Category Archive: Career Development

Level Five Leaders

Posted by on June 30, 2009

In my opinion the best organizational leadership book that has been written is Good to Great by Jim Collins.  It proves beyond any doubt some things we have always know about effective leadership but he discovers some key principles that fly in the face of everything we have been taught in the past.

One thing that is really not new but clearly prioritized in his book is the importance of character in the life of any leader.  Character ensures that the motives of the leader are always focused on what is best for the people they are leading and not for themselves.

The most significant myth that this book destroys about great leaders is that they all must be very outgoing cheerleader type personalities and that they have to lead with an authoritarian dictatorial style to be effective.

According to Collins, “Level 5 leaders display a compelling modesty, are self-effacing and understated.  In contrast, two thirds of the comparison companies had leaders with gargantuan personal egos that contributed to the demise or continued mediocrity of the company.”

This personality type should never be mistaken for laid back soft leaders who don’t have the strength to make the hard calls.  As a matter of fact they combine humility with an incredible strong will to make sure the right things are getting done.  If they have to they would fire their mother if that is what was necessary for the long term benefit of the organization.

They also give credit to others when things are going well and when they are not they assume personal responsibility.  This combination of personal humility and professional will make for the type of leader anyone would want to follow.

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Crisis Management

Posted by on June 29, 2009

Every individual and organization at some point in time will face a crisis and the way they respond will determine if the situation potentially becomes fatal or they experience a complete and total recovery.  I have learned a lot from personal experience on this subject over the years and probably the most important lesson is to be incredibly proactive and not stick your head in the sand and hope it will get better.

In Jack Welch’s great book Winning he gives some great advice on how he dealt with crisis situations at G.E.  These are his five guiding assumptions:

1.      The problem is worse than it appears—No matter how hard you might wish and pray; very few crises start small and stay that way.  The vast majority are bigger in scope than you could ever imagine with that first phone call and they will last longer and get more ugly.

2.      There are no secrets in the world, and everyone will eventually find out everything—Information that you try to shut down will eventually get out, and as it travels, it will certainly morph, twist and darken.   The only way to prevent that is to expose the problem yourself and tell the truth.

3.      You and your organization’s handling of the crisis will be portrayed in the worst possible light—The very nature of a crisis means that you and your organization will be portrayed in a light so negative you won’t even recognize yourself.  Don’t hunker down.  Along with disclosing the full extent of your problem you have got to stand up and define your position before someone else does for you.

4.      There will be changes in processes and people—Crisis requires change.  Sometimes a process fix is enough.  Usually not because the people affected by the crisis demand that someone be held responsible.

5.      The organization will survive, ultimately stronger for what happened—There is not a crisis you cannot learn from, even though you hate every one of them.  After a crisis is over the tendency is to put it away in a drawer.  Don’t, teach its lessons every chance you get.

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Six Ways To Make Emotional Deposits

Posted by on June 26, 2009

We are all familiar with the metaphor of making emotional deposits and taking withdrawals from another person both personally and professionally.  When you end up taking more than you give to another person you end up with a negative balance and believe me there are serious fees and late charges involved.

Stephen Covey in his great book Seven Habits of Highly Effective People gives us six ways that we can make sure we are making deposits on a consistent basis with another person:

1.      Understanding the Individual—really seeking to understand another person is probably one of the most important deposits you can make, and it is the key to every other deposit.  You simply don’t know what constitutes a deposit to another person until you understand that individual.

2.      Attending to the Little Things—the little kindnesses and courtesies are so important.  Small discourtesies, little unkindness’s, little forms of disrespect make large withdrawals.  In relationships, the little things are the big things.

3.      Keeping Commitments—keeping a commitment or a promise is a major deposit; breaking one is a major withdrawal.  In fact, there’s probably not a more massive withdrawal than to make a promise that’s important to someone and then not to come through.

4.      Clarifying Expectations—the cause of almost all relationship difficulties is rooted in conflicting or ambiguous expectations around roles and goals.  That’s why it’s so important whenever you come into a new situation to get all the expectations out on the table.

5.      Showing Personal Integrity—personal integrity generates trust and is the basis of many different kinds of deposits. One of the most important ways to manifest integrity is to be loyal to those who are not present because that builds trust with those who are.

6.      Apologizing Sincerely When You Make a Withdrawal—when we make withdrawals from the Emotional Bank Account, we need to apologize and we need to do in sincerely.  Great deposits come in the sincere words we share with the people we have hurt.

