Archive for January, 2009

The story of Maya Angelou`s life is a great lesson for us all. Raised mainly by her grandmother, she was raped at age eight by a family friend. She told her brother what happened, and the man who raped her came up dead a few days later. Because Maya thought she was responsible for the man`s death, she chose to stop talking for five years. She became pregnant and gave birth during high school.

Yet Maya Angelou went on to do many wonderful things in her life. She is known as an author, a poet, a civil rights activist, a dancer and a singer (among other things). Her grandmother encouraged her to “celebrate life to the fullest.”

Ms. Angelou learned her grandmother`s lessons well and managed to rise above the circumstance of her early years to affect an entire nation. I have no doubt that her success in life has to do with a purpose ?€“ something she deeply believes in that drives her daily life.

I`ve heard that 95 percent of business promotions are based on results and performance, yet results only account for 10 percent of the reasons that people follow a leader. The most common reason given for following is a leader`s character. This might be part of the reason that, today, people have a hard time naming leaders they respect. Let me help.

Can you name three Nobel Prize winners? It`s rare that anyone can name one winner, much less three. Yet if I ask you to name three people who inspired, challenged and supported you, I`ll bet with some reflection, you will be able to recall those individuals.

The point is that we have long memories about people who have touched us emotionally and influenced our lives. For those of you who are striving to be the best leaders that you can be, this is the kind of impact you want to make. I`m pretty sure that those people who inspired and supported you were leaders who had a purpose in their lives that they also expressed in their leadership.

Many leaders go through life without identifying what is important to them. Life sweeps them away in the busy-ness of everyday living. Yet a life with a purpose provides an anchor that can give stability to someone through the toughest of times. A purpose is a solid place to visit when tough decisions need to be made, or when frustration or disappointment is high.

There is a fair amount of literature written by psychologists and consultants indicating that success is attained and sustained by those who exhibit resilience. A sense of purpose seems to me to be foundational for resilience. Finding your purpose may or may not come easily, but a leader MUST have a sense of it in order to be successful in these tough times.

I’m always looking for life lessons that apply to leadership. I try hard to listen to the unplanned things that come my way for the learning within them. The parallels between my life and my calling (i.e., what I do for a living) are sometimes too significant to ignore.

I’ve had a humbling and human reminder recently. It’s small, but significant enough to make me want to take notice.

Two weeks ago I fell and broke my “great toe” (you know, the biggest one). For those who are interested (and everyone seems to ask), I stumbled on a couple of steps and the toe snapped. It hurt a lot, and I felt very silly about it – which was humbling enough.

But the other consequences of this accident include the following:

– Spending a weekend on my back icing and propping up my foot when all I really wanted to do was get some things done.

– Having to wear a hard-soled orthopedic boot for the next 6 weeks – it doesn’t match my suits and forces me to wear several pair of socks in our frigid Michigan weather.

– Most significantly, slowing down and having to count on others (or ask for assistance) – which just don’t come naturally or easily to me.

It seems to take forever to get anywhere with this toe and foot that don’t bend painlessly and this strange clunky boot. I can’t be on my feet all day facilitating workshops or planning sessions (I’m still doing these, but must be conscious of needing to sit down more often). And I’ve had to ask my husband to keep the sidewalk cleared, carry things up and down steps, and do some of the other chores I’ve done habitually throughout the years without asking for help.

It makes me realize how quickly I move through life, how independent I’ve been all these years, and how little I ask for help. Funny thing, these are some of the same things I also coach my clients on. How blind we can be to our own failings! I’ll try a little harder to “practice what I preach” now.

What life lessons have you had that you can apply to your leadership?

Chesley Sullenberger, the pilot of the U.S. Airways flight that landed in the Hudson River this week, is certainly gaining a lot of press. As yet “Unqualified” as a true hero – perhaps we’ll at least be able to unofficially qualify him as a true leader.

My colleague, Paul Knudstrup of Midwest Consulting Group, is a business owner and a pilot. When the incident unfolded this week, some of my colleagues traded email messages and had requested Paul’s take on what happened. I thought his response was the perfect description of a dedicated leader who has learned his leadership lessons well:

You are trained in what to do, you practice it regularly, and you do what has proven to work best in similar situations. Then, you trust in whatever works for you (God, the Universe, Allah, fate, etc.) and use your skills. Most of the time it works and you survive the off-airport landing. Sometimes it is not enough and you don`t survive. If this had occurred over the ocean or mountains, the result probably would have been different.

The words that are most important to leadership are in bold. The fact of the matter is that very few leaders are naturals at it. It takes intentional practice, thoughtful action, and skill to become a leader of the caliber shown by this pilot. Chesley Sullenberger, if not a proven hero, is at least a proven leader, and for that – the passengers – and all of us – are grateful.

I’ve been watching Nic Askew’s soul biographies for several years. His simple and short films are always profound.

Nic reminded those of us who subscribe to his weekly message about humility in this video, called “Size Doesn’t Matter”. Spend eight minutes with it and think about what Carlos’ message means for leaders.

‘size doesn’t matter’ from Nic Askew on Vimeo.

Ellen Weber’s blog, Brain Leaders and Learners, made me aware of this frightening New York Times article on bullies in the workplace.

As we consider a new year, I note a fair number of blog posts (including my own) about 2008, and all the leadership blunders that were in the news during the year (and it hasn’t let up yet – 2009 may be a banner year for stories about bad leadership).

