Come on people! It doesn’t work for parents, teachers, spouses… so why do we think that tough love is a viable approach to leadership?

Now I get this woman’s position: she is frustrated because her teams are under-performing. The rest of the organization is counting on them… they are highly visible, and the face of the organization. If I were in her shoes, I’d feel gutted too. And probably annoyed and a bit embarrassed.

So to get the best from her teams, she motivates them by telling them how much they suck. Surprisingly, there is no substantial shift in results from her team. Then what does she do? More tough love. And what does she get? More mediocre results. It’s a downward spiral into blame, judgement and de-motivation.

Einstein was on to something: “Insanity is doing the same thing, over and over again, but expecting different results”. This applies more than ever to leadership.

While her teams may be faltering… the common denominator in all of this is her leadership. To change a system, starts with changing self.

When I’ve worked with leaders like this before, a common worry I hear is that people don’t want to shift their style in a way that is inauthentic. But the truth around authenticity is that sometimes people are authentically as*holes – and then they wonder why team performance suffers. Authentic leadership, on the other hand, is about showing up as who you are AND being willing to work with the impact you’re having on those around you. Instead of saying “this is me, deal with it,” authentic leaders say “how can I play to my strengths and adapt my style to get the best from my people?”

Because really, results can’t happen without people. To get the most from your team, bring intention to your leadership this week. Try a few new things:

Be a Leader:

• Start by taking 100% accountability: if your team isn’t getting the results you want, choose accountability rather than blame. What do you need to shift in your leadership to get better results from your people?

• Facilitate success. Rather than de-motivate through tough love, try giving feedback and coaching. One of the biggest and most important roles a leader plays is helping their people succeed.

• Listen with curiosity and care. When results are faltering, find out why. Start first with asking questions and listening rather than directing and declaring. Facilitate conversations where learning happens.

While it is a bit of circumstance that is forcing me to take best advantage of my time in the sky, this ‘white space’ is useful (probably even more so) when I’m in the chaos of my life on the ground.

As a leader, it’s a art and a skill to be able to step above the day-to-day, to be able to both observe and assess what you see happening in your interactions, your team, your company and your career. In The Practice of Adaptive Leadership, Heifetz, Grashow and Linsky say: “To diagnose a system or yourself while in the midst of action requires the ability to achieve some distance from those ‘on-the-ground’ events.” This distance and perspective leads to informed action, rather than unconscious reaction.

And you don’t have to be in plane to put these leadership practices in place:

Balcony View: This in-moment perspective requires the ability to observe your interactions, the impact you’re having, and the quality of conversation. Leadership is an everyday practice, and not distinct from strategic business conversations. How you show up in the immediate is what makes up your leadership essence. To have the impact you want means being able to both observe and act simultaneously.

Make it a habit:

• At the end of every meeting, check in with yourself: did I show up the way I wanted to? What was my leadership impact? How do I know?
• Check in with the team: how would everyone rate the quality of the conversation? Did we defend and declare or pause and inquire? What worked and didn’t work with how we engaged with each other?

Strategic white space: Ever noticed how one minute your calendar is blissfully empty and the next it’s completely full of meetings, phone calls, operational deadlines? If you’re not intentional about giving yourself some white space – that time away from the day-to-day where you can have a longer-term perspective – your day-to-day time just fills up.

Make it a habit:

• Book time at least once a quarter to step away from your day-to-day to look more strategically at your leadership and your business. Ask yourself: Am I leading my team in a way that gets the best out of them? What challenges and opportunities do I see on the horizon? What’s it going to take from me and my team to overcome these challenges and seize the opportunities?
• Check in with your customers: What trends am I seeing in customer expectations? How can we best meet customer needs? How can we stay two-steps ahead of what our customers want?

Periods of complete disengagement:  Self-care is one of the most overlooked leadership advantages. When you are at your best, your team is too… And the reality is as much as you try to convince yourself otherwise, working endless hours, day-in and day-out is not conducive to your best self.

Make it a habit:

• Take vacations. Even though it can seem pointless – working crazy hours to get ready to leave, and crazy hours to catch up when you’re back – the complete disconnection from work is what allows you to come back with refreshed energy, perspective and mental focus.
• Turn your e-mail off every once in a while. Companies managed to survive (and even thrive!) before the days of the digital… a few hours of inaccessibility isn’t going to end the world.
• Spend time doing things you love… and if you looooove work, spend time doing OTHER things you love. Time with family, laughs with friends, adventures in the woods… do things that feed your soul. Then your soul has more to give.

