Wings and Roots

As parents and grandparents, we wish one thing for our children and grandchildren, namely wings and roots. As they get older, we mostly focus on theirs wings, wanting them to fly well as they go out into the world. We want them to do well, and to make a difference. We want them to engage with others and to continue to grow into their best selves. 

What we don’t talk about much with our children and grandchildren are their roots. And I think this is a mistake. When we say “wings and roots,” the roots are as important as the wings. They are the inner process of growth and maturity. They are the foundation from which flight takes place. 

When our sons went off to college, I gave each of them the following advice: “Remember who you are, and where you came from.” This had been shared with me by another father. I thought it was a powerful statement for this important life transition. 

When it comes to flying, I am not worried about our children and grandchildren. There is so much support and encouragement for them to do this. What worries me is that they will forget their roots. And in the process, they will forget who they are. The danger is that they will try to meet everyone else’s definition of who they should be. Their inner clarity will be replaced by others’ unhealthy outer expectations and definitions.

Furthermore, I worry that they will forget where they came from. The focus here is not on the physical location of their home, their community, or their state. Instead, the focus is on remembering something that Linda Hogan (Chickasaw) wrote: “You are the result of the love of thousands.” The author reminds us that where we standing and where we come from happened because of the commitment of so many people. 

In our rush to help others fly, we forget that we drink water from wells we did not dig. We warm ourselves by fires that we did not light. We sit in the shade of trees we did not plant. So much love, effort, and commitment is reflected in our existence. Our generational roots can support us each and every day. 

And it is by drawing on our roots, the generational place from where we came from, that we come to realize that our inner light, our inner spark, our inner clarity is connected to all who have come before us, and to the Divine at all times and in all places. As Father Richard Rohr reminds us, “We cannot attain the presence of God because we’re already totally in the presence of God. What’s absent is awareness. Little do we realize that God is maintaining us in existence with every breath we take. As we take another, it means that God is choosing us now and now and now. We have nothing to attain or even learn. We do, however, need to unlearn some things.”

The convergence of our learning, unlearning and relearning takes place when we remember our roots. And this happens best when we tell our current stories and listen to the stories told by our elders. It is the combination of our individual stories, and our collective stories that creates perspective and understanding. As Father Richard Rohr writes: “Why does a story have such power? Because most of us don’t think abstractly. We live in a world of images and and symbols; that’s what moves us. . . . Each of us is a story. We were created by God as a story waiting to be told, and each of us has to find a way to tell our story. In the telling of it we come to recognize and own ourselves.” 

For me, this is the part that is missing when we wish our children wings and roots. We are not creating adequate time and space for the sharing of stories. We are trying to share at the speed of software and tasks when we need to share at speed of listening and relationships. 

When we create open ended time and space for sharing, listening, plus contemplation and reflection about our stories, we create a deep, cellular memory that we stand on the shoulders of those who came before us. Their strength, their love, their efforts, their commitment, and their sacrifices need to be celebrated and acknowledged. Then, we need to be intentional about how we choose to live our lives moving forward. 

I hope as we look to the coming years that all our children and grandchildren will have wings and roots as they head out into the world. I hope they will learn, unlearn, and relearn how to fly and soar. I hope they will achieve their dreams, hopes, and aspirations. I also hope they will make a positive difference in the world. 

At the exact same time that they are flying, I hope they will remember where they came from, and that they will remember their roots. I hope they will recognize that their ability to fly is directly connected to all their relatives and their relationships with others that came before them. I hope that this tap root is deep, strong, and ever growing. And with this realization, they will grasp what the author of Romans 11:18 was saying when they wrote: “Remember that it is not you that supports the root, but the root that supports you.” 

During this Thanksgiving week and during this coming holiday season, may all our children and grandchildren feel this support, believe in this support, and experience this support as a source of inspiration, love, and strength as they grow, mature, and go out into the world. Life is a journey and each of us needs wings and roots in order to thrive, grow, and live our best life. 