Peter Block, one of my favorite writers/speakers, writes about how followers create leaders. Our initial reaction to this might be, “How can I, as a follower, possibly have any responsibility for a leader who is irresponsible, immoral or unethical?”. Let’s consider this.

In the public arena, we vote for our leaders (this may provide the mose obvious connection to our responsibility for bad leadership):

In this case, we might ignore bad past behavior before we cast our vote. We may be snowed by the public relations machine that “markets” a poor leader. We might simply vote without doing our homework first.

Worse yet, we may not vote for anyone. Complacency has it’s price, up to and including bad leaders being elected to public office.

So here is the tough one.

How can followers possibly be responsible for bad leadership in the business realm?

We tolerate them. We don’t speak up or take action to continue to assure that they don’t continue their bad behavior. Authority and power being what they are, we might fear the retribution that can come from speaking up. We prefer to avoid the risk and continue to do what we’ve always done – remain silent.

Is it possible that we sometimes need to break or silence and in so doing, step up to leadership ourselves?

At one point in my career, I worked for a man who was a tyrant, bigot and sexist (and this was in Human Resources, where good leadership should be modelled). I had talked to this man about some of his bad behavior, but to no avail. He was incapable of listening to or accepting my feedback.

I was young and had a lot at stake in my position – I was the major breadwinner in my family and felt the weight of the responsibility to provide for my young children. Yet, the situation became intolerable for myself and my coworkers, and I had concerns that the company could be vulnerable to a lawsuit due to this man.

I confided in a friend at the company and sought her advice on what I should do. She had a lot of faith and trust in the VP of human resorces (whom she worked for) and suggested I have a conversation with him. The tyrant boss reported directly to this VP. It would a huge risk for me to have this discussion the VP. I felt compelled to do something, even if I would suffer personal consequences.

So, I set up an appointment with the VP. He was caring, expressed understanding of the spot I was in, and he listened well. I assumed he talked to others. He ultimately took the tyrant out of a management position at the company (in today’s world, this individual may have been fired).

I didn’t suffer any consequences for speaking up. I stepped up to leadership through having the courage (some may call this stupidity) to report the transgressions of my boss to his boss. And the VP most certainly expressed leadership by realizing that the tyrant could not stay in the position he was in.

So, my final point is that followers can be responsible for bad leadership when they don’t step up to leadership themselves.

How have you been responsible?

copyright 2009, West Michigan Business Review

The story of Maya Angelou`s life is a great lesson for us all. Raised mainly by her grandmother, she was raped at age eight by a family friend. She told her brother what happened, and the man who raped her came up dead a few days later. Because Maya thought she was responsible for the man`s death, she chose to stop talking for five years. She became pregnant and gave birth during high school.

Yet Maya Angelou went on to do many wonderful things in her life. She is known as an author, a poet, a civil rights activist, a dancer and a singer (among other things). Her grandmother encouraged her to “celebrate life to the fullest.”
Ms. Angelou learned her grandmother`s lessons well and managed to rise above the circumstance of her early years to affect an entire nation. I have no doubt that her success in life has to do with a purpose ?€“ something she deeply believes in that drives her daily life.

I`ve heard that 95 percent of business promotions are based on results and performance, yet results only account for 10 percent of the reasons that people follow a leader. The most common reason given for following is a leader`s character. This might be part of the reason that, today, people have a hard time naming leaders they respect. Let me help.

Can you name three Nobel Prize winners? It`s rare that anyone can name one winner, much less three. Yet if I ask you to name three people who inspired, challenged and supported you, I`ll bet with some reflection, you will be able to recall those individuals.

The point is that we have long memories about people who have touched us emotionally and influenced our lives. For those of you who are striving to be the best leaders that you can be, this is the kind of impact you want to make. I`m pretty sure that those people who inspired and supported you were leaders who had a purpose in their lives that they also expressed in their leadership.

Many leaders go through life without identifying what is important to them. Life sweeps them away in the busy-ness of everyday living. Yet a life with a purpose provides an anchor that can give stability to someone through the toughest of times. A purpose is a solid place to visit when tough decisions need to be made, or when frustration or disappointment is high.

There is a fair amount of literature written by psychologists and consultants indicating that success is attained and sustained by those who exhibit resilience. A sense of purpose seems to me to be foundational for resilience. Finding your purpose may or may not come easily, but a leader MUST have a sense of it in order to be successful in these tough times.

I find that some leaders stuggle with finding a way to look at the big picture, especially in these times. Firefighting and working within “now” is attractive and can reap immediate gratification. However, having a vision can be inspiring and motivating, and many leaders find themselves struggling to get into a mode that will help them to set some goals for the future and move their teams forward.

Yet vision is an over used word. We sometimes feel a loss of energy around the topic, because it has been used, misused and berated. That’s because often the vision is often not big enough to capture the hearts and minds of the people who need to work toward it. It must be bigger than we are.

One of the most useful ways to create a vision is to consider where your organization is NOW, and then (think big!) and consider where you’d like it to be. To be very simplistic, moving toward that big vision is a matter of filling in the gap between now and where you’d like to be.

Some questions that can be asked to help:

• What would it mean for our organization to be great?
• What does greatness look like?
• What will we be doing?
• What will we be feeling?
• What will our customers observe?

If you are facilitating these questions with your team, shut up and listen to their answers. Do not judge them. They can be energetic and inspiring.

Notice that all of the questions can be turned into first-person questions in order to create a personal leadership vision as well.