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The Power Of Listening To Resolve Conflict

Posted by on February 9, 2017

Most of us are not very good listeners to begin with much less when conflict arises within the team. We immediately start listening to respond instead of listening to understand. If things get worse, then we will interrupt to try to transition the momentum back in our direction. This HBR post provides very practical help:

“Our review of research and company examples suggests there are three things you can do to avoid communication breakdowns like this. Whether we’re walking into a meeting, drafting an important proposal, or sitting down face-to-face with a colleague, our attention can easily be hijacked, especially when our mind wanders 50% of the time, as research suggests.”

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Corporate Shepherd

Posted by on February 6, 2017

There are many leaders today that want to move beyond just making a profit to really making a difference. They want to be successful and that’s great but they also want the significance that only comes from adding value to other people.

When leadership is approached from a Christian perspective a new model starts to develop where the leader becomes more of a shepherd to their people than a boss to their employees. They do care about performance and productivity but they also feel responsible for developing alignment around core values and creating the right culture for work-life balance for their people.

They also see life beyond the immediate pressures of planning, project management, staffing, goal setting and execution. The legacy they want to create for their life and organization includes eternal metrics that must be included when talking about the ultimate bottom line.

The clear plan for every Christian is to use your professional life as a platform for ministry because we are all in full time Christian service. Our lives should no longer be seen as segmented into faith, family, friends, recreation and entertainment but become totally integrated into being one life on mission for God. The various roles that we fulfill are no longer competing with each other but complimenting the calling God has for our lives.

In the end there is only one performance review that really matters. The evaluation criteria is simple, How faithful were you with all that I entrusted to your care? Thinking about that moment should overwhelm us with gratitude and give us a renewed sense of passion to hear well done my good and faithful servant.

Categories: Church Scattered Servant Leader Spiritual Growth Work Life Integration | Comments Off on Corporate Shepherd

4 Commitments Leaders Must Make

Posted by on February 1, 2017

One of the most successful executive coaches in the country is Marshall Goldsmith. He wrote a great book that I would highly recommend What Got You Here Won’t Get You There.

The simple thesis of the book is your competency and skill set is what has got you to where you are now as far as promotions are concerned. What it will take to get you where you need to be in the highly participative leadership culture of the future will be your people skills. This area is where the overwhelming majority of executive men and women hit the wall.

A key tool in helping people with people skill problems is to use some form of 360-degree feedback. This should involve superiors, peers as well as subordinates and sometimes even clients.

If you are one of the executives that clearly sends the message that I don’t like bad news and you consistently shoot the messenger who delivers it then you are probably in the dark about all your serious blind spots.

Everyone involved in the process must commit to the following four things:

Let go of the past-forgive.
Tell the truth-even if it hurts.
Be supportive and helpful-not cynical or negative.
Pick something to improve yourself-so everyone is focused more on “improving” than “judging.”

Feedback will tell us what we need to change. Then the moment of truth, Are we willing to do it?

Categories: Career Development Leadership Development | Comments Off on 4 Commitments Leaders Must Make

The Chemistry Of Great Teams

Posted by on January 27, 2017

I have probably learned more from Pat MacMillan on this subject than from any other writer. His book The Performance Factor is still a must read if you want to fully understand all the dynamics involved in leading a successful team.

When selecting team members you must have the right combination of competency and character. You really need people who are experts in their area of responsibility that can bring great factual accurate information into the discussion. However, the ultimate success of the team in my opinion will be even more driven by how people interact with each other showing mutual respect and humility.

I want everyone engaged and passionate about their contribution to the discussion but I do not want anyone attacking another person rather than debating their ideas. I have found the following list to be helpful for setting the right tone:

Treat each other with dignity and respect
Listen for understanding
Don’t take things personally; don’t mean things personally
Ask, but do not assume motives
Avoid degrading language; do not attack each other credibility
Everyone has input, regardless of position
We will not take ourselves too seriously

There is a big difference in being professional vs. being negatively personal toward another person. We must separate their ideas and comments from who they are and even though we may disagree we always value the individual.

Categories: Leadership Development Strategy Teamwork | Comments Off on The Chemistry Of Great Teams

3 Must Do's Before Termination

Posted by on January 25, 2017

There may be nothing harder to do as a leader than make the decision to terminate an employee. To be honest we feel to some degree we have failed and that is hard to accept.

This is especially true if we hired the person in the first place. Not only have they failed but now our performance as a leader may be in question also. We cannot let our own emotional need for personal success stand in the way of doing what is right for the organization.

There are three critical things that I must do as a leader before I feel that my responsibility has been completed prior to any termination. The first is to provide clear expectations of what is required in their job description. It is impossible for someone to meet your expectations if they have not been clearly communicated early and often.

The second important thing is to make sure the person has had adequate training and resources to complete their job successfully. It is not fair to ask someone to grow a particular area and not give them the financial and manpower assets they need to be effective.

The last issue for me is a comprehensive and ongoing feedback system that lets a person know exactly where they stand in the area of performance. It is not right to see someone make mistakes day after day and stick your head in the sand hoping it will go away only to drop a bomb on them at annual review or even worse an unexpected termination. If you do not have the leadership skills to positively confront someone about what they are doing wrong then you may be the one in the wrong job and not them.

