Are You Happy With Your Level of Well-Being?

A client once said to me, "Scott, I realize I need to take better care of myself. When I do that, I am at my best. I have decided to do yoga when I get up in the morning and exercise again at noon. I am going to be more conscious of my diet and make better choices about what goes into my body."

When I probed for the reason, he continued.

"Recently, there has been a lot of negativity in my life and I am just not going to allow it to get me down any longer. I am choosing to be the leader I want to be and not be a weak victim of my circumstances."

His decision prompts me to ask this question to you:

How are you, as a leader, focusing on your emotional well-being?

There’s a great story of 2 out of 180 nuns that were the subjects of a study on longevity and happiness. If you want all the details, you can read the book  Authentic Happiness by Martin Seligman, for some interesting facts and percentages about the nuns.

Studies of longevity are very complex from a purely scientific standpoint. Causality is extremely difficult to make a case of. However, one of the reasons this study is so impactful is that nuns lead very similar lives. They eat basic food, don’t smoke or drink alcohol, and have similar routines. Of course, there are differences such as intellect, depths of spirituality, and outlook on the future that could account for the varied results in the nuns.

However, none of these aspects made any difference in the research. In his book, Seligman points out that the largest contributor to their longevity was the sheer amount of positive feelings.

According to the National Wellness Institute, wellness is "an active process through which people become aware of, and then make choices toward, a more successful existence."

Four things to notice about wellness:

• It is an active process. It is something you devote energy to making happen. It is intentional on your part as a leader.

• It starts with self-awareness. Are you aware of the moment when health choices present themselves?

• Wellness is a choice. You decide to be well in the moment or you decide to say “screw it” and become a victim of your circumstance.

• There is an end game. A successful existence. This is your life. You only get one. Why not make it the very best that it can be?

Emotional intelligence and well-being:

One of the attributes we measure in Emotional Intelligence training is either Happiness or Well-being. In our model there are four factors that comprise Well-being:

1. Self-Regard: Believing in yourself and living according to your values.

2. Self-Actualization: A willingness to learn and grow in accordance with your beliefs.

3. Interpersonal Relationships: Engaging in mutually satisfying relationships.

4. Optimism: The ability to respond, recover, and claim a happy state from disappointments and setbacks in life

Two considerations for evaluating your own level of well-being:

1. The first is attempting to display as many of these four attributes as you can.

   • Believe in yourself and live according to your values.

   • Learn and grow in areas that really matter to you.

   • Have friends that reciprocate these areas.

   • Realize that things in life are not always going to go your way. What counts is how you respond when setbacks happen.

2. The second is to have a balance between these attributes.

   • For example, you want to make sure that your self-regard is balanced with your interpersonal relationships.

   • If you have a high level of self-regard and low levels of interpersonal relationships, you could come across as prideful.

   • If you have low levels of self-regard and high interpersonal relationships, then you could come across as needy and not fun to be around. It’s all about balance.

As you think about the successful life you want to live as a leader:

Are you choosing to maximize and balance these 4 attributes of emotional health?

What changes can you make to ensure that you live a long and successful life?

Are You Happy With Your Level of Well-Being?

One time, a client said to me, "Scott, I realize I need to take care of myself. When I do that,  I am at my best. I have decided to do yoga when I get up in the morning and exercise at noon. I am going to be conscious of my diet and make good choices about what goes into my body."

When I probed for the reason, he continued.

"Recently, there has been a lot of negativity in my life and I am just not going to allow it to get me down any longer. I am choosing to be the leader I want to be and not be some weak victim of circumstance."

His decision prompts me to ask this question to you; how are you, as a leader, focusing on your Emotional Well-being?

There’s a great story of 2 of 180 nuns who are the subjects of a noteworthy study on longevity and happiness. If you want all the details, you really need to get the book  Authentic Happiness by Martin Seligman, but here is the bottom line:

• 90% of the most cheerful 25% of the nuns were alive at age 85 vs. only 34% of the least cheerful 25%.

• 54% of the most cheerful quarter was alive at age 94, as opposed to only 11% of the least cheerful.

