How Not to RIDE the Negative Train

Duke Ellington once said, “A problem is a chance for you to do your best.” I just love this perspective. I wonder how many of us really see it this way?  I wonder how many of us as leaders, when people on our teams bring us situations that feel like a problem, see it as an opportunity to do our best?

Reflect with me for a moment. Stop, take a sip of your coffee, and think back over your last week. What is a situation or a problem that someone on your team brought you? Do you feel as a leader that your perspective was a chance for you to do your best? Do you feel you took the opportunity to help the person bringing you the problem to do their best?

Perspective

One of the more interesting things about being an executive coach is that I get an opportunity to have a lot of interactions with a lot of different leaders. I have been known to log over 42 hours of Zoom meetings sometimes in a couple of weeks! For me, and I am sure you as well, this has been a pretty typical pace since the pandemic started. 

For the past couple of years, I have been paying closer attention to not only what people are showing up with, but how they show up. In leadership coaching, I get the chance to help folks look at their leadership and ensure how they show up is how they intend to keep showing up.

Most of us want to make sure our intentions match our impact. It is my experience, however, that not many of us stop and think proactively about what we want our impact to be. Especially when there is a problem and that problem has an emotion attached to it.

Go back to the reflection you did at the beginning of this post. As a leader, when the person on your team brought you the problem, did how you want to show up match how you did show up? Or, were you so caught up in the emotion of the problem that you had a hard time even knowing what problem it was you were trying to solve? I see this a lot! I will often ask folks I am working with...”Now, what problem is it we are solving exactly? Let's keep the main thing.”

Example

Some of you know that I am an avid golfer. Not a good golfer, but I really enjoy the challenge the game brings to me. So many little things have to be done right to hit a good golf shot, and once in a while, I hit a good one even though I don’t do everything right.  Those are the ones that keep me coming back.

So for Valentine’s Day one year, my wife gave me a great gift. It was a golf fitting for new clubs. It was a really great experience for me and I was like a kid in a candy store. I was so excited! This was something I had always wanted to do.  

When the day came for me to go to the fitting, I walked in at 3:30 pm for my appointment and I was met by this really high-energy guy named James. He could tell I had one eye on the bay where you get to try out the new clubs. But before he would let me take a swing, he asked me a question, “Why are you here?” My response was not well thought out, nor very accurate it turns out.  

I told James “I have always wanted to do this and I am really excited,” I quipped, just wanting to get into that bay and hit a ball with the newest technology golf club makers have to offer.

“Awesome!” James responded, with so much enthusiasm that it was effervescent coming out of him.

But, then he changed his tone, took his enthusiasm down about 3 notches, and said, “I appreciate your excitement, but why are you here? What is it that you are trying to achieve through this experience in your golf game?” 

Dang! I had been so excited about the opportunity, I completely lost focus on the problem I was trying to solve. 

“I want to hit the ball straighter and further,” I said in response. 

“Good,” he said. “I can help you do that, but I don’t think that is why you are here.”

Now I was a bit stunned, perplexed, and feeling a little like I was about to enter a therapy session. 

“I give,” I said…”Why am I here?”

“Exactly,” James said again…” Why are you here?” He didn’t answer my question for me but was going to make me answer. It was like therapy!!

Then, a light went off for me about skill. “I want to be a better golfer. No, wait, I want to lower my golf score. and I want to be more competitive on the golf course.”

“Yes!” James yelled. Literally yelled. I mean he screamed it so loud I think people having dinner at Chick-fil-A across the street could have heard him.

“Let's work to solve that problem,” James said when he calmed down. And when we got in the simulator and I would hit a ball 30 yards further with a new club, he would say, “Now that shot will lower your score on the course!” 

Being Coached

James either had a natural ability or someone had trained him on some excellent coaching techniques. As I reflected on that experience, James was actually pulling from some great psychology as he was preparing me to buy golf clubs. (Hey, James had a goal, too. Make no mistake, he gets paid to sell golf clubs, and I love the set he sold me!)

RIDE*

Here is a model I use in coaching when problems that have negative emotions are brought to the discussion.  I try to find a way for the person NOT to “RIDE” the negative train. I use the acronym RIDE as a process. Each element is really an independent tool, so you do not have to use them all or think of them in a stepwise fashion.

The problem I had in my golf fitting example was that I had lost my perspective on why I was there. Here is what James helped me with, even if he didn’t know the psychology behind it.

R: Remove the negative thing. This strategy employs taking the thing that is negatively impacting me out of the situation. My excitement was clouding my perspective to see why I was really there.

I: Insert a more positive perspective. This can involve distracting my attention away from the issue causing negative emotions. He took my emotion that to me felt positive - but it actually was negative because it was in my way of seeing the problem and got me to the root of why I was there in the first place.

D: Distract the attention from the negative thing. Finding something less negative can put the problem in perspective. James had me sit down, then offered me a Powerade as he was asking me about my expectations. He was distracting me away from my excitement so I could focus.

E: Emotionally Pivot. Help the person change the emotion to match the problem. James brought me down so skillfully off my high, never losing his enthusiasm, but helped me focus so that when I got in the bay I was calmer and he could do his job. Nice work, James.

How about you as a leader? If you go back to your reflection exercise at the beginning of this post, could you insert one of the elements of the RIDE model to help someone on your team?

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*For all you academics out there, the RIDE model was derived from research done by Little, Gooty, and Williams and published in Leadership Quarterly 2016. The article is titled: The role of leader emotion management in leader-member exchange and follower outcomes.

Are Your Goals Making You Sore or Helping You Soar?

Remember back in January when you had that new year motivation and fresh start attitude? You had all of this pent-up passion for making something change this year. You had the idea that something was going to be different this year from your previous rut.

Once you identified the “what” you wanted to change, your next step was to set some goals for yourself. Most of us set goals for work, travel, or maybe even working out at a gym.

Do you remember your goals from the beginning of the year? Do you remember where you wrote them down or typed them? Are they still in legible form or has the Post-It Note you wrote them on started to curl around the edges with its spotlight position on the refrigerator now covered by last month's grocery list?

Have you made any progress on the goals you set?

You might even have named your goals something like “BHOG” (Big Hairy Audacious Goal), Key Results Area, Performance Management Objective, Personal Development Plan, or some other colloquial term that you or your organization or discipline uses.

It is now September, and it is time to go back and check in on what was important to you at the beginning of the year. Ask yourself, "Have I accomplished my goals, or did I get off track?”

It can be quite common for people to not to want to review the goals they set earlier in the year, especially if they know they have not made the progress they hoped. The feeling of discouragement can become overwhelming when we see a lack of progress and we know we aren't where we had hoped to be by now when the goal was originally set.

Stay in the game.

Discouragement can be devastating when it comes to goals. In my experience, it can be one of the hardest obstacles to overcome.

The goal had meaning and significance to you 9 months ago, so it's time to start asking yourself some questions as to why you are not making progress this far into the year. You HAVE NOT failed! You have likely learned a lot in 8-9 months about the goal and your progress if you just stop and think about it.

An analogy came to me the other day that may have some application:

In January, you set your goal. Let's say you wanted to exercise three days a week for an hour. Think of this goal as getting on an airplane. You are all buckled in your seat and ready for take-off. You know the goal. It is written down and it actually feels comfortable.

The plane starts down the runway, shakes, and surges as it gains speed. All of a sudden, it is February. You likely have taken a couple of steps toward goal attainment. You are gaining speed and you can feel the inertia of the plane starting to lift off. In regards to your goal, maybe you called around to see what gym would best fit your needs. You went out and bought new exercise clothes and maybe some shoes. The feeling and speed of the change felt good.

Then comes March. The plane reaches 30,000 feet, the seat belt sign comes off, and the plane levels out. And the exercise doldrums set in. You no longer feel the rush of take-off. You no longer can sense the speed of the plane. This is when goal attainment becomes difficult. When it feels like you are not making any progress at all.

This feeling is not real.

The interesting thing to me is the lie that our emotions give us in this context. While the positive “dopamine” feeling of starting to work on the goal may be long gone by September, the important thing to realize is that the plane is still going 450 miles an hour even when you can’t feel it. You are still moving. You are still experiencing progress. Even though you have said goodbye to 8 months of the year, YOU are still flying. Realize your plane is still in the air. You have not crashed. YOU HAVE NOT FAILED!

Instead of assuming that you are way off track and that you've already failed, step back and look at your goal objectively. Think about the time when you set your goals — were they SMART goals?

Most likely you've heard this acronym and even used it when setting goals, but it is helpful to use to check up on your goals or even get back on track. Was it…?

• Specific? When getting specific with your goal, don't just consider what your goal is, but why and how you want to achieve it. Perhaps you want to work on developing young leaders. Your why might be because you want to prepare them for more responsibility in the future and your how will be through professional development workshops or one-on-one mentoring sessions.

• Measurable? Are you able to see where you are right now and where you'll end up? If you are not able to track the progress of obtaining the goal along the way, you'll have a hard time seeing if you succeeded in the end or staying motivated along the way.

• Achievable and Realistic? I feel the A and R in our acronym go hand in hand in some ways. When you figure out your goal, how to do it, and when to accomplish it, you have to think about the parameters and circumstances that you are working in that will make it possible. This isn't to discourage you from setting the goal, but rather to encourage you to think about how you will make sure you complete the goal and ensure that it's not completely out of reach or asking too much from your team. At this point, something may have come up in the last 8 months that have changed your circumstance and deterred your goal. That's okay. Life happens. Instead of seeing it as a failure or no longer attainable, just think about what changes need to be made to your goal, the plan, or the timeline. Don't be tempted to start from scratch, instead, make less work for yourself by simply re-evaluating and tweaking what's already in progress and steer it back on track.

• Time-bound? Some of you may have set goals that you've already completed, others might feel the pressure of the time ticking away. Use the time as positive pressure to get the work done, not to stress you out. If you feel constrained, give yourself a break and allow yourself more time. If it's a project with a deadline, reach out to your team or manager and see how you can work together to get it completed. Also, consider how you are using your time and what could be distracting you from focusing on your goal. What limits do you need to implement personally to give yourself time and focus to achieve this goal?

Most importantly, remember the why behind your goal and the reasons that motivated you to set the goal in the first place. Visualize what it will look like for you and your team when that goal is accomplished. Write this down and keep it somewhere you'll see it and can read it often. (Perhaps avoid the refrigerator this time!)

Keep yourself in the air and land that goal safely on the ground.

Homework:

Take a look at the goal you set at the beginning of the year. Grab a coach, mentor, or trusted advisor and share with them your SMART goal. Listen to any advice they have for you. Be encouraged by the progress you have made (even if it feels like you are flying in circles). Decide with your support system what steps you need to take to land your plane safely. Set up another meeting with them in November for a progress check and then in December for a celebration of your achievement.

