Episodios

  • Leadership Isn't A Reward

    Leadership Isn't A Reward
    Feb 3 2025
    I hope you aren’t waiting around for the day when someone with authority finally rewards you with the title of leader.This is my hope for two reasons:1. Leadership isn’t a reward, it’s a massive responsibility.2. Leadership has nothing to do with assigned authority.Waiting to finally be rewarded with a stamp of approval is a great way to miss the opportunity to lead today.It’s easy to think of leadership as a destination, but leadership is a part of the journey.When everyone is frustrated and you find a way to diffuse the frustration, that’s leadership.When no one else in the meeting is willing to say the thing that needs to be said and you do choose to be the one who speaks up, that’s leadership.When the team is faced with a brand new obstacle for which there is no guidebook and you say, “what if we try…”, that’s leadership.When you see a better way of doing something (it doesn’t have to be your idea) and you rally people to adopt new behaviors, that’s leadership.When you notice someone playing small and you challenge them to think bigger, that’s leadership.The reward of leadership is not a title, notoriety, or a lifetime achievement award. The reward of leadership is the trust from those who choose to follow regardless of your title.OPPORTUNITY FOR ACTION: Identify three ways you can lead in your current role and take action this week. They don’t have to be sexy or grandiose. Most leadership happens quietly, behind the scenes, and without much fanfare.
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    15 m
  • No one knows what you mean

    No one knows what you mean
    Feb 9 2025
    What does “soon” mean?What about “expensive”?Can you tell me with any clarity what “I’ll get right on that” means?Yeah, me neither, because each – and many other words we use every single day – are extremely contextual and based on myriad experiences that are unique to us.We say things like, “I’ll have those numbers for you soon,” with the belief that we all agree on what soon means. Except, our definitions often vary wildly and we create expectations we didn’t intend to create when we aren’t specific.Soon might mean tomorrow afternoon to you. And it might mean within the hour to me. Telling someone you will have those numbers “by 2PM tomorrow” sets a far clearer expectation, one that can be instantly renegotiated if the specified deadline doesn’t work.OPPORTUNITY FOR ACTION: Review the emails you send this week for words that avoid specificity and replace them with words that are more concrete. Monitor your interactions to see if these tweaks reduce the amount of inadvertent confusion. Monitor your own workflows to see if they benefit from clearly specified agreements.
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    12 m
  • It’s not bad luck

    It’s not bad luck
    Feb 16 2025
    I’ve been reading a lot of Calvin & Hobbes lately. A child of the 80’s, I remember enjoying the comic strip as a kid, but reading it as an adult is a completely different experience.That rambunctious kid and his stuffed tiger have a lot of layers.In a strip I read recently, the pair are careening down a hill in a red wagon while Calvin tells Hobbes that we are all victims of “luck” and that there’s nothing any of us can do about it. As the frames pass Hobbes leaps from the red wagon before Calvin flies off a cliff, further proving Calvin’s bad luck. Hobbes notes, from a safe perch atop the cliff, that the same thing happened yesterday, revealing that Calvin might be less a victim of bad luck and more a victim of taking the same unwise actions over and over again.Sound familiar?It’s convenient to blame bad luck for the things in your life that you don’t like, but it would be wise to examine how your day-to-day habits might be informing those outcomes.After all, pointing your red wagon in the same direction every day is a great way to find yourself at the bottom of the same cliff.OPPORTUNITY FOR ACTION: Identify one habit that isn’t serving you well and find an alternative. Bonus points will be awarded if you enlist the help of someone else…
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    18 m
  • I make people tense

    I make people tense
    Feb 23 2025
    I was convinced for many years that good leaders needed to understand how to alleviate tension.I wasn’t wrong about that, just shortsighted.Turning down the tension IS an essential part of leading a team but, in the same way your car needs a brake pedal AND an accelerator pedal, it’s only half of the equation.Leaders must be conscious of how their people are responding to a host of inputs and know when to reduce tension, tapping the metaphorical brake pedal to ensure people don’t burn out when there is too much happening at once.BUT, leaders must also be conscious of when to introduce tension to help their people grow.In the same way lifting weights, playing a new piece of music, or taking a class introduces tension for the purpose of expanding one’s capabilities, leaders must be willing to allow their people to navigate tension as a means to make them impervious to that tension in the future.The job of a leader isn’t to simply alleviate tension, it is to manage it. OPPORTUNITY FOR ACTION: Consider those on your team and identify where alleviating tension could be useful and where introducing tension could be beneficial. Someone may need your help alleviating tension in one arena while you challenge them with increased tension in another.
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    17 m
  • Slow down, do it again

    Slow down, do it again
    Mar 2 2025
    A few years ago I took piano lessons for about 4 months.It changed my life.That might sound sarcastic given the abbreviated amount of time spent, but I’m being quite serious.I ended those lessons because of a scheduling conflict, not because I learned it all in 4 short months, but two simple instructions my teacher used have stuck with me since.Slow down. Do it again.I hadn’t read music in years when I started these lessons and found that trying to read music for two hands was a real challenge. I would invariably encounter sections of the simplest music through which I would stumble and she would calmly tell me to slow down.It turns out that I could read and play almost anything IF I slowed down enough. It may have been painfully protracted and an absolute chore to listen to, but I was able to execute every note in the correct sequence IF I gave my brain enough time to process the flow of instructions.And when I would finally find the tempo at which I could play the music successfully she would interrupt my celebration by asking me to do it again.Doing it once isn’t proof of mastery. You have to be able to do it over and over again to prove that.These are powerful phrases we can use with those we lead.When they struggle, look for the equivalent of slow down so they can rehearse the steps and build new grooves in their brain. When confronted with our own incompetence we often consider giving up. Slowing down is the alternative that helps us reconsider our ability to overcome that incompetence.It’s the difference between I can’t do this, and I can’t do this YET.Monitor their progress and ensure they are doing things correctly. You don’t want them reinforcing the wrong actions. It’s like lifting weights: form is the first priority. You don’t add weight or reps until you can do the motion correctly. When they are able to complete the task/project/presentation, give them a high five, but then find an opportunity for them to do it again. Mastery comes from repetition. OPPORTUNITY FOR ACTION: Consider your team and identify opportunities to use slow down and do it again this week. Who needs someone to help them improve their presentations? Who needs someone to offer feedback about their email communication? Who needs help navigating conflict? Help them slow down. Help them do it again.
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    22 m
  • Are you trying too hard?

