LEARNING TO LEAD, LEADING TO LEARN
Focus On What Is Important
What we focus on determines where our priorities lie
“Focus on People Before Products”
Welcome to Take The Lead Five – the final edition of phase one. My goal has been to encourage all to explore and experiment with leadership in whatever role or responsibility we have. Leadership is for all!
The previous edition said that successful leadership is people centered, and that successful leadership comes from being people focused: as J. C. Maxwell says: “People want to know you care before they care what you know.”
Where, then, should the leader’s first focus?
Purpose? Vital, for sure. Without purpose, there is no direction or goal. Not much worthwhile can be achieved without setting goals or targets.
Products? If the company requires a product to be solvent, then focusing on the product makes perfect sense, too. After all, if you do not make it, you cannot sell it.
People? As a “leader” you inevitably work with people, and require the services or support of those people to achieve that purpose or make those products.
Unless you are working solo, without the need of any interaction to achieve your goal, neither purpose nor product holds any value, or is achievable, without the help of other people.
Of course, purpose and product are important, but achieving them is better, and better done, with good people, well led. Effective, people-centered, leadership makes the difference.
People, therefore, should be a leader’s priority.
So, what is meant by being “people” focused? As its simplest, it is about motive: what is most
Important to you? The achievement of a purpose by any means; a quality product without consideration of others; or the care, welfare and wellbeing of your people?
Good people, well led, cared and catered for will produce quality products and be motivated to achieve worthy purposes.
Poor, mistreated, and neglected staff will not perform well, and will likely be lost. Retaining good staff is a crucial factor for an effective leader. A recent survey carried out by the Institute of Leadership & Management showed that 55% of people leave employment owing to poor management: a direct product of poor leaders not focusing on their people.
It is no good just “saying it”, either. Motives bleed through messages. If you tell your people that their welfare is your priority, but do not show it in your actions and decisions, trust will be broken and your integrity will be shattered. Without trust and integrity, you will not successfully lead anyone.
If your people are happy, they will work better: better together, better performance, better quality: they will pass the 3C test: committed, cohesive, and confident.
If they do not feel that they are valued, cared for, or even considered, and feel secondary to your purpose, or expendable to the product, then they will not be better, only bitter, and you will be forever either replacing them or only keeping what you offer: people who do not expect much and will not give much.
If you want to keep good people and get the best out of them, be a people-focused leader. Put good people first and good products will follow.
LEARN To Lead
“Everyday there are events that demonstrate leadership. In the news, at home, at work, even in our social life. We may hear something said or see something done. Whether excellent examples or demonstrations of disaster: lessons are literally everywhere.”
Learning Is A Habit of Effective Leaders
Good leadership requires constant learning.
Reading and listening about leadership, watching and speaking to others who lead, are all good sources for inspiration.
These “formal” avenues of knowledge are not the only ways, however. Much more can be learned from life-experiences.
Whether it is observing someone making a mess of it, or watching one do a sterling job, seeing is a good source of learning.
The key is to be alert to opportunities. Just as the first step of a risk assessment is the identification of hazards, likewise with learning leadership, you need to identify lessons worth learning!
Those lessons surround us: everyday there are so many events that demonstrate leadership. Little snippets from the news, behaviours at home, events at work, experiences in our social life. We may hear something: a quote or an anecdote or the way someone speaks to another; may see something done: an excellent example or demonstration of disaster: lessons are literally everywhere.
The first step is to Look for them. Be alert. When you notice one, focus on it and think about it. Then evaluate it by asking four simple questions:
Was it a good example? Does it Enforce a good principle previously learned?
Was it a bad one? Does it provide an example of something to be Avoided?
Does it challenge something previously thought, thus providing an opportunity to Revise the way you do something?
Is it completely New? Something worth adding to your way of doing or understanding?
Follow this model to take advantage of all those daily opportunities we experience that can contribute to developing our leadership skills.
Look, Enforce, Avoid, Revise, add something New, and be prepared to LEARN!
When Is A Team Not A Team? (Pt. 4)
TeamWork
Motivate, Don’t Manipulate!
Motivate Your Team to keep going.
“If we just push our own needs to get people to do what we want without considering their needs and their wants, we are not motivating, we are manipulating!”
Concluding my TEAM Valence model (Talk, Example, Accept, Motivate), here is the final action point:
M is for Motivate.
Help others to keep going and encourage one another. It is not easy to survive in this environment and some of us really struggle!
Mastering motivation is a delicate balance between needs, returns and values, but the heart of motivation beats with understanding. If we do not understand others, we will not move them.
Make an effort to really understand each other and acknowledge the difficulties we all have dealing with our own work-world: see their viewpoint; offer support and empathy; let them know they are valued!
At the core of motivation resides respect: motivation grows from being recognised, feeling valued, accepted and appreciated. Then results in rewards and achievement.