© Geery Howe 2024

Geery Howe, M.A. Executive Coach in Leadership, Strategic Planning, and Organizational Change

True Change

The Law of the Comfort Zone states that “True change does not occur until you step outside your comfort zone.” At first glance, this seems obvious. At second glance, we have the potential to grasp the magnitude of this statement, and to realize the significance of it’s impact. For when we truly step outside our comfort zone, things can feel unstable, crazy, and chaotic. We also can feel bewildered and stressed, lost and overwhelmed. It all happens in an instant, and then we are stunned by the impact of this action. 

When I taught a year long course on leadership and organizational change for 24 years, I often referenced The Law of the Comfort Zone. I explained that when an individual, team, or an organization left their comfort zone, they needed three elements in place in order to transform chaos into a challenge. Those three elements were the support of a team, a strategic perspective, and a safety zone for strategic dialogue. 

For most leaders, the first two elements made sense and, as a result, they often focused on strengthening their teams and creating a shared, strategic mindset. The third element was sometimes considered to be pretty touchy feely. It was often framed up as something nice, but not critical to success. Furthermore, it was perceived as highly abstract. 

Nevertheless, the best leaders I met spent considerable time, energy, and resources to create a safety zone for dialogue. They recognized that psychological safety generated clarity and commitment for the work of change. They also recognized that we need to have a safety zone outside our comfort zone in order to grow, individually, collectively, and as an organization as a whole.

The act of stepping outside our comfort zone is an act of faith, because we do not fully understand the totality of all that is going to happen once we are outside our comfort zone. It also reflects a commitment to change, because once we step outside our comfort zone we, more likely, will encounter what feels like a danger zone and/or the feeling of total chaos. Thus, the goal of every leader is to be mindful of where are our safety zones in order for the magic of true change to take place. 

But within this act of faith, and our desire to find and/or create safety zones, there is a critical element to success. It is the realization that we do not think our way into a new ways of leading, living, and working. Instead, we live our way into a new ways of thinking, feeling and being. By choosing to create safety zones, we are creating new ways of understanding change, which is the foundation for true change. Nevertheless, without the creation of a safety zone for dialogue and reflection, the outcomes of true change can not be fully manifested. 

When I reflect on all the safety zones I have participated in during my career, I am reminded that they are places where people feel safe to take risks, to speak up, to disagree, and to share concerns without the fear of negative repercussions. And within the best safety zones I have witnessed there is trust amongst the participants. Stephen Covey in his book, The 8th Habit: From Effectiveness to Greatness (Free Press, 2004), reminds us that “trust is the fruit of trustworthiness of both people and organization.” It is a verb and a noun, and that “role modeling inspires trust without expecting it.” 

Brene’ Brown in her book, Dare To Lead: Brave Work, Tough Conversations, Whole Hearts (Random House, 2018), notes that “We need to trust to be vulnerable and we need to be vulnerable in order to trust.” This is an important point in the generation of trust and in the creation of a safety zone where people will share ideas and perspectives that they value. And as a result of this sharing, they will make themselves and their ideas vulnerable to another person or persons reactions and actions. 

There is something else that increases psychological safety and the creation of effective safety zones. In the beginning, we as leaders need to be very clear about what we are role modeling and what we are tolerating within a safety zone. For example, if we allow someone to blame or shame another, we are creating a level of toxicity within the safety zone that will cripple the important dialogue that needs to take place. Yet, if we actively invite input and clarify why different perspectives matter, we generate trust and safety. 

We also generate something else, namely confidence. For what most leaders do not recognize is that my personal level of confidence impacts my ability to embrace and create true change. First and foremost, this level of personal confidence reflects the depth of my confidence in myself. And this is emotional as much as mental. I have to learn how to trust and respect myself before I can, to any degree, trust and respect my team. It also has direct impact on my confidence in the process that creates the conditions for true change and any plan to execute those changes. 

At the exact same time, we need to remember the feeling of safety, the capacity to step outside one’s comfort zone, and the ability to grow in the process, all happen on different timelines. It is not a linear process where we step outside our comfort zone, enter a safety zone, share our thoughts and feelings, turn chaos into a challenge, all of which generates personal growth and successful organizational change. True change is not an A-B-C or 1-2-3 step process. Instead, it is the sum of multiple, highly dynamic processes, all interacting at multiple levels and in a multitude of different ways. The outcome of which is true change. 