Studies of longevity are very complex from a pure science standpoint. Causality is extremely difficult to make a case. However, one of the reasons this study is so impactful is that nuns lead very similar lives. They eat basic food, they don’t smoke or drink alcohol, and have similar routines. Of course, there differences such as intellect, depths of spirituality and outlook on the future that could account for the varied results in the nuns.

However, none of these aspects made any difference in the research. In his book, Seligman points out that the largest contributor to their longevity was the amount of positive feelings.

According to the National Wellness Institute, wellness is "an active process through which people become aware of, and make choices toward, a more successful existence."

Four things to notice about wellness:

• It is an active process. It is something you devote energy to making happen. It is intentional on your part as a leader.

• It starts with self-awareness. Are you aware of the moment when health choices present themselves?

• Wellness is a choice. You decide to be well in the moment or say “screw it” and become a victim of your circumstance.

• There is an end game. A successful existence. This is your life. You only get one. Why not make it the very best that it can be?

Happiness and Emotional Intelligence

One of the attributes we measure in the Emotional Intelligence training is Happiness or Well-being. In our model there are four factors that comprise Well-being:

1. Self-Regard: Believing in yourself and living according to your values.

2. Self-Actualization: A willingness to learn and grow in accordance with your beliefs.

3. Interpersonal Relationships: Engaging in mutually satisfying relationships.

4. Optimism: The ability to respond, recover, and claim a happy state from disappointments and setbacks in life

Two Considerations for Evaluating Your Own Level of Well-Being

The first is attempting to display as much of these four attributes as you can. Believe in yourself and live according to your values. Learn and grow in areas that really matter to you. Have friends that reciprocate. Realize things in life are not always going to go your way. What counts is how you respond when setbacks happen.

The second is to have a balance between these attributes. For example, you want to make sure that your self-regard is balanced with your interpersonal relationships. If you have a high level of self-regard and low levels of interpersonal relationships, you could come across as prideful. If you have low levels of self-regard and high interpersonal relationships, then you could come across as needy and not fun to be around. It’s all about balance.

As you think about the successful life you want to live as a leader, are you choosing to maximize and balance these 4 attributes of emotional health? What changes would you need to make to live a long and successful life?

Moving toward Delegation Expertise: Delegation Series #3

Last week you heard from BELAY’s CEO, Bryan Miles, and how he helped me with my business. This week, I’ve invited one of my virtual assistants, Tannis Oliveri, to share how she empowers multiple clients toward delegation expertise. Here’s Tannis...

When a client begins an engagement with a Virtual Assistant (VA), they are typically overworked, stressed, and looking for a reprieve from the mundane tasks that weigh them down. Through the first few weeks of onboarding with a new client, I seek to learn their pain-points, what part of their day is the most productive, their personality type, and their communication style. This helps me get a broad view of their work and life. Once I determine their greatest needs I strategize how to take things off their plate which typically begins with delegation.

Depending on their professional journey, they may or may not have utilized Bryan Miles’ delegation matrix in order to identify tasks they want to get off their plate. In my experience, some clients, like Scott, have been the one-man-show in their business and need encouragement to continue handing things over. Regardless of where the client is on the road of delegation, here are some simple tips for moving toward delegation expertise.

• Templates, Templates, Templates: This has been the biggest area of success for my clients across the board. If I can remove the brainwork from a repeating task by creating templates, then it’s a win for everyone involved. Here are a few of my favorites:

  • Meeting + Travel Templates: This works best is in a task-management software where I list the overall details needed for meetings or travel arrangements (location, required attendees, etc). Rather than my client and I playing email-ping-pong with gathering the necessary details, my client is able to copy the template, type in the meeting or travel request information, and I take it from there. It is efficient and creates clear lines of communication.

  • Email Templates: Whether my client wants to touch base after submitting a proposal or reach out to a volunteer, a canned response gives them a track to run on. In creating the template I will include language such as, “I’ve CC'd my assistant, Tannis, on this email. Please respond to her with your availability.” In doing so my client (1) doesn’t have to remember to delegate the scheduling to me and (2) is training his team to come to me with calendar requests.

