Tag Archives: leadership

Communications, Internal Communications, Management

How do you know if you are on a good work team?

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How do you know if you’re part of a good work team? I’ve been having lots of wonderful and intriguing discussions with friends of mine about teams. With my soccer team, about why we like each other enough to hang out when we don’t have to.  With my friend Ann Max, who coaches corporate teams towards productivity. I also chatted at length with my friend Jen Hunter, who works with leadership teams to build on their collective strengths. The question is harder to answer than you might think. For one, sometimes people don’t know that they’re in a team.

I once had a colleague who regularly and without fail tried to ambush his team members.  He saw us as competition. Was he a bright and capable guy?  Absolutely, he is one of the smartest people I’ve worked with. He just couldn’t imagine us as being on a team and so saw us as chasing the same scarce resources, whatever he imagined them to be. Did the rest of us think he was competition?  Nope, we thought we were on a team.  Therefore, we were regularly surprised at his negative response to simple initiatives. If you’ve read my blog before, you’ll know I think surprises at work are terrible things with disastrous results.

Of course, there are those times when a team comes together and does amazing things.  When this happens, it creates synergy, energy and amazing outcomes. My soccer team does one thing consistently, we laugh. If we don’t laugh, then what’s the point of getting together? We also know what roles we play. 

I’ve been fortunate enough to have some fantastic work teams, those times when a group of individuals transcends their independent parts to produce results well beyond their scope. One of the tricks of success is that we didn’t allow ourselves to get too insular. Not only is navel-gazing boring, but it epitomizes counter-productivity.

Good teams also know that effective communication is central to success.  Good teams have frank conversations, respectful consideration of ideas and the freedom to laugh at each other and ourselves when things get goofy. They are patient.  Good ideas take time to share and understand and they can’t come to fruition without a team patient enough to listen. If you’re on a good work team you’ll know it because you not only like your colleagues, you respect them.  You certainly won’t be afraid to speak your mind to them.

Quick Tips

  • Good team members give each other time, patience and fun. 
  • They respect and can anticipate each other.
  • Good teams happen when you realize that you are collectively better than your individual parts.
  • Good teams are self-aware, everyone knows what their role is and how that role connects to and supports others.
  • Most importantly, good teams communicate.

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Communications, Leadership

Personal Paradigms, The Good, The Bad & The Impact

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They say that goldfish have a memory that’s about 10 seconds long, no doubt an exaggeration but for argument’s sake, let’s say that’s true. With a memory that short, they would be forever rediscovering the world around them. They would have no operating principle to help them navigate. Without personal paradigms, we’d be very much like that goldfish.  Though his bowl of water is small he is forever shouting, “Hey, there’s a castle! Hey, there’s a castle!”

How Personal Paradigms Serve Us: Paradigms help us to interpret, define and engage in the world around us. Without our paradigms, we would constantly be struggling to determine and define what we see, what we hear and what we should do about it. Our paradigms help us to move through our lives seamlessly.

When I was in college, I made a friend who often shared stories about her family and their activities. She spoke of the antiques her mother collected and the beautiful old apartment they lived in. She shared stories of their travels and generally painted an amazing picture of her life.  As I got to know her better it became clear her stories didn’t quite reflect reality. There were no antiques, no beautiful apartment and certainly no travels.

Young or old?
Young or old?

Flash forward a few years and I’m on Parliament Hill and the office across the hall has brought in a summer student. One day the student tells us about her adventures. She has met Sting, spent a few weeks on the streets for a research project, her grandmother has left all her money to her cats and she has written for a popular soap opera. As you can imagine, because of my history, my paradigm would not allow me to believe the stories she told unless I had evidence. It was simple when people start telling fantastical stories about their lives you need to look more carefully.

Later, I quietly mentioned to my colleague that I had some suspicions about the truth of the stories shared. Well, my colleague’s paradigm was different from mine, so she got more than a little annoyed at my suspicions and a few uncomfortable days followed. After a short period, the summer student… disappeared from the office across the way. It eventually came out that she had made up all of her stories, including her skills. People were shocked and angry, but not me. My paradigm had stepped in and said, this is bull. Once that happened, all I could see were flaws and inconsistencies. Our paradigms save us a lot of grief and can generally help us to interpret the world.

