leadership challenge

The Leadership Challenge: Poor Decisions – 5 Tips!

September 12, 2016 By Tip of the Spear

The Point: If you’re a leader undoubtedly you’ve come to the decision tree in the process map of leadership several times… Decide correctly and fame/fortune await you, but decide incorrectly and failure awaits. In this post, we’ll examine the leadership challenge of poor decisions and provide 5 tips to help decide correctly… Enjoy!

Ready, Fire, Aim!

Meet Jane, a mid-level executive for an Inc 500 company that oversees operations. Since joining the company (she’s approaching year 4), the organization has seen tremendous growth. Part of this growth initiative is the result of Jane making what she calls good “strategic decisions” in her role. The nature of these strategic decisions stem from a similar fashion of how the CEO of the organization makes his (Think of these as “Ready, Fire, Aim!” strategic decisions… Or decisions made without any strategic-orientation whatsoever!)

The organization has grown to a size now though that requires a much more strategic oversight. With a 4x growth in employees, approaching 2x growth in customer base, and the inevitable IT support required the future simply will not allow for poor decisions, let alone poor execution of those decisions.

Perfect Solution or Perfect Right Now Solution?

So Jane is challenged with the decision-making that takes place in the organization. On the one hand, she knows that she can do better (She did so in her previous role/organization, which she’ll be the first to admit was 10x more professional and had a rather litigious corporate counsel act as compliance officer for the operation). On the other hand, she somewhat enjoys the Ready, Fire, Aim! decision making process. The benefits as she sees them are less bureaucracy, time consumption, and simple stress associated with conducting due-diligence required to explore decision contingency plans.

A Machiavellian cavalier attitude prevails resting on Occam’s Razor theory, where you can do what you want, when you want and simplicity rules the day. This is what she’s seen the CEO do successfully since joining the organization, and other leaders replicate/follow suit with little/no failure repercussions.

5 Tips to Better Decision Making

But the times, they are a changing. Expectations are higher and as one of the organization’s only female leaders Jane needs to make her best decisions. She’s previously been “called out” for making less than favorable decisions in the past (Read that as the “Good Old Boys” club didn’t like them). The following 5 tips serve to provide you, the leader that might find themselves in similar Jane-like shoes, with decision making guidance:

Tip #5 – Take It Easy

Stress is the enemy of good decision making. Take a few deep breaths, go for a walk, and clear your head. Once you’re in a better position/situation then begin to examine your decision making next steps.

Tip #4 – Take a Step Back

What should you consider that will make your decision the best one possible, aligning with mission, vision, values of your organization. There should be a litmus test applied for each decision that is to be made, starting with taking the biggest picture possible before zeroing in on details.

Tip #3 – Take Data Into Account

Figures don’t lie, but liars figure… Take data that you can trust into account when determining future courses. If you can’t get insight/perspective yourself, call on others to help.

Tip #2 – Decide!

You know that your decision is not going to materialize without a strict action planning process that includes a date which decision is to be made. Establish this target and then move aggressively towards achieving it.

Tip #1 – Follow-Up/Follow-Through with Commitments

You made a decision, so now oversee the implementation/installation of the engagement. While some leaders would look at this as job completed in status, know that it is only the beginning stages of a successful initiative (With much more work to be done in order to be successful!)

SUMMARY

In this post we’ve examined the leadership challenge of poor decisions and provided 5 tips for the leader looking to make their best decisions. Leadership is a difficult job at times, and poor decisions typically upon autopsy provide insight into what should be done next time through learning.

Sam Palazzolo

www.BloodSweatSpears.com

The Leadership Challenge: Gratitude – 3 Tips!

September 5, 2016 By Sam Palazzolo, Managing Director

The Point: A well functioning team lead by a solid leader has much to be thankful for, akin to the thought that “success” has many fathers while “failure” would appear to be an orphan. So it begs the question what happens when results aren’t accomplished, workloads not distributed equally, and attitudes go right down the drain? In this post we’ll examine the leadership challenge of gratitude and provide the leader with 3 tips to help a leader towards success… Enjoy!

I’m Thankful, Appreciative, and Kind (Aren’t I?)

Meet Jim… A mid-level manager for a Fortune 100 company (Name obviously changed to protect identities!) Jim has an “opportunity (i.e., a problem). Jim’s opportunity is that after years of successfully leading his team of five sales associates towards “best ever” results for the company, this year they are falling short of objective. This “shortness” is causing tension amongst the team, as would be expected.

The largest problem that Jim faces is the level of gratitude that his team exhibits. If the definition of gratitude is the quality of being thankful; readiness to show appreciation for and to return kindness, then Jim’s team seems to be running in the opposite direction. While “coffee is for closers” and a certain level of Darwinism is present leading to only the strong surviving, in this situation/place/time it is becoming evident that a change needs to be made… Starting with Jim’s gratitude.

