Management Craft

Flaws and Humanity - the Essense of Great #Leadership

A pal just sent me an email that contained the following line: "People love them for their flaws and humanity. They don't have to be perfect." And although he was not referring to leaders, I think this is also true of the very best and most impactful leaders. They are not perfect, and are often highly flawed individuals. But they move us. They make us buzz with life and catalyze big dreams.

Spend your development time learning to turn on the buzz, not worrying about how to be perfect.

And because I beleive in giving credit where due, the lovely line I quoted above came from Mark Levy. I recently did a podcast with Mark here and you can download his rockin' free Change This manifesto called, The Fascination Factor, here. I might just make your brain buzz.

Messing with Marshall Goldsmith's Feedforward #coachgoldsmith #coaching

I love the well-known approach that executive coach Marshall Goldsmith uses called “feedforward.” Feedforward is an alternative to giving feedback that is easier and more helpful. Here is how feedforward works. The performer states how he or she would like to develop or grow in the future. This should be a simple statement like:

• I would like to build stronger collaboration within my departments.
• I would like to become a more effective listener.
• I would like to spend more time building talent.
• I would like to think, act, and lead more strategically.

With a feedforward exercise, each person shares his or her goal and asks for ideas for how they can accomplish it. The “coach” offers a few ideas and the performer says, “thank you.” Then they switch roles. Here is a description of why feedforward works from Marshall’s website:

“Feedforward helps people envision and focus on a positive future, not a failed past. Athletes are often trained using feedforward. Race car drivers are taught to, "Look at the road ahead, not at the wall." Basketball players are taught to envision the ball going in the hoop and to imagine the perfect shot. By giving people ideas on how they can be even more successful, we can increase their chances of achieving this success in the future… Negative feedback often becomes an exercise in "let me prove you were wrong." This tends to produce defensiveness on the part of the receiver and discomfort on the part of the sender. Even constructively delivered feedback is often seen as negative as it necessarily involves a discussion of mistakes, shortfalls, and problems. Feedforward, on the other hand, is almost always seen as positive because it focuses on solutions - not problems… Successful people like getting ideas that are aimed at helping them achieve their goals. They tend to resist negative judgment.”

I saw Marshall Goldsmith facilitate 500 leaders doing feedforward at the same time at a leadership conference and I have used the technique in groups of many different sizes and it always works because it removes all the mental garbage that often comes with feedback. Anyone can offer you ideas and it is not so important that the ideas be right, great, or even good. We will all give and receive ideas that are great and ones that are lousy ideas. No matter! The power of feedforward is that we talk ourselves back into our goals each time we articulate them, we get some good ideas, and we turn on our peers’ awareness of our goals, increasing the chances they will continue to support us in helpful ways in the future.

“A fool learns from his experience. A wise person learns from the experience of others.” Otto von Bismarck

I have built on Marshal Goldsmith’s idea of feedforward with the following mutations that are useful for various situations including the following:

• Reverse feedforward: This is done when we proactively offer support based on goals expressed by a peer. “Sally, I know you are working on becoming more strategic, how can I support you in working on this?”
• Reverse feedforward with a twist: Like the mutation listed above, but with a tempting offer. “Sally, I know you are working on becoming more strategic, I happen to play golf with the professor of strategic studies at the University of Cincinnati and he owes me one. Would you like it if I set up lunch between the three of us? I would love to learn more about strategic thinking, too.”
• Reverse feedforward up and down: Get group members to write down five skills/strengths and five things/skills they want to learn more about. Then put folks in pairs and have them compare lists and offer to either coach or be coached when there is a match. After five minutes, participants switch off and do this again with another group member. Repeat several times and then ask participants to follow up on at least one match up per month. This will catalyze coaching up and down the generations. "Sally I see that you want to learn to use technology for team communication. That's a sweet spot for me and I would be happy to share what I have learned. Also, I see that you list listening as a strength. I would love to learn to be a better listener and would love to hear how you do it."
• Barrier blaster feedforward: This type of feedforward offer help to blast away current barriers. “Sally, I am struggling to get my proposal and presentation done and ready for the offsite. I am getting bogged down _______. What tow ideas do you have for me that you think would help me zoom forward again?”
• Staff meeting feedforward mini-session: Start each staff meeting with 10 minutes of feedforward. Encourage each leadership team member to ask for ideas that will help him or her have an amazing week/month.

What do you think? Give feedforward a try and keeping using it. This is not something that only works once. If you asked for ideas every day, it would work every day. You do not need to take and act on every idea you get, but you should show thanks for every idea, even the seemingly ridiculous ones.

Feedforward, and the mutated versions we have offered, are great ways to increase peer coaching conversations and effectiveness.

Thought Leadership? for Managers?

The term "thought leadership" is a hot buzz word to describe what we used to call scholars, gurus, and experts. It's not exactly the same thing as these other terms, but along the same lines, and it seems to be the term of choice because I see it popping up all over the place.

