Leadership – Market Me Too

December 19, 2022

Leader’s communication style, responsiveness level and success attainment. Are they linked?

When someone is in a leadership role, there is plenty of scrutiny on everything they do. They are also subjected to having most aspects of what they are involved with measured. Either overtly, or from a judgement and opinion level. This is something that new or even experienced leaders will either find to be helpful in evaluating their performance, or similar to a heavy weight they must learn to tolerate carrying while performing at a peak level.

One of the most glaring mistakes I see new leaders make is assuming they have to know everything about their role. In other words, that if they ask others for advice, it might disclose they don’t know everything. This seems absurd when you think about it from this perspective. Why? Because it would be unrealistic for anyone, let alone a leader to know everything related to their role. Even experienced leaders will not have mastered everything about their role, and they don’t need to. However, they will need to be humble enough to admit this. Doing so early on in their leadership role will serve them well.

Maybe it’s me, but I find it extraordinarily frustrating when I interact with leaders who truly need support yet will initially keep you or others at an arm’s length and not allow you to help them. Of course, they need the help, they know they do, but they seem to be unable to allow their guard to come down enough to gain value from others experience and advice. Some of this is attributed to their pride or perhaps their ego, and neither will serve a leader well from a long-term success perspective.

Considering how pride and ego can have a detrimental impact on a leader who refuses to realize this, leads me to think about what are the contributing factors to this scenario? Let’s start with how comfortable a leader is with communication. If they do not find this to be one of their strong suits, have they, or will they seek support to improve this ability? Communication comes in a variety of forms, so tackling one at a time is more reasonable. A leader also might find that they can master one type of communication more easily, and doing this will help them to gain traction in the other areas they can then begin to work on becoming better at too.

If a leader is struggling with their ability to communicate well with others, I have seen a pattern of this also impacting their responsiveness levels. For context, I’m referring to how much of a sense of urgency a leader has with handling and responding to via their ideal communication style. When a leader is not yet comfortable with communicating with others they lead or need to engage with a sense of urgency, their responsiveness level generally isn’t as strong or as quick as it could or should be. Given the fact that there are many leadership situations which require a rapid response, if a leader isn’t capable of responding at the required response rate, this will then critically impact the desired success outcome of the scenario they are involved with.

Responsiveness levels for leaders can vary, but one of the negative contributing factors is whether they have even a slight tendency to procrastinate. Perhaps this is because they either feel like they need to take extra time to think things through thoroughly, or that they don’t or haven’t learned how to respond to the urgency and pressure, and then resort to stalling their actions. This responsive style will not serve a leader well, but only they can decide to alter and commit to not falling prey to this potentially career limiting reality.

Let’s assume you are a leader or sports coach who might recognize the need to improve your communication, responsiveness and ultimately your success level. Here are some suggestions for you to consider how to move in the direction of doing so.

What would you say is your strongest area of communication (e.g., verbal, written, listening, non-verbal, visual)?
Have you proactively invested in making your top communication area stronger?
Are you willing to invest in yourself to enhance your leadership communication ability?
What is your timeframe to improve your communication ability, and can you see how doing so will have a positive impact?
How would you rate your responsiveness level from a communication perspective? For example, do you routinely get right back to people who are looking for a response, generally delay your response, or perhaps ignore and not respond at all to some people? Perhaps some variation of these? Hint. The most successful leaders and sports coaches are highly responsive, even if it involves the most trivial topic. In this case, they may delegate someone else to respond for them, and that is perfectly acceptable.
If you lean towards not being as responsive as you know you could be, ask yourself what is contributing to this behavior and causing your responsive level to be lower than it should be? Stubbornness, lack of having a sense of urgency, self-sabotaging or being complacent are some potential reasons why.
Be honest. Is your success level where it should or could be? Write down what may be contributing to your current success level, and make sure that the majority of items on your list are what you can do to impact this. It’s tempting to point finger at others, but ultimately you are responsible for the success you and your team will experience.
Ask yourself why you want to ultimately improve your leadership success level. You might be surprised at your responses, and they will also provide you with additional insight into areas you can focus more attention on to improve your situation.

Based on my experience, I will say that a leaders communication ability and responsiveness level is directly linked to the success they and their team’s will have. If either of these two areas are not at an optimal operating level, or considered as contributing success factors, I would recommend they are evaluated and adjusted accordingly.

