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BlogLeadership

Leading Change

by Ron Potter March 9, 2023

The basis for this blog is a Harvard Business Review article by Patti Sanchez titled “The Secret to Leading Organizational Change is Empathy.”

I’ve had several experiences in my consulting career and personal life that emphasize the importance of empathy. One of them was a personal experience.

The Association

We moved into a new city several years ago to be closer to one daughter and her family. This particular family lived in the Middle East for at least ten years and we wanted to spend more time getting to know our grandkids before they went off to college. After looking at several possible locations we settled on a small community of condos within a couple of miles of our daughter’s house.

After a few years, I was asked to be the association president. The president before me had been in that position for several years and it seemed to him he was constantly dealing with conflict. When I agreed to run and won the presidential position, his words to me were something like, “Good Luck. This is a rough crowd.” He felt like there were competing desires within the homeowners and there was no way to reconcile them.

There were only sixteen homeowners in the association, so the first thing I decided to do was get to meet and listen to the needs of each of them. I had no agenda and no particular goal. I just wanted to listen and show empathy.

I visited each of the sixteen families and just listened. No goal. No timeframe. No rush. Each family invited me in and talked with me about their situation and desires. I made no attempt to correct or guide them, I just wanted to hear them. I left each visit with no promises made. I had just listened.

There were a couple of difficult issues that the association faced. After those visits, I formulated my plans (with the executive team) and let the residents know what I was going to recommend for a vote at our annual meeting a few weeks later. They had been controversial issues for a few years and I wondered how the discussion and vote would go. There wasn’t much discussion, so we put the issues to vote. All the issues were passed by unanimous votes. People felt they had been listened to. In fact even now, several years later, one of the residents who had been the most controversial and vocal calls me “the best president they ever had.” Why? Because I listened to her with empathy.

Who’s the Boss?

Another issue I remember is related to my consulting career. The CEO resided in the US but they had major operations in Europe and SE Asia. The European leader for the company was Irish and resided in Ireland. He was an authoritarian leader. People did what he told them to do or else. After our team meeting about leading with empathy, I was hoping he would change. Unfortunately, not.

When I began to talk with him about being a leader, I asked him to describe what a leader was like. He proceeded to tell me about the British ruling Ireland. The Anglo-Norman invasion of Ireland by English kings happened in the last 1100s. His view of being a strong leader went back nearly a thousand years. But to him, a great, strong leader was based on England ruling Ireland. He wasn’t about to shake that image that a ruler was someone who came in and subjugated people to do what they were told when they were told.

Experience

Question your own thoughts and motives. What has your experience taught you? Who empowers you as an employee, that controlling boss who keeps you under his thumb or the empathetic boss who makes you feel like you’re a part of what’s going on?

Most often people think of an empathic leader as weak and a controlling leader as strong. That’s not true. A great empathic leader is one who helps you grow, develop, listen, and help your team make decisions. A controlling leader is one who makes all the decisions and expects you to respond. My observation over the years is that good people will leave a boss like that as quickly as possible. The people who stay under those conditions are sometimes referred to as “yes men” and all the creativity leaves the organization. Believe me, now and in the coming years creativity will become more and more required. Without it, companies will die quickly.

Fortune 500

Only sixty companies remain that were in the Fortune 500 after WWII. Why is that? One of my beliefs is that after WWII, most of the companies on the list were being run by officers from the war. They knew how to “command.” They expected their commands to be carried out without question. Companies were generally not creative. In order to survive the coming years, companies (leaders) will be required to be creative.

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BlogLeadership

Boss – Leader

by Ron Potter January 5, 2023

On LinkedIn the other day, Fabio Moioli displayed a chart with the differences between a Boss and a Leader.  I thought it was well done and here are the ten he listed:

Touchy, Feely Consultant

The more I looked at the list the more powerful it became.  I’ve had bosses that fit mostly in the Boss category and a few bosses that fit into the Leader category.  I had a very successful consulting career for 30 years.  As I looked at the list and thought about how I conducted my consulting work, I believe much of the success I experienced was due to the fact that I worked off the Leader list as much as possible.  It also struck me that it had been very difficult functioning as a helpful consultant when the person I was working with believed very much in the Boss list.

I remember one vice president who functioned on the Boss side of the ledger.  To start with, he could just not figure out why his boss had hired me to help him with his leadership skills.  After all, he had been very successful (in his mind) working on the Boss side of the ledger.  Why on earth would he need this touchy, feely consultant?  He just didn’t get it.

Almost everyone who had worked for him over the years had either asked for a transfer or left the company.  When I asked him about that statistic, he considered them weak and blamed them for their failures.  It obviously had nothing to do with him.

Boss vs Leader

If you’re in a leadership position, think about each of those terms.

