Monthly Archives: April 2012

April 5, 2012 · 11:56 pm

Leadership Lessons From MLK

His Name Always Comes Up

Leadership Lessons from MLKIn my leadership classes, I always asked my students for the names of great leaders.  I’ve never had a class where Martin Luther King’s name didn’t come up.  This week is the 44th anniversary of his death.  We’re still struggling to realize his dreams, but we have made significant progress.  But why do we remember his so clearly?  Many of my students weren’t born when he died, but they identify him as a great leader.  He is still leading us.

What are the lessons that leaders can learn from MLK?

  • Dream –MLK dreamed a BIG dream.  His dream was not to be a good minister at a Church in Atlanta.  His dream was thought to be impossible among some of his followers–‘I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.’ . . I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.  .  . I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.”  Sadly, at that time, that was a big dream.  Joyfully, some of this dream has come to pass.  There are young people reading this who can’t imagine the way it was.  Unfortunately, we still have the cancer of racism in our American body.  I’d like to think that had MLK lived, we’d be much further along.

As a leader, are your dreams big enough?  Is it enough to dream of making this year’s numbers, or finishing this project on time, or delivering the product in your strategy?  The difference between a leader and a great leader is the size of the dream.

  • Inspire  –MLK inspired people from all parts of the country, from all walks of life and of all ages to fight for his dream.  His dream became theirs.  His peaceful methods became theirs. He inspired through his words and through his actions.

As a leader, do you inspire or do you tell? Do you speak to some and ignore others?  Do you act your beliefs and words, or are you a hypocrite? Are you brave and do you speak truth to power, or do you go along.

  • Take Risk –MLK kept going despite the risks.  He knew them, but his dream was bigger.  His commitment was bigger.  Risk was a constant in his life as a black man in the South. The risks he took as a leader were breathtaking.

MLK’s risks put most of the risks that today’s leaders take (or don’t take) into perspective.  The stakes for most of us are much smaller.  Even so, we resist risk.  As MLK knew, change doesn’t happen without risk.  I worry that readers will take this point wrong–I don’t want to diminish MLK’s accomplishment by comparing the risk he lived with with the risks that leaders take today.  Understanding and taking risk, however, is essential to great leadership.  Risking your life isn’t necessary, but risking your ego is.  Risking your identity is.  Risking being wrong or failing is necessary for great leadership. When was the last time you took a breathtaking risk?

  • Be Persistent —He was tired.  He was exhausted.  He kept going.  He kept standing.  He kept inspiring.  He kept dreaming.  He got results.

He went to jail! To Jail!  To be a great leader, you’ve got to keep believing  it can happen.  You’ve got to help your people believe that it can be done.  Pretty much every great person I know is persistent.  Persistent in the face of set backs, failures, temptations and loneliness.

MLK was a great leader.  He was a great man.  He continues to inspire me to be a better person and a better leader.  Thinking about MLK and his contributions to my world gives me perspective on what is possible and how much more growing I have to do.

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April 3, 2012 · 10:40 pm

It’s the End of First Quarter. How Are Your Resolutions?

Most of Us Make Resolutions

The website, The Statistical Brain, says that 45% of us make New Year’s Resolutions and 8% of us succeed with them.  Thirty nine percent of folks in their twenties succeed, compared to fourteen percent of folks over age fifty.  (Now what is that about?)  The bottom line, lots of us make resolutions and few of us manage to succeed at them.  I’m not going to go into all the reasons this is true, but I will give you some tips on how to keep working on them (if you still are), or how to start again if you’ve already given up.

New Years Resolutions

Pick One

Look at your resolutions.  If you have more than one, pick the MOST important one.  If you only did one this year, which should it be?  If you’re anything like me, then many of your resolutions are inter-related.  That’s ok–one is still more important, or more foundational than the rest.   Now, in order to accomplish that resolution, what is the first step?  The VERY first step?  When are you going to do that?  Be specific.  VERY specific.

Write It Down

Use a journal.  Write down the goal.  Write down the steps.  Write down the dates.  Now, write down what it’s going to be like when you have accomplished it.  Specifically.  VERY specifically.  How will you feel?  Who will be happy?  How will things be better?  When will you be able to start on your next resolution because you finished the first one?  Write it all again.  And again.  Write it till it isn’t writing about the future, but it feels like the present.  Write it till you are so familiar with it that it feels uncomfortable because what you’re writing hasn’t happened yet. Write it.  Write it. Write it.  Write it every day.

