How Pretending Develops Leaders

Your brain knows gibberish when it hears it. You can’t fool yourself. “I think I can,” sounds like a lie to someone who believes they can’t.

Pretending you can doesn’t help, but pretending does.
Expand skills and develop behaviors by pretending.

Example:

Fred’s performance stalled. It’s time for a tough conversation that you dread. Worse yet, tough conversations often end with you comforting rather than challenging. You’re a softy.

Invite a member of the leadership team for a walk. Tell them it’s time for a tough conversation with Fred. Say, “I’d like to run something by you.” Pretend you’re having the conversation with Fred.

Guidelines:

1. Don’t violate privacy by talking about Fred with his colleagues.
2. Find someone on the leadership team who knows Fred, if possible.
3. Use fellow leaders who have emotional intelligence.
4. Approach someone who handles tough conversations well.
5. Step outside your organization, when necessary, but protect privacy by changing names.
6. Begin with the end in mine. Always explain the goal of the conversation, first. Describe how you want Fred to feel and behave after the conversation?
7. Invite immediate feedback during practice. Ask, “How did it feel when I said …?”
8. Try several approaches. Adapt your approach to Fred. What works for him?
9. Seek alternatives from your partner. Ask, “How would you handle this situation?”
10. Visualize positive results but practice the process.

Repeating, “I think I can,” while sitting in your office, won’t change a thing.

You tell yourself you can because you fear you can’t. 

“I think I can,” adds stress when you fear you can’t. On the other hand, pretending builds confidence and develops skills.

When I pretend, I often ask someone, “How does it feel when I say…?”

How has pretending helped your leadership?

How can leaders use pretending to develop leadership in others?

The Secret Power of Vulnerability

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The power of  vulnerability is lost
when you don’t dare or don’t know how.

Bill Treasurer, author of, “Leaders Open Doors,” said, “I used to drink too much. Way too much. … Three years after getting sober … I decided to reveal to my boss, a partner at Accenture, that I was in recovery. …

I didn’t expect my boss to pat me on my shoulder and say, ‘Good for you; you’re a drunk!’ I expected more of a reaction than I got.

After I told him that I was in recovery, my boss looked at me quizzically, and muttered, ‘I see.’ Then he made some small-talk and hurried to another meeting.”

“I regretted having told him…”

If you reveal your real self, what’s left if it’s rejected?

Selective vulnerability:

1. Not all the time with everyone. “I gotta be me,” is self-centered, weak, and self-indulgent.
2. Not everything. No one wants to hear it all.
3. Not helpful. Before vulnerability ask, “Is this helpful.”
4. Not only weaknesses. Vulnerability includes telling your personal story.

Another story:

Bill told me another story. He was scheduled to spend two hours riding alone with a tightly wound, military style boss. He said, “I wasn’t looking forward to it.”

Surprisingly, the boss turned the radio to a rock station where Creedence Clear Water Revival was playing. After that, “My boss told me stories of when he fought in Vietnam.” After hearing his stories, Bill said, I judged him less and respected him more.

Vulnerability builds connections.

 Back to recovery:

Two weeks after telling his boss he was in recovery something amazing happened. Bill’s boss was on the board of the Georgia Council of Substance Abuse and Accenture had volunteered to do a research project. The boss asked Bill to lead the team. “It was the first time as a new manager that I got to lead my own project team.”

Vulnerability creates opportunities.

Recommendation: 

Read, “Leaders Open Doors.” It’s about WAY more than vulnerability.

What are the dangers and opportunities of vulnerable leadership?

What principles guide vulnerability?

***

10 Ways to Stand Up for Your Great Idea

Your idea got shot down. Give up, play safe, or push forward?

Courage and boldness create your future.
Cowardice solidifies your past.

Leaders don’t give up quickly.

Boldly advocate.
Courageously stand up.
Tenaciously push forward.

How to stand up for your ideas:

Courage and boldness don’t have to be rude, irritating, and adversarial.

Jerks aren’t courageous they’re fearful.

