Category Archives: Success

April 13, 2012 · 12:56 am

Great Leaders and Their Paradoxes

I have always loved the concept of paradoxes.  A paradox is a self-contradictory proposition.  Paradoxes  are the embodiment of complexity.  Great leaders are full of them.

Extreme Self Confidence v. Humility:

I don’t think you can be a leader without having self-confidence.  Self-confidence and self-worth combined make up self-esteem.  I’ve seen leaders (although not great leaders)  without a good sense of self-worth, but I don’t think I’ve ever encountered a leader who didn’t have a realistic belief in his own ability to deal with the situation.  It is this self-confidence that inspires others to follow.

At the same time, great leaders demonstrate real humility.  Self-confidence does not preclude humility.  Since self-confidence is a realistic view of your abilities, humility is a realistic view of your limitations.    Humility is a demonstrated sense of modesty.  Humble leaders can take feedback, can admit their mistakes, and are much more respected by their followers.

Decisive v. Consensus Building:

A great leader is comfortable making decisions based on the information that is available.  Decisions are the lubrication that make organizations go.  Without decisions, things slowly grind to a halt.  Sometimes there just isn’t enough information to make a comfortable decision.  Great leaders step up and make the decisions anyway.

At the same time, great leaders have the skill and know the value of consensus building.  There are times when it is best to take the time for the group to make the decision, rather than for the leader to make the decision alone.  Great leaders know not only that is, but they also know how to do it.  They allow followers to participate in the organization decision making and get follower buy-in in the process.

Leader v. Follower:

Leaders challenge and change.  They inspire and energize.  Leaders lead.  It goes without saying that great leaders are leaders.  Leaders do not lead 100% of the time, however.  Leaders follow sometimes, too.  They follow thought leaders.  They follow their bosses and their heroes.  Sometimes, they even follow their followers.  Great leaders are as comfortable being followers as being leaders because they aren’t so into themselves that they need to lead all the time.

Detail Focused v. Big Picture:

There are tons of examples of Executives who failed because they weren’t paying attention to the details.  This does not mean that you need to be in the details all the time;  in fact, that is probably as bad as not being able to deal with details at all.  You do need to be able to dive into the details and spot the aberrations when the situation arises that demands it.  Steve Jobs was famous for his ability to crawl into the details of his products.

At least as important is the ability to see the big picture.  The big picture includes what is going on outside your organization, outside your community, and outside your industry.  You need to be able to see how things fit together and “what is wrong with this picture.”   Fred Smith saw the big picture when he came up with the idea of Federal Express.  Steve Jobs saw the big picture when he saw the need to combine extreme marketing concepts with bleeding edge technology ideas.  The ability to see the big picture can keep you going long after others would have given up.

Hands Off v Hands On:

Delegation is a very important skill for leaders.  The higher up you go the more you need to be able to delegate.  Except when you need to be hands-on.  Situational Leadership Theory by Hershey and Blanchard suggests that different leadership styles are required in different situations.  In other words, it isn’t always appropriate to delegate, even if you are at the top of the organization and have Executives reporting to you.  It isn’t appropriate to be hands-on all the time–your more experienced/senior employees will feel micro-managed.  You need to understand what your personal style is, when you should be using it and when you should be flexing your style.

The Dark Side–The Success Paradox:

Success changes us.  Those changes are mostly good.  We become more confident, more comfortable in our skins.  But we also develop blind spots.  Success robs us of the uncertainty that helps us be more sensitive to our environment.  We develop blind spots about our personal flaws.  We discount negative feedback about our interpersonal skills.  We aren’t as open to seeing organizational issues.  Most importantly, we miss the big, external-to-the-organization contextual issues–the world is changing around the organization and the organization is so busy doing what it does, that it misses it.  Think Borders with Amazon.

Great leadership requires complex responses.

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April 8, 2012 · 10:59 pm

Fail. Fail. Fail.

Failing Isn’t Fun.

I really, really to hate to fail.  In fact, I hate it so much that I rarely admit that I failed when I do–it’s not that I lie about it–I just don’t even admit to myself.  So why does every guru on leadership say that failing is good?  I had the opportunity to watch lots of kids this weekend–kids of all ages.  They “fail” all the time.  They try something, it doesn’t work, they try again, or they walk away and try something else.  Sometimes they get upset, sometimes they get hurt, but they pretty much pick themselves up and keep trying.  They don’t usually see it as “failure.”  They just see it as a part of living.