Change

In his new book, The Power of Habit, Charles Duhigg says that about two-thirds of our behaviors are based on habit.  Our morning routine, our drive to work, our morning email, internet usage, our interactions with our co-workers, and on and on and on.  There is a good reason for this.  It is how our brain economizes–it routinizes what it knows and can then use the brain power on other things.  I do my best thinking when I’m driving.  Just think–if I had to pay as much attention to driving as I did when I was sixteen–what tremendous thinking would be lost:-)  The bad news is that in order to acquire a new habit (and succeed with a resolution), you have to overwrite the old habit, one that the brain has efficiently and effectively turned into rote behavior.

In order to create a new habit, you need a cue–a signal to your subconscious that you’re about to perform the new habit.  Example:  Resolution is exercise; running is exercise of choice; cue is putting on running clothes as soon as you get up; new habit is run first thing in the morning.  Then you need a reward.  It actually doesn’t have to be much, just something that feels good after you perform the new habit.  Listening to your favorite song.  A small glass of your favorite juice.  Something.  Every time.

Dubigg says that when a habit is formed, the brain stops participating fully in the decision-making.  So, you need to put the brain back into the decision-making as you extinguish the old habit and take it back out when the new habit is established.  There is evidence via MRIs that different parts of the brain fire as old habits (and brain patterns) are replaced with new.

The Power of Habit is the best book I’ve read so far this year.  I highly recommend it.

Get to work on those resolutions!

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April 1, 2012 · 10:12 pm

My Generation Is Best, The Other . . . Not So Much

That OTHER Generation is IMPOSSIBLE!!!!!!!!

One of my favorite team building exercises is to put people of the same generation together and have them describe the other generations.  I have them make a list of the characteristics of the other generations, the strengths and the weaknesses, what most interferes with their own ability to work with the other generations, and what they admire about the other generation.  There are frequently three different generations in the groups I work with these days.  What I enjoy so much about these exercises are:  1) how similar the feedback is across different organizations; 2) how surprised and (frequently) outraged the generations are about how others see them; and 3) how important these conversations are to changing the way these folks look at and work with each other.

The Generations

The three generations that co-exist today in most American workplaces are:

  • Millennials- born between 1984 and 2002
  • Gen X- born between 1965 and 1983
  • Babyboomers- born between 1946  and 1964

Someone born in 1946 was born to parents traumatized by both the Depression and World War II.  Someone born in 1966 was born to parents who were influenced by the Civil Rights Movement, nuclear weapons, the Vietnam War and the Sexual Revolution.  Someone born in 1986 was born to parents who were just getting used to computers, two-income families, PacMan and the beginning of CNN.  Each generation is different from the other because of the influence of their parents’ experiences, the differences in their education, and the impact of different political and technology influences.  Each generation thinks theirs is “the best.”

More important, though, each generation is trying to solve the same problems–create a home, have a meaningful life, feed and educate their kids,  make the world a better place, care for aging parents (Millennials aren’t there yet).  They believe that theirs is the correct way to do it, but they all are seeking similar goals.  The similar goals are as important a common ground as the different ways are an area of disagreement.

R.E.S.P.E.C.T.

The most important thing that comes out of the team building exercises that I do across generations is that each wants R.E.S.P.E.C.T. from the other.  Real, genuine respect.  Sometimes these exercises get quite heated–and it is almost always because  they feel disrespected by the other generations (not even necessarily from the ones in the room, but from other encounters.  These feelings are usually built up over years.)   Respect isn’t possible if you continue to think that your generation’s way is the best.  It is one way.  It is based on what was going on when you hit maturity.  It is not the ONLY way, though.  If you had had the same issues/experiences/challenges as another generation, then you would likely have the same priorities and opinions of how it “should” be done.

Figure out how to appreciate the strengths of the other generations’ approach.  I couldn’t do what I do if I didn’t have the Gen Ys to challenge me and the Millennials to help me with the constantly changing technology.  They need me to give them a longer perspective that is tinged with wisdom.  Although it would probably be more comfortable to be in an organization that includes only those who share the priorities and understandings that I have, it would be so BORING!

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