Latest blog entries

Why Would Anyone Follow You?

Sun, 26 Jul 2026 15:36:56 GMT

This is a question every leader of any business (for profit or non-profit) of any size and any industry or market needs to regularly ask themselves. It is a critical question in that it establishes the very reason a leader earns the privilege of being called a leader. Among the hundreds of definitions of leader, this one matters most: No followership, no leadership!

The inspiration for this discussion comes from a recent Global Leadership Effectiveness survey from Hogan Assessments. In the survey, the gap between the competencies followers want in their leaders and the competencies they are currently getting from their leaders is significant. Significant in the fact that there is no overlap between the two lists. Based on the report, the two lists of the top five competencies are shown below. The desired competencies are listed in order of endorsement:

As we see, the absence of any overlap creates concern that leaders are missing the point on what effective leadership actually entails. And while the report lists Hogan Assessments' definition of each desired competency, we will expand on what we've seen through the lens of our business and leadership coaching practice over the past 18 years and counting.

Effective Communication ~ We define effective communications as occurring when both the sender and receiver understand the message in the same context. A leader's ability to think through the purpose of the message and the expected behavior by the receivers of the message goes a long way in the effectiveness of the leader's communications. This is especially true in change management and conflict management, both of which occurred in great volume during the pandemic. The resulting communications ineffectiveness from that period prompted us to publish, " Finding The Missing Piece: The Impact of Effective Communications on Sustainable Success " in 2022.

Effective Decision-Making ~ In our view, the heart and soul of effective decision-making is the leader's ability to critically think, especially in the current dynamic business environment. The level of complexity and uncertainty creates a challenge for leaders to make timely and effective decisions at the speed of business. Cutting corners on their critical thinking process creates fear, uncertainty, and doubt by their followers. We've outlined the critical thinking process in greater detail both here and here .

Leading Others ~ Leadership is a team sport, hard stop. While it is unfortunate how many definitions of leadership exclude building and leading teams as a critical competency, the inescapable fact is teamwork is a key reason people follow their leaders. Building on the Rocket Model created by Gordy Curphy of Curphy Leadership Solutions, leading a team, or a group if appropriate, requires unique attitudes and knowledge beyond the leader's own personality traits. Our most recent reference to The Rocket Model is here .

Integrity ~ We define integrity as the leader's attitudes, words and actions all telling the same story. There is nothing worse than leaders who say one thing and do another, especially when their actions contradict a stated core value of the organization. In that situation, the leader is said to be out of integrity, a term we do not hear often enough of when the situation calls for it. We explore the importance of integrity in more detail here.

Accountability ~ Leaders and followers both seem to have a love/hate relationship with accountability. In our experience, the challenge lies in the struggle to differentiate accountability from responsibility. Effective leaders understand that accountability is about taking ownership of their actions, regardless of the outcomes. Attempting to deflect ownership of a bad outcome due to ego only degrades their effectiveness as a leader. We explore the importance of accountability in more detail here .

Followers want to be led well. Based on the results of this recent survey, their expectations of their leaders are very much in line with what has defined effective leadership for decades. The fact that the gap exists is a clear message to leaders at all levels, regardless of industry or tax status, that leadership is, and always will be, a team sport!

What would motivate someone to follow your leadership and how do you know? If you're not sure, we can help .

Lead Well!

“The greatest waste...

Mon, 29 Jun 2026 15:29:52 GMT

...is failure to use the abilities of people...”

In a recent LinkedIn post, the conversation centered on the Dr. W. Edwards Deming quote, “94% of problems in business are systems driven and only 6% are people driven.”. This is a quote we’ve used many times with our business coaching clients in our conversations around process improvement and systems development. Our latest reference is linked here from our most recent podcasting guest appearance. In the LinkedIn discussion, it centered on whether the quote implied Dr. Deming’s teachings did not emphasize people development rather focusing on systems development.

In truth, the title quote of this article is also attributed to Dr. Deming. The quote ends with, “...to learn about their frustrations and about the contributions that they are eager to make.” Two months ago, we wrote of the importance of ensuring business systems stay relevant , primarily with the Dr. Deming “94%” quote referenced earlier in mind. In this conversation, we focus on the human element of systems thinking every leader must address for sustainable success. We will use the full title quote above as our outline.

The greatest waste... ~ One of our more popular business seminars centers on the concept of continuous improvement. In the seminar we address the seven most common operational wastes (Over-production, Excessive inventory, Unnecessary motion, Unnecessary transportation, Waiting, Over-processing, Defects) that are the focus of operational efficiency and effectiveness. Notice that none of the longtime waste references directly address the human element. It is only within the turn of the century that businesses started recognizing the 8th waste: Underutilizing human skills!

...is failure to use the abilities of people... ~ This idea is making headlines due to the ascendency of artificial intelligence (AI) platforms. Many leaders jumped headfirst into the hype-pool that AI would replace hundreds of human jobs. Most recently Salesforce admitted to making that very mistake as quality suffered in the transition. Even the CEOs of the AI platforms are walking back their audacious predictions of what their platforms would do versus the human workforce. Our response online to the Salesforce situation was merely two words, “ Unintended consequences .”

...to learn about their frustrations and about the contributions that they are eager to make. ~ From our own business leadership experiences, we fully understand the importance of alignment of people and systems. It is clearly built into our Business Alignment Maturity Model™ ( BAMM ) by listing the Structure layer breakout in order of priority: People, Process, Technology. Based on our experience, any business leveraging these structural operating elements in any other order than they are listed above will struggle with sustainable success.

People are what makes business work, regardless of which stakeholder label leaders put on them (employees, associates, vendors, customers, clients, etc.). The implication of this conversation for leaders is the importance of leveraging their team’s intrinsic motivations. As we often say, “We lead people and manage processes.”. So, when people are solely managed and not led, it is a form of waste in underutilizing human skills. Of equal importance is leaders ensuring the systems supporting the people doing the work are also aligned to prevent the underutilization of human skills. Closing out with one more Dr. Deming quote, “ Put a good person in a bad system and the bad system wins, no contest.”

How are your people and systems aligned for sustainable success? If you’re not sure, we can help .

Lead Well!

“Pressure...

Mon, 25 May 2026 21:28:55 GMT

...is a privilege.”

As the year progresses, we find ourselves having consistently more conversations with our client leaders around the stresses of leading in a VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment. So much so that we will make it the core topic of this month’s discussion. The title of this edition comes from a YouTube video a client recently referred to us in which the actor, Tom Hiddleston, used the phrase in a sports context. However, we believe it also sets up a broader discussion around the stresses of leadership.

Social media, and specifically LinkedIn, is full of articles and posts about how to create and achieve “stress-free...” As often as these posts cross our LinkedIn feed, we will challenge the notion of stress-free leadership in any form. Stress-free leadership is analogous to eliminating conflict in the workplace. In our minds, trying to achieve either or both is a fool’s errand. We learn to manage workplace conflict because we know it never goes away completely. We also learn to manage stress as leaders as we know it never really goes away completely.

The other element of stress and conflict similarities is that, like conflict, not all stress is negative. Most are familiar with the negative side of stress we call distress. However, few are familiar with the positive side of stress called eustress. Eustress is the short-term stress that motivates and creates focus for leaders in any given situation. For instance, everyone has heard of the common fear of public speaking. Even though I’ve been a confident public speaker since high school, I still get butterflies when speaking in front of a new audience. Those butterflies are a sign of eustress that helps focus on the speech or presentation I’m about to give.

How does stress impact the leader’s decision-making process? Having recently facilitated a session on decision-making and problem-solving to a group of leaders as part of a leadership institute, the idea of stress’s impact on the topic made for an interesting discussion. It brought us back to when we first learned about System 1 and System 2 Thinking created by the Nobel Prize winning psychologist Daniel Kahneman . System 1 Thinking is quick, subconscious and intuitive thinking that is highly influenced by stress. It creates an urge to quickly decide based on past experiences that may or may not be contextually appropriate to the current situation. System 2 Thinking on the other hand is slower, rational and deliberate thinking that transcends the urge to succumb to distress. By leveraging eustress, the leader can be more focused and disciplined about the decision in the context of the current situation and less biased by the past.

Referring back to the title quote, “Pressure is a privilege.”, we see that pressure in the form of eustress can significantly change a leader’s attitude toward facing the challenges of a VUCA business environment. It is the attitude that creates sustainable success for the business!

How are you managing pressure as a privilege? If you’re not sure, we can help .

Lead Well!

“It is impossible for a man to learn...

Tue, 28 Apr 2026 20:05:12 GMT

...what he thinks he already knows.”

This business cycle has already generated a multitude of discussions among leaders from all types of businesses on how to navigate the VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment. From individual client leaders to groups of leaders in the multiple leadership institutes we facilitate, the challenge is always how they think about, or frame, the challenges in front of them. In past articles, we tended to focus on critical thinking as the core answer to these challenges. However, in this discussion, we step back a bit and focus on a broader view of the challenges through the lens of systems thinking.

In our book, “ Finding the Missing Piece , The Impact of Effective Communication on Sustainable Success”, we define systems thinking as a holistic approach focusing on how a system’s components work together, how a system operates over time as well as how it operates in the context of other larger systems. It is the foundation of our organizational Business Alignment Maturity Model ( BAMM ) we use when coaching business leaders. In the leader conversations, we hear challenges of finding THE problem to solve that will help generate desired results.

Defining THE problem is in itself an issue and a common trap leaders fall into as they want to simplify the challenge. While there is nothing inherently wrong with simplicity, seeking to narrow VUCA-driven business challenges to a single issue creates a series of unintended consequences and misalignment within the business system itself. With that being said, let’s look at what leaders can do to ensure they do not fall into the single issue trap in a VUCA business environment.

Document the systems from end to end . The more common practice is to document processes, especially core processes that directly impact clients and revenue. Sales, engineering, customer service, operations are all processes in and by themselves. However, how does the system document handoffs and interconnections between these processes? Handoffs are where most errors occur partially due to the lack of documentation and clarity around responsibilities during handoff periods. The lesson we learned early on is to create and document dual accountabilities around handoffs, for example between engineering and project management. The clearer the expectations, the clearer the outcome!

Regularly walk the systems end to end . The challenge with documented systems is the lack of a means to ensure they are still relevant with the passing of time and constantly changing business assumptions and conditions. Generally, we call this stapling an order to yourself and walking the order all the way through from order to invoice. At each step, the leader questions the relevance of the actions with particular emphasis on the handoffs between functions. We also coach leaders to not only ask what happens at each step in the system, and to also ask, “Based on what...?” to ensure the logic behind each action is still relevant. As we wrote several years ago , the ultimate goal is to ensure the system cannot be executed poorly!

Actively solicit feedback on system performance . Even leaders who walk the system will still need to encourage continuous feedback on how well the system is producing desired results. The people who do the work will always sense problems and solutions well before leadership does. The question is whether leadership is listening for this “ground truth”. An expression we’ve used frequently goes, “Expertise without curiosity is arrogance in disguise”. Curiosity up and down the organization chart begins with the leaders creating the level of trust where anyone who sees a problem and a solutions can raise their voice to enable action. At least once in each of our executive leadership roles, we received feedback from those who actually do the work that led to significant positive shifts in our systems thinking!

Business systems thrive in a VUCA business environment when they are documented end to end through all the handoffs, when leaders walk the systems periodically to validate the documentation is still relevant and openly listens to real time feedback on the system’s performance from the people who do the work. Leaders who believe they already know how the system is working without these steps will fall prey to what the Greek philosopher Epictetus alluded to in the title quote; it will be impossible for them to learn!

How are you continuously learning from your business system? If you’re not sure, we can help .

Lead Well!

“Knowledge speaks...

Mon, 23 Mar 2026 20:10:38 GMT

..but wisdom listens.”

There is little question as to how much effective communications occupies leader’s mindspace in today’s VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment. Leaders in every industry, large or small, public or private, for profit or nonprofit, all face the continuous challenge to communicate effectively to their teams and successfully advance their business strategies.

It is fair to say most leaders view themselves as problem solvers. In that vein, it is easy for them to take on the role of problem solvers when issues are brought to their attention. Due to the speed of business, this, in turn, leads to directing resources, monetary or non-monetary, in the direction of the issue to resolve it as quickly as possible. What gets missed is the contextual changes occurring in real time in any dynamic business environment so that whatever knowledge the leader thinks they know in the moment may well be outdated without making the time to listen for current verifiable context. The title quote by the late great rock star Jimi Hendrix succinctly outlines the value of listening for greater leadership success.

In our leadership and business coaching practice, we refer often to the DIKW (Data, Information, Knowledge, Wisdom) Cycle to help our clients communicate more effectively. This model visualizes a progressive relationship evolving from raw data organized into information. When information is contextualized and given meaning as knowledge and then applied over time to create wisdom. When leaders communicate at the knowledge and wisdom levels, the risk of poor decisions drops significantly. As we mentioned earlier in this article, the challenge leaders face in capturing wisdom is making the time to effectively listen in the moment to resolve the issue armed with the best possible knowledge-based solution.

However, if and when the only time leaders make time to listen to gather wisdom is when there is a problem to solve, they will always be behind in a VUCA business environment. Effective leaders are listening constantly to accumulate wisdom before the issues occur. We coach them to be problem finders as well as problem solvers. Problem finders are listening for market and industry trends to proactively understand how potential problems might affect their businesses. We’ve had people tell us the chaos in Washington DC could not have been predicted. While partially true, it is not enough to have ignored signs and signals that had the potential to slow business growth so that proactive decisions could mitigate the end effects.

All of this boils down to effective communication by leaders to have their decisions executed to achieve desired results. Effective communications involves more than what the leaders say. If leaders do not listen (not just hear) to what the business environment is saying, their knowledge base rapidly grows stale. As Warren Buffet famously said, “If you can’t communicate, it’s like winking at a girl in the dark; nothing happens.”

How well are you communicating with wisdom and how do you know? If you’re not sure, we can help .

Lead Well!

“Whatever you are not changing...

Mon, 23 Feb 2026 20:40:17 GMT

...you are choosing.”

Lately, we’ve written extensively about effectively leading in a VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment. It is an environment that begs for change given the ever changing external drivers and conditions. Regardless of business type (for profit or nonprofit), industry, or size (corporate leader or SMB business owner), the current environment presents an ongoing stream of challenges leaders must tackle. The title quote by Laurie Buchanan, Coach and Author, suggests any choices made to address these challenges that does not include change still contain a level of accountability to the consequences of those decisions.

One of the key effects of these challenges is the impact they have on organizational culture. Inspired by a recent LinkedIn post on culture change by Rob Briner, we present our take on culture change based on our experiences as both an executive business leader and as leadership coach to business leaders both for profit and nonprofit, corporate and entrepreneur.

While there are many different definitions of culture, we define culture as the shared values, beliefs, attitudes and norms within the organization that govern the behavior of its members. When most leaders speak of culture change, they address it as something in and by itself to change. However, we address culture change as an output rather than an input. In other words, leaders don't change culture, they change the things that create the culture. For instance, in our executive leadership roles, the core foundational element of our culture was adaptability. In all cases, we achieved an adaptive culture, not by addressing the culture itself, but rather by addressing how we infuse adaptability into the shared values, beliefs, attitudes, and norms which showed itself in the resulting behaviors. Let’s break down the five components and see how change is, or isn’t, achieved in each:

Values ~ We define values as the broad preferences concerning appropriate course of actions or outcomes. As no one is born with values, these become the product of the influencers (parents, teachers, ministers, etc.) in one’s formative years. Ultimately, they help prioritize life decisions based on which values one holds deeply. When leaders create, socialize and model core values for the organization, they are explicitly stating that key decisions are influenced by those core values. Individual values typically do not change over time, so it is important that organizational core values truly represent the desired culture behavior. How are the core values of the organization reflective of the desired culture?
Beliefs ~ Beliefs are those ideas and ideals that are generally believed to be true. Unlike values, beliefs can change over time given new inputs and learning. It doesn’t mean they will, it just means they can. For example, we believe that 99% of the workforce comes to work every day to do a good job. For that reason, the first conversation when a situation went sideways was always with the manager before the person who made the mistake. That belief could be changed based on new learning or experience, but for now, we believe it to be true. What beliefs are being held as true that align or misalign to the desired culture?
Attitudes ~ We define attitudes as habits of thought that determine people do as a predisposition to respond positively or negatively to someone or something in their environment. Fundamentally, attitudes are informed by beliefs, emotions and behavioral intention (merely the intent to behave in alignment with beliefs and emotions). We established earlier beliefs can change and we also know through emotional intelligence that emotions can also change depending on the appropriate alignment between feelings and behavior. When addressing culture change, we challenge attitudes by asking simply, “What drives the way you think about...?” What attitudes are preventing the culture from thriving?
Norms ~ Where attitudes are more of an internal force behind behavioral decisions, norms are the external forces influencing behavioral decisions. Norms are the contextual rules (written and unwritten) and expectations of the organization. Our favorite reference to norms lies in The Rocket Model created by Gordy Curphy as part of his broader work on effective high performing teams. Norms that address operating rhythm, communications, decision-making, accountability and self-adjustment can all be changed, socialized, and modeled in new ways by leaders. How are the current norms working for or against the desired culture?
Behaviors ~ All these efforts to change core values, beliefs, attitudes, and norms must now inform new behaviors or the desired change results will never materialize. One of the bigger challenges in creating new change behaviors change is taking definitive action in the new direction. Leaders know what they need to do differently yet hesitate to take the risk. It is the knowing-doing gap in action relative to adapting the culture to meet the challenges of a VUCA business environment. Among them is the struggle to communicate the change such that it evokes the right behavioral actions. We wrote previously about that challenge several years back. What obstacles are preventing new behaviors that align to the desired culture?

One of our favorite stories around culture change occurred during the first two years as an Area Vice President for Sprint. Every six months, we announced evolutionary changes that directly addressed core values, beliefs, attitudes and the new norms for the organization (640 people strong at the time). At the beginning of year three, the senior leadership team proactively looked forward to the next six months which meant the change was now cultural!

Culture change takes time which makes understanding how to move the piece parts is fundamental to success. It also means not confusing organizational culture change with organizational climate change, especially in an emotionally charged VUCA business environment. Reacting to changing short term business climate thinking it is longer term culture change is a recipe for failure and diminished relevance in the new reality!

What is your process to lead changes in your culture? If you’re not sure, we can help .

Lead Well!

“To argue with a person who renounces reason...

Tue, 27 Jan 2026 20:47:27 GMT

...is like administering medicine to the dead.”

As we begin a new year, leaders continue to face off against influences and challenges to their businesses requiring level-headed thinking and courage to navigate effectively. One only has to gain access to a technology screen to see what is happening (mostly negative) in the world having some impact on people’s perceptions and thinking. While we have written extensively about critical thinking, most recently in July of last year , we are taking a slightly different approach this time and focusing on the use of reason. Reason is defined as the power of the mind to think, understand, and form judgments by a process of logic (dictionary.com). What inspired the focus on reason was the title quote by Thomas Paine, an English American political activist, author, and political theorist whose writings influenced American thinking at the beginning of the revolutionary war.

We will break down the definition of reason stated above to shed some light on how effective leaders can approach these events that, while not directly impacting the business itself, is certainly having an impact on the people who work in the business and, by extension, are the business. Let’s break it down:

The power of the mind to think ~ Thinking requires the leader to consciously resist the urge to react, possibly overreact, to any given situation. Thinking requires a period of time to gather all the facts of the situation. We consider this the content phase of reasoning as the leader is collecting all available information regarding any given situation. The challenges we see are leaders who react emotionally so strongly that they compromise their ability to pause and gather the relative facts. The other key issue is fighting confirmation bias such that the leader is gathering facts that are not predetermined to support an already formed opinion.
The power of the mind to understand ~ Once the facts have been gathered, they need to be organized in a way that helps the leader understand the impact of the situation. We consider this the context phase of reasoning as the leader must now give meaning to the information they have available to them. The challenges we see are leaders who do not have depth of experience or knowledge to see the meaning of the situation. How well have they kept up with market changes and industries shifts? How well have they educated themselves on the driving forces that impact their business using tools such as the PESTEL (Political, Economic, Sociocultural, Technological, Environmental, Legal) Analysis we referenced in last month’s post . Effectively using reasoning requires the logic be grounded in the right context.
Form judgements by a process of logic ~ Simply knowing the facts and their meaning does provide success in and by themselves. Leaders make considered decisions and conclusions acting decisively with the results of their thinking and understanding. We consider this the action phase of reason in that success can only come from conclusive and decisive action. The challenges we see are leaders being afraid to make decisions in light of high emotional reactions to the situation. We know this from most any change initiatives any business goes through. The other fear is that the conditions will change, causing them to also change their decision and thus looking indecisive in the eyes of their organization.

In a previous article , we wrote about how feelings neither prove nor disprove facts. However, leaders now lead in an environment that challenges that principle each and every day. That is why leaders must be able to act and decide with reason such that logic prevails over theater in the final decision. To be completely transparent, Thomas Paine’s full quote was, “To argue with a man who has renounced the use and authority of reason, and whose philosophy consists in holding humanity in contempt, is like administering medicine to the dead, or endeavoring to convert an atheist by scripture.”

What is your process to lead with logic in today’s uncertain world? If you’re not sure, we can help .

Lead Well!

“Uncertainty is...

Sun, 21 Dec 2025 13:16:46 GMT

...the only certainty there is,...”

In a recent gathering of business leaders, the discussion centered on the results of a recent economic forecast many of us had just attended hosted by our local chamber of commerce. The conclusion that many in the room came to was that the overall message from the panel of economists and experts about next year’s economy was a shoulder shrug accompanied by a collective, “We don't know”. We made the point then, and will make it again here, this level of uncertainty is, in fact, certainty. The title quote above from Temple University professor John Allen Paulos sums it up quite nicely along with the rest of the quote when he said, “...and knowing how to live with insecurity is the only security.”

As business leaders look toward the new year, uncertainty is a defining condition of the VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment. Economic volatility, rapid technological change, shifting regulations, workforce expectations, and geopolitical dynamics affect for-profit and non-profit organizations alike. Leaders who succeed will be those who build organizations capable of adapting quickly and deliberately.

As we stated earlier, this level of uncertainty is actual certainty that must be viewed as a strategic input to business planning and budgets. The two tools we use regularly with our clients are the PESTEL (Political, Economic, Sociocultural, Technical, Environmental, Legal) Environment Analysis and the SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats) Synthesis. While traditional strategic planning often assumes relative stability, we now see and encourage a much faster cadence in evaluating changing business conditions. At this point, a rolling six-month look ahead makes good business sense.

We know that uncertainty creates anxiety among employees, boards, donors, and clients among the many stakeholders the leader communicates with. With a faster level of flexibility and adaptability to changing conditions, leaders need to communicate clearly about what is known, what is uncertain, and how decisions will be made. Consistent, honest communication builds trust and keeps organizations aligned even when conditions change at a faster pace.

For years, our success as a business leader was built on contingency planning around a set of assumptions and conditions that helped create multiple scenarios versus one linear path for success. Using best case, worst case and most-likely case scenarios allows the leader and their teams to act quickly when assumptions come true or not and when conditions change that affect the overall mission and strategy. The value is not in predicting which scenario will occur, but in identifying strategic moves that perform reasonably well across all of them such as strengthening core capabilities, improving data visibility, and/or deepening stakeholder relationships.

Earlier this year, we wrote about leaders maintaining focus on the organizational mission in these uncertain environments. The long-term vision and mission become much more important as long-term plans become less reliable. Leaders should be clear about purpose, values, and the desired results while breaking execution into shorter cycles to learn, adjust, and reallocate resources without losing strategic focus.

Whether leading a corporate business, entrepreneurial business or mission-driven organization, flexibility is a strategic asset. As for-profit leaders, maintaining contingency funds, leveraging modular initiatives, and focusing on key partnerships that can scale up or down. As non-profit leaders, a key strategy is diversifying funding sources.

In uncertain conditions, speed and quality of decisions matter more than perfect information. Two mantras we live by, and coach our clients to embrace are, “The goal is to achieve imperfect excellence” and “Be comfortable making good B+ decisions”. The implication in both of these mantras is the search for perfect is a fool’s errand both in the leader’s expectation and the leader’s decision-making process. Equally important is leading in a culture where revising decisions based on new information, even at a rapid pace is seen as discipline, not failure.

In the new year, the goal is for leaders to not try and outguess the future, but to prepare their organization to meet it head-on. Leaders who embrace uncertainty with vision, understanding, courage and adaptability ( VUCA 2.0 ) will not only endure the disruption, they will create a strategy that shapes what comes next to creating sustainable success!