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Law Of The Inner Circle

Posted by on June 23, 2009

This by far is one of the most important principles identified by John Maxwell in the realm of leadership.  The simple definition of the law is that a leader’s potential is determined by those closest to them.

As any organization continues to grow the leader cannot continue to spend equal time with every person on staff because of time constraints alone.  This means that eventually the majority of a leader’s time will be need to be spent with the top 20% of their leadership team.

It is a proven leadership principle that they in turn will produce at least 80% of the desired results because of the scope of their impact throughout the entire organization.  The leader is incredibly dependent upon this inner circle because they are responsible for providing the best information possible upward for decision making and they are also responsible for the downward execution of all planning.

Leaders of large organizations should still spend some time managing by walking around and maintain some personal contact with all levels of staff.  However the purpose of this interaction is for personal encouragement and visibility and not for problem solving and day to day decision making.  The leader can be involved to some degree with everyone but they must invest themselves only in the inner circle because they are the key to continued growth and outstanding performance.

 

 

 

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Rinsing Your Cottage Cheese

Posted by on June 22, 2009

There were many profound conclusions reached by Jim Collins research team that were documented in his bestselling book Good to Great.  The principle of rinsing your cottage cheese received a small amount of space in the book but may be one of the key principles that separate those organizations who merely survive in this economy and those who thrive.

This analogy comes from a disciplined world-class athlete named Dave Scott, who won the Hawaii Ironman Triathlon six times.  Even though he had a training schedule that would burn at least 5,000 calories per day he would still rinse his cottage cheese to get the extra fat off.

From a business planning model this represents the last 10 percent of work that most people are not willing to do or even know exists to make their project or program  the best it possibly could be.  Most people are willing to settle for 75-90% effort and feel that should really represent the best they can produce.

Sometimes the last 10% represents seemingly little things like a spot on the carpet or windows that have not been cleaned.  However that can be the very thing that a customer will notice and come to the conclusion that if you do not care about those areas what else are you not doing to be your best that they cannot see.

Collins writes, “Everyone would like to be the best, but most organizations lack the discipline to figure out with egoless clarity what they can be the best at and the will to do whatever it takes to turn that potential into reality.”  Bottom line they lack the character and the discipline to rinse their cottage cheese.

 

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Shut Up And Listen

Posted by on June 19, 2009

This phrase is not only the title for one of the chapters in Mark DeMoss’s book on Wisdom but it is also incredibly good advice.  To make his point he uses the confirmation hearings of Justice Samuel Alito where most senators spent almost all of their allotted thirty minutes for asking questions pontificating about their own political bias.  At the end of the day we learned very little about the new prospective judge because he had no time to talk.

Mark has many great insights in this book and on this subject he writes, “It’s safe to say that in my life I have never learned a single thing while I was talking.”  On the other hand his willingness to close his mouth and open his ears has given him a tremendous amount of knowledge from a variety of different people.

In corporate culture today the priority is on participative leadership that makes sure everyone on the team has a voice in the conversation.  For that to happen the people that used to do all of the talking have to discipline themselves to now do most of the listening.  Mark has another great quote when he says, “To dominate a meeting or conversation is not power, informed good judgment is power.”

When someone is a great listener it says several things about them.  First they are learners by nature and they seek out other people who can teach them something.  Second they are also humble because they do not always have to be the expert on everything and they are willing to be quiet and even give someone else the credit.  Finally they are relational because they want the other person to know that what they have to say and who they are as a person is important to them.

Mark believes that when a person is not a good listener, “it’s like standing on a balcony over breathtaking panorama and using the entire time to stare into a mirror.”  OUCH!!

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Customer Service That Works

Posted by on June 18, 2009

In a day when we tend to have more user identifications and passwords than we do meaningful relationships real customer service that treats you like a person really stands out and separates you from your competition. There may be nothing worse than to be stuck on a computer phone tree that puts you through twenty selections only to drop your call before you get to a real person.

I love technology but when you substitute the personal touch with a phone tree you have gone too far regardless of what the cost benefit studies tell you. These are my non-negotiable items when it comes to customer service:

1. Personal Touch—If you must use automated answering software there must be an option to get to a real person within first ten seconds of call. If people want to use technology they can go to your website and totally automate the entire transaction but when they make a phone call they need to talk with a highly trained friendly individual who knows how to deliver.

