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BlogCulture

Loosing the Forest for the Tree

by Ron Potter

You’ve seen me turn to Shane Parrish many times.  I think he is one of the best “thinkers” around today which makes him my favorite blogger.

Einstein Essentials

In this article, Shane talks about how Albert Einstein sorts the essential from the non-essential.

I can also go back to one of my favorite Aristotle quotes that I use for great teamwork: Truth, Love, Beauty, Unity.  Beauty is what Shane and Einstein are talking about here.

In Aristotle’s terms, he is talking about the simplest, most direct, most essential information.  Sorting out the essential from the non-essential is the key to great success but it’s getting harder every day.  Social media has filled our lives with more and more non-essential information.  Years ago I decided that the daily news was not about the news but about entertainment and sensationalism in an attempt to gain larger marketing numbers.  I stopped watching the evening news nearly twenty years ago because I found it irrelevant.  It was not about wisdom.  It was non-essential!

Einstein’s greatest gift

In Shanes’s observation of Einstein, he notes that a great mathematical mind was not his greatest gift.  It was not.  His greatest gift was the ability to sift the essential from the inessential, to grasp simplicity when everyone else was lost in the clutter.  Too many people today are considered experts on a particular topic and work hard at making it more complicated.  Real genius works hard at simplification.  In Einstein’s biography, it points out that it wasn’t that Einstein understood more about complicated things that made him impressive.  It was that he understood the value of simplicity.

In working with several corporate leadership teams through the years I would often observe those leaders who always wanted more information before they could or would make a decision.  My reaction was they didn’t understand the problem or issue and therefore they wanted more information in an effort to understand.  It seemed to me that the best leaders, investors, and advisors always simplified the situation to a few essentials that would make the decision clear and understandable.

We were talking with our own financial advisor recently.  It seemed to me that the market had been in a wild gyration over the last few weeks with the Dow going up and down several hundred points per day.  When I asked how they dealt with such volatility his answer was “It’s just noise.”  To him, it was non-essential information.

Filtering Skills

Shane closes his article by listing the skills to better filter and process:

  • Focus on understanding basic, timeless, general principles of the world and use them to help filter people, ideas, and projects.  The italics are mine.  The news is not timeless, it’s daily.  Timeless principles are the ones that last and ones we should be focused on.
  • Take time to think about what we’re trying to achieve and the two or three variables that will most help us get there.  Three variables lead to six options.  Four variables lead to 24 options.  The human brain can only deal with about seven options at a time.  Keep your variables to three or less.  Otherwise, the brain cannot process it.
  • Remove the inessential clutter from our lives.  This can be the things we think about, the number of balls we try to keep in the air, and even stuff.  The stuff you collect over time only creates clutter in the long run.  Sort it out.  Get rid of the inessential.
  • Think backward about what we want to avoid.  Start with the end in mind.
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BlogCulture

Are You a Hedgehog or a Fox?

by Ron Potter

Years ago I was working with a client in Scotland.  It was mid-June so the days were very long.  Because Scotland is so far north the sun rises at about 4:30 in the morning.  This allowed me to play nine holes of golf before my meetings started.  While I was on one hole a small hedgehog came walking out from a nearby woodpile.  He seemed oblivious to my presence and walked right into the line of my pending putt.  I reached out with my putter and “patted” him on the rear end assuming he would scamper off the green.  Instead, he curled tightly up into a ball and held his defensive position.  I watched him for a few minutes but he never came out of his defensive ball.  I then took my putter, treated him like a golf ball, and putted him off the green.  After a few minutes, he got up a scampered off.

So when I saw the Wall Street Journal titled, “The Hedgehogs of Critical Race Theory”, I was intrigued.

Archilochus

Archilocus was a Greek poet and philosopher who said, “The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing”. The WSJ article says that the political philosopher Isaiah Berlin wrote an essay in 1953 suggesting that the world was divided between hedgehogs and foxes.  He identified Karl Marx as a supreme hedgehog and Franklin Roosevelt as a restlessly improvising fox.

The WSJ article expresses that the world’s hedgehog population tends to expand in times of stress and change.  Lately, it has exploded in the U.S. with all of them advancing One Big Thing or another, each peering through the lens of a particular obsession. (Italics are mine)

The theologian Richard Niebuhr, explained it this way: “There is no greater barrier to understanding than the assumption that the standpoint which we happen to occupy is a universal one.”

Barrier to Understanding

Do you want to understand or would you rather stick with your hedgehog approach to one big standpoint?  This is the difference between normal teams and great teams.

In great teams, everyone suspends their opinions and standpoints for a moment while they attempt to completely understand each members’ viewpoints.  This requires that we listen to understand rather than listening to respond.

It’s a natural human trait to keep score in our head of the issues that we agree with and disagrees with while another person is explaining their viewpoint.  STOP IT!  It does take a great deal of energy and discipline to fully listen with the intent to understand where the other person is coming from and what is forming their opinion.  It takes hard work.

Work at it!  It will make you a better person and a better team.

Koosh Ball

A colleague called me the other day and asked if I had ever dealt with someone that was so convinced that their opinion and perspective was right that they never stopped talking or interrupting.  And if so, how did I deal with it? My answer was a Koosh ball.

  

It was an exercise I often used when we had a “talker” on the team.  The rules were simple:

  • Only the person who was in the possession of the Koosh ball could speak.
  • When that person was done expressing their opinion and perspective they would then decide who the Koosh ball was tossed to next.

Two things I often observed was the the “talker” still needed a signal to stop talking even though they knew the rules.  I often had to put my hand up to cut them off and remind them that their job was to fully understand the perspective of the talking person.  They still seemed to have a difficult time.  It took hard work on everyone’s part.