• Gently pull things away: Expense reporting was a tremendous drain for one of my clients. When we first began our engagement he would manage all his receipts, even though I offered to do them. His response was, “It doesn’t take me much time. It’s no big deal.” But his calendar screamed how valuable his time really was. So, rather than waiting for him to upload the receipts each week, whenever an expense comes through his email, I take care of it right away. The small fragmented pieces of time are back in his control when he allows me to take the initiative.

• Remind them of your skill-set: One of the things I’m known for (and actually enjoy doing) is taking messes and cleaning them up. Whether it’s an online storage that needs a complete overhaul, or a tangible folder that needs reorganizing, I encourage my clients to delegate that to me. When I first began with Scott his Dropbox was in desperate need of organization. Rather than Scott trying to clean it up, he handed it over to me and I whipped it into shape.

• Ask lots of questions: Some clients have been doing a task for so long they don’t realize someone else can do it for them. During my weekly meetings with each client, I ask various open-ended questions that help them process through their tasks. This creates time and space for them to think through things and offload work that doesn’t belong on their plate.

As a Virtual Assistant, I feel I am an extension of my client. We are both working toward the same goals. When they become empowered to delegate, my clients find freedom and more time to spend on the work they love.

Does Your Team Need This Lifeline?

A while back, after a much-needed vacation, I scheduled some time for writing and research. During this time, my interaction with my coaching and training clients was limited to text and phone conversations.

About 10 days into this period, I noticed something unusual.

I was starting to get a little down. Not an all-out depression, but I was noticing something declining in my overall mood. I felt like I was sinking. Nothing bad happened, really. In fact, I had just come off a very restful vacation and had plenty of work to accomplish.

Nonetheless, there it was; the feeling of not having enough connections that sustain love for my work.

A lifeline is defined as "a rope or line used for life-saving, typically one thrown to rescue someone in difficulties in water or one used by sailors to secure themselves to a boat." Things can happen to us in our lives that give us a similar feeling of sinking or being stuck. If we don’t have some help to secure us, we can begin to feel alone and hopeless.

From time to time, we all need a lifeline of care and compassion from others.

BASIC HUMAN PSYCHOLOGY

It is fairly common knowledge amongst psychologists that the feeling of isolation can be a key determinant for a wide range of human ailments, from depression all the way through to premature death.

The Wall Street Journal reported there are very few public health initiatives to combat loneliness, even though this state of being is riskier to “health and survival than cigarette smoking or obesity.” 

Loneliness a bigger health risk than smoking or being overweight?

If loneliness is a bigger health risk than cigarette smoking and obesity, then perhaps it is something we as leaders should pay closer attention to. Are there people in our sphere of influence that need a lifeline?

IMPACT ON LEADERSHIP

A very insightful study was published last October in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society. Researchers wanted to know the impacts and categories of social contact or lack thereof, that might predict clinical depression. In studying over 11 thousand people over the age of 50, the scientists found that only face-to-face interaction forestalled depression in older adults. Phone calls made a difference to people with a history of mood disorders but not to anyone else. Email and texts had no impact at all.

The lifeline that people need, according to this study, is face-to-face interaction

In the study, the frequency of gathering with friends and family—or not—was the key. What’s more, the researchers discovered the more in-person contact the less likely that depression would occur in the future. Participants who had minimal social contacts had the highest depressive symptom rate, while those who connected with people in person at least three times a week had the lowest. It would seem that the more people gather in person, the better off they are.

What could we as leaders do to become part of the solution?

Mayoclinic.org has some very simple steps for preventing depression. The 5 most relevant to our discussion are:

• Control your stress

• Increase your resilience

• Boost your self-esteem

• Reach out to family and friends (i.e.. grab a lifeline)

• Get help fast

As leaders, we can be intentional with those under our influence. Here is how I would adapt the above list for leader-follower interactions.

