Leadership Coaching by Jeff Lugerner

Why Some Teams Stay Average

2008-08-18T19:50:00.000-07:00

Most of the people that I coach are very bright. Most of their colleagues are amazingly bright.
Most of the teams that my coachees are on are amazingly average in many respects.
How could that be? A really bright group of people should make for a "star team" that out performs most teams. Unfortunately it doesn't work that way.
In fact the smartest team I ever worked with was also the most dysfunctional.
Here are the top 5 things in my experience that get in the way;
1. Lack of a clear articulated vision and subsequent goals.
2. Inability or lack of willingness to resolve conflicts.
3. An atmosphere where competition with each other outweighs collaboration.
4. Emotional reactions of team members are unchecked.
5. A failure to make what's important to a colleague important to you.

Two suggestions;
1) Ask your colleagues what is the most important thing they are doing right now and see if you can find a way to make at least some minimal contribution to their biggest priority.
2) As a team lock yourself in a conference room and establish rules of engagement for dealing with conflict. Once established communicate those rules to your respective teams, publish them in every meeting room and "call out" behavior in real time that is not in line with the rules of engagement that have been established.

Jeff

"He Is Only Invested In His Own Success"

2008-08-15T09:23:00.000-07:00

Several times a week I hear executives use the phrase "he is only invested in his success" when talking about a colleague. When I ask them how they have come to that conclusion almost 80% of them remark that when their colleague asks for something they do it with a sense of urgency, with a requiring tone. However when asked to do something or respond to a request this colleague is a very slow responder and sometimes doesn't even respond at all.
Now while it may not be factual that this person is only invested in their success you can see and hear just how strong a perception has developed. They are "branded" and this sticks to this person hard and fast.
What I'm struck by is how this small set of behaviors can impact a person's brand in such a powerful way. I'm bringing this up with the idea that all of us might look in the mirror and ask ourselves if we are doing this with our colleagues? If you are you may want to think about how you're going to change this quickly! Actually this is low hanging fruit....be more responsive to what is important to others. Another crazy idea would be to go to your colleagues and ask them if there is anything you can do that might be helpful to them and their organization.
Protect your leadership brand by paying attention to how you interact with your colleagues. One thing we know for sure is that people are always forming perceptions of us and sometimes those perceptions become facts in the minds of other people.

Jeff

Don't Be Too Helpful To Your Subordinates

2008-08-13T20:01:00.000-07:00

The desire to be a good leader sometimes translates to managers being too helpful to their direct reports. You might be asking yourself "How could I be too helpful? Aren't I supposed to be helpful to them?" The answer is yes and no. Let yourself be helpful to the extent that you are teaching, sharing ideas and providing direction. Don't let yourself be too helpful by taking back assignments that were previously delegated to them and now sit on your desk waiting for you to complete them.
If you are doing this on a regular basis you are doing your people a disservice and may be teaching them learned helplessness. Learned helplessness happens when as a direct report I come to learn that you are always more than willing to take back my assignments, solve problems for me that I should know how to solve myself and give me the answer readily when I am a bit stumped by something you had asked me to do. What happens after awhile is that I learn that if after looking at a document for five minutes and I can't come up with the answer I know I can quickly come running into your office and you will give me the answer. When you do, you are teaching me learned helplessness and you will ultimately have an employee that you will end up working around. STOP IT NOW! DON"T RESCUE THEM!
The next time your employee comes running to you with a problem you believe thay have the ability to solve, say the following; " Bob I believe you have the ability to solve this problem on your own. I want you to spend more time figuring this one out and get back to me when you have your solution." That's teaching Bob self reliance and letting him know that you are no longer going to rescue him and reinforce his playing helpless with you.
Try it, I'll bet you feel unburdened and you will have a more productive organization.

