Lessons of Leadership

Lesson/Goal/Outcome
1. Thoroughly Know Yourself
- Become keenly aware of your strengths and challenges as a leader
- Learn your “blind spots” and their impact
- Solicit and act on feedback
2. Build on Strengths, Fix Your Weaknesses
- Remove skill deficiencies
- Pro-actively overcome debilitating biases
- Develop and maintain your own personal development plan
- Actively seek out opportunities to challenge your weaknesses
3. Master Difficult Conversations
- Be able to handle difficult conversations
- Use conversations as a tool of leadership
- Learn to listen on multiple levels and with empathy
- Get more accomplished through people
- Get buy-in to critical initiatives
- Deal effectively with performance issues
4. Communicate Pro-Actively
- Get the organization focused on the customer
- Speak passionately about your strategy and direction
- Openly ask for commitment to goals
- Become a powerful public spokesperson for the organization
- Write clear, crisp documents that get intended results
- Take full responsibility for interpersonal communication
- Build communication strategy into all initiatives
- Maintain a “transparent” approach to managing
5. Adopt a Facilitative Style
- Become a catalyst for idea generation
- Ensure innovative ideas are heard without judgment
- Successfully exploit the value of competing viewpoints
- Use conflict as a creative force for change
- Insist on data-based conclusions
- Lead powerful, productive meetings
6. Focus on a Few Initiatives
- Select initiatives with high-impact potential
- Set appropriate priorities for the organization
- Accurately assess situations before taking action
- Accurately analyze unintended consequences of actions
- Concentrate on results that implement strategy and profits
- Challenge and remove “activities” that do not lead to results
7. Drive Change
- Acknowledge and communicate the urgency of change
- Set challenging goals for everyone
- Manage the impact of change on the organization
- Insist on learning and growth in the organization
- Properly assess the current environment and its implications
- Develop strategies to remain competitive, vibrant, relevant
- Set high standards and demand accountability
8. Model a Clear Way
- Lead by example
- Consistently demonstrate the connection of work to strategy
- Model and enforce corporate values and personal integrity
- Be transparent in executing strategy
- Share your learning with your people
- Transmit the culture to newcomers
9. Let Leaders Lead
- Choose a team with impeccable skills
- Provide broad guidance regarding strategy, direction
- Build in appropriate reporting and check-ins
- Ask openly how you can help
- Delegate generously and stay out of the way
- Find ways to develop every person
10. Become a Life-Long Learner
- Stay tuned in to the changing environment
- Study the lessons of history
- Make learning a requirement of managers
- Lead and participate in development
- Consistently reward learning in the organization
- Make every manager a coach/facilitator
- Make ROI-based training a consistent element of strategy
11. Focus on People
- Fine tune your own people skills
- Build an organization that treats everyone with respect
- Recruit leaders with a record of getting results through people
- Recognize excellent performance, new ideas

Writing: 3 more ideas

The last several Learning Links have been dealing with the subject of writing and how to improve your business writing. This time let's look at formatting, clearer sentences, and adding some "action" to your written document.

Most of us do not think about the visual impact of our writing as we are drafting a document. But formatting makes a huge difference for the reader. For one thing, large blocks of text are not inviting and encourage the reader to skim over them and possibly miss the meaning. In a business document this is not good because we often tend to bury the important part of our communication deep inside a long paragraph.

Formatting Is Key

After you have completed your document and you are so proud of it, it is time to have a critical look for formatting concerns. Here are three suggestions:

• Use lots of subheads
• Separate lists with bullets
• Make liberal use of white space

Use lots of subheads
Subheads and another formatting techniques are "road signs" which give the reader some idea as to where the document is going. If our document is organized well, these road signs make it easy for the reader to grasp key points. Subheads separate out important information and make it easily accessible.

Separate lists with bullets
One of the nice things about word processors is that they give us lots of flexibility with formatting. Bullets help the reader absorb lists of related information and put that information in perspective.

Make liberal use of white space
Visual impact really matters to the reader! When faced with a series of pages of block text and no formatting, it seems a major undertaking just to get started. Break up the text with formatting techniques such as those referenced above and expand the amount of white space between paragraphs and key points. This makes the document much more interesting visually.