Herminia Ibarra in her book, Act Like A Leader, Think Like A Leader (Harvard Business Review Press, 2015), writes, “This cycle of acting like a leader and then thinking like a leader - of change from the outside in - creates what I call outsight.” She breaks down outsight into three core actions, namely redefining your job, your network, and yourself. Then, she notes something very important: “When challenged to think beyond their functional speciality and to concern themselves with strategic issues to support the overall business, many managers do not immediately grasp that these are also relational - not just analytical - tasks.” 

And for me this is a critical point to true change and stepping outside one’s comfort zone. It also is a critical point to the creation of safety zones. The work on all these levels is more relational than analytical, and as such, it requires us as leaders to connect with people as people more than just connecting with them as a source of ideas.

In sum, we need to build bridges that generate personal trust, compassion, and hope more than just the sharing of some form of strategic, big picture. When we recognize the importance of people to people connections, we create a place that is safe, trusting, inclusive, and expansive. And this is a foundation for true change outside one’s comfort zone. 

© Geery Howe 2024

Geery Howe, M.A. Executive Coach in Leadership, Strategic Planning, and Organizational Change

Face To Face

Real leadership requires real contact. On the one hand, this seems completely obvious. On the other hand, fewer and fewer leaders are choosing this option. Instead, they are defaulting to management by e-mail as their major form of contact and communication. Therefore, I believe we need to return to more face to face meetings. I also believe we need to create more in-depth and meaningful connections with people before, during and after these meetings. 

Now, I get that this will take a great deal of time and resources to make happen. E-mail is so much easier and quicker. Still, a face to face meeting reflects an investment in the people we count on the most, namely our team. Technology can complement those relationships, but it can not substitute for the connection that takes place during a face to face meeting. Furthermore, this choice to meet people in person sends a message to the team as a whole, and to the people on the team that they matter, that the work they do matters, and that the relationship is important. 

As we recommit to face to face time with our teams, we must come to these meetings with epistemic humility, namely the recognition that someone else’s viewpoint might be useful, helpful, and interesting. Even if we don’t fully agree with them about everything, this level of humility shows others that we care for them, and that we respect them. And it indicates that we can work through our differences to discover common ground and creative solutions. 

I think there is another reason why we need more face to face connections with people at this time period. In a world that is focused on our differences more than our similarities, and in a world that is focused on our pain more than our healing, people in every organization want one simple thing, namely to be seen and to be engaged in meaningful work. They also want to make a difference, and to work in a place where integrity, and respect are lived and experienced each and every day. Thus, our job as leaders is to accept this challenge and to create meaningful work, and a meaningful work environment. 

Now, as leaders, we want to help people “find a job you love and you will never work a day in your life.” However, many people haven’t found that job yet, or have not been supported to transform their job into one that they love. This is where leadership and face to face connections can make a difference. 

First, we can help people to get better at their job. However, most leaders, managers, and supervisors just want people to get the job done. And as a result, starting Sunday afternoon, most employees experience a level of worry and anxiety as they anticipate going back to work on Monday morning. The combination of “just get it done” pressure, and the experience of anxiety and worry that shows up on Sunday does not generate engagement, commitment, or successful outcomes. Instead, it creates distance and disengagement.

Nevertheless, leaders, managers and supervisors can help people get better at their jobs. This begins by helping employees measure their own progress. As Patrick Lencioni in his book, The Truth About Employee Engagement: A Fable About Addressing the Three Root Causes of Job Misery, formerly called The Three Signs of a Miserable Job: A Fable for Managers (and their employees) (Jossey-Bass 2007), writes “Employees need to be able to gauge their progress and level of contribution for themselves.” This simple choice empowers people, and helps motivate them. It gives them the opportunity to improve. 