As I start the slow decent into Vancouver, I’m thankful for this reflective time I’ve given myself. Come join me in this leadership mile-high club, take some time-out-of-time to reflect and think – and let me know if it makes a difference for you.

So often I see this problem-focused mentality with leaders too. With a mandate of: fix things… improve… do better… be better… do more… it’s no wonder many leaders look first for problems, rather than look for what’s working, or even what’s… awesome.

Shifting from problem-focused to awesome-focused is hard. Many of you were hired to fix things. And, absolutely keep fixing… I’m just suggesting that the fixin’ might get easier, and the road less bumpy, if you look also for the good.

This week, try these few things (at home or at work):

• Pause to celebrate the little things… This means slowing down enough to notice.
• Look for the awesome in your colleagues and employees… (or your spouse!)…. And tell them. Not just the “you’re awesome” comment… but really, truly telling them what they’ve done that makes them awesome, and the impact it’s had on you, the team and on results.
• Notice what makes you smile.

Emotions are contagious. Take this to heart.

When I need a little reminder to lighten my mindset, I’ll pick up Neil Pasricha’s The Book of Awesome and read a few pages. Pasricha, a self-proclaimed “regular guy,” started a website called 1000awesomethings.com as a way to escape the doldrums of everyday life.  It’s a reminder that there is joy in noticing the little awesome things.

e-musings awesome list for May 21 and 22:

• Waking up while the house is still quiet and sneaking in a productive hour of work. It’s not often that this happens (me waking up early, and a quiet house! I’ll take it!)
• The morning crib-chatter of my 17-month-old. This sound melts my heart. I have no idea what he’s saying, but it sure sounds important and interesting!
• Listening to my dog have puppy dreams. If you have a dog, you know this sound. I laugh every time I hear it… It just doesn’t get tired.
• Tiny glimpses of sunshine on an otherwise cloudy day. I’m in Vancouver. I’ll take what I can get!
• Cows lying down. Saw this the other day, and I couldn’t help but laugh. Cows need rest too.

What’s awesome in your life today?

Truth be known: he irks you because you let him… and it may be more about you than you think or choose to admit. When we are triggered by someone, or something, we get thrown into a response that can sometimes be out of proportion to the situation.  This amplification is a cue that it’s less about the other person and more about, well… you.

As a leader, when you are triggered, frustrated, annoyed, or irritated that energy is both observable and contagious. Your team performance suffers, as does your reputation. Boyatzis and McKee talk about this contagion of leadership in Resonant Leadership. On the flip side, when you are curious, confident, compassionate and accountable, so too is your team. What team would you rather lead?

This week I invite you to join in my experiment. When you get triggered by someone, stop and ask: “What’s my part in this.” Get serious and real with yourself. Try these tactics:

1. Change your lens. You see the world through your filters. Values, beliefs, family history, past experiences: these all shape your perception of people and situations. You can’t change another, you can only change yourself, so try on a new pair of glasses to see the world through.
2. Own your part. If someone gets under your skin, look in the mirror. You might just be casting your shadow where it doesn’t belong.
3. Get curious. What’s going on for the other person? Would your response be different if you came at it from a learner mindset?

e-musings confession: I’ll tell you what gets my irk on… ego. Pure. Arrogant. Ignorant. Better-than. Ego… That grandiose sense-of-self is in direct conflict with my value around learning. And if I get really, deep-down honest with myself I’m triggered because I, too, can be egotistical. I inadvertently make other people feel small when I show up with blinders on. So, to make life easier (on me!) I prefer casting that shadow onto someone else rather than own it myself. Please tell me I’m not alone!

We get triggered all the time. It’s how we respond to those triggers that determines our character. Notice, reflect and then choose your response. I know it’s something I’ll be working on… forever.

Sometimes financial need dictates our direction. Other times convenience stands in our way. And more often than not… even when we choose to plead ignorance… we get in our own way of really, truly declaring and going after our dreams.

It takes courage to take a stand for what you want, and sometimes it’s just easier to ride the current rather than dig in and paddle. I know. I’ve been there, and will probably be there again… and again.

So rather than fall prey to circumstantial drift, how about giving yourself some good anchoring? Sit back, take a time-out-of-time and reflect on these questions:

• What gets you excited in life and in work?
• What untapped potential have you been shying away from?
• As a leader, what do you want people to be saying about your character 5 years from now, 10 years from now?
• What’s keeping you where you are?
• What risks are you willing to take to get what you want and be even happier than you are now?
• What first step are you willing to take tomorrow to move you closer to your dreams?