  • When you’re talking about the success of your group, are you talking about the great example you presented so that your team would do the right thing?
  • When you give an assignment to one of your direct reports, do you explain every detail and how you want it done, or do you allow them to be creative?  I’ve worked with people who had that micromanaging boss and it wasn’t long before they stopped taking any initiative and just waited for the boss to tell them what to do.
  • It’s easy to criticize.  It takes work and discipline to encourage when things go wrong.  I’m a football fan.  You can always tell what kind of coach you’re watching just by how they treat their players when the player makes a mistake.  Those who encourage the player and help them learn build great teams full of players that want to do their best.
  • Focusing on weaknesses vs strengths can be a tough one.  I don’t believe it’s a good idea to ignore weaknesses but it’s also important to help your team learn from their weaknesses and turn them into strengths.
  • I’ve also been in team meetings where the boss never shuts up.  Pretty soon most of the participants tune out what is being said and never learn.  The leader who listens and encourages grows great teams.
  • Whether they intend to or not, bosses are always inspiring others.  They either inspire fear or enthusiasm.  Inspiring fear brings the growth of a team to a halt.  As a leader, make sure others are inspired to be enthusiastic and do better.  Growing teams become powerful teams.

Easy to Get Trapped

It’s very easy to remain a Boss when you should be a Leader.  Being a Leader brings risks.  If the team fails, you feel like you’re failing.  But don’t make the mistake of believing that being a Boss will eliminate failure.

The best approach to becoming (or remaining) a Leader is to have a confidant who will tell you the straight story.  This confidant may be an outside or inside consultant.  It may be someone on the team who you trust and who is not afraid to tell you straight out how you’re performing.  It may be someone totally removed from the work environment that you can talk with and be straight with and they’ll be straight with you.

But all of these things are difficult to see on your own.  It takes a partner of some sort who you trust will give you the straight scoop.

Being a Leader

It’s difficult to be a Leader.  It takes hard work, good listening skills, and a lot of humility.  Find someone you trust who you can be honest with and they’ll be honest with you.  It will pay you great rewards.

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BlogPersonal

Influential People

by Ron Potter December 15, 2022

A few weeks ago I talked about Ashira Jones and the influence she had on my life.   She may not even remember meeting me.

I decided to talk about a few other people who were also an influence in my life.

I would have to list my father as number one on that list.

My Father

My father grew up in a small town in southern Michigan where he also raised me and my siblings.  For the most part, he only left Michigan a couple of times in his life.

The most impactful departure was WWII.  His first assignment was in Northern Africa.  He was part of the force that chased Rommel across and then out of North Africa.  That part of his military career was part of the Allied Forces that fought the Germans in Tunisia and drove them from the African continent and back to Europe.  (My daughter and her husband now live in Tunis.  My son-in-law is the Facility Manager for the US Embassy there.)  As my father’s unit chased Rommel back into Europe he ended up in Anzio.  There was one of the worst battles for the Allied Forces and he lost a leg from a shrapnel hit and was shipped home.

With one leg (which must have left him in constant pain) he wore an ill-fitting artificial leg (nothing like the high-tech legs of today) and yet started a bottled-gas business that required him to wrestle 100-pound propane cylinders (empty) and crawl under old farmhouses (the rural community was converting from coal and fuel oil to propane).

And yet I never heard him complain about his life.  He was a fantastic human being and anytime I feel like I could complain about my life circumstances, I think of him.  He was one of the most influential people in my life.

My Physics Instructor

Mr. Steven Ray was my high school physics instructor.  It seemed to me that he was always “picking” on me.  He would always be saying “Potter, what’s the answer?”  “Potter, what were the steps you took to come to your conclusion?”  “Potter, come to the board and show the class your work.”

One day I ran into him in a back hallway with no one around.  I asked him why he was always picking on me.  His answer was “Because you’re worth it.”  That stopped me in my tracks.  I had nothing I could say.  After a few minutes silence, he smiled and patted me on the shoulder.

He was the only high school teacher that I visited after graduation.

Your Real Value

For many years, I worked with a client that ran a global company.  After one session where we had employees for Europe, Asia, North American, and South America, we were sitting in his office talking about the day.  The name of my company was Team Leadership Culture.

He started by telling me what a great job we had done building teams.

Next, he told me how I had taught him to be a great leader.

Finally, we talked about taking this learning throughout the culture.

There we had it.  Team Leadership Culture.  I was feeling very good about what we had accomplished.  Then he said, “But your real value is…”  I was floored.  He had just listed every element of my business TLC and I had no idea what he was talking about.  We were in his office with our shoes off and just chatting.  He said that my real value was when we just sat around and talked about where the company was and how he was doing.  He found as much value in that as he did when I was working on TLC.

