or with building infrastructure, hoping for a transformation in present behaviors which was seldom demonstrated.

So why don’t the ideas of learning and training work? Fundamentally, learning means “there is something outside myself, and if I had it, I would be a good leader.” Training also implies there is a successful way “out there” and if you are trained in it, you will be successful. The flaw in both approaches is that they start with your focus somewhere other than reaching inside yourself to bring out the authentic you and the unique leadership you can bring that can honed over the years by experience. Imitation more or less defeats itself for the same reasons as training and learning.

Your current mindset about leadership makes you the leader you are, the collaborative skills you demonstrate, and the results you are getting. If you intend to grow your leadership, your reach and impact, you must start digging new openings in your thoughts and beliefs. You must build the ability to self-reflect with some level of objectivity and you must learn to receive feedback and even criticism effectively.

Find people and programs that challenge your mindset. If you commit to this approach and work at it over time, you will find yourself creating and erecting new structures of thought and action which dramatically alter your results and those of the people around you.

Women, Work and the Will to Lead

Sheryl Sandberg's new book, "Lean In: Women, Work and the Will to Lead" has just been published this week. We wrote this post in May 2011 about Sheryl Sandberg's TED talk and continue to be impressed by her activism for women's leadership.

I have been listening to a fascinating TED talk on iTunes on “Why We Have Too Few Women Leaders” by Sheryl Sandberg, the COO of Facebook. Before we dive in, you have heard of TED – right? [TED (Technology Entertainment and Design) is a global set of conferences owned by the private non-profit Sapling Foundation, formed to disseminate "ideas worth spreading." There are many hundreds of free talks online, or as they say on the TED web site,“Riveting talks by remarkable people, free to the world.” If you are not familiar with TED – get thee to the TED site!] The other piece of this is - yes! You can watch the videos via an iTunes podcast so you can check that out too.

Ok, to the main topic. At 2130 Partners we have a strong commitment to women’s leadership. In addition to our corporate work, we have been investor activists with The Hunger Project for years. It is clear that the solution to world hunger is empowering women. I won’t go into all the details about that here, but the role of women and women’s leadership is an enormous overarching issue in the realm of “leadership” and it’s critical that we as leaders understand the barriers and come up with solutions.

In Sandberg’s talk she cites the following statistics for the current state of women’s leadership in the world:

• Of 190 heads of state, 9 are women
• Of all the parliaments in the world, just 13% of members are women
• In top corporate jobs, only 15-16% are held by women
• In the non-profit world, top jobs are held by about 20% women

Rather than focus on corporate policies and such, Sheryl focuses on the messages we should be giving to women and what they should be thinking about if they choose to be leaders. According to her, they are:

• Women need to “sit at the table” – what she talks about here is how women have radically different self images from men particularly in underestimating themselves. This is something that has been shown in research studies for too many years.
  • Women systematically underestimate their own abilities.
  • Women don’t negotiate for themselves in the workforce.
  • Men attribute their success to themselves and women attribute it to other external factors.
• “Make Your Partner a Real Partner”
  • This is about the power of equality in marriage/committed relationships as far as the distribution of responsibilities and also about society being more supportive of those who choose to work from home. This makes an enormous difference for women’s success.
• “Don’t Leave Before You Leave”
  • This is about women “mentally leaving” or taking the foot off the gas pedal of their careers as they start to envision having families and children, often far in advance of these events happening. Her point is to stay in the game until you are really leaving.

As Sandberg says in this talk, there are no easy answers and it will take a true cultural shift for the number of women in the population to be equally represented in various leadership roles. The thing is don’t you want this for your daughter? For your niece? For your grand-daughter? Don’t you want it to be true when you tell them they can be anything they want to be when they grow up?