How Personal Paradigms Make Us Blind to the World: So your thinking, so what? You’ve heard all this stuff before. But what if despite knowing this, the most experienced and in some cases the most powerful people in our respective worlds persisted in behaving as if their paradigm was the only paradigm?

Is the black diamond the top or bottom of the square?
Is the black diamond the top or bottom of the square?

People get used to power and after a while, they can start to think that no matter what they do or say, they are somehow removed from consequences. They can build a personal paradigm around themselves that is so airtight that they become incapable of seeing pitfalls. They lose the ability to judge good from bad. They can divorce themselves from seeing the errors in their own behaviour.

Consider American President, Donald Trump,  celebrity chef Paula Deen or former Toronto Mayor Rob Ford, all could lay claim to huge popularity and all had difficulty seeing problems with their own behaviour.

When our paradigms blind us, they don’t just make us blind to opportunity, they make us blind to threats, blind to ethical considerations, blind to the harm we are doing.

Whatever Your Perspective, Understand That You Have One: Although you may have heard it countless times, don’t forget that your truth is not necessarily THE  truth.  Your version of reality may not even be based in reality. If this was an easy thing to remember, then the examples above would be a lot harder to find.

Has your paradigm ever helped or hindered you? Have you ever seen someone else struggle because they just couldn’t see the “truth” of a situation?

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Leadership

26 Personal Vision Questions

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26 questions on personal vision

Vision boards surged in popularity for a few years and I often thought about creating one.  In fact, I still see posts from local business groups inviting people to come develop their personal vision boards.  I’ll admit I’m bit sceptical, the research suggests that vision boards are only effective if they are also supported by plans for how to achieve these goals.

I do believe having a personal vision is important and for my own life, things tend to “fall into place”  when I’m operating with a vision. Having a vision for our lives allows us to put our personal power behind how we spend our time, the work we do and ultimately the level of satisfaction we have in our lives. A vision gives you a path to follow Developing a personal vision is about stepping back and determining what you really want so that you can take the time to achieve it. Your personal vision shouldn’t be a vague description of your daydreams, but instead, it should help to focus your time, attention and energy towards achieving those things you consider important.

The biggest challenge with developing a strong personal vision is answering hard questions and always looking to ask more.

Some suggested questions to get you started:

  1. What themes consistently run through your life?
  2. What are the five or ten things you enjoy doing the most?
  3. What makes you lose track of time?
  4. If you had to teach something, what would you teach?
  5. What do you care about the most or what values do you hold?
  6. What makes you feel good about yourself?
  7. Who inspires you?
  8. What do people usually ask you for help with?
  9. What does your ideal work embody?
  10. Do you have colleagues?
  11. Are your colleagues brainstorming and laughing?
  12. Who are they?
  13. Do you have any direct reports?
  14. Who do you report to?
  15. Do you work for yourself?
  16. What kinds of projects are you working on? Are they huge, small or a blend?
  17. What do you need to do each day in order for you to feel fulfilled?
  18. What skill sets have you acquired?
  19. What does your workspace look like?
  20. What strengths do you see in yourself?
  21. What challenges have you overcome in the past?
  22. What do you see as your work weaknesses?
  23. What do you see as your personal weaknesses?
  24. What weaknesses have others identified?
  25. What would you regret not doing if your life were ending?
  26. What strengths do others see in you?

Really dig into what makes you tick. The more questions that you pose, the more likely you are to come away with an effective personal vision.  For instance, you may want to influence people, make their lives better.  You might envision yourself up on stage or you might be out interacting with the public, but if you don’t want people prying into your personal life, you may want to think about being a professional speaker versus being a politician. If you want to be a professional speaker, what topics are you going to speak about?

Focus on the positive. Rather than building a vision based on running from those things that disturb you.  Embrace those things that engage you.

The next challenge is to take your questions externally. Talk to people you respect and trust and ask them what they think would be required to make your vision a reality. Ask them what jobs they think might suit you. Once you have a clearer idea of what you want and what it takes to get there, you can start planning for it.

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25 Questions for Setting Organizational Vision 

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Management

How Do You Know You’re Not Producing Crap?

