Leadership
It’s Time To Fix The Holes In The Boat
You’re the Captain of the boat. Yet another day you steer the boat on the choppy waters. All of your crew members are busily completing their tasks and doing them well.
“I have a good team,” you think to yourself. Then your mind returns to those nagging issues that are dragging the performance of the boat down.
“What are we going to do about the holes in the boat?”, asks the most junior member of your management team. You wonder if he drew the short straw and was sent by the rest of the team.
“There’s no time to fix the holes in the boat. Besides, we’re doing fine,” you say authoritatively.
“If we can’t fix the holes in the boat, could we speed up the engine? Or, maybe we could bring along some more people to bail water. Or, maybe even get bigger buckets”, suggests the junior manager a bit sheepishly.
You instantly realize two things. First, you realize that those three suggestions are foolish and more costly compared to fixing the holes in the boat. And second, you realize that you’ve been doing those same three things for months in an effort to solve the problem.
Then the real revelation hits you. You’ve been addressing the symptoms of the problem, not the real problem.
“Let’s make a plan to fix the holes in the boat,” you announce.
A sense of relief creeps across the face of the junior manager as he heads off to gather the team and make a plan.
What are the “holes” in your organization’s boat? Isn’t it time you dealt with the real issues? Yes, opening up those issues might be painful. But, 2010 will be a better year if you “fix the holes in your boat.”
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To your success!
Where There Are People…There Are Issues
When discussing his rise through the ranks of management to executive leadership over the course of thirty one years, one of my clients said, “The time between rewarding moments is often filled with frustrating weeks.” Is that true for you? If you said yes, you’ve obviously had enough leadership experience to know that there is some element of truth in this statement, because not every day is rewarding. If this statement is not true for you, you’re either not really leading or you are one of those rare exceptions.
Effective leadership is a simple process, but difficult to well. If it wasn’t difficult, everyone would do it and everyone would do it well. I do believe that leadership skills can be learned. However, I also believe some people are born with some talents that, if developed, can make them highly effective leaders. In either case, if you are interested in improving your leadership effectiveness, make it a priority in your schedule to take four L.I.T.E. steps.
Lead Proactively, Not Emotionally
When thrust into a leadership role, you may have nothing to rely on other than your natural instincts. If you’re an impatient person, you’ll likely be an impatient leader. If you’re a dynamic person, you’re likely to be a dynamic leader. And so on.
The key is not to let your leadership style be determined by your emotions, your mood or your personality. Leadership requires skills. Effectively leadership requires developing knowledge, skills and talents into a strength.
Whether you aspire to a leadership role or you are currently in a leadership role, leadership skills can be and should be learned and developed. The most effective leaders are those who coach / develop / grow / mentor their followers along a path toward peak performance.
Leading employees effectively and developing them into peak performers provides a significant return on investment for the organization. That’s the highest and best use of leadership skills.
Influence, Not Control
Leadership is an influence process.
In the “good ol’ days”, leaders could say to an employee, “Do this or you’re fired.” If the employee complied, the leader was successful. The leader had the control in that situation.
Nowadays, leaders often don’t have direct control in a situation. And, even if the leader can today say, “Do this or you’re fired,” they know that this is a costly standoff. Leadership effectiveness is achieved when the employee carries out the leader’s direction even when the leader is not looking. When this happens, the leader has influenced the employee to embrace the assignment and/or direction. When this is done successfully, the leader multiplies his or her efforts several times over.
Think First, Then Speak
Wouldn’t work be easier if you could single-handedly do the work of all the people who report to you? There wouldn’t be any need for leadership, but, if you could do all of that work alone, work would be easier than leading effectively, wouldn’t it?
The difficulty in the leadership role is that we have to accomplish objectives through the work of other people. And, as the title of this article says, where there are people – there are issues. Those we lead are not automatically single-mindedly focused on whatever we want them to do. They have issues. And those issues don’t always line up with the work we have for them to do.
The clarity of our communication on what exactly we want them to do, why we want them to do it and how it fits into the larger scope of things will determine our success in getting employees to embrace the work we have for them. Generation Y is called that for a reason. When given any assignment, they want to know “Why?” The reality is that it’s not just Generation Y, we all want to know why something needs to be done. We want to know the larger context within which this assignment fits.