If you have done all of these three things well and given this person every opportunity to improve and they don’t then you should feel no guilt or sense of failure. Never obsess on the five to ten percent of your staff that may need to go every year. What is extremely important is to remember the ninety to ninety five percent who are doing their jobs well and are watching to see if you have the character as their leader to pull the trigger.

Categories: Leadership Development Pastoral Leadership | Comments Off on 3 Must Do's Before Termination

Being A Strategic Leader Is About Asking The Right Questions

Posted by on January 23, 2017

By now, I have lived through four major leadership theory transitions that have all shaped my effectiveness. One of the single greatest advancements today is that key leaders are no longer seen as the answer person but the one who can ask the great questions. Great questions force everyone to think deeper and provide better outcomes. This HBR post is excellent:

If you asked the world’s most successful business leaders what it means to “be strategic,” how many different answers do you think you’d get? Consider this number: 115,800,000. It’s the number of unique links returned when I searched online for “strategic leadership.” There’s a good reason for all of those links: Strategy is complex.

Categories: Leadership Development Strategic Planning Strategy | Comments Off on Being A Strategic Leader Is About Asking The Right Questions

Effective Leaders Value Their People

Posted by on January 20, 2017

Leaders have always been evaluated based on the two extremes of the tasks that must be done compared to the relationship skills involved in motivating the people who will actually do the work. The theory was some leaders are born project managers and others are great in customer service.

In the old industrial age model of the last century based these either high task or high touch leaders were placed in jobs that maximized their strengths and overlooked their weaknesses. So if someone could always hit their numbers but had higher rate of turnover they were viewed as someone who was not too good with people but they could always get the job done.

Today in the more highly participative style of leadership that is required to be successful in the 21^st century it is an absolute necessity that all leaders prioritize their people skills so they can positively interact with a wide range of constituencies.

Marshall Goldsmith is one of the top Executive Coaches in the market. His greatest book What Got You Here Won’t Get You There is a great read for all leaders who want to reach their maximum potential. He identifies twenty habits that can completely destroy your influence as a leader.

The amazing thing that he confirms for all of us is that the most critical problems related to executive leadership have very little to do with core industry specific competency or even the expected qualities of productive leadership.

The overwhelming majority of smart, disciplined, experienced and passionate leaders are failing in the one major area of basic people skills. They do not relate well to their superiors, peers, subordinates and sometimes even customers.

They do not listen, make negative comments about people when they are not in the room, and always tend to punish the messenger when bad news is delivered just to list a few. Almost always these potential fatal flaws are obvious to everyone but the leader who does not even see them as an issue.

An absolute priority for any effective leader today is to establish a culture within their organization where the truth can be told and they will get the relational feedback they need or these extremely negative blind spots will never be revealed and the organization or team will fail.

Categories: Leadership Development Servant Leader | Comments Off on Effective Leaders Value Their People

Developing A Life Plan

Posted by on January 13, 2017

All of us at some point in time finally ask ourselves if we are living out the script someone else gave us or is it really the life we want. There are so many outside factors: parents, friends, culture and circumstances that drive us toward an uncertain destination. Developing a Life Plan starts with a healthy self-awareness that helps you discover who you are and what you want out of life. This HBR post tells great story:

“Tina was at a crossroads. Her daughter had recently left for college, and her husband had his own pursuits. And although she’d once enjoyed banking, she now bore little interest in her work. For some time, she had been asking herself whether she should quit. But what would her colleagues and bosses think of her?”

Categories: Church Scattered Life Plan Work Life Integration | Comments Off on Developing A Life Plan

How To Change Organizational Culture

Posted by on January 11, 2017

According to John Kotter there are many reasons change initiatives fail especially in large organizations. The number one reason is there is not a clear sense of urgency for change that makes everyone willing to pay the short term price of pain due to change to gain the long term benefit of progress.

Many times the communications part of the process breaks down and the implementers do not get enough information to really buy in. The importance of creating short term wins for establishing credibility for the entire process cannot be overstated.

When the new of change becomes the norm there are several key factors that let you know it is now firmly in the D.N.A. of your organizational culture:

More change, not less: The guiding coalition uses the credibility afforded by short-term wins to tackle additional and bigger change projects.
More help: Additional people are brought in, promoted, and developed to help with all the changes.
Leadership from senior management: Senior people focus on maintaining clarity of shared purpose for the overall effort and keeping urgency levels up.
Project management and leadership from below: Lower ranks in the hierarchy both provide leadership and specific projects and manage those projects.
Reduction of unnecessary interdependencies: To make change easier in both the short and long term, managers identify unnecessary interdependencies and eliminate them.

When everyone in the organization starts to articulate the new vision in their own words as if it were their idea then you know they own the process. It is time to start looking for what needs to be changed next, the process never stops.

Categories: Organizational Culture Strategic Planning | Comments Off on How To Change Organizational Culture

The Self Leadership Secrets Of Extreme Athletes

Posted by on January 9, 2017

I am convinced that the greatest leadership challenge you will ever face is the ability to consistently lead yourself. Leadership theory several years ago would stress identifying your weaknesses and then work on them until they are significantly improved. Today even though you must be competent in every area, the emphasis is upon knowing what you do extremely well and maximizing that. This post by Michael Hyatt has some practical tips:

“Sometimes leading a business can feel like running a marathon. That’s especially true when our goals seem ambitious, daunting, and a long way off. What could the sport of running teach us about reaching the finish line?”

Categories: Leadership Development Personal Leadership | Comments Off on The Self Leadership Secrets Of Extreme Athletes