A vision is an anchor point. A place from which directed action occurs. It’s an internal compass – helping to guide decisions and ideas. It gives purpose and meaning to our work and leadership.

My litmus test for a vision (personal or corporate) is whether or not you can answer positively to these three questions (The 3 Cs):

• Is it clear? Can you say, without a doubt, where you’re heading?
• Is it concise? Can you remember it? Does it make sense?
• Is it compelling? Does it guide your decisions and actions? Does it “grab” you and inspire you?

While these questions may seem a tad fluff, I can tell you that the clearer you are in the difference you want to make the more likely you are to make it. And from a leadership perspective, when you lead with intention, courage and clarity, people are more likely to want to be around you.

Bring some discipline of thought and passion to your own leadership. I dare you to lead with purpose… You may be surprised at what you come up with.

My stress was high and my resilience was low. Let me tell you, it was not a winning combo.  Despite my type-A, success-at-all-cost mentality, my body shut down. Stress was oozing from any available outlet. Meanwhile, my b*tch-of-an-inner-critic was saying: “get it together,” “you’re stronger than this,” “successful people don’t break down!” (Doesn’t she just say all the right things?)

With so many changes (real and potential) going on, my mental and emotional capacity was tapped out. I was at my max. And, what I’ve realized is that I’m not alone. Stress isn’t something we casually talk about… especially as a leader. It has a stigma, and can be seen as a sign of weakness or vulnerability. Though I can tell you, I’m stronger now for having lived through and experienced that low point.

The truth is, stress is real and it’s everywhere – at work, at home, between work and home… With our current world, some say we might even have a stress epidemic on our hands: leaving people with an out-of-control feeling more often than not. But what we do have influence and control over is growing our capacity and resilience to deal with it.

Physiologically, we are wired to respond to threats with our automatic stress reaction of “fight, flight or freeze” – a response that is very useful in predator-prey situation, not so useful in a corporate office.

In Full Catastrophe Living, Jon Kabat-Zinn, a world-renowned expert and teacher on mindfulness-based stress reduction, says that rather than falling victim to our stress reaction, we can develop adaptive strategies for coping: “you do not have to go the route of fight-or-flight reaction nor the route of helplessness every time you are stressed. You can actually choose not to.” Simply by bringing in mindfulness, or moment-to-moment awareness to what happens to us when we are stressed we reduce the strong-hold that our stress reaction can have on us.

When we’re in the grip of stress, we’re not at our best. And as a leader, when you’re not at your best, your team can suffer.

So what can you do? Start with simply noticing.

• What is it that triggers a stress reaction in you?
• What is your “typical” full-out stress reaction?
• Can you pay attention to the subtle cues that are the start of the downward spiral of stress?
• What can you do to re-calibrate and re-energize?

When I get that antsy, anxious flutter in my tummy, I know it’s time to hit the woods on my bike and get grounded. It fills up my tank emotionally, physically and mentally, and gives me the re-fresh I need to face the challenges that are part of life and leadership.

What are your stories around stress? What’s your re-fresh routine? Do you have one?

In Fearless Leadership, Loretta Malandro says “most successful leaders are unaware of two things: (1) the impact of their blind spots on others and (2) the degree to which others work around them and avoid confronting the real issues.” Organizational potential gets strangled because of these blind spots.

And though the interpersonal outcomes of a leader’s blind spot can be weighty, the thing to remember is these behaviors are usually sub-conscious, resulting in unintended impacts. Where leaders do get into trouble is in:

• Not getting curious about their blind spots
• Ignoring them altogether
• Thinking they are immune, and have none
• Immediately dismissing feedback that highlights a potential blind spot.

Let’s get real… a blind spot isn’t a blind spot anymore if you know about it already but choose to ignore it… That’s just leadership carelessness. Even if the feedback shocks you beyond belief, take it as a cue to pause, take a deep breath, and look for the part that is true – even if it’s only 2%. The choice is yours. Once uncovered, a blind spot is information that can help you up your game – you can wallow in self-pity, or look for the opportunity (easier said than done, I know!). Just know you’re not alone. We all have them. And, if you think you don’t have any… think again. There’s your blind spot.