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how do you know you are not producingWhat would you do if you found out that your best practices had become your worst practices? Would you stop doing them? Most of us would probably say yes, but its not that easy is it? If we could stop when we recognized that something was a bad idea, then we would have far fewer smokers, alcoholics, gamblers and other addictive behaviors. 

Ok, what if we removed addictive behaviours from the conversation and simply looked at those behaviours that are just bad practice, we would stop right?  Well, actually, not really or not easiliy.  Often what people do instead of changing their behavior is to work harder at their old models.  They don’t do it out of stupidity or spite, they do it because they are absolutely convinced  that if they apply themselves, if the tools are right, if everyone would do their part, if any array of things were different  then  the old models would be effective and they in turn would be proven correct. On a regular basis new and better ways of doing things are revealed and ignored.

Psychology Today shared results from recent psychological research that revealed that the five worst learning practices are the ones we are most likely to use in schools.  Think about that. We teach our young with methods that are most likely to ensure they don’t learn.  Do we hate our kids?  Unlikely.  Are we committed to seeing them learn and develop new ideas? Yes.  So why aren’t we using the five best learning practices? 

Think about the corporate world’s persistent use of brainstorming sessions as a way to generate new ideas.  Research has shown that we actually generate more ideas when we are alone, than when we are in group settings.  The reasons are many, ranging from a reluctance to share because we might be ridiculed, to feeling too much pressure to perform.  Regardless of the reasons for low output, we know that we are less innovative in group settings, yet we not only persist in brainstorming sessions, but we work hard to make them work better.

What makes the sessions so very appealing is that we like how we feel when we participate.  We feel that we have produced more.  They generate trust and generally make us feel more connected to our colleagues.  Not bad for a bad practice and if we had feeling good as our objective, then that would be great, but that is not the outcome we are looking for from the activity, so why persist? The answer is simple and really complex, we don’t like change.

Change is hard and it can seem frightening or futile. We will work hard to avoid change. If we can understand what motivates us to do the things we do, then we are in a better position to manage performance, manage outcomes and manage expectations.  As leaders we need to understand that what we are comfortable doing isn’t always what we should be doing. Some of the most destructive words in any workplace, community or culture can be,  “That’s how we have always done it.”

This s not to say that traditions are wrong or old way erroneous. We just need to  be aware of why we cling to activities and ways of doing things.  We should also constantly be looking for the ways to improve.  We may determine that the old ways are still the best ways, but being blind to possibility, or closed to opportunity is not only a way to fail ourselves, but when managing people it can be disastrous for an organization.

One of the most interesting aspects of social media is that it behaves like a continuous improvement process.  It never stops assessing and adjusting, it asks participants to continuously adapt, it regularly produces metrics that you can measure performance by and it never stops changing. Not bad practices for the rest of our lives. Not surprisingly, it also happens to be one of the few places where brainstorming actually produces a quantity of innovative ideas.

Applying some of the adaptability that we use to navigate the social media world in the real world would be a great start to ensuring we are not producing crap. What do you do to stay effective? How do you ensure that your practices are still best practices? Share your ideas with me in the comment section.

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Management

How To Be A Charismatic Leader

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We have such a laundry list of things we consider important to effective leadership that I often wonder if a leader could exist who met even half of the requirements. We want leaders who are brilliant, multi-talented, visionary, creative, insightful and the list goes on. The job gets harder still when we start to pull in abstract characteristics like charm or charisma. Imagine trying to practice your compelling. Perhaps they offer courses in being fascinating at Harvard. When we start to describe that quintessential something that great leaders possess I think our imaginations can contribute more than any one leader can produce.

Despite my misgivings about the importance of the charm factor, I can‘t escape the fact that there are a preponderance of leaders who also happen to be charismatic.  Those people who walk into a room and draw others to them. There are men and women who can motivate others to do as they say, even when what they are saying is nonsense. If great leaders are charming and leadership can be taught, it follows that charm and charisma can also be taught. So I went looking for my leadership charm school.