• Become attuned to what stress looks like for those on your team

• Meet regularly with your team members at least every 1-2 weeks

• Prioritize these meetings

• Spend most of your time listening and asking questions, rather than being in "solve mode"

• Meet in person, if at all possible. If not, use video chat like FaceTime or Zoom

• Give them some assurances that you believe in them

• Establish a culture that encourages learning from mistakes

• Do spot check-ins in times of high stress

• If a teammate seems down, ask about it early

• Consider frequent mini-sabbaticals as a way to rejuvenate

How often are you connecting with those you lead? How intentional are you in making connections? Who on your team seems a little down and needs to know you believe in them? Your lifeline of care and compassion might be what is needed to help your team reach peak performance.

Are you in a Mini, Major, or Stormy Transition?

Many of the organizations I work with are going through major transitions right now. Some are growing and expanding while others are experiencing unprecedented contraction. The change seems to be showing up in a couple of very different ways.

Some folks are in mini-transition where they are gaining clarity around their life’s work; like an update of what has been happening in their lives over the past several years. These folks find themselves doing a new job, or on a new team, or maybe even relocating for an opportunity. It is a change they may or may not have been asking for, but alas they find themselves with some new opportunities ahead. While significant, and full of emotion, these mini-transitions keep the person on a similar life trajectory.

Then there are the life-impacting transitions where full-on change is happening in your life. Your circumstances are shifting entirely and rocking your entire world!

• You have lost your job, through no fault of your own.

• You have decided to retire and to give your talents to a local non-profit who really needs your leadership.

• Your spouse has served you divorce papers after 25 years of marriage.

• Or you experience the loss of a child.

Real loss. Devastating loss. The kind of loss that makes life seem like there is no way out.

Frederick Hudson writes, “…many people think of transitions [like this] as a penalty box, a place for losers, for quitters and weaklings-people who can’t take the heat, victims who thrive on self-pity and helplessness.” Many will seek to blame others; a bad boss, a spouse, or more likely God.

When you lose something you love, a job or a person it can seem like life itself is not worth living. Hudson writes, “the acceptance of an ending sounds like termination, humiliation, resignation, and defeat.”

However deep or devastating your transition, please take heart. However disorientating the change you are encountering, this experience is almost always a road to some kind of regenerative growth of you as a person and a discovery of some new and exciting you that is being created.

You really are a butterfly emerging from a cocoon…eventually.

But for now, it might feel like you are a caterpillar who just wants go into the basement, drink beer, and cry!

What to be aware of is how you are experiencing your transformation. Think of it as “The Meantime.”

The Meantime

When I was a kid, my mom used to talk a lot about the meantime. It was always mentioned as a time preparation as a transition was coming. It would go something like this:   

• “Scott your father will be home in about an hour and in the MEANTIME you better get your room picked up.”  

• “Scott you have basketball practice tomorrow morning and in the MEANTIME you better get your gym bag packed.”

• “Eric (my brother) you have your piano lesson tonight, in the MEANTIME you better get practicing.”

As I reflect back when I was a kid the MEANTIME was always a time of storming. You see, I knew dad would be home in an hour, but a kid could play a lot of basketball in 60 minutes. Who in their right mind wants to stop playing ball and clean up there room?

The storm would begin to brew.

My mom would remind me. “You better get on it now. You can play ball when your room is done, but in the MEANTIME you better get moving."

After the second request to clean my room, she would invoke my middle name.

“Scott Robert!”

The pressure would rise with dad’s presence looming on the horizon. The stormy transition was fast approaching.  

We all experience stormy space in our meantime; the space that exists between “how nice it was before the transition” and “what it will be like when the transition is over.”

The question I have been asking myself a lot lately is, “When the meantime comes, how do I show up?”

Leaders, we need to be very aware of how we are showing up during times of transition. We need to ask ourselves what our behavior was like during the stormy transition. Are my actions those of a self-centered protectionist?

Am I becoming so focused on my own unfortunate circumstances that I am missing out on key relationships that could be a vehicle to restore my healing? Can I remain calm and have some clear thinking, vision, and self-introspection as events unfold around me?