Some common leadership blind spots or pitfalls that I’ve come across (caveat: more often than not, these are not conscious, intended behaviors, but rather unconscious, unproductive habits):

• Needing to be right: When you need to be right, someone needs to be wrong. This winner-loser mindset really is a no-win game.
• Thinking you have all the answers: Being the go-to answer-guy is seductive, but the unintended impact of this blind spot is stifling others growth.
• Quick to say No: Saying “No Way” or bringing a negative mindset to everything instead of exploring possibilities is a sure fire way of getting people to work around you. Let’s face it; no one likes a constant Debbie-Downer.
• Not really listening: While you might be in the same room as someone, your mind wanders to other places or you re-direct the conversation back your way (a move I call the “Back To Me” (BTM)). The unintended impact? Others feel insignificant. (Read Mobilize Strategies great post on Listening).
• Having an inflated sense of self: Leading from a place of ego leaves little to no room for learning. The impacts of this grandiose sense of self are that people may shut down and stop collaborating with you. Ego can break a team.
• Being unaware of your impact: The mother-of-all blind spots, you’re either too “busy” to notice, unable to read others, or just don’t care how you’re impacting your colleagues. This blind spot leaves others thinking you’re cavalier and insensitive. Don’t be surprised if people start avoiding you.

If any of these strike a nerve or get you thinking… it may be time to explore what blind spots might be getting in your way.

e-musings leadership tips on uncovering blind spots:

• Seek feedback often – the good, the bad and the ugly
• When you learn about a blind spot, slow down, get curious and find the grain (or boulder!) of truth in it
• If you notice a potential blind spot in a colleague, help to enable their success by:
  • Asking if they are open to hearing some feedback
  • Being as specific as you can – what behavior do you notice and what is the impact (on the team, on results, etc…)
  • Getting curious and helping them process the information

Any comments or stories to share? Have you ever been blinded by a blind spot? How did you work through it?

Now let’s be honest. Leaders often get to where they’re at because of a ruthless drive they have inside of them… a striving for excellence and success. And yet sometimes (okay, often!) this race to the top is often done with the elbows out and blinders on. The danger comes when leaders think that they’ve reached the top of their game because of this spirited, success-at-all-cost mentality, rather than realizing that success has likely come in spite of it.

In Marshall Goldsmith’s book “What Got You Here Won’t Get You There,” he states that the higher a leader gets in the organization, the more their problems are behavioral. In other words, the distinguishing factor of leaders at the top is that they bring awareness to their own behavioral liabilities, AND they make a commitment to getting better. Goldsmith says, “as we advance in our careers, behavioral changes are often the only significant changes we can make.” So, all other things being equal, the lesser leader is unwilling to address their own inter- and intra-personal challenges, often with a mindset that they’ve already arrived at their leadership destination.

I’m not saying to diminish or erase that deep internal drive that many leaders have – in fact, I find that quality of leadership admirable and powerful. I am saying that to have more of an impact, to be more of a leader, we need to have greater awareness about the impact we’re having – not only on results but also on the people around us. Results happen through people.

I once told a client that it’s a bit like the difference between racing a drag race and being in a Formula 1 race. In a drag race, you have a straight stretch of road, the focal point of a finish line being right in front of you. It’s foot down and haul ass to the finish. In Formula 1 racing, you are on a twisting and turning track with a bunch of other cars. Sometimes you need the gas; sometimes you need to strategically brake. You are always attuned to where the other drivers are around you, and you rely on your pit crew to keep you and your car at the top of your game. (**Disclaimer: not being a car racer myself, this is my own, perhaps naïve, interpretation! Forgive me Michael Schumacher.)

So to up your skills as a leader, take the blinders off. It might be bright and overwhelming at first, but with the right mindset it can be full of learning and reward.

Here are some things to try this week:

• Ask for feedback from a peer, a direct report, and a boss. Don’t settle for generalities – ask for details and specifics… stay curious.
• Set your own leadership goals. What is the impact you want to have in your time as a leader? What’s your aspiration?
• Have your antenna up. Look for evidence (even subtle signals) that you are having the impact you want. Adjust and make change if not.
• Find a thinking partner – a coach, an impartial friend… someone who can hold the mirror up for you and tell you the truth about your impact — good, bad and ugly.

Next week, we’ll dive into the common behavioral pitfalls that trap leaders. In the meantime – let’s hear from you: what’s the biggest behavioral change you’ve made as a leader, and what impact did it have?

We hear it all the time: the best learning comes from mistakes. And when we fail to learn from mistakes, failure sets in. But trying to glean that learning is a bit like trying to find a marble in a field of grass that hasn’t been mowed in a month… when you’re IN it, it sucks.