As it happens, I didn’t have to look very hard. Almost immediately, I was overwhelmed with articles on emotional intelligence or social intelligence. There has been a lot of research done in this area over the past twenty years with perhaps the most notable work being done by psychologist and author, Daniel Goleman. His book, called simply, Emotional Intelligence, first published in 1995 marked the start of a proliferation of literature in this area.  His most popular work since that time is his 2006 book, Social Intelligence: The New Science of Human Relationships, which really marks the expansion of his theories.

Whether you are looking at emotional or social intelligence, it really comes down to your ability to know and control yourself so that you respond to the people around you appropriately. What’s more, it’s reading them and then knowing how to use those cues to influence or motivate their behaviour. In effect, it comes down to your capacity to step outside yourself, and accurately assess your environment and the people in it.  Not surprisingly, the ability to deep listen was an essential component of emotional intelligence. If you can’t listen, you can’t lead or at least not well. Emotional intelligence is seen as a more predictive trait than IQ in determining effective leadership.

When you look at some of the more consistent measures of social intelligence, then you also see why the behaviours associated with descriptions of charm or charisma are also seen as factors in high emotional intelligence.  The best part is, emotional intelligence can be learned.  The most difficult part is determining that you actually want to learn because you will have to remove old habits and ingrain new ones.  Not an easy task as any one who has tried and failed to diet successfully knows.

At the heart of emotional intelligence is emotional control.  Control over yourself and in many respects, those around you. It is the ability to stay calm in an emergency or peaceful when things or people conspire to frustrate or make you angry. Emotional intelligence enables you to chose the feeling you’re going to feel best about when you reflect back on any given exchange.

Below are some tips for achieving emotional intelligence:

1)      Be self-aware: Being self-aware means that you are always present in the moment.  If you are talking to someone, they are your priority, the centre of your focus. Remember its not just what they are saying, but what their body is reporting to you.

2)      Know Your Options: Be aware of the choices you can make.  Sometimes that may mean choosing not to respond or engage in a behaviour.

3)      Know Your History: History has always been a terrific teacher and in our personal lives that remains the case. Be aware of which actions have worked for you in the past and which have failed. Learn from experience.

4)      Be at Peace: Regardless of the setting, stay calm. The calm gives you the space to make smart decisions.

5)      Win-Win:  One of the things you quickly discover in lobbying is that win-win outcomes will mean that results last longer. Conflict oriented approaches tend to result in more conflict.

6)      Respect and acceptance: If someone disagrees with you look at it as an opportunity to learn more.  This is not easy, nor is it about being Pollyanna.  This is tied to remaining calm and being aware of your options.

7)      Abundance. Benjamin Zander‘s and Rosamund Stone Zander’s book, The Art of Possibility includes this mindset as part of the critical path to achieving your objectives.  It opens you up to sharing and exchanging ideas. Knowledge shared is power squared.

8)      Patience: This is easily the one I have the hardest part with, but by embracing it my stress goes down and my productivity goes up.

9)      Delayed gratification.: This is very much like patience with the exception that you can have something, but choose not to because by waiting it will be better.

10)   Foresight. This is really about using your imagination and knowledge to think about what might happen next and then following a chain of consequences out as far as you can.

11)   Deep listening: This is back to body language, it’s about hearing more than words. Try to remember that 85% of what we understand comes from unspoken cues.

12)   No egos allowed: Although we like to think of ourselves as the centre of our personal universe, if you are the centre then you are not focused on the people around you or the options available to you.

Have you ever met a leader who had it all or came close? How easy do you think it would be to gain more emotional intelligence? What do you like in a leader?

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Communications, Internal Communications, Management

Surprises at Work

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I once had a boss who loved to sabotage meetings.  It wasn’t a question of him not liking his staff or even disliking meetings.  It was more that he didn’t want people to enter into discussions with their minds already made up. His theory was that if we all started from the same point, with the same information, we would produce honest and open responses. So, he habitually called meetings without explanation or gave only the vaguest indication of what he had on his mind.

While this concept might have worked in theory, it was a bit of a bust in practice.  I remember feeling completely lost in meetings, staring across the boardroom table at my colleagues who were equally lost while our boss discussed his newest idea.  Now, I’m all for hearing new ideas, but he wanted a decision about what we thought of his idea right then and there. What we discussed was his idea, his research on the idea, his perspective, his contemplation and of course, his bias. It didn’t go well. Not because he wasn’t smart, but because there was no opportunity for the rest of us to research, test or think about the idea as he had.