1. Build alliances. Boldly support the ideas of others as much as you support your own. Stand with others if you expect them to stand with you.
2. Forget defending. Adversarial relationships emerge during defensive conversations. You defend and they shoot down. It’s lose – lose.
3. Explore. Defending pushes away; exploring invites in. “I’d like to explore an alternative outreach program. What if …”
4. Choose private first. Don’t put people on the spot in front of colleagues. Introduce and explore ideas in one-on-one conversations.
5. Align with current circumstances and organizational values. When values collide, conversations move from pros and cons to who’s right and who’s wrong.
6. Be firm and nice. Weakness gets angry when it doesn’t get its way.
7. Listen if you want to be heard. Don’t dismiss counter-points, say, “Good point,” instead. Go slow to go fast. Patience is courage not cowardice.
8. Suggest pilot programs. Say, “I’d like to test this in our marketing department,” for example. All or nothing often ends up with nothing. A small piece of pie is better than no piece.
9. Ask, “What are the benefits of staying the same?”
10. Ask, “What are the dangers of staying the same?”

Bonus: Never make your ideas about you. Always pursue what’s best for your organization.

Successful leaders find reasons to step forward,
not stay the same.

Warning:

New ideas meet opposition. You’ll hear reasons it won’t work before reasons it will. Listen and understand, but don’t play dead.

How can leaders stand up for their ideas without unnecessarily pushing others down?

What strategies work well for exploring innovative concepts?

The Surprising Path to the Top

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Top tier leaders develop their leadership; bottom tier leaders don’t. Lousy leaders don’t develop their leadership.

Those who need it most – want it least.
Those who need it least – want it most.

Simple test:

Ask yourself, “What am I doing to develop my leadership?” Lousy leaders don’t have an answer.

Number one:

I talked with Marshall Goldsmith, yesterday. Harvard Business Review named him the number one leadership thinker in the world. Marshall said the best always strive to be better.

Surprising path to number one:

Marshall said I always learn more from the people I coach than they learn from me. He’s not minimizing his value. It helps that he only works with top leaders of top organizations in the world.

Grow your leadership by growing others.

Help yourself by helping others. Teachers learn more than students.

The surprising path to the top is helping others to the top.

Unselfishly develop yourself by unselfishly developing others.

Tip:

Know less. Even if you think you know, listen and learn.

In and out:

People ask me how I come up with a leadership post six or seven times a week. I always answer the same way. I’m putting more in my cup than I’m taking out. A conversation with Marshall Goldsmith is one example.

Keep filling and pouring out of your cup.

Writing Leadership Freak is part of my leadership development. You think I do it for others and that’s true. I also do it for me. What I take in, I give out.

Tool:

Here’s a tool to help you develop others and yourself: “Managers as Mentors,” by Chip Bell and Marshall Goldsmith.

How are you developing your leadership?

Where Passion Comes From

Passion is longing to be what you could be, but aren’t.

Passion for leadership is the combination of falling below your imagined leadership potential and longing for exceptional leadership – at the same time.

The gap between longing and attainment is passion.

You:

ABC’s of finding your passion:

1. Accept disappointing performance. You read leadership books, blogs, and articles because you long to be better. You aren’t there yet. Pain gives birth of passion.
2. Believe improvement is possible and worthwhile. Hope makes you bold.
3. Create a Picture of the preferred future. Think about ultimate goals not the process. You aren’t sure how to get there. But, when you close your eyes and dream, you see the end.
4. Deliberate steps – action. The whole path is never clear but a step is always possible.

Others:

People fuel our passion when they make us feel we matter.

Recently, people fueled my passion, again. It happened during a presentation to a group of Human Resource professionals.

I paced the back of the room like a caged animal while announcements were made. A participant came back and said, “Can I do anything to make you more comfortable?” I’m not sure if my pacing invited the question but it made me feel I mattered.

A participant asked me to sign their program. I felt awkward and didn’t respond well. “Really?” I said. I regret saying that. After reflection, it makes me feel I matter.

About half-way through my presentation, someone asked, “What’s the future for you, Dan?” That wasn’t the topic. I almost brushed it off. Instead I gave a short reply and moved on. It made me feel I mattered.

Leaders make others feel they matter.
Any fool can make others feel they don’t matter.

Passion – the courage to act on dreams – comes from within and without.

How are you making people feel they matter?