2. Inside Staff—When you talk with someone and you can tell they are probably several thousand miles away and they are not well trained it is a horrible experience. I do not think customer service should be outsourced because no matter how much they know about your product they are still not personally invested in your success.

3. Follow Up—There is nothing better than when the person on the other end of the line lets you know they own your problem and they will not be satisfied until you are as well. This means they give you their name, an incident report number and a direct phone number if you need to call them back. They also get your number and call you back later to make sure the problem has been resolved.

There are many areas where it may be prudent and profitable to cut back on expenses to help your bottom line. This is not one of them because in the end if your customers are not satisfied they will find someone else who gets it.

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Resolving Conflict

Posted by on June 17, 2009

All of us at some point in time will have conflict and disagreements with someone else either in our personal lives or professionally at work.  These situations can be painful at times but seeking resolution is the only way to maintain positive momentum in your life.

There are at least three critical steps that you must take if you want to restore the relationship and move forward in your own life.

1.       Own Your Part—In every disagreement there are always two sides to the story.  I have never known a situation where there was not some responsibility for the problem with both parties.  If we think the other party is the major offender then we tend to wait for them to make the first move.  Instead we need to take whatever percentage of the problem is ours even if it’s minor and do what we need to do to admit it and ask for forgiveness regardless of what the other person does.

2.      Talk Person Privately—Most of the time when we are having problems with another person we tend to go to other people first and complain or try to find emotional support.  What we should do is go privately to the person who offended us first and tell them in a respectful way why we are offended and give them a chance to respond.  When we are talking about someone else to another person rather than talking to them the situation will only get worse.

3.      Give Benefit Of Doubt—When we sense that a conversation is not going well and we can tell it may hurt us we have a decision to make.  We can either assume the worst about the other person’s motives or we can believe the best.  Many times if we can give them the benefit of the doubt at this critical moment then even though it may still hurt there will be no lasting damage because we give them a pass because we trust their heart.

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The Power Of Momentum

Posted by on June 15, 2009

There are very few things more difficult to deal with in your personal or professional life than a loss of momentum.  It can be brought on by some major tragedy or a series of small compromises over a very long period of time.

Eventually we get to a place where we start worrying about things outside our control and that drains us of what little emotional energy we have left.  Also because we are so focused on the negative we stop doing the things we should and can do and that brings even more despair.

The only way to break this cycle is to start doing what you can do and build some small daily wins into your life.  This principle works with individuals as well as organizations.

With every small win comes movement and that generates confidence that things are finally headed in the right direction.  When we regain our confidence then we attempt even more things that product even bigger wins and the power of the momentum begins to put the wind back in our sails.

It is very ironic that when we get to the places of greatest difficulty in our lives it is the very smallest of things that can break the downward cycle.  We are desperately searching for the big answer that is going to solve all our problems when the solution was right in front of us all the time.

The good news is that the power of momentum works in a positive way to an even greater degree than it does toward the negative.  When you repeatedly do what you can do daily the positive flow of your life moves you beyond all the negative issues that may still be there but now they are in the proper perspective.

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Clock Building Not Time Telling

Posted by on June 12, 2009

The days of all decisions being made solely at the top with a few people involved are fading fast.  Throughout the Industrial Age of leadership during the last half of 20th century this was the only model of leadership.  The overwhelming percentage of the workforce was for the most part simply telling time based on the clear instructions that were given for them to follow.

Today we are leading from an Information and Idea Age model of leadership.  The entire development process has been delegated to various teams so that everyone who can contribute will be involved.  In essence people are now being asked to help build the clock.

Most people think the changing role of the top executives is by far the most dramatic shift that has occurred.  In a sense of scope that may be true.  Key leaders today do not have to know all the answers to all the questions they only need to know what are the right questions to ask? 

There primary responsibility today is to make sure they have the best possible people on their team because the quality and success of the clocks they are making will determine the future success of the entire organization.

The most dramatic shift in leadership today certainly from a standpoint of scale is not at the top but in the middle of organizations.  There is a big difference in telling time compared to building clocks.  Today people are daily being asked what do you think and what would you recommend?

Many organizations are caught in the middle of this transition and seem to be stuck.  The problem could be that you are asking people who only know how to tell time to build clocks and they are not capable of making that change.  Don’t give up on clock building just find the right people who know how to build great clocks and you will be fine.

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