Influential People Is a Choice

Just like the “firsts” that I wrote about last, the people that have been influential in our lives help shape us into the human beings that we are.  But keep in mind that we have a choice about who influences our lives.  Look at their character.  Are you being influenced by people of high character?  Take a look at what they talk about and how they see the world.  Is everything focused on them?  Do they see the world as being against them?  If we have selected people of high character and people who think more of others than they do themselves, they’re worth having as people of influence in our lives.  In fact, they’ll see more about who we are than we do ourselves.  They’re worth being chosen as People of Influence in our lives.

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BlogIn-Depth Book Reviews

Management of the Absurd

by Ron Potter May 5, 2022

As I continue the review of some of the books I’ve read through the years, next up is Management of the Absurd by Richard Farson.

Management of the Absurd

A dictionary definition of the word absurd calls it “wildly unreasonable or illogical.”  I consider myself both highly reasonable and logical so this definition didn’t make sense to me.  Which may be why I read it.  My notes alone for the book totaled up to 15 pages so I guess it caught my interest.

This book is written by Richard Farson.  In the book, he lays out eight parts.

  1. A Different Way of Thinking
  2. The “Technology of” Human Relations
  3. The Paradoxes of Communication
  4. The Politics of Management
  5. Organizational Predicaments
  6. Dilemmas of Change
  7. The Aesthetics of Leadership
  8. Avoiding the Future

I’ll quickly touch on each of the eight parts but I think you’ll notice the absurdity in the titles themselves.

A Different Way of Thinking

The most important discoveries come from taking a fresh look at what people take for granted.  They cannot see it because it is too “obvious” or is what they expect to see or not seen.  Farson calls this the invisible obvious.  I’ve often seen when the “expert” doesn’t pay any attention to the new person on the team or someone who doesn’t have the same “expertise” they do on a particular topic.  The absurdity comes from the fact that the best new creative ideas come from the person who is taking a fresh look at a topic.  This can come from the new person or, if you train yourself well, you can provide that fresh look no matter how much of an “expert” you are on a topic.

The “Technology of” Human Relations

Farson says that “The more important a relationship, the less skill matters.”  In both parenthood and management, it’s not so much what we do as what we are that counts.  It is the ability to meet each situation armed not with a battery of techniques but with an openness that permits a genuine response.

Effective leaders and managers do not regard control as the main concern.  Instead, they approach situations as learners or teachers or sometimes both.

My take from this section is the openness and genuine response that people respect and will be motivated by.  Trying to control or dictate situations will not motivate people.

The Paradoxes of Communication

Paradox is another one of those interesting words.  Webster says that it is “a statement that is seemingly contradictory or opposed to common sense and yet is perhaps true.”

Listening can also be a disturbing experience.  All of us have strong needs to see the world in certain ways, and when we really listen, so that we understand the other person’s perspective, we risk being changed ourselves.

The best kind of listening comes not from technique but from being genuinely interested in what really matters to the other person.

This is what I have come to think of as listening to understand rather than listening to respond.  Often when we’re listening to the other person, we’re building a list in our head about how were are going to respond.  That’s easier and takes less energy than listening to truly understand what the other person is saying and the belief system they are basing their statement upon.  Listening to understand creates a different set of questions, often forcing the other person to expose their own belief system.

The Politics of Management

Fighting for the rights of special groups has contributed to an erosion of civility.  When people are treated as representatives of special groups, society is fragmented.  The achievement and preservation of the community must become our top priority.  Otherwise, the concept of rights has no meaning.

Organizational Predicaments

Organizations that need help most will benefit from it least.

I experienced this with one client I worked with many years ago.  The head of HR knew that the team needed help and convinced them to employ my services.  After talking with the head of HR, I decided to highly discount my services because I didn’t believe that would have been willing to pay my going fee.  In their mind, they just weren’t in that bad of shape.  After working with the team for almost a year I believed we had learned a lot and gotten much better.  If we were climbing a ten-step ladder, we had just successfully made it up to step one.  However, to the team this was seen as such great strides—they felt like they had reached the top of the ladder.  Because they were so much better than they had been a year ago they no longer had a need for my services.  In their mind, they had achieved everything they could have.

Dilemmas of Change

I’ve talked about the word “dilemma” before.  The foundation is “dilaminent” which meant horns.  Being on the horns of a bull put you in a dilemma.  You’re going to get gored either way.

Our author Farson makes the point that creative ideas are relatively easy to elicit.   Implementing them is a much tougher task.

Farson says that it’s important that we fail.  We need to fail ofter.  If we don’t, it means we’re not testing our limits.

The Aesthetics of Leadership

Farson says, “There are no leaders, there is only leadership.”

One of the great enemies of organizational effectiveness is our stereotypical image of a leader.  We imagine a commanding figure perhaps standing in front of an audience, talking, not listening.  The real strength of a leader is the ability to elicit the strength of the group.  Leadership is less the property of a person than the property of a group.