The key is to think through what and how you want to communicate your leadership guidance. Clearly communicating what needs to be done and why it needs to be done is one of the hallmarks of effective leadership. Think first, then speak.
Exit If You Hate It
If you end up in a leadership role and you hate it, quit! Life is too short.
Just as it takes a certain set of interests to enjoy a career as a Geologist, leaders thrive on the fact that where there are people – there are issues. If you went to school to be an accountant, worked in your field and now find yourself doing leadership stuff instead of accounting stuff and you hate it, quit. Go back to being an accountant. We’re each wired with a unique set of talents, skills, knowledge, interests, and experience. Find out where your “sweet spot” is and make a career there. You’ll quickly find that it doesn’t feel like work anymore.
Leadership is a noble calling like many other roles. Some of us thrive on the frustrating weeks because of the rewarding moments. If leadership is your calling, spend your career taking these four steps to improve your knowledge, skills and leadership effectiveness. The Employers’ Association has programs throughout the year geared specifically to help you develop leadership skills.
Why Efforts To Improve Business Results Often Fail
Efforts to improve business results often fail. Why is that? In my twenty plus years working with clients, it comes down to two factors:
- Lack of execution - Good or even great plans are made to improve a process, reduce costs, hire a star player, identify a critical gap, etc. But, when it comes to implementation, efforts fall short. Other things take priority, no one is sure what exactly to do, no one is driving the process, “if we wait long enough this stupid idea, like all the others, will fade away,” etc.
Build into your plan for improvement a plan for what might be a challenging implementation and you’ll find your success rate increases dramatically.
- Lack of accountability - If you make a plan, for instance, to improve sales, but don’t hold people accountable for the activities needed to drive more sales, sales won’t improve. This sounds so basic, but it is a significant issue in many companies. If you announce that more sales calls are required to new prospects, but don’t measure those sales calls and don’t provide any consequences for not performing as expected, then results won’t improve. The same applies to using a new process or reducing costs or staying on budget.
Recently I spoke to a former IBM sales representative and asked him what would happen if he routinely didn’t turn in his sales report on Sunday nights. He said, “Without a legitimate reason, I wouldn’t have a job to go to on Monday morning.”
Build expectations, accountability and consequences into your processes and you’ll see business results improve significantly.
For free access to all of our blog resources on improving business performance, click here. To sign up for our monthly newsletter, click here. To see how we have delivered results for companies like yours, click here. For a no-cost, no obligation consultation to discuss your organizational challenges with our Founder and President, Jim Connolly, click here.
To your success!
THE Six Essential Traits of Effective Leadership
In my experience, these six traits are the most essential skills for effective leadership. You may disagree. If you do, please provide your input in the comments section.
- Effective Influence….influencing the behavior of others toward the achievement of organizational goals in such a way that they continue to be influenced even when you’re not around
- Developer….building peak performers first by being clear about what you’re looking for, second by hiring only the people who are capable of doing what you’re looking for and finally by providing what they cannot yet provide for themselves along the path from beginner to peak performer
- Courage…addressing, with dignity and respect, the tough issues that might upset people knowing that moving the organization forward is more important than not upsetting the status quo
- Strategy……not about tactical or incremental improvements….rather it’s about identifying and capitalizing on market opportunities that position you to dominate specific market segments
- Vision Casting….create one crystal clear picture of the future that employees actually invest themselves in
- Management Innovation…..it’s not about efficiency, productivity, more, better or faster….it’s about organizing in non-traditional ways that engage employees while focusing them on achievement of organizational goals
When leaders fail to lead effectively, one or more of these factors are missing. As you think about the nagging challenges you face, do they generally fall into the same one or two categories above. If so, you may have discovered your weakest leadership trait.
In that case, find a way to address it by developing the skills necessary or including another leader whose strengths include the skill you lack. If necessary, get outside help to address the issue. It’s still less expensive than letting the problem continue.
For free access to all of our blog resources on improving business performance, click here. To sign up for our monthly newsletter, click here. To see how we have delivered results for companies like yours, click here. For a no-cost, no obligation consultation to discuss your organizational challenges with our Founder and President, Jim Connolly, click here.