The other thing I often observed was that the team was so tired of constantly hearing the talker, they would toss to anyone other than the talker.  It became obvious that we were hearing the other’s perspective for the first time.  Very refreshing and very empowering to everyone.

Opinion and Perspective

It’s OK to have clear and powerful opinions and perspectives.  However, don’t assume that each person sees that same universe.  Every person is unique and comes from individual experiences and understandings.  Just look at your own family.  I have three siblings.  We grew up in the same household with the same parents and were only a few years apart.  And yet, each of us had very unique experiences and developed a unique set of values.

That is why great teams outperform average teams and individuals.  Pulling all of those experiences and unique views of the world together into a team decision is very powerful.  If you haven’t experienced that, I hope you do someday.

It’s incredibly satisfying.

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BlogLeadership

The Decisions You Make Determine the Kind of Team You Are.

by Ron Potter

This is oversimplified, but you can boil the purpose of most teams down to:

  • Leadership Teams
  • Management Teams

Leadership teams provide vision and mission and deal with the difficult issue of dilemmas.  Management teams make the tough choices of executing the vision and mission in the most cost-effective manner.

If you’re not dealing with dilemmas, you’re not a leadership team

Most management teams are dealing with right vs wrong issues.  The answers may be difficult and the team may be divided, but in the end, they can be categorized as right vs wrong.

Dilemma issues are very different.  They deal with right vs right issues.  For instance, almost all leadership teams deal with short-term vs long-term.  Should they deal with both?  Yes.  But often, the resources needed to give both fronts adequate support are not available.   So they now face a dilemma.

  • Should they apply the available resources to deal with their short-term issues?  Yes!
  • Should they invest in the long-term success of the company?  Yes!
  • Are there enough resources to do both?  No!

They are now faced with a dilemma.  Both answers are yes; they just don’t have the resources to do both.  Which option do they invest in?

Horns of a Dilemma

The origin of the word dilemma is delaminated.   This refers to the horns of a bull that are laminated.   Thus, when you’re in a dilemma, you’re being forced to pick one horn or the other, knowing that you’re still going to get gored by the opposite horn.

If you decide to put your available resources toward fixing and supporting the short-term, the long-term issues are going to gore you.  Or visa versa.

The issue for leadership teams is to be transparent about their decisions and document, document, document.   It’s all too easy for someone to second guess the team’s decision when the other option is goring them.

When dilemmas are not being handled in a completely transparent way or there is inadequate documentation, someone will be thinking or saying, “The Leadership Team should have seen this coming and given it the adequate resources to prevent this mess (being gored).”  The truth is that they did, but they were faced with right vs right choices and those issues are much more challenging than right vs wrong issues.

If your leadership team is not dealing with right vs right issues, they’re a management team!

Personal Dilemma

I am currently facing a genuine personal dilemma.  I have a liver disease called NASH.  The first two letters stand for non-alcoholic.  My liver scars over as if I’ve been a heavy drinker all my life and begins to shut down even though I don’t drink any alcohol.

Trying to understand the issues I face as my liver continues to fail, I’ve spoken with two heart transplant surgeons that I know.  Even though they are separated by geography, they both gave me the same answer.  I’ll have to choose between a liver transplant or continue to treat and deal with the symptoms of a failing liver.  But they both said there is no right answer.  Either way will produce difficult issues that I’ll have to face and deal with the best I can.  But while there is no right answer, they both advised me that I must come to peace with the direction I choose.

At that point, it hit me.  I’m dealing with a very real, very impactful, very difficult decision.  I’m facing a dilemma.  And the only advice the surgeons could offer me was to be at peace with the decision that I make.

Leadership Teams

Leadership Teams face the same issue.  They must reach a certain level of peace with their decision, knowing full well that at some point they’re going to get gored by the other option.

This is a very difficult task.  It’s difficult to deal with it on a personal level.  It’s maybe even more difficult to deal with it on a team level.  Getting the entire team to be at peace with the decision takes a great deal of patience, openness, confidence, and trust.

It’s hard work!  But it’s the only way that Leadership Teams fulfill their mission of guiding the company through dilemmas.

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BlogCulture

The Coming Ice Age: Leading Beyond the Blizzard

by Ron Potter

As we try to figure out the new normal, many comments and images have been tossed around.  I ran across this article by Andy Crouch, Kurt Keilhacker, and Dave Blanchard of Praxis that gives us a good overview of what we’re facing.

Blizzard, Winter, Ice Age

For a minute, put your own thoughts to each of those words.

Blizzard

Years ago when my children were young, my wife and I decided to drive from Salt Lake City where we were living at the time back to her family farm in Michigan for Thanksgiving.  Everything went great getting there as was our time with family at a very comforting time of the year.  But then it was time to drive back from Michigan to Utah in early December.  Things were going fine until I woke up (my wife was driving at the moment) and realized that we were spinning (a full 360) on the Interstate along with the cars and trucks near us.  We had hit a blizzard in Nebraska.  No one crashed and no one was hurt and we were able to get to the first exit which had a Holiday Inn where we checked in for a couple of days until the blizzard passed and the roads had been clear.

It was a scary experience!

Even after we were able to restart our journey, there was this anxiousness in the back of our minds as we headed out on the plains of Nebraska and into the mountains before making it to Salt Lake.

Blizzards are like that.  Scary.  They can be dangerous.  And the possibilities can linger in our mind even after they clear.

Winter

Unlike blizzards that can come upon you quickly, we know that winters are coming.  The calendar tells us so.  The only thing we don’t know is how severe the winter will be and how long it will last.  Keep in mind that we live in Michigan near the Lake Michigan side of the state.  A couple of winters ago, we had an extremely cold spell of a couple of weeks during winter.  Temperatures were below negative 20 degrees for nearly two weeks.  When it’s that cold you need to protect people and things and be prepared if you lose your power.  Even things in our garage began to freeze.  But just like blizzards, we know that it will end sometime and things will get back to normal.

