Last week I attended a 4-day leadership training session at Ole Miss. At the end of the training, we were asked to talk about a take-away; something we got out of the four full days we had spent together. For me it was the opening 15-minute ice breaker where we interacted with almost all 30+ participants. I didn’t know many of the leaders in the room, so the ice breaker was an opportunity for me to...
I had to be around 5 or 6 years old, my job, each Saturday was to dust the furniture and empty the trash. I really hated dusting, but at the trash detail I was good. I could see it, grab it, and remove it. Not so much with the dust. At such an early age, I rarely, if ever, noticed dust on the furniture. So, for the longest time, what I remembered most from those chores was...
I rarely use the word freedom in the workplace. It is a 4th of July word. It works well when I talk about our founding fathers, not so much in the workplace. If you have a weak team player, freedom may mean they will goof off, not work or, worse yet, hide. I have a friend who often jokes about weak team players in this way: “Why aren’t you working?” “Because I didn’t see you coming.” But autonomy (a.k.a....
“Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt.” ~ Abraham Lincoln Have you ever had to teach one of your up-and-coming leaders to be quiet instead of talking all the time? Over the years, I have experienced leaders who are amazing chatterers. I have often set up a meeting to visit them with my 2-3 meeting items to cover. Much chattering happened, but I left the meetings with my...
Buy-In: To Own it When teams distrust their leader and can’t get on board with the instructions they give, people feel that it’s time to get another leader. When the leader talks too much and promises this-and-that and doesn’t deliver, it’s very hard to get buy-in. Why? John C. Maxwell writes, “Every message that people receive is filtered through the messenger who delivers it. If you consider the messenger to be credible, then you believe the message has...
“The trouble with talking too fast is you may say something you haven’t thought of yet.” ~ Ann Landers Communication…it’s vital for all organizations. And like most things, communication is a process. It starts with the sender who chooses to send a message. Words are chosen and we speak it, write it, or model it. The receiver then has to process the words to understand. Then, if we are lucky, the receiver responds/feeds back to the sender that...
“A weak leader likes to tell us how many people work for them. A great leader is humbled to tell us how many people they work for.” ~ Simon Sinek What is the heart of leadership? Ask ten leaders and you will likely get ten different answers because every leader is different; no two teams will need the same level of leadership. We find the heart of leadership in our core belief about how we lead others. For...
“Either you will manage your culture, or it will manage you.” ~Roger Conner and Tom Smith, authors of Change the Culture Change the Game. Toxic work culture seems to be running rampant in many work environments. This week I spoke at an association where several members told me about the challenges in their own work atmosphere: “It’s like walking on eggshells around here.” If the work culture is toxic, it sounds like this: “I only have 30 more years and...
Coach John Wooden won 10 NCAA Men’s Basketball National Championships in his coaching career at UCLA. He is credited with the Wooden Pyramid of Success, his philosophy for developing a dynasty while developing young talent. His first lesson in leadership is Good Values Attract Good People and through my personal experience, I know this to be very true. For me, these words are not just a chapter title from a good book – they are words...
“Before we too can move mountains, we must learn to walk the daily grind, one quiet step at a time. We must learn to serve before we can lead.” Sebastien Richard Matt worked hard to be a leader on his team. He listened to his boss, excelled in his work, and achieved great success by producing high-end results. Matt showed up to work on time, displayed a good team attitude by doing the work as needed to...