Where does your passion come from?

Too Afraid to Matter

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***

Fear binds to the present.

Paralyzing fear pats you on the back when nothing changes.

Fear cheers for the status quo.

Fear says; don’t stand out because you’ll:

1. Look foolish.
2. Screw up. (You will)
3. Get in over your head.
4. Lose what you have.
5. Seem arrogant. Others aren’t standing out. What gives you the right to think you can?

Fear of loss and criticism prevents you from doing what matters.

How to matter most:

Forget and shift:

1. Forget about being in charge. Stop thinking leadership is authority, power, command and control. Shift to serving. Bring benefit. What’s the good thing you can do for others?
2. Forget about final results. Focus on the path forward. Meaningful results never happen all at once. How can you make a difference today?
3. Forget about one. Think two. An ancient proverb says, “Two are better than one because they have a good reward for their labor.” Everyone needs a “with.” Who can you stand with? Who can stand with you?
4. Forget about old guard leaders who are fear-driven, controlling, and self-protective. Pass them by. They need you to be like them.
5. Forget about fanfare and recognition. Do things quietly. Spotlights come later, if at all.

Bonus: Forget about permission.

Courage:

Above all, doing what matters takes courage.

Courage is taking action while thinking of reasons not to. 

Deep courage is bringing you to opportunities and challenges. People who matter, ask:

1. What does better look like?
2. How does my story apply to this challenge?
3. What can I do?
4. What can we do?

The path:

1. Start small.
2. Start now. Starting is the most important thing you’ll do today.
3. Start “with.”

Courage needs a next step; fear needs a guarantee.

How can people overcome paralyzing fear?

How to Bring Out the Best

Bringing out your best is child’s play compared to bringing out their best.

Leaders who bring out the best in others make courage possible. Nothing meaningful happens without courage.

Encourage courage.

Everyone is still unlearning the necessary fear parents taught us. Leaders have the courage to develop courage in others.

Who before what:

Bringing out the best in others begins with “who” not “what.” Know who you’re dealing with, before thinking about what you want them to do. Are they…

Deep or shallow:

Some respond well to being thrown into the deep end. Throw them in. Others prefer the shallow end. They prefer to learn courage gradually.

In either case, successful leaders grow the courage muscles of others.

History:

Bring out the best in others by knowing their past. The past directs the future.

1. How did they responded to new assignments?
2. What have they learned from failure?
3. What motivated them in the past?
4. Who did they mesh with?
5. Who rubbed them the wrong way?

Heart:

Bring out the best by knowing their heart. What are their values and aspirations. Are they working for advancement, for example.

You know what makes you tick.
Leaders know what makes them tick.

How can leaders bring out the best in others?

The Complete List of Reasons Leaders Fail

Top 12 reasons leaders fail:

1. Neglecting culture. Culture building is job-one for all leaders.
2. Lack of paranoia. The paranoid think about what could go wrong and make contingency plans.
3. Bitterness, grudges, and resentment. People fail. Successful leaders allow fresh starts.
4. Task rather than people focus.
5. Accepting complexity.
6. Lack of political awareness. Successful leaders build relationships with powerful players.
7. Failure to sell successes and accomplishments with humility. If the right people don’t know your value, you aren’t valuable.
8. Trusting the untested. Talent without a track record is dangerous.
9. Fearing great talent.
10. Postponing tough conversations.
11. People pleasing.
12. Refusing to adapt. Adaptability is the greatest ability.

Bottom 20 reasons leaders fail:

1. Stagnant pool of friends. Keep your current friends and develop new.
2. Disconnecting with others due to the blindness of power.
3. Failure to build strong teamwork.
4. Neglecting to develop skills, both theirs and those of others.
5. Needing to outshine others rather than letting others shine.
6. Confusing leadership with management.
7. Cowardice. It takes courage to lead. If you don’t think so, you haven’t led.
8. Brown nosing those above and neglecting those below.
9. Too much doing and not enough helping others do.
10. Withdrawal.
11. Over-promising.
12. Fence sitting.
13. Lack of clarity.
14. Lack of follow through.
15. Favoritism.
16. Blaming.
17. Rejecting uncomfortable ideas.
18. Excluding themselves from accountability. “Do as I say, not as I do.”
19. Lack of alignment with board members and organizational values.
20. Relying on authority.