Second, along with the above, we can help people understand how their job is making the world a better place. Again, referencing the aforementioned book, Lencioni writes, “Human beings need to be needed, and they need to be reminded of this pretty much every day.” As we help people make progress and assist them in doing better in their jobs, we can help them answer these two questions suggested by Lencioni, namely “Who am I helping?” And “How am I helping?”. The answers to these two questions are a force multiplier. 

And yet, from my experience, this all needs to happen in a face to face setting. Neither e-mail or a Zoom meeting can super charge these outcomes. Instead, when it happens in a face to face meeting, the authenticity of the communication and the subsequent action that follows makes the process more relevant and helpful. 

Third, we need to change our leadership paradigm and focus on serving others, more than focusing on ourselves. As James Hunter in his book, The Servant: A Simple Story About the True Essence of Leadership (Crown Business, 1998), wrote many years ago: “Leadership is about getting things done through people. When working with and getting things done through people, there will always be two dynamics involved - the task and the relationship…. The key to leadership is accomplishing the tasks at hand while building relationships.” He continues, “Leaders should identify and meet the needs of their people, serve them. I did not say that they should identify and meet the wants of their people, be slaves to them. Slaves do what others want, servants do what others need. There is a world of difference between meeting wants and meeting needs.” 

James Autry in his book, The Servant Leader: How to Build a Creative Team, Develop Great Morale, and Improve Bottom-Line Performance (Prima Publishing, 2001), picks up on this theme when he wrote: “Leadership is not about controlling people; it’s about caring for people and being a useful resource for people…. Leadership is not about being boss; it’s about being present for people and building a community at work.” He continues exploring the role of serving others, noting “Leadership is … about letting go of ego, bringing your spirit to work, being your best and most authentic self.” He expands on this theme by explaining that “Leadership is less concerned with pep talks and more concerned with creating a place in which people can do good work, can find meaning in their work, and can bring their spirits to work.”

Patrick Lencioni in his book, The Motive: Why So Many Leaders Abdicate Their Most Important Responsibilities (Wiley, 2020), writes, “At the most fundamental level, there are only two motives that drive people to become a leader. First, they want to serve others, to do whatever is necessary to bring about something good for the people they serve…. The second basic reason why people choose to be a leader - the all-too-common but invalid one - is that why want to be rewarded. They see leadership as the prize of years of hard work and are drawn by its trappings: attention, status, power, money.” Lencioni calls these two forms of leadership “responsibility-centered leadership” and “reward-centered leadership.” As he explains, “I believe it’s long past time that we, as individuals and as a society, reestablish the standard that leadership can never be about the leader more than the led.… leadership is meant to be joyfully difficult and selfless responsibility.” When the leadership paradigm focuses on serving others more than serving ourselves, we create capacity in the organization to rise to adaptive challenges and a diverse collection of difficult technical problems. 

Fourth, we need to remember that successful organizational change does not proceed by contraction, but by expansion. It moves forward, not by exclusion, but by inclusion. And meeting people face to face can be an expanding and inclusive experience for all involved. 

Yet, to make a face to face meeting an expansive and inclusive experience, we as leaders must learn to “keep vigil and listen.” This phrase has its roots in the world of faith, and it is deeply applicable at this time period. When we choose to keep vigil and listen as leaders, we are choosing to enter face to face meetings from a place of commitment to the time and place, i.e. we are willing to be 100% present to the moment, and we are willing to engage in active listening during the time we are together, i.e. no distractions and no interruptions. This is a powerful and important choice, because it signals to all involved, you matter and this matters. And that is a rarity in the world of business that is trying to move at the speed of software rather than at the speed of relationships. 

Yet, to achieve an on-going expansive and inclusive experience, we need to remember that meeting people face to face comes with one challenge, namely we are not always sure of what is going to happen during the meeting. During a face to face meeting, we can experience a “cloud of unknowing,” referencing a 14th century metaphor. We think we know what is going to happen, but people are people and they will always surprise us when we least expect. 