How are you leading your team into next year’s uncertainty? If you’re not sure, we can hel p .

Lead Well!

"Duty, honor, country: Those three hallowed words reverently dictate...

Mon, 17 Nov 2025 13:22:00 GMT

..what you ought to be, what you can be, what you will be.”

With our recently celebrated Veterans Day, we are inspired to dedicate this month’s article, and every November going forward, to invite a veteran in our network to guest write about the benefits of hiring veterans. Using the words of GEN Douglas MacArthur from his 1962 speech to the Corps of Cadets at the United States Military Academy at West Point for inspiration, the theme is highlighting the value veterans bring to any organization once they transition out of the service.

To launch this new idea, we invited Colonel (Retired) Mark Lisi to share his thoughts on the subject. COL Lisi and I were lieutenants stationed together in the same unit in the early 80s, he as an Infantry Officer and me as a Signal Corps Officer. In all those years, we’ve remained fast friends, even through the gaps in time where we didn't physically see each other from our travels around the globe. You can learn more about COL Lisi here . Without further ado, we present his thoughts:

Ask a veteran about their background and they will surprise you. There is always a gap between the view of what military is and is not. Listen to them and you will find their stories are full of gems that will support your cause. The Armed Forces trains recruits to perform specific tasks and inserts them into performing organizations, and the veteran is the product. This service based paradigm seamlessly crosswalks into the civil work place.

The Nation has relied on the work of her veterans for 250 years. They have performed in jobs up to and including the Presidency of the country. The value of the veteran to the working pool of the nation cannot be overstated. Veterans will bring a more mature and concrete view of responsibility to your workplace. They know and understand the concept of service.

The veteran brings a sack of skills to the work place. They have experienced both good and bad leadership styles, put on three or four years of maturity, and learned individual responsibility.

In the main, the veteran has made a contract with the nation and completed the terms of that contract. Exactly “what” the veteran did in the Service, can only be found on his/her Discharge document. If you really want to know what they did in the Service, ask them directly. Many military skills were dangerous and performed under dangerous conditions. From infantry fighting positions to the danger of the carrier flight deck.

Employers should view veterans as savvy, reliable, and competent. Every task from punctuality to an orderly work space comes as part of the veteran package. The veteran has been trained to endure and perform during periods of duress. This skill set is beyond value to employers. Service members must get up, get in a uniform and go to work every day; it is not a choice. As an employer, your veterans give this to you every day.

Independent, reliable and resilient, veterans provide employers with a solid worker foundation. Trainable and committed, they bring a background of production that their civilian peers cannot match.

Veterans serve as the working foundation of their generation. This foundation can be built upon by employers and integrated into the business leadership architecture. National Service helps veterans shake off the yoke of generational cultural and breeds the independent thinker.

Employers need only watch how veterans who chose higher education as their post-service gateway perform. They understand that they are paying for the classroom seat, and they are in that seat every class period. They learn, they apply and make their own way forward.

Veterans are not the magic beans that Jack bought. They are the men and women that Norman Rockwell so accurately captures in the Americana of his paintings. Like those paintings, they exist in the culture, and the population. Learn to hire the veteran, train them and rely on them. There is no higher salute you can offer to those who bore the weight of freedom.

How can you bring the value of veterans to your organization? If you’re not sure, we can help .

Lead Well!

“What we’ve got here...

Wed, 29 Oct 2025 13:34:07 GMT

...is failure to communicate.”

With all that is said and written these days about artificial intelligence (AI) and its impact on the way we communicate, we thought it fitting to spend some time with our take on what’s actually new and what is actually an age-old problem on hyper-speed. The title quote from the movie Cool Hand Luke sums up what we believe is the real root of the communication challenges in an AI infused world.

The real challenge is leaders not acknowledging effective communications as THE issue to be addressed. We did a recent Google search asking, “What is the biggest leadership challenge in business today?” The Pacific Institute stated the top 10 leadership challenges and, to their credit, did mention communications as #3. A featured LinkedIn article from last month did not mention communications as did a Forbes article that only mentioned that leaders are overwhelmed. A featured Center for Creative Leadership (CCL) article listed 20 issues, 5 for each level of leadership and did not once directly mention effective communications as a key issue. What is important to this conversation is that none of the issues listed by any of the sources can be resolved or mitigated without effective communications!

So, is it any wonder that in an AI infused business environment, leaders struggle to effectively communicate? Not if communications is viewed as an assumed skill and attitude and not actively viewed as THE skill and attitude for sustainable success. When coaching clients, we use the metaphor of a carpenter. A good carpenter knows how to use power tools to their advantage. A lousy carpenter will use power tools to just screw up the project faster. The same is true of AI and communications.

The big pitch in using AI is how effective the user prompts are when engaging with any of the AI tools on the market. A poorly crafted prompt will generate a poorly aligned answer resulting in multiple prompts for the user to get the desired result. The same is true of communications. We communicate to generate a behavioral response from the other party. When leaders communicate to their teams in poorly crafted or vague language, they will get confusion and likely result in the wrong behavior initially. They then have to go through multiple iterations (prompts) to get the desired results. The more specific the leader’s ask, the more specific the follower’s results!

The other challenge we see is the trade-off of quality and time. As frequent AI users, we recognize the advantage of speed in using the many AI tools on the market. We also recognize the lack of quality in the many generic, non-contextual replies generated, even with great prompts. As we’ve written so many times on the challenges the lack of critical thinking presents to leaders, AI can compound those challenges. Leaders who fall prey to confirmation bias, for instance, are looking for answers that confirm their preconceived ideas of what should happen in a given situation. The same lack of critical thinking from an AI user merely confirms a false premise sooner in the absence of critical thinking! Confirmation bias is just one of many examples of this trade-off of something that sounds right (but may not be) for the sake of speed of response.

In a recent LinkedIn article , Dave Ulrich, noted speaker, author, and professor at the University of Michigan Ross School of Business, presented a unique formula effectively combining AI with what he calls HI (Human Ingenuity). He suggests that Talent Advantage = AI * HI where the real value exists in a multiplicative fashion rather than an additive fashion. As he said, “Either AI or HI without the other severely limits overall talent.” This combination manifests itself when leaders communicate to their teams in a way that optimizes talent (HI) and tools (AI) to achieve desired results and sustainable success.

How are you leveraging AI in your leadership communication? If you’re not sure, we can help.

Lead Well!

“If necessity is the mother of invention...

Mon, 29 Sep 2025 13:40:06 GMT

...conflict is the father.”

Over the course of the last few quarters, we’ve focused a good deal of time coaching our clients, both at an individual level and at the team level, on effectively managing conflict. Possibly influenced by the political, societal and cultural challenges of today’s business environment, the leadership challenges of managing conflict is a recurring topic. The title quote from psychologist Kenneth Kaye sets the stage for our discussion on how leaders can effectively manage conflict in their organizations and teams to achieve sustainable success.

The first thing we establish in these coaching conversations is agreement on two key conditions related to conflict. First, we never speak of eliminating conflict as it is an inherent part of the human condition. Therefore, we only speak to conflict management, not conflict elimination. Secondly, we set the stage that not all conflict is negative or destructive. In our own business leadership experience, we effectively used constructive conflict as a leadership tool. Every leader we led understood that part of our job as their manager was to never let them get comfortable. Comfortable leads to complacency and lazy leadership, which is something no effective leader can afford, especially in today’s VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment.

As we explore each leader’s ability to manage conflict, we typically see that most know they have a basic responsibility to manage the conflict situation and simply don’t know how. There is an inherent fear of conflict in the workplace for many different reasons. The first obstacle to overcoming that fear is the leader’s own habitual response to conflict that is baked into their subconscious. Given that our subconscious governs nearly 90% of what we do, the habitual response is quite a powerful force in the leader’s attitude towards a conflict situation.

To counter the leader’s negative habitual response to conflict, they must have a conscious adaptive response. As it is estimated that close to 80% of society will choose avoidance as a subconscious habitual response to conflict, the conscious response must be well defined. As we coach our clients, we remind them that it is communications that is both the cause and the cure of conflict. Therefore, the leader’s ability to effectively communicate with all the elements that go with it (tone, listening, nonverbals, emotions, etc.) is crucial to successful conflict management. As effective communications is routinely stated as the biggest issue in business in general, the importance in doing so when emotions are running hot during conflict merely compounds its importance in conflict resolution.

So, when is a conflict effectively managed to its proper resolution? The answer highlights what we see as a key blind spot for leaders in these situations. Conflict is effectively managed when both the substantive issue(s) as well as the emotional issue(s) are both resolved by all parties concerned. The blind spot occurs when leaders focus on the much more tangible substantive issue(s) and neglect to resolve the emotional issue(s). We’ve heard too many stories where one party of the conflict is reassigned to another team, department or business-unit as part of the conflict resolution solution. It solves the substantive issue(s) yet leaves the emotional issue(s) unresolved to surface again, usually at a very inopportune time.

Through the course of our business and leadership coaching practice, we’ve had multiple opportunities to directly facilitate workplace conflict as well as coach others on how to effectively manage conflict in their organizations. Conflict in the workplace brings out a multitude of opportunities for leaders to demonstrate their effective communication, listening and emotional intelligence skills. A leader’s ability to positively leverage these skills gives hope to the fact that disagreements don’t have to have dire negative consequences and instead lead to fresh ideas and a stronger sense of psychological safely and trust within their organizations.

How is your leadership communication causing or curing conflict on your team? If you’re not sure, we can help .

Lead Well!

“Fortune favors the brave...

Mon, 25 Aug 2025 13:45:24 GMT

...and never helps a man who does not help himself.”

As business leaders, for profit and non-profit, continue to navigate the volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity (VUCA) of today’s business environment, we see a theme rising out of the chaos; the courage to act! Courageous leadership takes on many forms and is a critical element of staying relevant in our current VUCA business environment. It was put forth by Bill George, former CEO of Medtronic, when he described VUCA 2.0 comprised of Vision, Understanding, Courage and Adaptability. This discussion centers on what we see are the key elements of courage and courageous leadership.

The title quote for this discussion starts with an expression dating as far back as 161 BC with variations attributed to various Roman poet and orators. The second part of the title is attributed to the famous circus performer, PT Barnum. Courage is one of those characteristics constantly argued either as an innate personal characteristic or something that can be learned. Based on our experience coaching leaders across a multitude of businesses both large and small, for profit and non-profit, we believe the latter is true, courage can be learned. We’ll explore the three key elements to make this come to life based on these experiences.

Critical Thinking ~ We’ve written extensively about the importance of critical thinking to effective 21st Century leadership, most recently last month . One of the biggest obstacles to having the courage to act is the lack of information to confidently make the decision to act. Often times, the initial emotional reaction, much like the early stages of grief, lingers longer than it should in the absence of critical thinking. The ability to act with courage depends on evaluating the relevant objective facts as quickly as possible. For instance, we’ve coached our business clients to review their knowledge of macro-economics to understand the factual pros and cons of tariffs. It is armed with objective facts, regardless of their impact to the business, that the leader can make the next right decisions for the organization!

Continuous Learning ~ Learning is a non-stop process for those 21st Century leaders who want to stay relevant in the current VUCA business environment. Successful learning goes well beyond knowing about the business environment to knowing how that information impacts the business. To use the previous example of tariffs, it is one thing to know what tariffs are and another altogether to fully understand their impact to the leader’s business. As we live in an information-rich, knowledge-poor world, it is critical that leaders constantly process new information, gained via ongoing training or in the form of real time intel, through the lens of their business. This contextual knowledge provides the necessary confidence to again decide on the next right steps to staying relevant!

Attitude Reframe ~ One of our favorite quotes is from Maya Angelou that says, “If you don’t like something, change it. If you can’t change it, change your attitude.” Part of dealing with change in the VUCA business environment is how leaders control their mindset in the face of challenging business decisions. Today’s business world is hyper-connected, so it makes sense that leaders embrace systems thinking as part of their attitude reframe. Systems thinking requires an attitude that sees the whole rather than just the parts, sees patterns of change rather than static snapshots, and understands the subtle interconnectedness of their industry. Of key importance is quickly focusing on what they can control within the system versus what they cannot. Lamenting why changes happen after the fact only adds unnecessary distraction to the need to act on what needs to happen next in real time. Leadership confidence comes from knowing there is much still within their control and contributes to the courage to act!

Recent history in this century alone informs leaders in clear terms that a “wait and see” mindset will only put them behind their competitors who have the courage to act decisively. Leveraging the benefits of critical thinking, continuous learning and the right attitude for winning, leaders will have the relevant, objective facts at their disposal to courageously act on the decisions they have the ability and control to make!

How is courage showing up in your business decisions? If you’re not sure, we can help .

Lead Well!

“A lie doesn’t become truth, wrong doesn't become right...

Tue, 29 Jul 2025 13:51:17 GMT

...and evil doesn’t become good, just because it’s accepted by the majority.”

This quote, attributed to educator, author and orator Booker T. Washington is one of our favorites as it relates to leadership. It is timeless in the sense that it cuts to the quick of the importance of critical thinking to effectively lead in today’s dynamic business environment. It has become quite clear how important critical thinking is to effective leadership as demonstrated by the myriad of social media posts reacting to the recently signed Public Law 119-21, also known as the One Big Beautiful Bill ( OBBB ).

We’ve previously written about the importance of critical thinking which we define as, “A process where leaders question their own assumptions, as well as those of others, using a mix of research, analysis, questioning and exploring new ideas to inform in a way not restricted by the subjective perspectives of peers and/or the status quo”. Throughout our leadership and business practice, we’ve come to realize how many leaders intellectually understand the definition yet lack the know-how to apply it in the context of their leadership roles. Drawing on the work of Zety writer Michael Tomaszewski, we outlined the eight critical thinking skills leaders must know both here and here . Based on what we see in social media reacting to the OBBB, it is clear many leaders need a refresher on these skills!

We only recently finished reading the OBBB in its entirety. While not the most riveting reading, it was important that we actually read what is written in black and while to effectively support our for-profit and non-profit coaching clients. That’s part of the critical thinking skill set that begins with analysis by collecting and processing available information. In this context, reading the actual OBBB such that leaders are informing their next business decisions based on objective facts versus subjective opinions and emotional reactions. That way their interpretation of the facts helps the leader understand the proper context of the situation. In this case, the timing of when certain components of the OBBB go into effect and the impact each has on the leader’s organization.

Which gets us back to the plethora of reactions on social media. It is truly unfortunate how many posts reacting to the OBBB, both positively and negatively are from people who have clearly not read the document. Emotional reactions to such a sweeping action are expected as normal human reactions. However, posting opinions as if they are based on facts out of context is irresponsible leadership!

While it is unfortunate that politics has become such a lightning rod in today’s business environment, being an effective leader mandates critical thinking when making decisions that address the challenges of a VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment. Hiding behind the fear of making the wrong decision or not having enough information for the safest decision is no excuse for not making the leadership decisions to move forward!

How objective is the thinking behind your next leadership decision? If not, we can help .

Lead Well!

“The Calmer You Are, the Clearer You Think…

Wed, 25 Jun 2025 13:55:50 GMT

…Move with Strategy, not with Emotion.”

A common theme we’ve written about since the beginning of the year centers on decisiveness and keeping the proper alignment between the impact of facts and emotions on the outcomes. In recent conversations with clients, this theme continues to headline coaching conversations as leaders navigate the VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment. One such conversation inspired the topic of this discussion around the question, “Are you being thorough or overthinking and how do you know the difference?” Using the title quote attributed to Mickael McIntyre, let’s dive into being thorough versus overthinking in the context of leadership decisiveness.

We define decisiveness as the ability to make decisions quickly and effectively, even in the face of uncertainty. Each of the key words in the definition play a part in differentiating thoroughness from overthinking. Quickly refers to the timing element in that many leadership decisions do not provide the luxury of enough time to make the perfect decision. It is the nature of 21st Century Leadership that the pace of business simply outpaces slow and deliberate decision-making. Effectively refers to the impact of the decision. As there is little chance of ever making an A+ decision for any significant leadership situation, the ability to move the business forward with positive impact with good B+ decisions is important to achieving sustainable success. Finally, uncertainty refers to the quality and quantity of information leaders have at their disposal to make good B+ decision. 21st Century Business is information-rich and knowledge-poor. While leaders can have access to reams of information, almost too much in many cases, it is the uncertainty around having the right information that is the greater challenge!

When leaders are being thorough in their decision-making, they ensure they have access to only the relevant and complete details that matter to the decision. This implies that a strategy exists in which to contextualize the available information into the knowledge details that matter. Organizational strategies provide the guiding conditions that allow leaders to be very efficient in their decision-making as it allows them to quickly disregard information not relevant to the decision at hand. We recently wrote about the need to focus on the organization’s mission given the new business realities and being able to maintain a factual focus on the mission. The leader’s focus on strategy when it comes to timely and effective decision-making is equally, if not more, important to sustainable success!

Overthinking, on the other hand, can take leaders down the path of indecision, inaction, and possibly stress and anxiety. Whereas being thorough focuses on the most important information needed for the decision, overthinkers tend to focus on every detail, no matter how relevant or insignificant. In today’s new reality, not all details are created equal, yet to an overthinker, they are. The absence of an organizational strategy can severely complicate and enable overthinking in that there is no way to differentiate one detail from another on the relevance scale of importance to the business. In an age of complexity, simplicity is often the leader’s secret weapon. Overthinking has the opposite effect in that it complicates simple issues by looking for more information, more time, or more input before making what should be a decisive B+ decision!

Being a thorough decision-maker reflects leadership that plays to win. Being an overthinking decision-maker reflects leadership that plays not to lose. In our experience both in corporate leadership roles and working with business leaders, both for profit and non-profit, what makes the difference between the two are the information systems and communications structures within the business. This experience led us to writing Finding the Missing Piece : The Impact of Effective Communications on Sustainable Success. These systems are tightly aligned to the business strategy such that leaders at all levels have access to the right information at the time they need it and in a manner they can be decisive in how they use it.

How are your leadership decisions playing to win and how do you know? If you’re not sure, we can help .

Lead Well!

Step Up...

Sun, 25 May 2025 14:03:19 GMT

...or Step Aside

It is a well-known fact that leadership is a team sport in that without followership, there is no leadership. When we look at the characteristics that define a team: complementary skills, common purpose and mutual accountability, we find one of these to be easily understood yet the most difficult to execute well. As teamwork requires all three to exist to be effective, we’ll dig deeper into the challenges of mutual accountability!

In our mind, there is nothing worse for teamwork than looking around the table at a team where individually everyone emphatically states they did the job they were responsible for, yet the desired outcomes were not achieved. It is a classic case of a team only holding themselves responsible to their assigned tasks. It can be through a job description, a project plan, a workflow, or any other number of ways that team tasks are delineated.

What is clearly missing is the team’s accountability to each other as a team and to the team’s success. We also recognize how accountability has been unfairly misused as a stick to criticize individuals on teams for the lack of success. What leaders who use this negative tactic don’t understand is that accountability is more of an attitude than a task to be completed.

For example, we challenge leaders to look at a sampling of job descriptions in their organization and report how many times any version of the word “accountable” appears. After seventeen plus years in our leadership and business coaching practice, we are still looking for an organization that passes this simple query, although admittedly some have come close. Yet, the same leaders will not hesitate to hold accountability over their team members without truly understanding what it means. For us, there are two key elements that support a bigger level of mutual accountability on a team, ownership, and trust.

Ownership simply means the team “own” their thoughts and actions. There are no excuses for miscues or misses that affect the team’s mission and desired results. Surely, mistakes and miscues occur on teams, especially in today’s VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment. Team members’ ownership of both the error and the corrections leads to a buildup of the other key element of mutual accountability ~ trust.

We’ve written numerous articles regarding the value of trust in leadership and leading teams. One of the elements of the trust equation forwarded by Trusted Advisor Associates, LLC is the idea of self-orientation. Essentially, high self-orientation means the team member is more concerned about their own interests above those of the team. Conversely, how self-orientation means the team member puts the team’s interest above their own. This level of benevolence is crucial to building the level of trust that creates mutual accountability in an organic way!

Fans of the Star Trek movies will appreciate the words of Spock in The Wrath of Khan when he said, “...the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.” Mutual accountability dictates the needs of the team outweigh the needs of any one team member built on a high level of ownership and trust!

How are you stepping up to lead your team? If you are not sure, we can help !

Lead Well!

“Think like a person of action...

Wed, 23 Apr 2025 14:17:30 GMT

...Act like a person of thought”

As we continue to support our clients in navigating the VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment compounded by the events over the last several months, it inspires us to continue the conversation around how leaders must show up in these turbulent times. We modified the title quote by Henri-Louis Bergson, a French philosopher who was influential in the traditions of analytic philosophy and continental philosophy, slightly by replacing “man” with “person”. Regardless, either way it fits nicely with the overall theme of leaders aligning their thinking with the right actions for their organizations.

Last month, we wrote about the importance of maintaining focus on the organization’s mission so as to not lose sight of why the organization exists. Without question, the need exists for leaders to change how they think and subsequently act in the execution of their strategies. In this discussion, we use as an outline the ideas from Geoff Colvin’s book, The Upside of the Downturn : Management Strategies for Turbulent Times. We’ve referred to this book often in our own business and leadership coaching practice for ideas on managing through tough times and it only seemed fitting under current circumstances to go back to it again.

In Chapter 6 of his book, the author lays out three questions to organize the leader’s thinking around how to reexamine what must change and what must remain constant. We will add our own thoughts to each question based on what we are seeing across both our for-profit and non-profit coaching clients.

What is the core of the business? ~ This was really the conversation that began in last month’s discussion around mission. What is it that makes the business unique in the chosen markets or industry? What is the secret sauce that makes the business what it is? It is easy to get caught up in the woulda, coulda, shoulda conversations of the situation and lose sight of the core of the business. Now is the right time to assess the current actions of the business and see if, in fact, those actions truly are in alignment with the core purpose and mission. The core of the business may be anything from being product centric to being a unique business model that delivers products a different way. Whatever it is, the leader’s ability to put it front and center to current ongoing discussions is paramount.

How is today’s environment changing customers/client/donors and their behaviors? ~ One of the best practices we use with our clients is to revisit their environmental scan every six months. We use a combination of PESTEL (Political, Economic, Socio-Cultural, Technology, Environmental, Legal) external environmental scan along with the SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats) Synthesis to help client leaders organize and document their thinking around the true nature of the changing environment. When leaders are diligent in their focus on why their customers/clients/donors make their buying/giving decisions, they are better prepared to understand how to adapt to the changing times affecting those decisions.

Is the change hastening, or even causing, a large-scale restructuring in the industry and, if so, how does it affect the business? ~ The important thinking for leaders in the context of this question is that the changes are not just impacting their business by itself. These changes have a wider impact on entire markets and industries. While at first blush, this may seem onerous, it actually presents new opportunities in how the strategies are executed. Much like the recent pandemic, the question is how will leaders navigate their business to the front of the industry competitive line when conditions change for the better? By using the similar tools in the previous paragraph, (PESTEL and SWOT), business leaders can once again organize, document and effectively communicate their thinking around how their business can adapt quicker than their competition.

Last year, we wrote about the challenges of trying to solve complex problems with linear thinking . Recent challenges are unprecedented in their complexity as they are happening for the first time in recent history where the solutions may well be ones that are being considered for the first time and without a proven track record. However, like past challenging times, the danger is not the challenge, rather it is thinking and acting on the challenge with yesterday’s logic.

How are you thinking and acting differently to lead your business? If you’re not sure, we can help !

Lead well!

Your mission...

Mon, 24 Mar 2025 14:25:57 GMT

...should you choose to remember it...

Yes, I know, I know, that is not how the line goes from the Mission Impossible franchise. It is a take-off on the original line, “...should you choose to accept it...” as a reminder to leaders at all levels, sizes and types of businesses as they continue to navigate the VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment. We have written about this idea in the past, even going back nearly ten years ago when we used flying a plane as the metaphor. This month, we bring it into a more realistic setting.

Last month , we wrote about leaders focusing on the facts while mitigating emotional over-reactions. One of the solutions we put forward is to avoid reacting to reactions leading to losing focus on the real issue. Granted, there is plenty to react to. Ongoing hiring challenges, political chaos in Washington DC, continued economic uncertainty both domestically and globally, among others can be highly emotional issues. So much so that leaders can lose sight of the organization’s purpose!

Organizational purpose is typically captured in the strategic thinking process by senior leaders. We define strategic thinking as the collective vision, values, mission and strategy of the organization. While many businesses may not have all four created and/or documented, it is fair to say most will have a sense of mission, hence the tie back to the title of this article.