Solving the Right Problem Using Emotional Intelligence

Lately, I have been really frustrated by something. In my work, it’s something I do quite a bit of and sometimes it is really hard.

Writing!

You’ve heard versions of this angst from nearly everyone who has to write anything for any reason. You’ve definitely heard it from bloggers, coaches, or students who have a thesis that is due.

It sounds something like one of these statements:

“I want to write, but I am afraid I won’t know what to communicate.”

“I have been able to write in the past, but now nothing is coming to me.”

“Writing is a passion for me but I just don’t have the time right now.”

“Who, me? Write? What would I say? Who would read it?”

As you read over the list of reasons for not writing, does anything jump out at you?

I have a suggestion for you to consider. In fact, I think you can consider this suggestion anytime you are solving a problem and trying to figure out why you are frustrated.

In each of the examples above, there is either explicit or implied emotion attached to the “writer’s block.”

Feelings such as fear, anxiety, or frustration creep in and are communicating something to us. These emotions often accompany any problem we are trying to solve or any goal we are trying to achieve. In fact, these emotions are what make us human. Every thought we have, everything we experience, will come with a feeling.

For example, as I write this post on a beautiful morning, I have a cup of hot coffee sitting next to me. The sun is just coming up over the horizon with a hazy yellow intensity that somehow fades into the color blue as the light from the sun becomes more invisible to my eye. As I experience this, I have an overwhelming feeling of gratitude.

I am experiencing the sunrise and I feel grateful. The experience comes with an emotion.

You should try this simple exercise sometime. See if you can become aware of the emotion you are feeling at any given moment. Maybe at your kids’ sporting activity this weekend, you become grateful that they can run and play. Perhaps you are attending a small gathering of close friends for the first time in a long time and you are feeling joy just being with people you love. Maybe you are doing some deep house cleaning, and you feel proud of yourself and the progress you are making.

Paying attention to emotions can be really valuable for us. Not only when things seem so good, like watching a beautiful sunrise, but also when they are not so good; such as when we have writer’s block and don’t know what to write about.

Emotions and Problem Solving

Your emotions are communicating something to you. They are trying to tell you something about what you are experiencing or thinking.

What I have found is that when I am frustrated with writing, I am often not working on the right problem. The problem is not in my writing.

I wonder if you have ever experienced something similar? You have a problem you are trying to resolve, and it is really frustrating, and then you realize you are not trying to solve the right problem!?

When I get writer's block, for example, the problem is rarely that I truly cannot write. The problem is that I have not been reading enough! For me, to be able to read means doing research, studying, and paying attention to what is going on around me. It is amazing to me that when I get the feeling that I cannot write, or that I am stuck - when I reframe the problem, the answer becomes more clear.

The problem is not that I cannot write. The problem is that I am so busy that I have not been reading or observing what is going on around me.

When I cannot write, I need to sit down and read. When I pay attention to what my emotions are telling me, I can see my world differently, and often with more beauty and grace.

How about you? Has something been frustrating you lately? Have you been working on something and not getting the results you had hoped for?

Why not step back for a moment and consider if you are really solving the right problem, to begin with?

5 Tips Based on Over 15 Years of Working From Home

The Coronavirus pandemic caused and is still causing many of us to rethink assumptions we never thought we would have to consider.  As a result, many of you who have maybe worked a day or two from home now and then might find yourself working from home more often, or even indefinitely now.

Some schools have even decided to move to online formats and are requiring students to stay home, forcing many workers into new scenarios that they had never faced before when it comes to working remotely, and many parents have had to make the decision to homeschool their kids.

There is some good news in all of this. A Harvard study in 2019 stated that people who can work from wherever they choose were 4.4% more productive than those who had fixed, rigid work requirements.  I actually was a bit shocked and thought this might be higher, but my fear is that not everyone who chooses where they work from will follow the same discipline that they would in an office environment. 

So, I thought I would give you some of my thoughts on how I have navigated these “free to choose your workspace” waters for myself (although for some this may be a forced choice).  

These tips are not based on any specific research. I will typically spend several hours researching and crafting a blog post, but this post is different. It is just my opinion.  What I write may not fit you or your style, and that’s okay.

5 Tips Based on 15+ Years of Working From Home:

1. Guard Your Attitude Against Loneliness.  

   I am starting with attitude because many of you really enjoy the social aspect of work.  If you had a question about something, you were used to popping your head into someone’s office to get an answer  When you are working from home, the feeling of loneliness can be very real.  I like to intentionally schedule meetings early in the morning and in the late afternoon that have a “check-in” social component to them.  I always have a cup of coffee (you substitute your social non-alcoholic beverage of choice) in the morning and my seltzer water (love that fizz) in the afternoon. There is something that just feels social for me about sharing a beverage with someone while we are talking.  I also try, if at all possible, to do these calls over video chat.  I just love Zoom, it is so easy to use and within 30 seconds I can schedule the meeting, put it on my calendar, and send the invite to someone.  

2. Carve Out Dedicated Work Space.

   I realize that this work-from-home scenario many are facing may not have given you a completely dedicated office with a door and a desk and a comfy leather chair. You really don’t need all of that, anyway, but you do need a place that is going to be your designated work space. It is important that you dedicate that space to work and that it is not in front of the TV while the news stations broadcast all of the latest news. Having a dedicated space will tell your brain this is now where you work. If you can avoid it, try not to make the kitchen table your office, because this is likely a grand central station in your house, if it is at all like mine, and it is really hard to have meetings and concentrate with a lot of traffic. 

3. Keep Your Routine.

   If you are used to being at the office by 7:30 am, continue to get up at the same time. If you shower in the morning, then by all means continue this habit. Get dressed like you are going to work and be at your desk by 7:30 am, ready to engage.  What you may find is that when you don’t have your normal commute, you can put that time to good use and do something like starting that book you have always wanted to get to but just never had the time.  If you eat lunch, take a lunch break. You can still schedule lunch meetings if you want, just warm up your soup or make your sandwich and do the meeting over video conference.  One thing I find about working from home is that I have to get up and take more frequent stretches and walks.  I try and keep them around 5 or 10 minutes, but I try and get up at least every 60 to 90 minutes and stretch.  Then, end your day when you would typically leave your office.  Pick up your book and read another chapter to account for your commute.  When you are finished working, then close your device and be finished.  

   WARNING: Working from home is not a time to “sort of work” while you clean the shower that has not been cleaned in a while. Your organization is still expecting full work productivity. Don’t fall into the trap of half-working and half-doing whatever else needs to be done at home. 

4. Communicate Expectations.  

   Most people who you work with will understand that everyone has probably adapted to a new normal. Your family and friends may not understand this still. They may see this as, well, “mom and dad are home, so it must be like the weekend”.  I have found it really important to communicate with my wife that when I am working, it is like I am not here. Now, if there is an emergency, then by all means come get me. But this should be rare like a total eclipse of the sun. If you clearly establish boundaries I think you will find you will be just as, if not more, productive. Running out of mac and cheese or paper towels will have to wait until you would normally get home to resolve the issue.  I have found that kind words like, “Is this an emergency, or can it wait until I am finished working?” works well for me and helps establish appropriate boundaries.  

5. Pay Attention to Habits.

   You are in an interesting space of getting to form some new habits when you work from home. For this, we turn to the research. Wendy Wood, in her book “Good Habits/Bad Habits”, reviewed 64 studies and found that for some behaviors, people’s actions aligned with their intentions. For example, if they intended to get a flu shot or enroll in a class, they did as they intended. The stronger the plan for these one-off types of things, the more likely they were to do them. But for other behaviors and actions that are repeated more often, intentions didn’t matter that much. Things like taking a bus or recycling, for example. People might want to recycle but it turns out that intention doesn’t matter that much here. Persistence and the formation of habit have little to do with willpower or the mere desire to accomplish something.  What is needed is the repetition of the desired behavior. So, as you think about working from home, put all your good intentions aside and practice what it is that you want your behavior to be.

I hope you found this interesting to think through as we all navigate a new age of a lot of people working from home.   If you know someone who works from home or is going to be in the future, why not forward this post to them and encourage them to sign up for the blog?

 If you have ideas on how to be successful working from home, please send me a note with your thoughts. I promise to give you credit for your idea if I do a “reader’s hacks” type post in the future.

Are You Happy With Your Level of Well-Being?

A client once said to me, "Scott, I realize I need to take better care of myself. When I do that, I am at my best. I have decided to do yoga when I get up in the morning and exercise again at noon. I am going to be more conscious of my diet and make better choices about what goes into my body."

When I probed for the reason, he continued.

"Recently, there has been a lot of negativity in my life and I am just not going to allow it to get me down any longer. I am choosing to be the leader I want to be and not be a weak victim of my circumstances."

His decision prompts me to ask this question to you:

How are you, as a leader, focusing on your emotional well-being?

There’s a great story of 2 out of 180 nuns that were the subjects of a study on longevity and happiness. If you want all the details, you can read the book  Authentic Happiness by Martin Seligman, for some interesting facts and percentages about the nuns.

Studies of longevity are very complex from a purely scientific standpoint. Causality is extremely difficult to make a case of. However, one of the reasons this study is so impactful is that nuns lead very similar lives. They eat basic food, don’t smoke or drink alcohol, and have similar routines. Of course, there are differences such as intellect, depths of spirituality, and outlook on the future that could account for the varied results in the nuns.

However, none of these aspects made any difference in the research. In his book, Seligman points out that the largest contributor to their longevity was the sheer amount of positive feelings.

According to the National Wellness Institute, wellness is "an active process through which people become aware of, and then make choices toward, a more successful existence."

Four things to notice about wellness:

• It is an active process. It is something you devote energy to making happen. It is intentional on your part as a leader.

• It starts with self-awareness. Are you aware of the moment when health choices present themselves?

• Wellness is a choice. You decide to be well in the moment or you decide to say “screw it” and become a victim of your circumstance.

• There is an end game. A successful existence. This is your life. You only get one. Why not make it the very best that it can be?

Emotional intelligence and well-being:

One of the attributes we measure in Emotional Intelligence training is either Happiness or Well-being. In our model there are four factors that comprise Well-being:

1. Self-Regard: Believing in yourself and living according to your values.

2. Self-Actualization: A willingness to learn and grow in accordance with your beliefs.

3. Interpersonal Relationships: Engaging in mutually satisfying relationships.

4. Optimism: The ability to respond, recover, and claim a happy state from disappointments and setbacks in life

Two considerations for evaluating your own level of well-being:

1. The first is attempting to display as many of these four attributes as you can.

   • Believe in yourself and live according to your values.