To your success!
Don’t Confuse Motion With Progress
“David, how’s it going?”, the seasoned leader asked his newest manager.
“Wow, I’m swamped, but lovin’ it”, said David.
“Tell me about what you’re working on,” the seasoned leader asked with a hint of where the conversation was going. David reviewed his long list of activities for his boss.
“Can I make a suggestion David?”, asked the boss.
“Of course,” said David.
“Don’t confuse motion with progress,” the seasoned leader offered, recalling how he learned the same lesson some thirty years ago. David looked at his list.
“In light of that advice David, which items on your list are most important?”, asked the boss.
“These four items will help us make the most progress,” David offered excitedly knowing that he was learning an important lesson.
“Great, work on those,” David’s boss said with a smile as he looked at his watch and noticed that only six minutes had gone by.
Effective and results focused leadership in only six minutes? Absolutely. When we get busy, we all can get trapped by the to-do’s that pile up. Make your to-do list, review it for which items will help you make the most progress and then focus on those things.
For free access to all of our blog resources, click here. To sign up for our monthly newsletter, click here, For a no-cost and no-obligation consultation to discuss your organizational challenges with our Founder and President, Jim Connolly, click here.
To your success!
Average Effort Will Never Yield Great Results
Would you pay for the premium cable package each month and settle for access only to the basic channels? Would you buy a new sports car, but agree to accept a used compact car in it’s place? So, why do we settle for mediocre results in our companies? As Jim Collins said, “Good is the enemy of great.”
- If your sales people understood the psychology of the sales process, could they sell more? Could you sell more with fewer sales people?
- If your managers learned more effective leadership skills, could they lead more effectively? Could managers manage more employees?
- If your senior leadership team viewed the organizational change process as a human behavior process and not a list of tasks to be accomplished, would your changes be implemented more fully and more quickly? Could change become a normal part of your organization’s culture?
- If you dealt with the top 3 troubling people issues now, would productivity, morale, departmental performance and organizational results improve?
- If you understood that organizational structure, by its very existence creates dysfunction, would you stop creating new processes to fix the dysfunctional old processes? Isn’t there a better way?
- If you acknowledged that the management model we are all using is more than 100 years old, would you consider some management innovation concepts to reduce costs and build competitive advantage?
I know what you’re thinking. You’re already so busy. “How can I find the time to address these challenging issues?” The problem is that if you don’t do anything, you’ll continue to get the results you’ve gotten in the past.
However, if you’re committed to addressing these issues, find experts and resources with the advanced skills and experience to help you with these issues. If done right, the cost of getting the expertise will be offset many times over by the on-going organizational and financial benefits. In fact, if you ask us to help, we guarantee your results.
All of our free blog articles are posted here in 12 categories. Our Web site with testimonials from clients in a variety of industries is here. Finally, for a free, no-obligation consultation with our Founder and President, Jim Connolly, contact Jim here.
To your success!
A Leadership Teaching Moment
“Why do we have to increase our revenue target for next year?”, the young supervisor asked his boss frustrated because he thought the budgeting process was over three weeks ago.
“Because of the Golden Rule,” the boss replied.
“The Golden Rule?”, the puzzled young supervisor replied.
“Yes,” the boss said. “The people with the gold make the rules.” There was a pause.
“How can they sit up there and arbitrarily increase our targets?”, the young supervisor said rather boldly.
“Great question”, the boss replied. “Because of the shareholders”, the boss replied knowing that a teaching moment was about to take place.
The young supervisor was very puzzled. “Aren’t we a private company?”, the supervisor added.
“Yes we are”, the boss said. He went on. “But the five shareholders who own the company have a choice to make on where to invest their money. Should they continue to invest here where there is a risk that they could lose some of their money and where their return is not guaranteed or should they sell the company and put their money in the bank and get a guaranteed return? We have to make the case to the shareholders that investing in the company again next year is the best return on investment for them.”
“Wow, now that makes more sense,” the young supervisor said enlightened by his boss’ teaching moment. “So, what can we do to increase the revenue target for next year?”, he added.