Mission statements are a high-level, tangible representation of what the organization does, for whom the organization serves and a macro-level how the organization does what it does. A mission statement is typically created after senior leaders conduct an environmental scan looking at the social-cultural, political, economic, and technological factors will impact their success. Additionally, senior leaders look at what internal capabilities and capacities provide a competitive advantage under these external conditions.

We have worked with hundreds of businesses both for-profit and non-profit, large corporations and small businesses exposing us to a wide array of mission statements. We have yet to see a mission statement that includes verbiage like, “Make 30% profit margin on global goods” or “Receive 20% of our funding from the federal government”. While these are clearly valid operational goals, they reflect a means to achieve the mission. In a VUCA business environment, they can also become the primary focus when conditions change and making the original goals no longer valid.

By focusing on the organization’s mission, senior leaders are prompted to think differently about how they can achieve their mission. Looking at diversifying revenue and funding sources, for instance, can have positive effects even under adverse business conditions. It helped a small business owner recover from losing 75% of their revenue on one contract cancellation. It helped a non-profit survive a recession when 55% of their funding came from a single government grant. Leaders must think different to do different!

In a VUCA business environment, it is all too easy for senior leaders to react to adverse conditions by focusing on the impact to operations. However, when this happens, there is a slow disconnect between their decisions and the focus on the overall mission. Keeping the mission front and center provides the correct context for how they navigate current conditions and create sustainable success!

How are you focused on your mission and purpose? If you’re not sure, we can help!

Lead well!

“Emotions neither prove nor disprove facts.”

Wed, 26 Feb 2025 14:53:13 GMT

It has been quite some time since we wrote about emotional intelligence and the role emotions play in the effective leadership journey. It is also a time when emotions are running higher than usual with all the chaos in Washington. We use the word chaos less because of what is being done and more about how it is being understood/misunderstood. From our extensive work around effective communications working with leaders at all levels and types of businesses, we see this as one of the first lessons leaders should take away from this situation; communicate for understanding!

Drawing on the title quote from Thomas Sowell, an American economist, economic historian, social philosopher and political commentator, we see heightened emotions from all sides of the current situation. What we don't see as much is the underlying facts supporting the views loudly expressed across the various news platforms, both traditional and non-traditional. It is the facts that leaders must consider when making their key decisions and address as many of the positions loudly expressed as possible. As we wrote about previously , we don't disagree on the facts, we disagree on the interpretation of the facts, usually with a strong emotional attachment.

This situation is a good reminder for leaders to understand the impact of emotional Intelligence on their ability to lead today’s workforce. We reminisce of the days past where nobody cared how we felt about a situation. Today’s workforce, and society by extension, is very different in that feelings are more overt and openly communicated. The four elements of emotional intelligence (self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, relationship management) are a reminder to manage our own emotions as leaders with a keen eye on the relevance of the emotion to the current situation. It also reminds leaders to acknowledge other’s emotions even though they may ultimately be a barrier to a sound business decision.

Along these lines is a common trap that we see leaders fall into and that is reacting to the reactions of others. What can start out as a rational dialog about what is happening in Washington can easily evolve into an emotionally charged argument where sides are taken and emotions run higher than usual. What happens is the discussion becomes one of emotional reactions to the other party’s emotions to the point that the original point of the discussion is lost in the noise. At this point, there is very little value in discussing the facts involved in the discussion, a situation leaders must see unfolding and avoid to be effective.

A topic we’ve written and spoken widely about is the leader’s ability to critically think. We define critical thinking as the process where leaders question their own assumptions, as well as those of others, using a mix of research, analysis, questioning and exploring new ideas to inform in a way not restricted by the subjective perspectives of peers and/or the status quo. Subjective input to most discussions is emotionally based and thus, while certainly containing some element of fact, may provide a skewed interpretation of those facts. One of the easiest ways to manage this for leaders is to be well read on all sides of an issue so they mitigate the wide array of interpretations as well as their own biases on the subject.

Jay Goltz, the author of The Street-Smart Entrepreneur , is quoted in the book saying, “Lesson #18: Emotions can be a leadership asset and a management liability”. When leaders are looking to inspire their teams and rally the organization around a cause, vision, mission or purpose, emotions are quite useful to achieving that end. When the necessary facts are in play to make the right business decision, these same emotions can become a liability as they cloud the objective decision-making process. It is the artful balance leaders must take between emotions and facts to help their teams stay focused on the strategy and achieving desired results!

How are you effectively managing emotions and facts on your teams? If you’re not sure, we can help !

Lead well!

“The greatest danger in times of turbulence is not the turbulence...

Tue, 28 Jan 2025 15:01:32 GMT

...it is to act with yesterday’s logic.”

Happy New Year and welcome to a new year of leadership opportunities in a challenging business environment! As the title quote suggests, we are living and working in times of turbulence as we’ve described in the past using the acronym, VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous). We exited last year challenged with recovering from mother nature’s wrath compounded by the pace of change under the new administration. It is a good time to remind ourselves once again that no matter the level of turbulence, leaders have a responsibility to lead well in the context of the current VUCA business environment.

It is the second part of Peter Drucker’s title quote we are focused on in this discussion. The ability to tackle current turbulence levels with relevant logic is likely the greatest challenge today’s business leaders face. When we work with business leaders, both for profit and nonprofit, small business and corporate, private or public, the common language we use to describe the right types of decisions is around relevance. We consciously avoid describing situations as old or new and today’s or yesterday’s logic. The only thing that matters is how leader’s decisions and actions are relevant in the current context in order to achieve desired results.

How do leaders avoid this dangerous trap of using yesterday’s logic? The first step will always center on recognizing the shift from what was relevant yesterday to what is now relevant today. Peter Drucker’s quote speaks to the danger of yesterday’s logic. However, in our experience, it is the absence of logic altogether or not enough logic to offset the emotional reactions to the turbulence that is an even greater danger. Making the time to objectively assess the turbulence and applying the collective critical thinking of the leadership team to evaluate the turbulence against the current organizational strategy is paramount!

Invariably, the process of identifying the new context will reveal gaps in the leader’s knowledge base to effectively address the turbulence. Thus, the next key to avoid using yesterday’s logic is to learn what relevant logic looks like. We’ve written extensively on the importance of continuous learning for leaders at all levels. In this context, we’re reminded of what Dr. Martin Luther King wrote in a 1947 Morehouse College campus newspaper when he said , “The foundation of education, therefore, is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically.” A leader’s relevant logic is deeply grounded in both of these principles of thinking both intensively and thinking critically supported by their drive for continuous learning!

The final key to avoiding yesterday’s logic is to act decisively based on the outcomes of the first two discussion points above (trend identification and updated learning). Acting with purpose is based on gathering complete and current data related to the current business context and creating specific actions to advance the business strategy amid the turbulence. In most cases, the turbulence affects entire markets and/or industries. Leaders not taking purposeful action in the face of turbulence means they are consciously abdicating market share to their competitors who are!

The turbulence of the current VUCA business environment is, at this point, a constant business leaders must contend with. Having systems in place to capture and characterize the turbulence and to continuously learn how to address the impact is crucial. They set the leader up to act with relevant logic and achieve sustainable success!

How are you acting with relevant logic in this new business cycle? If you are not sure, we can help .

Lead well!

“If you don’t like change...

Wed, 18 Dec 2024 15:17:38 GMT

...you’ll like irrelevance even less.”

One of our all-time favorite quotes from General Shinseki illustrates one of the key challenges leaders face when leading organizational change. More often than not, the focus is on the physical changes the organizations must tackle to achieve their strategy. While important, the psychological changes are the intangible, less measurable definable changes that also factor into the overall success of the change efforts. However, executing a new strategy with outdated operational support elements is the quickest path to irrelevance. As businesses prepare for another business cycle, this idea is critical to their sustainable success!

In our “The Missing Piece” series of books, we define the operational support elements as the people, processes, tools and compensation systems necessary to support the organizational Vision, Mission and Strategy. We will take a look at each of these elements through the lens of relevance in a VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment.

People ~ In our leadership and business coaching practice, we often use the mantra, “It’s not about being employed, it’s about being employable.” In this context, people must have the relevant technical, functional, and people skills to execute the change strategy. A common leadership mistake is to begin by restructuring the organization which is akin to moving the desk chairs on the Titanic. It is more important to know what new soft skills and hard skills define relevance, then executing a development process cementing the new skills that are paramount to sustainable success, especially within the leadership ranks!

Process ~ The Deming Institute estimates over 90% of the problems in organizations are process related (versus people related). Maintaining relevance is a key issue for leaders in that processes are typically not routinely vetted for validity over time. The recent pandemic proved that point clearly. Having an established cadence to review core and supporting processes for effectiveness and efficiency keeps them relevant over time. Even now, with the pandemic in the rear-view mirror, organizations continue to struggle adapting their processes in a hybrid working structure!

Tools ~ As leaders clearly now operate in a digitized business environment, relevance is an ongoing part of the discussion around automation. But to be clear, the relevant tools/technology need to effectively support the relevant core processes, which in turn support the relevant people (soft and hard) skills. The conversation that crosses all three is how artificial intelligence (AI) factors into an organization’s overall strategy. Much of the handwringing about AI is the jobs it will replace. To be more correct, those jobs will be replaced by people who know how to leverage AI to achieve sustainable success. In other words, by people who stay relevant!

Compensation ~ The final operational support element is compensation, both monetary and non-monetary. More and more articles are written around what motivates this new workforce that’s operating in a predominantly hybrid work arrangement. Research continues to show how things like challenging work, recognition and culture are ultimately more important than pay, structure and supervision What’s old is Frederick Herzberg posited this in the late 1950’s with his Two-Factor Theory of Motivation. What’s new is the ever-changing context in which leaders apply these principles to the current hybrid workforce!

This concept of staying relevant is crucial for achieving sustainable success in today’s VUCA business environment. As the expression goes, “If leaders keep doing what they’re doing, they keep getting what they’re getting.” And what they’re getting without constantly adapting is a slow march to irrelevance!

How are you staying relevant as a leader and how do you know? If you're not sure, we can help .

Lead well!

“Everything that irritates us about others...

Sun, 24 Nov 2024 15:22:04 GMT

...can lead us to an understanding of ourselves.”

In our most recent discussion, we spoke of the importance of self-reflection as an integral part of self-leadership. In that discussion, we reinforced our belief that if you cannot lead you, you do not have the right to lead others. In keeping with that general theme in this discussion, we explore the idea outlined in the title quote by the noted psychologist Carl Jung. The thing we least like about another person can very well be the thing we like least about ourselves.

Leaders will always be able to recognize and identify irritations within the teams they lead. Vocalizing these irritations outright in the moment has little redeeming value as there is little backing for why they exist for the leader. However, recognizing these irritations presents an opportunity for the leader to exercise their own emotional intelligence. We define emotional intelligence as the capacity to be aware of, control, and express one's emotions, and to handle interpersonal relationships judiciously and empathetically. Essentially, the leader’s ability to recognize and manage their emotions while understanding the emotions in others to build meaningful relationships.

While recognition and understanding are important elements of the emotionally intelligent leader, so too is curiosity. It is the curious leader who can ask themselves some key questions in the face of irritations before actually responding in the moment. Questions such as, “What is my reaction actually based on?” or “How is my reaction adding value to my own leadership?” among many other possibilities. This combination of emotional intelligence and curiosity can be tough in the moment and feel awkward at first, especially if the irritation in question is significant. We coach our leader clients around PBR in these situations. PBR stands for Pause, Breathe, Respond. Basically, it means to develop an initial response pattern of taking a three-count, take a breath, then respond, preferably with a question!

Here is where the five-step self-reflection process outlined in our previous discussion comes into play. Reflecting on one’s responses to irritations through the lens of self-development creates an attitude of self-confidence and self-compassion that appreciates the work-in-progress status of every leader. The leader’s team benefits greatly from this process. We know from the Betari Box (shown above in the grasphic for this post) that the leader’s attitude influences the leader’s behavior. This behavior in turn impacts the team’s attitude ultimately informing the team’s behavior, the very behavior that drives desired results!

Effective relationships cannot happen if leaders are always waiting for the others to change. Effective leaders own their work-in-progress humanity and make the time to self-reflect and adapt to achieve sustainable success!

What did you learn about yourself the last time you were irritated? If you’re not sure, we can help.

Lead well!

“I’m starting with...

Mon, 28 Oct 2024 15:27:11 GMT

...the man in the mirror.”

In the many years we’ve coached leaders from many different organizations and industries, both for-profit and non-profit, our discussions always begin with self-leadership. We lead with, “If you can’t lead you, you do not have the right to lead others.” The most common visual we use is leading the person in the mirror. In this season of self-reflection, it is the person in the mirror who is the topic of introspection. Hence, the title from Michael Jackson’s 1988 hit song, “ Man in the Mirror ” is appropriate for our discussion around self-reflection!

Much has been written about the importance and value of self-reflection as a means to continuously learn and grow as a person and a leader. What we’ve found are leaders not really knowing how to self-reflect. Intellectually, they understand the mechanics. In practice, it rarely sees the light of day as many of these same leaders are much more focused on the organizational goals in front of them, not fully realizing the value of their self-leadership to achieving their organizational goals.

Self-reflections is a form of personal analysis to bring life into alignment both the derived outcomes and impact. So, let’s explore some of the key elements of effective self-reflection in the context of self-leadership:

Make time ~ Make the time to reflect where there will be no distractions or possibility of being disturbed. The quiet will provide the needed focus on asking the right questions and thinking through the best answers in reflection. Fifteen (15) minutes of focused time is a great place to start!

Ask questions ~ Ask questions that begin with “what” or “how” to begin the reflection process. An example we use often would be, “How can I think about this situation differently?”. Avoid using questions beginning with “why” as that tends to be defensive and can set a negative tone for the reflection process.

Write the answers ~ As answers come up, write them down as they appear. Do not attempt to apply validity appropriates or correctness to the answers as they appear. Writing them down creates a visual record of your thoughts to reflect on. Or, as we say in our coaching practice, “Not written, not real.”!

Select one answer ~ After fifteen minutes, pick one answer from the list of answers that is actionable and will have the greatest upside impact to self-leadership development. It should be something actionable in the short-term, so the reflection process has immediate impact to new leadership attitudes and behaviors!

Act on the new idea ~ Hold yourself to accountability and ownership to the new attitudes and behaviors. Use an outside resource if necessary as we acknowledge humans are generally ill-equipped to hold themselves accountable to change. Intent does not generate results and growth does not happen without action!

Self-reflection is a process enabling leaders to grow their understanding of who they are, better ground themselves in their values, as well as understand why they think and act the way they do. As we outline in our essence of leadership, “What a leader believes, they think. What they think, they do and what they do drives desired results.”!

What is the person in the mirror telling you about your leadership? If you are not sure, we can help .

Lead well!

“If you don’t have a strategy...

Thu, 26 Sep 2024 15:50:48 GMT

...you’re part of someone else’s strategy.”

As we approach the final quarter of the year, many leaders’ thoughts and communications are geared towards next year’s strategy. Critical questions will need answers such as, “What assumptions are we making about the markets and the competition?” and “What are the critical conditions necessary for sustainable success?” as well as “How will we continue to compete in our markets?” I’ve long been a fan of Alvin Toffler who, as a futurist, is one of the writers who had a profound influence on my own leadership thinking. His quote in the title is one of the many examples of his thinking.

In this discussion, we address each of the above questions with insights on how to answer each one. As we believe there is something of an order to how we listed the three questions, we will address them in that order as well.

What assumptions are we making about our markets and competition? ~ There is an expression we use in our coaching with clients around strategic thinking that goes, “Plans are inherently wrong as they are only as good as the assumptions they are grounded on.” No one can accurately predict the future so effective leaders make educated risk assumptions aligned to the external drivers of change and the internal capabilities and capacity of the business itself. The tool we use is the SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats) Synthesis process. Others refer to this as TOWS, but hey, tomāto – tomǎto! Our view of the external environment is based on the PESTEL (Political, Economic, Socio-Cultural, Technological, Environmental, Legal) Environmental Assessment. Those assumptions combined with an objective view of internal capabilities and capacities creates the proper context for the new strategy.

What are the critical conditions necessary for sustainable success? ~ One of the common blind spots leaders have lies in creating strategic objectives primarily based on timelines versus conditions. To use an individual example, a common thought process used by many is determining when to retire. Most will use an age to define retirement. However, we use a set of conditions that define our retirement decision as the conditions are a more predictive variable for success. So too, in the business strategic thinking process, what are the conditions, both external and internal, that need to exist to achieve success. A business leader may state the business will achieve X revenue in Y years. However, without stating the critical conditions necessary to achieve X revenue in Y years, the timeline is arbitrary at best and a recipe for a flawed strategy.

How will we continue to compete in our markets? ~ It is at this point where leaders create specific strategic objectives to execute in the context of the stated (and documented) assumptions and conditions. The strategic objectives direct how the business will win in their respective markets. This is an important distinction as leaders communicate the strategic objectives throughout the organization. There is a crucial difference in stating a production objective by itself and a production objective communicated in the context of gaining market share in their respective markets. Context matters greatly in communicating a sustainable strategy.

The key to success in any strategy lies in how well it is thought out and documented in the context of the new reality. Even more important is how well the business flexes and adapts to changing assumptions and conditions. Failure to address these in the flow of execution and only focusing on the outputs, positive or negative, is to lose the advantage of knowing how effective and sustainable the new strategy really is. It also results in your business becoming part of someone else’s strategy!

How sustainable is your business strategy and how do you know? If you are not sure, we can help!

Lead Well!

What The CEO Wants You To Know

Mon, 26 Aug 2024 16:45:31 GMT

In our most recent leadership discussion, we continue the conversation around the difference between perfectionist leaders and imperfectly excellent leaders through the lens of how they lead their teams. An aspect of leading with imperfect excellence is focusing on both the outcomes and the process by which the outcomes are achieved. A book that we frequently refer to is, What the CEO wants you to know: How your company really works by Ram Charan. All businesses fundamentally work the same, so it is important that leaders truly understand some of the common business principles Ram Charan lays out in this book.

Our favorite parts of the book are chapters 4 and 5. Chapter 4 speaks to understanding the whole business and how all the moving parts work together. By including some basic questions to guide the business leader through, the chapter helps the leader understand how well the business is really working. Chapter 5 is a favorite because it addresses that in this new reality, it is about priorities necessary to cut through the complexity to focus on the things that really matter. It means, by definition, that the business leader must say “no” to something in order to say “yes” to the priorities that matter most. Click here to read more.

Enjoy the book!

Perfectionism is a competition with yourself...

Mon, 26 Aug 2024 16:02:51 GMT

...that you can never win.

Several times over the last nine years, we asked the leadership question, “Are you trying to be perfect or excellent?” In our discussions both here and here , we spoke in general terms of the difference between perfectionist leadership and imperfect excellence leadership. In our leadership and business coaching practice, we continue to see leaders struggle with perfectionist attitudes. In this discussion, we will focus more directly on the marked differences between the two mindsets and the impact they have on effectively leading teams.

Our discussion here will focus on three key areas of team leadership: leading change, team development and team culture/climate. In today’s new reality, these three areas are crucial to successful execution as they align with the three criteria needed to define a true team: common purpose, complimentary skills and collective accountability, respectively.

So, let’s explore each in more detail:

Leading Change ~ one of the greatest challenges for any team is staying aligned to their common purpose in the face of constant change. A perfectionist leader tends to overthink issues and view mistakes as failure, thereby creating a climate of risk aversion on their team. Innovation comes from being able to think creatively which rarely occurs under the jaundiced eye of a perfectionist. A leader who embodies imperfect excellence encourages progress over perfection and is therefore more comfortable with embracing change. These leaders view mistakes as learning opportunities to best achieve the team’s common purpose!

Team Development ~ achieving the right mix of complementary skills on a team requires ongoing development of those skills to ensure relevancy in today’s new reality. The perfectionist leader is prone to micromanage their team and struggle to delegate appropriately out of fear of mistakes. By only focusing on the end goal versus also focusing on the process of achieving the end goal, the team becomes stifled in their collective development. The imperfectly excellent leader, however, embraces the learning process from all angles knowing the team becomes stronger with each learning opportunity. These leaders are comfortable providing a level of team autonomy to allow for the interactive learning process to continuously develop the most relevant complimentary skills!

Team Culture/Climate ~ arguably the most important element of what separates high performing teams from all the rest is how well they hold each other accountable. Because the perfectionist leader has unrealistic expectations of themselves and their team, team morale and trust are compromised in the risk-averse team culture and climate. Without trust, collective accountability simply cannot exist. The imperfectly excellent leader, on the other hand, is comfortable with empowerment and providing ongoing recognition of incremental progress towards their common purpose. This breeds a culture and climate of confidence and trust in each other leading to a higher level of collective accountability by every member of the team!

The idea that a leader has to be a perfectionist to have high standards is nothing but a myth. Leaders with high standards of excellence understand the concept of winning in their markets and industries is an iterative and adaptable learning process. Leaders who adopt this mindset can effectively lead their teams through the challenges of the new reality while creating a culture and climate that develops relevant skills for sustainable success.

How well are you setting your team up to win? If you are not sure, we can help!

Lead Well!

Bill of Rights

Sun, 28 Jul 2024 16:51:45 GMT

A little over four years ago, we wrote a short piece about citizenship and made our recommended reading at that time to be the U. S. Constitution. It gets thrown around in conversations rather loosely and it is apparent that many have not read it either at all or in the last ten years. As we approach another highly contested political climate, the term “rights” is getting thrown around quite liberally by all sides of the political discourse. With that in mind, we are recommending this month’s reading of the Bill of Rights, also known as the first ten amendments to the constitution. We said it then and we’ll repeat it here, leaders read ! Regardless of where you land in the debate, be there because you read the source material and are informed rather than merely repeating what someone else said or wrote! Click here to be informed.

Lead Well!!

You can’t fix systemic issues...

Sun, 28 Jul 2024 16:12:18 GMT

...with linear thinking

A core topic in many of our business and leadership coaching sessions has been the challenge of solving many of the systemic issues 21st Century leaders face. Whether it be in the non-profit space, the small business space or the large corporate space, leaders are challenged to fully understand the root causes of the issues impacting their organizations. From a leadership perspective, one of the key challenges is how the leaders themselves think about the issues. Hence, it was in one such coaching session that the title of this discussion was born.

From the very beginning of our own leadership journey, we’ve embraced and supported the value of systems thinking. Our Business Alignment Maturity Model© is based on the concept as are the five Missing Piece books we’ve published highlighting the application of systems thinking at an organizational level. From Chapter One of our book, Finding the Missing Piece : The Impact of Effective Communications on Sustainable Success, we define systems thinking as a holistic approach focusing on how a system’s components work together, how a system operates over time as well as how it operates in the context of other larger systems.

When we look at linear thinking, then, in the context of the above definition, we can start to understand why linear thinking alone cannot solve systemic issues. Linear thinking is a way of thinking logically based on rationality, logic, and rules and typically follows a sequential pattern and progression. The implication is that one completes a step in problem-solving an issue before moving to the next step. When we consider the most common approaches to solving organizational issues, we think of solving for effectiveness and efficiency in a manner not unlike what is taught in most process improvement training. However, when applied to systemic issues, we can quickly see that a step-by-step process has limited value as each step in the linear thinking methodology has multiple impacts within the system.

Since the late 1960s, the idea of lateral thinking came into play as another way to look at how to address systemic issues. Lateral thinking is a holistic, non-linear thinking style that relies on flexibility in searching for creative ideas and original solutions. It is associated with creativity and innovation, generating and exploring many different ideas to restructure existing ideas and knowledge to develop original models and approaches. In the example above where leaders lean heavily on driving effectiveness and efficiency, we introduce a third complementary measured variable into the discussion. We ask leaders how they are measuring adaptability alongside effectiveness and efficiency. More often than not, we are met with silence suggesting a natural comfort with linear thinking and a lack of understanding in the importance of lateral thinking.

This discussion is not to say that linear thinking is bad. Quite the opposite is true. However, the limitations of linear thinking, when applied to the systemic issues organizational leaders face every day, must be recognized and augmented with developing strong lateral thinking, especially within the senior leadership ranks. In Chapter 10 of their book, Ignition , Gordy Curphy, Dianne Nilsen and Robert Hogan speak to the concept of first loyalty on the senior leadership team. It means that the senior leadership team’s first loyalty is to each other over the teams they lead. The implication of not having first team loyalty is that each leader naturally focuses on linear thinking within their own team to optimize their function while the CEO/Executive Director/Business Owner hopes that it all adds up to a systemic solution for the organization.