No matter what genius you call your own, if you really want your ideas to be given a fair hearing, you have to assume people need time to consider and test that idea. No matter your ailment, you probably wouldn’t take medication based on even the best scientist’s suggestion without first knowing some independent testing had been done.  So why would you accept an untested idea any quicker?

So what did we do as a group when my boss presented his surprise idea? We reacted on instinct, impulse and prior bias.  Instead of having an open debate, we ended up arguing over our own biases, perspectives and ideas. The facts had little to do with the discussion. Rather than build on an idea collectively based on our individual expertise, we became little more than the sum of our independent parts.  For those of you who have been taken by surprise at work by unexpected propositions, meetings or changes, you won’t be surprised to know that our meetings frequently ended in tears, anger or frustration – not exactly an ideal or productive working experience. Certainly not the honest and open response my boss had hoped for.

Lessons Learned:

  • No one likes surprises at work.
  • Whether you’re preparing for internal or external meetings, providing a fair warning in the form of a briefing note or clear agenda is central to success.
  • Give participants the opportunity to bring their best thoughts and research to the table and your meeting will prove more fruitful, effective and productive.
  • Taking people by surprise with ideas means that, rather than putting ideas to the test before implementation, at best all you’ll get is the sum of your own parts and some disgruntled colleagues.
  • Even if you’re the best brain on the planet, synergy will always improve on good ideas, not to mention the acceptance of them.
  • Despite the popularity of brainstorming sessions, they have many built in flaws that reduce their effectiveness.
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Management, public relations

Does Being A Lefty Or A Righty Make You A Better Boss?

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Cover of "A Whole New Mind: Moving from t...
Cover via Amazon

Are you a right brain thinker or do you use your left brain? Which do you think makes you a better leader? My book club is currently reading Daniel H. Pink’s book, “A Whole New Mind”.  The book explores the strengths and skills of leadership from the perspective of left and right brain skills. It looks at what was needed in the past to be a successful leader and what is needed now.  To date, our leaders have leaned towards left-brain thinkers.  MBAs and lawyers who could crunch numbers and construct contracts, but he argues that the time is right for new kind of leader. Those of a more creative bend, those capable of recognizing patterns, telling stories and a generally more inventive frame of mind.

Pink suggests that in times of abundance humans begin to look for more meaningful ways of defining success. The basic premise is that that if you are living in a time of abundance (which many of us are in North America and Europe) then you start to wonder about different things. You start to aspire to achieve more emotionally complex goals. In essence, you move up Maslow’s hierarchy of needs to focus on self-actualization and start to think about other, more emotionally charged means of reaching satisfaction, success or happiness…depends on your personal target.

2000px-maslows_hierarchy_of_needs-svgI might have scoffed at that thinking a little, but I just spent the last two weeks reading a variety of blogs about finding happiness, managing emotional vampires and getting past the “aaaarrgggghhh” moments in our lives.  It seems Daniel Pink might have a point about where we are in our economic and emotional development. Our definition of what defines success seems to have become more complex.  Simply having a job or even achieving monetary success is no longer enough.  We need to have a deep-rooted satisfaction with the work we do.  The blossoming blogosphere, the emergence of countless freelancers, our praise of entrepreneurial spirit, our insistence on visionary leadership and an emerging interest in working from home all speak to a desire to lead more independent and satisfying lives.  We’re looking for control and to be part of something better.

Could Daniel Pink be right about which side of the brain will make for a more effective leader in today’s environment? Do we need bosses who know how to be responsive to our more complex emotional demands? Leaders, who can think outside of the box, be holistic and intuitive because not only is it what workers are looking for, but may also be what the work we do increasingly requires.

The use of automation and less costly workers means that jobs in the first world are more complex and require a different level of thinking.  Couple that with our preoccupation with self-actualization and it makes sense that we need a different kind of leader…or does it?

In discussion with Jen Hunter, a management expert and facilitator she responded in this way when asked what her thoughts were, “Would you go to the gym and only exercise one side of your body? Unlikely, so why would you want leaders who only used one side of their brain? It doesn’t matter which half, it matters that they only use half.”