Ice Age

Back when I was a kid, we didn’t hear about global warming; we heard about another coming Ice Age.  (Both based on science… supposedly.)  We have beautiful, great lakes and terrain in Michigan because of the last ice age in which glaciers reached what is now the southern border of the state.   It must have been impressive and awesome and it created and left a beautiful environment.  But it was uninhabitable!  The last Ice Age lasted about 12,000 years.  Ice Ages create new normals.

What Are We Facing

Which category —Blizzard, Winter, or Ice Age— do you place our current Covid situation and the virtual workplace it has spawned?

Blizzard

I believe it’s clear to all of us that this is not a blizzard.  We may have had some hope of that a year ago.  We may have thought that “this will be over soon” and we would get back to normal.  It is now obvious that is not going to happen.

Winter

I’m often asked why I continue to live in Michigan when I could live anywhere.  My answer is that when you have a perfect day in Michigan, there is nothing like it anywhere else in the world.  I’m sure it’s the result of the great lakes and beautiful forests.

But with Covid, we don’t get a summer full of beautiful days.  We’re at least in winter.  There will be no “perfect” days with Covid.  We will not return to “normal”.

Ice Age

We may even be into an Ice Age with Covid and virtual work.  Things are not likely to return to “normal” in our lifetime.  It will be a much more cautious and virtual world.  Because I have children and grandchildren who live in other countries of the world, I’m very familiar with virtual connections.  But I can’t wait until I can be with them again to give them each a big hug.  And with the teams I work with, there is nothing like that shake of a hand, that pat on the back, and being able to look directly into the eyes of each other when dealing with difficult issues.

New Norm

This is the new norm.  We’re never quite sure what the new normal will actually look like.  We only know that it will be different (and confusing) until the new normal emerges.

We haven’t really figured it all out yet.

I know that many of our collaboration platforms (Zoom, MSTeams, Webex, and others) are working fast and furious trying to figure it out.  But I do know that they’ll miss the mark if they rely on transactional measurements rather than personal relationships interactions to create the new normal.

Trust

As the team from Praxis says, “Out greatest resource is trust”.  Trust is difficult to cultivate virtually, although I believe it can be done with focus and effort.  It’s more important than ever in this time of winter and/or ice age to build trust.  It will be hard work but it will also be worth it.

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BlogMyers Briggs Type IndicatorMyers-Briggs

Myers Briggs Type Indicator: Where Decisions Are Made

by Ron Potter

We’re going to take this break because the last two functions (Sensing-Intuition & Thinking-Feeling) are the two functions that make up our decision-making process.

Energizing

The Energizing function doesn’t come into play in our decision process except that we must be in our preferred function (extraversion or introversion) in order to make our best decision.

If we have a preference for introversion, but because of norms or a particular leader, we are required to make decisions during the meeting or on the spot, we’ll make a decision but we will remain uncomfortable.  For the introverted person to make the best decision, it would be better to take a break so they can think clearly before asking them to make a decision.

If we have a preference for extraversion, energy remains high during conversations and it seems easier to make decisions that we’re comfortable with.  Our quiet times are useful to think about the many options and maybe even rank-order them.  But we’re never quite comfortable with a decision if we don’t have the opportunity to bounce our thinking off someone else.  This ability to talk through a decision gives us confidence.  I once heard a person with extraversion preferences make the statement “How do I know what I think until I hear what I say?”  Perfect summarizing statement!

But neither extraversion nor introversion contribute to our decisions, they are simply environments that allow for better or more confident decisions.

Decision Functions

The next two functions, perceiving and deciding, are exactly where our decisions are made.  Of the sixteen Myers-Briggs Types, the second function will be either sensing or intuition (Perceiving) and the third function will be either thinking or feeling (Deciding).  For instance, my preference is ENTJ. My second function (Perceiving) is iNtuition and my third function (Deciding) is thinking.  I must have these two functions satisfied in order to make a decision.

Which Function is First?

It is the first (Energizing) and last function (Orientation) that determine which of the two functions lead.  When we get to the last function (Orientation) it will identify us as having a preference for either judging or perceiving (J vs P). You will recall from a previous blog that the third function (T-F) is called your Deciding function but it was originally described as your Judging function.

The last function (Orientation) will indicate if you have a preference for either judging or perceiving (J-P).  This indicates your preferred world.  If your preferred world is judging, then you will prefer to start your decision-making process with the deciding (Judging) process.  If your preferred world is perceiving, then you will prefer to start your decision-making process with your perceiving process.

ENTJ Example

I mentioned earlier that my MBTI preference is ENTJ.  This means that I will rely on the Perceiving function of iNtuition and my Deciding function of thinking in order to make my best decisions (ENTJ).  But, which of the NT functions do I tend to begin with?  My last function (orientation) is J.  This J refers to the original Judging function, now called the Deciding function.  This means that I prefer to start with thinking then back it up with iNtuition.

Had my preference been ENTP, I would have preferred to start with the Perceiving Function of iNtuition and then back it up with the Judging (Deciding) function of thinking.

It’s important to know this sequence because I used the term “back up” in the previous paragraphs.  For instance, my preference for ENTJ will start the decision-making process based on logic.  However, I will back this up based on my iNtuition of what the right decision should be.  So, even though I make decisions that seem logical, I also make them based on what I perceive to be the right decision.

What does the World See?

The last function helps us understand one more thing about our decision-making process.  We will tend to use our lead decision-making process in our preferred world.  The preferred world for extraverts is out talking with people.  The preferred world for introverts is quietly thinking.  This means that for the ENTJ, the world is exposed to and engaged in my lead decision-making process of thinking.  I’ll use the iNtuitive process to think about the decisions long-term implications or to support how iNtuitively I see the world.

