Captain

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Good morning, Team!  It’s Friday!

…the last Friday of the month and the second in my new series at a different cadence.

What is a leader?  What names do we assign and how does it make us feel when we hear it? When it’s directed at us or someone else?

The label I chose for this month is Captain.  Who wouldn’t think of a ship, at the helm, traditional wooden steering wheel or the seat with a large window/screen where James T Kirk sat?

The figure I want to focus on today is Ernest Shackleton.  He was a famous explorer who participated in three expeditions but led his last one to Antarctica.  His ship froze in the sea of ice and could have resulted in tragedy.  Instead, Shackleton, like any great leader, focused on the people.  In the face of adversity, anxiety, horrific weather and the fear of impending death, he kept his calm, brought with him and kept close the most caustic personalities to keep them in check and returned to his stranded men to return all safely home.

I don’t know whether he controlled the rudder of his ship at all times, but I know he was the Captain of that expedition.

How do you see yourself as a leader?  Are you focused on the competition or the competitors within your organization?  Is your responsibility to influence your people and develop other leaders eclipsed by your personal desire to win at all costs?

Shackleton wasn’t always heralded for his achievements.  On the surface he looked like a failure.  Fortunately, leadership scholars took a closer look at what he did accomplish.  Today, in an evolved way of thinking, we no longer tolerate the aspirations of a few to drive behavior at any cost.  We expect leadership to prioritize safety first, people second, the mission of the organization and serving clients next and to generate a market-leading profit margin as well.

These are all achievable.  Its easy to get the order mixed up if you allow it.  Stay focused.

Have a blessed month!

Keep your eyes on the horizon.

 

 

Coach

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Good morning, Team! It’s Friday!!

Before I start, I promised something different in 2020. This is what I’m offering:

•A different cadence – once, monthly

•A keen focus on leadership

•A renewed commitment to share lessons revealed and learned

Now,

Over the past month, I’ve paid particular attention to interactions with multiple examples of the leadership role titled Coach.

I typically spend a day and an hour with my executive coach, had a beer with my old presentation coach, and was asked to be a career development coach by a colleague.

I had breakfast with a long time friend and spiritual coach who started a church (after denying his technical career aspirations). I’m welcomed to a men’s bible study when my schedule allows and the spirit moves me to be coached by a group.

I’ve seen a number of sports related coaches interviewed recently as we mourn the loss of a premier athlete and prepare to celebrate the football extravaganza this weekend. It is their job to help promising and professional athletes reach their athletic potential.

During the last month, I spoke with a wide array of individuals who could benefit from a coaching relationship, if they were aware … and willing to seek their potential and impact the quality of their life.

There are numerous types of coaches, depending on what you seek. It is critical to recognize that we all need one, at least one. In my case, many. Friend, mentor, brother…pastor, chair, supervisor…father, servant, teacher.

They require trust to create a relationship.

They require vulnerability to assess your appetite.

They require cooperation to develop momentum.

They require commitment to dig deep and not quit when it gets hard, and it will.

They require communication as they are not mind readers.

They require active listening on your part to take guidance to heart.

There is not one coach in my life as you can see. I’ve leaned on several brilliant, persistent, and caring people on my journey. We all need the trusted advisor to get us through tough situations that allow us to grow and heal and learn…and eventually teach.

A few guidance statements that I’ve heard, processed and conveyed include:

•Inquiry versus advocacy

•Assume noble intent

•What we don’t transform, we transmit

Find your coaches. Mine the nuggets of wisdom. Practice until permanent then go model the way.

Have a blessed month!