Two hard truths to embrace; Hope is never a viable strategy and cumulative linear thinking rarely, if ever, solves systemic issues!

How well are you thinking systemically to achieve desired results? If you are not sure, we can help !

Lead Well!

Here's What I'm Sayin'

Tue, 25 Jun 2024 16:59:33 GMT

Still More Revelations for Making Leadership a Way of Life

Every five years since we started RPC Leadership Associates, Inc, we’ve published a collection of our most popular articles along with several never before published articles. These quick reads are geared towards helping leaders become the most effective leaders they can be through the lens of individual leadership, leader relationships and organizational leadership. Our third installment, “ Here’s What I’m Sayin’: Still More Revelations for Making Leadership a Way of Life” is now available on Amazon here.

What makes this edition special is that we had a lot more to choose from because of the pandemic. During that time, we doubled down on our writing to help inspire and support those leaders who were navigating unfamiliar territory. It was actually harder this time to pare down to the most popular articles to make way for four new, never before published articles in support of leaders in their own unique leadership journeys. Order a copy for yourself or maybe you know a leader who may benefit from a gift of leadership insights that can support their success!

Lead Well and Enjoy the Book!

What’s in it for me?

Tue, 25 Jun 2024 16:18:43 GMT

Last month, we wrote about the impact of consequences and their importance in seeing visible change in skills, behaviors and attitudes. Without them, it is just too easy for leaders and followers alike to fall back into old habits. In this edition, and in response to conversations around change we’ve had with our own leadership and business coaching clients, we will focus on a structure we used both as leader and coach to effectively communicate change.

It stands to reason that as a business strategy evolves, so too do the needs of the business for and from its people. As leaders communicate the new strategy to the organization, how are they also communicating the changes in skills, knowledge, and attitudes necessary to effectively execute the new strategy? How are they winning over hearts and minds to help embrace change at an emotional level?

The format we recommend and follow consists of the five elements listed below and first introduced by Achilles A Asmerakis and Stanley G. Harris in 2002:

Discrepancy ~ help the organization understand the need for change; why the current state of the business is not acceptable and what would happen if no change occurred. This is where consequences have a role to play in helping the organization understand what happens if nothing changes. The leader’s communications must connect with the organization on both a physical and an emotional level.
Efficacy ~ instilling confidence in the organization that they have the ability and skills needed to succeed in the proposed change. This includes communicating both the technical skills required for each function as well as the people skills required to leverage the new technical skills. We are seeing this play out in a very meaningful way as artificial intelligence invades every corner of the business consciousness.
Appropriateness ~ convincing the organization of the appropriateness of the change to win their minds and hearts, normal resistance notwithstanding. Effective leaders are rarely surprised by some level of resistance to change. Resistance to change is a normal human condition so leaders must embrace it and communicate in a way that resonates on a human level and addresses the specific reasons why the resistance to the change exists.
Principal Support ~ demonstrate to the organization the requisite resources and commitment are in place to see the change through to institutionalization. The challenge of change is easier to accept when leadership provides and communicates the means to succeed as an organization. We see this in organizations that minimize the chaos of change by investing in retraining existing employees rather than firing those with less relevant skills and hiring all new employees with newer skills.
Personal Valence ~ help the organization understand how the change impacts them personally and how they fit into the new scheme of the business, including their roles in the transition. Everyone listens to WIIFM (What’s In It For Me) Radio so leaders must proactively and openly communicate what can be shared as to the impact of the change. A key element of success here is to treat this as a series of conversations versus a one-time event.

The last bullet point brings up a challenge many leaders struggle with when communicating change. “What if I don't know the answer to their questions?”, they ask. Our answer is always the same. Tell them what you can and if you do not know the answer or cannot tell them because of confidentiality, then tell them that as well. Our experience tells us that the more up front the organization knows what to expect as far as the skills, knowledge, and attitudes they will need in the new reality, the more they will ultimately embrace the change itself. Springing it on people at the last minute where they have little time to react and process the new information only creates more problems than it solves!

How well are you communicating changes to your team and how do you know? If you are not sure, we can help!

Lead Well!

No consequences...

Mon, 27 May 2024 16:30:29 GMT

...No change!

In our goal-planning work we facilitate with our leadership and business coaching clients, a key element of the process is documenting the rewards and consequences attached to any specific goal. Whether it is an individual, a team, or an organizational goal, we look at the rewards of achieving the goal and the consequences of not achieving the goal. This process is critical to establishing why the goal is important to the individual’s, team’s or organization’s success. These rewards and consequences always exist for any goal. What doesn’t always exist is the full understanding leaders have as to the impact they have on achieving the desired results.

Psychology tells us people are more motivated by consequences than they are by the equivalent number of rewards. This is due to the impact of fear, survival, immediacy, and conditioning to name a few. What we’ve encountered in our leadership and business coaching practice is the struggle surrounding a leader’s ability to recognize and manage the consequences in any giving situation. Generally speaking, we see two scenarios that routinely come to light with clients. The first is identifying and clearly communicating the consequences of a given situation. Secondly, the ability to enforce the known consequences and the difficult conversations that usually ensue. Let’s take a closer look at each and what leaders can do in each scenario.

Identifying and communicating the consequences of a given situation typically involves situations where change is introduced. Humans inherently will resist change to some degree. Thus, consequences of the change are the ones that individuals conjure up in their WIIFM (what’s in it for me) thinking. Leaders have a responsibility to effectively communicate the consequences of staying the same as the driver of change as well as the consequences of the change itself. In the absence of this communication, the tendency is to go through the motions and ultimately fail to reap the benefits of the change. No consequences, no change!

In the scenario where the consequences are clearly present, there exists a challenge for leaders to facilitate the difficult conversation that typically accompanies enforcing them. In our work with clients and MBA students around working with conflict in the workplace, it is estimated that close to 80% of people choose avoidance as their first reaction to conflict. As we dig deeper, we find a few trends related to why this occurs. Most common is leaders don't have the vocabulary to effectively manage both the substantive and emotional elements of conflict. Closely related is the emotional strength to carry the conflict discussion to a proper end, thus giving way to a more watered-down version of the situation. Both scenarios typically result in an out-of-integrity situation which literally erodes the leader’s credibility. No consequences, no change!

We can all remember either being on the receiving end or the giving end of the phrase, “Because I said so.” In days gone by, that might’ve worked without further discussion. In today’s workplace, not so much. Change, which is a constant in today’s new reality, has consequences that must be recognized, communicated and managed by leaders. Whether at an individual, a team or an organizational level, if there are no consequences, there is no change.

How are you managing consequences on your team? If you are not sure, we can help!

Lead Well!

Accountability is the glue...

Mon, 29 Apr 2024 19:13:55 GMT

...that ties commitment to the final result.”

This month’s discussion is inspired in part by recent events in the world of sports. We recently witnessed exciting college basketball final four tournaments with the women’s tournament setting overall viewership records. We also watched the NFL draft as 32 professional football teams take steps to predict and perfect their team’s future success. With that in mind, we turn our thoughts to a much-discussed topic in our leadership and business coaching practice: accountability.

To quote a post that has made the rounds on social media (original author unknown) and goes:

Bad teams are not held accountable.

Good teams are held accountable by the coach.

Championship teams are held accountable by each other.

It aligns quite nicely with our definition of a team as, “A group of people brought together to use their complementary skills to achieve a common purpose for which they hold themselves collectively accountable.” It is the last point on collective accountability that is the essence of what separates the top performing teams from the rest in both sports and business.

We also define accountability as an “attitude of ownership” in whatever the leader says, does, decides, etc. it differs from responsibility in that responsibility is focused on tasks and actions while accountability is people focused. So, let’s break down the earlier quote in the business team context.

Bad teams are not held accountable ~ Individually, very few people show up to work to consciously make mistakes or fail in their job. Yet, when mistakes do happen (and they always will) those same individuals will look to others to blame or deflect the blame for their mistake. When leaders allow this behavior to linger, it is the sure sign of a bad team. Favoritism, poor goals and expectations and constant unresolved conflict are all signs that the leader is leading a dysfunctional team or not a team at all. As the expression goes, “ The culture is only as good as the worst behavior the leader tolerates .”
Good teams are held accountable by the coach ~ In a business sense, a team that depends on their team leader for accountability, regardless of what level in the organization they manage, may also not be a team. Often times, business groups better fit this description. That is not to say groups are any less effective than teams, they just do so in a different context. In the same manner that we defined a team earlier, we define a group as, “Two or more individuals, interacting and interdependent, who have come together to achieve particular objectives.” Notice this definition does not include collective accountability. Rather the accountability comes from the group leader and is focused more on an individual one-on-one basis and sometimes with the group as a whole.
Championship teams are held accountable by each other ~ Three of my favorite sports coaches who promote team accountability and achieved championship status are recently retired Nick Saban of Alabama football fame, Mike Krzyzewski of Duke men’s basketball fame and the late Pat Summit of Tennessee women’s basketball fame. While collective accountability sounds like a great idea, it is very difficult to achieve. According to Gordy Curphy of Curphy Leadership Solutions, only 20 percent of business teams are high performing. One of the biggest challenges is the team holding themselves accountable to a set of goals expectations and norms that are agreed to by the entire team in both words and actions.

The title quote of this discussion from Bob Proctor sets the stage for the ongoing importance of true accountability on every business team. In my past leadership roles, I’ve had the opportunity to lead what I would consider two high performing teams by any measure. What made these two teams special is their desire to self-manage and lean on each other for the good of the entire team above themselves. That is what true collective accountability means and is the secret to achieving desired results and sustainable success as a team!

How is your team holding themselves accountable to win? If you are not sure, we can help!

Lead Well!

If you stay ready...

Mon, 25 Mar 2024 19:17:37 GMT

...you never have to get ready.

In a recent discussion with other buiness owners, the topic of luck came up as a point of conversation and the impact it has on business success. One of the owners related the title quote of this article her grandmother shared with her to help navigate the ups and downs of owning one’s own business. While variations of the quote are attributed to an actor, an athlete and a rapper, this version immediately resonated as great leadership knowledge in today’s VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment.

In Michael E. Gerber’s 2004 book, The E-Myth Revisited , he highlights the concept of working on the business versus working in the business. This is a great place to begin the discussion regardless of the type of business a leader leads. Whether a for-profit or non-profit, public or private, corporate or small business, the degree to which leaders work on their business is the degree to which the business will stay ready. In our leadership and business coaching practice working with leaders from all business segments mentioned previously, we’ve identified several keys to successfully staying ready by proactively working on the business.

Know the Industry: It is easy for leaders who are not consciously focused on working on the business to get pulled into the day-to-day issues every business deals with. This inward focus takes the leader away from the looking outward to understand the industry and market trends affecting their business. It is not a luxury to know these trends, it is an absolute requirement. Ignoring this fact literally puts the sustainability of the business in jeopardy by not being ready and being slow to react to market and industry shifts!

Be a Problem Finder: One of the most common attributes leaders identify with is that of being problem-solvers. They see problems and issues and resolve/solve them for the good of the business. While we clearly understand the positive aspect of being a problem-solver, we also know that getting caught up in the reactive activities of problem-solving can detract the leader from proactive problem-finding . Knowing the market and industry trends means looking for the potential issues and challenges that might affect the business either now or in the future. When leaders embrace a problem-finding attitude, they are more likely to stay ready for what comes next!

Think Critically: Critical thinking is an essential leadership skill in a VUCA business environment. The ability to question and challenge existing conventional norms and the status quo ahead of the reactionary curve of change helps leaders make critical business decisions. Last year, we covered the eight essential critical thinking skills here and here . These skills run the gamut from analyzing the market and industry trends to actually making the decisions necessary to maintain a sustainably relevant business. The decisions necessary to stay ready for what comes next!

Thinking and acting reactively means the business is, at best, in the middle of the competitive pack. The leader’s ability to keep their businesses relevant and ready depends on both their proactive attitude towards thinking critically as well as their actions to make the timely decisions to stay ready and in front of their competition!

What decisions are you making to help your business stay ready? If you are not sure, we can help!

Lead Well!

"The needs of the many outweigh...

Mon, 26 Feb 2024 19:46:30 GMT

...the needs of the few...or the one.”

Over the last few months, this dialog between First Officer Spock and Captain Kirk in the 1982 movie, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan , keeps popping up based on many of our coaching conversations thus far this year. If you are a fan of the genre, then you know the circumstances behind the brief dialog between these two characters. The reason it keeps coming up is it highlights one of the key challenges all leaders face in a VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment. The challenge of leading through competing performance tensions in the business!

While the quote speaks to competing tensions between the many versus the few or the one, the idea of competing performance tensions is not new. What is new is the context in which these tensions reveal themselves as leaders navigate the new reality of today’s business environment. The three performance tensions, identified by Dominic Dodd and Ken Favaro in their 2007 book, The Three Tensions , are: Profitability versus Growth, The Short Term versus The Long Term, and The Success of the Organization as a Whole versus that of its Individual Parts. The secret to sustainable success is for leaders to not look at these tensions as either/or rather as both/and. We will look at each of these in a more recent context and what leaders must consider in their decision-making thought processes.

Profitability versus Growth: Growing margins AND top-line revenue is challenging on a good day and can be daunting in today’s VUCA business environment. However, we find that one of the biggest obstacles to achieving success in these competing tensions is old thinking. Leaders get comfortable with how profitability and revenue growth were achieved in the past. More than likely, this success was achieved in better times without much effort or thought into how the success was achieved. It’s what we call: success by accident. We recall a time in a previous corporate leadership role where the team achieved double digit gross margin improvement, double digit client satisfaction improvement and double-digit client renewal improvement all within the same fiscal year. It required very different thinking from past successes such that the past did not prevent a different future. In short, leaders must think different in order to do different!

The Short Term versus The Long Term: The definition of what is long term versus short term has changed dramatically over the last five to ten years, especially in the post-pandemic new reality. We remember the days of the five-year plans of old to now leaders struggling to get comfortable with a three-year strategy. Regardless of timeline, the philosophy of making the right short-term decisions with the long-term impact in mind still holds true. The assumption here is the leaders have a defined vision with enough long-term clarity to see where the short-term decisions connect. An additional challenge here is leaders making most of their short-term decisions proactively. When most of their near-term decisions are made reactively in response to external and internal forces, there is typically very little alignment to any long-term goals!

The Success of the Organization as a Whole versus that of its Individual Parts: This is the tension we are seeing more than the other two, especially among senior leadership teams. In chapter 10 of their 2019 book, Ignition: A Guide to Building High-Performing Teams , authors Gordon Curphy, Dianne Nilsen, and Robert Hogan address the unique aspects of senior leadership teams. One of the key challenges on these teams is what the authors call First Loyalty. Where does the senior leadership team’s first loyalty lie, with the team they are on or the teams that they each lead. The most frequent response by far is the latter. However, if the first loyalty is to a part of the organization, how can the leadership team collectively and collaboratively lead the whole organization to achieve desired results and sustainable success? They can’t!

A VUCA business environment presents many challenges to leaders as they navigate the new reality. Part of the new reality is that the right decision today may very well need to be changed tomorrow as the assumptions and conditions of the original decision change. However, it is still necessary to make these new decisions through the context of how they impact all elements of the entire business, now and in the future!

How are your recent leadership decisions impacting your business tensions? If you are not sure, we can help!

Lead Well!

“Content is the King...

Mon, 29 Jan 2024 19:50:25 GMT

...Context is the Kingdom."

We’ve written extensively on the importance of context in leadership ranging from effective communications to critical thinking to effective decision-making. We recently came across the title quote in an article by Dave Ulrich as yet another reminder of the importance of context over content for effective 21st Century leadership. Additionally, we’ve actively embraced artificial intelligence (AI) as an important support tool for our leadership and business coaching practice. One of the key lessons in using AI (ChatGPT in this case) most effectively is the ability to leverage the right prompts or questions to support the issue at hand.

Recently we had a conversation with ChatGPT and asked it the following question:

What are the top 3 tips to ask ChatGPT great questions?

The response back is listed below without edits:

Be Specific: Provide clear and specific details in your question. Instead of asking vague or broad questions, narrow down the scope to get more focused and accurate answers.
Provide Context: Give ChatGPT context about your question to help it understand the background and purpose. Context can be crucial for generating more accurate and tailored responses.
Ask Open-Ended Questions: Frame your questions in a way that encourages detailed and informative responses. Avoid yes/no questions, as they may result in brief answers. Open-ended questions encourage more in-depth exploration of the topic.

What immediately came to mind was how familiar these answers are in the many coaching sessions, workshops and even books we’ve read and written around effective communications! We know that effective communications is the biggest issue in business leadership today with the largest impact being the proliferation of unclear expectations between leaders and followers. With that in mind, let’s break down each of these suggestions in the context of being a more effective communicator as a leader:

Be Specific: Probably one of the most challenging communications challenges is leaders being specific enough in their expectations to their teams. Throughout my executive leadership career across multiple industries and organizations, my communications guideline was always based on, “The more specific the ask, the more specific the outcome”. However, it doesn’t mean that leaders must go through every detail of the ask. It does mean the intended outcome must be clearly understood so the team can operate within that intent. By way of example, we were recently working with a group of leaders who were actually saying the same thing without realizing it and the tone was taking a turn to frustration. When the discussion turned to specifics about what each was saying, the clarity brought the conversation back to a constructive outcome!

Provide Context: We live and work in an information-rich, knowledge-poor world. Leaders are constantly bombarded with content, a situation actually enabled by tools such as ChatGPT. It is therefore a crucial skill of leaders to provide contextual meaning to their expectations to enhance the understanding of their followers. One only has to look at the prevailing leadership development processes as an example of the importance of context. Merely attending training on a specific skill or set of skills is a first step in actually improving one’s leadership skills. Developing those skills in the context of the work through coaching, mentoring, assessments, etc. is the only way to ensure the skills are being leveraged for the overall success of the teams and business!

Ask Open-Ended Questions: Another one of our frequently used communications guidelines for effective leadership communications is using open-ended questions to create a discussion versus a conversation that feels more like an interrogation than a discussion. There are six ways to open with a question, Who-What-Why-Where-When-How. Any question that begins with Who, Where or When can be answered with one word or few words answers. We coach our client leaders to avoid Why questions altogether. Unless the tone of the question is spot on (and it rarely is), the conversation can get defensive. The best two ways to open a question that is most likely to generate a meaningful discussion are What and How questions. It is the reason we end every newsletter and blog with an open-ended question beginning with either of these two words!

ChatGPT is merely a tool that enhances the information flow to its user. As such, it is only as useful as the user’s ability to optimize its power. Replacing a hand saw with a power saw in the hands of a lousy carpenter only results in faster screw-ups! Leaders must master the art of effective communications before tools like ChatGPT can support effective communications and create sustainable success for their organizations!

How well do your followers understand their kingdom? If you are not sure, we can help!

Lead Well!

“The purpose of today’s training...

Mon, 18 Dec 2023 19:58:51 GMT

...is to defeat yesterday’s understanding."

As leaders make time to plan for the next business cycle, we’ve noticed a common theme both in our coaching conversations as well as in general conversations not directly related to coaching. Leaders are quick to delve into the operational plans for their businesses and organizations. However, when the asked about their personal leadership development plans, the conversations suddenly go silent or taper off significantly. Thus, this is the theme for this month’s discussion around how leaders must think more broadly when it comes to planning for sustainable success in a new business cycle.

The title of this month’s discussion is from the 17th Century Japanese philosopher, Miyamoto Musashi. He is also a noted strategist, swordsman and ronin. He is credited with developing a unique style of swordsmanship, a feat he could not have accomplished by continuing to use the yesterday’s understanding of his time. So too, leaders of this century must continue to adapt to this VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment of the present day!

Business plans, along with their associated sales, operations and financial forecasts, are only as accurate as the assumptions and conditions they are built on. So too are the leader’s individual and team development plans leading into a new business cycle. What assumptions and conditions are leaders making about how relevant their leadership is in a VUCA business environment? Specifically, what is the current understanding of what it takes to consistently succeed in this environment? How are leaders thinking critically about how they are leading themselves, their teams and their organizations?

Of course, the answers to these questions will generate a training and development plan to ensure the leader’s understanding is relevant to the current environment. Using tools such as the PESTEL (Political, Economic, Social-Cultural, Technology, Environmental, Legal) Analysis of their business, leaders understand the context in which they lead. For instance, what individual development does the leader need to ensure they are leading from a level of trust by their followers? As we work with leaders in our coaching practice, one of our favorite questions in response to the leader’s assessment is, “Based on what?” The intent is to validate the level of critical thinking on the leader’s to effectively inform their conclusion!

Often leaders find themselves in situations where they simply do not know how to address certain aspects of the many challenges of 21st Century business. It is in these situations where training and development can close the gap. Training to close the leadership skill gaps such as effective communications, managing conflict and priority management to name but a few. Development to apply those new leadership skills in the context of their business to create a new level of understanding and thinking that informs new possibilities for sustainable success. For instance, when the conversation turns to innovation, an often-forgotten concept is that leaders must think different to do different. Only when they think different can innovation come to life!

As leaders across all types of businesses set their plans for the next business cycle, training and development of themselves and their leadership teams is crucial for sustainable success. Whether for-profit or non-profit, public or private, small boutique or large global corporations, as the saying goes, “Knowledge is not power. Applied knowledge is power.”

How are you training to defeat yesterday’s understanding? If you are not sure, we can help !

Lead Well!

“...Inspire through values...

Mon, 27 Nov 2023 20:03:27 GMT

...and motivation takes care of itself."

One of the most visible effects the current VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment has been the impact on organizational culture. We define organizational culture in our leadership and business coaching practice as the shared set of Values, Beliefs, Norms and Attitudes within an organization that guide the Behavior of its members. At the foundation of this definition are the core values of the organization that become the guiding principles of its leaders as they model the desired culture.

What we’ve observed over the last four years is less about the values themselves and more about the struggle leaders face in aligning their core values to the desired culture. The title quote from Tony Hsieh, the late founder of Zappos, highlights the point. When we look at the relationship between values and culture, we can state it in simple terms as Values + Alignment = Culture. With that in mind, let’s explore why alignment is so critical to achieving the desired organizational culture.

Organizational values are the guiding principles used by leaders to set the foundation for how to conduct their business. They inform key decisions leaders must make to achieve the sustainable identity and success of the business. As my friend John Blumberg, author of " Good to the Core " and " Return on Integrity " says, “Having Core Values will cost you. Not having them will destroy you.” Leaders must make difficult decisions, especially when the likelihood of revenue growth conflicts with what the organization stands for. It is in these situations where alignment of values plays a key role!

Alignment very much corresponds to the integrity leaders display in how their behavior echoes their stated core values. As we’ve written in the past , leaders don’t really know what they believe until they have to believe it and act on those beliefs in a very visible way. There was a well-known organization whose stated core values were: Communications, Integrity, Excellence and Respect. Of course, these were the published core values of Enron and we know how that story ended. No effective leader knowingly wants to be labeled as out-of-integrity, the term used when actions and words do not align. Misalignment with core values creates a lack of trust by the followers who, like all humans, put more stock in the leader’s actions than in the leader’s words when the two are in conflict.

The key to creating effective alignment with organizational values is for leaders to define up front what each value looks like in action. In our leadership and business coaching practice, we ask leaders to describe what each of their core values looks like in practical terms. In the book, “ It’s My Company Too ”, the value of respect at Tasty Catering is told through an actual story that became the inspiration for the book’s eventual title. Without behavioral expectations that are consistently socialized throughout the organization, each value is open to interpretation leading to a culture that is out of alignment with desired results!

Every organization has a culture. The question is whether it is the desired culture needed for sustainable success. In our own executive leadership experiences, our primary stated cultural norm was adaptability. In that context, our leadership team had to consistently model what we defined as adaptability for our teams to believe in, and embrace, the desired culture. When we stated we would evolve (read: change) every six months so as to not become complacent, we had to ensure the integrity of our words. In the eleven years of executive leadership across three organizations in two different industries, we never missed a six-month evolutionary change!

In all four of our Missing Piece books, we highlight the impact of alignment. In our fourth and most recent installment, “ Finding The Missing Piece ~ The Impact of Effective Communications on Sustainable Success”, we were inspired by the challenges leaders faced at the outset of the pandemic in effectively communicating to their organizations across all levels of leadership.

These challenges had a direct impact on their efforts to maintain their culture in alignment with their core values, a struggle that arguably still exists today!

How is your culture aligned to your organizational values? If you are not sure, we can help!

Lead Well!

“..., you have to be immune to criticism, but...