Personal ENTJ/INFP Example

One of the best ways to understand the J vs P preference (last function) is to think about non-work time.  At work, we have often figured out that a good balancing act pays high rewards.  In our non-work time, we tend to function much less guarded.

Let’s look at vacation time.  Because of my “J” function at the end, I like to have my vacation time structured and decided.  I want to know arrival and departure times, where we’ll be staying, when and where do we have meal times scheduled and when are we scheduled to “have fun!”  Yes, even our “fun” time is scheduled!  My wife is just the opposite —everything should be spontaneous!

I decided I needed to give her some vacation time built around her preferences because usually, my “J” preference won out over her “P” preference.  So I made it clear to her that I wanted to give her a vacation that fit her preference.  She was thrilled!  But as our vacation time approached, my “J” would attempt to seize back control.  “Where are we going?”  “When are we leaving?”  “What should we pack?”  etc.  But with each of my questions, she responded that she didn’t know yet.  I finally received an indication that she wanted to go “antiquing.”

The day of our departure came.  I drove to the end of the driveway, stopped, then asked “Left or Right?”  She thought for a minute (she also has a preference for introversion), then finally said “Right.”  These Left-Right questions continued for the entire week through five states of our vacation.

As we drove we would see a sign for an antique store at the next exit.  Normally, when she wanted to stop at one of these stores, I would look at my watch and make a statement something to the effect of  “Sorry, we don’t have the time built into our schedule.”  But on this trip, my response was “Sure!”  I was slowly learning.  When we pulled up out front I wouldn’t ask “How long will we be here?”  As we entered the store I wouldn’t ask “What are we looking for?”  Once in the store, she might spot a cute little salt and pepper set.  I would ask “Can I find some more of those for you?”  That would put me on the hunt and firmly in my “J” mode.

We would leave the store and get back on the road and I”m thinking (I bet it’s going to be Strawberry Festival in the next town and there won’t be a room within 50 miles).  And then she would say “I’m tired, let’s stop at the next B&B and rest for the afternoon and evening.”  I’m thrilled.

And so the next several days went in a pure spontaneous “P” mode.  I painfully survived but she enjoyed every minute.

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BlogLeadership

Three Time Frames

by Ron Potter

Raymund Chua was a client of mine many years ago.  We built a good relationship and have stayed in touch with each other through the years.  Raymund, living in Singapore, is doing some great work in Southeast Asia.

He posted something on LinkedIn the other day that I found very powerful because it was profound and simple at the same time.

Leadership Story

The chart is titled “The Three Timeframes” as part of a series called, A Leadership Story.

State of the Leaders Focus

Current – Next – Future

I’ve not only seen these states in various leaders, I’m aware that I also get “stuck” in one of the three states.

Possible Symptoms

This list is very interesting in that it shows the possible symptoms of each state.

  • Future Focus –  Full of new ideas.  Often not quite sure how to get there.  Very Start-Up in its nature
  • Next Focus – Great initiatives but really never takes into account where the organization is or what they’re cable of doing.
  • Current State – Focused on doing well today with no thought of the future.

Which State is Best?

OK, trick question.  While there may be moments in time when one state will serve better than the others, long-term all the states must be blended into the leadership thought.  Let’s take a deeper look at each one of them.

Future Focus

This is an extremely valuable focus.  Where is the future headed?  What insights will prepare us for a future that is mostly unknown today?  In the pandemic we’ve been experiencing which has caused tectonic shifts in our culture and way of doing business, this is a valuable focus.

What happens when the majority of people begin working from home?

  • Commercial real estate loses a great deal of its value.
  • Building teams becomes even harder when people are not able to be close to each other, shake hands, or put an arm around someone’s shoulder to offer some comfort.
  • It doesn’t matter where you’re located.  Areas like New York City, Silicon Valley, Boston Rte 128, and others are no longer required living locations to be a contributing member of a high tech team.

I”m sure there are many other aspects of our future that we can’t even see yet.

But having a future focus will tune you into issues and moments that others may miss and could be extremely valuable.

However, being future focused comes with its drawbacks as well.  I mentioned earlier that I get stuck in one of these states.  This is the one that has been my nemesis and has added stress to my life through the years.  Because I tend to be future focused, I look forward to what might be coming or what I may be able to experience in the year ahead.  However, it is usually late February or March when I feel like the year is well underway and I’m bogged down in the ordinary and won’t be able to experience the fabulous future I had imagined.  And by July or August, my sense is that the year is over and I might as well start focusing on the next one.  Unfortunately, I’ve missed many wonderful things that happen “in the moment” because I’m so focused on the future.

You need all three.

Next Focus

I would probably call this “near” focus.  These are the people who are focused on the near term —the next year if they are working in the business world.

They aren’t really thinking about the immediate or today’s problems and issues.  They also are not thinking much beyond the year.  There’s not much of what you would call future vision in their thinking.

There are two issues that these types face but don’t seem to grasp.  One is immediate problems.  They may have the year thought out but seem to be unaware that something is about to blow up or go terribly wrong in the next couple of weeks.  By next month they may be trying to recover from or get on top of an issue that essentially keeps them from accomplishing the year as they envisioned.

The second issue is they are not visionary.  High-performance teams always have a future destination they are excited about and committed to achieving.  Because the next focus leader doesn’t think or have a vision for the future, it’s hard for them to build high-performance.  They can be good at what we might think of as operational teams, ones that are efficient and get the near term tasks completed, but they are not good at having the right team or building the right skills for the future.

Current State Focus

These people are very short-term focused.  They’re good at solving the immediate problem.  In the business world, they are often called “firefighters.”   Firefighters are important.  There can always be a fire to put out and it must be done as quickly as possible.   The problem I began to see over the years was that firefighters were sometimes arsonists.  They either started fires or fanned small fires so they could put their skill set to use solving bigger fires.