While it is easy to identify the core element, motivating others is complex and diverse: It is personal: what motivates one does not necessarily motivate another. It is also collective: it relies on the valence of interconnected factors. It is hierarchal: it is driven by what is needed at the time, and changes over time.
Someone hungry will be motivated to eat more than to learn something new. Working extra hours to pay the rent will trump a “social” to bond with colleagues.
For any working network of people, understanding where each are in their own world helps us to realise what motivates them personally. It might be a material need; it might be caring support; it might be personal progression; it might be just some appreciation – to be recognised and valued.
Whatever it is, make an effort to reach out and understand them. Being in a group is no guarantee of being part of a team. It takes effort and commitment to build a team from a group and the difference is seen through commitment, cohesion and confidence.
It starts with communication, so talk with each other – this is where we began the TEAM model. Then take the lead by setting an example: show that you care and that you value them. Accept the reality of difference, difficulty, and even, at times, deficiency! We are all different and just because something works for us, it may not work for others.
If we are just pushing our own needs to get people to do what we want without considering their needs and wants, we are not motivating, we are manipulating!
As we can see, motivating others requires a lot more than just rousing speech. Motivation is a process of setting an example, offering encouragement, and providing empowerment. It requires engagement, support, facilitation, and always, always, needs recognition and reward. Sadly though, it is the recognition and reward that are often the most significant omissions despite being among the strongest drivers for motivation.
What can we do this month?
- Start by just encouraging someone – again, choose someone not on “friend” list (unless we never encourage them, either).
Often do I get calls that off-load about someone’s error, but who calls to sincerely compliment anyone? Nor do I hear that others get many – if any – calls that just commend despite many being received to complain. So, call someone and compliment them!
Make it personal and make it specific. If we find we cannot do either, then it is a sign that we need to make an effort to know them better and understand them more.
Our goal is to impart worth to them and show we value what they do: let them know they are recognised and appreciated.
- Focus on positives not problems.
Problems need fixing but people need motivating. Sure, we must correct mistakes, and criticism may be valid, but when it becomes the focus it erodes the team.
If we focus on problems instead of positives we just “manage by failure” – judging fellow team members by those failures which, as said previously, are often a fault of the “system” rather than the “someone”. After all, it is so much easier to point a finger at the person instead of plugging holes in the process!
Instead, recognise and commend our colleague’s value, effort and commitment despite their daily struggles with those failing systems: and reward with at least some praise.
If we take the lead in motivating our team, others will follow. We will then grow from a group of talented, but disjointed, individuals into a motivated and valued team: and in the words of the game ‘Call of Duty’, “the ultimate weapon is team!”
Avoid DRAMA
MY LEADERSHIP
“The Way Is As Important As The What”
“Good manner-management, demands we avoid “DRAMA”. When communicating we should refrain from Disrespectful, Rude, Aggressive, Myopic, Arrogant communication.”
Our last edition looked at a way of improving communication with something we can do: be SMART. Now we look at a way to improve communication by something we should not do: cause DRAMA.
TTL4 emphasised that our communication constitutes three areas: message, mechanics, and manner. SMART helps with some of those mechanics, the message we will look at in later editions, but it is the manner where the DRAMA comes in.
Good manner-management, demands of us to avoid “DRAMA”. When communicating with our team members, we should refrain from Disrespectful, Rude, Aggressive, Myopic, Arrogant communication.
These five crimes are common barriers to building respect, and make it nigh on impossible to be liked. Whether intentional or not, if our manner carries one of these malevolent manner-maggots, it will eat at the respect of the relationship and erode the team.
Being disrespectful should need no explanation! However, a reminder will help: our tone and implication must reflect our recognition and appreciation for the efforts made by our colleagues.
Aggressive speech often triggers aggressive answers. If you go round poking people in the eye, don’t be surprised if you get a slap in the face occasionally! Aggression spawns retaliation.
Aggression sits between abrasive and abusive. If we have a tendency to be abrasive, we are just one step from being aggressive, then it is a short jump to being outright abusive. All three should be avoided as one can easily escalate to the next. If we control one, we can avoid the other.
Being myopic is all about self. Where is our focus? Is it shortsighted, fixed only us and what we want and what we do, or on them, what they need and how they are doing?
Arrogance is a special breed of disrespect: in effect, it is a form of superiority! Putting our self above others, with a self-proclamation that we, and our view, is better than them and theirs.
Remember, good communication requires a clear message, good mechanics, and a respectful manner. For most of us, however, even if our “what” said – the message and mechanics – is perfect, if the way it is said – the manner – is dysfunctional, then the rest will just get lost in the DRAMA!
What’s Next?
This concludes phase 1 of the TTL project. Phase 2 will explore the structure of leadership by looking at some models, methods and means. Until then, whatever you are doing, live, learn, and Take The Lead!