   • Learn and grow in areas that really matter to you.

   • Have friends that reciprocate these areas.

   • Realize that things in life are not always going to go your way. What counts is how you respond when setbacks happen.

2. The second is to have a balance between these attributes.

   • For example, you want to make sure that your self-regard is balanced with your interpersonal relationships.

   • If you have a high level of self-regard and low levels of interpersonal relationships, you could come across as prideful.

   • If you have low levels of self-regard and high interpersonal relationships, then you could come across as needy and not fun to be around. It’s all about balance.

As you think about the successful life you want to live as a leader:

Are you choosing to maximize and balance these 4 attributes of emotional health?

What changes can you make to ensure that you live a long and successful life?

Does Conflict Have to Feel like a 4 Letter Word?

CONFLICT.

It is not literally a “4 letter word,” but in organizations sometimes it feels twice as bad as any four-letter word ever would.

Conflict is one of those tense words that can have such a negative connotation. So averse that we avoid it like we would have during the heart of the COVID Pandemic if someone in the grocery store was not wearing a mask when it was required.

It is like the conversation you know you need to have with someone, but you go the other way because avoidance seems, at the time, to be much less painful than the interaction.

But is it? What is behind this avoidance? 

This is the generation of “when you see something, say something.” I think that mantra is pretty easy to articulate in isolation, like when you are hiding behind your Facebook or Instagram page. But, putting all the social pressures we feel in organizations on top of it and avoiding conflict can seem like a better route than addressing it.

What if the person I am in conflict with gets hurt? Worse yet, what if I get hurt?

Rather than face the hurt or the pain, our knee-jerk response is often to avoid it. Just like the person in the grocery store who was not wearing a mask during the Pandemic, our first thought was not the fact that it is unlikely they have COVID, rather, we probably chose to avoid them altogether. There is over a 90% chance that all is well, but we become paralyzed by the prospect of the pain, so we avoid and miss all the great opportunities that could have been present if we just engaged.

Conflict and Emotional Intelligence

I was working with a team of folks a few years back whose senior leadership team was trying to address the fact that their business was being held back because everyone in the company was so nice to each other. 

I actually see this a lot with the organizations I work with. They are great people. Highly professional. And rightly so, in our organizations, it has become the right thing to do to treat employees well, and with respect.

A goal in developing organizations is to try and understand what the people need and to try and meet those needs. We hear a lot these days about how to engage employees; making sure they are enjoying their work has become a metric for performance. That is all well and good, except if we are not careful we can over-index the relationships to the extent that problems will go unsolved.

It is interesting to me the relationship between “Interpersonal Relationships” and “Decision-Making”, specifically the problem-solving aspect of a decision-making process. 

First, let me define my terms:

Interpersonal Relationships between people are mutually satisfying relationships that are characterized by trust and compassion. 

Problem-Solving is the ability to find solutions for problems where emotions are involved (which is every problem) and how the emotions impact the decision.

Here is what it looked like for the client I mentioned above:

The organization had a culture of caring about people. The experience was very much like being in a family. By in large, they all are really nice people. They trust each other and show a tremendous amount of care and compassion. They have strong interpersonal relationships. 

So when a deadline came…(and went)… for a project to be delivered, it created a problem. Other teams would be waiting for the work that was now missing. What ensued is what I called “tension smiles”. You can feel the tension of the missed deadline, all the while smiling as if nothing was wrong. 

The emotion about the problem was high. The relationships were trusting.

The issue became that the folks in the organization saw the choice they had as either stressing the relationship OR solving the problem. What I heard was, “If I confront Sam for missing the deadline, then I will lose trust with him.”  

From their perspective, the choice was between preserving the relationship OR the solving problem - not both.

This is common when it comes to conflict. The tension and the emotion affect our ability to see things clearly. We fall into fear-based thinking that blinds us. Instead of seeing the full picture, fear causes us to see very few options in front of us.

The Strategy 

A simple hack when you feel you are facing this dichotomy is to change your “OR” to an “AND”.

How can the manager in the above scenario have both strong interpersonal relationships and solve the problem at hand?

Understanding where Sam is coming from AND holding him accountable for missing the deadline are both possible by flexing your empathy muscle; empathy for Sam as well as for the people impacted by his missing the deadline. 

Our emotions will, at times, not tell us the truth.

It will feel like I must pick one option over the other; such as the relationship over solving the problem. This is the “false” in a false dichotomy.  

Your emotion, your fear, and your anxiety are all telling you something, but what they are telling you gets misinterpreted.  

Your emotion is telling you that there is tension. The question your emotion is asking you is “What do you want to do about this?”  

Emotions can’t decide. All they can do is inform.

It is up to your more rational, thinking brain to make the decision. In order to do this, it is key when you feel the fear or the anxiety in the false dichotomy of the choice to take a deep breath. Step back for a moment and see if you can find a way to solve the problem AND maintain the relationship.

Change your “OR” to an “AND”.

Hold Sam accountable AND maintain the relationship.  

The Secret to Self-Reflection

A while back I had a conversation with a young man who was interested in applying for his first leadership role. This young soul recounted all of his accomplishments to me: bonuses earned, awards won, and recognition given to him by his organization for his outstanding performance.

As he continued to try and convince me that he was ready to take this next step, I sat back and thought, “why is he trying to persuade me?”

The Conversation Was Quite One-Sided and Seemed Self-Aggrandizing.

As I continued to reflect during the conversation, my thoughts turned and I realized… he was not trying to convince me, he was trying to convince himself. Even though he had received rewards and recognition, he knew in his heart of hearts that he was not ready. His peers were being promoted around him, and this caused him to take on their call as his own.

My role as a coach was not to judge whether he was ready, my role was to help him explore his reality so that he could make informed decisions about his own life. After he stopped talking, we ate in silence. A long and very uncomfortable pause ensued, and I could tell he was starting to get uncomfortable. “You're not ready,” I said. My intention was not to judge him, but rather to shock his ignition and get him thinking.

He immediately became defensive. "What do you mean I am not ready?" he said. Immediately, he launched into his list of accomplishments once again. I let him go on until it seemed he was out of breath. When he finished I said, “You have all the WHAT you need. You have all of your individual contributions. You have shown your skill and capability. I think you might be missing the HOW.”

“What Do You Mean by the How?” He Asked.

I turned to one of my favorite modern-day philosophers, Parker J. Palmer, who wrote, “I now know myself to be a person of weakness and strength, liability and giftedness, darkness and light. I now know that to be whole means to reject none of it, but to embrace all of it.”

My young friend was still trying to embrace all of his strengths as an individual contributor. He was still selling to himself the idea that these attributes were enough for him to lead others.

He was also not being completely honest with himself or in his description of his accomplishments. He was grandstanding, and frankly, it made me uncomfortable just listening to it.

So I asked him, “Would you tell me about a time when you worked on a project that did not succeed?” Long silence again. I could tell he was stuck.

The thinking in his head must have been like a game of chess, calculating his next best move: “If I tell him about an unsuccessful project then I admit failure and that looks bad, but if I don’t tell him anything then I look arrogant and that looks bad, too.” I could see the thoughts rolling around in his head like a pair of dice being shaken just before being jettisoned in a game of Craps. I interjected, "You see, what Palmer is saying is that you have to know your whole self. We all have strengths and we all have weaknesses. Until you are ready to embrace your weaknesses, I don’t think you are ready to lead. Begin to think about HOW you accomplished your work, then frame your story around that.”

My Morning Reflection

Many of you know that I try to spend my mornings in quiet reflection and meditation prior to starting my day. Many days I will do some type of scripture reading to accompany this reflection. I love it when the topic of my reflection shows up later in my day. The day of the above conversation was such a day.

Prior to my talk with this young leader, my quiet meditation had been on the story of Moses. When I think of Moses, I cannot help but think of the Charleston Heston caricature in the movie The 10 Commandments. In my mental picture, Moses is standing on the rock, staff held overhead, as the wind and clouds swirl around him and the Red Sea in front of him splits open like a zipper separating two sides of a jacket. Powerful, in control, strong, mighty….Moses.

However, my study that morning showed a different side of the biblical character. God is having a conversation with Moses trying to convince him that he is the guy to lead the Hebrew people out of slavery. Moses, who had been raised as the son of an Egyptian Pharaoh, felt self-righteous enough as a young man to kill an Egyptian and vindicate a fellow Hebrew. Rather than face the conflict of what he had done, he ran from that life to be a shepherd - a bit of a nomad in the wilderness. Forty years later, Moses encounters God in a burning bush. God says he wants Moses to go and lead the Hebrew people out of Egypt. Moses’s reply is so classic, “Who am I?"

According to Dr. Ken Boa, this question revealed a radical change in Moses, from radical impulsive youth to a middle-aged man feeling inadequate for the task. Moses had come to grips with the totality of his humanity, from knowledge of his strengths to understanding the depth of his weakness.

This level of self-knowledge is what Palmer calls “embracing one's wholeness." It is this wholeness that allows a leader to balance their strengths and weaknesses, their confidence and self-assurance, along with empathy and compassion.

Self-Regard: The Ability to Respect and Accept Yourself.

Essentially, self-regard involves liking yourself the way you are. This competency ensures the leader has enough self-confidence that others would want to follow. That his/her self-worth is balanced with enough empathy that the leader is going to be able to get through good times and bad.

Eleanor Roosevelt is famous for saying, “No one can make you feel inferior without your consent." People who have positive self-regard have a real sense of identity and work to overcome feelings of inadequacy or inferiority.

In order to lead others, you must have enough confidence to lead yourself. Then, you must have enough empathy to realize that leadership is not about your identity, but your relationships with your followers that matter.

Appreciate your positive qualities, and accept your limitations. Know your strengths and weaknesses. Learn to like yourself, “warts and all.” After all, if you don’t, why should they?

Reflection Question: What value would it provide for you to understand your strengths, and what would it feel like for you to embrace your weaknesses?

Happy Memorial Day 2022

A memorial is an object which serves as a remembrance focusing us on something from our past, either personal or historical.

Oftentimes this object is physical, such as a flag, a piece of stone, or a shape like a cross or a star. The physical object serves as a trigger for us to stop, even if just for a moment, to remember. This object interrupts our thinking and causes us to momentarily think of something different.

Sometimes the object is a day. Like today, for instance. Where we pause from our regular flow of activity and do something different.

Memorials take us out of our routine and cause us to do things differently.

If we just keep on doing what we have always done, then the memorial really is not having much of an effect on us.

Today, can we all just slow down a bit and think? Maybe think about something from your past. Maybe think about an interaction you had with someone, and how good it was. Or, if it was not so good, what could you have done differently to make it better?