They also don’t really do anything to prepare the organization or team for any longevity.  They don’t really think beyond putting out the immediate fire.  They don’t prepare the team for bigger or longer-term issues.  And they certainly don’t offer up a future to work towards.  They’re needed but they’re needed in the moment and not beyond.

There are two other categories that are also important.

No, No, No

The first (top of the chart) one talks about a leader that is neither current state, next, nor future focused.  My apologies to those people who are trying to do a good job and make things better but I often think of government offices when I think of the No, No, No environment.  In the “Unintended Team Culture” apart of the chart, it lists:

Good talents would have left.  What’s left is a culture that is very contented (and at times) protective of the status quo.

In the corporate world, I’ve actually seen a couple of cases where the leadership had decided to no longer be in a part of the business or spend resources on doing a certain piece of the business.  But as I looked around the corporation I would see people showing up for work, getting to their office, and continuing to do the work they had done for years just the way they had always done it.  The CEO would be floored.  He would wonder why they were spending resources on something they had decided to kill off months or maybe even years ago.  It didn’t take much looking to find a No, No, No leader.

Yes, Yes, Yes

This category at the bottom of the chart talks about the leader who is focused on all three states, current, next, and future.  If you read the “Possible Symptoms” and “Unintended Team Cultures”, I hope you resonate positively and want to belong in that atmosphere.

Possible Symptoms: A leader who knows the organization’s current capability, knows precisely what to do next, and has a roadmap to the future.

Unintended Team Culture: a culture that has a crystal clear understanding of their current situation, has a shared vision, and knows what to do to close the gap.  I would actually title this as the Intended Team Culture.

Be a triple yes type of leader.  It’s the only type that builds high-performance teams and has a shot of conquering the uncertain future.

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BlogCulture

Unity

by Ron Potter

Joe Biden’s Unity Address at the inauguration on January 20, 2021 was the title of an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal written by their editorial board.  In the opening paragraph, they write “The peaceful transfer of power from one party to another is a sign of underlying democratic strength no matter our current political distemper.”

I have always believed that this is one of the true strengths of our republic and our constitution.  If you look back through history, I believe that we are the only country that has pulled off this peaceful transfer of power for over two hundred years.  It makes me very proud.

Unity

But this blog is titled “Unity”, not the transfer of power.

Some of President Biden’s words were “Politics doesn’t have to be a raging fire” and “Disagreement should not lead to disunion.”  Unfortunately, politics does remain a raging fire, regardless of which party is in power.  But my focus here is not politics, but teams and corporate cultures.  The second statement is the one I want us to hang on to because it is one of the elements of high-performance teams:  “Disagreement should not lead to disunion.”

Disagreement

Some people believe that you can’t have unity if you have a disagreement.  I believe the unity that comes out of trusting and respecting disagreement is the most powerful unity that you can experience.  From our ancient philosophers, we find that the idea of truth, love, beauty, and unity is the highest level of happiness.  I use these four concepts to help teams bring about unity from disagreement.

Truth

I’m not talking about truth being the opposite of lies.  I’m talking about what you know and have experienced as your truth.  I often marvel at the concept that there are no two snowflakes exactly alike.  I would put forth the premise that there are no two human beings that are exactly alike.

I’m one of four siblings in my family.  We all had the same father and mother.  We all lived in the same house for most of our lives.  We all grew up in the same small town for most of our lives.  I say “most of our lives” because my father died when my youngest sister was still in her teens which altered her life a great deal.  But what I have found very fascinating through our adult years is how the “truth” of those formative years was so different for each of us.  I remember one discussion between myself and my siblings as adults when I finally said “Who are you talking about?”  They said “Our father”.  My reaction was, “That’s not the father I knew or grew up with”.  Even how we ranked from youngest to oldest changed how we experienced our parents.

In order to build a strong unity, we must share with each other what we see as the truth of the situation.  Both of my daughters and all four of my grandchildren have lived overseas.  They have experienced different “truths”.  I believe this will serve them well through life.

I’ve told this story before but it’s very powerful for me.  During my consulting years, I almost always conducted a session with each team that I called “Human Beings, not Human Doings”.   In these sessions, participants were asked to share about someone or some event that they know profoundly affected their lives and values.  We never made it through a single session without tears flowing.

Knowing each other’s experiences, values, and truths, is the first very powerful step towards unity.

Love

The second of the unity elements was termed “love” by the Ancients.  Unfortunately, that word loses something in the translation and how we think of it today.  In the Greek Language which most of these ancients spoke, they have at least four words (I’ve seen as many as six) that all get translated into the word love in English.  Our English is very limiting.

  • Philia – deep friendship.  The city of Philadelphia is based on this word.
  • Eros – sexual passion.  We get the word erotica from Eros.
  • Philautia – love of the self.  We would translate this word as narcissism — self-obsessed and focused.
  • Agape – love for everyone.

Agape is the word for love that I associate with teams.  I often used the word “respect” to convey this idea.  Do we show respect for the other person regardless of their “truth” being in alignment with ours or not?  Do we listen with the intent to understand?  We didn’t have the same experiences as the other person.  We must listen with a willingness to learn and understand about the background that would bring them to their truth.   Only then can we begin to develop true and powerful unity.

Beauty

This is another word that’s difficult to understand in the business context.  We’ve heard that beauty is in the eye of the beholder.  That makes beauty unique to each individual.  I don’t think that works well with teams.

I’ve come to think of beauty as elegance.  One definition is being pleasingly ingenious and simple.  I think this definition works well with teams.  Ingenuity or innovation is a very strong skill in high-performance teams.  Although sometimes it seems counter-intuitive, simplicity is also a strong point for high-performance teams.  Adding complexity and complications to projects or decision making is not a trait in high-performance teams.