How Long Is Your Sentence?
This is not a reference to a prison term, but to the length of sentences we write in business documents. After you have written, it's a good idea to go back and break up those long sentences. Strive for a maximum of 15 to 20 words per sentence--and while you are at it, avoid semicolons since they really serve no purpose in a typical business document. (If the two clauses can stand alone, simply separate them with a period.)

Using Action Verbs
Passive tense is boring! Sometimes it is necessary but typically not in a business document.
Example: "The annual report produced a disappointed reaction among the board of directors. "
Revision: "The annual report disappointed the board of directors."
Example: "It is our expectation that we will see productivity improvement when the workers learn the new system."
Revision: "We expect workers to produce more when they learn the new system."
The revisions show action and produce a sense of excitement about the subject matter that is missing in passive tense. (Sometimes we try to diffuse responsibility with phrases like "mistakes were made" and maybe there are times when that is helpful, but for the most part you should avoid these types of sentences.)

What to do this week
Review your documents for formatting, use of white space, simple, clean communication and active verbs. Take a few minutes to make editorial changes and then ask someone you trust to review the document before you send it. Most of us have to do a fair amount of writing as part of our job, but our readers really appreciate it when we take them into consideration as we draft and format the document.

Writing Performance Goals--A special type of writing

This Learning Links issue is about a special kind of writing: Writing performance goals for yourself and for your team members. Most of us fail to obtain performance results from our associates because we have never made clear to them what we expect. The best way to do this is through well-written performance goals which follow the SMART principle. Goals need to be Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Results-oriented, and Time-oriented. In other words, goals need to spell out what the person is to do in measurable terms by what date. If these conditions are met, at least it is clear whether not the employee achieved the goal and that should make the discussion about performance a lot simpler--and a lot more objective.
Goals need to be specificGoals such as "To improve communication with the team" are too vague to even consider. The question to ask is what is it that you want to do? If the goal is to provide a method of communication among team members, then spell that out and spell out exactly when it is to happen. For example, "To install an intranet web page for use by the team by February 1" is a much better goal.
Goals need to be measurableMeasures should be quantitative (To develop 10 new pre-qualified prospects by the end of each month) so that both manager and employee are clear as to whether or not the target was met. Of course if conditions change along the way, perhaps the measurement needs to change as well--but at least you have a starting point as to how to measure progress.
Goals need to be attainableWe can write many goals for ourselves and for our employees, but if they are not attainable or realistic, they are of little value in performance management. This is not to say that we should not have "stretch" goals. We should always be attempting to set goals that are beyond our reach. But goals such as "Relocate the parts department to the Broad Street location by Christmas" may not be attainable, for example, if it is affected by construction delays or other likely interruptions. Also, sometimes we make goals that would be difficult under any circumstances. Better to have a stretch goal and meet it than a nearly impossible goal and fail to achieve it. (One of my favorite definitions of a stretch goal came from Dana Mead, former CEO of Tenneco who defined a stretch goal as one you set having no idea at the time how you could possibly attain it. His theory, of course, is that reaching high greatly improves our chance for major improvements.)
Goals need to be results orientedIt doesn't make sense to have goals without a specific business outcome. So the goals we set need to be geared toward improving the bottom line, sales figures, customer satisfaction or the like. Many times we set goals which seem to be useful, but don't have an impact on business results. When that happens, it is a nice exercise but not very useful as a performance tool.
Goals need to be time orientedOne of the biggest failures many managers make in goal setting is failing to put a deadline by which the goal is to be met. A goal is not complete until it has a time measurement associated with it. Even if the time constraints are difficult to nail down, you should still associate a deadline with the goal, noting that it might be subject to change dependent on other conditions.
Here are a couple of simple goals which meet our criteria:

• To complete the migration to XYZ software for the sales division by December 15, 2009.
• To develop a performance management template for the human-resources department and obtain management approval by July 1.
• To schedule and complete a presentation skills course satisfactorily by August 1.