I think this is the real challenge of memorials, exemplified in the United States as Memorial Day. Are we willing to stop and really examine ourselves and how we are behaving?

It is easy to see how others are impacting us. It is much harder to see the impact we are having on those around us. Yet this is the real purpose of memorials.

My wife spoke with a friend not too long ago. The friend was recalling an encounter she had with another old friend, let’s call her Sally. As the story goes, the conversation between these two friends drifted to the topic of COVID vaccinations. My wife’s friend is a Physician’s Assistant and believes in COVID vaccinations, and has taken the vaccines. Sally, however, had an opposite view...such an opposite view that Sally said to my wife’s friend, “I guess this means that we can not be friends.”

What has this world come to?

Have we really lost the ability to think critically?

What I mean by critical thinking is the ability to challenge our own points of view. Assuming that what our particular news stream is feeding us is absolute truth...to the point we would abandon friendships. Have we really lost the ability to empathize with others to the point that we don’t care at all to see things from their point of view? Have we become so lazy that we are unwilling to do the work to understand where someone else might be coming from?

One of the things that really makes the United States stand out in this world is our ability to speak freely. I actually think as a country we are pretty good at this. But, we need to work on listening.

Why not ask some curious questions to others about why they think what they think rather than just rudely assuming if they have an opposite view from you that they are wrong? At the end of the day, no one says you have to agree, but at least you will have a better understanding of where they are coming from.

Memorials serve as guideposts for behaviors, personally and for society. These objects really are a time for us to step back and reflect on who we are and where we are headed. They give us an opportunity to remember all the good and all the bad and to put perspective on each of these.

My hope for you this Memorial Day is that you have the ability to pause and reflect. In this reflection, if someone has an opposing view to yours, I hope you will spend the time to be curious about where they are coming from, rather than having that knee-jerk reaction to defend your position.

Perhaps the real work here is to just listen and be curious without having to even share your point of view. Let's all work this Memorial Day on our listening skills, rather than sharing our opinions.

May we demonstrate the ability to understand the other person's perspective before we automatically go to war with them over something. May God help us all as we try and find some kindness, compassion, and understanding in our approach to our fellow man.

Happy Memorial Day!

Reacting vs. Humble Inquiry

Sometimes, I feel like I have just been talked AT.  No dialogue. No asking my perspective. One descriptor said that it feels like their boss has come into their office and said, “Do this, think this way, shut up, and go there!" There is a lot of talking AT people going on these days. No one seems to be listening.

It feels like no one has any time to listen to anyone anymore at all. We have all become experts in our own minds over the past couple of years on mRNA technology, vaccines, statistical curve flattening, etc…even though very few of us have even taken a calculus class to know what flattening a curve really means...or is it statistics?

If you are not sure, then I have made my point!  We read one article from the Washington Post written by a journalist whose editor is politically tied to a party and we count that article as completely factual. So, there is not much thinking going on these days either. Just a whole lot of people running around REACTING..

I Get it. Sort of.

At the end of our block when I was 10 years old,  there was this old house that was probably built in the early 1900s. It had been condemned by the health department with a clear sign posted on the door: DANGER KEEP OUT: BUILDING CONDEMNED.

All the kids in the neighborhood had been told by their parents to not go near that house. My dad was a construction guy and he sat me down and told me about the rusty nails that would be sticking out of the floorboards, and how the front porch was unsettled to the point it could collapse at any moment. He also seemed to be concerned that rats or some other wild animal could have taken up residence inside, as the house was nestled up against a heavily wooded area.  

At one time,  I bet this house was pretty cool. Probably the talk of the town, two stories with a pillar-supported front porch. It was about 1/2 mile from the Illinois River and sat up high enough on the hill that on a clear day you could easily see the river and likely all the way across.

But time had taken its toll on the place. We had lived in the neighborhood for three years and my grandparents had lived there for at least 20. My grandad couldn’t remember the last time someone lived in the home. No one knew for sure who owned it. The entire place was a real mystery.

But for us kids in the neighborhood, the house was one thing… haunted. That meant it was ripe for exploring as soon as one of us in the group mustered up enough courage to suggest we go poke around and see what might be inside. That kid was named Bobby.  He wasn’t a real leader for the group unless it was for things that were sure to get us all in trouble, in which case Bobby was pretty good at that. It might have been Bobby’s idea, but you really can’t blame a group of ten-year-old boys for just wanting an adventure on an otherwise hot, boring summer day, can you? What? You don’t think it is a good idea either?

Well neither did my mom nor my dad. I got two doses of the lecture on that day after my mom got the call from a man named Mr. Thompson. And then again after my dad got home and my mom told him about the phone call with Mr. Thompson. 

Reacting

Boy, could my mom lecture. This one went about half an hour from what I recall, complete with volume, tone, and pitch as she explained to me the dangers of our exploration. She mentioned words like tetanus and trespassing, neither of which would have meant anything at all to me even if they were delivered without volume, tone, or pitch. We didn’t have internet then, so I couldn’t quickly look it up to see what tetanus meant, I just had to take mom’s word for it. She was the expert. What she decided was true…and was what we went with. If this lecture was a court of law, mom was both the prosecutor and the judge. Where was Bobby when I needed him?

And the verdict…Guilty! (Before I even had the chance to take the stand.)

Mr. Thompson was a truck driver who just happened to be home that day between hauls and saw us poking around. He called all our parents. Mr. Thompson was an otherwise nice guy, a bit nosey perhaps, but a nice guy. However, in my case, he was an eyewitness. I was doomed. His credibility was impeccable. 

Of course, I denied it, but I have to give mom credit. As a prosecutor she was good. “Why would Mr. Thompson lie about that…why would he even care if it was not true?”I had no response. I thought about attacking Mr. Thompson’s character. Probably good impulse control at that point. Had I said anything at that point it would have for sure been held against me.

The penalty…Grounded! Crap. Grounding was the worst.

“Mom, couldn’t you just beat me?” (This was a legitimate form of punishment 50 years ago!) My logic was that although a beating would hurt, it would end, and then it was over. Grounding a 10-year-old boy was painful torture meant for thieves and murderers.  Really what that meant was that I was home and in the house when dad got home. Crap. Beating and grounding. That is not fair or just. 

The thing was, from my perspective, no one seemed to care about me. I swear the only thing my parents cared about was what the neighbors might think if they saw me in that old house. Or what if the police came…what then? I could have gotten arrested. Worse yet, the neighbors would see the police in our driveway. I think my mom would have rather me just be arrested.

Not to mention all the potential health risks or physical danger if something happened like the roof collapsing on me. I can still hear Dad saying "You know the pillars that support the weight of that roof could just collapse and then you would be crushed?”

You have to know one thing. I really love my parents. My dad has been gone for over 20 years now and I miss him a lot. What I wouldn’t give to get a lecture on how to best protect myself from the dangers that lurk around every corner. Most of the time my mom and dad were actually pretty good listeners…except when they reacted with angry or scared emotions.

Humble Inquiry

There are a lot of people running around right now angry and scared.

People are angry that they still have to come to work at the office, while others work from home.

People who had to furlough are scared because they have house payments, car payments, insurance payments, and utility payments, and they had no margin in their lives even when they had full incomes. 

When people are scared or angry they can get all kinds of emotionally unsettled. I really love the concept Edgar Schein wrote about a number of years ago called Humble Inquiry. If you are a regular blog reader you will know this book is a favorite of mine. The subtitle is what is really brilliant: “The Gentle Art of Asking Instead of Telling.”

When people get all fired up angry or scared they stop thinking and just start reacting. As a leader, you need good impulse control and not to react back at them at that moment.  What I coach leaders to do in this instance is to practice some “humble inquiry” vs. reacting.

1. Minimize your own preconceptions. You are about to get curious about someone who is scared. Clear your mind and shift from judging to observing. 

2. Keep your questions for them open-ended. You want to explore with the scared person what is it that is really scaring them. 

3. Practice giving up control of the conversation. You are not trying to lead them anywhere specific. You are there to just help them process what they are experiencing.

What might it be like if we all just got a little more curious about where folks are coming from these days? They may not ever tell you the real reason they are scared, but they will remember you as an excellent listener, if you practice some humble inquiry vs. reacting.

Learning About Social Responsibility

This past Saturday morning I had the opportunity to attend a memorial walk for my neighbor, Bill.  He passed away about a month ago after a battle with lung cancer.  Bill was 80 years old and if you would have asked him, which I had the opportunity to do, he would have told you he lived a rich and meaningful life. 

Everybody in the neighborhood knew Bill. He made it a point. Bill is the kind of guy who would look around and move toward you like a heat-seeking missile. 

Bill Was Socially Responsible

I have no idea if he recycled or cared about global warming. He didn’t drive an electric car and he never talked about things like boycotting Nike because of child labor practices.

He did not do any of the typical things, that I know of, that we would relate to as being socially responsible. What he did do though was bring a smile to people's faces. He had what we call in the emotional intelligence world “Social Responsibility”.

A Socially Responsible leader is one who has a social consciousness and is generally a helpful person. At a deeper level, these leaders are willing to contribute to society and show concern for the community that they are a part of. This was Bill! 

He was a leader in our little neighborhood without being on the Homeowners Association board or being chair of any committees. Bill was a leader because he had tremendous Social Responsibility. 

Bill Cared

When I first met him, about six years ago, he was a jogger. He would jog six miles every morning. Never in a hurry. Always at his own pace. More importantly, he stopped along his run and talked to everyone. I mean everyone! He talked to all the neighbors walking their dogs. He talked to all the folks who clean the swimming pools and mowed the lawns. He talked to the heating and air-conditioning repair people, and the workers fixing roofs.

He would tell me often that if I ever needed work done at the house, to just ask him. He had all the best contractors scoped out. He would say after a 30+ year career at General Motors he was pretty adept at deciphering who really knew their stuff and who to stay away from.

My wife used to tell Bill that she was praying for him and his response was classic. He would tell her, “Kim, you keep praying, I need all the points I can get.”  With all the good Bill did, it always seemed he was looking for a way to do even more for others.

As far as I know, none of you who regularly read these posts ever met Bill. That does not mean we cannot learn from him.

Developing Your Social Responsibility

When thinking about developing ourselves as leaders, it is always good to have a benchmark set of competencies to use as guiding principles. Let's think about Social Responsibility for a moment and think about what goes into a leader who is Socially Responsible.

Social responsibility is that moral compass directing your behavior toward promoting the greater good and contributing to society and one’s social groups. 

A moral compass relates to the values a leader holds and informs their ethical decision-making.  It is the beliefs, objectives, and judgments that a leader holds when it comes to something being right or wrong. 