Homecoming

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Good morning, Team!  It’s Friday!
Wearing the nicest pair of work boots I’ve ever owned, I show up like the kid whose parents took him shopping for the first day of school the night before; stark white tennis shoes, fold creases in the shirt and pants, and the tag still hanging off of the new backpack.
I’m still at home in the dirt with a bunch of calloused handed, hairy faced, dirty jacket, ball cap wearing, field tested folks.  The environment has changed from what I recall, in a good way.  Safety is paramount, respect for clients and coworkers is obvious and deliberate, language is clean, desire to do well is shared by all.  This is an impressive culture!
To be clear, I’m an office guy who hasn’t been in the field … for a very long time.  My new hard hat is pristine white (and might be forever).  I’m not turning wrenches or operating equipment and I’m not a foreman, manager or director.  I have been hired as a leader to get things done through others … which isn’t simple or easy and garners little respect from many who do use their hands to earn their pay.  My gray beard, bald head, and clean shirt give me a head start but the legitimacy starts when I open my mouth and … seek to understand and support … instead of barking about things I may lack undeniable expertise in.
It always helps to understand how you and your Team and their actions influence others within and outside of an organization.  What is our part in the product and service delivery to our customers?  Sometimes you have to see it, immerse yourself in it and recognize how things really work.
I feel blessed to be where I am.  I’ve been trusted to optimize critical internal functions for a company building renewable energy generation.  It’s a worthwhile effort impacting hundreds of millions of people.  I have purpose and peace.
Have a blessed weekend!
Note to readers:  I’m taking some time off of the weekly cadence.
I wish each of you the best of the holiday season ahead.  God bless you!

Where you are

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Good morning, Team!  It’s Friday!
My new role has required me to be away from home … again.  Besides the strange bed, feather pillows (I’m allergic to), dry air, strange noises, questionable breakfast meat and powdered eggs in the breakfast buffet, I am finding ways to focus on work, communicate with loved ones, exercise again and be present with less support and daily reinforcement than I’ve grown accustom to.
One of my new responsibility leaders shared some of his stories about sacrifices made on the home front as he switched from one job to the next.  Married for two months then off to South Africa … for two years!
Another leader in my group has relocated to a region far enough away that being in the office is nowhere near as frequent as it has been.  His spouse had an opportunity that required she be in the city they now live and our company is progressive enough that he was allowed to relocate.
Leading where you are still requires the fundamental communication, collaboration, encouraging the heart, completing the tasks necessary and accomplishing things through others.  The distance away from the office or the distance away from loved ones makes it more challenging but certainly not impossible.
The business environment is changing.  The workforce majority is made up of sharp, progressive, motivated, enthusiastic and talented people who fully intend for themselves and their respective organizations to be successful.
•This requires flexibility, to the point of being fluid.
•This requires honesty with ourselves and the organization of what is expected, what is critical and what is optional.
•This requires leveraging technology to communicate whenever, wherever, however to meet the needs of both work and home.
How does this translate?
Let’s take the smart phone.  I used to walk by someone who was on their phone at work and assume they were slacking.  Maybe texting a friend about grabbing a drink or sharing some cat-themed meme about a current event.  Now, I walk on by because it might as easily be someone in a meeting 20 feet away who doesn’t want to disturb the presenter but needs something from their coworker.
Assume noble intent behind your Teams actions.  Judge based on results without trying to prescribe means and methods.  Stay nimble when it comes to how we get work done today.  Lead from where you are, not the way you grew up but the way you wish you had been treated.
Have a blessed weekend!

Crushing ice

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Good morning, Team!  It’s Friday!
New leadership opportunity, new approach to building trust quickly.

Getting to know someone beyond name, rank, serial number usually takes time.  But what if you don’t have time?

