Management Craft

Things You Should Give Up

I really dig this post from the Purpose Fairy called 15 Things You Should Give Up to Be Happy. I agree with them all. Breakthroughs await those who give up even a couple. Extra credit if you are a manager, as your good choices will rub off on others.

TEDx Talk - Why You Will Fail (and how not to)

I enjoyed this TEDx talk from Larry Smith called Why you will fail to have a great career. It is very inspirational in a counter-intuitive way. Check it out and then check your assumptions and beliefs that will help or hinder your success and satisfaction.The times where we "go for it" will be those we remember the most because they are the times when we fully use our potential.

Courage and gumption and passion launch things. Resoluteness fuels continued progress.

I have come to believe that success is more like a marathon and less like playing the lottery - and yet more of us are buying and scratching then we are training in the rain (present company included at times - happy to say I feel more on track, pun intended, these days).

And by the way, I don't think there is only one shot that we get. Most of us have already passed up several pivotal opportunities. But another will present itself - or you will seek it - tomorrow. Will you be ready? Willing? You are able.

Enjoy the TEDx talk from a fellow Canadian - I like his sarcastic humor!

 

Fear of, and Anticipation for, Human Tipping Points #management #cancer

As many of you know, I have had a very interesting year health-wise (medullary thyroid cancer, surgery, many life changes including reinventing the way I eat/exercise, food as "health", etc..). I am a reflective person, but have found that I am much more so now. I enjoy letting ideas and concepts bang around in my head a bit longer because I want to discover their meaning and potential.

Over the last couple of weeks I have been pondering tipping points (hat tip to Malcolm Gladwell's awesome book by the same name). My reflection on this topic is mostly self-absorbed and related to my health. That said, I have also considered how human tipping points affect how we manage, lead, and create momentum in our workplaces.

I have read and heard many times that my type of cancer grows very slowly until it doesn't (most people, myself included, are diagnosed after it has spread to lymph nodes and is considered incurable). And because of this most people live for decades after diagnosis and often die from other causes. This is great news and gives me encouraging odds.

And yet, the idea that it "grows very slowly until is doesn't" has been tough to get out of my mind. What the doctors mean by this is that at some point - a tipping point - the volume and spread of the cancer becomes such at the trajectory of the disease changes and is hard to reverse. And apparently the difference in disease progression and likely outcomes are stark. Very slow to very fast - very good to very bad.

Before I worry you dear readers (because this is not my intent), I want you to know that I have no reason to believe that I am anywhere near the tipping point. I am enjoying life, living more healthfully, reinventing my work, and plan to experience a fun retirement in 15 years if only I can save a bit more money in my 401K.

It's the road TOWARD the tipping point that interests me right now. I wonder how much each individual action or decision might/could/does impact my trajectory and how much power I have to slow my body's march toward the tipping point. As a firm believer in the butterfly effect and someone who has seen that this applies to health, I believe (and the science concurs) that each tiny action reverberates.

I will be the first to admit that I was flapping my butterfly wings in the wrong direction - speeding up my journey to the tipping point - for many years. I let excessive travel, poor diet, and life as a road warrior consultant get in the way of exercising regularly and good sleep habits. If you imagine my disease progression as a trip from Seattle to Key West, by car from Seattle to Dallas, and then on supersonic jet from Dallas to Key West (Dallas being the tipping point), I wonder if my years of living less healthfully caused me to speed at 80MPH toward Dallas and wonder how far I have gone. Where am I now? Am I two states away? In northern Texas? Did I catch myself early enough to slow things down in Portland? Can I slam on the breaks and go 5MPH instead of 80?

Here is a specific example. I am taking several supplements (fish oil, curcumin, mushroom, resveratrol, black raspberry, skullcap, etc) that seem to help directly or indirectly reduce cancer growth (not of my cancer, mind you, my cancer is too rare to have been studied). Am I taking enough of each to be therapeutic? What if I am taking two pills less than the right dose? Most studies don't provide cut and dry answers about how much is enough and it would be a shame if two more pills a day would have done something different.

I have cut sugar out of my diet because sugar feeds cancer tumors. I wonder, however, how strict I need to be. Will one chocolate cake bender/celebration fuel growth? Will a week at a conference eating processed turkey deli sandwiches affect my overall trajectory? What if I eat broccoli with my cake - will this make a difference? I know some folks with my disease who eat cruciferous veggies at EVERY meal. Should I be doing this?

I will never likely know the answers to any of these questions (quarterly blood tests will tell me some information about overall speed of progression). And perhaps this is the point of this post and my inquiry into tipping points. It is hard to understand them except when looking back. But we know that these forces occur and are in play in all aspects of life. So what can we do?