Avoiding the Future

Farson closes with “If absurdity is ubiquitous, if the most important goals are lost causes, why do we keep playing this absurd game?  We play it because it is the only game in town.  Of course, it is absurd.  Of course, it is only a game.  But it is a game well worth playing and worth playing well.”

Management of the Absurd is a long thought-provoking book.  I have not done it justice in the blog so I suggest you find a copy, read it, and underline it so that you come away with the greatest learnings for you.

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BlogIn-Depth Book Reviews

The Five Dysfunctions of a Team

by Ron Potter April 28, 2022

As I continue the review of some of the books I’ve read through the years, The Five Dysfunctions of a Team by Patrick Lencioni seemed like a natural fit after looking at Peter Senge’s The Fifth Discipline.

Lencioni pictures a nice pyramid with the following elements:

  • Absence of Trust (as the base)
  • Fear of Conflict
  • Lack of Commitment
  • Avoidance of Accountability
  • Division of Company Results

Absence of Trust

This comes from the unwillingness to be vulnerable and not genuinely open within the team.  This makes it impossible to build the foundation of trust.

The absence of trust comes from several issues but I believe the main one is a lack of being open about our belief system.  It’s good to hold strong belief systems.  But it’s important to remember that each of us is unique based on history and experiences.  While holding too strong beliefs, it’s also important that we be open to exposing our ideas and beliefs to others on the team for scrutiny and building a shared belief system.

I have three siblings.  We grew up in the same household with the same parents.  However, speaking to each other as adults it became clear that we each have very different memories and belief systems.  Think about that for a minute.  Today’s society assumes that if we’re in a particular category then we all must think alike and have the same belief systems.

Oh, you’re a white person who grew up in rural America, therefore you must have these belief systems!  Not true!  Yes, I am white and, yes, I did grow up in rural America, but as I just explained that even with those similarities I don’t have the same belief system as my siblings who grew up in the same household with the same parents.  Don’t let people (or for that matter yourself) be put into a category just because we have some broad-based backgrounds.

Fear of Conflict

The failure of building trust in a team can be damaging because it sets the tone for fear of conflict.

Teams that lack trust are incapable of engaging in an unfiltered and passionate debate of ideas.  Instead, they resort to veiled discussions and guarded comments about people, never allowing their own belief systems to be questioned.

Lack of Commitment

Without healthy conflict, it’s impossible to reach team commitment.  If we lack trust because of fear of conflict, it’s impossible to expose our ideas and beliefs to passionate and open debate.  Team members may sign-up as being committed to an idea or position during the meeting but as soon as they walk out of the room and are questioned by someone who knew they believed something else going into the meeting they may say something like “I don’t necessarily agree with the team goal but I’ll support it until a conflict arises between the team goal and my true beliefs.”  This is not commitment, it’s compliance.  True commitment must be in place for a team to move forward together.

Avoidance of Accountability

This most often happens when team members are fearful to call out other members whose actions don’t align with their supposed commitment.  Not holding each other accountable to the team commitment will quickly break down the trust and commitment of the team.  Being a leadership team means you’ll need to make difficult decisions.  Without the accountability to the difficult decision, you’re not really a team, just a group of people trying to lead on your own belief system without the commitment of a team with you.

Cohesive Teams

Cohesive teams:

  • Trust one another
  • Engage in unfiltered conflict about ideas (not people)
  • Commit to decisions and plans of action
  • Hold each other accountable for the commitment
  • Focus on the achievement of team results
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BlogLeadership

Are You the Smartest or the Hardest Working?

by Ron Potter November 25, 2021

Jamie Dimon has been a very successful leader of JPMorgan Chase for many years.  He talked of the traits to succeed that I found very interesting.

Traits of Successful Leaders

Mr. Dimon’s list of successful leadership traits included:

  • Humility
  • Openness
  • Fairness
  • Authenticity

He also included a shortlist of traits that don’t lead to being a successful leader.

  • Smartest person in the room
  • Hardest working person in the room

Later in the article, he enhanced these traits even further by distinguishing between management and leadership.

He identifies Management as

  • Get it done
  • Follow-up
  • Discipline
  • Planning
  • Analysis
  • Facts, facts, facts

This is a great list and is much needed to run a business.  But these are management traits, not leadership traits.

Dimon goes on to say that the key to leadership is not just doing the management thing but having respect for people. (Italics mine)

Elements of Leadership

Humility.  This is the number one trait of great leadership that I list in my book Trust Me.  The understanding of humility has taken a wrong turn since the original definition.  Humility is not being a doormat or turning the other cheek.