One of the business units I’ve been asked to help solidify has grown from two guys and a trailer twelve years ago to a twenty person Team, with seven of them either new or new to the group this week!
We decided to undergo an ice breaking exercise compounded with “speed dating” where senior leadership was part of round one and managers were part of round two and the rest of the group sat at tables while management circulated.  It was a very successful exercise with personalities coming out, humor to speed things along and a palpable feeling of camaraderie by the time we finished.
One of the facts that came out that just about made all of us “ugly face” cry was of the family who has been foster parents for two infants, one girl, one boy for two years when the biological mother of the little boy decided she wanted him back.  While heartbreaking in itself, the little girl and her situational awareness was the clincher.  The mother and son were reunited so the foster parents, hoping to become the adopted parents of the little girl were overjoyed to tears when they learned they would be the little girl’s parents.  Hearing the play by play, the anxiety and eventual joy from the big man with a bigger heart, the inflection in his voice as he shared this fabric-of-his-family story … was a gift.  He dove into the vulnerability exercise and melted all of our hearts a little more that day.
There are three core Team members with adopted children.  Each story gave insight that may have taken months or years to find out otherwise.  What incredible insight gained because we took the time to listen.
Lessons applied:
•People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.
•As my old pastor Jerry Carlson used to say as he wrapped up his sermon, “As you go out into the world this week, remember, everyone is fighting a battle of some kind… so be gentle.”
Have a blessed weekend!

Thankful for adversity

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Good morning, Team!  It’s Friday!

It was 30 years ago today, the day after Thanksgiving, 1989 that I started a job I thought would be my last career move.  Today, it would be challenging to find a place that would start you on a Friday, especially the day after Thanksgiving.

 

My attitude of gratitude post today is not about all of the awesome things I’ve been blessed with, up to and including; beautiful family, good health, great friends, and rewarding jobs.  Instead, I’d like to share the inflections in my life that I didn’t expect, at the time felt I didn’t “deserve” and where I am today.  I’ll stick to the big ones.

 

Job:  After 25+ years in a company I gave heart and soul to, the Board representatives said they “wanted to go a different direction”.  It has taken me years to forgive them and myself for the change in my career trajectory.  I’m in a better place today and truly thankful for the interesting journey I would not have experienced otherwise.  I’ve been given the opportunity to meet hundreds of new people and influence Boards, Divisions and Market Sectors as I expanded my view of the world.

 

Marriage:  After 33+ years with the mother of my children, we reached a point where we couldn’t see eye-to-eye … on much of anything.  We tried and tried and tried but couldn’t make it work.  It was (and still is) painful and we will be healing for quite some time to come.  It was a wake up call for me to what matters most in life.  We all deserve to experience joy.  We all deserve to be loved.

 

Health:  It is nothing short of amazing how stress erodes health.  In one of my last jobs, the CFO of one of the business lines retired and came back to work.  In a conversation over a beer with several of us, Duane shared that he dropped all medicines when he retired the first time and felt great.  Two months back in the saddle and he was back on the meds he was able to drop.  My physical exams would tell a similar story.  I have completed an annual checkup for the last 10 years, many at the Mayo clinic and have some interesting data; cholesterol levels, blood pressure, anxiety were all considerably elevated when I was in a high stress job.  Conversely, during the breaks, my numbers were stellar.  It is entirely possible that I took each of my roles too seriously and might have blown a gasket if I’d stayed in them.  Your life looks a whole lot different when you don’t have good health.

 

Today, I am grateful for all of the adversity I have faced.  It sucked going through it and I am not going to claim that I was well behaved when things didn’t go the way I had planned.  I complained, I gnashed my teeth and I let the world know I didn’t think it was fair.  Bad things happen to good people every single day.  It can be tragic and I wouldn’t wish ill on anyone.  Perhaps, as one close advisor shared, these are tests of faith.  Adversity has lessons to teach us, if we can see beyond ourselves.

 

Have a blessed weekend!