Many of you are experiencing change and chaos going like never before. So, over the next several weeks I am going to write about going through these changes with skill and grace. Next week, I’m going to dive deeper in how to work through stormy transitions such as grief and loss.

I hope you enjoy the support. If you know of someone going through transition, why not send them the blog and encourage them to sign up. I would greatly appreciate it.

Are You Intentional About This?

An old friend recently called me and told me about her work. Her company really values leadership and sees it as a competitive advantage in the marketplace, but they view personal development as the individual's responsibility. Much like how they expect my friend to dress business casual when she comes to work, but they are not going to take her shopping.

You may work in an organization that takes a more proactive approach and provides classes to attend or gives you a budget to spend on yourself for your own development. You may even work in an organization that doesn't care about your development at all, they just want the job done.

No matter what type of organization you work with, planning your own development as a leader is paramount to your improvement. We can not simply hope that we will improve or leave our development to chance.

So, what exactly does development look like? Development is about:

• Growth as a person

• Finding a new skill

• Advancing yourself

• Creating something new and exciting

• Breaking out of the routine so that you become the person YOU desire to be

Perhaps you want to improve your position or your skills, yet you just are hoping that it will happen. Hope is a poor outcome predictor. Instead of hoping something will happen we need to intentionally engage others in our development.

HERE’S AN EXAMPLE

You are conversing with a peer while waiting for a meeting to start. You say, "Hey, I am trying to speak less in meetings, but when I do speak, I am going to try to have more influence. My goal is to draw others to my ideas, rather than beat them into submission with my words. Could you observe me over the next few months and give me some feedback on how I am doing?" Admitting we need to develop something brings us face to face with the reality that if we do not make a change we will be stuck where we are for a long time. This takes courage and vulnerability.

Being intentional with your development allows you to go to other leaders, and even followers of yours, asking them to partner with you in the creation of the more advanced you. This may be scary, but so is skydiving, or running your first half-marathon, or going on your first date. Scary in an exhilarating sort of way. It demonstrates a healthy and respectful fear.

Sharing an aspect of your leadership development plan allows three important things to occur:

1. You are declaring that leading is important to you.

2. You are showing humility.

3. You are saying to others that stagnation is NOT OK with you.

If you are collecting feedback by involving others in your development I want to encourage you to pay attention to the accompanying emotion. Are you feeling sad or encouraged? Are you motivated or discouraged? No matter the emotion you are feeling, focus on what is being said and how you can use it to improve your leadership.

So, how are you involving others in your personal development? I’d love to hear your comments around the topic of intentionally developing yourself as a leader.

10 C's Checklist to Decide if You Have an Effective Team (Part 2)

Last week, I opened the conversation about Effective Teams and challenged you to think critically about your own team. If you missed the first 5 C’s Checklist, click here to get caught up.

As promised, here are the remaining 5 C’s:
...And don’t forget to click the free download at the end!

6. Competent members.  Every team has to have people with enough skill and intellect to get the job done. Notice this does not say you need Perfect People, or The Smartest People, or The Best Looking People. You need people who can get the job done that align with the vision. This competence extends to a lesson I learned when I was about 4 years old. Everybody wants to play with the nice kid in the sandbox. Nobody wants to play with the arrogant, egotistical, narcissistic bully in the sandbox. All our adult lives we have been told this lie; that our organization is a zero-sum game. Which comes from an attitude of scarcity. The reason we organize as humans is that we can do more if we have each other. Stop threatening to take your sand bucket and go home if you don’t get your way. Start being nice to people, relax…go have lunch. Start behaving like you are part of an abundant world and that there is enough around for us all to eat like kings.

7. Coaching for results with a high standard of excellence. Coaching is a word that is getting a lot of play these days. It can mean anything from being directive and telling a person exactly what you want them to do (think football coach), to very supportive and delegating tasks without fear of being let down, and everything in between. In this idea of coaching, the coach bases their direction style on the needs of the person being coached. Yet keeping a high standard of excellence is key, not a matter of style. For me, coaching is all about helping the person see around a corner they are getting ready to turn and they have no idea what awaits them. There are times when the coach knows exactly what is going to happen to the individual and can help them prepare for what is coming next. There are other times when neither the coach nor the teammate knows what is around the bend. This is where the coach can get curious and at least brainstorm with the person what to expect and how to best handle whatever comes at them. The reason I like coaching so much is that it really helps to get rid of blame in organizations and focus more on opportunities that exist.