The original definition of humility meant tremendous power under complete control.   Notice that there is tremendous power.  Much of that power is identified in Dimon’s management list above.  But leadership has this strong element of humility.  One of the key elements of humility is having a deep respect for every individual.  If that respect is not there, it leaves untethered power.

Humility is the number one issue of great leadership.  Humility doesn’t happen without a deep respect for each individual.

Openness.  Some of the words related to openness include accessible, lack of secrecy, and frankness.  Being open means that you’re accessible.  Being accessible in general, people can talk with you at any time about anything.

Being accessible in meetings—because people feel and experience the respect you have for them, they are completely at ease talking about any issue.  And because you’re frank, they also know they can state their beliefs and assumptions and they’ll hear the same from you.  They also know that your frank opinion is not the final say but another point of view to be considered in the “team” decision.

Fairness.  Once again, a dictionary definition is very helpful:  “Impartial and just treatment or behavior without favoritism or discrimination.”  Can you see the equal respect for each individual in that statement?  Being fair with your team means taking each and every opinion and belief as equally valid.

Great teams understand that their individual beliefs and assumptions may not be the final answer but if they feel listened to with great respect, then they believe a great team decision will result.

Authenticity.  Authentic people are the same no matter what the circumstances.  There’s no question that you’ll hear the same thing from an authentic person regardless of who they’re speaking to.  They’ll say the same thing to an employee as they will to their boss.  There is no doubt in anyone’s mind.  They are simply themselves regardless of the situation or person they’re speaking with.

Be authentic.  Not being authentic is clearly and immediately noticeable by anyone and everyone.

Are You a Great Leader?

Or do you hope to become a great leader?  Yes, you’ll need to be a good manager but “good” managers begin to let their leadership traits come through even when they’re in a management position.  Even if you’re just a manager you can let the traits of a leader—Humility, Openness, Fairness, Authenticity—come through.

Great leadership traits always shine brighter than great management abilities.

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BlogLeadership

The Good Ole Days

by Ron Potter November 18, 2021

Notice anything unusual about these medieval castle ruins?  You wouldn’t unless you knew it was built in the 18th century to resemble a medieval castle constructed in the mid-five hundreds.

Why do we have this fascination with the “good ole days”?

The Good Ole Days

I was born in the late nineteen forties.  So for me, the good ole days were probably the decade of the ’50s.  I have fond memories of lying in the front yard at night, looking at the stars, and listening to the Tigers play baseball on my portable radio.

We lived in the country about 3 miles from town.  I remember getting on my bike and riding to town and anywhere else I wanted to go.

We also lived on a piece of property with a wonderful stream running through it.  I remember leaving the house with my Red Rider BB gun.  On every occasion, my mother would say “don’t get wet!”  And on every occasion, I would come home wet.

To me, those were the good ole days.

But they weren’t all good.  I remember doing nuclear bomb drills at my school where we got under our desks.  Seems ridiculous now but that was all we had at the time.  My dad who had lost a leg in WWII built a new house in the early ’50s.  Off one corner of the basement, he built what we knew as the “storm shelter” but as I look back today, it may have been his attempt to build a bomb shelter.

Those “good ole days” were not all good.  But my memories of the good parts seem to outweigh the bad parts.  Research demonstrates that our mind enhances those good moments to the point of fantasy.  They were good but not as good as we remember.

The Good Ole Days were short-lived

For me, those good ole days were pretty much the 50’s.  The 60’s brought the sexual and drug revolution.  I didn’t understand or get involved with either.  I had a family member who dropped out of college in his senior year and moved to Haight-Ashbury in San Francisco.  That made no sense to me at all.

By the 70’s, I had graduated from Engineering School and was working.  I enjoyed it but it was work.  Not like the good ole days of being carefree.

In the ’80s I started a software company.  It was a new technology and it was exciting.  But still not like the good ole days.

From the ’90s on I had moved into Leadership and Team consulting and coaching.  Probably the most satisfying work I could imagine but I also had to sit in an airplane seat for 4 million miles to accomplish it.  Still not the good ole days.

So I began to wonder, are everyone’s “good ole days” short-lived and from an earlier part of their lives?  I imagine they could come from any portion of our lives but I believe they are probably short-lived.  So why this yearning for the good ole days when it was such a small portion of our lives?  A Wall Street Journal article indicated that 41% of Americans believe life is worse today than 50 years ago.

Placing our Identity in the past can be both natural and useful

I must admit that much of my identity is based on my life during the ’50s.  Life seemed to be simpler.  Life seemed to be more about community.  Life seemed to be more carefree.  I would head out the back door and jump on my bike and head in almost any direction I wished.  My grandchildren don’t have that kind of freedom today.  It’s sad to me but I also need to remind myself that every generation has probably experienced very changes.