The English word moral is derived from the Latin “mos” or “moris” which refers to “conduct” or “a way of life”. For leaders, morality is a set of culturally transmitted standards of right and wrong. In order for leaders to be able to do the right thing, they must have objective standards to rely upon. Without these standards, the leader can do whatever they wish, for whoever they wish.

The Rabi In Heaven

There is an old story told about a small town in Eastern Europe. In this village the people were very poor, the Rabi was very holy, and the skeptics were very doubting. 

The poor people believed that on the Jewish New Year their Rabi went up to heaven to intercede on their behalf. They needed to eke out a living for the next year and they had hopes for good health and that their children would have good matches when they married.

One New Year’s Day, one of the skeptics decided to hide and watch the Rabi. The skeptic was convinced that the Rabi did not go to heaven and was just deceiving the people. So the skeptic hid under the bed of the Rabi. He watched him dress in the morning, putting on boots, a sturdy belt, and a heavy woolen shirt. Then the Rabi picked up an Axe. 

At this point, the skeptic was sure he was discovered and that the Rabi was going to kill him. But the Rabi slipped the Axe into his belt and walked deep into the forest. When the skeptic caught up to him he found the Rabi chopping down trees and organizing them into big logs, smaller branches, and twigs. He then took off his heavy wool shirt and put the wood on it and drug it even further into the woods where there was a small cabin.

The Rabi knocked on the door and an elderly woman answered. “Who is it?”, the woman asked. “It is Ivan the woodcutter,” The Rabi told her.  He had brought firewood because he heard that she had been sick and the winter was very cold. 

At daybreak, when the Jews went to synagogue they encountered the skeptic. One said to him, “Well, last night our Rabi went to heaven and surely next year will be better for us. But you do not believe us do you?”

Quietly, the skeptic said, “Yes I do. He indeed went to heaven and maybe even higher. In fact, I saw him do it.”*

The Lesson I Learned From Bill

Concern for others promotes healthy relationships. Neighborhoods and societies function more effectively when individuals help each other. The world is a better place when we take the time to just get to know each other.

There is a lot of pain and suffering in our world today. Would the world be a better place if we all just went on a neighborhood walk and got to know each other?

I think Bill would advocate for this.

Bill, Rest In Peace.

*This story was adapted from Ethics in the Workplace by Craig E Johnson.

Learning Stress Tolerance

I had an interesting conversation with a coaching colleague the other day. He called me to get some perspective on a difficult client that he was coaching.

Case in Point

His client is a top performer in her field and has aspirations to get promoted in her company. She is a very hard charger and a self-proclaimed perfectionist. Overall, she is respected by the team she leads, but that dynamic is starting to show some cracks. 

In meetings, she is always telling her team to push back on her, and that she is open to feedback. However, the team has recently started shying away from doing this, because when they do, her non-verbal communication says she is not in the mood for it. Her words say “I am open”, but her facial expressions say “Don’t you dare”. 

Her team says she is a workaholic, routinely sending emails around 2 AM. If someone asks her to be in a mentoring relationship, she always says yes. If her bosses ask her to do something, she will call the team together at any time of the day to kick off a project and make assignments. 

My colleague spent a day shadowing her. He went to meetings with her and observed her in her office where her phone rang and text alerts went off constantly. She answered the phone by the second ring and usually picked up the phone to answer her texts within 30 seconds. 

One of her teammates even pulled my colleague aside and said they were really concerned about her, that she rarely takes time to eat and when she does it is only half of a cup of yogurt. They said something to the effect of: “We don’t know when she sleeps. Stuff comes to us at all hours of the night. People on the team have started sleeping with their phone alerts on so that they don't miss anything. This can’t be healthy long term…can it?” 

When I asked my colleague if he had addressed any of this with her yet, he said “yes, to all of it.

Her response to him was that:

1. She loved work, so why wouldn’t she do a lot of it?

2. She has always strived for perfection, and that's what got her where she is today.

3. Her bosses love her production.

4. She feels fine. She eats when she is hungry and she doesn’t require much sleep. 

She Is Not Fine.

The lie that this leader is telling herself is that she is fine. She is not fine.

While things may seem okay to her right now, she is on a path to self-destruction. I have seen this pattern too many times in my leadership coaching. The person who is striving so hard that they never say no, and they have no boundaries.

According to Dr. John Townsend, in his book Hiding From Love, one of the most basic human needs we all have is that of “Integration; Our need for resolving good and bad”. This person just always says yes so that others feel good about them. This is the person who gets a 95% on a test and feels like a failure, so they start believing that the only way to live successfully in the world is to always get 100%. 

Dr. Townsend says that this temporary solution to the tension between real and ideal is always inadequate and involves some sort of splitting between good and bad, keeping the two apart rather than resolving them through forgiveness, both of themselves and others. 

The problem continues for folks like this leader because while it is a psychological concern, it will eventually manifest itself physically as well. 

Dr. Gabor Mate, MD, writes in his book When The Body Says No, that our immune system does not exist in isolation from daily experience. Many people unwittingly spend their lives under the gaze of a powerful and judgmental examiner whom they must please at all costs. 

Gabor goes on to write that stress is a complicated cascade of physical and biochemical responses to powerful emotional stimuli. When emotions are repressed and dissociated from our awareness and relegated to the unconscious, this confuses our physiological defenses and our immune system goes on the attack rather than being in protection mode. 

What I found most interesting in studying Dr.Mate is that almost none of his patients with serious diseases had ever learned to say NO. 

Back to our example: no, she is not fine. She is living in a self-delusion.

George Vaillant said, “It is not stress that kills us. It is effective adaptations to stress that allows us to live.” 

Stress tolerance is the ability to withstand adverse events without developing physical or emotional symptoms by actively and positively coping with stress. One way to positively cope with stress is to learn to resolve the good and the bad. It is what Brene Brown has written extensively on, to begin to look at imperfection as a gift. 

Learning Stress Tolerance

The growth of this emotional intelligence domain takes some very specific work.

The first is developing an understanding of the need leaders have to understand the tension that exists between the ideal and the real, and to resolve the need to understand between good and bad. There is at the beginning of this kind of development the setting of healthy boundaries. There is no need to try to put other coping strategies into place if a leader is going to keep unhealthy boundaries. They just need to know that at some point in the future the data suggests that the body does keep score. There will be a payment due on this kind of life choice.

Once some healthy boundaries are put into place, things like progressive relaxation, purposeful distraction, self-debate, deep breathing, exercise, and spiritual worship can be employed. 

Leaders who are experiencing feedback like my colleagues' clients need to heed the warnings.

The Feedback Is Telling Them Something

You can grow your tolerance to stress in a healthy way. A way that you can become an even better performer and leader. A way that might not have to be as costly to your psyche and your overall health. 

What if I Don’t Want to Change?

What is it about change that makes it so difficult for people to process?

Is it the overall complexity that change brings? Or is it the level of comfort that existed prior to the precipitating change event?

One aspect that I have been thinking about is that our aversion may not be to the change itself but to the awareness that the current reality exists at the same time as the new reality.

If the answer is yes to both of the above questions, this makes for a confusing environment.

Consider the following story as an example:

As a member of an organization, “Bob” has a job to do that he has been doing for approximately 24 months. He is competent at the craft and has built some good relationships with people on his team and with his customers. Bob’s supervisor even rated him as exceeding expectations last year which is really quite rare for only being on the job for 2 years.

Then all of a sudden, the organization says it needs to change how it operates. They have to become a more holistic organization. This new structure isn’t really going to be structured at all! It is more of a self-managed, self-organizing network of people who are going to get everyone closer to the customer and to each other. Out with bureaucracy, hierarchy, and consensus.

The consultant who gives the presentation to the company called it a “Teal Organization”. Bob had to research it and learned it was something called “Spiral Dynamics”, which is a new consciousness for business. Teal Organizations are agile, lean, flexible, and responsive to the environment. It all sounded great until Bob started to get a little anxious. Like how flexible? So flexible that he won’t be needed? Feelings of real anxiety started to sweep over him.

Teal organizations, since they distribute decision-making to the lowest levels of the organization, require a level of trust, emotional intelligence, creativity, and intuition that was not previously required. There is a great sense of the work that is being done is for the good of, indeed the survival of the organization and that the individual interests of the contributors are taking a back seat.

As Bob contemplates his old paradigm he feels paralyzed between the drive to the consensus that used to exist and making decisions for the good of the organization (which by the way, Bob remembers is what consensus was supposed to do).

He wants very much to succeed in this new world order, but he is not sure exactly how to do that.

How was he supposed to come to work today and be inclusive with all his business partners and at the same time make decisions on his own?

He feels tremendous uncertainty in what his role is and a lot of ambiguity in how he’s supposed to do his job.

And then, on top of all of this, his wife says that maybe they should not have bought their new house.

This did not help calm his thinking.

Personal Example

I know how our protagonist Bob in the above scenario feels about change. I remember when I first got married, and my wife Kim and I were on our honeymoon. Now, for any person, marriage brings on a very significant change. On the morning of my wedding I woke up single, but by 1 pm that afternoon I was married. This was a new reality that I did not fully understand.

I was excited about the change though. I anticipated with positive anxiety the reality that was ahead. And unlike many who experience a change in an organization, I was a willing participant who was choosing this destiny.

For our honeymoon, my bride and I set off on a Caribbean cruise. Seven fun-filled days just the two of us. On our first night at sea, we were walking to dinner. I was so excited to eat because the number one thing people told me about cruising was that the food is outstanding. Or, maybe it was the fact we had skipped lunch and I was famished. No matter, when I got to the dining room I turned around and Kim was nowhere to be found. Where could she be? So, I started retracing my steps and when I rounded the corner there she was…just standing…and waiting.

“What’s wrong?” I enquired. “Are you OK?”

“I am fine,” she said. Then she went on and delivered the truth that helped me realize my new reality. “You are married now, and I would really like to walk to dinner with you and not behind you.”

Ouch! What a change lesson that was for me.

My old paradigm of singleness was confronted with my new reality of being married. If I was going to be any good at this being married thing, then I had to understand what this new life was all about.

I am so thankful that I married a very patient woman. She has been at my side now for 35 years teaching me all about what it means to start something new.

The real key if you are experiencing a dramatic change in your organization, or if you are doing something like getting married, is to pay close attention to the relationships between people. For this new reality to be successful we have to replace our negative and anxious feelings with those of a more positive outlook.

Being in the middle of change requires us to slow our thinking down and manage the anxieties we are experiencing.

Sure we will stumble at times, but let’s not forget that a step backward is not failure. It is just learning. No one, not even those leading the change in organizations knows everything. We all need space to think and to understand what our new way forward looks like.