8. Confidence among members. Not one of us holds all the answers. In today’s complex organizations this is just not possible. We need to be able to ask each other questions and then listen to what the person has to say. This give and take, where one person is curious about something and then shows the ability to focus and pay attention and listen to the response, is a real key to team performance. If we are interacting like this, then I know that I can count on you to be there when it matters. Life is not perfect, things happen. If we run our teams knowing that someone has our backs when we fail, then others are more likely to reciprocate the deed when we might need it most. It is only on a team that is confident and comfortable that risks can be taken. As humans, we crave safety and security. Taking a risk isn’t safe, it is often scary and unpredictable. Knowing that you are there to support me if I fall helps me to be able to take my first step. High performing teams have confidence in each other.

9. Commitment to unity. I used to frame my thoughts around team strength using a skill model. My thinking went something like, “The team is only as strong as its weakest link.” I have to admit I was heavily influenced in my early management life by Jack Welch who had a model of ranking teammates from A (best) to (D) worst. Jack said to reward the A’s and get rid of the D’s. I have really changed my thinking on this over the last 20 years. Getting rid of people does not create unity. It only causes fear that “I might be next.” How I see team unity now is more around the philosophy of "a team is only as good as the least committed member.” I also believe it is up to the leader to create this level of commitment and to foster a spirit of “We are going to win or we are going to lose, that much I know. I also know whether we win or whether we lose we are going to do it together.”

10. Collaborative environment. No working environment is perfect. Everyone gets their feelings hurt from time to time. The worst thing that can happen on a team is that silos form and an “us versus them” mentality is created. Organizations are so complex that it is imperative that the culture remains collaborative even in the face of conflict. A spirit of collaboration says I care as much about your goals and the organization as you care about mine. I want you to win. I want you to succeed. I want you to be able to be the very best version of yourself that you can be. If I can help you with your goals and your goals are linked to the organization obtaining its vision and I truly believe in the vision, then why wouldn’t I help you? The enemy here is selfish ambition. We have to put away our own selfishness and arrogance and realize that these are going to leave us and everyone short of what they are trying to achieve. An effective team collaborates.

So, those are my top 10 C's to decide if you have an effective team.  Why not sit down and reflect on this list and really think through how your team is doing? Where are the places that you exceed expectations and are cause for celebration? Where are the gaps that need to be shored up?

If I came in and observed your team for a day, what would I find? If we used this checklist as a 1 (low) to 5 (high) scale how would your group fare? The other question that comes to mind is what if you rated your team and then I rated your team, would there be any differences? Sometimes leaders need outside perspective to see if what they are really seeing and experiencing is valid.

Care to take the challenge? If so, click HERE for a free printable download of this checklist. Use this with your team and let me know what you discover.

5 Questions to Assess Your Social Responsibility

The competency of social responsibility asks if there is anything emotionally holding you back from serving others. Social responsibility is a desire, an ability, and a volition. When I bring this topic up with clients the response I usually get is that I am giving them a “guilt trip."

Is it healthy to be the focus of your own life and the center of your universe? My guess is that none of us want to feel this way. However, the busier we become, the more self-absorbed we seem to get and the flow of our leadership lives suffers.

My point here is not to make you feel bad about your level of social responsibility, but rather to get you thinking about how are you balancing your selfish ambition. Most of us as leaders are trying to find a flow between work, family, recreation, and faith. Where does service fit in for you? If you dedicate too much to any one of these areas, the flow becomes restricted in other places.

Will you take action as a leader even though you might not benefit personally? Do you have a sense of accepting others and using your talents as a leader for the good of society and not only yourself? I don’t know how that hits you, but it actually stings a little for me. Of course, we have the skill. Yes, most of us in our hearts want to. The question is, what is holding us back from acting?