Mon, 30 Oct 2023 20:08:34 GMT

...at the same time, responsive to feedback.”

We find this distinction between criticism and feedback to be an interesting topic as we coach our client leaders through the many changes occurring in their businesses. In a VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment, it is easy to take any negative input, whether from internal or external sources, as a personal affront. The skill of the leader is to know the difference between criticism and feedback as the title quote from Deepak Chopra suggests. His entire quote above is, “The biggest insight is that if you want to be successful, you have to be immune to criticism, but, at the same time, responsive to feedback, which are two different things.

In our leadership and business coaching practice, we routinely facilitate coaching around the differences between the two so we are using this month’s discussion to share some thoughts on how leaders can effectively leverage this difference to stay focused on providing feedback in lieu of criticism to their teams. The foundation of these ideas comes from the work of the Center for Values-Driven Leadership at Benedictine University.

So, for leaders to provide effective feedback they must:

Focus on what they want, versus what they don’t want ~ In light of an issue or challenging situation, it is all too easy to launch into all the things about the situation that the leader does not want or like. While it makes sense to call out the actions that do not add value to the situation, a leader’s feedback must focus on what they do want or need going forward. Even starting out with criticism with the intent to eventually get to the feedback can fall flat if the negative is too much of the focus of the conversation!

Focus on the desired future, versus the past ~ In a similar vein as focusing the conversation on what is needed, the leader’s feedback must focus on the desired future in order to promote forward change and progress. By focusing on the desired future, leaders can avoid the trap of getting caught up in a situation that is likely emotionally charged, by bringing up past issues that may not even be related to the current situation!

Focus on desired strengths, versus weaknesses ~ Ask most anyone to self-critique without detailed prompting and more often than not they conjure up their blind spots more so than their strengths. When leaders provide feedback that leverages team member strengths needed to overcome the existing blind spots, they support a more balanced and productive outcome to the feedback process. It supports the team member’s efficacy in their belief they can respond positively to the feedback!

Focus on inspiring forward progress, versus deflating in the now ~ The operative word here is inspiring as feedback done well will have that level of impact on the team members receiving the feedback. This does not suggest the change needed is not discussed in detail. It does suggest, similar to focusing on strengths, the conversation leaves the team members feeling as if they clearly have the ability to improve based on the leader’s feedback!

Focus on the “we” solution, versus “you” are the problem ~ When leaders provide feedback that creates a “we” solution, it negates a feeling of isolation by the team members receiving the feedback. It is far too easy for insecure leaders, either consciously or sub-consciously, to isolate errant team members as a problem on the team. It is especially important in this case for leaders to realize when mistakes on the team occur, the leaders themselves carry a key part of the ownership of creating and supporting the “we” solution!

The second part of the Deepak Chopra quote reads, “When you are not immune to criticism, you take it personally. You will be offended for the rest of your life, and that will interfere with anything you want to do. At the same time, it is important to be responsive to feedback, because, sometime, the critics are right, as long as you’re not offended.” As leaders, it is crucial to learn to provide effective feedback to their teams as the means to achieve desired results and sustainable success!

How is your team receiving your feedback? As criticism? If you are not sure, we can help!

Lead Well!

“It’s not who is right...

Mon, 25 Sep 2023 20:33:50 GMT

...but what is right, that is important.”

As we continue to focus many of our writings on critical thinking and the leader’s ability to set direction for their teams, this quote from Thomas Huxley rang true on so many levels. We continue these discussions in the context of operating in a VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment. It is a recurring theme because we continue to see and hear about business leaders struggling with change and conflict they feel they have limited control over. It stems from a frequent chorus of leaders struggling with what should be, versus what actually is, the current reality!

In tough situations, it is not uncommon for leaders to hear themselves and other leaders lament the current situation through the lens of, “it could/would/should be this instead of that.” or “It isn’t supposed to be like this”. While these statements carry an element of truth in that the leader saying it can be right about what they are saying. So what? If the leader cannot correctly frame any challenging situation in its current reality, then they are clearly not going to effectively lead in the realm of what’s right.

When this happens, we see two common solutions leaders need to address when they find themselves in these situations:

React to the Actual Situation ~ In our coaching practice working with leaders at all levels of leadership and in all industries both for-profit and non-profit, a common situation involves conflict around how to deal with a specific issue or situation. Often times these situations are reactionary and thus carry a high emotional quotient within leadership communications. As we delve into these situations, we find all too often the leaders are reacting to the reactions of others involved in the situation and have lost touch with the original issue. It is a classic case of the conversation turning from what is right to who is right about how to deal with the given situation. To overcome this urge to react to the reactions, leaders must keep the core issue front and center so that when the emotions run high, and they will, the collective discussion does not waver and become more about the reactions and less about the right solution!

Be Accountable with Ownership ~ The second situation we often see is when leaders are reacting or responding to an issue and not keeping the discussion focused on accountability and ownership to find a solution. We find first and foremost that many leaders do not understand the difference between responsibility and accountability. Additionally, we work with several clients who have a negative perception of accountability due to past experiences where it was used too much as negative motivation. So, whether leaders call it accountability or ownership, there is a distinction between that and responsibility. When the discussion focuses on responsibility, it is too easy to focus on who is right and who is wrong based on their given responsibilities. It is very frustrating to be in a discussion where everyone claims to have “done their job” yet the problem still persists. It is at this point that collaborative ownership around what is right for the whole is the only way to actually resolve the issue!

We would be remiss if this discussion did not address a key reason for leaders wanting to be right. Simply put, they don't want to be wrong! Yet, to address what is right may well highlight that certain points of view are, in fact, not correct. Effective leadership communications is about all parties understanding the issue in the same context. The only way to do that is to put personal agendas aside and collaborate around what is good for the whole team, organization or business!

How are you focused on what’s right as a leader, even if you may be proven wrong in any given situation? If you are not sure, we can help!

Lead Well!

“A different world cannot be built...

Sun, 27 Aug 2023 20:42:58 GMT

...by indifferent people.”

A recurring theme in our writings this year center on critical thinking and the leader’s ability to set direction for their teams in the context of operating in a VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment. It is a recurring theme because we continue to see and hear about business leaders struggling with change they feel they have limited control over. Using the title quote attributed to Peter Marshall, former chaplain for the U.S. Senate in the late 1940s, we continue to explore effective leadership in a VUCA business environment.

Indifference is defined as a lack of interest or concern in a given situation. It is being apathetic in a situation and is a clear reflection of the leader’s attitude. This is an important distinction as part of the challenge of effectively leading change is thinking it merely involves doing different to get different results. It is a common misconception by not realizing and understanding that doing different must begin with thinking different. A leader’s attitude of indifference and apathy is a core issue in the VUCA challenge!

What does indifference look like? We see two common scenarios in our coaching practice:

Doing nothing different in hopes of a self-correction ~ “Hope is not a Strategy” is a mantra prominently displayed on our website homepage and heard frequently by our clients. We find this reaction is borne out of not knowing what to do combined with a risk tolerance for change that is out of alignment with the needs of the business. While it is true the business continues to be stacked with challenges, it is reality, not an anomaly. Embracing the challenge as reality forces the leader to act proactively and not falling back on hope as a strategy!

Being apathetic to change ~ Change, by definition, is emotional and impacts people on a deep psychological level. A term we learned many years ago in this context was “ heart-count ” instead of “headcount”. The term reflects the team’s emotional engagement versus their merely physical engagement. A leader’s ability to recognize and respond appropriately to the emotions in play beyond the visible behavior are critical to their effectiveness as a leader. This recognition and responsiveness applies to not only their team’s emotions, but to their own emotions as well. This heightened level of emotional intelligence allows the leader to fully lean into the critical success factors of change leadership!

So, what is a leader to do under these conditions? We’ve written previously about VUCA 2.0 (Vision, Understanding, Courage, Adaptability) introduced by Bill George, former CEO of Medtronic. From where we stand, the entire process of effectively leading change begins with vision. In our leadership and coaching practice, we spend a good deal of time helping our clients create a vision, revise their existing vision, or merely reconnecting to their existing vision as a means to center themselves on their purpose. It is nearly impossible to be indifferent as a leader when there is clarity and alignment to the core purpose of why the business exists!

We’ve all heard the familiar definition of insanity, doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. Being proactive in a VUCA business environment begins with the leader checking their own attitude to ensure they are not directly or indirectly modelling an attitude of indifference. Rather, they are consciously and courageously maintaining an attitude of understanding and adaptability centered around their organizational vision!

How are you leading differently to achieve desired results? If you are not sure, we can help!

Lead Well!

“Are you a GPS...

Sun, 23 Jul 2023 20:47:00 GMT

...or a Compass?”

One of the common topics that routinely comes up in our executive coaching discussions with senior leaders, is understanding the distinction between strategic leadership and operational leadership. It is an important distinction that we’ve outlined in all our “ Missing Piece ” books. Recently, I watched an interview with Ken Frazier, former CEO of Merck & Co. who touched on this topic. During the interview he used the title phrase as his way of making the distinction, especially for leaders in the C-Suite.

We define strategic leadership as the level of leadership that sets the direction for the organization. This includes creating and socializing the vision, mission and values of the organization. It also includes creating and executing the strategy for the business and how the business competes in its markets and industries. It is typically the realm of the leaders at the top of the organization. The CEO, Executive Director, Business Owner are the lead strategic thinkers in their businesses who rely heavily on their lead teams to collectively create the direction towards achieving the strategy and becoming the vision!

Operational leadership, on the other hand, are the leaders who ensure the organization has the capacity and capability to execute the strategy. This includes ensuring the business has the right people, processes and tools (read technology) in place to create sustainable desired results. This is typically the realm of the leaders who report directly to the senior leadership team (strategic leaders) as they have a view of the strategy as well as a view of where the business meets the clients/customers/donors. This dual view provides the alignment between the strategy and tactical goals and actions required for sustainable tactical execution!

With that in mind, let’s explore the idea of senior leaders acting as a GPS or as a Compass and the impact both have on the business:

Senior Leadership as a GPS ~ By now, we are all too familiar with the value of a GPS app that gives step-by-step and turn-by-turn directions to our destination. It can be tempting for senior leaders to establish the Why (vision and values), the What (mission and strategy) AND the How (operational leadership) to ensure the outcomes are achieved. However, when senior leadership takes on the operational leadership mantle, they create two serious negative consequences. The first is that it relegates operational leadership down further to focus on tactical operations and the day-to-day tactics and actions. This directly hampers the development of the leadership team as a whole because the senior leaders are now doing the operational workload. Secondly, senior leaders are now neglecting their strategic leadership responsibilities to the detriment of the overall business. In a dynamic business environment, being distracted from strategic leadership negatively impacts the entire business!

Senior Leadership as a Compass ~ With the proliferation of GPS apps, we rarely see a compass used any longer. I would venture to say that there are some who don’t know what the N, E, S, or W located somewhere on the vehicle dashboard actually means. Strategic leadership is all about using the compass to establish and socialize the Why (vision and values) and the What (mission and strategy). Effectively communicating the desired direction to the rest of the organization allows both operational leadership and tactical leaders to do the work of executing the strategy through their plans and goals to achieve the desired outcomes. As Ken Frazier said later in the interview, senior executives have the least effective view of what we call “ground truth” so why would they have an over-active role in the How? Trust the operational leaders to do their work without having to get permission every time an important operational decision needs to be made. I learned this lesson early on as an Area Vice President for Sprint Business with a senior team of six directors and forty-three managers covering a nineteen-state territory of nearly $1B in revenue. It would’ve been impossible to achieve the strategy if I tried to lead like a GPS!

In a VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment senior leaders have a heady responsibility to create the right direction as well as continuously adjust the direction to account for the fluid nature of business change. They can ill-afford to take their eyes off the compass and must trust their operational leaders to fully leverage their GPSs to achieve sustainable desired results!

How are you fully leveraging your operational leaders? If you are not sure, we can help!

Lead Well!

Dialog is about learning...

Mon, 26 Jun 2023 20:59:22 GMT

..Debate is about winning.

We’ve spent a good deal of time of late speaking to the importance of critical thinking for 21st Century leadership to achieve sustainable success. In the new reality of the VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment, the leader’s ability to separate the information wheat from the information chaff is crucial. As important as critical thinking is to effective leadership, the ability to both share and evolve their thinking with their followers is just as important!

In this discussion, we outline some key ideas from our own experiences to enable critical thinking starting with the ideas from the title. We’ll begin with dialog:

Dialog is about Learning ~ We all intellectually know that learning can’t occur if the leader is always talking and not listening. It occurs at the outer edge of the leader’s knowledge which we wrote about several years ago here . True dialog requires effective listening (not just hearing) such that the leader understands “ground truth” within their organization. It begins with the leader’s attitude oriented to being open-minded and willing to put aside what they think they know about any specific situation. Inherent in doing this well is communicating their assumptions initially before communicating any decisions. Speaking last has also proven effective to avoid the impact of the status effect. Lastly, rewarding and recognizing those who share alternate ideas and insights fosters a level of psychological safety that supports an effective learning dialog!

Debate is about Winning ~ Not a day goes by in the business world where disagreement will not occur. As we coach teams, we position conflict as both a human dynamic to be managed (vs. eliminated) and that conflict is not always destructive or negative. However, when a leader’s attitude focuses on always being right or winning the conversation, then the ensuing debate will most likely be destructive in nature. From our experience, to avoid the trap of wanting to be right and the ensuing confirmation bias, leaders must consciously focus on the core issue versus on the specific points put forth by others in the discussion. This helps avoid the trap of finding fault with other’s input and seeing the value of input not yet known by the leader. When leaders leverage their power position to enable open discussion of ideas and options, the greater their followers feel vested in the team’s overall success!

Be Curious, not Judgmental ~ For those who follow the show “Ted Lasso”, they will recognize this quote from the show. Judgmental leaders are quick to opine before understanding the entire story. We wrote about curiosity as having its own reason for existing several months ago and you can read it again here . Curious leaders are comfortable asking powerful open-ended questions to learn what they don’t know about any given situation before weighing in on their decision. We coach our leaders to leverage questions that begin with “What” or “How” to engage in effective dialog. Questions that begin with “Who”, “When”, or “Where” typically get answered with short answers that actually suppress dialog. More often than not, questions that begin with “Why” will turn an open dialog into a defensive debate and lose the opportunity for additional learning to occur!

We work in an information-rich, knowledge-poor business environment. The leader’s ability to leverage critical thinking to understand the true context of a situation is key to sorting through the noise. It enables them to make effective knowledge-based decisions that directly contribute to the overall sustainable success of their team!

How are you leading your team with dialog versus debate? If you are not sure, we can help!

Lead Well!

Don’t practice until you get it right...

Mon, 29 May 2023 21:05:40 GMT

...Practice until you can’t get it wrong.

Sustainability and spaced repetition are joint themes deeply embedded in our coaching practice since day one. Sustainability is mentioned in all seven of our books and spaced repetition is built into our attitude change platform/practice. In fact, a good portion of our coaching practice is helping our clients focus on repetitive practice to develop new attitudes, behaviors, and skills.

In this discussion, we take a look at how repetition factors into the key elements of business leadership. We will explore the value of repetition as it pertains to leading people, managing resources and creating value regardless of whether the business is for-profit, non-profit, small business, large corporation, public or privately held. Let’s get started with the most important aspect of business leadership: leading people.

Leading People ~ In any business, people are the heart and soul of the sustainable success of any business. In today’s dynamic new reality, attracting and retaining the right people for the business is an ongoing challenge. The new generation of workers have different expectations than the work force of ten or twenty years ago. The repetition required to retain and lead today’s workforce must be inherently baked into the business culture. As culture is defined as the values, attitudes, norms and beliefs that influence the behavior of the workforce. What is repeatedly modeled and/or tolerated by leadership will set the cultural tone of the business, for better or for worse! You can see more about culture in this short video .

Managing Resources ~ In a practical sense, we’ve always viewed resource management as an optimizing (vs. minimizing) process. In particular, we focus on how waste can be eliminated from the day-to-day operations. One of our more popular business workshops speaks directly to the seven wastes (defects, waiting, motion, inventory, overproduction, overprocessing and transportation) and how waste can be reduced through streamlining. Effective, Efficient and Adaptable systems are optimized to produce repeatable outcomes. The repeatability includes the leader’s routine monitoring of resources in real time as well as establishing a repeatable cadence in which the systems are evaluated for relevancy!

Creating Value ~ Creating sustainable success in today’s dynamic business environment is about creating repeatable value. The opportunity lies in the evolving definition of value in the eyes of key stakeholders, both internal and external. What was valuable to employees, clients, donors and investors five years ago is different than value defined in today’s terms. The leader’s key responsibility is leading their business to deliver tangible value (think measurable impact) through the many evolutions of what value entails. As the expression goes, the best investor in a business is repeat clients/donors!

Leaders create sustainable success by addressing the repeatability of their business on the actions that matter most. They model a culture that routinely inspires the workforce. They manage resources at a cadence that optimizes their contribution to the business while mitigating all possible waste. And they create value that differentiates their business from the one-hit wonders to being a hall of famer!

How are you ensuring your business can’t get it wrong? If you are not sure, we can help!

Lead Well!

“Those who cannot change their mind...

Mon, 24 Apr 2023 21:08:39 GMT

. ..cannot change anything."

This quote from Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw leads us into this month’s discussion and part two of our discussion around critical thinking skills. Last month , we introduced the first four of eight critical thinking skills. This month, we discuss the last four critical thinking skills identified by Zety writer Michael Tomaszewski earlier this year.

Last month, we focused on the skills that support the leader’s ability to make the best decision under their present conditions and assumptions. In our current discussion, we focus on the skills that support the leader’s execution of their decision and their ability to flex their decision when the conditions and assumptions change! Before we dig into these four skills, as a reminder we define critical thinking as, “A process where leaders question their own assumptions, as well as those of others, using a mix of research, analysis, questioning and exploring new ideas to inform in a way not restricted by the subjective perspectives of peers and/or the status quo”. With that in mind, the next four critical thinking skills are:

Explanation : A leader’s ability to effectively communicate their decision is crucial to the overall success of the decision itself. Effective communications is defined as the sender and the receiver understanding the message in the same context. Invariably there will be those who question the decision, either out of a need for clarity or out of outright fear. The ability of the leader to effectively communicate their findings and reasoning clearly and succinctly will help answer those questions consistently and objectively. This is also why the first four skills are crucial in that they help formulate the narrative that supports the leader’s decision!

Self-Regulation : The ability of the leader to self-regulate means they are constantly monitoring and correcting their thinking based on the changing conditions and assumptions. The implication is that leaders are continuously challenging their sources and assumptions in the context of what is currently in front of them. Military combat leaders are trained extensively to self-regulate their thinking as the conditions on the battlefield shift dynamically and in very dramatic ways. One could argue the business battlefield that we’ve previously defined as VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) is need enough for leaders to develop this crucial critical thinking skill!

Open-Mindedness : Closely related to self-regulation is the ability of the leader to be open-minded to changes in their original thinking. A leader who effectively monitors their own thinking may still feel they, and they alone, must have the answer to what the new thinking suggests. Open-mindedness means the leader is comfortable accounting for other possibilities and points of view from their team. The clear implication here is that effective listening is imperative to developing this skill. It means they are not only challenging current thinking of others, but are also open to their own thinking being challenged by others!

Problem-Solving : The final critical thinking skill is the leader’s ability to problem-solve around unexpected problems as well as the conflict resolution that comes with the unexpected. It is that rare occasion that the original decision plays out perfectly from the moment it is made! Therefore, leaders must have the comfort level with flexing in the moment and yet never lose sight of the reason the decision was made in the first place. This skill reminds me of a key lesson learned when I was learning to fly airplanes. No matter what is going on in the cockpit, never forget that job #1 is to fly the plane !

These four critical thinking skills focus on the leader’s ability to execute and flex in their decision-making process to determine the best way forward. They outline key activities that inform the decisions leaders make each and every day in a VUCA business environment. And while there is still a role to play for AI-informed technologies, the leader leverages these technologies to support their critical thinking before, during, and after they make their decisions!

How are you leveraging critical thinking to execute your business decisions? If you’re not sure, we can help.

Lead Well!

“Curiosity has its own...

Wed, 29 Mar 2023 21:10:23 GMT

...reason for existing."

The title of this month's article is actually the second half of an Albert Einstein quote that reads, "The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing." We introduced thinking differently as a lead-in to innovation last month which we also know is a function of curiosity. As we continue our conversation around diversity of thought, we will speak directly to the importance of critical thinking. Even now, as the conversation around Open AI and ChatGPT ramp up to a fever pitch, the need for leaders to understand the importance of critical thinking has never been more crucial!

We define critical thinking as, "A process where leaders question their own assumptions, as well as those of others, using a mix of research, analysis, questioning and exploring new ideas to inform in a way not restricted by subjective perspectives of peers and/or the status quo." In this month's discussion, we will address the first four of eight critical thinking skills identified by Zety writer Michael Tomaszewski earlier this year. These four skills focus primarily on what critical thinking skills the leader needs to effectively make decisions based on their own critical thinking.

Analysis : The ability of the leader to collect and process information and knowledge is a crucial first step in effective critical thinking. The important attitudinal element of analysis is that it is a continuous process. In a VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment, thinking that decisions are based on static events can end up being a fool’s errand. Effective analysis is an ongoing process where the leader is constantly gathering new information either based on new events or simply to continue validating the information they have on current events. The easiest way we’ve used in our own experience is taking Albert Einstein’s words to heart and never stop questioning!

Interpretation : The ability of the leader to conclude the meaning of processed information they have available to them becomes the next import critical thinking skill. In our coaching practice, we often refer to the DIKW (Data, Information, Knowledge, Wisdom) Cycle when facilitating or coaching around effective communications. The DIKW Cycle helps leaders fully appreciate the difference between content and context. For instance, it is common information that a tomato is a fruit. However, knowledge prevents us from putting a tomato in a fruit salad. Similarly, leaders know that information by itself (financial reports, operational reports, etc.) have limited value until their meaning is fully understood!

Inference : Now the leader must assess whether the knowledge they have is sufficient and reliable to support their decision-making process. Here is where the leader’s decision-making and decision risk come into play. One of the best pieces of advice as a young executive was from my then leader who advised me to make my best B+ decisions. His meaning was that we had to acknowledge that there would rarely, if ever, be a time when leaders have all the information needed for an A+ decision. Rather, understand when there is enough information to make the decision and acknowledge that forward progress on a B+ decision where other information would follow is better than no progress waiting for the perfect decision!

Evaluation : Having information available to the leader still necessitates that they have the ability to make decisions based on the available information. Being a Leonardo de Vinci fan, there is an expression attributed to him that says, “Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Being willing is not enough; we must do.” Hiding behind fear of making the wrong decision or fear of not having enough information for the safest decision is no excuse for not making the leadership decision to move forward. Action is the way forward for any leader and being able to take the newfound knowledge and decide is the action their followers are expecting!

These first four critical thinking skills focus on the leader’s ability to formulate and decide what is the best way forward. They outline key activities that inform the decisions leaders make each and every day in a VUCA business environment. Certainly, there is a role to play for AI-informed technologies. However, the leader leverages these technologies to make very human decisions!

How are you leveraging critical thinking to support your business decisions? If you’re not sure, we can help.

Lead Well!

Diversity of Thought...

Sun, 26 Feb 2023 21:17:50 GMT

...is the Wellspring of Innovation

Last month, we wrote about thinking differently as a means to develop new habits and behaviors in order to continuously evolve as business leaders. Based on the response from that article, we decided to continue the theme and expand on it through the lens of diversity and critical thinking. The title inspiration comes from multiple articles and social media posts we came across in our research for this article. The essence is leaders must think different to do different. So, let’s break it down on how leaders can think different.

Demographics vs. Psychographics ~ The essence of truly understanding diversity of thought, or cognitive diversity as its also referred to, is leaders recognizing different attitudes people hold. A team can look diverse based on demographics related to age, gender, race, education, etc. However, if the diverse demographics converge into a single psychographic based on similar attitudes, then the full value of diversity is not fully realized. Diverse psychographics related to attitudes, beliefs, values and personality, etc. can be the single best strategy to combat the real enemy of business – the status quo!

Importance of Critical Thinking ~ We define critical thinking as, “A process where leaders question their own assumptions, as well as those of others, using a mix of research, analysis, questioning and exploring new ideas to inform in a way not restricted by the subjective perspectives of peers and/or the status quo”. Effective business leaders are those who can challenge their own, and others, prevailing assumptions and perceptions about how the business must evolve. In order for this to work, however, there must be a high level of psychological safety within the business culture. Based on Tim Clark’s book , “The 4 Stages of Psychological Safety”, the highest stage is Challenger Safety which is the level in which leaders and their teams challenge the status quo with high intellectual friction and low social friction!