Jeff

Be a Leader Who Doesn't Have All the Answers

2008-08-11T19:32:00.000-07:00

It's tough leading people. The only thing that might be harder to do in life is raise kids.
The leaders I have worked with over the years put a lot of pressure on themselves to have all the answers. Forget thay crazy expectation of yourself, it will only get you into trouble. The kind of trouble that comes from not running your ideas by people, relying completely on your perspective when making decisions and trusting the data you have collected without testing it against other data that may be out there. I see it everyday and find myself helping executives to dig out of that proverbial hole they just threw themselves into! Do yourself a favor and acknowledge that at least for now you are an incomplete leader! Ouch, that is a hard one to admit and quite frankly very true about most of us who are leading people. We can't and shouldn't have all the answers. We are not good at everything, we lack experience in some areas and may rely too heavily on a problem solving or decision making model that may leave us with some blind spots.
My suggestion is this, unburden yourself from having to have all the right answers and rather than attempt to develop individual know-how in every aspect of business and leadership, develop "group know-how" with the people you surround yourself with everyday.
Acknowledge where you can learn from each other, ask the proverbial "stupid question" and say "I don't know" when you don't know.
You will sleep better, make fewer mistakes and learn from your colleagues, so that perhaps one day you will be closer to that complete executive!
Jeff

Career Stopping Behavior

2008-08-07T20:24:00.000-07:00

I witness what I call "deal breaking " behavior everyday in my coaching work. Behavior that is ultimately career stopping. It takes many forms the most obvious being angry outbursts, winning at all costs, constantly passing judgement and putting oneself first above all else.
Then there are also the condescending "positions" that people state proudly; "I don't suffer fools gladly", "That's just the way I am", 'I don't respect people who aren't as smart as I am."
I could go on and on but I won't, you've seen it, heard it and rolled your eyes at it. Some people don't have their careers limited by this kind of behavior or atttitudes towards others. My experience is that most people do and don't even know it. In fact they are the last to find out.
It's time to look in the mirror and ask yourself if you are demonstrating this obnoxious behavior. You need to look in the mirror because most of us aren't lucky enough to have someone else tell us! The majority of people know they are involved in this kind of behavior and don't stop it because they feel justified. Here is the action plan; tomorrow at work pick someone you completely trust and ask them to be brutally honest with you about your behavior and whether or not you demonstrate the above mentioned list of examples. Tell this trusted co-worker that you will not be offended by their honesty and you will not defend yourself and your behavior. Listen, keep your mouth shut and say thank you when they are done.
Take notes and pick a behavior that you are going to stop immediately.
Thirty days later pick another behavior and stop that one as well.
Cycle through your list (if you ended up with one) until you have completely run through all of your behaviors and then START OVER AGAIN! Deal breaking behavior doesn't cease easily, however your career might if you're not careful.

Jeff

Make What's Important to Your Boss Important to You

2008-08-06T20:50:00.000-07:00

I've heard a theme this week in my coaching meetings that sounds like this: "My boss wants me to do xyz but I don't think that's very important so I'm concentrating on xxx." These are Director level folks who are saying their VP level boss is essentially hallucinating and I'm going to do what I think is important. Over the course of a year this mindset generally translates to fewer choice assignments, decreased credibility and a very diminshed role in the organization.
Because their boss hasn't commented on this behavior or held the person directly accountable doesn't mean they haven't taken notice and taken action in their own way!
Here is my 2cents, make what's important to your boss important to you! It is that simple and for some people that hard. Learn to take direction even if you disagree. Learn to disagree and commit. After all wouldn't you want the same thing from your people that I'm suggesting you give to your boss?

Jeff

Why Sould Anyone Be Led By You?

2008-08-05T18:47:00.000-07:00

So tell me this, why should anyone be led by you?
A provocative question to say the least.
Are you hesitating? Reflecting? Stumped or do you have a good reason why people should follow you through the day to day struggles of work?
Research tells us that leaders create avid followership by generating three emotional responses within their people.
The first one is a feeling of significance. The message is "you really matter" and that message addresses the human drive to be valued. When leaders are able and willing to let people know they matter they are rewarded with loyalty and a relationship that weathers all kinds of storms.
The second emotional response followers want from their leaders is a feeling of community.
This sense of community happens when a leader creates a unity of purpose around work and develops an organization that values people working through tough/sticky issues directly with each other and for the greater good.
Finally followers want excitement, challenge and pushing the envelope in their work lives. Leaders who are able to do this create an intense feeling of "engagement" for their people.
Leaders do this through their own excitement , energy, commitment and most of all by creating a wide scope of inclusiveness in bringing everybody along for the ride.
As a leader the low hanging fruit here is letting people know they matter.
Spend some time in the next few days/weeks and brainstorm how you can help your people feel that they matter and implement just one or two of your ideas and see what kind of reaction you get.
More about creating followership next time.
Jeff