TAGS: #Leadership #Leader #Sportscoach #Team #Teams #Success #Productivity #Communication #Responsiveness #Business #Teamdynamics #Successtips #Management #Personaldevelopment #Professionaldevelopment #Strategy

September 6, 2022September 7, 2022

The benefits of losing.

If I have said this once, I have said it hundreds of times. No sports team ever shows up on game day and says, “let’s lose today”. This same sentiment can apply to work scenarios too, albeit there are some additional layers of complications that doesn’t make this statement as simple or straightforward. However, it is applicable. Although in work scenarios, this statement may not be applied one hundred percent of the time, much to the chagrin of those leading the employees.

The comparison between sports teams and work teams is something I truly enjoy doing. Yes, this is partially due to working with both team types, but also because there is so much to learn from both of them. Now toss in the cross-pollination from the learnings, and that’s where everything begins to start to become more interesting.

I chose the word interesting, because I am always pleasantly surprised by how similar sports and work teams are to one another. The obvious common denominator is that people are at the core of both scenarios, and both are led by typically a few leaders. Although where the people comparison differs, is in the age decade that the sports teams are in, compared to work teams. The sports teams age decade is more homogenous and typically all female or male teams, versus the work teams being far more diverse in both categories.

Another interesting comparative difference between the two types of teams is that there are more opportunities for less experienced leaders of sports teams. An exception to this would be that some work teams in the start-up phase, or smaller, family-owned businesses might have less experienced leaders. Are the less experienced leaders at a disadvantage then the more experienced leaders in both categories. Yes, and no. Yes, if they seek counsel from more seasoned leaders, and no, if the less experienced leaders are willing to admit they will likely require more support than they might realize.

Although work and sports teams have different metrics to determine their performance, the sports teams have a more straightforward method of determining their outcome results. Work teams also are generally working on quarterly based results, while sports teams may not all be playing in all four quarters of the year. This also has both advantages and disadvantages. An advantage is that the sports teams comparatively are operating on more of a “sprint” style, versus the work teams who are running marathons. Preparing for both styles is far different, and also comes with a separate mindset approach. One isn’t better or more favorable than the other, they are just different.

Having experienced for most of my career what it is like to be focused on quarterly results, I learned how to pace myself and ramp quickly for results at the beginning of a quarter. Typically, my team would then have to shift into maintaining and then potentially have to figure out a strategy to surge on the performance results in collaboration with the sales teams towards the end of the quarter. Admittedly, there were times that the frantic feeling of having to collaborate extraordinarily well with the sales team was something I enjoyed doing. Although it could also be exhausting and highly stressed induced.

Comparatively, sports teams are in this situation on a game-by-game basis, so their cycle to focus on what it will take to win is different, but also similar. The similarity is that like the work teams, they are extraordinarily dependent on one another to perform at their peak level in every game. We have all seen plenty of examples of some of our favorite college or professional athletes who exhibit being able to perform at a peak level consistently, but this doesn’t apply to everyone on the team. So, can one or two peak performers on both work and sports teams make a difference? Yes, I think they can, but this is where the concept of taking a look at the benefits of losing comes into focus.

As I stated earlier, no one shows up on game day and says, “let’s lose today.” The athletes may think their chance of winning is limited, but most of them are going to put all their energy into having the game outcome be favorable. Ideally with a win, but a tie in some cases will also give them points towards their final season performance numbers. Granted although we can agree that winning can be more desirable, teams can in fact equally benefit from losing. Here are some benefits to a team losing.

When a team loses, more emphasis is put into evaluating where were the trouble spots that prevented them from winning, versus a winning team focusing less on this.
Losing isn’t satisfying to anyone except the winning team and its fans. However, it can help the losing team to look for opportunities related to how they can work differently and more effectively together.
Experiencing adversity can be a great motivator towards change, and if the change is oriented towards being constructive, it can help a team to fuel its team dynamics in a positive way.
No matter how stubborn a leader is, eventually if they are consistently experiencing defeat, they will inevitably seek support from others to help them. Or, help will be given to them. Although this doesn’t always mean they will accept the help if the leader is reluctantly having to accept it. Even if it is in their best interest for them and their team.
Upon repeated defeats, some leaders will eventually figure out whether they are unselfish enough to admit they don’t have all the answers. This doesn’t always mean they will seek more experienced counsel, but it does offer a glimmer of hope they will admit their leadership approach isn’t working.
Although there are teams who have long stretches of losses, at some point, circumstances will change that will have others making decisions for the leader who they have lost confidence in. This doesn’t always happen at a desirable pace for most fans, the athletes, or the support staff of the team, but it will invariably get to this point.
The feeling and memory of losing can remain with you longer than the amazing feeling achieved by winning. How a leader and their team handle both aspects can be what separates them from heading towards the path of turning their performance results around, or continuing on the same path. Knowing how to achieve this is critical, with emphasis placed on the word “how”.