Back in the saddle

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Good morning, Team!  It’s Friday!
I struggled to find a relevant topic for today.  After starting a new job and looking to create value quickly, my discretionary time has evaporated.  Conversely, the content to extract inspiration is overwhelming.  Throw in the holiday preparation and decoration, the deliberate effort to enjoy the journey rather than succumb to the tyranny of the urgent and voila! you have one confounded author.
Through a series of events, some at my hand and some out of my control, I took a sabbatical in 2019.  This gave me pause, a chance to reflect, and to untie some knots in my rope.
I spent the first 53 years of my life scouring the landscape for purpose…my one thing.  I wore myself out.  Along the way, I learned a lot, made a living, and was blessed with a wife, three children, one grandson (to date) and a host of memories and experiences.
“There’s nuthin’ like bringin’ in the herd”
I derive great joy out of accomplishment.  Look what I did in an “aren’t you proud of me, Mom and Dad?” sort of way.  We all have those feelings, most of us choose to stuff ‘em deeper when they crawl up our throat.  However, I have continued to struggle with keeping my priorities straight; God, family, work, me, others.  Probably because they are not linear or two dimensional.  Each looks at those priorities differently and complicates them with our own justifications.
I don’t know what your one thing is.  That’s for you to find out, Curly says.  I’m working on mine now.  I’m through with my peek at retirement and I’ve recalibrated to complete my own personal cattle drive.
I hope you take the time to reflect, whether for six months or six hours this weekend or six minutes a day.  Put your phone down, close your eyes, meditate, pray, and take a deep breath before jumping back on your horse.
Have a blessed weekend!

Integrity

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Good morning, Team!  It’s Friday!

In recent years it has become more important that companies declare what their values are, what they stand for, in an effort to attract similarly minded and similarly behaved people who make up their culture.  The last four companies I’ve worked with have had integrity listed as a core value.
Is it just a buzz word?
According to Oxford dictionary, the use of the word appears to be at a relative high over the last 150 years or so.
The Webster first definition is: “Firm adherence to a code of especially moral or artistic values: incorruptibility.”
I prefer a more simple definition, “do what you say you’re going to do.”
It seems to me that this is how you form trust and trust is the basis of any relationship, at least one worth having.
As a leader, trust in the direction you are asking people to go is paramount.  I’d say it might be the difference between having business partners compared to just having people show up each day and collect a paycheck every couple of weeks.
I have a recent example of integrity that surprised me.  Data has become the way we communicate and data brokers are making a handsome fee on managing it for us.  When a company sells you a data package with certain download and upload speeds, you expect that company to have integrity that they’ll do what they say their going to do and that the system supports what they plan to sell you.
During a call last evening, navigating an issue with a pleasant but relatively poor communicator who burned 45 minutes and solved very little beyond scheduling a tech and sending me 10 coupons I will not use, I was directed to a “speed test”.  This allowed me to self-diagnose what I already knew…websites weren’t loading, latency was significant and I couldn’t communicate at the speed my brain wanted to go.  I had no confidence that paying more (a mere $60 more per month) for faster speed was going to happen.  My results were validating and appalling.  Running the test multiple times, instead of 100Mbps, I got 12Mbps! Each time I ran the test it was…worse.
I’m paying a fair amount for data speeds I’m not getting and I have to hold the company accountable because they won’t do it on their own.  That doesn’t sound like integrity to me.
It might be easier to change your internet provider than it is to change a boss but if you are a leader and you want really good business partners, start building trust by doing what you say you will.
Have a blessed weekend!

Or so it seems to me

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Good morning, Team!  It’s Friday!