Don’t Forget to Practice Good Self-Care

You might recall from last week's post that an old friend had called me and asked for some tips about working with a new boss who was proving to be a tough relationship - 5 Ways To Work With A Difficult Boss.

The next morning, I was doing some personal development work of my own in the area of staying resilient during times of stress. In my personal journey, I have been working on this because it has been an interesting and somewhat challenging start to this year for me.  The year was lined with lots of potential goals, but at this point, not a lot of work has been committed to them.

I have faced some challenges and obstacles in this business that I have not faced before. A little bit of rejection. A little bit of waiting. Quite a few promises. Not too many signed agreements. I was feeling a bit defeated and wanted to capture this and work on how I can be resilient during some of these setbacks. “Taking a bit of my own advice” is how I might position it. 

One of the things I will often tell my clients during times of difficulty is to make sure they are practicing good self-care. Was I practicing good self-care during this difficult time in my business? 

What comes to mind is the analogy of how during an emergency on an airplane, we are instructed to “put our own mask on before helping others.”  I know it is maybe a bit cliche, but let's make sure the point is not lost.

I think it is safe to say that most of us when times get tough, the first thing that goes to the wayside is our own wellbeing. We stop practicing good self-care and we just try to do a decent job of psychologically coping with what is going on in our world. 

This is the one more thing I needed to call my friend back and tell him - that during times of difficulty, like working with a difficult boss, also remember this - don’t forget to practice good self-care. 

My Homework

As I will often do with my coaching clients, I gave myself some homework. I pulled out an exercise I had done in the past to evaluate my own self-care and where I might need some replenishment. 

I looked at 4 areas of my life that are critical for me to be at peak performance:

1. Physical Life: practices that cultivate the health of the physical body

2. Emotional Life: practices that support the relational nutrients that we need

3. Intellectual Life: practices that stimulate our curiosity, thinking, and knowledge

4. Spiritual Life: practices that expand our soul and connect us to things outside ourselves.

I think it is really important that if you are working on something like stress tolerance, stress management, or resiliency, you look more holistically at your life. 

For example, most of the time when I ask clients about their self-care they respond with, “I am not getting as much exercise as I was in the past.”  Sure, exercise is an important element of physical self-care. But inside of caring for yourself in the physical domain, you need more than just exercise.  As leaders, we need to focus on our diet, our sleep patterns, and ANY practice that cultivates the health of our physical bodies. 

So I took an inventory of these 4 aspects of my life to see if anything was missing.

Physical:

• I do OrangeTheory workouts 4x’s a week

• On off days I golf or walk 3 miles

• I get 8 hours of sleep

• I balance my nutritional macros

Emotional:

• I read or listen to one non-fiction book a month

• I attend my TLP (Townsend Leadership Program) group

• I attend my Coaching Cohort Group

• I practice telling my wife what I need emotionally from her 3x’s a week

• I play golf at least once a week

Intellectual:

• I teach twice a year

• I do Dissertation Chair and committee work

• I read one work-related book per week

• I listen to one work-related podcast per week

• I read one biography per month

Spiritual:

• I attend church weekly

• I attend my church small group weekly

• I am generous in giving to others

As I was examining some of the things I currently do, I felt really good about the physical, emotional, and intellectual things. However, on the spiritual side of my life, I am feeling a bit robotic and stale. So I am going to ask around to some trusted advisors and my coach to see if there are any insights they may have. 

How About You?

All of us go through ups and downs in life. Sometimes we connect well with our boss, sometimes not so much. Sometimes we love our jobs, and sometimes not so much.

When was the last time you took an inventory like this? If you did, would you notice any voids in your life?

I had a client, who is a nurse, tell me recently that early in her career she did a lot of bedside patient care. She worked at a famous healthcare institution and had taken care of quite a few wealthy and famous people. She told me that none of them cared an ounce about how much money they had in their bank account at the end of the day. All they wanted was to talk with those they had close relationships with about how they had lived their lives.

That story, while I for sure had heard it before,  just like the old airplane and oxygen mask warning, really hit home for me.

I want to make sure I have the right flow in my leadership life in all aspects, not letting just one dominate my being. I hope you will take some time for yourself and do an inventory as well to see if you have any self-care practices missing in your leadership life.

5 Ways to Work With a Difficult Boss

I got a call last week from an old friend. After we exchanged some pleasantries about our families, the reason for his call came quickly.

“Hey Scott, I have been reading your leadership blog for several years now and I was wondering if I could ask you a question. We just did a reorganization at work and I got a new boss. I connected well with my previous supervisor but this new one is off to a rocky start. Wondering if you have any tips?”

After asking if my friend had experienced rough starts with other supervisors in the past, and getting a “not really” response, I started thinking about how it feels to work with difficult people.  

The first thing that clients I have had in the past want me to focus on is changing the other person, in this case, my old friend’s boss. Since I am not working with the old friend’s new boss, the odds of me invoking any kind of advice to change that person is slim to none. 

What we can work on, however, is how my old friend is responding to his new boss. Here are the things we talked about that day:

5 Ways to Work With a Difficult Boss

1. Maintain Long-term Focus: It is so easy for us to get caught up in the emotion of the moment. All of the frustration and anxiety that can come from a new relationship can seem paralyzing. Keep in mind that the supervisor you had prior to this one took time for the relationship to develop. Even if it started off on a good foot, relationships take time to evolve. So if this relationship gets off to a rocky start make sure to keep a long-term perspective. When I asked how long my friend had worked for the previous manager he said about 2 years, which is about how long he has worked for anyone over the last 20 years at the company. Supervisors tend to be temporary, and very few work relationships last forever. 

2. Find and Convey the Good: When we have irregular people in our lives (those that are hard for us to connect with), it is really easy for us to focus on all the negative things. Focusing on the negative does one thing, it forces us to only look at all the bad. A simple recognition of what is not going so well is ok and something to process with a coach or trusted advisor. But dwelling on what is negative is not helpful in the long run. So make a list of all the positive things the new boss is bringing to the table and do the best you can to focus on those. 

3. Have a Spirit of Acceptance. There are many reasons that a relationship with a boss might get off to a rocky start. Very rarely, the reason is that the boss is innately evil. While I always want to give space in a relationship for moral hazard, most of the time the new boss just wants to win, maybe they have been told to shake things up, or they have strong preferences based on their past experiences. Whatever the reason is for how the new boss is behaving, as long as it is not immoral or illegal, you can try to approach them with a spirit of accepting them for who they are…warts and all. I try to keep in mind that the new boss is checking me out as well and I might have a few warts myself.  Sometimes all a boss needs from us is to connect with them without judgment.

4. Set some clear boundaries for yourself. It is very true that you might not be able to control or change the other person but you can always control your own actions. According to John Townsend in his book The Hiding Dilemma, “People with healthy boundaries can say yes to the good and no to the bad.” The person who is saying yes to someone else’s demands out of fear is setting themselves up for failure. Plan what you can say yes to and what crosses the line in your mind that you must say no.  Resist the temptation to just say yes to try and please them or get on their good side. As you plan your boundaries, keep in mind what you are willing to do in certain situations and what you are not willing to do.

5. Stay Open and Curious. If a relationship is tense from the start, our natural inclination is to protect ourselves and fight. None of us wants to get hurt in a relationship or get sideways with a boss especially if we really enjoy our work. According to Edgar Schein, if you practice “Humble Inquiry” you will stimulate more truth-telling and collaboration.  By staying humble in your own character and curious about what might be going on you can stay out of judgment and see more clearly what the boss is all about.

Your Development

From time to time we are all going to work with people, who are for whatever reason, tough for us to process. Here is a case study for you to write about yourself to help you see how you might strive to improve the relationship. Remember you are the one sensing the tension. You are the one who may have to flex and find a new approach.

• Think about a conversation or situation with a boss that went very well.

• Now think about a situation or conversation with a boss that did not go well.

• Compare your Thinking, Feelings, and Behavior in each circumstance. Use the chart below to guide your thoughts:

As you study the chart above, what are you learning about yourself and your approach to working with people who are more difficult for you to relate to?

Patience and Urgency - Part 2

Last week's blog post was formed from a question I received from one of our readers. If you missed the post, you can read Part 1 here. The main question was:

How Can We Have Patience and Urgency at the Same Time?

Growing up as an 8-year-old boy in Central Illinois, I loved baseball. But maybe even more than the game itself, I loved the Chicago Cubs. 

Ernie Banks at first base, Glen Beckert at second base, Ron Santo on third base, Don Kessinger at short stop, Jim Hickman in right field, Don Young in center field, Billie Williams in left field, and my favorite, Randy Hundley behind the plate. 

If it was a really great day, Fergeson Jenkins was on the mound as the pitcher. And Old Jack Brickhouse was quoting Ernie Banks, begging the teams to “play two games”.

I just love the Chicago Cubs! In those days the Cubs were on WGN TV and the games started at 1:05 pm. I could watch an entire game on TV and then go out and grab the guys and have enough daylight to play our own game. If we were lucky, we could get two in that day as well. I loved the Chicago Cubs so much, I dreamed of being one. Playing all kinds of organized baseball, the game as an 8-year-old came pretty easy to me and I loved it!

Then, as I got a little older, something began to change. The pitchers could throw the ball at different speeds. As a batter, as long as the ball came to me straight and fast, I could hit it a mile. But then, as the pitchers got older they learned not only how to throw the ball at different speeds, they could make it curve as well. If the speed was slightly different, it threw off my timing and the ball became very hard to hit.

I know I am not alone out there. I can only imagine how many of you had similar dreams. My dreams of playing for the Chicago Cubs ended when I just couldn’t hit the dreaded curveball.

The curveball in Baseball is known as an off-speed pitch. It has two primary features: it is thrown at a slower speed and it moves off a straight line. This means that the hitter has to be patient in order to be able to make contact with the ball. As a batter, if you can be patient and wait for the ball to get to the plate, and you can see it move, then that ball becomes easy to hit. The problem is that it really isn't so easy!

Patience

As I grew older, the pitchers gained more skill and the baseball kept moving at different speeds and on different lines, so I started to strike out more and more.  The more I would strike out, the harder I would swing at the ball and the more impatient I became. I was so frustrated, I would swing the bat at where I thought the ball would be only to whiff and hear the umpire call “strike three!” 

I just didn’t have the skill as a young player to be patient and wait for the slower speed pitch. In my brain, the ball should have been coming at a faster speed and I found it really hard to just wait for it.  If I could have been more patient at the plate, maybe, just maybe I could have worn those blue pinstripes of my beloved Chicago Cubs. 

Patience, according to Merriam Webster “is an ability to wait without becoming annoyed or upset”. For me, it is being able to suspend your personal need for satisfaction and action. For leaders, patience is all about being able to slow down those fast-paced exchanges with others in order to facilitate higher-quality interactions and better decision-making. 