Because we are not the center of the universe, competencies such as social responsibility are vital in any model for leadership. If you read this blog on any regular basis you know that one of the best leadership models, uses emotional intelligence.

One such model for emotional intelligence that incorporates this idea of social responsibility is the EQ-i 2.0 by Reuven Bar-On. According to the EQ-i 2.0, emotional intelligence is defined in the user’s manual as, “a set of emotional and social skills that influence the way we perceive and express ourselves, develop and maintain social relationships, cope with challenges, and use emotional information in an effective and meaningful way.”

Most of the time when I speak to folks about emotional intelligence, their thoughts immediately turn inward to our personal emotion. Or perhaps they turn to a difficult relationship, a place where we are struggling relationally in our lives. Very few of us relate our emotional intelligence to our social consciousness.

Steve Stein and Howard Book, in their book on emotional intelligence called The EQ Edge, describe social responsibility as "A desire and ability to willingly contribute to society, your social group, and generally to the welfare of others."

Are you willing to test your desire and ability to willingly contribute to society?

If so, here are five questions you can ask yourself to assess your own level of social responsibility:

1. What community organizations am I currently involved in outside of my paid vocation? (Involved means regularly serving, not that your name is merely on a list).

2. What active role am I currently playing to make the organization better?

3. What did I do this week to lend a hand to someone who could use it?

4. How many examples can I cite in the last month where I was sensitive to the needs of friends, co-workers, or my boss?

5. Do I participate in charitable events?

We are never successful on our own. Real success comes from our work as a contributing member of a team or society. Having a caring and compassionate heart is a great balance for high levels of self-regard, that if left unchecked, could fall into arrogance.

After you take the assessment, talk to your spouse, significant other, coach, or a complete stranger about how you are doing. Do you have any changes you need to make to become more socially conscious? Your leadership depends on it.

Open with Caution...Do You Trust Me?

“I just don’t know where they are coming from” lamented Julie. “Of course I am trustworthy. How could they think I am not?” The tension in the room was rising as she was reading the summary of her leadership 360 feedback report.  

“I take good care of all of the people on the team, walking around asking about how they are doing. I ask about their kids and what they did fun over the weekend. I mean I work hard at showing genuine concern for them.”

Julie continued with simmering anger underneath her words. “I mean I don’t question them at all when they have to leave in the middle of the afternoon when the school calls and one of the kids are in the principal’s office sick and needs to be picked up immediately. In fact, I am actually proactive and tell them, ‘Go we will cover whatever you have to do, just go and take care of your family.’’’

As I listened to Julie struggle with the feedback, I sat back and said to myself, you know she does sound like she has care and compassion and a genuine concern.  But the 360 is saying that there are those on her team that do not trust her.

Where is the disconnect?

I reflected back on previous clients who also received feedback revealing trust as a potential issue in their leadership.

My thoughts turned to Tim whose team said that he was the most dependable manager anyone could ever have. If you ever needed anything all you had to do was ask Tim and he was there for you. Tim got great accolades for being reliable, whether you were in crisis or just needed to talk something out. Tim struggled when he was reading his 360 feedback and trying to process the disconnect between being dependable and reliable, yet being seen as not being fully trustworthy.

How is it that two leaders, one who is seen as showing concern, care, and compassion and the other who clearly demonstrates reliability and dependability both be seen as not being able to be trusted?

Well, it turns out that trust, or what those in our organizations perceive as trust, are rooted in two parts of our brain; our cognitive thinking, and our emotional feeling abilities.

Trust has, as a component of its formation, something called psychological safety. In order for your team to trust you, they need to both KNOW and FEEL that they are safe. Psychological safety is the portion of our being that says all is well. You can be free to be yourself. No harm is going to come to you, this is an open and judgment-free zone.

Experts have found this psychological safety is built on a couple of important foundations. The first is that the leader is able to develop cognition-based trust. This is the type of trust that Tim was giving himself such high marks for demonstrating. Tim indeed received excellent marks for being dependable and reliable. But something was missing.