I’m pulling together many bits of wisdom and my experience to make a point.  Hopefully, they make sense and the conclusion resonates.  As always, your comments are welcome.
A bit of wisdom from an icon
Warren Buffet says it takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it.
A bit about my preferences
I personally love to:
•Build
•Grow
•Influence
•Problem Solve
•Create and Add Value
A bit of a conundrum
Problem solving doesn’t always equate to simply adding more in a leadership role…sometimes removing and reallocating is important to allow a business to perform and to help some resources to thrive elsewhere.  You might think this last point sounds like a one-sided argument.  It’s not.  Case in point:
Cameron Herald, author of Double Double, gave a compelling example of letting someone go from his organization and after deliberating and agonizing quietly for a long time, he finally took action and to his surprise the person being let go asked him, “What took you so long?!”  Sometimes what you believe is firing is actually allowing someone to be released from their obligation to you/company so they can be successful elsewhere.
Anecdote
Maybe the percussionist didn’t belong in the orchestra but they went on to excel in a rock band.
A bit about my journey
I was handed an incredible amount of responsibility at a very early age and just about the time I felt like I could handle it, another load was dropped on my plate.  This happened continuously for 43 years straight.  I was told and believed;
 “If you want something done, give it to a busy person.”
“What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.”
“God doesn’t give you more than you can handle.”
A bit about my first career experiences
Have you ever seen a continuous-flow process not work well? Like a plugged drain or a starved grain auger?
I was so programmed to see the total traffic picture and run to the point of a problem so the process could keep rolling that I gained insight and could anticipate concerns, troubleshoot on the fly and keep things moving in a positive and productive direction.
Example:
Our family contracting business used to crush concrete with a specially designed crusher…
Raw product (broken up concrete) delivered up top, run through process, perform quality control at the bottom of the output chute and stockpile final product, ready for distribution.
Typical problem patterns that became obvious over time:
*When there was too large of a concrete piece, it would plug the hopper.
*When there was too much clay with the concrete, it would plug the jaw.
*When there was too much rebar in the jaw, it would plug the output.
When it worked well, everyone knew it and felt it and Dad used to beam with pride.  When it didn’t go well, we were all frustrated.  All processes have points of failure.  Anticipation and constant correction is part of life.
A bit about my professional career
In my past, I’ve been challenged with instilling accountability and aligning resources at department, division and enterprise levels.  Each situation was different … but short term thinking often led to the steaming piles of obligation I was asked to sort out.  Because I enjoy a challenge and love to solve problems, I dove in … without much regard for my personal reputation.
Lessons learned
+For someone who is aware of what culture is and should look like, a best culture fit yields joy and satisfaction to the extent that your significant other can see it when you walk in the door at night …. before you even open your mouth.  Conversely, when someone is unfit and unhappy, everyone knows about it and wishes you wouldn’t open your mouth.
+To be successful in business, one must balance short-term and long-term thinking, demonstrate courage in the face of adversity and persevere, own your mistakes, forgive others and yourself.
+We all need to understand you can’t control everything around us.  In fact, you will find the only thing you can truly control is how you respond to things that happen, whether “to you” or just happen.  Our choices shape who we become and how people see us is beyond our control.
Conclusion
Well placed people executing sound processes with a clear mission directed by leaders who keep a balanced approach to the company’s short term and long term vision will find success and earn a reputation worth protecting.
Have a blessed weekend!

New Beginnings

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Good morning, Team!  It’s Friday!
This political, geographical and economic part of North America, more familiar to us today as the United States of America, has been home to more new beginnings than I’m able to recall in less than 500 words but I will say that it is welcoming and inspiring to know we live in an environment that fosters change and new beginnings.
It’s never easy to start something new because we get so comfortable or talk ourselves into staying a little longer.
I met a banker recently who was describing his new family and lovingly explaining his former relationship.  He said that the former relationship was over in five years but since he’s from Minnesota, he gave it another eight years before calling it quits.
The workplace is no different.  We all face challenges; personalities, conditions, expectations that may not align.  Do we seek to reconcile, stay quiet or look for a new beginning?  I’ve had some experience in this regard.  I’ve created anxiety for those  close to me but know that we all deserve the right to experience joy.  Sometimes, the only way to reach that is to find your new beginning.
Edison invented the light bulb after thousands of attempts and new beginnings.  He didn’t consider them mistakes, just steps in the process.  He could have given up multiple times but persevered and changed the world as we know it.
Whatever the barrier; physical, mental, emotional, financial, geographical, relational or psychological … or some other excuse you’ve decided is enough to prevent you from moving on … I’d ask you to take inventory.
*What’s important?
*Are you living the life God planned for you?
*Are there things you can do to improve your human condition or life quality without having to take radical steps, for instance, redefine your relationships?
In 2019, I have initiated and experienced a significant number of new beginnings.  Some of them have been scary, some exciting, some too new to know how I feel yet … but I’m in the ring, I’m swinging, landing a punch now and then and still standing.  What’s the alternative?
Have a blessed weekend!