Innovation from Adaptability ~ Innovation is classically defined as doing things differently. We also know that in order to do different, leaders must think different. We have always viewed thinking different through the lens of adaptability. Every organization we led in our business career was grounded in a culture of adaptability. We define adaptability as the quality to adjust to new conditions or the capacity to be modified for new purpose. Treating adaptability as a critical attitude for success and embedding it into the culture, leaders have the ready-made platform to innovate in the VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment they operate in!

One of our favorite quotes is, “Discovery consists of seeing what everybody has seen and thinking what nobody else has thought” by the Nobel Laureate, Albert Szent-Gyorgyi. It summarizes the essence of the alignment between the importance of a leader leveraging cognitive diversity applied critically to identify where the business can adapt and innovate for sustainable success!

How are you thinking different about leading your business? If you’re not sure, we can help.

Lead Well!

“I never thought of it that way”

Mon, 23 Jan 2023 21:21:36 GMT

As a business and leadership coach, these words are music to my ears! When I’m asked the usual question at networking events, “What do you do?”, I answer with, “We’re in the attitude adjustment business.” More often than not, it catches the asker by surprise. Yet, truthfully, it completely captures our goal when working with our clients, to help them think differently about what it takes to lead in the VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business world we operate in.

We enter a new business cycle with some existing challenges (rising interest rates, supply chain issues, etc.) and new challenges (impact of inflation, etc.). To that end, leaders must embrace the idea of thinking differently about what is possible given the current economic, socio-cultural, political and regulatory conditions affecting their markets and industries. As we work with our for-profit and non-profit clients to think differently, we identified several common themes, regardless of type of business and/or market.

Stop Coping, Start Flexing ~ In a VUCA business environment, it is easy to get caught up in a coping mindset. Coping is fundamentally a “play not to lose” defensive-minded attitude. It is focused more on not losing ground versus flexing to gain ground. Flexing is a near-term “play to win” offensive-minded attitude that looks at possibilities in spite of the current conditions and obstacles that may exist. While the ultimate attitude we look for in leaders is adaptability, having a flexing mindset is a great start! How are you flexing your business in this new year?

Challenge the Status Quo ~ By definition, growth, and the change that growth demands, is venturing into space the organization has never been to. That is likely the main reason it is difficult for leaders to challenge their thinking where they are comfortable. Throughout my own career, I’ve used variations of two simple questions to begin a conversation around getting beyond our collective comfort zone. We would challenge ourselves to answer, “What if ...?” and “Why not...?” to identify new ideas and potential obstacles which is still the staple of our goal planning process! How are you challenging the status quo in this new year?

Experiment ~ One of the most valuable lessons learned in my many years of leadership in multiple industries and at multiple levels is to always have some level of experimentation in play. We may have called it a pilot program, a beta test or something that sounded less scientific, but we learned always to try new things looking forward. Experimentation allows leaders to constantly revise their assumptions about what is possible under different business conditions. It also sets a great example to the organization they lead that the status quo is never the acceptable end game! How are you trying new things in your business in this new year?

Thinking different is paramount to success in today’s business environment. To think the same, yet try to act different, is not sustainable and old thinking will ultimately prevail. To think otherwise is the definition of insanity!

How are you thinking differently about how you are leading your business? If you don’t know, we can help !

Lead Well!

Optics...

Sun, 18 Dec 2022 21:25:08 GMT

...or Outcomes

Several months ago, I was having a coaching conversation with a client where the conversation went down a path of how a situation looked versus how it was in reality. In that moment, it occurred to me how impactful that concept was to leaders of any organization! To be able to separate perception of how a situation or issue looks or feels from the factual truth about a situation or issue is the level of critical thinking crucial to effective leadership.

As we put these words to paper, most leaders are winding down the current business year and putting the final touches on their plans for the next business year. If they are like our clients, they’ve documented the strategies, operation and tactical successes for the past year. In addition to the summary of success, we press further to have leaders document what they base their successes on. This prevents a success narrative that begins with statements such as, “We feel like we did...”, or ”We think that we accomplished...”, or “It looks like we achieved...”. In our view, these are optics statements that are begging to be challenged with factual validation. As the expression goes, “If you can’t measure it, did it really happen?”!

As leaders put their final touches on next year’s strategy, and associated operational and tactical plans, it is important to remember the level of metrics that tell the complete story of organizational success. As a refresher, we look at the multiple layers of metrics that align to produce business impact. At a tactical level, processes produce outputs. When we combine processes into a collection of systems, outcomes are the output of these systems. Finally, when people apply these outcomes through the lens of the organizational vision and mission, then impact happens. Processes produce outputs, systems produce outcomes and people produce impact!

So, as leaders look ahead, they must focus on all the three. When leaders only focus on process outputs, the results of each process are out of alignment with each other creating friction within the system. When development outputs in a non-profit are misaligned with program outputs, systemic outcomes cannot be achieved. When sales outputs are out of alignment with customer service outputs, systemic outcomes cannot be achieved!

This brings us to the importance of systems alignment. If we assume the process outputs are aligned within the systems, leaders must still address the question of impact. What impact are these outcomes having? If you are a non-profit leader of a food bank for instance, what measurable impact is providing food having on the community at large? If you are a leader of a national services organization for example, what measurable impact is providing those services having on the clients and/or communities? The conversation does not stop at outcomes, it ends with how the outcomes are leveraged for sustained impact!

Business alignment is about creating a business narrative giving leaders the ability to communicate success in a tangible and meaningful way. Just because the business feels good or looks good, does not mean it is having the desired impact. That impact can only be a product of measurable outcomes, not optics!

How are your business outcomes creating impact? If you don’t know, we can help!

Lead Well!

“Execution is the ability to mesh strategy with reality,...

Sun, 20 Nov 2022 21:28:49 GMT

...align people with goals and achieve the promised results”

One of the organizational planning best practices we use with our clients is beginning the process with a look back at what was accomplished in the current year. We look at how many of the goals were accomplished and what percentage of the desired results were achieved. This sets the stage for the leader’s communications narrative of what is being carried over to the following year as well as what needs to be added to continue to grow as an organization. In Chapter 6 of our most recent book , “Finding the Missing Piece: The Impact of Effective Communications on Sustainable Success”, we focus on the communications involved at a tactical level and why it is critical to the effectiveness of an organization’s overall communication strategy.

Drawing on the definition of business alignment as the process of matching the organization’s tactics to the available or readily acquirable resources to achieve its strategic objectives, we will focus on the organization’s tactical communications needed to achieve the strategic objectives. In leveraging tactical communications, leaders focus on defining the goals that align directly to the strategy, the scientific methods used to measure progress and the desired results needed for sustainable success. To that end, tactical communications is unique in its application than the strategic communications which we addressed two months ago and operational support communications which we addressed last month.

Goals ~ Nothing creates more confusion in the VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment that is the post-pandemic new reality than the lack of clarity around goals and expectations! Goal planning is having a written set of actions and commitments leading to goal achievement. In chapter 6 of our, “The Missing Piece” books, we outline the ten steps to our goal planning process to give leaders a means to organize their thoughts and actions around how to achieve both their individual and/or organizational goals. Like any documented process, it also provides the communications narrative leaders use to discuss their intent with each goal as well as specific actions necessary for goal achievement!

Scientific Methods ~ All effective leaders understand the importance of informational metrics in their ongoing tracking and decision-making process. While intuition, experience, “gut-feeling” and other forms of subjective decision-making inputs may play a role, objective metrics play a crucial and necessary role in the leader’s ability to effectively communicate goal progress. While metrics help inform the story of what is really happening in the business, it is the context around the metrics that informs how the story is told. The format we coach our client leaders to organize their information is The Balanced Scorecard created by Drs. Norton and Kaplan. Consisting of four key areas (Customer, Financial, Business Processes, Learning and Growing), each area is supported by four criteria that help organize the information and enable knowledge-based decision-making!

Desired Results ~ It stands to reason at any given point in time, the actual results will not align to the desired target. It is in these discussions where some of the most important business decisions are made to course correct the business. It is in these discussions effective leaders understand what is controllable and what is not controllable. This ability helps the leader understand what part of the course correction conversation is based on reasons (uncontrollable) and what parts are based on excuses (controllable). The goal is to begin the discussion around each metric that is lagging with, “We have not met the goal due to <insert reason here> and here are the adjustments we are making.” This approach signifies accountability and is a healthy discussion around what key decisions are needed to course correct. As opposed to, “We couldn’t meet the goal because <insert excuse here> and we can’t move forward until it changes.” This approach focuses on blaming others and shows a lack of accountability to flexing and adapting to the current conditions. One only has to look at the recent pandemic for evidence of leaders in both scenarios!

If we think of the Strategic Thinking Process as communicating the WHY of the business and the Operational Support Elements as communicating WHAT the business needs to succeed, then Tactical Execution is focused on communicating HOW the business will achieve its desired results. It speaks to the execution from the title quote from Larry Bossidy and Ram Charan from their book, “ Execution ” that helps align strategy to reality!

What will your tactical narrative sound like for your business leading into the new business year? If you’re not sure, we can help.

Lead Well!

“Trust is the glue of life.

Mon, 24 Oct 2022 13:22:09 GMT

It’s the most essential ingredient in effective communication.”

As business leaders start looking at how this year will end and begin planning for the next year, the words of Stephen Covey in the title ring true as leaders develop their new operational plans. Operational planning is comprised of the four guiding elements of the business: People, Process, Technology and Compensation. In Chapters 4 and 5 of our most recent book , “Finding the Missing Piece: The Impact of Effective Communications on Sustainable Success”, we focus on the communications involved in operational planning and why it is critical to the effectiveness of an organization’s overall communication strategy.

Drawing on the definition of business alignment as the process of matching the organization’s tactics to the available or readily acquirable resources to achieve its strategic objectives, we will focus on the available or readily available resources needed to achieve the strategic objectives. In leveraging operational communications, leaders focus on defining the people, processes, systems, milestones and conditions needed to be successful. To that end, operational communications is unique in its application than the strategic communications which we addressed last month and tactical communications which we will address in next month’s blog article.

People ~ The most important element of the organizational structure is its people and having the right people in the right seats within the organization. With a new strategy in place, it is important that leaders clearly and concisely communicate the necessary skills, knowledge and attitudes to achieve the new strategy. Additionally, as leaders communicate the necessary attitudes, it is important that the desired behaviors associated with the attitudes are clearly understood. It is important to understand the communications around attitudes and behaviors not only helps the existing workforce evolve to the new strategy, but also supports the organization’s recruiting, hiring, and onboarding processes. Of course, the most important criterion for success lies not only in how leadership communicates these attitudes and behaviors, but models them as well to the rest of the organization!

Process ~ Statistically, the W. Edwards Deming Institute estimates that over 90% of the issues in any business are process related! What many leaders are missing is mistaking process issues for people issues and trying to “fix” people when, often it is the processes the people are given to work with that are less than optimal. Effective communications within this structural element rests on two related factors. The first is communicating the flow of the process as it moves horizontally through the organization and vertically within different departments and business units. Of note are communicating the key handoffs that occur between business units where most of the clarity is dropped. The second is the universal understanding of the process language. When everyone involved in the process understands the moving parts and actions the same way, the process can deliver on the promise of desired results!

Technology ~ To continue the discussion from the previous paragraph around process, technology plays a crucial role in ensuring the communications from people and process is as efficient and effective as possible, while still being adaptable to changing business conditions. This is achieved through the combination of effective information technology in concert with an effective level of operations technology such that the leader’s intentions, both stated and implied are understood in the context in which they were given. In our business coaching practice, we have found one of the best ways to bring it all together is to engage with those who do the work in the process using the technology in the improvement process. When associates are engaged and included in process improvement and technology enhancement discussions, they not only have a sense of ownership in the outcome, but also become evangelists for the new processes and/or new technology when it launches to the rest of the organization!

Compensation ~ The last piece of effective operational communications is Compensation which is further compartmentalized into monetary and non-monetary rewards. This is a direct link to the motivation associated with achieving sustainable success and serves as a reminder to leaders that motivation is not just about money. The discussion around motivation in the context of today’s VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment cannot happen without a discussion of trust. Trust in leader’s communications is based on the level of credibility the leader has in their words, the level of reliability they have in their actions and the level of psychological safety at an emotional level. When leaders’ communication clearly reflects the good of their team over their own personal agendas, then trust will be a positive factor in achieving sustainable and desired results!

These Operational Support Elements are the critical link between the Strategic and Tactical operations of the business alignment process. They must exist in alignment to reduce the friction that naturally occurs between people, processes and systems. For leaders to neglect the importance of these elements is to set their organizations up for less-than-optimal success!

What will your operational narrative sound like for your business leading into the new business year? If you’re not sure, we can help.

Lead Well!

Making Numbers Count

Thu, 20 Oct 2022 17:02:06 GMT

This month, we highlight the value of tactical communications in the planning process around goals, metrics and desired results. With the focus on knowledge-based decision-making, we also highlight a book that has helped us become more comfortable with communicating numbers as leaders. In, “ Making Numbers Count ”, Chip Heath and Karla Starr outline a process that helps leaders not only understand the numbers, but more importantly communicate the numbers in a way that resonates with the audience both logically and emotionally!

Our favorite section of the book is titled “Use Emotional Numbers ~ Surprising and Meaningful ~ To Move People to Think and Act Differently”. It is a powerful set of ideas in short and easy-to- understand chapters that help the reader quickly understand the authors’ idea. The authors use plenty of examples that also aid in the reader grasping the main idea in a way that also makes it easy to apply to their business. For instance, in the chapter on comparatives, the authors suggest instead of saying “Their center is 7’8” tall”, use the phase, “Their center is 2 inches taller than Yao Ming”. These types of examples are peppered throughout the book to make it easy to understand and apply!

Enjoy the Book!

“If you don’t know where you’re going...

Mon, 26 Sep 2022 13:27:56 GMT

..any road will take you there.”

Many will recall this classic line from Lewis Carroll’s “Alice in Wonderland” in the conversation between Alice and the Cheshire Cat. As business leaders start looking at how this year will end and begin planning for the next year, it is important they plan through the lens of strategic thinking. Strategic thinking is comprised of the three guiding elements of the business: Vision, Mission, and Strategy. In chapter 3 of our most recent book, “ Finding the Missing Piece : The Impact of Effective Communications on Sustainable Success”, we focus on the strategic communications involved in strategic thinking and why it is critical to the effectiveness of an organization’s overall communications strategy.

We define strategic communications as the actions involved in communicating the long-term purpose and direction of the organization. To that end, strategic communications is unique in its application than the operational and tactical communications which we will address in the next two month’s blog articles respectively.

Vision and Values ~ At its very foundation, the purpose of any organization begins with its vision depicting a future state of the organization. It is not THE future as no one can accurately predict the future. Rather, it is a desired future based on why the organization exists in the first place. In his best-selling book, “Start with Why”, Simon Sinek makes a compelling case for the importance of understanding why the organization exists, regardless of whether it is a for-profit or non-profit, public or private, large or small or any other combination that can define a business. What is uniquely important about communicating a vision is how it evokes an emotional response from the organization itself such that they want to willingly join the journey into a future they’ve quite possibly never been before. At an organizational level, individual and organizational values help support the emotional element of strategic communications. When leaders align their communications to the core values of the organization and/or the core values of the people in the organization, they enjoy a much higher level of success in followers embracing the yet-to-be-experienced future!

Mission ~ With the organization’s vision ready to communicate to all its stakeholders, the organizational mission becomes the next piece of the Strategic Thinking process. Where the vision denotes the organization’s purpose, the mission presents a more tangible picture of that purpose. Specifically, the mission denotes in more detail what the organization does, how the organization does what it does and for whom the organization does what it does. Together they form the organization’s “What” in the Strategic Thinking process. The most important element of effectively communicating the mission is that it is communicated in the context of the vision. The great thing about the mission is it provides rich content for strategic communications the leader will use to inspire the organization. The leader builds a narrative using the SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats) Analysis providing a structure to identify the tangible pieces of information behind deciding what the mission must be to be competitive. This gives leaders the ability to answer questions and concerns from the organization as they emotionally attach to the changes in front of them!

Strategy ~ The third piece of the Strategic Thinking process is the organizational strategy. Strategy is how an organization plans to compete in their markets or industries. Again, this is true for non-profits and for-profits, public and private sector and both large and small organizations. Every business has competitors, so it is crucial that leaders outline how they are going to compete in a VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment. What is important here is the strategy becomes an extension of the SWOT Synthesis process. The SWOT Synthesis process takes the SWOT Analysis information referenced previously to understand the business at a contextual level by creating knowledge from the original SWOT Analysis. This allows the leader to strategically communicate “How” the organization is going to achieve the mission (what) and the vision (why) identified previously in the strategic thinking process. It not only provides leaders with a narrative on what the organization will do to compete but also what the organization will not do to avoid getting distracted from achieving the desired results!

Effectively communicating strategically is the process of setting the organization up for success. The key to effectively communicating strategically lies in the understanding the leader simply cannot communicate all the details of how the organization will compete. Rather, the leader communicates enough of the strategy at a level we call “leader’s intent” meaning there is enough of the strategy shared with the organization that the next level leaders and/or operators know the direction the organization needs to pursue to achieve desired results. Generically, the new narrative sounds something like, “This is how we will execute our strategy in order to accomplish our mission in order to become our vision”!

What will your strategic narrative sound like for your business leading into the new business year? If you’re not sure, we can help.

Lead Well!

“The ability to learn faster than your competitors...

Mon, 29 Aug 2022 13:38:31 GMT

...may be the only sustainable competitive advantage.”

It is the time of year where many organizations are starting to plan for the continued success of their business. Whether for-profit or non-profit, large national corporation or small local business, the challenges of maintaining a sustainable and successful strategy continue to challenge leaders at all levels. Leaders continue to navigate a VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment laced with supply chain issues, employee retention, political unrest, and economic inflation to name a few.

The inspiration for the framework of this month’s discussion is an article in the most recent issue of Harvard Business Review titled “ Strategy-Making in Turbulent Times – a Dynamic New Model” by Michael Mankins and Mark Gottfredson. Right up front I’ll argue whether their model is new or not, a point the authors even acknowledge as true for parts of their recommendations. However, the five elements of the structure are valid in the context of today’s challenges for business leaders to effectively compete in their markets, the very core of strategy!

Define extreme but plausible scenarios ~ Scenario planning is one of the ideas that is not new. However, think scenario planning on steroids based on the VUCA conditions. Regardless of the tools used to conduct environmental scans such as a PESTEL (Political, Economic, Socio-Cultural, Technology, Environment, Legal/Regulatory) Analysis, the contextual understanding of the scan must be viewed and analyzed through an extreme, but plausible lens. These are not times to shy away from the true market conditions of the new reality!
Identify strategic hedges and options ~ Strategies are only as good as the assumptions they are built on. Creating the right strategic options is about identifying the best possible options as well as the right time to exercise those options. This is playing out in real time in the real estate market with interest rates climbing. Many options for growth are now being put on hold for better timing to exercise them. Leaders who effectively exercise this strategic flexibility will have their organizations in the best position to adapt in this new reality!
Experiment before investing ~ Experimentation is an activity all businesses must get comfortable with. In our experience in variety of leadership roles, it was continuous experimentation that enabled our organizations to continuously evolve and grow. A friend recently shared a speech by Peter Kaufman titled, “The Multidisciplinary Approach to Thinking”. One of the key tenets of the article is the idea he called, Dogged Incremental Progress, an approach used by Berkshire Hathaway. Experimentation helps fight complacency and gives business leaders a flow of new ideas to continuously evolve in this new reality!
Identify trigger points, signposts, and metrics ~ One of the flaws in looking ahead at future events is thinking along timelines. A great example from our coaching practice is around succession planning. Typically, the discussion begins with a transition that will happen in X years. However, without knowing the future, we quickly turn the conversation to defining the conditions that need to exist for the transition to happen successfully. Without realistic conditions defined quantitatively, business assumptions about the strategy may not be valid!
Provide prescriptive surveillance ~ One of the biggest challenges, especially for small business leaders and non-profit leaders is keeping a pulse on all the changes happening outside the walls of their business. A key value of association membership must be regular updates on key markets and industry trends. Industry publications also provide valuable insights to support strategic thinking. Regardless of what resources are available, effective leaders constantly leverage their resources to understand the contextual impact the new reality has on their business!

It is important to note that each of the five dimensions are strongly linked to the others. Effective strategic making is creating a strategy using all five dimensions to learn quicker than the competition as the title quote from Arie de Geus suggests. Finally, strategic thinking is a continuous process not defined by the calendar. Rather it is defined by the conditions and cadence that helps business leaders achieve desired results and sustainable success!

How is your business strategy creating a sustainable competitive advantage and how do you know? If you’re not sure, we can help.

Lead Well!

Tue, 26 Jul 2022 13:42:30 GMT

For those who are regular readers of this platform, you might recognize the title of this edition as the way we sign off on all our online posts. I also use it to autograph the books we’ve written over the course of the last ten years. We also reference it in a different way when giving leadership presentations and speeches when we say that, while leadership is complex in so many ways, people ultimately want to be led well! But what do we mean when we say, “Lead Well”?

In a November 2021 article , “7 trends dominating the future of work in 2022”, Korn Ferry talks about 7 key trends that business leaders all need to be focused on. Because we’ve coached our clients through all these trends/challenges in our business coaching practice, we decided to use them as a catalyst to further discussion what is means to Lead Well.

While the article positions these trends as a reaction to the post-pandemic new reality, we believe they’ve always been areas of focus, just with different contexts in the past than the new reality of the present. So, without delay, here are some thoughts on what effective leadership can do to address each of these trends:

Reinvention: Redesign to Stay Relevant ~ Truthfully, relevance didn’t become a thing because of the pandemic. Staying relevant in a VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment has always been critical to sustainable success. Two key points come to life based on our work with senior business leaders in both for-profits and non-profits alike. The first is staying relevant is a strategic initiative, period. To think otherwise is to abdicate the future of the business to others who do recognize the value of strategic thinking. The second is around the idea of innovation. The term is thrown around rather loosely in times like this. However, innovation is doing things different, it begins with leaders thinking differently. Leading well in this context reminds us of a favorite quote that says, “Discovery is seeing what everyone sees and thinking what nobody else has thought.”
Scarcity: Survive the Big Quit ~ While it is no secret the talent market has created quite the churn in the marketplace, what still seems to be a secret is why the big quit is affecting so many industries in so many markets. This takes us back to a simple question we routinely ask our clients, “Why would someone work for you/follow you/work here?” Leading well begins with defining and modelling the organizational culture to answer that question. If followers feel their leaders are taking them for granted, they will leave. The good news is we see plenty examples of leading well in this regard as more organizations invest in their core talent while they continue to solidify their culture for sustainable growth
Individuality: Make Business Personal ~ One of the greatest leadership challenges is accepting the notion that the leader needs to adapt to where each of their followers are to tap into the full potential each follower brings to the team. Not a week goes by that we are coaching to this key point, especially around effective communications. While it is also true that we all adapt to our leader’s style, leading well is the recognition that each follower has a unique motivational profile that gives effective leaders the advantage!
Inclusivity: Unleash the Power of All ~ In our most recent book, “Finding the Missing Piece”, we discuss the importance of inclusion as the point of entry to achieving even a basic level of psychological safety. Leading well is focusing on the creation of an inclusive culture and climate in the organization and viewing diversity through the lens of psychometrics more so than demographics. Leading well welcomes and endorses diverse attitudes as a precursor to unleashing the power of all to achieve a truly inclusive culture!
Vitality: Beat Burnout ~ According to the Korn Ferry report, 89% of professionals say they’re more burned out now than at the start of the pandemic. Just last month, we wrote about burnout from the perspective of what the organization can do to mitigate the effects of burnout. The only thing we would add here is leaders themselves must be self-aware of their own signs of managing the demands of leadership. Leading well shows in leaders who are leading themselves well and who are aware of the signs before they become ineffective!
Sustainability: Shape the Smarter Future ~ In every one of our, “Missing Piece” books we use the word sustainable. It is a deliberate focus on the need to lead well, not just in one or two business cycles, but for the foreseeable future. Whether the leader approaches sustainability from an internal CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) or an external ESG (Environmental, Social, Governance) point of view, leading well creates an organization that is adaptable to changing times. Leading well is creating an organization structure providing the right people, processes, and tools to enable the organization to stay relevant (See also point #1)!
Accountability: Stand By What You Do ~ One of the biggest challenges we see when coaching leaders in this context is helping them understand the difference between accountability and responsibility as they are used interchangeably in error. We simplify it down to being responsible for tasks and accountable to people. The scenario we use is being in a meeting where everyone in the meeting has absolutely done what they were responsible for, yet the desired outcomes and results were not achieved. To lead well is to own the desired outcomes above and beyond ensuring the tasks were accomplished. Leading well also means holding others accountable to the teams they are part of and especially those they lead!