Last week I made a mistake, an interpersonal mess actually, and I am reminded of how critical that moment is: once the realization hits that you could have and should have done something differently. This moment-in-time is the proverbial fork in the road. It’s the choice point between truly embracing a learner mindset or going straight downhill towards the sh*t-pit.

And let me tell you, the sh*t-pit is no fun. It’s filled with self-doubt, blame and shame – all mindsets that actually inhibit learning… so if we really want to glean the learning, it starts with giving yourself some grace… to be vulnerable and courageous enough to admit it, digest it and learn from it.

And what does this mean for leadership?

As a leader you have the ability to shape that learning moment for your employees. It’s also a choice point for you. Will you jump to blame or judgment, or will you pause and inquire to help facilitate the learning? (And, by the way, “Why did you do that?” isn’t true inquiry… it’s judgment disguised as a question!).

A miss I commonly see with leaders is not giving the time required to debrief mistakes… thinking that asking “what would you do differently next time?” is enough. To truly deepen the learning, and build competence and resilience, takes asking some powerful questions. These are questions that serve to deepen awareness and advance learning, questions like:

• What is it like for you to have made this mistake?
• What are the impacts – good and bad of having made this mistake?
• Tell me about the learning you’re doing as a result of this mistake.
• Where else might this learning relevant for you?

Mistakes can be a breeding ground for learning. It starts with getting curious and asking the right questions.

Where have you learned from mistakes? Any stories to share?

e-musings resource suggestion:

• Change Your Questions, Change Your Life by Marilee Adams. This book highlights the power of bringing curiosity into relationships – with others and with yourself. Marilee’s method, called QuestionsThinking is a way to ask the right questions, leading to better results and better relationships.

Then it’s time to pause and look at how you’re operating. Even though we resent it, there is something seductive and seemingly powerful about being the glue that holds the team together.

But the reality is, this hub and spoke model of leadership is getting old. And yet I still see many leaders operating this way – spending the bulk of their time in one-on-ones, trying to get the best from the individuals on their team, yet not realizing that this approach comes with downfalls when it comes to team performance.

With each person being lead individually, the focus on collective team effectiveness and accountability wanes. Not only does this model contribute to exhaustion on behalf of the leader, it also contributes to an erosion of trust between and among team members. Though you may be leading high performers, you likely aren’t leading a high performance team.

Katzenbach and Smith, in The Wisdom of Teams, talk about the individual vs. team focus: “Deeply engrained biases towards individual accountability and achievement reinforce the executive behavior patterns that run counter to team requirements. Teams at the top, like teams elsewhere, must develop a sense of mutual trust and interdependence.”

In extreme cases, that lack of mutual trust and interdependence can be devastating. Individual executives are reluctant to rely on anyone other than themselves for results. A subtle drive for individual high performance, often supported by one-on-one leadership from “the boss,” can turn to full-blown competition and cutthroat behavior amongst colleagues. Competition without a solid foundation of trust easily breeds contempt and can break a team. Not to mention the example that being set for the rest of the organization…

The good news is a new model has been emerging where the leader is less at the center, but moves freely to where he or she is needed, with the leadership focus shifting from the individual to the individual as team-member. Roll away hub and spoke… Enter “The Web” — a delicate weaving of relationships, results and shared accountability.

This leader is nimble in his approach – going where he is needed most: coaching, setting strategy, facilitating healthy debate, encouraging team dialogue, front-and-center with the customer. You get the picture.  While also seemingly pulled in multiple directions, this leader is intentional in where he spends his time — he knows when and where to get involved, in best service of the organization and the people. He develops the individuals and cultivates the team.

The other day I was talking to the head of an organization about Hub and Spoke vs. Web Leadership… He paused for a moment and offered this nugget of arachnid goodness: “the spider moves where the spider needs to go.” I couldn’t have said it better myself!

e-musings leadership tips:

• Lead individuals AND the team. Focus on the inter-dependencies and relationships between and among team members.
• Get out of the way. Enable your team to achieve success. Coach when needed, give feedback often, celebrate milestones and facilitate learning from mistakes.
• Hold your team capable of solving problems, jump in only when absolutely necessary (this builds trust, increases capacity for problem solving, and gives you more brain space for strategic thought)
• Be nimble. Lead others the way they need to be lead. Flex your style to get the most from your people, but be consistent in your expectations of the team.
• Hold the team accountable for shared success.
• Remember, it’s not what you expect, but what you inspect that counts. Set team incentives as well as individual incentives.

What tips do you have for cultivating team performance?