That assessment makes sense to me, but beyond that comes the big elephant in the room, the brain function itself.  While we often hear about the two sides of the brain as having distinctly different functions, they are not quite that easily defined. Much more research is still required.  So for the sake of this conversation lets simply consider that the skills we have traditionally seen as strengths for our leaders may be changing.

What do you think?  Do you think we need more right brain leadership?  Do left-brain thinkers still make for better leaders? Is the whole conversation of what drives us even relevant? Are we solving more complex problems in our jobs? Are we aspiring to more complex goals?

Want to test which side you use? Follow the 3rd link to, “Instant Personality Test”, it’s quick though I can’t speak to its accuracy.

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Communications, Government Relations

The Fastest Way to a Politician’s Heart is Through a Camera Lens

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press and politiciansIf politics were for wallflowers, government buildings would look like bungalows and politicians wouldn’t need to give speeches.  So for the sake of simplicity let’s start from an understanding that politicians expect to be seen and heard.  They would like it to happen at their convenience and on their issues, but they will adopt an issue if you capture their attention, if they can make it serve their needs and if they think it will have resonance with the public.  This description may make them sound opportunistic, but keep in mind that as public figures, they need to be, well public.  If you never hear from or see your legislator again after you elect them, then you might begin to wonder what if anything they were doing for you.  Also keep mind that a representative in parliament who can’t seize an opportunity when one is presented isn’t going to do you a lot of good in the long run.

What this preference for press means for you and your issue is that you have to think of ways of making it sexy or at least ensuring that elements of it have broad appeal.  While working in the public interest is a great starting point, it doesn’t necessarily capture headlines much less passing media interest.  The media likes conflict, sex appeal, violence and sensation, or more to the point, the assumption is that consumers of media like those things.  If you’re lucky on a slow Friday in the summer, you might get them to pay attention to human interest stories. Again, this isn’t a commentary on the personal peccadilloes of reporters, but a reflection of the corporate demands that now plague journalism and what you and I as a members of the public have indicated we are willing to pay for. This is what bumps online ratings, sells papers and raises television audience numbers.

So how do you make your news and issuesissue interesting?

As a start test its appeal with family and friends.  Do people start to glaze over when you tell your story?  Do they get angry, do they laugh, sympathize?  Do they appear shocked? If you can get a reaction from them that isn’t bored indifference you’re on the right track.  If your audience is glazing over halfway through your story, then you might want to take a slightly different approach to telling it.  For instance, you can take your issue and consider the worst-case scenario.  What could possibly happen if nothing is done? What are the implications of leaving things at the status quo?  Don’t stretch the bounds of believability, but try to follow through on what might happen if things did not change.  Stir in a few experts. Consider the plight of those impacted and suddenly you have a news story.  It also helps if you can think of a catchy way to express your concerns. The catchier, the more likely it is to end up as a sound bite on the news.  This may seem crass, but it works.

Then of course there is social media. There are volumes written on the many ways you can generate attention on your issue by blending traditional and social media campaigns or simply taking the social media route.  I would say though that unless you already have a strong online following or are about to start an active campaign to get that following, then you will want to look at blending. Although it can sometimes seem that anything can be made popular online from screaming goats to funny dances, it’s harder to do than it looks.  It’s also true that not all coverage is necessarily good coverage.

Timing is also critical to the successful launch of a story.

Any number of things can obliterate a good story, from bad weather conditions to a single but memorable violent act. A sporting event that has captured the attention of the public can make your story go from leading to pleading for coverage. You can manage some things, like avoid launching a story around an important holiday unless you can tie your story to it. Elections are tempting times to launch stories too, but do it with care.  If you cost a party a drop in the polls or even a temporary setback during an election campaign, they will remember you and it won’t be fondly. Take a look at the local events calendar, not just to avoid conflicting activities but to look for opportunities.

Whatever approach you adopt remember, media is a blunt tool.

There is little purpose in using the media strictly as a way of getting a legislator’s attention.  If you use it, it must be with the understanding that you are trying to get a message out to a broad audience, including those who may disagree with your perspective.

Do you have any media success or failure stories? Any news you saw that you knew wasn’t true or received a revelation by watching the news? I’d love to hear your stories.

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