Leaders and Team Members

I think the lesson here is to not get too stuck in our own “good ole days”, no matter how recent or distant.  I entered the workforce in the early seventies.  That was less than 30 years after the end of WWII.  America was rebuilding and the management approach of the day was built on a military model that many of the leaders had experienced first hand.  But that model was already beginning to chafe on the young generation (me) who wanted to be more entrepreneurial and innovative and not just do what we were told to do.

After starting in traditional engineering work, I saw my first microcomputer.  This was new and exciting and I wanted to be a part of it.  When I told my boss that I wanted to shift out of engineering and into microcomputers his response was “what’s a microcomputer?” I said hang on, you’ll find out.  In a few years, we had shifted the work that we had been doing on an IBM370 which we leased for tens of thousands of dollars per month to microcomputers that cost almost nothing in comparison.

Millennials

As I was wrapping up my 50 years in the business world, almost every leader I was working with was complaining about the millennial generation and their lack of a good work ethic.  I watched that generation get excited about things and put in many hours and a lot of brainpower.  They were working through something entirely new and exciting and different than any company had seen before.  It’s not that they didn’t have a work ethic (good ole day thinking) but they liked tackling things in new and innovative ways.  They were doing things differently, just like every generation before them.

As a leader, you need to keep an open mind and watch with curiosity and interest how the next generation is tackling things.  Mentor them.  Guide them.  Don’t tell them they need to do things as it has always been done in the good ole days.

Learn from them.  One of your jobs as a leader is to keep learning.

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BlogLeadership

Being Smart vs Not Being Stupid

by Ron Potter October 28, 2021

It is remarkable how much long-term advantage people like us have gotten

by trying to be consistently not stupid, instead of trying to be very intelligent.

– Charlie Munger, Berkshire Hathaway.

Most of us would consider Charlie and his partner, Warren Buffet, as being really intelligent.  And yet, here he is saying it’s more advantageous to be consistently not stupid.

Let’s examine those two words—intelligent and stupid.

Intelligent

One definition is “having or showing intelligence, especially of a high level.” (Italics is mine.)

I believe it’s one thing to be intelligent but a very different thing to show intelligence.  We’ve all seen or even commented on the person who is highly intelligent but seems to have no “common sense”.  It’s one thing to be very intelligent about a specific issue but in general, not understanding how the world works as a whole (common sense).

It took me too long to figure this one out.  As a youngster in high school, I was often reminded how intelligent I was.  I just seemed to “get things” like math and physics (not so much chemistry though…) and I had a great curiosity for geography and history.  These were subjects that just came to me.

I wasn’t trying to be the top student but I found I could get acceptable grades just by being smart.

Upon entering Engineering School things were a bit more difficult but once again, I just seemed to get most of the topics without a great deal of effort.  I found I could be one of the fastest at calculations.  I could often just see things and come up with the right answer in my head.  Once again, being highly intelligent seemed to be all I needed.

It wasn’t until I began my career as a leadership and team consultant and coach that I began to realize that being right wasn’t the best approach.  If I acted too smart, there was always someone there to shoot me down at the first opportunity.  My intelligence was not going to help me be a good coach and consultant.

I remember working with one team of a very large corporation that seemed to be stuck.  One of the youngest members of the team asked for some personal time with me.  His first question was “You see what’s going on don’t you?”  My answer was yes.  With that, he then asked, “Are you going to get in there and tell them what they’re doing wrong?”  My answer was no.  He seemed astonished.  Why would I not tell them exactly what I was seeing in order to correct it?  I explained to him that I can’t teach anyone anything, the only thing I can do was to help them learn.

I had learned that being right carried no weight at all.  Helping them learn at their own pace was the only thing that worked regardless of what I was seeing.

Stupid

Stupid is as stupid does.

– Forest Gump.

Don’t confuse stupid with ignorance.  Ignorance means “lack of knowledge or information.”  Ignorance is simply a lack of knowledge.  Stupid has full knowledge—you just ‘know better’.

Maybe one of the best ways to look at the word stupid is by examining its antonyms.  These antonyms include brainy, bright, clever, fast, nimble, quick, quick-witted.  Remember that these are antonyms.

That means stupid is not:

  • brainy
  • bright
  • clever
  • fast
  • nimble
  • quick
  • quick-witted

Remember that Charlie says the advantage comes by not being stupid.

Don’t be brainy, bright, or clever.  All of these signal that you’re smarter than everyone else.

Don’t be fast or nimble.  The means you reach your conclusions quickly.  You’re not listening well and trying to absorb what’s being explained.

Don’t be quick or quick-witted.  Quick-witted means coming to quick, humorous conclusions.  This can often mean that you’re covering up your own stupidity by offering a humous statement— that covers up your lack of understanding.

Consistently not Stupid

Charlie says they try to be consistently not stupid.  This means it takes a great deal of effort to continually act in a non-stupid way. 