Imagine if they were so afraid of failure that they didn’t try.  What if they didn’t learn to walk because they would fall down.  What if they didn’t learn to read because they wouldn’t be able to figure out all the words.  The way they keep going in the face of what we adults would see as “failure” is an important lesson for us.  Some time around late elementary school or middle school, kids start to stress about failing and start to be afraid of trying.  By the time we’re adults, we’ve got that lesson well-learned.

Failure Is A Step

The flip side of failure, though, is that without it, you don’t get better.  Even if we succeed we don’t do it as well as if we fail first and try again.  If I spend my time obsessing about how I failed at something, rather than treating it like a baby treats a fall–that way didn’t work, maybe the next way will–then my forward movement becomes a loop at best.  One of my favorite quotes is from Thomas Edison, “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.”

There are LOTS of books on the benefits of failure:  Fail Forward; Celebrating Failure, The Power of Failure, Great Failures of the Extremely Successful,  Adapt: Why Success Always Starts With Failure, to name just the ones I’ve read in the last two years.  So, I  get why failure is critical.  The problem is the way we look at it.  Failure isn’t an event.  To quote Edison again,  “I am not discouraged, because every wrong attempt discarded is another step forward.”  Failure is a step.

Try, Try, Try

So, remember the way a kid thinks: Try. Try. Try.

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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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March 29, 2012 · 10:06 pm

So you want to start your own business . . .

get ready to start businessGet Ready!

I talk to a lot of people whose life goal is to start their own business.  For most of them, it’s a “some day . . . ” kind of dream.  You can’t start too soon. There are tremendous opportunities to use your jobs between now and when you’re ready to learn things that will help you.  There are lots of skills that you need to develop to be able to hit the ground running with your business.  Why not be ready to succeed when you start your business?

To start your business, you need at a minimum (and not necessarily in this order):

  • Confidence
  • Money
  • A Product or Service
  • Customers
  • Marketing skills
  • Management skills
  • Finance knowledge

You can buy some of these, but most of them you had better have enough to be able to oversee the basics until you can hire it in.

I know lots of people who have had their own business.  Some were successful executives who bought or created a business after many years running large corporations.  Some were middle managers who bailed on the big corporation either by choice or through layoff.  Some were entry level employees who just couldn’t take the structure and lack of autonomy in the company they joined.  Some were young people who never joined an organization, but went out on their own immediately.

Get Set!

The ones who succeeded had tons of confidence and drive.  This doesn’t mean that they didn’t have doubts, but they continued to believe it would work out or they would figure it out way past where many of the rest of us would have walked away.  (Of course there are always people who are lucky and come up with an idea that is a killer idea that people swarm to, but that is pretty rare–like winning the lottery).

There is a great book, Effectuation: Elements of Entrepreneurial Expertise, by Saras D. Sarasvathy, which explores the ways that entrepreneurs think differently than corporate leaders.  The researchers asked successful entrepreneurs to help them develop a entrepreneurial game that would provide a simulation of creating a business.  They compared the way the entrepreneurs thought about creating a business–including ideas, product development, financing, overcoming problems–with the ways corporate leaders did.  They found that entrepreneurs do not close down the options in the same say as those who are successful in corporations.  They approach the problem looking for how to make it all work, rather than how to pick some of it and make that work.    The author, who did her research at Carnegie Mellon and is presently a professor at the University of Virginia, believes that people can be taught to think this way–just as people can be taught leadership.    Thinking like an entrepreneur is only part of the battle, though.

From a practical stand point, no matter how well you think like an entrepreneur, and no matter how great the idea for the business is, you also have to be able to manage the business well enough to get it on its feet.  Once on its feet, you can hire people to help you.  From the time you start the business until it is producing enough revenue to hire the help you need, you have to be able to get the product produced or deliver the service, market it and manage the finances.  You also have to be able to provide the necessary cash–either your own, or you have to figure out how to persuade someone else (usually through a business case) to give you the money that is necessary.