To be clear, this is not one of those, “Do these seven things and you will be an effective leader” kind of post. Rather, it illustrates what leading well can look like against some of the prevailing workplace trends today’s leaders are contending with. To lead well is to understand the constant ebb and flow of what it means to be relevant, adapting to what follower expectations are in the new reality and being able to hold themselves and their organization accountable to being there and withstanding the forces of change. Because, when all is said and done, followers want to be led well!

How are you leading well and how do you know? If you don’t know, we can help!

Lead Well!

A Book of Values

Mon, 27 Jun 2022 17:05:28 GMT

This month, we tackled the issue of burnout from an organizational point of view. We know the modern workforce is drawn to organizations with a clearly defined purpose and have a strong foundation of values. We talked specifically about one of the causes of burnout is lack of purpose or meaning. Last year, friend and fellow business coach Alan Kovitz published, “A Book of Values” outlining 52 distinct values for leaders to reflect on.

As I read the book through the lens of this month’s topic, my favorite values are Fairness and Wellness. Fairness in the sense of leveraging the uniqueness and individual differences in the organization to the greater good of the team. Wellness in the sense of ensuring self-care of an organization’s most valuable resources, again to the greater good of the team!

Click here to get your copy!

Enjoy the Book!

“Resilience is not about how you endure...

Mon, 27 Jun 2022 13:47:18 GMT

...but about how you recharge and replenish.”

Over the last several weeks, we’ve had the opportunity to attend a global virtual coaching summit as well as attend and speak at another national virtual coaching summit. A common topic, among many others, in both summits was around self-care and focus to avoid the impact of burnout in the VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) new reality we live and work in. In fact, the title quote of this article is from a speaker at the global summit, Dr. Jacinta Jimenez, author of, “The Burnout Fix”.

Dr. Jimenez spoke of burnout resulting from a mismatch between the nature of one’s work and one’s capacity as a human being. Taken to an organizational level, we’ve written previously about the importance of leaders understanding both the capabilities and capacities of their organizations. This naturally leads us to look at burnout at an organizational level versus an individual level.

In a December 2109 Harvard Business Review article, Christina Maslach, a social psychologist and Professor Emerita at the University of California, Berkeley stated much the same thing. She is also the co-author of the Maslach Burnout Inventory , the gold standard for measuring burnout. According to Dr. Maslach, there are at least six aspects of organizational work that can fuel burnout. We will look at each one through the lens of what leaders can do to mitigate these causes:

Workload or Overload: Here is where leaders can directly take stock of their capacity and capability of their organizations and teams. If the capacity and capability are not 100%, expecting 100% output and outcomes becomes a no-win proposition. Unlike machines which can be calibrated for continuous operations, humans require both physical and mental down time to refresh and recharge!

Control or Autonomy: In a VUCA business environment, it may be a natural tendency for leaders to double-down on their direct control of work. However, in a predominantly knowledge economy, this ends up stifling the very advantage knowledge workers bring to the organizational strategy, the ability to think in the moment and control how work gets done. Leader must resist the urge to over-manage and trust the team to do the work you empowered them to do!

Feedback: There is an ancient law of physics that nature abhors a vacuum because life cannot exist in that environment. A VUCA business environment is fluid by nature and thus requires leaders to be on top of their communications game. Leaders must not shirk from providing effective communications in all facets (speaking, listening, writing, non-verbal, etc.) to ensure their organizations and teams are clear on the leader’s expectations and priorities!

Workplace Community: The new reality positioned leaders to now lead their organizations and teams in a hybrid work environment relying on technology and new communications skills and attitudes to maintain their culture and continuity. While leading remote teams is not new, it is certainly new to an entire generation of leaders across the globe and involves much more emotional intelligence than past situations may have required!

Fairness: Fairness is about equity (not to be confused with equality) and is an integral part of leaders modelling an inclusive culture. Looking at Amy Edmondson’s work on psychological safety which we speak to directly in our most recent book, “Finding The Missing Piece”, the first layer of safety is inclusion. Without inclusion, there is no psychological safety so leader’s must re-think their own attitudes towards diversity, equity, and inclusion to ensure they represent fairness in their own attitudes, words and actions. As the Verna Myers quote goes, “Diversity is being invited to the party. Inclusion is being asked to dance.”!

Value or Meaning: In our, “The Missing Piece” series of books we directly mention Frederick Herzberg’s Two-Factor Theory of Motivation to illustrate what leadership actions really cause higher levels of job satisfaction. Many leaders default to pay, policies and quality of supervision. While important, they merely eliminate job dissatisfaction. When leaders focus on the meaning of the work, the recognition of effort and outcomes and personal growth, then the work has purpose to every member of the organization and team!

As we look at these six causes for burnout, we see they are all related to each other in some way or another. It is important that leaders acknowledge their role in creating organizational culture that either promotes and tolerates these issues or addresses and mitigates them to optimize their organization’s health and sustainable success!

How is your leadership helping your team stay resilient? If you don’t know, we can help!

Lead Well!

Finding the Missing Piece

Tue, 31 May 2022 18:27:46 GMT

..The Impact of Effective Communications on Sustainable Success

This month, we are proud to announce our 7th book is now available on Amazon! As we navigated the pandemic and continue to support leaders across all business model and industries, we realized that effective communication continues to be a common challenge to leaders at all levels. Thus, “Finding the Missing Piece, The Impact of Effective Communications on Sustainable Success” was born. The book addresses key issues at all three levels of leadership we previously outlined in our “Missing Piece” series of books previous published for Entrepreneurs, Non-Profit Leaders, and Corporate Leaders. The book continues to leverage the Business Alignment Maturity Model to ensure that effective communications not only occur at each level of leadership while also aligning throughout the organization from Vision to Desired Results and embedded in the organizational culture!

Enjoy the Book !

Lead Well!

“I’m too busy.”

Tue, 31 May 2022 13:50:58 GMT

A common theme we’ve noticed in our leadership and business coaching practice over the last year is the many variations of the title phrase becoming a more and more frequent response to workplace requests for assistance, coordination, or action. Unfortunately, it yields more frustration than not which is why we see an opportunity to dig in behind the expression and see what is really being said.

The first thing we need to agree on is that it is a meaningless statement. Basically, it is a stall or an excuse to not engage. We equate it to the common expression that sounds like, “I didn’t have time to do, act, respond, etc.” In truth, the correct response is that they did not make the time to do, act, respond, etc. because they had other priorities, whether correctly or incorrectly created, that they attended to. In truth. everyone has the same 24 hours in a day, so no-one has more time. They either make time for a specific action or they don’t.

In a similar vein, being too busy implies they are the only ones that are busy, overwhelmed, burned out or whatever is happening to them at the time. If everyone is busy doing what they do, then attempting to differentiate one’s set of circumstances by saying they are too busy is essentially a meaningless statement.

That is not to say there is a real intent to communicate behind the statement because there is. In this edition, we will explore some alternative approaches to “I’m too busy” that can mitigate the frustration when others hear it and quickly get to a meaningful exchange.

I’m too busy ~ what it likely really means is there is no more time in the day or week to do what the leader is asking the person to do. When that is the case, the better response to the leader is to be honest and say their current priorities have locked up available time between now and the requested deadline of the new ask. However, if the new ask is more important than current priorities, a conversation around re-prioritizing the current list becomes the focus!

I’m too busy ~ what it can also mean is the person doesn’t want to do what the leader is requesting of them, even before the actual ask. This could be for several reasons ranging from the person may simply not trust the leader to the person not being sure they can do what is being asked and doesn’t want to be exposed. In this case the leader needs to simply ask to clarify why the person cannot respond to the request to get a “ground truth” understanding of why it cannot be done. The resulting conversation can then move the leader to an outcome that makes the most sense for all concerned!

I’m too busy ~ lastly, this could simply be an excuse for something that was previously committed to and did not get done. The danger here is if the leader lets the person off the hook with this excuse. We wrote about the difference between an excuse and a reason earlier . The more this excuse is accepted the more it will be used. The leader simply asks clarifying questions to understand where the priority was derailed and re-prioritize to a mutually beneficial outcome!

Everyone is busy in the new reality leaders currently find themselves in. While we focused on the leader in these scenarios as the person hearing the excuse, we also recognize the leaders themselves are many times guilty of using the excuse. Clearly this does not set the right example for their teams as they will model the behavior they see in their leaders.

The key issue in all of this is the ability to effectively prioritize and communicate the priorities to the team. The priorities will more than likely change over time as the business continues to evolve and adapt to the VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment. The resulting communications can only be effective when real reasons are the grounds for progress and not clouded by excuses like, “I’m too busy”!

How are you communicating priorities to avoid the excuses? If you don’t know, we can help!

Lead Well!

“Leadership is cause...

Wed, 27 Apr 2022 13:55:31 GMT

...everything else is effect.”

John Maxwell’s first irrefutable law of leadership (Law of the Lid) states, “Leadership ability is the lid that determines a person’s level of effectiveness.” It is further reinforced by the title quote credited to Professor Stephen Adei, in 2004. In today’s VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) business environment, effective leadership is paramount to sustainable success in every sector; for-profit, non-profit, private, public, corporate, and entrepreneur. To the extent leaders effectively impact the cause, the more predictable and impactful the effect.

In our upcoming book, Finding the Missing Piece: The Impact of Effective Communications on Sustainable Success, we refer to the answer to a question we often get in our coaching practice around the three things leaders need to know about effective leadership. Our answer is always the same:

Create and communicate a Vision and Strategy
Build a Structure aligned to the Strategy
Disciplined and accountable Execution

In essence, these represent the three levels of effective leadership: Strategic Leadership, Operational Leadership and Tactical Leadership. We will use these three levels of effective leadership to further highlight the importance of leadership cause and effect to creating sustainable success.

Strategic Leadership creates a vision and strategy for the organization. The vision is the aspirational purpose of the organization and is becoming even more important to the current modern workforce. While the early days of the recent pandemic created a spike in employee turnover, the ongoing level of employee turnover could be argued is a result of employees feeling disconnected to a meaningful purpose or vision. Strategic leadership is also about creating a strategy that not only directs how the organization will compete in their markets but is also aligned to the organization’s vision. This implies a plan that drives the organization beyond merely waiting for the marketplace to dictate the plan. Better to be the thermostat than the thermometer. Strategic Leadership is the cause, everything else is effect!

Operational Leadership builds an operating structure from available and readily obtainable resources that wholly supports, and is aligned to, the strategy. Any strategy without an effective operational structure identifying the people, processes, and tools to support it is not worth the paper it’s printed on. Additionally, any definition of leadership that does not include building teams and core processes around strategy is just as worthless. Operational Leadership is about putting the right people and processes in play such that the organization capacity and capabilities effectively support sustainable success. Operational Leadership cause, everything else is effect!

Tactical Leadership creates the goals, metrics, and systems to hold the organization accountable to achieving desired results. It ensures the tactical goals are aligned to the strategy such that different department goals are not at cross purposes with each other and the strategy. Tactical Leadership produces the outputs that feed the systemic outcomes that create the strategic impact outlined in the vision and strategy. Tactical Leadership is the cause, everything else is effect!

Leading change is essentially a binary issue. The leader either drives change within the organization or the organization and their leader become victims of change (change happens to them). When leaders focus on the true cause of sustainable success, then they are clearly in the driver’s seat of change. Everything else is effect!

How is your leadership causing sustainable success? If you don’t know, we can help!

Lead Well!

"We the People..."

Fri, 20 Mar 2020 18:30:58 GMT

During these uncertain times when many are in some degree of self-isolation and working remotely, it makes sense that there might be some time to catch up on reading. One of the leadership challenges we see, especially in an election year as we are in now, is the level of citizenship demonstrated across the landscape in the United States. When we speak of leadership, we often speak of the ground rules of effective leadership. As we’ve spoken often, “Leaders read!” When we speak of citizenship, the same idea applies. It is those ground rules that are behind our recommendation for what to read this month. If you have not yet read, or recently read, the Constitution of the United States, this may be a great time to begin. Click here to begin reading!

Lead Well!

Ignition

Mon, 27 Jan 2020 18:39:13 GMT

This month we focused our discussion on strategic leadership and the key skills necessary to effectively lead a 21st Century organization. Given that organizational leadership is a team sport, it is only fitting that we highlight a new book by Gordy Curphy, Dianne Nilsen and Robert Hogan, “ Ignition , A Guide to Building High Performance Teams” The authors set out to create a very practical book to help teams develop regardless of the type of team they are. The book aligns nicely to their research-based Team Assessment Survey as well as the Rocket Model which I use specifically in both my business and leadership coaching as well as my graduate teaching of MBA students.

My favorite chapter is Chapter 10 where the authors spend an entire chapter specifically talking about C-Suite Teams. These are the top leadership teams in any business, for-profit or non-profit who essentially guide the strategic direction of the business. It is the team that likely has the highest collection of egos, experience and alpha personality. The authors do a great job of addressing these and other issues such that any team can benefit from a greater sense of self awareness and practical ideas on how to become high performing teams!

Enjoy the Book!

The Innovator’s Book

Wed, 18 Dec 2019 18:45:45 GMT

With a theme of adaptability in this month’s post, it is only fitting to review this author’s latest book. I’ve reviewed Dr. Max McKeown’s books before and his latest does not disappoint. “The Innovator’s Book – Rules for Rebels, Mavericks and Innovators” is unique in that is does not at all read like your typical business book. Yet it is the kind of book that with few words gets one thinking about how they are thinking about and implementing their strategies for sustainable success.

My favorite page in the entire book is titled “What you know can hurt you” When I read it, it struck me how tritely we use phrases like “continuous learning” and “we need to innovate” without really understand what we are asking ourselves to do. With that, I listed most of the page below to give an idea of how the book is set up to generate new thought:

“If you think you know something then it is hard to be open to learning.

But the problem is that eventually what you know may be wrong, old-fashioned, outdated, unhelpful and finally dangerous.

People can attack new ideas just because they are new. And defend old ideas because they are familiar. Saying you are always right can stop anyone telling you when you are wrong. Infallibility is an error.

Better to ask stupid questions and keep learning than stop learning and stay stupid.”

There is more to the page, but you get the idea!

Enjoy the Book!

I'm Still Sayin'...

Tue, 25 Jun 2019 18:50:03 GMT

...More Revelations for Making Leadership a Way of Life!

We are proud to announce the availability of our sixth book, “ I’m Still Sayin ’…More Revelations for Making Leadership a Way of Life”. It is a follow-up to our most popular seller, “ I’m Just Sayin ’…Revelations for Making Leadership a Way of Life”. In this recent release we once again draw upon the best ideas and articles we’ve published over the last five years organized by their relevance to Individual Leadership, Leadership Relationships and Organization Leadership. Along with the ideas and articles in the book based on reader input, we also included five never-before published articles to continue fueling the conversation around being a successful lifelong leader!

Enjoy the Book!

8 Steps to High Performance

Wed, 24 Apr 2019 19:01:24 GMT

It has been a while since I’ve reviewed a book in these pages and, as it so happens, I just finished a great book that also applies to this month’s leadership message. Because there are so many leadership fads out there, it is refreshing to read a book that uses what we know through science to support ways to improve our leadership performance. Marc Effron’s book, “ 8 Steps to High Performance , Focus on What You Can Change (Ignore the Rest)” is one you should give a read! My favorite chapter deals with Step 5, Maximize Your Fit, in the 8 Step Process the author outlines. Maximizing Fit is a crucial element to staying adaptable and relevant as the world around us changes, as the author explains, faster than people change. Therefore, people need to be aware of the continuous changes going on around them and adapt accordingly. This is true whether you are a student still in school or a leader in any type of business, for-profit or non-profit! Enjoy the Book!

Spark

Tue, 26 Jun 2018 19:09:39 GMT

How to Think Like Leonardo da Vinci

Thu, 25 Jan 2018 19:12:56 GMT

In this month's post, I used a quote from Leonardo da Vinci that actually came from this month’s book. This book was recommended by one of my clients and after reading it, I can see why! “ How to Think Like Leonardo da Vinci ” by Michael J. Gelb is a great read not only on what made da Vinci such a great genius, but also provides ideas on how to apply his genius to our current day leadership environment. My favorite section is actually the section the quote came from. Leonardo Da Vinci’s second of seven principles is called Dimonstrazione, a commitment to test knowledge through experience, persistence and willingness to learn from mistakes. Along with the text, the book provides self-assessments for each of the seven principles and this chapter is no exception. The leadership lessons learned through the exercises in this chapter around challenging one’s own beliefs, gain multiple perspectives on an issue and using affirmations were my personal favorites! Enjoy the Book!

The Missing Piece for Corporate Leaders

Thu, 26 Oct 2017 19:17:59 GMT

In our quest to leverage the Business Alignment process to business leaders across key organizational situations, we are proud to announce the upcoming availability of “The Missing Piece for Corporate Leaders: Achieving Sustainable Value through Business Alignment”. As its predecessors did for Entrepreneurs/Small Businesses and Non-Profit Leaders, this third installment helps Corporate Leaders understand the importance of aligning their people, processes and tools to bridge the gap between the Vision and Strategy and the execution of the Strategy through aligned Goals and Metrics to achieve Desired Results. Corporate leaders have a unique challenge in they achieve success through many layers in the organization. The more layers, the more opportunities for the Vision and Strategy to get sanitized and diluted by the time it reaches the part of the organization that needs to execute the Goals aligned to the Strategy. Complexity can beget confusion and the most effective leaders understand that simplicity is the best remedy for confusion. The Business Alignment Maturity Model is outlined in a clear and logical manner so that when all the pieces are combined, the Corporate Leader can see how business alignment can simplify their organization for sustainable success! As one corporate leader stated after reviewing the book, “This book was written about us!”. Enjoy the Book!

The Courage of the Samurai

Tue, 29 Nov 2016 19:21:36 GMT

Several months ago, I was asked to read a book that was recommended to me through a source that I did not know well, something that I do not normally do. However, after several inquiries and because the title and subject intrigued me, I agreed to read the book and provide my thoughts. I am so very glad I did! “The Courage of the Samurai – Seven Sword-Sharp Principles of Success.” by Lori Tsugawa Whaley is an easy to read history of the Samurai combined with how the philosophy can be applied in today’s context. The author brings in examples from business, the military and her own personal examples to highlight lessons learned from this philosophy rich in tradition. My favorite chapters covered the principles of Integrity (Gi) in Chapter 2 and Loyalty (Chuugi) in Chapter 7. The other five principles covered include Courage, Benevolence, Respect, Honesty and Honor. These two chapters on Integrity and Loyalty bring out these principles through examples that are easily understood by the reader. In the case of Integrity, the author brings forth personal examples born out of her family’s experiences in the Japanese Relocation Centers during the United States involvement in World War II. The Loyalty chapter uses several examples from the military in highlighting the most decorated fighting unit in U.S. military history for its size and tenure and made up of soldiers of Japanese ancestry! Enjoy the Book!

ROI - Return on Integrity

Tue, 25 Oct 2016 19:27:00 GMT

As we find ourselves in ever more challenging leadership situations across business, politics, religion and sports, I find myself looking more deeply into what effective 21st leadership really is and why it seems to so difficult to achieve. As if he was reading my mind, John Blumberg comes along with his new book, “ ROI ~ Return on Integrity , The New Definition of ROI and Why Leaders Need to Know It”. It is unlike many leadership books in that it’s not a book of answers as much as it is a book of questions to help leaders get better answers to help them lead with integrity. My favorite chapters are Chapter 2, Discovering the Drift and Chapter 12, The Call of Every Leader. In Chapter 2 he speaks of the drift that I have heard John speak of many times before in his speeches and keynotes. It is a direct reminder that we do not wake up one day in conflict with our values, rather we drift slowly until it hits us that we are morally off-course. In Chapter 12 we are reminded that there is a core that drives every leader. It is a reminder that it is not what we do as leaders that define us but rather who we are as leaders that will be our legacy. Enjoy the Book!

Sticking Points

Mon, 26 Sep 2016 19:31:31 GMT

Given our recent focus on the multi-generational workforce, this edition of What to Read helps us understand generational diversity more effectively. I recently had the opportunity to listen to Haydn Shaw speak at a local chamber event. His combination of candor and experience got me interested in his book, “Sticking Points”. Haydn’s take on generational diversity and the most common challenges (12 by his count) are all good reasons to read this book.

My favorite parts of the book are Chapter 3 where he introduces a five-step approach to dealing with misunderstandings and misperceptions in a multi-generational workplace. As effective communications are a large part of my coaching practice, I also enjoyed his take on the communications issues between the generations outlined in Chapter 8. As we focus on perception, this is a great way to not only know why the generational misperceptions occur, but also how to work through them!

Enjoy the Book!

The Missing Piece for Non-Profit Leaders

Tue, 28 Jun 2016 19:38:44 GMT

I believe being a non-profit leader in the 21st Century is one of the toughest roles in leadership! The ongoing reality of thin budgets and fierce competition for donor dollars and volunteer time against the passion and altruism of a host of staff and volunteers requires the leader to have a unique mix of attitudes, knowledge and skills. It is this backdrop that provides the inspiration for our latest book, “ The Missing Piece for Non-Profit Leaders: Achieving Sustainable Programs through Business Alignment ”. In this book, we apply the elements of Business Alignment to assist Non-Profit Leaders in creating their Vision, Strategy and Goals to achieve sustainable success.

As Tom Okarma, an experienced non-profit executive in his own right, stated in the book’s Foreword, “Finally, here is a book that specifically addresses the issues and speaks directly to non-profit leaders to show them how their agencies can make that elusive leap to the next level.” As many non-profits are likely in the midst of their next fiscal year planning, this can be a timely resource to help them achieve their desired results!

Enjoy the Book!

The World’s Most Powerful Leadership Principle

Tue, 28 Jun 2016 19:34:20 GMT

...How to Become a Servant Leader

A client recently gave me a copy of this month’s book based on our multiple discussions of leadership, specifically servant leadership. While it had been awhile since I last read this book, this was a great opportunity to re-read it in the context of leadership and business twelve years removed from its first printing. I was not disappointed as I read “ The World’s Most Powerful Leadership Principle : How to Become a Servant Leader” by James Hunter. It provides a great foundation for thinking what it takes to be a successful 21st Century Leader.

My favorite chapter in the book is titled, “On Character and Human Change” and speaks very directly to what character is and how it is a habit that can be built and developed over time. The author speaks directly to how people can change highlighting the four stages of learning in the process. These are the same four stages we use in our practice to help our clients Make Leadership a Way of Life by embracing leadership built on character as well as many other ideas in the book!

Enjoy the Book!

Better Than Before

Tue, 23 Feb 2016 18:49:54 GMT

Effective Communications, Goal Planning, Time Management, Prioritization. These are skills at the heart of sustainable leadership. Not because they exist from time to time but because they are habits of effective leaders, they exist repetitively and are consistent over time. That is the idea behind " Better Than Before " by Gretchen Rubin. While drawing upon the latest research, she also uses herself as her own study to see and feel firsthand what it takes to set and make something a habit. My favorite chapter is titled, “Nothing Stays in Vegas: Loophole Spotting” where she talks about the loopholes we rationalize our inability to maintain a habit. She pretty much covers nearly all the reasons why people procrastinate and I recognized a few of them from working with my own clients. In that same vein, my other favorite chapter is titled, “Someone’s Watching: Accountability” which clearly speaks to the value of enlisting the help of others to help you create new, more successful habits. Enjoy the Book!

Why Entrepreneurs Especially Need to Take a Vacation

Wed, 26 Aug 2015 18:54:50 GMT

This month I had the pleasure of contributing to Entrepreneur Magazine in Lisa Evans’ 8/12/15 article titled, “ Why Entrepreneurs Especially Need to Take a Vacation ”. In it, we talked about the importance of stepping away from the business and taking a true break from the business. This is especially true for entrepreneurs who likely started the business and become physically and emotionally invested in all aspects of the business.

In truth, the best measure of health of an entrepreneurial business is best described by how well leaders at the top delegate to their next level of managers. How does the business run in the absence of the top leader? What happens when the owner gets sick or has to step away for unintended circumstances?