Even if you are not a competitive person, most people will agree that winning is far more fun than losing. Although, understanding and appreciating the benefits of losing can be far greater in terms of applying it successfully to other areas of one’s life.

TAGS: #Leaders #Teams #Motivation #Leadership #Business #Winning #Sportsteams #Sportsleaders #Teamdynamics #Collaboration #Learning #Personaldevelopment #Professionaldevelopment

August 15, 2022

Stubborn? It’s not a good look.

I’ve always been an optimist. So, when I hear someone expressing that something isn’t possible, my mind immediately begins to diverge into two directions. The first one is to think about why this was stated, and the second path has me considering whether all of the options have been explored to create an opportunity to make something possible.

My skepticism about whether all potential options have been investigated and applied may come from my family heritage of having an “inventors-like” mind. Or, possibly because of my innate curiosity about imagining why a solution has not been developed to attempt what others think can’t be achieved. Which, leads me to wondering if stubbornness could in fact be one of the reasons?

Fortunately, most people are not classified as being stubborn, but we all know someone who might have this adjective associated with them on a regular basis. Possibly without them being aware that others clearly see them being this way more often than not. The person who is unaware of themselves being stubborn might actually think they are just like everyone else. What they don’t realize is that being stubborn generally isn’t working in their favor.

An example of someone who is being stubborn could be that they are unwilling to consider, take or apply practical advice which could be highly adventitious to them. It can be highly frustrating in this scenario, especially when not taking the advice can have less than desirable consequences. However, we also need to factor in that some people learn via experiences, and failing to take advice and the outcome from this could actually result in a positive outcome for them. How? Because afterwards they could appreciate the value of considering to listen to, and ideally applying sound advice the next time a similar scenario arises.

Perhaps you have heard the expression “you can lead a horse to water when they are thirsty, but you can’t make it drink it.” This expression is ideally aligned with people who are stubborn, because they often do the exact opposite of what they should be doing, primarily due to their stubbornness. I personally have encountered a number of people who would be far happier, have an easier outcome in numerous scenarios, and much less stress if they would first recognize that their on-going stubbornness is one of the core reasons for many of their challenges and why they are often highly frustrated.

Telling someone they are stubborn seldomly has any positive impact on someone changing from this disposition. It might make you feel better expressing this sentiment to them, but that’s not going to lead either of you anywhere you will want to end up. So, are there techniques that can be applied to help someone who is stubborn? Especially someone who is unaware of how they are presenting and interacting with others? Yes, there are, and below are some suggestions to ask them, or have them potentially consider.

· What is your definition of being stubborn?

· Ask yourself why you are often considered by others to be stubborn?

· Is being stubborn an easy excuse of your “why” you are not doing or achieving something you could be?

· Have you thought about how being stubborn is impacting your relationships with others?

· Could you potentially be unaware of the fact others consider you to be stubborn, and think you are acting differently than how you are being perceived?

· Why wouldn’t you accept help, advice or guidance from someone more experienced or knowledgeable than you are that could positively impact you both personally, professionally or both?

· Do you have an example of someone who others consider to be stubborn, and can’t see how you could be compared to them?

· Providing you acknowledge you are stubborn; can you imagine the benefits of being less or not perceived as being a stubborn person? This applies to both your personal and professional life, as you might not be as stubborn, or stubborn in one of these scenarios.

If redirecting energy from a trait such as stubbornness into more productive outcomes is possible, are you, or someone else you know ready to re-develop your person to experience the benefits of doing so? Or, will your stubbornness prevent you from being more happy, less frustrated and experiencing a higher quality overall mental health and well-being?

TAGS: #Leadership #Business #Success #Professionaldevelopment #Sports #Teams #Leaders #Sportscoaches #Coaches #Traits #Stubborn #Stubbornness #Overcomingstubborness #Solutions #Awareness #Selfawareness #Benefitsofbeinglessstubborn

June 21, 2022June 21, 2022

People who support you versus people who take your words for themselves.