Notice all these are specific, measurable, and are results and time oriented. If we follow this formula, not only will performance likely improve, employees will feel that the system is fair and they will be willing to commit to the goals proposed.
Two other ideas:
1) As you begin drafting goals for yourself, a good place to start is the performance agreement of your own manager. What are his/her goals? How does your work fit into achieving them? If you're not sure, it is a good time to initiate a dialogue to clear this up. If your goals don't seem to be related to those of your manager, there's a serious absence of alignment which can result in a lot of lost motion.
2) Allow your associates to draft their own goals. Give them a copy of this Learning Links and suggest they draft their own goals. Research shows that when you allow an employee to draft his or her own goals, they typically make them more demanding than you would had you written them yourself! What a great position to be in!
In summary, writing goals for the organization or for your team is a valuable exercise--although frequently it does not get the attention it deserves. As a manager, you must ask yourself if an individual's performance is not up to standards, have you made your expectations clear in writing? The best way to answer that question is to write really effective goals and get agreement to their execution.
What to do this week
Have a discussion with your manager about his or her goals for the next time period, then draft goals that support your manager's goals. Next, share your draft with your manager, get approval, then share with those who report to you to help them draft their own goals. Use the measurement criteria above to make sure they are all conforming to the SMART formula.
What do you think?

Writing--Organization

Happy New Year!
This Learning Links issue is the second in a series on written communications. In the hundreds of documents, reports and presentations we have reviewed and critiqued over the years, nothing improves the document like improving organization. When most of us sit down to write, we simply start typing text and then "cut and paste" until we're satisfied with the document or presentation. There is a better way.

Start With An Outline
This sounds so boring and time consuming but it is our experience (and we have validated it over and over) that taking a few minutes to draft a simple outline greatly improves the organization and success of the document. The usual complaint is that it takes too much time. The fact is that if you spend 20 minutes writing a document and 20 minutes editing, you are no better off than when you spend 10 minutes outlining the document and then 30 minutes (or less) fleshing in the outline with a well thought out narrative. And of course the goal we're all pursuing is for our document to have an impact.
Clearly if the reader does not sense that you know where you're going with your document, there's little incentive for him or her to hang in there in hopes you will eventually illuminate the way. The outline does not have to be a rigid, constraining exercise (like you may have experienced in high school). Simply jot down the major headings of the document and some bullet points under each. Miraculously, as you do this, the points you want to make tend to find their natural place and the document becomes much more cohesive.

How To Create An Outline
Forget about the rules you live heard about beginning an outline with a Capital A or whatever and instead simply list the major topics and the bullet points beneath them as mentioned above. If you are not clear about where to start, consider making your major headings one of the following possibilities:

• The topics you wish to cover in order of importance
• A brainstormed list of options
• A "map" of how the points relate to each other
• Once you have begun this simple exercise, move the subtopics and details to the spot they belong in the document.

How To Organize Any Document
Any well-organized document has at least three sections: An introduction, some expository information about the issue, and recommendations or summary. With this simple structure, now all that is left is to flesh out the three sections.
In our previous Learning Links we suggested that you could start any document with "The purpose of this document is ..." and this is not a bad way to begin. By stating the purpose of your report, proposal, memo about change, etc. you alert the reader what is to follow in some (hopefully) orderly fashion. So your report should include:

• Statement of purpose
• Definition of the problem (what was happening vs. what should have been happening)
• A summary of principal cause and implemented solution
• Summary of the impact
• A detailed description of causes and how the solution addressed them

The same organization with some minor modifications can apply to sales proposals, requests for funding, problems to be solved, procedures changes, progress reports or even a letter to your mother about her finances!
The most important point to keep in mind in any writing assignment is whether the document reaches its goal of communicating clearly and without misunderstanding the points you wish to make. (In that regard, it is a good idea to let someone else read over your draft before you send it.)
If you can visualize your writing assignment as taking responsibility to make sure the reader understands and can act on the points you're making, it will change the way you approach the writing assignment. In other words, it is not about you and the struggles you're having putting the document together. It is about the reader and his understanding of your message.

What to do this week
Pull out a recent email or memo you have sent. Look at it critically to see where things could have been made clearer or where organization could have clarified the message. Quickly mark up the document indicating where things could be moved around to make it more readable. Then on the next writing assignment, resolve to begin with a simple outline instead of simply tapping out your message on the keyboard. If our experience is correct, you'll be amazed at the improvement! Good luck!

