Comfort with uncertainty
What’s your tolerance for uncertainty? As a leader, either too much or too little is bad for your health, and bad for the health of the organization you lead. Unfortunately, more and more our world surrounds us with uncertainty. A few weeks ago I was working with a client in an organization that has an ownership team that has an amazing willingness to live with uncertainty. They hold off making decisions. They collect data from widely varied sources. No decision that has been...
Read More7 Tips for Great Meetings
So Many Meetings, So Little Time… When you ask me to come to a meeting you are asking me for x number of minutes of my life. Minutes I’ll never get back. Please… take the time to make sure we are using those minutes wisely. There is a great book on meetings by Patrick Lencioni which is also an entertaining read: Death by Meeting. If you are struggling, I definitely recommend it. But in the meantime, here are some tips: One: Look from a distance at...
Read MoreHow compromise might prolong conflict
Can compromise get in the way of listening? I was talking with a leader a few days ago about how to bring together two “warring” factions. Apparently there were two important divisions with extremely divergent perceptions of a major problem the organization was facing, Not only were they proposing opposite solutions but they characterized the problem entirely differently. Each time she brought them together they ended up trying to disprove the position of the other, and thereby...
Read MoreIt’s 11-11-11. Do you intend to have fun at work?
WHAT FUN ARE YOU HAVING? Fun at work? I hadn’t given it much thought until a few weeks ago when I was working with a group of Norwegian leaders. Two of them specifically mentioned fun as an important part of their thinking about leadership. I like to have fun at work, don’t get me wrong. I’ve just appreciated it when it happens, but not given it much intentionality. Since meeting Per and Oyvind, I have given a lot of thought to the role of fun in the work environment. I...
Read MoreIf Your Team is Bugging You – Look at Yourself
How are you creating your team’s behavior? Recently I was asked by a client to help him figure out why his team wasn’t more engaged. He wanted them to participate with more ideas, more independent thinking. He was incredibly responsible, passionate about his company and their success, and thought the team behavior might be holding them back. He had me observe a team meeting. He was animated, excited, engaged, and he worked hard at bringing his six senior leaders into the...
Read MoreBullies at Work
Working with Bullies Recently someone asked me what to do with a bully at work. This client is almost ready to quit a very prestigious executive role because of the emotional impact this nasty colleague is having on the team in which they both participate. Bullying can be obvious – yelling and screaming. It can be more manipulative, politely insulting so that it’s only later it starts eating at you that you didn’t respond, or withholding or threatening to withhold resources. When you...
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