A though leader is someone who continues to work hard to stay current and knowledgeable in a field and adds to the collective knowledge of that field.

Often, thought leaders (those we recognize or those who proclaim themselves though leaders) tend to be outside the organization. Most consultants, for example, want to be regarded as thought leaders. I did a presentation yesterday for ASTD and they introduced me as a thought leader in management and leadership.

But look at my definition above again. Wouldn't we want our managers and leaders to also be thought leaders? I do! Great managers and leaders stay current and they add to our understanding of what it takes to catalyze greatness in others and produce extraordinary results.

Great managers read, explore, discuss, experiment, and innovate. They are active participants in the craft of management and they help future professionals.

I like it when people refer to me as a thought leader, because I work hard to stay on the edge of my field. I hope, however, that this is nothing special and unique, that all managers and leaders endeavor to be thought leaders, too.

Consider Tony Hsieh, CEO of Zappos and author of Delivering Happiness. He is a thought leader in organizational culture. As a leader, he has added to our collective understanding of how to build cultures that engage and excite employees.

Sure, Tony wrote a book, too, and I know many of you could fill a great book. I talk to brilliant professionals every day - people who are actively engaged and innovating quietly within their organizations.

Are you a thought leader? I encourage all managers and leaders to consider this a goal (not so you can write a book, so you can do your best work) and I encourage training departments to consider how they can develop the discipline of thought leadership inside their organizations.

And if this is something you are or endeavor to be, how are you staying on the edge? More than anything, thought leadership is a deliberate and active practice. It involves taking time to reflect on how you manage and how employees and peers respond. To be a thought leader, we need to ensure our daily to-do lists don't take up 125% of our time, because how can we improve what we do when we can't improve what we do?

From time to time I feel like I am falling behind in this regard. As a consultant, having client projects is great and a big part of my business goals. But just like you, I can take on too much "doing" and fail to stop and think, network, discuss, and learn. My blog posting goes down and I struggle to hop off the hamster wheel. And the wheel is not a bad wheel, by the way, we all choose our jobs for a reason. We like the doing, the work, and may feel more productive when we are doing a lot. And yet, we can't grow our craft and our capabilities when we are doing so fast and furiously.

We can and should also learn and grow while we are doing, but this type of progress should not be our only kind. A great conference, training session, networking group, book, collection of blogs, or other growth experience can be very powerful catalysts. I really enjoy my podcast conversations, because I get to talk to great thinkers and this recharges my mind.

Make sure your good DOING does not completely take over your work. Your work and potential thought leadership will suffer. And this, eventually, will reduce your results and your competitiveness in your field.

As we head into August, Management Craft's 6th Anniversary by the way, put something on your schedule for the month that has the potential to electrify your mind and push you to your edge.

#SOBCON 2010 - The Rockies Edition

If you would like a day and an evening of intellectual buzzing, bubbling, and catalyzing, check out the SOBCON2010 Colorado conference in September. My pals Terry and Liz - both with bubbling brains and then some - are hosts, MCs, and chief connectors. Don't expect a buttoned up business conference, this one will be decidedly more sloppy and special.

Free Webinar on Multi-Directional Coaching - Join Me Wednesday!

I will be offering a 60 minute webinar for the ASTD Benchmarking Forum this Wednesday, July 28th at noon EDT. They have some slots left and you can attend by clicking and registering here. Here is the title and description of the session from their web page:

Catalyzing Coaching Up and Down the Generations

 
Coaching is a great learning tool. Often however, we see coaching as something that the "sage" imparts to  "newbies." With four generations in the workplace and work practices and preferences changing faster than a hummingbird on espresso, we need to foster a coaching environment where people give and receive coaching up, down, and sideways in the organization. During this interactive webinar, Lisa Haneberg will offer several strategies and practices learning professionals can use to catalyze multi-directional coaching in their organizations.

The primary target audience for this webinar is training, HR, and OD pros, but even managers and leaders who coach a lot will benefit. I hope you can join in!

Intellectual Ice Cream Cones - get yours today!

I was talking with a coaching client when a new way to look at time management popped out of the conversation. She was sharing how things were going since our last conversation and was happy that her improved focus and love of her work enabled her to be in the right mindset to do some fun and proactive work (when previously her days felt more like being behind, disengaged, and overwhelmed). I said something like, "isn't it great when we can get into a space where we can take advantage of those intellectual ice cream cones?" After I said it, we both decided that this is a great way to look at things. Intellectual ice cream cones are those pieces of work that challenge you, fuel you, and engage you. We all love to do these things but often let the craziness of our days take us away from them. In addition, if your stress level is high, you might not get the benefit of this highly desired work when you do it. Intellectual ice cream cones. One way we can fall back in love with our work. And as leaders and managers, we should model the way for our teams who are likely struggling to stay connected and engaged, too. What's getting in your way? Do you know what your intellectual ice cream cones are?