Managing Remote Teams

Managing From A Distance
By Emmie Alexander
You've just learned from a colleague that Joe, one of your employees, is delaying progress on a very important project. On your way to lunch you pass Joe in the hallway and ask, "Could you stop by my office this afternoon? I'd like to talk with you about the project." In the cafeteria you spot Sandra, an extraordinarily talented new member of your team, and join her for a quick conversation in which you offer her a suggestion that will help her solve a difficult problem she's wrestling with.
All in a day's work, you say? But what if Joe and Sandra don't work in your building... or in your state? What if all three of you work in different time zones? How do you address Joe's lack of urgency? How do you support and coach Sandra? Managing a team you see every day is challenging enough. Managing from a distance significantly raises the ante. And the current economic crisis probably means even less travel by managers to meet with dispersed team members face to face.
Leaders of geographically dispersed teams tell us they worry over the following questions:
How can I really know what is going on, day to day? What if they're just telling me what they think I want to hear?
How can I identify potential problems early, figure out why performance is off track --and get them back on track --when I'm not there to see what they're doing?
How can I provide the kind of coaching that helps turn good employees into great employees?
How can I keep everyone focused on continuous improvement?
How can I effectively motivate and energize my team --from a distance?
How can I make sure my best performers feel connected to the company so they'll stay with us, when they see their manager (me) only once or twice a year?

(read more at December 8 Newsletter)

Business Writing--the introduction

(from 12/15/08 Learning LinksTM)
The purpose of this Learning Links edition is to give you a sure-fire way to get started when writing a document and to focus the attention of the reader on the subject immediately.
Please re-read that opening line. In the opening line above, you'll find a formula for getting started on writing any document--letter, report, email, whatever. In other words, when you find yourself staring at an empty screen or a blank piece of paper, simply write "The purpose of this document is ..." and fill in the blank. If you can answer that simple question, then you are clear about what the document intends to do. If you cannot complete that sentence, you need to think some more about your intentions in writing the document.
Keep in mind that business writing is all about efficiency and clarity of communication. Vague terminology, wasted words, rambling sentences, story-like writing if only serve to frustrate the reader and short-circuit the communication. Too many times, business communication reads like a fairy tale--it opens with a vague phrase not too unlike "Once upon a time" and rambles like Little Red Riding Hood in the woods until it finds the point it wishes to make.
Your opening sentence should make clear to the reader what it is that you want them to do as a result of the document you're writing, or least make crystal clear the subject.

Presentations Series

Our series on Presentations has generated a lot of comment to us that did not make it to the blog. People are really tired of tired presentations! It actually takes only a little time to make the presentation more effective--and that is offset by the peace of mind (and reduced nervousness) you have when you actually deliver the presentation.

So why the problem? Is it ignorance of the techniques? Laziness? Give us your thoughts.

And while you're at it, what are the trouble spots for you in written communication. We really want to focus on that soon!

Hubris

A few years ago a writers’ group named hubris as the word of the year. It just might be the word for 2008 also.

In John Edwards’s recent confession of his extra marital affair, he told ABC television interviewer Bob Woodruff, “In the course of several campaigns, I started to believe that I was special and became increasingly egocentric and narcissistic.” He said that his rapid rise from small-town boy to national figure led him to believe “you can do whatever you want, you’re invincible, there will be no consequences.”

While the sex and the lying have provoked a media frenzy, the real story here is hubris – the self-delusion that entraps so many successful leaders in politics, business, and the church.

What happens to someone who reaches a level of power that causes him (or her) to lose their ability to see things as they really are? We speak of the loss of “moral compass,” but it goes further than that. It is a total distortion of reality such that they come to believe, like John Edwards and countless others before him, that there will be no consequences.

Eliot Spitzer in New York, President Clinton in the White House, Kenneth Lay and Jeff Skilling at Enron, Dennis Kozlowski at Tyco, Bernie Ebbers at WorldCom, the Rigas family at Adelphia, Jim Bakker of PTL, Ted Haggard of the National Evangelical Association, the catholic priests who abused children and the bishops who covered up for them…and on and on and on… What were they thinking? That they were invincible, that there would be no consequences, apparently.

For over thirty years, I’ve trained and coached leaders to be more successful in business, government, and non-profit organizations. The art of leadership is well researched, well documented. The Center for Creative Leadership has devoted 38 years researching what facilitates success and what derails it. Leadership training is a multi-billion industry. Millions more are spent in the search for the right leader for key positions in industry. Yet it seems that even with all that, once leaders reach these heights, for some of them at least, something happens.