I am slowly but resolvedly coming to the conclusion that we will be well served to err on the side of doing too much to achieve our goals. My goal is to slow my disease progression down to the point that this disease does not affect my potential for a full and healthy life. I do not know, and cannot know, the affect of the changes I am making but I can be pretty sure that each change has the potential to have an affect and that some changes will offer additive affects. Going "BIG" and making more beneficial changes does not appear to have a downside (except that eating junk food and being lazy can feel fun at the time - but this short term reward has lost its lustre with me).

When I think about stories about how everyday people generate breakthrough results against great odds, I recall that there is often an element of going big and persevering - of seeming obsessed with the journey toward their goal. We remark, "wow, they really worked hard!"

I will return to the topic of our workplaces, now. There are beneficial tipping points and detrimental ones. If your workplace culture is heading in a direction that you are not happy with, you might need to go big and throw a lot of positive butterfly flaps at it. If you want to start progression toward a new and positive tipping point, you will need to employ dozens of catalyzers to create momentum and get to the place where you will describe "it started slowly and then it hit."

Small actions can generate big results. And many, many, many small actions can impact the outcome even more.

As leaders, our most important skill and practice may well be dogged and focused determinism. A compulsion to unlearn bad habits and take on new practices  - so much so that watching you tires casual observers.

As is the case with most major life changes, my health challenges have taught me how important it is to influence the progression toward tipping points with passion, energy, and accountability. And it has taught me that we may need to do this in the absence of good data. We may not know which actions will work best or what combination will have additive effects. And we will need to decide and get going.

There is a kind of peace that comes from being fully in alignment with a goal. When I have good days - eat the best foods, exercise a lot, manage stress, sleep, remember my pills, enjoy people - I feel at peace knowing that if I can slow down the journey to Dallas (and ultimately Key West), I have done it that today.

We can feel that same sense of peace at work. When we do all we can to be positive and powerful forces for change and for people, we can fuel our organization's march toward the tipping points we seek and away from those we do not. I wish you more peace and less fear.

Life - work - life - work. What works, works everywhere.

Love this #ted talk from Shawn Achor - Will help you be happier.

Check out this supercharged and amusing talk from Shawn Achor - it is excellent and has the potential to help us all live more fulfilling - and successful - lives. 12 minutes.

Action and Mental Garbage Model

I hope you have a great week. Here is a quick model that I hope helps you shape your week. You choose the path and how many self-imposed barriers you allow to slow you down. Openness - versus defensiveness - enables us to fully trust in ourselves because we take in the world fully and can respond flexibly. When we carry a lot of mental garbage, we rely more on history that might not be relevant for today, inflexible mental models, manic mantras, and motivational posters to guide us. Why do we need to list our values? Answer: Because we are not open enough to fully trust ourselves.

I saw the master in action this weekend. #leadership #managment

I spent an afternoon with a dear friend yesterday. We chatted over lunch and walked around his beach town. I have always admired his engaging and caring way - he is a leader who makes others feel like they have his full attention and consideration and they do (that's the important part - it is sincere, not an act).

Why? Because he thinks and lives this way. He notices people and things and takes the initiative to be helpful and caring. More so than most people. More so than I do - by a long shot.

I have always known this about my friend but I was reminded - in a vivid way - during our walk. Those who we passed received a smile and hello. Someone had dropped a baby bottle on the walking path, he picked it up and put it on the cement wall so the owner could find it and no one would trip over it. We passed a couple who were taking pictures of each other, he asked if he could take their picture together and then had some fun with them to make sure they got a great shot. He interacted with people on the street, in shops, and in the restaurant in ways that made each smile and brighten.

You might be thinking that I am a little nuts for calling this out because these human acts are quite normal - or they should be. It is true that any one of these moments would be considered what it means to be a good person - nothing extraordinary.

But here is the distinction. He oozed care in every moment. He was aware of others, noticed others, proactively cared for others, and did so while being fully engaged in our conversation. I was much less aware of others.

My friend is someone for whom people love working and he brings out the best in them. And here is the main point of this post. WE can and should do this, too. It does not take a training class or being a particular behavioral style. We can relate to others in this way if we:

• Choose to be a powerful and positive influence on others.
• Take the time and attention to notice others.
• And then be gracious, kind, friendly, and helpful more often.

Don't go rushing to include these expectations in your new employee orientation. Don't add it to your performance review or create a management competency called, "caring." Just try being more demonstrably caring and see what happens. Lead from a basis of positive care for others and you will find that your days, weeks, and years are more amazing and that your good vibe spreads.