This topic is highly personal to me. As a matter of fact and context, I also wasn’t going to write about it. However, I was highly encouraged to do so based on a recent action taken by a person who either knowingly, but I hope innocently, took credit for developing content that wasn’t theirs. It was mine.

There is a saying that imitation is the highest form of flattery. Although when the imitation is blatantly occurring, there is generally an opportunity to acknowledge and reference the source. Either verbally or in writing. Doing this can make a world of difference. However, it doesn’t always address the core of this matter, which is how too often people are disrespectful of other people’s creations, and claiming the work as their own.

Given the fact I am someone who communicates professionally, I am sensitive and aware of making sure my communications are clear, and my own. This wasn’t something I had to learn in a Journalism course. To me, it is a fundamental principle of doing the right thing. That is, giving credit to others, where credit or acknowledgement is due. Simple enough right? Apparently not. So now what?

Bringing this topic to light is one way to address it, and there are a number of other ways to do so. I’ll share some options of how to pursue this with you. For now, let’s remain on the thread of why someone might not give or recognize another person they should credit for their words, or work.

One of the reasons a person might not give another person due credit for their creations could be because they are unaware of the fact they are doing so. The word plagiarize comes to mind in this case. If you are reading this story now, I am going to hope this was a concept that was shared with you when you were beginning to write in school. Citing or referencing other people’s work is easy enough to do, and is always the right thing to do.

Another reason people may not give credit to others is because they don’t think they need to. Or, that if they make some small adjustments to what they are claiming to be theirs, makes it entirely different. Thank goodness I’m not a patent lawyer, as I know I wouldn’t have the patience and stamina it must take to attempt to cover all of the bases to prevent someone’s idea from being copied. However, in reality, we see this happening all of the time, as there appears to be either unspoken or undocumented loopholes which are leveraged to essentially mimic another person or company’s creation.

Other people who don’t give credit to others for their creations, and who are knowingly doing so, are compromising their values. Either knowingly or not, the outcome isn’t an enviable way of operating, and is devoid of any leadership qualities. True leaders and ethical people give credit to others. No exceptions, and no grey areas. Yes, this may sound harsh, but the reality is that there is plenty of opportunities for people not to imitate or claim the work of others as their own. More importantly to consider, is the opportunity for everyone to work slightly harder to be creative, and to come up with their own version of expressing or doing something unique.

Praising and acknowledging others work and their accomplishments should be a common practice, and the finest leaders and sports coaches do this on a regular basis. In fact, they often go out of their way to make sure that others are recognized for their work, even rewarded for it when it is appropriate.

Let’s circle back to having people in your life, at work, or on your team that support you. Can you easily cite who they are? Think about them for a moment, and the impact they have had on you. For the sake of conversation, let’s focus on the people who have supported you in a positive way. What would your life or work, or team scenario be like if they weren’t in it before, or on a regular basis? Have you had an opportunity to acknowledge them for supporting you? If not, consider doing so soon.

Now, let’s consider some of the ways you or someone you know can increase and perhaps master the art of giving credit or acknowledgement to others on a regular basis. Here are some tips to help you to get started.

Start each day with looking for a way to genuinely pass along a compliment to someone. Either verbally, or even better, in writing, as this will have a longer lasting impact.
After hearing another person present information to you, let them know why you either liked, or have concerns about what was stated. You don’t always have to agree with someone to give them credit and support for their work.
If you realize you have unintentionally leveraged someone else’s idea, words or concept, course correct and let them know you have done so. Yes, it might be uncomfortable doing so, but wouldn’t you rather “tear off the bandage” now, versus having the person learn about you not crediting them at some point?
When you are in creation mode of any type, think twice about whether what you are producing could be construed as a blatant “rip-off” of someone else’s work.
Think about who you are supportive of. Now think about the ways you are supportive of them, and whether you could in fact be even more supportive with a few minor adjustments? What impact will this have if you do this?
Being aware of either your own, or someone else’s tendencies to either be or not be supportive is an awareness level that you want to strive towards. Consider the approaches you can factor in, and how you will increase your awareness on many levels.