Making People Care - A Managerial Oxymoron

I was talking to a small group of managers who were discussing elements of their ideal culture. One person mentioned that they thought the ideal culture was one where all employees cared about and helped shaped the organization's future. Another manager said, "man, they don't care about that, they just want to do their jobs and the best care about their customers. And isn't that enough?" The first manager disagreed and suggested that perhaps managers ought to do more to require employees to care about the business. And then he caught himself, immediately realizing the fundamental error of his statement.

You know this!  And yet, I see this idea, or shades of this idea, come up again and again. We think that if we clarify expectations and hold people accountable that we can "manage" increases in how much employees care and their engagement.

Care is an element of ownership, and it is a gift. We can't make people care. But we can lead in ways that inspire, uplift, and engage our employees' hearts and minds.

Going back to the original example. Do you share business results with your employees and hope that they will internalize the information and play an active role in making the organization stronger? If your employees don't seem to care about the business, the solution is not to shove MORE information down their throats or tell them they are expected to care about the business. The solution is to inspire and engage employees so that they ask for more information and ask questions that show you they are interested.

“You ain’t gonna learn what you don’t wanna know.” Jerry Garcia

You know this! And yet, I don't see an emphasis on this in how we train, select, evaluate, and promote managers. Do you? I mean REALLY. For example, is it NOT OK to have supervisors who drag the vibe of their teams down?

As I was finishing this post, I looked back over it and realized I have written this same general message repeatedly in several recent posts. Why? It keeps popping up as a theme in the projects I am working on. Many clients, many different projects.  One key theme. Hmmm...

Being a manager is a privilege and great management is not about pushing employees. Great managers create pull environments.

Fireside Chat with Mark Levy @levyinnovation

Would you like to learn a simple way to unlock your best thinking? Check out this podcast!

During this 33 minute podcast, I chat with Mark Levy, author of Accidental Genius: Using Writing to Generate Your Best Ideas, Insight, and Content.  You are going to want to listen to this podcast and then give Mark's suggestions a try. I always enjoy the podcast conversations I have with folks, but this is the first time, in a long time, that I felt intellectually "buzzed" after recording the podcast (and the post-cast conversation). I am working on a new concept for my next book and Mark gave me some great ideas for ways I can tap into my creativity.  I have been using several of the techniques Mark reviews in the book and, by golly, they are really helpful. Open up that beautiful brain and see what's inside!

Check out Mark's blog here. And if you live in or near NYC, plan on attending Mark's book launch party this coming Wednesday. Information here.

You can listen to my podcast with the Mark Levy by clicking here:

You can also download an MP3 version of the podcast here.

And just a reminder.....

Here is the Podcast Feed for the entire Fireside Chat podcast series:

To see the complete list of podcasts in this series, select the Podcasts and Webcasts category on this blog.You can also find this series on iTunes (and several other podcast sites), just search under my last name for Fireside Chat.

What's logic got to do with it? #Management

Yesterday, I found myself in two separate discussions about people and logic - or more accurately, people and a lack of logic. Here's the thing. People are wonderfully idiosyncratic. They are unpredictable and sensitive to what's going on. If we try to apply logic to people-based conundrums, we might just be setting ourselves up for more problems and getting off track.

Have you been disappointed with how someone responded to what you thought was a perfectly well-thought out message? And then, do you get stuck in the , "but I didn't do anything wrong," self-talk? If so, you might be trying to apply logic to a situation where logic was not the driving force. Logic is not the answer here, and in fact, it will get in the way of your progress in building this relationship.

When I coach people, I often find myself responding something like this:

"Well, that sounds like a perfectly logical interpretation of the situation. Was logic what caused the escalation of this conversation? (Answer: No) What is another way to interpret what happened?"

Power and Fascination

Check out this post on pal Phil Gerbyshak's blog called Powerdrunks. It is a guest post from Sally Hogshead, author of Fascinate: Your Seven Triggers to Persuation and Captivation. Click through and take her F-Test - it is quite interesting to think about what drives us. I like the premise that we are all fascinating and captivating.

This guest post, which focuses on the trigger of POWER is interesting, too. I am sure we all know people who get high on power - maybe some of us are like that! There are good and bad aspects of all the triggers. As a leader, we need to be cognizant about how our preferred style impacts others. It is our responsbility to communicate so that our messages are recevied as intended - which means that we need to be the ones who change our approach to be effective. That said, it is helpful and interesting to know our tendencies and the tendencies and preferences of those around us.

What if your team took the F-test and you discovered that one of your most talented empoyees was had a primary trigger of "Vice?" How might you better tap into his or her love of blasting traditions? How might this information change how you approch helping him or her do his or her best work?

All of these behavioral/style/preferences assessments provide information you can use to be a better leader and manager. There are so many options, it would be a shame not to use one or two.