Unity

Unity can be a hard thing to detect at times.  Especially if a team is good at working through their differences.  What does make unity visible is commitment.  When every member of a team shows commitment to decisions made, even if they personally see things differently, that’s unity.  Each member has to carefully demonstrate the commitment.  For others to hear the words “Well, I don’t agree with it but that’s what we decided as a team” is not unity.  But when people know that while we may have initially disagreed with the results and yet see full commitment on our part, they know that we’re committed to the team and the team’s decisions.

Truth, Love, Beauty, Unity

Truth, Respect, Elegance, Commitment

These are the elements of unity.  Check your own attitude and the behavior of others with each element.  Building high-performance teams require putting all of the elements in place.

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BlogLeadership

He Makes Good Decisions

by Ron Potter

I happened to come across a National Football League (NFL) scouting report of a young college student who wanted to be drafted into the NFL.  The Scouting reports were not good.

The college student also took part in the NFL Scouting Combine where they test physical attributes.  The results of that were not good either.  The reports said he had poor arm strength and athleticism and his sprint times for the 40-yard dash were terrible.

In his report, one longtime analyst said, “I don’t like him. Smart guy. That’s it.”  The only positive part of another report said that “He makes good decisions.”

In spite of these poor reports, this young college student was drafted in that year.  Of the 200 drafted, he was taken at 199.

He Was Prudent

Prudent is not a word we see anymore.  In fact, it doesn’t really sound very flattering.  But the definition of prudent is: The perfected ability to make right decisions.  That seemed to be the only positive thing in his scouting reports and physical analysis.  He was Prudent.

The Perfected Ability to Make Right Decisions

There are two points that you need to pay attention to in that definition.

  1. Right.  It’s easy to make decisions.  It’s not easy to always make “right” decisions.  “Right” in this case means right for the individual, organization, country, and the world in general.
  2. Perfected.  Perfection comes with practice, patience, and wisdom.  It takes time.  You must work at it.  I’ve spent a lifetime trying to perfect my golf swing.  It’s far from perfect but it is better.  Even the pros who will hit thousands of balls a day are trying to perfect their golf swing.

Practice Makes Perfect

We’ve all heard that old adage.  But it’s not true.  Practice doesn’t make perfect if you not practicing the right things or the parts that need to be practiced.  Back to the golf pros, they not only have coaches but lots of technology to help measure and visualize their practice.  They get almost instantaneous feedback on each practice swing.

Feedback

This is why instantaneous feedback is so necessary.  I heard someone once say, if you swat your dog with a newspaper for something he did wrong yesterday, he’ll have no idea what he’s being punished for.  He will only become afraid of newspapers.  This is one reason why annual assessment sessions with employees are so useless.  There may have been an instance several months ago that needs to be fixed.  But by now each participant has formed a memory in their head that satisfies their own needs and ego.  Memory is powerful.

A college professor once had the students in his class write down everything about the day before when the space shuttle Challenger exploded during take-off.  Ten years later, the professor tracked down as many students from that class that he could find.  He handed them their own written record of that day to read over.  One student who had written 14 pages read it through and then tossed it to the side and said to the professor, “That’s not right.  Let me tell you what really happened!”  Ten years later his memory of the incident was more powerful than his recording of the incident the following day.  Memory is powerful.

Prudent Decision Making

Prudence is a process.  It has well-defined steps that will need to be practiced to reach perfection.  The Prudence process requires Trust, Diverse Points of View, and a Good Process

Trust

In my book, “Trust Me” I list the eight elements of trust.  Those elements are self humility, development of others, commitment to learning, listening and creating unity, focus on the issue, compassion for others, personal integrity, not avoiding constructive disagreement, and finally endurance to stick with it to the end.

Diverse Points of View

We hear the word diversity used a great deal these days.  But diversity by itself is worthless unless there is trust.  Trust must be established first.  Without trusted diversity of thought, there is no perfecting of the decision-making process.

Good Process

Prudent decision making is not haphazard; it is a well-defined process.  It can be simplified into three words: Deliberate, Decide, Do.

Deliberate.  Because “time is critical”, most corporate teams don’t do enough (or any) deliberation.  Other reasons I’ve encountered for not deliberating well include:

    • “We already know the answer.”  This happens because of ‘group think’ and ‘selective attention’.  If we don’t have the trusted diversity of thinking, it’s easy to fall into these traps that make us think we already know the answer.
    • This is only one right answer.  This means that all the other possible answers are wrong.  Leadership teams shouldn’t waste their time on truly right-wrong decisions.  Leadership teams should be spending their time on dilemmas.  This means they are dealing with right vs right decisions.  These are the hard decisions.
    • I believe what I see or I remember.  (See the “Feedback” section above.)

Decide.  One element of good decision making is described in something called Triple Loop Learning (Originally developed by Gregory Bateson and extended by Chris Argyris and Peter Senge).  The first step in triple loop learning is to share openly and honestly your beliefs and assumptions about the topic up for decision.

Do.  Having reached a decision through this process, the do part becomes much easier because all the parts of the team are working together.  There is full commitment from each member of the team.  I cover  “Prudence” in previous blogs–take a look to get more detail than we covered here today.

So who was that young college student that was drafted 199 out of 200 that year?  Tom Brady.

No other quarterback has appeared in more than 5 Super Bowls, let alone claimed over 4 rings.  Tom has played in nine Super Bowls and won six of them.  This weekend he will play in his tenth Super Bowl with the opportunity for his seventh win.

He makes good decisions!

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BlogLeadership

Emotion, Humility, Humanity

by Ron Potter

Howie Mandel, the comedian, identified these three traits of people who changed the world.  More than a comedian, I have always found Howie to be a deep thinker as well.  These were identified in a youtube video by Howie.

Emotion

We often think of emotion as something inside of us and very personal in nature.  In fact, it has more to do with communication.