John Edwards said that as he become more and more surrounded by worshipful fans and dedicated staff, he “started to believe he was special, and became increasingly egocentric and narcissistic.” Leaders in our society, in business, politics, and the church, are the new kings and emperors – living and working in sumptuous heavily guarded surroundings, moving around in chauffeured limos and private jets, wearing beautifully tailored clothes, getting $400 haircuts, and socializing only with others who live similarly, and rarely if ever venturing into the real world where the rest of us live.

They are often surrounded by people whose job it is to agree with them, affirm them, cater to them, laugh at their jokes, and cover their mistakes. Is it any wonder they come to believe they are invincible, that they can do anything, that there are no consequences?

So the question I keep pondering, is how do we help our leaders see the world – and themselves – as they really are? How do we keep their feet on the ground? In the midst of all the trappings of power and wealth and influence that accrue to leaders, how can they learn to pay attention to the 98% of the people who do not have those assets? How can they learn to see the world that everyone else inhabits, where work is hard, worry and pain and sometimes hunger are daily companions, and where actions have consequences?

Thanks to a tip from a blogger in the family, I recently learned about something called Postel’s Law. In 1981, internet guru and professor of computer science Jon Postel formulated what’s called Postel’s Law: “Be conservative in what you do; be liberal in what you accept from others” (often reworded as "be conservative in what you send, be liberal in what you receive"). He was encouraging computer engineers to build systems that can understand each other, “to write code that could ‘speak’ as clearly as possible yet ‘listen’ to the widest possible range of other speakers, including those who do not conform perfectly to the rules of the road,” according to NY Times technology writer Mattathias Schwartz.

There’s a lesson in there for managers. Schwartz says, “The human equivalent of this robustness is a combination of eloquence and tolerance — the spirit of good conversation.”

Eloquence: speaking as clearly and crisply as possible, striving to communicate concise, unambiguous messages.

Tolerance: listening without judging; listening without formulating your own rebuttal; listening with patience and empathy, even when – especially when – the other person isn’t doing a very good job of communicating, or, as Schwartz says, “conforming perfectly to the rules of the road.”

Engineers who followed Postel’s Law created an opportunity for billions of computers to connect across the globe. Managers who follow Postel’s Law in their conversations can create organizations where people can connect in a profound way and collaborate to make great things happen for their organizations.

What do you think? How can business leaders learn to "be conservative in what you send, be liberal in what you receive"? How can that approach help us connect across the globe, across the board room, across the kitchen table?

Does your boss talk "at" you or to you?

In our e-newsletter, An AHA! Moment, we’ve been talking about the conversations managers have with their employees, and offering tips for making these conversations more effective.

Every time we work with another group of managers, we find similar issues – regardless of the level of management, or of the years of management experience. In working with thousands of managers over the past thirty years, we’ve found that managers generally tend to talk at employees instead of engaging with them. Managers seem to believe that managing people consists of telling them what is expected, telling them where they’re on track or off track, and telling them what they need to do to meet targets. Employees are expected to “get it,” and produce the desired results. If they don’t produce, it must be because they didn’t listen.

Even those managers who believe they are engaging employees with questions tend to rely on leading, closed questions (“Do you think if you try this approach you can meet your targets?”), to which employees can simply smile and nod agreement.

Our data show that neither of those approaches is effective in producing high levels of performance, innovation, quality, or commitment. Without an engaging two-way conversation guided by open-ended questions, there is no way managers can know what their employees are thinking, their rationale for doing what they do, their understanding of the job expectations, and most importantly, what commitment they are willing to make.

Why is it that managers talk at employees instead of engaging them with questions that cause employees to think for themselves, reflect and take a new perspective, and make their own commitments? We’ve considered a range of answers to that question. One answer is that people get promoted into management because they’re good problem solvers – they know how to fix things. So as managers, they assume their job is to tell people what the problem is, what’s causing it, and how to fix it. Another possibility is that the people who are their models for management conversations – their own bosses – do the same thing. (Remember, we said we’ve seen this consistently at all levels.)

One intriguing possible explanation has its roots in the industrial revolution, when large business organizations grew up and began to separate management from labor in significant ways. This functional structure also separated thinking (management) from doing (labor). So over the last century we’ve built a culture that fosters the belief only the “suits” know how to think and make decisions, and even though the workplace has changed dramatically in that time, we’re mentally stuck in our understanding of what successful managing is all about.

We’d love to hear from you on this. Click on COMMENTS below and sound off!

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