It seems like the faster things go, or the more urgently we feel the pressure, the more we want to execute NOW! Just like trying to hit a curveball, trying hard or succumbing to the feeling of urgency doesn't help us hit it. What leaders need is an ability to slow their world down. 

As the pressure in the organization builds, as the requests from senior management become stronger and more frequent, most people will feel this urgency and just want to do something. If we are doing something, we feel good. It doesn’t matter if it is the right thing, at least we are trying.  It is a bit like me trying to hit the curveball. At least I went down swinging. didn’t hit the ball. But at least I did something. I wasn’t successful, but I tried.

I think the key is to be aware of what the pressure or speed of the change is doing to you and not become annoyed or upset. Once frustration starts to set in, now we are putting additional pressure on ourselves, and our ability to perform is drastically reduced.

3 Coaching Strategies for Being Patient

Patience is not racing ahead in one’s thought processes while missing the nuanced, but important information that others are trying to share. Sure you want organizational change. Yes, you need it now! But putting so much pressure on yourself could cause you to miss critical things that others need to provide input on. Here are 3 things I work on with my coaching clients when patience is a desired virtue:

1. Write a plan. It is amazing to me how many leaders do not want to sit down and write out a simple plan. A plan that includes people, times, dates, and objectives.  Just writing out a simple timeline can help calm our minds down so that we can see the speed at which we need to move. Then, if we need to move faster, we all are working from the same plan.

2. Use STOP.  This is a model I use to help clients slow down and think. It needs to be implemented before you feel the pressure building. However, if you find your mind racing, it can be used then too. The strategies are simple, but the implementation isn’t always so easy. Like learning to hit a curveball though, with practice, this can be a valuable tool.

3. Gates. I use the analogy of being on a walk. Going from one place to another when all of a sudden something changes or you start to feel pressure. When you do,  think of the following 3 questions as “gates” you can walk through just to slow yourself down and give yourself some time:

• Gate 1: Ask yourself “Is It True?” What evidence is there that what you are experiencing is real? So many times, we put so much added pressure on ourselves that is unnecessary. If it is not true, then there is likely no reason to continue this mental exercise. Just stop at the first gate. If it is true, then proceed to Gate 2. 

• Gate 2: Ask yourself “Is It Necessary?” Many times, being a leader myself, something might be true, but I just don’t need it. For example, I might feel like I am being attacked, but is it really necessary for me to defend myself? Just because I feel it, doesn’t mean I need to act on it. If it is not necessary for you to act, then you can stop. You have talked yourself off the ledge and there is no reason to move on. If it is both true and necessary, proceed to Gate 3. 

• Gate 3: Ask yourself “Is it kind?”. Sure it might feel better for me to unload on someone, or make another department my scapegoat, but is it kind? Would I want someone to say the same thing about me? It might be true, it might be necessary, but if what I am about to say is hurtful or lacks compassion, then should I really walk through that gate? 

What all three of these strategies do is help you develop some patience in the face of urgency, tension, and complexity.  They are meant to help you slow down and think.  

Who knows, someday someone in your organization might throw you a curveball and you might just hit it out of the park!

Patience and Urgency - Part 1

I received an interesting email from a leader last week asking me if I take requests for blog topics. I wrote back to her and let her know, YES I love it when folks engage and are looking for tips or tricks to enhance their leadership life. The question was so well-formed that I asked her for permission to quote it. 

I love leaders who care about their organizations! I really get the sense that this leader both wants to personally be brought into what senior leadership is seeing and cares enough to wrestle with such difficult questions.  

As a leader, if someone in your organization wants to go to lunch or grab a virtual coffee and ask a question like this, I think you should find a way to give them a raise. I have worked alongside too many folks who would just throw their hands up in the air and cast blame on the organization for the lack of productivity. What I love about this question is that there is no blame here, just a leader seeking to contribute. 

The Question

Her question was:

“If you're taking requests, how about something on patience with organizational readiness during times of change?

Lately, we have received several calls to action from senior leadership that incremental changes are not enough...we must make big changes (and in a relatively short time frame).

Oh, and all of this is supposed to occur in a matrix organization devoid of hierarchy.   I find that I struggle to find patience when we identify high-impact opportunities (to do things better, faster, more cost-effectively) that, in reality, will still take 6-18 months to persuade all the affected stakeholders to even START.  No tears or anger, just a lack of productivity.”

I am going to dissect the question as a series, a multi-week post. I am particularly intrigued by this question because at its core, the organization seems to be asking for two different things. Not only are there multiple requests, but they also seem like they are polar opposites.

Patience…………………………….and…………………………………….Urgency

How can we have patience and urgency at the same time? 

On the surface, these attributes seem to be time responses to the same trigger. And in some sense they are. 

When faced with dilemmas like this, I like to separate out the attributes and see if they really are on the same linear plane. Are they really polar opposites?  If we separate the attributes and put each on its own line, can we find any new or interesting ways to look at the problem?

My good friend and organizational change expert Dr. Drew Boyd, writer of Inside the Box Thinking would probably call this “division”. You see, Drew maintains that innovation does not come from what we do not know, but from what we do. So if we give our problem a new definition, we might learn from it. So I did the following:

Patience…………….

And 

Urgency……………

As soon as I wrote the problem on two different lines, the thought came to me that we are likely talking about two different things entirely.  I went back and read the email that my leader friend wrote to me and saw the problem anew. Here is what I am now seeing:

Individual Patience

And

Organizational Urgency

If we put each of these on some sort of linear graphic it could look something like this:

Individual Patience……….and…….Individual Impulsiveness

Organizational Urgency…and……Organizational Stagnation

What this graphic representation does for me is it helps me see how I need strategies for both myself and the organization. The problem with leaving the attributes on the same line is that my brain sees them as the same thing and if I have emotion about them, one will spill over into the other.

By separating out the issues, I can gain clarity and formulate a plan. So now that the question is clearer I can search for better answers to both of these problems.

How can I be more patient?

How can I help the organization gain a sense of urgency?

Next week, in part two, I am going to answer both of these questions and give some tips and strategies that leaders can use in their everyday practice. 

Until next week, I have an assignment for you:

Sit for 15 minutes each day with your journal and reflect on how you can be more patient. 

I really want you to try this. Don’t do anything else while you do this exercise (well maybe have a cup of coffee or hot tea). Just sit quietly with no radio or distractions on and write what it feels like for you to be patient.

If you do this exercise for a day or two, I would love it if you would write a comment below and let me know what the experience was like for you.

Would You Choose Wisdom?

In last week's post, I mentioned an opportunity that King Solomon was presented with as a leader. If you missed it, you can read that post here. In short, the story from the book of Ecclesiastes describes how God shows up in Solomon's dream and tells him to ask for any one thing and God will give it to him.

Fully acknowledging this is happening to Solomon in a dream, I find the story to be one of gripping drama, and the choice that King Solomon was faced with is fascinating. Here is a quick recap:

God shows up to a sleeping Solomon and says, “Ask for anything and I will give it to you.”

I think Solomon has to be thinking along the lines of: 

“This is cool! I have to get this one right! This is big. Maybe I should create a list of options…”

• I need a new chariot

• My marriage isn't going so great

• I have just seen the doctor and the news wasn't so good

• My kids have lost all respect for me

• My kingdom has a history of revolting against its leadership

• I have enemies on every side of my land

• My army is a lot smaller compared to all my enemies

• My land is prone to drought, and there are a lot of people to feed

Let’s stop there for a moment and put ourselves in Solomon's place. Pretend that God, who by definition is all-knowing, all-powerful, is always everywhere, and can do whatever is desired, is saying to you, "Ask me for anything and I will give it to you."

While you ruminate on that question, I have some additional thoughts for you to ponder.

Why Wisdom?

As you consider King Solomon’s list of options, you can begin to understand the gravity of the question he faced. I am sure as you are thinking about your own request of God, you might be thinking, “This IS big.”

It is very big. Especially if you are a leader. And most of you who read this lead others. 

Some of you lead organizations, others of you lead teams, others lead churches, and some of you have the responsibility of a family. No matter what your leadership level is, this can be a difficult question to answer, "If I could have one thing in my life, what would it be?"

I think somehow Solomon must have realized that how he answered this question would likely impact the rest of his life on earth and maybe even impact him beyond his earthly life. I don't mean to over dramatize the point,...but how can I not?

I can almost feel the tension Solomon may have had in his dream..."Think, think! before God changes his mind, what should I ask for?"

It is possible that Solomon wasn’t quite as confused as I am  while contemplating that question. Perhaps Solomon was a more reflective leader and had read a lot of blog posts on leadership, so he had spent some time thinking about questions like this. Or maybe he even worked with an Executive Coach who asked him similar questions to prepare him for this very moment. Who knows?

What we do know is that no matter the level of drama associated with the decision, Solomon asks for wisdom.

On the surface, this is a curious choice. 

Most of us have  some concept of what wisdom is, but if we are honest, it is not something we think as much about these days. Prior to reading these recent blog posts, when was the last time you even thought about the concept of wisdom?

While there is not one agreed-upon definition for wisdom in any of the scholarly leadership literature I have read, I do think there are some thoughts that are quite insightful as we begin our thinking about this important leadership attribute:

Most perspectives on wisdom view it as an expert knowledge system that concerns the fundamental pragmatics of life. (Baltes)

• Another perspective is that wisdom is a skillful application of the practical truth to ordinary facets of life that extend beyond information and knowledge. (Dr. Ken Boa)

• Yet another view is that wisdom is perceived as exhibiting two categories of attributes: exceptional understanding and attributes of judgment and communication. (Holiday 7 Chandler)

• Wisdom is a capacity to put into action the most appropriate behavior by considering what is known and what does the most good. (Rowley)

• Recently an affective component to wisdom has been added that includes Emotional Management as a key to leaders being able to display wisdom.

Is there anything we can glean from these 5 perspectives that might inform us on how we see wisdom? It entails some level of expertise:

• The skillful application of practical truth

• Often what is needed is beyond our own level of information and knowledge

• Leaders are faced everyday with not only what needs to be decided and communicated, but HOW this needs to be done

• Some level of emotional management and tolerance of stress is indicated for good judgment and decision-making

• As leaders, our judgments impact not only ourselves but many others in our organizations.

So, why wisdom? 

Why then as a leader did Solomon choose wisdom over anything else?

Perhaps there are two reasons, one a bit self-centered and the other focused on more of a greater good:

1. My dissertation chair, Dr. Very Ludden, was famous for saying that leaders require wisdom in decision-making to avoid taking foolish actions. No one wants to look foolish. No leader I know wants to take their team down a path of wasteful folly.