I believe the key to being consistently ‘not stupid’ is to be consistently humble.

It takes a great deal of effort to overcome our natural desire to be the best.  But being the best doesn’t mean having the answer first and always being right.  Being the best means sharing your opinions when it makes sense and always realizing that they are only your opinions.

Fully respecting others and their opinions makes you the best and goes a long ways toward not being stupid.

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BlogLeadership

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

by Ron Potter September 16, 2021

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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BlogLeadership

Your Title Doesn’t Make You a Leader

by Ron Potter September 9, 2021

This comes from an article in INC magazine with that same title.

In that article, they list a couple of issues that do make you a leader.

  • “From Intimacy comes ‘Into-Me-See'”
  • “Forget your Title and Be Yourself”

From Intimacy Comes “Into-Me-See”

I’m not sure if I’ll ever remember the “Into-Me-See” when I see the word Intimacy but the point is very clear.

I’ve written many times how important it is to develop trusting relationships with your team.  The manager who says “I’m not here to make friends, I’m here to get the best productivity” doesn’t ever quite realize that the best productivity only happens when people are treated like people and not wholly about what they can accomplish.

This usually breaks down with the manager blaming others for not meeting deadlines, not tackling the issue with enthusiasm, or even being too stupid to get the task done.  They never realize that the task doesn’t meet expectations because people don’t feel valued and connected.

In the article Brene Brown says,

“I define connection as the energy that exists between people when they feel seen, heard and valued; when they can give and receive without judgement; and when they derive sustenance and strength from the relationship.” 

Sustenance and strength from the relationship!  Without building trusting relationships, that sustenance and strength doesn’t exist.

I recently wrote a blog about the Neuroscience of Trust.  Building relationships releases Oxytocin which promotes trust.  In the Inc. article the “into-me-see” statement is explained,

“With intimacy, we mean ‘into-me-see’:  it means that you are seeing the other person, the other human being at the other side of the table with whom you are having a discussion.  Only when someone feels seen, heard, and valued will then listen to what you have to say and, as appropriate, follow your leadership.”

See into other people.  Let them know that you know who they are, not just what they do.  You will build the trust needed to be a great leader.

Forget your Title and Be Yourself

Charlie Munger, partner of Berkshire Hathaway recently said, “It is remarkable how much long-term advantage people like us have gotten by trying to be consistently not stupid, instead of trying to be very intelligent.”

Somehow with new titles comes this concept that we must be smarter than we are or at least smarter than those around us.  That’s stupid.  Charlie says, trying to be consistently not stupid results in long-term advantages.

I’ve coached a few people lately who are taking on a new job and feeling they weren’t quite smart enough for the new role.  I tried to help them understand that everything they needed was already inside them.   They should just be who they are!  They already have what it takes to be great at the new jobs.  They don’t need to be something more! They don’t need to be smarter!  In fact, trying to be smarter only creates obstacles and doubt that keep them from being the best.

Just be yourself.

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BlogLeadership

Honored and Humbled

by Ron Potter August 19, 2021

This blog is personal.

Alumni of the year

I was recently honored as the Alumni of the year from my high school.  I was very honored and humbled.  The upbringing I had as a child doesn’t seem to be available to many people anymore.  I was raised in a small rural Michigan town that was very stable.  Many of my friends I knew all the way from kindergarten to high school graduation.  Some of them I knew even before we started school.

One of those friends and I have occasionally wondered about what was it about our environment and upbringing that allowed us to work comfortably all over the country and world.  This award forced me to get my thoughts down on paper as an answer to that question

God, Family, Friends, Mentors

As I began to collect and record my thoughts, I focused on these four elements that had made difference for me that carried me through a lifetime.

God

One summer I was attending a Christian Camp run by Bill Glass.  At the time, Bill Glass was the defensive end for the Cleveland Browns.  He was big and powerful, a man’s man, and had everything he needed to be a self-reliant individual.  However, that week he spoke often about his total dependence on Christ being his Lord and Savior and that he would be nothing without him.  His message began to sink in with me and by the end of the week, I had also accepted Christ as Savior.

On the last night of the camp, there was a great deal of singing and asking people to come forward to either declare their decisions or acknowledge that they needed to make a decision.  I was in a row of about a dozen guys, standing third from the isle.

I knew I had to go forward to declare my decision but as a 14-year-old boy was struggling with the issue.  Pretty soon the two guys closest to the aisle went down front.  The guy to my right began nudging me saying that I needed to go down front.  I kept saying that I knew I did but just needed a minute.

Finally, after one more nudge, I turned to him to tell him I knew that I did but when I turned to face him, the entire row was empty.  I was the only one in the aisle!  I knew right then that it wasn’t a human that was nudging me and I immediately went down front.  After that my local church began to nurture me, learning more about the Lord as I grew.