Why Gratitude is a Leader’s Secret Weapon

In working with Jim I recognized that if he was leading the team, he was also leading the team when it came to being thankful for what they had accomplished and progress towards the strategic plan made to date. While the goals were not being accomplished to the desire of senior leadership (or Jim), there still was a silver-lining in that they were steadily progressing down the sales playing field. In fact, they were just a few key accounts away from not only accomplishing sales objectives, but surpassing them. Could there be a way to tap into gratitude to make things better for all?

In researching gratitude I was surprised to see that those that practice frequent check-ins with what they have to be thankful/appreciative/kind in regards to experience more frequent positive emotions, have a sense of being more alive, get more restful sleep, share greater moments of compassion and kindness, and have a stronger immune system so as to ward off cold/flu/allergy viruses. We’d all like to get these, right?

3 Tips to Overcome the Leadership Challenge of Gratitude

So here are three tips that should help you/your team in upping your gratitude game to accomplish results (and feel great while doing it!):

Tip #3 – Journal 10 Gratitudes Daily

Start off each morning by finding a quiet place/time and list out in a journal ten gratitudes that you have in your life right there/then. These could be complex (I am beating cancer) or simple (I put two black shoes on today!) The important part is to develop this journaling habit and listing out what you have to be thankful for.

Tip #2 – Identify Actions To Be Taken

Identify actions that you will take that day to bring these gratitudes developed in Tip #3 above to reality. Look at your calendar for the day to identify meetings to be held and how you can strategically achieve greater gratitude.

Tip #1 – Share at least three (3) of your gratitudes with a peer. This peer could be your work peers, personal peers, or simply expressing these out loud if you choose to not make public your gratitude (but why wouldn’t you want to?)

SUMMARY

In this post we’ve examined the leadership challenge of gratitude and provided 3 tips to assist the leader in creating greater gratitude moments. While some will argue that this creates recognition of glass half full/empty, it also provides the springboard to a better day!

Sam Palazzolo

www.BloodSweatSpears.com

The Leadership Challenge: Lying – 5 Tips!

September 1, 2016 By Sam Palazzolo, Managing Director

The Point: If you deal with salespeople, or anyone in the workplace, you know that they have probably at some point lied to you in order to persuade you/your team to take action they desire. In this post, we’ll explore how to deal effectively with liars in the workplace as well as 5 tips to overcome their lying ways… Enjoy!

Liar, Liar, Pants on Fire!

A prominent study found that people on average lie one to two times daily. What? Who are these people? They must not be someone that I work with… hopefully!

When it comes to dealing with people in business, the same study found that roughly half of those engaged in negotiations will result to lying in order to get their way (read that as opportunity + motive=lying).

So what’s the answer? Most leaders will claim to have “Lie Detectors” (or “BS Detectors”) that through their years of experience, EQ+IQ, and just plain old detection abilities lead them to sniff out such lies. Unfortunately, this rarely happens, and the reasons abound for the nearly 50/50 chance at guessing whether or not a lie is happening (That’s the same odds as a coin flip!)

Lying… The Choice of a New Generation

So what can the leader do to better equip themselves so as to diminish the lying experience associated with business? The following are 5 tips to overcome the leadership challenge of lying:

Tip #5 – Reciprocate Transparency

Share your positions with others regarding intentions and/or what you have in mind, and set expectations regarding what you’d like to have in return. The act of setting expectations in a clear/concise manner results in higher outcomes where parties reciprocate transparency.

Tip #4 – Interview Expectations

You’ve properly established what your expectations are, but do you follow-through in conversations or interviews regarding what the other party intends through indentifying their expectations? When conducting such interviews, insure that your questions hit those expectation moments so as to identify whether or not the other party is on the same page with you.

Tip #3 – No Ducking

When conducting said interviews, make certain that you can identify moments where the other party is attempting to “duck” or dodge your question by not answering it. There can be no ducking when answering, because ducking leads to lying!

Tip #2 – Confidential Retribution

A study conducted found that the more a survey stresses the confidential nature of the answers providing anonymity of respondent, the more said respondent felt threatened by providing damning data (and therefore hedged or “ducked” their answers!)

Tip #1 – Hack for Results

With tight lips, there are no sinking of ships… However, today’s version of this classic WWII saying comes with the internet. The internet is where information abounds, so do your homework by hacking different sites to acquire information needed to make best decisions. You may even consider interviewing affiliated resources (i.e., people) to see what information they can share (like through LinkedIn’s “InMail” feature).

SUMMARY

In this post we’ve examined the leadership challenge of lying and provided 5 tips for dealing effectively with a liar as a leader. While you may never be able to extinguish lying in the workplace, you should look to diminish the impact that it has on you/your organizations dealings.

Sam Palazzolo

www.BloodSweatSpears.com

The Leadership Challenge: Agile Talent – 3 Tips!