2. A leader's actions are all about the sound judgment that without wisdom, are filled with distractions and temptations.

I think that somehow, Solomon had the ability to look at his list of options and see a connection. Solomon had many problems and issues he faced. Some personal, some organizational, some from external forces. I think Solomon knew that what he needed was an attribute that would help him across all facets of his life.

He knew that it was wisdom that would give him the ability to help reconcile his need to be seen as a leader by others with the external needs of creating followership by those in his kingdom and respect from those outside his kingdom.

How about you? Now that you have had some time to reflect on the question, what would you ask for if you could have just one thing? 

Success? Power? Influence? Riches? Love? Respect?

Wisdom?

I hope you will ponder this question for yourself. And, as long as you are pondering, why not ask? You never know what might happen…

If You Could Have One Thing…

As we begin a new year I have been thinking about something. More specifically, I have been asking myself a question that is not an easy one to answer.

Here is the question:

“If I could have one thing now that I either don’t currently possess or that I do possess but would like to have more of, what would it be?”

I know some of you are saying right now, “Scott, you really need to spend your time thinking about deeper things.”

I agree.

And after you judge me for thinking this, you will likely sit back and think to yourself, “What do I want more of”? 

Here are some things I consider as I ponder the question myself:

1. More clients to grow my business

2. More money to buy and do more things

3. More peace so my stress level would be lower

4. More impulse control so I won’t crave Chex Mix at 9 pm

5. More time to do what I love when I want to do it - like play more golf

A Little Irony

Most of you who know me know that I am a fairly spiritual person. I often start my day around 7 am with some reflection time that includes a few things: 

• A 21-day prayer journal that our church is working through.

• A Daily Meditation by Richard Rohr called “Yes, And…”.

• Reading some scriptures from my Leadership Bible and writing a reflection in my journal on what I am learning.

Interestingly enough, as I have this question rolling around in my head, “what do I want / more of,” I sat down one morning this week to the following:

• The prayer journal lesson was about the places Jesus went in his few short ministry years. There was a collision between the realities of his heavenly kingdom and the brokenness of our fallen world.

• Rohr wrote, “It’s all about seeing…moving from dualistic to non-dualistic thinking at the highest levels.”

• My scripture reading was from 1 Kings - the place where God appeared to King Solomon and said, “Ask for whatever you want me to give you.”

• My journaling brought these three big ideas together: a) the brokenness of the world, b) being open and patient with ambiguity, and c) that God asked Solomon the same thing I was asking myself.

Pretty interesting, right? I have this question rolling around in my head, then wake up and my reading for the day is God asking King Solomon the very same question.

Now I am feeling better about my question not being silly or trite. I mean… if God asked it of Solomon it has to be a good question…right?

What Would Solomon Do?

As I continued in my journaling reflection, I began to notice that all three of these topics have something in common. 

To answer any of them, brings in the unknown.

• What to do about the brokenness of our world?

• How to be open and patient with that which is ambiguous in my life?

• If I could ask God for one thing, what should it be?

This realm of the unknown to me is like a big dark cave. It brings feelings of both anxiety and fear. I just really don’t like not knowing. I would much rather be in control and know. Give me certainty all day long over the unknown.

I guess this is what impresses me the most with this part of the story about King Solomon. He could have been selfish and asked for his kingdom to grow, he could have asked for money to buy more stuff for the palace. He could have even asked for impulse control so his tummy doesn’t hurt at night after he eats his favorite snack. Shoot, he doesn’t even ask to live a long life free of problems.

Think about this with me for a minute. 

God shows up to Solomon in a dream and says “Ask me for anything and I will give it to you.” Solomon, now in the driver's seat to be granted anything he wants….

Can you feel the drama building…. ?

He asks for wisdom.

Wisdom to be able to make good decisions and distinguish between right and wrong on behalf of his kingdom. 

What an interesting request!

Wisdom. This pinnacle of human development. 

Next week I will begin to unpack this idea of wisdom and leadership a bit more. I don’t think anyone would argue that in our world today, wisdom is something that is needed by leaders everywhere. 

Perhaps this is a good question for all of us to ponder, after all.

If God showed up to you in a dream and told you to ask Him for anything, what would it be for you? I’d love to hear your thoughts. 

3-Step Recipe for a Productivity Reset

Question: When is the last time you experienced a productivity reset?

I read recently that in a knowledge-working society the work we do is really about creativity.  Now, when I hear the word creativity my mind immediately goes to the painters and sculptors of the world. The work they do is creative. 

Before those of us who are scientists, technologists, and managers or leaders abdicate the world of creativity to the artists, we probably should step back for a moment and make sure we are not leaving the best part of us behind.

The Story

I had a conversation with one of my former graduate students who said she was completely burned out and didn’t know how she was going to get her research project finished on time.  She was definitely in need of a productivity reset.

Here is a part of our conversation:

“..By the time I finish my commute to and from work, I am logging 60 hours or more a week. In addition, I have a family and my church that are both important to me. I just don’t have any energy left for creativity to get this research project finished.”

I could just sense the frustration and disappointment in her voice as she was trying to figure out how to be more productive. Then almost without taking a breath, she said,

“…You know, perhaps I could be more efficient in the morning. If I got up an hour earlier I could get more done because I am at my most creative in the morning.”  

The Point

As knowledge-workers, we are all going to have to realize that more time, more effort, more energy doesn’t equal creativity or effectiveness.  It just equals more time and more effort. That's it.  If you are playing a game of who-works-hardest, then keep going, but if you want to be creative and innovative, then maybe work as hard as you can while you're working and then stop and do something else.

I think there is a reason that athletes work really hard in times of peak performance and then rest their bodies.

There is a reason writers like J.R.R. Tolkien, William Stafford, and Victor Hugo would work for a while in the morning and then go for long walks in the afternoon.  

Both high performing athletes and creative writers alike see the value of both hard work and the regenerative process of the productivity reset.  There is only so much a knowledge-worker can do to be productive before they need to recharge their brain.

According to Margaret Moussa, Maria-Estella Varua, and Matthew Wright’s work on knowledge-workers, what has been left out of the discussion up until now are issues of self-efficacy and well-being.  

The question we need to ask ourselves as leader is:

Can we leaders continue to treat our knowledge-workers the same way we treated productivity-workers of ages gone by?

And…

Can we as knowledge-workers continue to try and cram more stuff into our day and expect quality outputs?

3 Step Rest Process

Here are three things that I try to do when I am in need of a productivity reset.

1. Read. There is nothing like reading to stimulate productivity. If I ever have writer's block, reading is one of the best ways I know to get the juices flowing again. I have found that there is nothing like poetry and fiction to really get my juices flowing again. In fact, I just finished a chapter of Britt-Marie Was Here by Fredrik Backman.
   

2. Walk. I love to exercise but when I work out I am really focused on pushing my body, so I don’t get many creative thoughts going when my heart rate is above 140. But when I am just out for a walk, and the sun is shining, and I can sense the beauty all around me, my creative energy just seems to flow.
   

3. Phone a Friend. For me, there is nothing like community and conversation to spur creativity. I always feel better when I get off the phone with my coach, my coaching group, or a conversation with Kevin or Joanne. There is just something about talking to others that will spur on my creative process.

As leaders, when we think about ourselves or those who are in our care, perhaps we need to be thinking less about how productive we can be and more about how we are practicing self-care. It is elements like reading, taking a walk, and engaging in a community that are the real ways we gain wisdom. 

Could it be that as knowledge-workers we are really seeking things like wisdom, and as we do we actually become more productive as a by-product?

I had many more things to say about this topic, but I am feeling a bit confused and convoluted right now….

I think I will go for a walk.

2 Minute Read to Improve Your 2022 Vision

When I was a kid my mom would tell me I needed to eat more carrots to improve my vision. If I wanted to be able to see with clarity, her wisdom of the time was for me to crunch on a few orange root sticks. Mom’s advice, while heartfelt and well-meaning, did not ultimately keep me from becoming farsighted and needing sight correction to be able to see clearly.

Many of us will get well-meaning advice as we approach the new year, reading and listening to experts drone on and on about goal setting and how you must have a goal if you want to accomplish anything.

While there is nothing inherently wrong with setting a goal, it can be a bit meaningless if not aligned with the vision of who you want to be as a leader. 

Envision Your Future You As A Leader

As the calendar changes from 2021 many of us will begin tithing about what we want to accomplish in 2022. Most of us will make some kind of resolution to make a change as the new year rolls in.

A resolution is “a firm decision to do or not do something”.

Like you, In the past I have made many types of New Year’s Resolutions:

• Personal: Eat right, exercise more, and lose 10 pounds

• Professional: Increase sales by 20% by becoming more customer-centric

• Family: Become a better listener when talking with my wife

• Spiritual: Read through the Bible in a year

All good stuff. I am sure many of you are making resolutions and talking with your friends and family about them over the next few days.

I thought I might challenge you to add a category this year. In addition to your personal, professional, family, and spiritual resolutions, think about a resolution to improve your leadership. Envision yourself becoming the leader you want to be in the future.

Leadership

Here are 10 ideas to get your thinking started on what you could resolve to do or not do in 2022 when it comes to your leadership.  I pulled this list from some of our more popular blog posts we have done over the years.

1. Reflect on being a great leader and what is keeping you from being great.  Who among us doesn’t want to be seen as a great leader? And yet, so many of us have some barrier that we just don’t want to see or do anything about. 

2. Work on your values before your vision.

3. Spend less time working and more time thinking. This idea runs counter culture to our “doing” mentality. Perhaps you need to work less and think more to enhance your ability to lead. 

4. If you were a brand (like Kleenex or Toyota), what would your value proposition be?

5. Who in your organization do you need to network with. 

6. What piece of FeedForward advice do you need to seek out? In our organizations we are so good at feedback. We just love telling people what we observed them doing.  Why not start a culture of FeedForward? Perhaps we could all get a little better at offering some solutions in addition to what we see in others that we don’t like. 

7. What cycle of negative thinking will you break this year?

8. How are you resting in the middle of your work day? Studies are showing how important rest is for leaders to maintain their effectiveness. How are you cycling your work to maximize your performance?

9. Take your emotional intelligence temperature. Are you able to choose how you react or are you “slave” to your knee jerk reactions?

10. Whatever change you make, put a plan in place to sustain it and get some coaching to keep you accountable.

I am looking forward to being with you on your leadership journey. If there are subjects you would like tackled on these pages just drop me a line. i am happy to do the research and write about what interests you.

My prayer for you is that you have a productive and effective leadership year.

Blessings to you and your families.

PS. If you know someone who might be interested in growing as a leader, why not forward them this blog and have them sign up? It’s free and easy and we guarantee they will gets tons of value.