“Let’s go back over the numbers and see what we can do”, the boss said now confident that his new young supervisor was committed to this organizational goal for the first time.
For more insights on how to effectively link employees, process, organizational results and return on investment in organizations, check out our other blog articles here.
“Sink or Swim” Is Not In The Leadership Effectiveness Manual
True Story
The student asked the teacher, “Could you say that again?”
“Your homework for tomorrow is page 141, problems 1-16.”
“But, we haven’t learned that lesson yet. How can we do the homework?”
“When you present the homework problems on the chalk board tomorrow, we’ll go over them.
“The student responded bravely, but hesitantly “Isn’t that backwards? Aren’t you supposed to teach us first before we do the homework?”
The teacher frowned in displeasure and said, “This is a sink or swim world, young man. Get used to it.”
At that the bell rang and students filed out. The student turned to one of his friends and said, “I thought his job was to give us all a chance to get an A, not set us up for failure.”
Is “sink or swim” part of your leadership style or a common leadership style in your organization? It’s an expedient way to lead, but not an effective way to lead. And, if you lead this way, there is no chance for achieving industry leading results.
Some people justify it because of the demands of time. But, it still results in ineffective leadership and mediocre results.
If you are an ineffective leader and you’re committed to do something about it, contact us. We can help. If you’re not committed to do something about it, please contact one of our competitors.
Image Credit: Juho Holmi
The Single Best Predictor of Sustainable Organizational Performance
Wouldn’t work be easier if you coud do the work of all of your employees? Well, of course, it’s not possible for any of us who lead people to do the work of all of our direct and indirect reporting employees.
So, if we need others to help get the work done, wouldn’t THE single best predictor of organizational performance be our effectiveness at getting the work done by working with and through others? And, to do so more effectively than our competitors.
If this is the case, why is it that we spend so much more of our time focusing on measuring sales, gross profit, operating profit, productivy, etc. than on the time we spend improving THE one thing that predicts all of these results?
Leadership effectiveness is THE single best predictor of sustainable organizational performance.
How will you use this insight to improve results in your organization?
Check out our blog for more free insights into improving employee performance and organizational results.
The Essence of High Level Leadership
You’ve undoubtedly heard the distinction between management and leadership. In short, it is said, that managing is about planning and control, while leadership is about influence. However, while many organizations now clearly emphasize the benefits of leadership (influencing behavior toward achieving organizational goals) as an organizational strategy for driving organizational performance, high level leadership remains elusive for many leaders.
So, what’s the difference between average leadership and high level leadership? And, how can a leader become a high level leader?
In addition to influencing employees to achieve organizational goals, high level leadership requires that leaders also become actively engaged in developing their employees into peak performers in key areas of responsibility. “Developing employees? Check. I do that, so I’m a high level leader,” is what I hear in response from a lot of leaders.
However, the evidence doesn’t support the claim that most leaders are high level leaders. Instead, when I probe further, I hear leaders say things like ”John is a very strong analyst, but his people skills are not as strong.” Here’s the key - Average leaders assume that what they’re getting today is all they’re ever going to get from an employee.
Now, hear me correctly. I’m not suggesting that every person can improve in every aspect of their jobs with just more training. John’s personality many not be wired for him to improve his people skills significantly. That may be the case, but average leaders just assume that John is doing the best he can do and so they don’t even try to help John improve his people skills.
High level leaders understand that there is a predictable human behavior model for developing peak performance. The process begins when an employee tries a task for the first time and ends when that same employee is a peak performer who can now train and mentor others on the same task. High level leaders work to build peak performance in employees in as many areas as possible.
High level leaders get their hands dirty and help employees develop into peak performers, to the extent that they can, in each key area of responsibility. If an employee is doing the best they can, but isn’t a peak performer, there are some options. Maybe another employee could use their area of peak performance to complement for an employee’s average performance in a key area of responsibility. Or, if an employee is average or below average in several areas of performance, maybe the employee is not really a fit for the position he/she is in and could contribute to the company much more effectively in a different role.
The essence of high level leadership is in developing employees into peak performers. High level leaders know that as they build more peak performing employees, the performance of the team, the department and the company overall will also improve.
Are you an average leader or a high level leader?