August 23, 2016 By Sam Palazzolo, Managing Director

The Point: If you/your organization rely on external experts to develop transformative products so as to (1) better understand how people think and use your products/services or (2) aim to benefit from external expertise as a strategic extension of your resources you probably understand that agile, fast, and lean strategies require you to think in new ways about (a) accessing and leveraging key strategic talent and (b) filling critical gaps in strategic capabilities… The answer may lie in your ability to identify/secure agile talent. In this post we’ll examine the leadership challenge of external agile talent and propose 3 tips… Enjoy!

Agile Equals External, Project-based, and Flexible

An estimated 20-30 percent of today’s workforce is comprised of talent which is based outside the organization’s full-time, permanent employee-employer relationship. Another study reflects upwards of 40 percent! And yet a third study reflects that nearly 25 percent of the US Workforce is comprised of independent contractors engaged in work for more than one organization.

While these financial expenditures help keep labor costs low (The all important expense found on an income statement), they also represent a leadership challenge working with such agile talent because by their very nature, external talent is just that… External the organization, especially when considering the agile talent’s individual mission/vision/values in comparison with that of the sponsoring organization.

How to Effectively Manage Agile Talent – 3 Tips!

The following represent three tips when working with such agile talent:

Tip #3 – Manage the Relationship

When sourcing and recruiting agile talent, most organizations assign the task to purchasing departments (not even human resources is consulted). This leads to the implementation/management of talent to those operating managers that were not even involved/present with hiring decisions. The obvious discord between purchasing and operations leaves a “gap” between expectations and engagement pursuits. In order to overcome such gaps, best practices include joint sourcing of agile talent whereby skills and talents are identified and allowed to execute according to organizational guidelines.

Tip #2 – Competitive vs. Cooperative Environments

While securing agile talent external to the organization can bring an influx of subject matter expertise to initiatives, these subject matter experts may be looked at as competition to those internal the organization. Best practices include creating an environment of cooperation, where internal talent and external agile talent combine for successful project execution.

Tip #1 – Results Focus

Selecting, engaging and managing agile talent is at the heart of successful change initiatives. However, most operations look upon external talent as those that are “separate, but not equal” in stature to those internal talents. Therefore, the results are often askew of intended results. Best practices consist of hiring for short, as well as long-term goal attainment. Such a broadening of goal attainment vision won’t allow for a “separate, but not equal” atmosphere/attitude.

SUMMARY

In this post we’ve examined the leadership challenge of agile talent, as well as three tips to improve best practice outcomes. Important tips to remember when engaging external talent include managing the relationships, creating a cooperative atmosphere, and maintaining a results focus on organizational mission, vision, and values.

Sam Palazzolo

www.BloodSweatSpears.com

Leadership Challenge – Is It Possible to Emerge From the Darkest Hell Healed and Restored?

November 14, 2013 By Sam Palazzolo, Managing Director

We recently participated in a leadership roundtable discussion. The focus was on the many leadership challenge moments that leaders face running their organizations. Whether the leader is in charge of a startup, with its many ups/downs associated with daily (sometimes hourly) survival or the leadership challenge of running an existing organization (sometimes no easy feat regardless of how long they’ve been in business!) There were many topics considered for discussion:

What’s the best way to develop the strategic plan (and how to get that strategic plan implemented)?
Best practices when it comes to dealing with moments of change
How to ensure that all (both leaders and team members) have the same organizational vision through communication
Implementing recruiting strategies for A+ candidates (A version of the Top Grading methodology)
Ensuring that the organization continues to be agile/innovative
Creating a “High Potential” program for future organizational leaders

As you can tell, the topics were those most pressing to the leaders gathered. Questions were asked/answered, and an overall tone of satisfaction permeated the meeting room. That tone though shifted abruptly when one of the leaders in attendance asked the following question:

“Here’s a leadership challenge for you… Is it possible to emerge from the darkest hell healed and restored?”

If you’ve read Malcom Gladwell’s recently released book, David & Goliath, then you know the story presented in Chapter 5 – Emil “Jay” Freireich. The story is of Dr. Freireich and his tumultuous search for a cancer cure for cancer. There is also presented in this chapter a theory regarding direct hits, near misses and overall misses (Think the London bombing that occurred during World War 2 . The theory being that those who received direct hits, as morbid as it sounds, don’t really count for “after bombing” feedback. Those that achieved overall misses still laid in wait/fear for future bombings (a very small minority). Finally, those that achieved near misses and lived to tell the tale found that they were not only resilient, but encouraged and grew in their resolve to overcome successfully future bombings!

With this knowledge in mind, we shared the story and similar story that those leaders who have experienced truly dark spaces (The ones they don’t tell you about in MBA school) often times have similar resiliency and resolve to overcome! The pressing leadership challenge therefore doesn’t really appear to present itself of much of a challenge at all (albeit those effected might tell a slightly different tale!)

What’s the Point? So what’s the point? Can it be as simple as “that which does not kill us only makes us stronger!” Based on the research of Malcom Gladwell adn Dr. Freireich, we think that not only is there a high resiliency that would allow one to overcome obstacles but also succeed.

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