Family

At the banquet were all of my siblings, one of my daughters from Tunisia (the other one was at a wedding in Colorado), and many nieces and nephews.  As I looked and talked with each of them it was amazing that they all knew the Lord and were growing in him.  I know that many families have difficulties and we have our share as well, but because we all know the Lord, we stay close and appreciate each other.

Friends

As I said earlier, many of my friends from high school have been my friends for my entire life.  We remain amazingly close and although jobs and family took us in different directions, we still get together as often as we can.  I cherish those moments and feel very blessed and loved by them.  It gives me great strength.

Mentors

This one was difficult because there were so many.  However, I narrowed it down to two because of time.  The first one I identified was my father.  I’m not sure he would have considered himself a mentor but he was to me.  He had lost a leg in WWII that made his life very difficult but he never let it stop him.  He started his own business that required a lot of physical effort, built his (and our) home, and raised a great family.  And never once did I hear him complain!

And although he only had a high school education, he was a non-stop reader and learner.  I would come home from Engineering School with a new concept I had just learned and couldn’t wait to share with him.  But as soon as I did I would find out that he had been reading about the same concept and knew more about it than I did.  I never could get ahead of him.  The most cherished possession that I inherited was his dictionary.  It is 8 x 10 in size and 8 inches thick.  8 inches thick!  A dictionary.

The other mentor that came to mind for me was my high school physics teacher.  There were many times when I thought he was picking on me.  He would say “Potter, what’s the answer?” or “Potter, come to the board and show us how to solve this.”  It just didn’t seem fair to me.  Then one day I ran into him in a back hallway of our school and felt emboldened to confront him.  When I asked why he seemed to be picking on me his answer was “Because you’re worth it!”  He was the only high school teacher I went to visit after graduating from Engineer School.

God, Family, Friend, Mentors

As much as you might like to be, you will never be God.

Other than spouses, you can’t pick who your family will be.

That leaves friends and mentors.  Cultivate friends that will tell you the truth no matter how painful that will be.  Be that kind of friend to them.

Seek out mentors who will help you grow and develop.  And be one yourself.  Maybe it’s a friend you can mentor.  Maybe it’s someone who you believe has great potential that could use your experience and care.  Maybe it’s a grandchild.  They look up to their grandparents whether they express it or not. Let someone else know they’re worth it!

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BlogLeadership

Entitled Anger

by Ron Potter August 12, 2021

“What we know is that entitlement is correlated with anger, meaning the more entitled you are the angrier you get,” said Ryan Martin, the author of Why We Get Mad: How to Use Your Anger for Positive Change.

Entitled

What does it mean to be entitled?  A dictionary definition is:

believing oneself to be inherently deserving of privileges or special treatment
Italics are mine.

Believing oneself!  Yes, it can come from your position in the pecking order but the definition says that you believe you’re entitled and deserve special treatment.

Leadership and Entitlement

I’ll remind my readers that the number one attitude of a great leader is humbleness.  I would say that being humble is the opposite of feeling entitled.

We’ve all run into the entitled leader.  Actually, they are not leaders, they’ve simply obtained a position of leadership.  But they believe that because they have become a VP or general manager, they’re entitled to special treatment and feel no hesitancy to use a command and control style.

Anger

Anger can be real and justified at times.  Even Jesus displayed anger at the money changers that were taking advantage of the poor.

The money changers were taking advantage of those who visited the temple.  This made Jesus angry and he said “My house shall be called the house of prayer”.

Anger can be justified but be very, very careful of your motives.

On a Clear Day You Can See General Motors

Patrick J. Wright is the author of On a Clear Day You Can See General Motors, an account of John De Lorean’s departure from General Motors. (The account is written without De Lorean’s cooperation.)

De Lorean left General Motors to start his own company, Delorean Motor Company (DMC).  If you’re a fan of “Back to the Future” you’ll remember the DMC used by “Doc” to go back in time.

There was one very telling section in that book that described the destructive nature of entitlement.

GM executives arrived at work each morning and their company valet service would pick up their car, take it to the shop, fix any squeaks, rattles, or other issues.  The car was then washed and cleaned inside and out and returned to the executive for their drive home.

Based on these executives’ experience, GM was making some of the finest cars in the world.  But the general public had a different experience.  To them, GM was producing some of the worst cars in the industry.  The executives didn’t understand.  Sometimes they even got angry at the public for thinking that way.  Their anger was based on entitlement!

Do you feel entitled?

That feeling or belief will get you nowhere.  In fact, it will be destructive to you and others.

It can be difficult to see our own entitlement.  You must develop good friends that are not afraid to tell you if you are acting that way.  You must develop a great team that can talk about anything, even your behavior, without fear of reprisal.  Entitlement will destroy you!  Do whatever you can to keep it from creeping into your life.

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