Take Time To Ponder

I had a great visit with a CEO yesterday and wanted to share some of her thoughts. We were talking about the pace of change and the seemingly extreme demands of technology (cell phones, Blackberry, texting, incessant emails all times of the day and night, etc.) and its impact on the quality of decision-making.

Her primary thought – “If leaders don’t take the time necessary to back away from the speed of things, the quality of their decision-making will decrease. It’s really as simple as that. And to improve the quality of decisions, leaders simply need to carve out critical think time on their calendars. I view it this way – just do it.”

There is nothing that complex with these thoughts but the message is so profound and insightful.

I also thought about some of the meanings of the word “ponder” and came up with this one –

"prolonged inconclusive thinking about a matter"

 It is certainly good weather to ponder.

Can Leaders Be Too Nice?

Can a leader be “too nice” to be effective in all situations?

Dr. Christine Riordan, Dean of the University of Denver's Daniels College of Business, has done research in this area and reports that “being too nice won't boost you up the corporate ladder.”

As readers consider their own situations, ask if these comments have ever been given as feedback on performance:

"won't make hard decisions;" "doesn't manage conflict;" "not sure he can lead us through hard times;" "too much of a pushover;" "nice person but never gets anything done"

I really enjoyed the summary of her research. Access it at:

http://msn.careerbuilder.com/Article/MSN-2194-Workplace-Issues-On-the-Job-Nice-Guys-May-Finish-Last/?sc_extcmp=JS_2194_advice&catid=wi&SiteId=cbmsnhp42194&ArticleID=2194&gt1=23000&cbRecursionCnt=1&cbsid=58366e7f6ebe41ed8dcdcdf5cf3081a9-319809240-wn-6

accessed 2-18-10

Engagement

I honestly do not think that most leaders think about engagement enough. 

My favorite source on engagement is Professor William Kahn. He suggested that engagement was related to three key factors: Meaningfulness, safety, and availability. 

Meaningfulness relates to the perceived benefits of investing energies into work roles. Think about it – if you feel your work role is meaningful, you will feel valued and useful - you will be more engaged. 

Safety reflects your own personal comfort in expressing yourself truthfully without fear of retaliation or other negative consequences. Engagement represents the ultimate connection between self and role: thus the honest expression of self is a key engagement component. 

Availability is your perception of the accessibility of resources to do your work. If your people's physical and emotional energies are depleted, you will disengage because you feel that work is too demanding.

Decision Making

One of the more important aspects of leadership is decision-making. Interestingly, it is very difficult to fully evaluate how someone makes decisions. Typically, it requires working with them for years to fully see their process.

One of the better discussions about decision making in the leadership literature comes from Vroom and Yetton. They argue that leaders improve group performance by using an optimal amount of participation in the decision-making process.

So a first question I would ask you is: How do you involve others in your decision-making process?

Secondly, I would suggest that you consider how you determine the quality of your decisions.

The two most important criteria for judging the adequacy of a decision are:

• Decision quality- does the      decision result in an objectively or measurably better outcome for      the group or organization. “Does this decision improve services to the      client”?
• Decision acceptance- to what extent do followers accept the decision as if it were their own and do not merely      comply with the decision. (Leaders often mistakenly assume their decisions      have been accepted and will be fully implemented.)

 How do you make decisions?

Collaborative Problem Solving

Once again, in keeping with short thoughts for busy summer days, I heard a CEO say this last week –

"If you can’t agree on what the problem is, you'll never agree on the solution.

Collaborative problem solving is problem oriented vs. solution oriented."

This made good sense to me. Give it some thought.

Adaptability - Perhaps the Most Important Competency

I am currently teaching an on-line course and out topic this past week was contingency leadership / adaptive leadership - essentially, the practice of being able to exhibit multiple styles of leadership. The more chances I have to observe great leaders, the more I am convinced that this may be the most important leadership competency.

Seriously, if you have not recently read some of Fiedler's work or the Vroom-Yetton Leadership Model, this might be a great time to take a look.

Not Enough Generals Were Killed

Ok, it is summer – there is not that much time to read in-depth treatises and expositions on leadership – so the earlier short posting that I wrote on June 2 caught the eyes of a couple of readers and they wrote me back.

– Here is another one (I think many of you know how much I respect our military men and women in uniform)- 

 Drucker recounts the story of an excellent history teacher he'd had – a man badly wounded in the First World War. The teacher, referring to the books around them, said: “Every one of these books says that the Great War was a war of incompetence. Why was it?” The teacher answered his own question: “because not enough generals were killed.”

Want to be a better person

I saw this on an overhead yesterday and thought it was a great quote --

"A good CEO makes you want to do a better job; a great CEO makes you want to be a better person."

Greatest Leadership Challenge - Staying Humble

OK, I have heard from several people - all CEOs - on the earlier post - "what is the greatest leadership challenge?" - and several of them told me that "staying humble" was their greatest leadership challenge. One said, "I never fully realized how powerful you feel until I moved into my first CEO positon. It was actually somewhat scary."

Question - How do leaders continue to craft vision, guide people, and play an enforcement  (I know I will get in trouble with some readers for this term) role and yet be humble?

What is the Greatest Leadership Challenge?

I was asked this week by a CEO what I felt was the most difficult activity in leadership. We had quite a spirited conversation about this question but did not reach any specific conclusions.

Let me present some of the points upon which we touched which:

• Dealing with difficult people – including dealing with those who are unethical
• Dealing with one's personal work/life balance
• Being visionary - truly coming up with significantly clear and anticipatory visions of the future
• Working under conditions with limited resources
• Truly delegating – letting others be free to act

He shared with me that moving into the CEO role itself had been his biggest challenge in leadership. As he became CEO, he felt pressure that he was “always on stage,” was not as free as he once was to think out loud or to relax and let down, and that the consequences of his mistakes were greatly magnified.

I plan to ponder these points further over the next few months. I would welcome any feedback from others.