After spending the afternoon with my friend, I found myself thinking about how I can improve what I notice and how I respond to others. I am no ogre, BTW, but I can and want to demonstrate care more often - for everyone, not just a chosen few.

You have likely heard the mind teaser about the tree - if a tree falls in a forest but no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?

I have to ask the same thing about caring for others. If we care but no one experiences our affection and goodwill, does it exist? I think that the vast majority of people are caring in terms of our intentions. Most of us are quite selective about how we give of ourselves and I am not sure this serves us, our intentions, or others well.

These tiny actions - smiles, pictures, gestures of help - add up and to make a very big and wonderful impression. Remember, though, that although this benefit is compelling, it should not be the reason that we choose to live a more generous (of ourselves) life. My friend does not think about this. In fact, I am guessing he would think this blog post is quite odd indeed.

Managers: Embrace your flawedness - and everyone's. @brenebrown

I love this article from Brene Brown called, Want to be Happy? Stop trying to be perfect.

When I teach management, I often talk about how we are all highly flawed and highly talented and embracing it all is a recipe for success (not just the talent part). I don't freak out when people do annoying or strange little things - we all do this. I don't let a botched delivery get in the way of great intent. I have stopped hiding my scars because I know everyone can see them. We are our idiosyncrasies.

I was talking to someone recently who pointed out a typo on one of my blog posts. I thought, "really, that's what you want to talk about?" I bet I have more typos than freckles in the sunshine. But seriously, how we think about flaws and imperfections can become barriers - or not if we don't stop to take too much notice.

And besides, most of it is in the eye of the beholder which means it is all bunk.

Meaning: The "wolf" of control in trendy sheep's clothing? #leadership

I am doing some digging around about meaning and here is a thought to chew on this new week and year. What if leaders should NOT and CANNOT make work meaningful for others? What if this idea reinforces control, extrinsics, and thereby serves to wreck not build our feelings that our work has meaning?

What if whether our work has meaning comes from deep within each individual and as a result of how we each define our experiences? What would this mean for leaders? What should they be doing differently to help every team member do his or her best work?

This is all a bit existential, I realize. Even so, I believe and see that many of our well-intended efforts to improve our workplaces are based on flawed premises and therefore doomed to fail.

This is an important topic to discuss because we know that meaning is a key measure of satisfaction. People want to know that their work matters. As leaders we should do whatever we can to help our team members thrive. We should not, however, tell them why they ought to find their work meaningful or attempt to define what makes work meaningful, generally speaking. There is no general rule here and doing this would throw water on our employees' flames of interest, engagement, initiative, and internal drive.

Leaders can help affect meaning, however, although not by focusing on meaning.

• Get to know each person and build strong and trusting bonds.
• Catalyze - let your employees pull you into their world and let them lead in it. Be a great follower.
• Take the initiative to offer catalytic (not control oriented) coaching.
• Let jobs morph with change and be open and eager to hear about ideas team members have for how their role ought to be reinvented.
• Know what the concept of a zen moment might look like. Promote "being here now" working habits.
• Allow each employee to get excited about and tuned into the aspects of their work that bring him or her the most satisfaction and fulfillment. We all define "progress" and "accomplishment" differently. As the leader, you get to decide how performance will be judged and rewarded, but you cannot tell people which task means more to them.
• Never let a day go by without letting your team members know how much they mean to you. Be thankful, gracious, and caring. Nurture. No one should doubt that they matter here and to you. No one. Be real about this, too, don't use some schlocky practiced reinforcement schema. Can you say that's transparent?

Example: I was recently in a situation where the client was telling me how important I was to the team. This is nice to hear, but did not improve my feelings that I was doing work that was meaningful. This particular team has the money to spend on consultants and has good intentions. But they have not yet embraced their need for individual and team reinvention for the leadership team. They give praise for my work, but my measure of meaning is that I can catalyze change. It happens a lot, but not yet in this situation. So while I love hearing that I am important to my client, I would give that up to have a more substantive impact on their practices and beliefs. It is a work in progress!

I once had a boss who liked to tell me I was important to the team. But then his actions said the opposite. If he wanted me to feel genuinely cared for, he would have taken the time to understand what drives me, excites me, and makes me want to become immersed. He didn't and didn't guess correctly. He applied what he thought were universal management approaches to his good intention of wanting me to stay with the company and flourish and expand the business. When it comes to meaning, there are no universals.

Start with yourself: You are the designer and implementor of your work experience. You define meaning from your perspective and for your work situation. What brings out the biggest and most engaged you? What can you do to pump up your interest? How will you relish and fully experience what's happening right here and now? Herein lies the true potential for leaders. Going first, discovering the meaning they derive from their daily experiences, talking about the parts of your job that matter most to you, being here now (even when creating a strategic plan, are you being in the room with a group of talents colleagues who are together reinventing the organization).