It is easiest to accumulate this cash and to develop the marketing, managing and financial acumen while sitting in an organization and using the resources of that organization to develop your skills.  I don’t think this is cheating your current organization.  As long as you are there, every skill set you develop benefits them.  The book that really helped me understand this and was the blueprint that I used to get ready to start my business was Soloing, Realizing Your Life’s Ambition, by Harriet Rubin.  I wanted to start a coaching and consulting practice.  This book may not work for you if you’re starting some other kind of business–but find the book that does work for you!

Go!

There may be specific skills that you need for the kind of business that you’re getting ready to start.  Take the classes, get a job in the kind of business you want to build, do whatever it takes.  When you are ready–take that first step.  The nice thing is that you can start your business while you are still earning a living in another organization.  You don’t have to dump one to do the other, until you are ready.

Go for it!

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March 22, 2012 · 10:39 pm

You Only Need 3 Things for a Successful Career

Career SuccessWhat if I told you that you only need three things to have a successful career.  Only three.  Would you believe me?  Probably not.  Let’s try it anyway.  You need to be able to adapt; you need to be a learner; and you need to be self-reflective.  That’s it.  If you have those, you can have a successful career.  But, you say, what about finance skills, strategic skills, negotiation skills?  As long as you are a learner, you’ve got it covered.  What about  leadership skills, EQ, presentation skills?  If you are self-reflective and a learner, you’ve got it covered.  What about managing change? Mergers and acquisitions? Financial crisis?  If you are adaptive and a learner, you’ve got it covered.  You see where I’m going with this, right?

A Life Long Learner

To have a successful career these days, you must be a life long learner.  A Bachelors or an M.B.A. won’t do it.  You can/will learn very important things in the process of getting those degrees.  Certainly they aren’t a waste of time.  They aren’t necessary to having a successful career (Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg, Bill Gates), nor are they a be all, end all.  Maybe in the wayback days a degree was enough, but not any more.

If you got out of college more than 5 years ago, you didn’t do marketing with social media.  Your IT skills didn’t include any ‘clouds.’  LinkedIn wasn’t  used to recruit employees.  Nobody ever heard of a TARP.  Iphone  apps weren’t a business, to say nothing of iPads.  They weren’t reading XRays for your hospital in India. You see the point.  You HAVE to keep learning.  If you approach your career as a learner, then the problems that arise are just opportunities to learn.  They aren’t overwhelming barriers.  If you have the belief that you can figure it out, you can.  If you’re a learner, you know you can.

Be Adaptive

All of us at one time or another get stuck in our rut.  Your career can’t be a rut, though.  Does anybody remember what happened when the housing bubble popped?  When mortgages cratered, construction stopped, and unemployment started growing?  If you were lucky enough to be unaffected, you may not be next time.  If you were affected, you came out better if you were adaptive.  Things are speeding up quite a bit.  Unadaptive people will be run over by the next crisis.  The new book, The Start-up of You: Adapt to the Future, Invest in Yourself, and Transform Your Career, by Hoffman and Casnocha, recommends that you do ABZ planning.  This can apply to either your career or your company.  Plan A is based on your competitive advantage and you iterate the plan, making moderate changes as necessary.  Plan B is a pivot, changing either the goal or the route, as necessary.  And Plan Z is your safety net, your fallback if all else fails–how you keep a roof over your head and food on the table if other plans don’t work.

When you are dealing with the ups and downs of life in a corporation, flexibility is essential.  Reorgs, company sales, downsizings, new projects, killed projects happen constantly.   You need to be in what Hoffman and Cosnocha call “constant beta.”  Nothing is end state–it is always a work in progress.  If you can have this mindset, you’ll be ready for anything that comes.

Self-Reflection

Being self-aware through self-reflection is like having a personal level tool.  It will help you figure out that things are out of kilter and help you figure out what exactly needs to be redirected.  Self-reflection is  essential  for being able to manage the only tool you have fully in your control for a successful career–yourself.   Howard Gardner, an expert on developmental psychology noted “it is important that the leader find the time and the means for reflecting, for assuming distance from the battle or the mission,” in his book,  Leading Minds: An Anatomy of Leadership.  You learn as much though self reflection as through any other method–if you take the time to do it.

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