The other value of taking a vacation is the health of the leaders themselves. Intellectually, we know that physical health has a direct effect on mental acuity and health. The more physically healthy the entrepreneurial leader, the better their mental sharpness and ability to make the myriad of decisions a growing business needs its leader to make. I maintain a business leader cannot deliver their best if they are physically in poor health!

Take Ten and Enjoy the Article!

Growing Mentor Intelligence™

Tue, 21 Jul 2015 18:58:42 GMT

One of the best things a leader can do for another is to be their mentor. I recently met the author as we are both alumni of the same college, The United States Military Academy at West Point. Alan Landry’s book, “ Growing Mentor Intelligence™, A Field Guide to Mentoring ” is an easy to read and understand guide to being an effective mentor and mentor partner (more on that in a bit).

In the classic sense, this mentoring relationship usually meant a more seasoned executive mentoring an up-and-coming leader to help them gain the experience needed to effectively achieve their goals. In the non-classic sense, it still means an experienced professional mentoring a less-experienced professional in helping them achieve their goals. In a perfect sense, the best of both worlds occurs and both parties benefit from the mentoring partnership.

My favorite part of the book is Chapter 6: Tools to Empower Mentor Relationships. By providing actual tools to use in the relationship, the author provides tangible means for both parties to operate the relationship from common ground. I especially found value in the seven step Course-of-Action Matrix that steps both parties through the process of helping the mentee navigate their options and making a decision for their future.

Enjoy the Book!

The Missing Piece for Entrepreneurs

Tue, 26 May 2015 19:03:01 GMT

Achieving Sustainable Growth through Business Alignment

As we wrap up Small Business Appreciation Month, I reflect on the many entrepreneurs and small business owners I have worked with in the past as well as those who I currently work with. It is these innovative, hardworking, sometimes frustrating and all the time inspirational business leaders who motivated me to publish, “The Missing Piece for Entrepreneurs – Achieving Sustainable Growth through Business Alignment”! It provides a framework to help the many current and future entrepreneurs and small business owners successfully thrive as a key component of a growing economy.

In the book’s Foreword, Joe Abraham, noted entrepreneur and author of “Entrepreneurial DNA” wrote about three groups of entrepreneurs. Of the third group he wrote, “Then there’s the minority – I call the elite – that have invested the time and energy to go through the process you are about to go through. The result of that investment is evident across their companies. From the quality of talent that wants to work for them and the performance-minded culture that surrounds the company to high growth rates and industry-leading profits. More important than all of that is the satisfaction I see on these owner’s faces. They are not slaves to their business. They are no longer the only one pulling on the oars. The engine for scalable growth is installed – and it operates with or without them.” This book is written to help entrepreneurs become part of this group!

Enjoy the Book!

A Contrarian's Guide to Leadership

Tue, 27 Jan 2015 19:10:10 GMT

Every once in awhile, I pick up a book sitting on my leadership bookshelf and re-read it. Because I process anything I read in the context of the here-and-now, re-reading older books through a new lens adds to the freshness of what it takes to make leadership a way of life! My most recent re-read is Steven Sample’s “ A Contrarian’s Guide to Leadership ”. The contrarian reference is about doing things that may buck conventional wisdom based on that wisdom created under circumstances that created a much different context than what leaders need in the current situation and contingency.

My favorite chapter is actually the last full chapter titled “”Being President versus Doing President” and comes from advice the author received prior to becoming the tenth president of the University of Southern California (USC). In the chapter he describes the challenges of leadership that many times cause leaders to subordinate their own personal interests to those of the organization. He offers his own formula when he was USC President of “Sample’s 30/70 Formula for Leadership” where 30% of his time was spent on substantially substantive issues. The substantive issues are those that advance the organization in a meaningful way. The other 70% is spent on reacting and managing the trivial, mundane and routine matters. How many leaders are doing this more than 70% of the time to the detriment of their organizations?

Enjoy the Book!

Hacking Leadership

Mon, 25 Aug 2014 19:21:31 GMT

In my July 2014 newsletter , I referenced a book that has a wealth of ideas on how to improve our leadership success. Hacking Leadership , by Mike Myatt's is a book written for any type of leader. The author defines hacking as discovering an alternate path, clever and skillful tricks, shortcuts and workarounds, breaking the code, deciphering complexity, influencing outcomes, acquiring access, and creating innovative customizations to existing/outdated methodologies. The book provides actionable, topical leadership and management hacks to bridge eleven gaps every business needs to cross in order to create a culture of leadership: leadership, purpose, future, mediocrity, culture, talent, knowledge, innovation, expectation, complexity, and failure.

My favorite sections are the discussions around both the Future and the Mediocrity hacks. I really could not determine which of these actually has more impact on the success of the leadership I’ve encountered in the last 30+ years. Between the ability to overcome the motivation and rhetoric issues in the Future gap or the safety and values discussion of the Mediocrity gap, this book raises the right questions on how to become a successful lifelong leader.

Enjoy the Book!

No More Excuses

Wed, 23 Jul 2014 19:31:08 GMT

I had the opportunity several months ago to hear Sam Silverstein speak about his book “No More Excuses”. At some point in our leadership careers we have had to deal with excuses, either from ourselves, or from others around us. The author provides a simple framework around five accountabilities for effectively dealing with a constant barrage of excuses.

My favorite part of the book is in Chapter Six where he talks about the fourth of five accountabilities, “Establishing the Right Expectations”. This hits close to home with my own beliefs of setting the right expectations for accountability around a core set of values that ultimately permeates the culture of the business, regardless of size and industry. In this chapter he also cites Dr. Maxwell Maltz, the author of “Psycho-Cybernetics”, a book that had a profound impact on my own expectations at an early age. Managing our own expectations and accountability sets the stage for accountability of those we lead.

Enjoy the Book!

I'm Just Sayin'...

Wed, 21 May 2014 19:41:31 GMT

Like most new businesses, RPC Leadership Associates, Inc. started in an environment of uncertainty, and often tumultuous, change. We were elated when we achieved our five-year anniversary late last year and decided to celebrate by letting our readers tell us what their favorite writings were of the last five years! The results, along with six never-before-published articles, were combined to create our latest book on Making Leadership a Way of Life. In “I’m Just Sayin’…Revelations for Making Leadership a Way of Life” we captured the many ideas on how to become the leader everyone wants to follow!

The book is divided into three sections. The first section highlights leading yourself. If you cannot lead yourself effectively, you have little right to expect others to follow you willingly. The second section speaks to the many relationships leaders create and leverage to the success of the organization. Collaboration is an essential element of a successful leader in today’s business environment. The third section highlights success as more than the sum of individuals. Leading a team, whether it be physical or virtual, requires crucial leadership skills and attitudes.

Enjoy the Book!

Choosing Change

Thu, 24 Apr 2014 19:50:09 GMT

When I look at most books that written about change, the author usually focuses on either personal change or organizational change. While each category is important, they are integral to each other and thus should be addressed together. In, “ Choosing Change ”, authors Walter McFarland and Susan Goldsworthy do just that by addressing the elements of personal change and organizational change together in the same discussion.

The foundation of their discussion revolves around the Five Ds for leading both personal and organizational change. The first part of the book addresses The Change Focused Leader while the second part address The Change Focused Organization. In both cases, change is structured around the Five Ds of:

Disruption – what is driving the need for change?
Desire – what is the motivation to change?
Discipline – what are the many small steps necessary to build momentum?
Determination - how focused is the process to change around life’s distractions?
Development – what is the continuous improvement process to maintain forward progress?

Enjoy the Book!

Focus

Tue, 25 Mar 2014 19:55:23 GMT

As we learn to adapt to an information-rich, knowledge-poor world, focus becomes an all-important part of our success. In his most recent book, “ Focus ”, Daniel Goleman, he of Emotional Intelligence fame, takes the reader deeper into what it takes to have enough focus to drive excellence.

My favorite part of the book speaks to these three kinds of focus: Inner Focus, Other Focus and Outer Focus.
Inner focus keeps us in tune to our intuitions. Without it we are rudderless.
Other focus connects us to others in our world. Without it we are clueless.
Outer focus allows us to understand the larger systemic world. Without which we would be blindsided.

Whether we are leaders by position, by influence or both, it is the combination of all three areas of focus that provide us the balance necessary to achieve sustainable success in what we do.

Enjoy the book!

To Sell is Human

Sat, 21 Dec 2013 20:10:37 GMT

When I speak with clients about getting it right the first time and avoiding re-work, the one functional area that seems the most frustrating in this area is Sales. Typically, when you don’t do it right the first time, someone else did (or at least did it better than you) and won the business. In his most recent book, “ To Sell is Human ”, Daniel Pink explores how the process of sales has changed and offers some great ideas on how to get it right the first time.

My favorite part of the book is Chapter 6 where he speaks to the idea of Clarity. One idea is turning the traditional notion of sales from Problem Solving to Problem Finding. The better we are at finding problems and offering solutions to solve them, the more valuable we are to our clients. The ability to do both forces us to leverage more than the analytical parts of our brain but the creative parts of our brain as well. He ends the chapter with discussion around five different frames that allow us to put the sales process in a context for Clarity. They are:

The Less Frame – The fewer the choices, the more often they will buy.
The Experience Frame – What experiences will I have with this product/service?
The Label Frame – What’s in a Name? Everything!
The Blemished Frame – A small dose of negative can increase buying.
The Potential Frame – What “could be” sometimes works better than what “already is”.

Enjoy the Book!

Getting Things Done

Wed, 20 Nov 2013 20:19:24 GMT

When I work with clients around their time management challenges, we work together on the attitudinal aspects of time management. Our mindset towards time and how we manage our time goes a long way towards successfully getting the right things done and minimizing our own procrastination. However, a complement to the attitudinal discussion of time management is David Allen’s book “ Getting Things Done – the Art of Stress-Free Productivity ”. I would venture that anyone who is struggling with time management would get something valuable from reading this book.

As I tend to look at business systemically, my favorite chapter is Chapter 2 that speaks to the process of managing workflow. The process consists of five stages we go through to deal with the work we do. They are:

Collect things that command our attention
Process what they mean and what to do about them
Organize the results
Review the options for what we choose to do
Do it.

Probably the one recommendation that raises the most challenge is getting rid of the daily “to-do” lists. Try it; you’ll be glad you did! Enjoy the Book!

Entrepreneurial DNA

Wed, 28 Aug 2013 20:25:50 GMT

For many entrepreneurs, a metric of success is staying in business for five years or more. Having successfully crossed that threshold, one of the reasons is being aware of, and managing to, our strengths and weaknesses as entrepreneurs. This month’s book review is from someone who is a resident expert on entrepreneurial styles or DNA. In " Entrepreneurial DNA ", Joe Abraham explores the four key profiles of entrepreneurs and why it is important to understand not all entrepreneurs are created equal.

My favorite section is Part 2 (of 3) where he takes the reader through an in depth profile of each DNA style and then strategies to optimize your business based on your style. After reading this section, you will be sure to recognize your primary style and possibly a secondary style. You will also better understand how to leverage your strengths and execute strategies to minimize your entrepreneurial blind spots.

Enjoy the Book!

The Right Decision Every Time

Mon, 29 Jul 2013 20:31:28 GMT

In keeping with the theme of effective decision-making this month, I recently read The Right Decision Every Time by Luda Kopeikina. Her research working with over 100 successful CEOs provides us with great insights into the process of making effective business decisions in an easy-to-read business case example format.

My favorite parts of the book are Chapter 8, which speaks to managing our emotions and Chapter 9, which deals with managing opposing opinions. Managing conflict in the business workplace is a key challenge for all leaders in today’s business environment. The ability to manage the emotional element of tough decisions as well as the feedback and opinions from others who may disagree with your perspective is invaluable. These two chapters provide valuable insights in managing emotions and opposition to ultimately make the best decision for the situation.

Enjoy the Book!

The Five Dysfunctions of a Team

Thu, 27 Jun 2013 20:36:19 GMT

In keeping with the theme of teamwork this month, I chose to go back to the bookshelf for a book I’ve read several times and find something new each time I read it. “The Five Dysfunctions of a Team” by Patrick Lencioni speaks to many of the challenges leaders face with creating a true high performing team. In his book he identifies these five team dysfunctions told through the eyes of a new CEO of a fictitious company:

Absence of Trust
Fear of Conflict
Lack of Commitment
Avoidance of Accountability
Inattention to Results

The fable format allows the reader to identify with some of the challenges he identifies in the story. While I liked the discussion around all five, my favorite is the discussion around the Avoidance of Accountability. I believe the true measure of a team is their ability to hold themselves mutually accountable and, in my experience, is a rare quality in today’s business environment.

Enjoy the Book!

Well Said!

Tue, 21 May 2013 20:42:12 GMT

I recently had the privilege of facilitating a workshop on using persuasion in the sales process to a group of fellow business coaches. In many respects the idea of persuasion fits with this month’s book that highlights a variety of different and effective ways to persuade a decision maker, whether it be in the sales process or not. “ Well Said! ” by Darlene Price includes many ideas on how to present, speak and otherwise carry yourself more effectively to convey your ideas.

My favorite part of the book is the discussion around the concept of establishing your credibility. The author speaks to the three Factors of Perception as keys to establishing true credibility with an audience or listener. The Factors of Perception are:

Visual Factor – How does the audience or listener see you in the manner in which you dress, the room, and your body language?
Vocal/Verbal Factor – How does the audience or listener hear you in tone, words and phraseology you use to convey your ideas?
Relational Factor – How does the audience or listener feel about you in the way they trust and appeal to your ideas on an emotional level?

Enjoy the Book!

It's My Company Too!

Tue, 23 Apr 2013 19:41:14 GMT

It was my distinct pleasure recently to meet one of the authors of this month’s book. I was immediately taken by his business card in that his title is listed as Chief Culture Officer. In fact, Tom Walter is one of the senior leaders of Tasty Catering and one of the co-authors of “ It’s My Company Too! ” along with Kenneth Thompson, Ramon Benedetto and Molly Meyer.

The title comes from a story from Tasty Catering where a supervisor was berating an employee for a mistake they were making with multiple orders. Another supervisor stepped in and reminded the first supervisor of “#2” which meant the second value of the organization was respect for people. The CEO witnessed this and later thanked the second supervisor in private for what he did. When offered a cash reward for exemplifying the values of the organization, the supervisor handed the money back and said “It’s my company too!”

My favorite chapter is Chapter 8 that speaks to creating an aligned culture at Good Samaritan Hospital in Downers Grove, IL. As an advocate of business alignment and understanding how difficult the dynamics of a hospital can be operationally, I was taken in by the stories and attitudes their leadership displayed in changing a culture from one of finger-pointing and blame to one of a fully entangled culture!

Enjoy the Book!

Adaptability - The Art of Winning in an Age of Uncertainty

Mon, 25 Mar 2013 21:00:07 GMT

In the March 2013 leadership blog , we talk about relevance and the importance of staying relevant in a constantly changing business environment. In keeping with that theme, this month’s book review offers some additional ideas on how to do just that. Adaptability by Max McKeown offers a blueprint through a set of 17 Rules for successfully adapting in an age of uncertainty. Of the 17 Rules, my favorite three are sequentially Rules, 5, 6 and 7 listed below.

Rule 5 – Stability is a Dangerous Illusion – when stability is the end game, human nature is to seek solutions that achieve a level of stability, which may be, in and of itself, unachievable.
Rule 6 – Stupid Survives until Smart Succeeds – be open to new paradigms and paths to success, but not just for the sake of newness and not at the expense of progress.
Rule 7 – Learning Fast better than Failing Fast – experimentation helps us learn what works from failure beyond learning to fail. The tragedy of failure is not the failure but the lack of learning from failure.

Enjoy the Book!

The Accountable Leader

Tue, 26 Feb 2013 16:40:19 GMT

In this month’s blog, we talk about the level of accountability a leader has to “Put the right people in the right seats on the bus” as the oft-quoted line from Jim Collin’s book “ Good to Great ” professes. I came across a book several years ago that lays out a game plan to do just that and then some. “ The Accountable Leader: Developing Effective Leadership Through Managerial Accountability ” by Brian Dive spells out 10 Key Management Accountabilities every leader must have. The first 2 of the 10 speak directly to this aspect of having the right people based on:

Deciding who comes onto the team..
Deciding who will work where, in which jobs and when.

Being an acknowledged supporter of business alignment, the book also identifies 7 Elements of the Decision Making Accountability (DMA) Solution Set that helps leaders align their activities to optimize accountability. The idea is these elements help determine the best place for any given task or job to reside within the organization. This can apply to large or small businesses, for-profit or non-profit and in scenarios where the job may be performed by a contractor or through other out-tasking arrangement. The seven are:

Nature of Work - why does a job exist and how is it unique in the organization
Resource Complexity - what is the accountability for: people, technology, knowledge and budgets
Problem-Solving - what type of thinking is required for the job
Change - how does creativity and innovation happen within the organization
Internal Collaboration - how does collaboration with peers happen to complete common tasks
External Interaction - how does collaboration with customers, suppliers and others happen
Task Horizon - how does the organization know the first six dimensions are working

Enjoy the Book!

Smart Trust

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 16:49:08 GMT

Trust is a sustainable success multiplier in today’s dynamic business world often described in terms that belie distrust and suspicion. The problem can be people may not know, or have forgotten, how to trust others, especially in a competitive business environment. In their recent book, “ Smart Trust ”, Stephen M. R. Covey and Greg Link set out to outline five trust actions that are common to high trust people and organizations.

Of the five smart trust actions outlined in the book, my favorite is the discussion around action #4, which is to “Do What You Say You’re Going To Do”. While this seems almost too obvious an action, it is set out as a key action for a reason; too many people don’t “Walk the Talk”. The ability to model the behavior that builds a culture of trust becomes a performance multiplier both for individuals and for organizations. Of note, is the importance of declaring the leader’s intent. The spoken intent transcends tactical actions that may or may not play out as planned. The trust is in the intent more than the actual steps to achieve the goal.

Enjoy the Book!

Making Yourself Indispensable - The Power of Personal Accountability

Tue, 27 Nov 2012 17:58:52 GMT

In this month’s blog I spoke of the importance of personal integrity. So it is only fitting that this month’s book review speak to the topic by way of personal accountability. In " Making Yourself Indispensable : The Power of Personal Accountability", Mark Samuel identifies the choices and behaviors required to truly be accountable people and by definition, self-leaders.

The heart of the book in my mind is not only identifying accountability as a choice, but creating a model in which we see the consequences of our choices. Essentially, in any given situation, we face two choices based on our intention within the given situation. One set of choices takes us to personal accountability while the other set of choices take us down the road to being a victim. Either which way, the choice is ours!

Hope Is Not A Strategy - The 6 Keys to Winning The Complex Sale

Wed, 14 Nov 2012 18:04:47 GMT

The end of the year holiday season is, among other things, a season of hope. As we take stock of 2012 and begin to focus on 2013, we are filled with hope for a better life in whatever way is meaningful to us. However, hope alone is not going to carry the day. Hope has to become a Vision which further translates to Strategies, Goals and Actions that lead to Improved Results. In his 2002 best seller "Hope Is Not A Strategy - The 6 Keys to Winning The Complex Sale", Rick Page lays out very definitive sales strategies to differentiate your value and effectively close sales in a business-to-business selling environment. While the definition of complex may have changed in the last 6 years, in today's global and very uncertain business landscape, we can ill afford to "hope" we close a deal or "hope" the client buys from us again. We cannot leave cash flow to chance!

One of the key points Rick makes is the need for an effective sales strategy and the importance of communicating that strategy. Sales strategies are executed at multiple levels and must be aligned both internally and externally with the client's buying process. Using the Business Alignment Model enables your business to achieve both levels of alignment to differentiate your value and improve sales results.

Leaders At All Levels

Sat, 27 Oct 2012 18:10:14 GMT

I recently finished reading "Leaders At All Levels" by Ram Charan and would recommend it as part of your professional leadership library. Ram Charan is a world-renowned advisor to business leaders and corporate boards as well as best selling author or co-author of 14 books. He zeroes in on different ways to ensure organizations have the quality and quantity of leaders in their ranks to ensure continuity of leadership.

I especially found his views on how to spot and develop leaders within the organization to be insightful. In one section in particular, he states, "The military is another source of leadership talent. Its leadership training is second to none." As I reflected on why I integrate military leadership lessons into my leadership practice, it occurred to me it wasn't that I was just learning how to lead, but rather I was learning to lead extremely well under adverse circumstances that makes a difference.

Reality-Based Leadership

Thu, 11 Oct 2012 18:17:47 GMT

Several months ago I had the pleasure of meeting the author of this month’s book at a presentation she was giving. It only took me a few minutes meeting with her prior to her presentation to know she was the real deal. Cy Wakeman’s book, "Reality-Based Leadership" - Ditch the Drama, Restore Sanity to the Workplace, and Turn Excuses Into Results is a bit of a wake-up call for organizations and individuals who are struggling with what real leadership is and should be to succeed in today’s global economy.

My favorite chapter in the book is titled Lead “First, Manage Second” because I believe it does a very good job of delineating the difference between leading and managing. In keeping with the theme of generational diversity, I can recount many situations involving multiple generations where the leader was really managing when they should be leading. In some cases, the leader was the only one not aware of the mismatch! I especially like the author’s Six Principles for Leading First, Managing Second. They are:

Resist the Urge to Add More Value
Coach the Person in Front of You
Work on Confidence First, and Competence will follow
Forget Logistics and Focus instead on Hearts and Minds
Allow People to move fully in their Roles
Disregard any and all attempts at Emotional Blackmail

The E-Myth Revisited

Thu, 27 Sep 2012 18:23:53 GMT

Since we are focused on choices this month, one of the more challenging choices a business owner makes is how much time to spend working in the business versus how much time to work on the business. In his book, “ The E-Myth Revisited , Why Most Small Businesses Don’t Work and What To Do About It”, Michael Gerber explains how the person who likes to work in the business as The Technician can also work on the business as The Manager and The Entrepreneur.

My favorite part of the book is in Section 3 where the author talks about the three key activities that form the foundation of the business. These activities are:

Innovation – Creativity is thinking new things, Innovation is doing new things to advance the business.
Quantification – What do the numbers say about how far Innovation has moved the business. If you don’t measure it, did it really happen?
Orchestration – Optimization of the business by embedding best practices into the standard operating procedures of the business.

As my own vision for my business is “Making Leadership a Way of Life”, these three activities help me realize what a sustainable leadership mantra entails. Whether you work in a small business or large business, for-profit or non-profit, this book will help you understand what it takes to be successful over the long haul.

The Power of Habit

Mon, 06 Aug 2012 18:26:38 GMT

In keeping with the theme of sustainable leadership, this month’s book review covers a topic that is, in my mind, at the very root of successful leadership. We define Attitude as Habit of Thought and so this month’s book review tells us how habits work and, more importantly, how we can change our habits if need be. In “ The Power of Habit ”, Charles Duhigg, gives leaders some wonderful insights into why change is so difficult for many and how that can improve when we understand the power of habits.

My favorite part of the book is the discussion around how to change habits. We know that habits are formed through life as our brains process and compartmentalize the vast amount of information we consume every day. Those habits that no longer serve us well, unfortunately, cannot be erased.

However, we can change the behavior by exercising the Golden Rule of Habit Change. Habits use a cue, or trigger, to create a corresponding behavior and expecting a reward for the behavior.

By changing the behavior around an existing cue and using a same or similar reward, leaders can change their own attitudes as well as the attitudes of the people in their organization. Culture can be changed one attitude at a time!

What’s Your Genius

Fri, 27 Jul 2012 18:31:30 GMT

As I work with clients both as an organization and individually, I am often asked how I can make them better leaders. My response is always to the effect of “I help you change the way you think about leadership, including leading yourself”. This month author was my inspiration for taking that approach and understanding the power of changing your attitude, or habit of thought. In his recent book, " What’s Your Genius ", Jay Niblick lays out in easy to follow details, the research, the process and the solution to helping you understand the way you think to realize your greatest potential.

Of special note in the book is its connection to the website allowing the reader to establish a private online workbook to go along with the book itself. This reinforces the importance of repetition and applying the knowledge we gain to ensure success from reading the book.

My favorite chapters are seven, eight and nine. These three chapters speak to the revolutions of Know Thyself, Choose Thyself and Create Thyself in order to realize your true genius. Even before I met Jay, I understood the importance of knowing yourself as a crucial first step before leading others. While we all realize we have choices how often do we abdicate that reality and digress into “I can’t” or “It’s too hard”? Of course, making the choice must lead to the re-creation of who you are to as any growth is going to involve change.