 

Forget Old Biz Myths @alevit

My pal, Alexandra Levit, has a cool new book out about myths called, Blind Spots: The 10 Business Myths You Can't Afford to Believe on Your New Path to Success (great title BTW). I asked her if she would share a post about the book with my readers and here it is. These are important and I would encourage you to pick up the book for anyone who is at a career crossroad/restart/start. Thanks, Alexandra!

To Succeed Today, Forget the Old Business Myths

By Alexandra Levit

This is not your parents’ business world.  It’s not even your older sister’s business world.  The recent recession has toppled and transformed our ideas about just about everything.  Massive change is afoot and many of us are still reeling from the work-force bloodletting that began three years ago and the downfall of companies we thought we all respected.  

I went in search of the 10 biggest myths of business success that people believe to be true even though they don't work for 98 percent of all truly successful people.  The time to debunk these myths is now because they are more dangerous and less viable than ever given this post-recessionary climate of ethical scrutiny and intense competition.  If adhering to these myths didn't get you places before, it really won't today, when employers want to hire people with Puritan work ethics, people who want to do their jobs well without rocking the boat too much and who are strong representatives of the organization’s culture. 

Putting on blinders is not an option and you can't afford to waste time.  You must throw away these myths immediately and determine what will work in their place. 

Myth #1:  Overnight success is possible.

Most people persevere for a long time and experience several setbacks before achieving an objective definition of success.  You’ll be best served if you are able to move your dream forward a little bit at a time, and are able to cope when things temporarily go south. 

Myth #2:  Controversy will propel your career.

Being controversial usually generates attention for a little while, but people will probably not trust you in the long-term.  Instead, work to incorporate the tried-and-true values of honesty and authenticity into your daily work life. 

Myth #3:  Employers want you to be yourself. 

While employers value the unique set of skills and experiences you bring to the table, they expect you to tow the line with respect to company rules and conduct.  You won’t get away wearing ripped jeans to a client meeting because that’s your personal style, and you must learn to be politically sensitive and diplomatic even if someone has wronged you. 

Myth #4:  Being good at your job trumps everything.

You can be the most talented employee your company has ever hired, but if your contributions aren’t visible and people don’t value what you do, it simply won’t matter.  So instead of slaving over your job, spend a little more time devising ways to promote the great work you’re doing.

Myth #5:  It’s best to climb the ladder as fast as possible.

Getting promoted year after year requires a near-constant vigilance as well as a laser sharp focus on work – often to the detriment of everything else in your life.  Higher titles usually bring longer hours, heavier responsibilities, and more politicking with them. 

Myth #6:   You’ll get more money because you’ve earned it.

The media is full of stories of people who rake up six figure salaries because they played their cards right.  But what about the unsung millions who came to the table with the same hand?  More often than not, compensation is about business realities, HR mandates, and office politics – not performance.   

Myth #7:  The problem isn’t you, it’s the organization. 

People job jump constantly because of this one, but the truth is, the same situations crop up in Corporate America over and over.  Don’t take yourself with you.  Learn self-awareness and change your own thinking and behavior instead of waiting for the company to adapt to your needs.   

Myth #8:  You won’t get laid off, you’re too essential.   

I often tell people that they should aim to be indispensable at their jobs.  But today more than ever company loyalty is a thing of the past, and while consistently trying to add value to your organization is a good move, sometimes it isn’t enough.  You need to be able to recognize when you’re on the chopping block and take active steps to prevent a bad outcome.

Myth #9:  If only you could break out of Corporate America, everything would be perfect.

Running a business is harder than it looks, and entrepreneurship is not for everyone. In fact, most people are better off working for large companies and receive substantial perks, like benefits, discounts, and contacts, which you don’t want to live without.  

Myth #10:  Do what you love and the money will follow.

Just because you have a passion for a particular area doesn’t mean you will automatically make money doing it.  Some things are better off left as hobbies, but if you really think an income is possible, keep your day job and test the waters first.

Want to learn more about how you can protect your career from these myths? Check out Blind Spots. You can also find more information at Alexandra's website here.

 

 

7 Ways to Not be a Great Leader @rajsetty

Being a star performer usually leads to rapid advancement up the career ladder.  But a star performer doesn't always make a great leader.  Why?  Pal and fellow biz book author Raj Setty outlines 7 top reasons for this from different skill sets to limiting employees' growth to being uncomfortable out of the spotlight.  But by addressing these issues, a star performer can indeed become an effective leader and create more star performers.  Check out Raj's great post here.