Even as I work with a team that has developed an app for being a better team, it seems like every day we find ourselves talking about how we should communicate with people who may be interested in our app.  We talk about communicating with emotion.   If people don’t feel the message, if our words don’t invoke a deep connection, they’re just words.  A software app lends itself to communication with logic but people seldom remember logical statements.  They decide right from the beginning if they agree with the logic or not.  If they agree, then they don’t feel like they’re learning anything new.  If they don’t agree, the words are almost immediately shut off and seldom remembered.  Communicating with logic doesn’t create much movement.

Communication with emotion creates a deep need to listen and learn.  Emotion is about communication.

Humility

Humility should not be a new concept to you, the reader of this blog.  We’ve talked about the need for humility many times.  It is number one on my list of great leadership traits.   Humility says we’re all in this together—let’s figure it out together!  Lack of humility is ego.  Ego says “I have all the answers—listen to me and do what I say.  I’m smarter than you.”

Humility says I don’t have all the answers.  Humility wants to know what the other person thinks and gives that information equal status. They may have a better idea.  They certainly have a point of view that makes others think and see things in a different way.

Humility listens to other people with the intention to understand.  People feel heard.  It makes people want to be more of a participant.  Humility is powerful.

Humanity

I’ve written in previous blogs about an exercise I used when working with teams.  I called the exercise “Human beings, not human doings.”

I always started the session with a couple of simple rules:

  1. Listen with the Intent to Understand.  You could ask questions, but only to clarify or increase your understanding.  No advice was to be offered, just listen.
  2. Put away anything you may have in front of you: papers, reports, and most importantly phones.  Pay attention to the other person.

The process was simple.  I asked each person to share a person or event that has deeply shaped their values.  We never ended a single meeting without tears.  It deeply affected people.  They were being Human Beings.  It was not about what they did or what was their title.  This was exposing their humanity.

These three things: Emotion, Humility, and Humanity were three traits that Howie Mandel claimed were possessed by people who had changed the world!

I agree. We may define your world as your team.  We may think of an impact on the whole world.  But without these three, you don’t have a chance to influence either.

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BlogCulture

Rut or Groove?

by Ron Potter

Are you in a rut or a groove?

One of the cartoons I enjoy is Animal Crackers by Mike Osbun.  In a recent strip, one character with a glum face says, “I’m in a rut.”  The other character with a cheerful face says “I’m in a groove.”  The first character says “Trade ya.”

Definition of Rut and Groove

The definitions of the two words are surprisingly similar.

Rut:  A long deep track made by repeated passage.

Groove: A long, narrow cut or depression, especially made to guide motion.

Notice that they are both long.  However, the rut is deep and caused by repeatedly doing the same thing.  Einstein says, “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, but expecting different results.”  That seems like a good definition of being in a rut.

Groove is defined as a narrow cut (not deep) but is there to guide your motion.

How Do We Move from Rut to Groove?

In the Animal Crackers cartoon, when the character says ‘trade ya’ he doesn’t seem to believe that trading is possible.  He’s stuck in his rut and there’s nothing that can be done about it.

But there is something that can be done.  Notice in the definitions that a rut is a deep cut while a groove is a narrow cut.  All it takes is deciding to move from rut to groove.

The Mind Projects in Straight Lines

A friend of mine told me that something I had said to him 40+ years ago was helping him get through some tough times.  He reminded me that I had learned early that the human mind tends to project in straight lines—if things are going bad, it seems like they’ll continue to go bad.  If things are going good, we assume they will always be good.  But life never travels along straight lines.  Things constantly change.

When You’re in a Rut

If you’re in a rut, the straight lines projected by the mind believe you will always be in a rut.  Not true!  Things change.  The real question is, how do we get into a groove sooner?  How do we ‘trade ya’ as our Animal Cracker friend says?  And there’s a simple answer to that question!

Attitude

It always amazes me how much attitude and outlook makes a difference.

There’s a story about the first days of NASA as they were preparing to go to the moon.  One of the head scientists was on his way home late one night so he cut through the giant hanger that had been built for the spacecraft.  As he was crossing the cavernous space, he saw one of the janitors sweeping up the floor.  In an effort to make a human connection, he asked the janitor what he was doing.  The janitor, with wonder in his eyes, said, ‘Haven’t you heard?  We’re going to the moon!’  He wasn’t just pushing a broom, he was helping get the hanger ready, so they could go to the moon.  Great attitude!

A woman who was in the audience when I was speaking wrote me a letter.  She would drag herself out of bed and get to her job just because she needed to provide for her family.  She hated it.  She not only hated the company she worked for, she hated the industry because she assumed all the companies dealt with the same issues.

After listening to the message about attitude, she decided to change.

By the time she wrote to me, she couldn’t wait to get started at her job every morning.  She loved her job, she loved the people she was working with, and she remembered why she chose that industry in the first place.  It was still the same place on Monday that it had been on Friday when she heard the message about attitude.  The only thing that changed was her attitude and remembering what she loved about her work to start with.  Her attitude had changed—nothing else.

How much of your attitude impacts your energy and excitement about what you’re doing and where you’re doing it?  Think about it.  It may have more to do with it than you realize.

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BlogTeam

The First Failure of Socialism

by Ron Potter

We have just finished Thanksgiving, or what we experience as Thanksgiving in this age of Covid.  It is a time, rightfully so, for each of us to talk about what we’re thankful for.  However, let’s not forget that the pilgrim settlement in plymouth in the early 1600s may be socialism’s first failure

Needs vs Work

In the settlement, all that was needed by individuals was provided from them, having been either produced or paid for by the collective-owned farms.  The “accounting” system was determined by what the individuals needed rather than how hard they worked or earned their way.

