I chatted with a valued colleague the other day that indicated that she is finding it increasingly difficult and even awkward in the face of financial pressures and employee strain to keep a cheerleader’s positive demeanor in the workplace.
This isn’t the first time I’ve heard from a leader struggling either to smile or simply maintain a positive outlook in the face of occasionally overwhelming obstacles.
Get your team talking about the right topics and get them focused on assessing and comparing based on the criteria that are the most important to your success. Skip the summer strategy offsite and start the dialogue on determining what’s truly important, and you’ll find yourself and your organization moving and working the right things faster than you might imagine.
A neighbor was out walking the dog a few nights ago and stopped to chat, which offered a welcome break from trimming the hedges. Friendly conversation turned to business and he offered his own encouraging news about his recent sales results. It turns out that he had just completed his best month ever in an industry and an economy where those words are seldom heard.
When I asked what he attributed his “best month” to, he thought for a moment and said, “Quite honestly, I think it’s because corporate finally left us alone.
My biggest mistakes as a leader occurred as a result of spending way too much time attempting to change two people. I was young, new to the formal leadership scene and convinced that with my help and guidance, these two talented individuals would certainly shed their dysfunctional and toxic behaviors.
Wow, was I wrong!
If you’ve spent time in a leadership role, you know that it is remarkably difficult to get good quality feedback on how you are doing and for that matter, how everyone else is doing under your leadership.
If you haven’t wondered about this, you are either naïve or you are caught up in all of the nice things that people say in your presence. Newsflash: almost no one tells the boss he stinks, when he’s in the room.
Some of the worst leaders that I’ve had the displeasure to cross paths with, plied their evil practices with glee, protected by the cheering throngs around them.
One of the things that I truly love about this time we are living and working through is the front-row seats that we all have to some fascinating experiments in strategy. Things happen so quickly and with such widespread coverage in today’s world, that it often looks and feels like a strategist’s living laboratory on Miracle Gro.
Fresh off of a family getaway “Up North” that involved boating, swimming, family camp fires and maybe a firework or two (all fingers still attached!), I find myself reflecting on receiving a dose of my own leadership medicine. For one who dispenses a lot of thoughts on leaders and leading, it is appropriate and just a bit humbling to be on the receiving end, especially when you are learning the lesson from your young adult children.
…And after you’ve marveled a bit at what our founding ancestors managed to pull-off, you might just want to pop a copy of The Sandlot into the VCR (my copy is still on VHS) and marvel at a nation that can produce baseball and hot dogs and Ray Charles and the sheer joy of freedom in spite of our many and recently very visible imperfections. The movie goes best with a cold lemonade next to you.
The best leaders in my opinion are guided by a strong sense of duty and responsibility. The individuals that succeed in motivating, inspiring and even changing the lives and careers of others operate with an underlying philosophical foundation that they draw upon to remain focused and steadfast in pursuing their daily activities.
Everyone else sort of wanders through the leadership woods, reacting more on instinct than acting as if they are being guided by a stronger sense of purpose and duty.
Many leaders are lousy collaborators.
It doesn’t seem to matter that they spend a great deal of time encouraging, coaching and facilitating collaboration between their team members and across functional boundaries. When it comes time for Leader A to work with Leader B on something other than getting other people to do things, the dynamics get interesting and the output is often disappointing.