And the second type, like Julie, who was perceived as not fully trustworthy by her team even though she was demonstrating strong affect-based trust abilities. These strengths are based on emotional bonds of care, compassion, and concern between people. Even though she demonstrated affect-based trust, Julie was missing something.

Well by now you have guessed it.

Julie was missing that cognitive-based trust from her team. While she was great at caring and demonstrating compassion, she was unreliable. She was often triple booked on her calendar and members of her team would need her support in meetings or presentations and Julie was nowhere to be found. Julie could not be trusted to show up.

And while Tim was a dependable manager who had an open door policy, walking into his office was another matter entirely. Tim, being an intellectual and (literally) the smartest guy in the room, would give people on his team the feeling they were insignificant by intimidating them, never asking questions, or showing empathy, just quick with an opinion on what should be done. Tim could not be trusted to care.

So what about you as a leader? Are you able to display both aspects of trust, cognitive and affective? Do you find yourself relying more on one and apologizing for the other?

Trust is a really big deal in leadership (blinding glimpse of the obvious here). Most leaders I meet would never say they are not trustworthy and they often will cite one aspect or the other of the psychological safety equation.

Which side do you lean toward? Cognitive or affective? Is it time you gave full consideration to what goes into driving trust with your team?

4 Ways to Avoid Being an Instapot Leader

Last week I encouraged leaders to think about how receiving feedback can be an opportunity to capitalize on personal growth. If you want to go back and review the post, or if you missed it entirely, you can click here and get caught up.

Utilizing feedback doesn’t get enough attention in organizations. Most of the emphasis is placed on making sure leaders have feedback. Ok. Great. We are spending money making sure they have the information, but how are we investing and supporting them in processing the gift they receive?

In organizations, we treat feedback like getting an Instapot for Christmas. This complicated pressure cooking device has more buttons than my TV remote control (which I don’t know all those buttons either). The instructions on the Instapot are so complicated and overwhelming, there is genuine fear of blowing spaghetti sauce all over the living room if you press the wrong button!

Receiving feedback from organizations could be compared to the fear of pressing the wrong button on the Instapot. All of this data comes in and you hold the instructions in your hands not quite sure what to do with it. You may struggle with being completely overwhelmed, or even feeling paralyzed if the proper processing support is not provided. All of this feedback is well-intentioned, but is it helpful if the leader doesn’t get the chance to really take the time to understand what the feedback is saying?

When working with clients who are getting organizational feedback, there are four key elements that will help them process the information:

1. Ownership:  How emotionally dependent or independent are they on what others are saying? Are they trying to fit in and be like everyone else? Or are they in control, and not overwhelmed by the emotion they are feeling from the feedback? A leader with ownership can tolerate people not liking them or agreeing with everything they say.

2. Empathetic Understanding: Are they able to see the feedback from the perspective it was given? They don’t have to agree with it, but can they contextualize it? The goal isn’t to fix everything right away, but to understand the feedback and take some steps toward processing change.

3. Rigid Stance: The polar ends of this spectrum are performance and relationship. On one end, the leader focuses so heavily on tasks that they cannot see relationships are damaged. On the other end, the leader is so focused on relationship nothing ever gets done.This usually shows as justification for whatever behavior the feedback has uncovered.

4. Self-Regard: How well does the person know themselves, their strengths, and their weaknesses? Are they attuned to their natural gifts and using them to achieve their calling in life? Do they understand their position and are they working to strengthen their organizational voice? If not, they are more than likely on the other end of the spectrum, which is a lack of acknowledging strengths and using victim voice.

As we use the gift of feedback in organizations, we should also work with our leaders on how to process the gift. We need to help them contextualize and get the full breadth of the feedback before we run to an action plan to fix anything. Most of the time, nothing is really broken. In my experience, most development work comes from overplayed strengths. While the changes might seem monumental, the person receiving feedback is more-or-less experimenting with slight modifications and practicing their newfound insights.

Do you know someone who has recently received feedback or are you in the process of giving feedback? Helping them process feedback will go a long way to revealing the gift of becoming the person they desire to be.