Bonus material: “Ten Reasons Leaders Fail, Plus ONE” – Based on a conversation with the CEO of Circuit City.

What’s at the top of your list of reasons leaders fail?

What should be added to the complete list of reasons leaders fail?

Hit it with the Simple Stick

Complexity makes confused leaders feel important when they should feel like failures.

“The business schools reward difficult complex behavior more than simple behavior, but simple behavior is more effective.” Warren Buffett

Rivers take long, complex routes to the ocean because they follow the easy path. The hard path is the straight one.

Rejection:

Simplicity is rejected because it seems unimportant, ineffective, even naïve. Simple feels common and easy, even though it’s rare and difficult.

Complexity is the path of least resistance;
simplicity the most.

Sources of complexity:

1. Resistance to simplify what’s already working.
2. Reluctance to kill something that might work.
3. Lack of resolve and attention to the value of simplicity.

Complexity reflects beginnings that never died, but should have.

Finding simplicity:

Simplicity is exclusive.

Complexity is inclusive.

Simplicity is the result of elimination.

Developing simplicity is taking away not adding to. Eliminating options is taking the straight path to the ocean.

First steps:

1. Find simplicity for yourself before imposing it on others. Eliminate nonessentials; expose essentials.
2. Make the pursuit of simplicity a leadership priority. Begin pursuing.
3. Constantly scan for complexity and attack it ferociously.

The Simple Stick:

The first time I read the expression, “Hit it with the ‘simple stick’,” was reading Ken Segall’s book, “Insanely Simple: The Obsession That Drives Apple’s Success.”

People often walked away from Steve Jobs having been hit with the Simple Stick. Segall believes the reason Apple is the most profitable business in the world is it’s obsession with simplicity.

The path to exceptional includes finding your “simple stick.”

*This post continues my reflections on my visit to the Chick-fil-A Leadercast.

Bonus: “Simple Isn’t Easy“

What are the sources of complexity?

What does the path to simplicity look like to you?

Jack Welch on the Cruelest Environments

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Jack Welch and candor come together.

It didn’t take long for the topic of candor to come up at the dinner I attended after the Chick-fil-A Leadercast. In his usual no-nonsense fashion, Jack said,

“If your employees don’t know where they stand, you have no right to call yourself a manager.”

Here’s what I’ve been thinking since dinner Friday night.

Sick, stressful environments include behaviors where:

1. Side-stepping and pretending is normal. Candor is taboo, even offensive.
2. Leaders “protect” others by massaging the message.
3. Confronting issues is rare.
4. Postponing, rather than addressing, is standard operating procedures.

Leaders who replace candor with hiding the truth become dishonest manipulators. They are either confused or self-absorbed or both.

Candor is kind; uncertainty is cruel.

Candor is kind because it generates clarity.

“Everyone wants to know where they stand.” Jack Welch

Dancing around feelings and ignoring issues:

1. Creates uncertainty.
2. Undermines credibility. You can’t trust leaders who don’t or won’t speak the truth.
3. Prolongs agony.
4. Encourages dishonesty.
5. Discourages excellence. When leaders avoid tough conversations, excellence doesn’t matter.

Dishonesty, in the name of “not hurting”
someone, hurts everyone.

Behind mediocrity is a tough conversation someone didn’t have.

Credible leaders speak with:

1. Courage.
2. Clarity.
3. Conviction.
4. Compassion. Give improvement a chance.
5. Optimism. (Another “c” would be perfect)

Credible leaders say what everyone already knows, but are afraid to say.

Kind candor:

1. Speak unvarnished truths. “Your angry outbursts frustrate your co-workers,” for example.
2. Reject excuses and blame – quickly, clearly, and firmly.
3. Develop clear pictures of “better” in terms of behaviors and outcomes.
4. Provide training, support, and resources.
5. Explain consequences.
6. Establish deadlines.

Kind candor stabilizes organizations, validates performance, lowers stress, enables excellence, and simplifies relationships.

See comments on cruelest leaders on Facebook (5-11-13).

What are the key success factors for developing candor in organizations?