Here’s a great Harvard Business Review article on the 10 Fatal Flaws that sabotage great leadership.

The leaders I’m coaching are all too aware of how these fatal flaws can be damaging blind-spots.

Can you find yourself in any of these leadership flaws?
To your continued success,
Ruth

TEN FATAL FLAWS THAT DERAIL LEADERS
by Jack Zenger and Joseph Folkman (June 2009, Harvard Business Review).

Poor leadership in good times can be hidden, but poor leadership in bad times is a recipe for disaster. To find out why leaders fail, we scrutinized results from two studies: In one, we collected 360-degree feedback data on more than 450 Fortune 500 executives and then teased out the common characteristics of the 31 who were fired over the next three years. In the second, we analyzed 360-degree feedback data from more than 11,000 leaders and identified the 10% who were considered least effective. We then compared the ineffective leaders with the fired leaders to come up with the 10 most common leadership shortcomings. Every bad leader had at least one, and most had several.
The Worst Leaders:
1. Lack energy and enthusiasm. They see new initiatives as a burden, rarely volunteer, and fear being overwhelmed. One such leader was described as having the ability to “suck all the energy out of any room.”
2. Accept their own mediocre performance. They overstate the difficulty of reaching targets so that they look good when they achieve them. They live by the mantra “Under-promise and over-deliver.”
3. Lack clear vision and direction. They believe their only job is to execute. Like a hiker who sticks close to the trail, they’re fine until they come to a fork.
4. Have poor judgment. They make decisions that colleagues and subordinates consider to be not in the organization’s best interests.
5. Don’t collaborate. They avoid peers, act independently, and view other leaders as competitors. As a result, they are set adrift by the very people whose insights and support they need.
6. Don’t walk the talk. They set standards of behavior or expectations of performance and then violate them. They’re perceived as lacking integrity.
7. Resist new ideas. They reject suggestions from subordinates and peers. Good ideas aren’t implemented, and the organization gets stuck.
8. Don’t learn from mistakes. They may make no more mistakes than their peers, but they fail to use setbacks as opportunities for improvement, hiding their errors and brooding about them instead.
9. Lack interpersonal skills. They make sins of both commission (they’re abrasive and bullying) and omission (they’re aloof, unavailable, and reluctant to praise).
10. Fail to develop others. They focus on themselves to the exclusion of developing subordinates, causing individuals and teams to disengage.

These sound like obvious flaws that any leader would try to fix. But the ineffective leaders we studied were often unaware that they exhibited these behaviors.

In fact, those who were rated most negatively rated themselves substantially more positively. Leaders should take a very hard look at themselves and ask for candid feedback on performance in these specific areas. Their jobs may depend on it.

To your continued success,
Ruth

Surrender?

When you think about surrender, you don’t likely think of great leadership. People who surrender, lose, right?

The dictionary tells us that surrender, as a verb, means things like: “to yield possession or power,” “to give (oneself) up,” “to give up, abandon or relinquish.” These are hardly the ideas we connect with leaders we aspire to emulate.

Or it is?

Yet, in order to lead effectively, whether on the shop floor, the cube farm or anywhere else, there are things the best leaders can and do surrender. And when you surrender these same things, you will accelerate your influence and effectiveness as a leader.

Great Leaders surrender . . .

. . . the need to be right. The best leaders know that the goal is for the group to get to best result. It doesn’t have to be their idea, and in fact, even if it is, it will be more effective when the group feels they own it. They also know that an “I told you so,” is never a valuable part of a coaching conversation.

. . . the need to speak first. The best leaders know they will, in many situations, achieve more and get better results if they shut up. They let their teams talk, discuss and explore. They know that when they start talking they might inhibit the ideas and input from the team. So they remain quiet and wait.

. . . the need to decide. Yes, there is a time for leaders to make decisions, but it isn’t all the time. Often, when leaders let go of their need to decide, others will make the same decision, if not a better one.

. . . the need for credit. This is related to the need to be right, but adds an additional component. Leaders who usurp all the credit for the success of their team won’t have the support of their team very long.

. . . the need for control. Often people aspire to leadership roles precisely because they want to have control. Yet how many micro managers and control-mongers do you want to follow?

Do you notice how all of these are framed as needs? Because we see them as needs, surrendering them feels like such a loss. But are they truly needs, or just strong wants? And while you may want these things (a lot), you likely want some other things too.

Do you want? . . .

. . . greater results. The best leaders lead because they know they can’t do it alone. They want their team to hit their targets, make progress and have success.