The person who I discovered that is leveraging my work may or may not be aware of what they are doing. However, they will be hearing from me, or perhaps others who represent me to make them aware of the fact I am not a fan of what they are doing. Will this change their behavior? I can’t say whether it will, but I do hope they will learn a lesson, and perhaps gain an appreciation for acknowledging other people’s work, and not claiming it as their own.

TAGS: #Leadership #Plagiarizing #Business #Motivation #Personaldevelopment #Sportcoach #Team #Teams #Awareness #Selfawareness

February 14, 2022June 15, 2022

Intimate teams and camaraderie. Which comes first?

Intimacy. It’s one of those words when you hear it expressed in professional settings and related to the development of business and sports teams which can conjure up associations which make people feel uncomfortable. However, it should elicit the exact opposite response.

So, why are most people uncomfortable with the concept of discussing team intimacy? One of the reasons is because our society tends not to have much experience with talking about concepts that fall into the emotion category. Especially in work and sports environments. It is also frowned upon to talk about subjects which may fall into the personal category, or are on the edge of it.

Another reason people are uncomfortable, especially managers and coaches, is that emotional development, which team intimacy falls into the category of, is not something taught in academic environments. As a result, we independently learn when we are growing up about how to apply emotions, and the appropriate ones to our social interactions. As you already know, there is a wide spectrum of people’s abilities in this area. Unfortunately, the majority of people are not at the level they may need to be.

Why are people not at the levels of where they should be in the areas of emotional intelligence and common sense? Simply put, these attributes are not equally distributed, and neither of them are academically taught. Now, toss in having to navigate and apply emotional management either as an individual team member or manager or coach, and that’s when most teams start to have challenges. Now what, and how is this remedied?

The first thing to consider is to think about why does this happen? It namely occurs because the managers and coaches are not taught how to positively leverage emotions of their team members. However, if they were, the outcomes of their team’s performance would be entirely different, and much more in their favor.

Let’s look at team intimacy from a different perspective. Whether you played on a sports team, or have been on a work team, think about which one of these were the best teams you have ever been on? What were the characteristics which made the team outstanding? If I had to pick one word to represent what is the essence of an outstanding performance team I had been on, it would be camaraderie.

Camaraderie isn’t something which is developed overnight. It takes time, and knowing how to develop it. Unfortunately, very few managers or coaches achieve the level of knowing how to do so. However, there are ones in the sports world that are shining examples of knowing how to develop teams that have incredible camaraderie and intimacy. Alabama football Coach Nick Saban is one example. Scores of content have been written about his ability to develop intimate teams. In the business world, Richard Branson is famous for developing intimate teams via the long list of Virgin brands he has crafted.

What separates Coach Saban and Sir Branson from others? Simply put, they have figured out the formula it takes to produce team camaraderie from leveraging the concept of team intimacy. They are also not afraid of harnessing human emotions to create powerful, high caliber producing teams, and so have I.

Here are some questions you can ask yourself to determine whether you have what it takes to create the type of team camaraderie which others admire, and wish they knew the formula for:

Do you have emotional based techniques which repeatedly produce high performance results for your team?
On a scale of 1-10, ten being the highest rating, how comfortable are you with having emotional conversations with each of your team members?
How would you rate your awareness of what truly motivates each team member on a scale of 1-5, with five being exceptional?
What was the last conversation you had with one of your team members which caused a conversational breakthrough, and which resulted in that member producing results you have not seen before?
Do you know how to influence the camaraderie of your team?
What methods of influencing the camaraderie of your team result in sustainable and increased performance metrics?
Would you classify your mindset as being self-growth or self-interest?
What was the last thing you did to develop team intimacy?
What are the systems, structure or processes you have in place to develop sustainable team camaraderie and intimacy?

The questions above are not easy to answer, and chances are you will want to reflect on the outcomes of your responses for a short period of time. If you are not satisfied with your answers, and the results your team is getting, perhaps it’s time to begin considering the importance of leveraging team camaraderie and intimacy in a way you never considered doing. Although there are few guarantees in life, in this case, I guarantee those who have, are the ones who are routinely outperforming your team.

The good news for you? You get to decide which type of team you want to have. I’m guessing I know which type you would prefer to be managing, coaching or be on.

TAGS: #Business #Leadership #Teambonding #Tipsonhowtobondateam #Sportsteam #Sportscoach #Motivation #Success #Nicksaben #Coachnicksaben #Richardbranson