Discontent and Starvation

The strongest colonists who worked hard in the fields all day began to resent those that received the same amount for doing nothing while the able-bodied provided all of the hard work to supply the goods.  In addition to the discontent, nearly half of the colonists died during that first winter because too many people took advantage of the supplies provided by the few.

Nearly 400 years later, Margaret Thatcher, the Prime Minister of the UK said, “The trouble with socialism is that eventually, you run out of other people’s money.”

Socialism Abandoned

About two years after the famine brought on by the socialism approach, the pilgrims decided that enough was enough, a new approach was undertaken that required each family to provide for themselves.  It required hard work.

Work Application

If you’ve followed my blogs, you know that I’ve tried to stay away from politics for the most part.  So how do we look at our own and other’s failed attempts at socialism?

How does socialism disguise itself in the workplace?  It’s not all that hard to see.  Some people are there simply for the paycheck.  No motivation.  No extra effort.  No innovation.  Unfortunately, those people are left in place for various reasons even though it’s obvious to their colleagues and others they’re not pulling their weight.

What happens when that attitude is allowed to continue?  Other people either:

  • Begin to exhibit the same traits: “Why should I put in the extra effort, create my own motivation, look for innovative approaches when others are not and no one seems to notice?”
  • Leave for new employment: If a person is hard-working, motivated, innovative, they begin to look for a different place to work.  Just like our pilgrim’s failed effort, it leads to starvation.  Starvation is the sense that productivity begins to dwindle and those left tend to wither on the vine.

Winston Churchill (where are all these UK quotes coming from all of a sudden? 😉) is quoted as saying, “Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all those others that have been tried.”

Don’t put up with it

This form of socialism in the workplace leads to failure.  Every time I’ve seen the “deadwood” taken out of the system, I’ve seen productivity increase.  Not just for a moment, but long-term.  Pulling together a team of highly motivated, hard-working individuals will always lead to long-term productivity gains.

Build a Team

Build a team of highly motivated people, each being productive, and you will experience long-term growth like you’ve never seen before.

Radar

Recently I watched a documentary on the development of radar that is credited with saving England during the Nazi air blitz of London.  Many times individuals wanted to quit but they were always reminded that they were part of a team that was bigger than any individual.  It took a team to accomplish the goal.

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BlogCulture

Heeeeere’s Johnny!

by Ron Potter

I’ve recently noticed there are Johnny Carson reruns from his old “Tonight” show on one of the networks.  I always considered Carson the best night-time TV host so I began to watch a few.  Overall, I have not been disappointed.

Humility

While I’m sure that Johnny Carson had a reasonably big ego, it seemed that he treated every guest with equal respect and humility.  It didn’t make any difference if the person was the hottest movie star of the day or had just won a contest for catching gumdrops in their mouth.  The person had accomplished something and Carson respected them for it.  He would often join the person on stage and attempt to duplicate their effort almost always failing miserably.  Once again to demonstrate their accomplishment and respect them for it.

Monologue

But the real topic of this blog is listening!  Elizabeth Bernstein wrote an article for the Wall Street Journal titled No One is Listening?  Maybe You’re the Problem.

I’ve written several times about listening with the intent to understand vs. listening with the intent to respond.  Many of our communication problems happen because we’re preparing our response rather than trying to listen and understand what the other person is saying.

But Ms. Bernstien made one point in the article that many talkers engage in monologue rather than dialogue.

Carson always started his show with a monologue.  While he certainly was listening to the audience for clues about how funny his statement was, he simply went on with the rest of his monologue just as he had written and practiced it.

The WSJ article said “Often talkers engage in a monologue rather than a dialogue.  They drone on and ignore the listener’s clues that he or she is disengaged.”

They’re speaking in a monologue while seemingly engaged in a dialogue.  And then rate the “listener” poorly for not being engaged.

Dialogue

But once Johnny had a guest sitting across the desk from him, he seemed to fully switch to a dialogue.  He listened.  He made eye contact.  He asked open-ended questions.  He encouraged the other person to elaborate.

Let’s examine the word Dialogue for a minute.  I have observed teams that use:

  • Debate
  • Discussion
  • Dialogue (although very few understand or have been taught what it means to dialogue)

Debate

Many of you have been on debate teams in high school or college.  If you’ll recall, you were often given positions on a topic that you may not have even believed.  But you still had to debate and in fact, were graded on your debating skills whether you believed in the topic or not.  The goal of the debate was to “win.”  If your goal in a team meeting or engaging with another person is to win the debate, you may actually accomplish the goal but over time will be ignored and shunned for your lack of dialogue abilities.

Discussion

Most teams will tell me that they’ve learned the negative aspects of debating and have avoided them by making sure the team is having a good discussion.  While their intentions and often their actions are good, they don’t really know the root of the word discussion.  The word discussion has the same root as percussion.  I played in the percussion section in my high school band.  When we were out marching in a parade or other pageantry, I played the snare drum and my job was to play it as loud as possible to help the band stay in order and be heard over the crowd.  All too often, teams turn to discussion where the loudest person wins through sheer force and percussion.

Dialogue

Dialogue has a pattern that will help a team reach a unified position.  There is much to be learned about dialogue and it can be modified to the team’s particular needs but in general, follows this pattern:

  • Boil the issue down to two positions so that you can decide (eliminate one of the options)
  • Once down to two positions, dialogue them one at a time.
    • This means that for a period of time “everyone” on the team is on the same side to help lead the position to great success.
  • Once each position has been dialogued, decide.  Eliminate one position and put all the team’s energy into the chosen position.  It’s amazing how quickly one position can be reached when the debate and discussion are removed from the process.  It’s also amazing how powerful one position can become when everyone is behind its success.

Heeeeere’s Johnny!

Treat each other with respect!

Treat each topic and position with dignity!

Get the entire team on the same page!

You’ll experience power and speed beyond what you imagined possible.

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