. . . greater influence. Different than power, influence is granted by others, when they choose to listen, to follow and to change.

. . . greater satisfaction. Who doesn’t want greater satisfaction from their work? Great leaders get great satisfaction from the growth of their team members in both skills and confidence. They know they didn’t do it for them, but they get a deep satisfaction for their contribution.

. . . greater significance. Great leaders want to make a difference, leave a legacy and make things better. Few things feel better than knowing you have truly made a difference.

Great leaders want these things. Highly effective human beings want these things. And if you want the last four things, you must surrender the first five.

If you agree that the last four are more meaningful and important, it will be easier (though not necessarily easy) to let go of, abandon, or surrender the first five. Think of the last four as the reason to let go.

When you see this – you have a glimpse of the great leader you can become.

What will you let go of, what will you surrender today?

Resource: by KEVIN EIKENBERRY on APRIL 9, 2012
Photo: Courtesy of MorgueFile, ManicMorFF.

“I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing.
Only I will remain.”
― Frank Herbert, Dune

On the other side of your fear is your possibility.

Remember that your doubts are nothing more than the lies your fears have sold you.
- Robin Sharma

To your continued success,
Ruth

Enjoy,
Ruth

1. Have active ways to listen to your employees.
2. Check often with employees to see if the information you are sharing with them is what they need and what they want.
3. Share information about customer satisfaction with employees.
4. Discuss financial performance with your employees and be sure everyone understands the importance of profitability and how they can contribute to profitability.
5. Allow ad hoc teams among employees to form to address organizational problems and work with those teams to tackle the identified issues.
6. Encourage employees to make suggestions for improvement whether those ideas are large or small.
7. Take an idea from one employee and share it with other employees and teams and let everyone make a contribution to build upon that idea.
8. Train!
9. For long-term employees, find ways to keep their jobs interesting through new assignments and challenges.
10. Conduct meetings around specific issues and brainstorm solutions.

Resource:  

“Involving people in the business is the most effective way to produce an organization in which people know more, care more, and do the right things,” explains Edward Lawler III, Professor, University of Southern California, as quoted in the book, 1001 Ways To Energize Employees, by author Bob Nelson.

I’d love to hear from you.  What practices does your organization implement to keep their workforce engaged?  Is this even on their radar?  What could you do to be part of the solution and improve employee engagement in your company?

To your continued success,

Ruth

Every single business outcome improves when your brain is in a positive state – the brain is 31% more productive than when in a negative, neutral, or stressed state, 37% better at sales, and doctors are 19% more accurate in their diagnoses.

I liked how he explained the biology of the brain and how the dopamine that floods into the brain when we’re in a positive state makes us happier but also turns on all the learning centres in the brain which allows us to adapt to the world in a more effective way.

Here’s a few things you can start doing for the next 21 days to become more positive:
1. 3 Gratitudes – write about 3 things you’re grateful for and watch how your brain begins to scan it’s environment looking for a pattern of positivity.
2. Journal – when you write about a positive experience you relive it and it sustains your positivity.
3. Exercise – because of the positive chemicals it creates and because it teaches your brain that your behaviour matters.
4. Meditation – stop multi-tasking and calm your brain and body down for greater focus, peace of mind, and replenishment.
5. Conscious Acts of Kindness – doing something nice for someone else makes you feel better and makes the world a better place.

To your continued success,
Ruth

Those of you in sales should take note. Never judge an “up” by their appearance! They might just inspire you.

To your continued success,
Ruth

If you don’t have time to read a bunch of books on the topic, tackle a handful of these tips, complied from the works of many authors:

1. Don’t micromanage
2. Don’t be a bottleneck
3. Focus on outcomes, not minutiae
4. Build trust with your colleagues before a crisis comes
5. Assess your company’s strengths and weaknesses at all times
6. Conduct annual risk reviews
7. Talk about values more than rules
8. Reward how a performance is achieved and not only the performance
9. Constantly challenge your team to do better
10. Celebrate your employees’ successes, not your own
11. Err on the side of taking action
12. Communicate clearly and often
13. Be visible
14. Eliminate the cause of a mistake
15. View every problem as an opportunity to grow
16. Summarize group consensus after each decision point during a meeting
17. Praise when compliments are earned
18. Be decisive
19. Say “thank you” and sincerely mean it
20. Send written thank you notes
21. Listen carefully and don’t multi-task while listening
22. Teach something new to your team
23. Show respect for all team members
24. Follow through when you promise to do something
25. Be courageous, quick and fair

Resource:  Leadership Weekly Digital, Posted by Eric Jacobson.