    Are you trying too hard?
    Apr 18 2025
    A few years ago my dad and I built a shed on my property in the west hills of Fairbanks.I got a few quotes from contractors but decided it would be a fun project to tackle with my dad, and I could use the money I’d save to pick up some new tools that would serve me on dozens of projects after the shed was finished.The tools we used along the way were a hit parade of devices made to speed things up and reduce effort.I can’t imagine time traveling back 100 years or more and tackling the same project without the aid of power drills, nail guns, and battery powered circular saws.Would the build be possible? Of course. But it would take so much longer and require so much more effort for the same eventual reward.Here’s how this parallels your work as a highly driven leader:If your default reaction to a vexing problem is to work harder, you may be sabotaging yourself.I’m not going to bash hard work, but I would like to offer that sometimes the solution is not MORE EFFORT, but LESS.If what you’re doing isn’t working, it is so easy to get fixated on the idea that MORE is the answer. More hours. More blood. More sweat. More tears.It can feel like the only way to proceed, especially to highly driven folks.Unfortunately, the value of LESS is rarely explored.And yet, when a building project is taking too long to complete you don’t allocate MORE time to turning every screw by hand, you find a tool that makes the turning easier.In many situations, the pathway to greater progress is literally working less.Occam’s Razor suggests that the simplest explanation is most likely to be true, and I don’t think it’s a massive leap to suggest that the simplest solution might be the most elegant and effective.If you want to solve more problems, faster, it’s worth considering this uncomfortable question: What if an obsession with working harder is amplifying the problem you are facing?OPPORTUNITY FOR ACTION: You will find more of what you look for. Reflect on a challenging circumstance you are currently navigating and consider the possibility that you are making it more complicated than it needs to be. Ask yourself, how could I make this simpler? Ask yourself, what could I use as a “power drill” in this situation?PS: Here’s the most nefarious part of this posture: We demonstrate to our teams that the best way to attack a problem is to work harder and do more. Our actions say, “I expect this of myself, so I expect it of you, too.”
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    21 m
  • What part do your people play?

    What part do your people play?
    Apr 18 2025
    Have you ever seen the master score an orchestra conductor uses? It is an overwhelming document that contains the music for every instrument in the orchestra and is usually covered in handwritten notes.It’s the conductor's job to know the inner workings of every part being played and to fully understand how they interact as the piece unfolds.This is very different from the score handed out to an oboist, a trumpeter, or a percussionist.These focused parts detail only what that specific musician needs to play.Providing each musician with the master score would be overwhelming and require them to turn an infinity of pages throughout the performance, so it’s up to the conductor to share their vision for the piece, helping each player to understand how they fit into the whole.In high school, our conductor would introduce a new piece by playing a recording first. It gave everyone context about how their part should be played, and how it interrelated with all the other parts being played.With that context, we would each focus on our own part, but the result would be dozens of musicians working in concert to create one unified performance.Your people don’t need to carry every detail of every project to do great work. In fact, trying to carry every detail will make it less likely for them to do that great work.What they need is a clear understanding of the desired outcome, how the part they play will contribute to that outcome, and how their work will interact with the work of others.Give them clarity about how it all fits together and then free them to focus on their unique contribution.OPPORTUNITY FOR ACTION: Ask your people if they have clarity about how the work they are doing relates to the goals of your organization. Do they know what song you are playing and how to play their part?
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    15 m
  • Is it time for a pit stop?

    Is it time for a pit stop?
    Apr 18 2025
    NASCAR drivers – athletes with the stated purpose of beating all the other racers to the finish line – do the strangest thing during their races: they stop.Instead of pressing forward relentlessly, they take a moment to refuel and swap tires – a pit stop – so they can be most effective in the remaining laps.Driving on worn tires impedes their performance and can result in catastrophic accidents.Running out of gas forces them to slow to a crawl until they can pit.These 10-15 second pit stops aren’t exactly extended vacations, but they are symbolic of the importance of using strategic stops to help us run our race at the highest possible level.100% effort isn’t a sustainable expectation for yourself or for your people, and the cost of never stopping is often a reduction in practical effectiveness.I once worked with a very wise man at my printing company who, in spite of the fervor of my youth to RUNRUNRUN to meet every deadline, counseled me to slow down and ensure things were done correctly because reruns meant spending more time, a resource that was always at a premium.Slowing down a little to ensure accurate output actually yielded better results than constantly running at full tilt, which introduced more errors.As a leader it is so important that you take the occasional “pit stop” to refuel because, like it or not, your team is looking to you to set the standard.What YOU DO expresses what YOU VALUE. OPPORTUNITY FOR ACTION: Identify one way for you and your people to enjoy a brief pit stop this week. Host a 10-minute mixer with ice cream sandwiches, send a department-wide message reminding people to pause and drink some water, or organize a short field trip inviting people to abandon their desks for a few minutes to take a lap around your building. The options are limitless. Consider your people and plan something that will fit them best.
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    21 m
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