Therefore, during these crucial connections, we need to be careful that we do not activate our default mental maps as leaders. Over the years, I have learned that at the core of every face to face meeting, people want three things. First, they want to be liked as in popular. Second, they want to be correct as in certainty. Third, they want to be secure as in invulnerable to challenges at any level. Once those three are happening, most leaders are happy with the face to face connection. 

However, in the world of leadership, organizational change, and continuous improvement, being liked, correct, and secure is not always possible. Many times, leaders need to question status quo, be that in structure and strategy, or systems and culture. We also need to hold people accountable to outcomes and behaviors, plus tasks and relationships. This makes everything complicated and complex. 

Many years ago, Harvard’s Ron Heifetz was interviewed by William Taylor in an article called “The Leader of the Future” in the June 1999 issue of Fast Company magazine. As Heifetz pointed out, “Mustering the courage to interrogate reality is a central function of a leader. And that requires the courage to face three realities at once. First, what values do we stand for -- and are there gaps between those values and how we actually behave? Second, what are the skills and talents of our company -- and are there gaps between those resources and what the market demands? Third, what opportunities does the future hold -- and are there gaps between those opportunities and our ability to capitalize on them?” He then explains that “Leaders don't answer those questions themselves. That's the old definition of leadership: The leader has the answers -- the vision -- and everything else is a sales job to persuade people to sign up for it. Leaders certainly provide direction. But that often means posing well-structured questions, rather than offering definitive answers. Imagine the differences in behavior between leaders who operate with the idea that "leadership means influencing the organization to follow the leader's vision" and those who operate with the idea that "leadership means influencing the organization to face its problems and to live into its opportunities." That second idea -- mobilizing people to tackle tough challenges -- is what defines the new job of the leader.”

From my perspective, the “courage to interrogate reality” and to pose “well-structured questions, rather than offering definitive answers” is best done in person. When people gather to explore the questions and to collectively listen and determine the answers together, they will then mobilize and tackle the tough challenges before them, be they technical or adaptive. Furthermore, the interpersonal connections that happen when people are face to face deepens both awareness and understanding, generating a level of shared thinking and shared commitment to collaborative action. Again, I recognize that this level of work can take significant time and resources. Yet, the resulting connections that happen over time generate capacity, i.e. better planning and better execution, which is what every leader, manager and supervisor wants at both the strategic and operational levels within an organization. 

Face to face meetings in a post pandemic world require a commitment to creating relationships and maintaining relationships. They are an investment in time, energy, and resources. But the short and long term return on these investments is significant. Because, in the end, the best leaders know that people commit to people before they will ever commit to the execution of a plan. And right now, we need more committed and engaged people if we are going to weather the current storms and pending challenges of the coming new year. As my late father always said, “Be prepared; then you don’t have to worry as much.” Now is the time to build healthy relationships so you can thrive in the midst of market uncertainty and complex strategic choices. 

© Geery Howe 2024

Geery Howe, M.A. Executive Coach in Leadership, Strategic Planning, and Organizational Change

Building A Better Organizational Culture

Over the years, I have written extensively about the interconnectivity of organizational history, culture, and meaningful work within successful organizations. In particular, I have pointed out how excellence, culture, and strategy impact execution. I have noted the role of cultural clarity and the concept of alignment plus the power of meta-messages in building culture. I also have explained the importance of accountability in building culture, and have even explored the subject of how organizational culture becomes real at the team level. 

Today, I want to explore one element of building a better culture, namely personal transformation. In particular, I have been reflecting deeply on something that Franciscan priest and writer, Father Richard Rohr wrote: “Transformed people transform people.” On the surface, this seems elementary. Beneath the surface, there is great depth in such a short and powerful sentence. 

Most people, especially ones in leadership positions, focus on the later part of this single sentence. They want to “transform people.” They want people to change, and to generate more and/or better outcomes. They define this as the pathway to building a better culture in their organization.

From my perspective, few people want to focus on the first two words of this sentence, namely being a “transformed” person. I think this happens because most people believe they are just fine as they are. They believe that they have it all figured out. They believe that the only problem in their life is that others have not changed enough to accommodate their clarity. From their perspective, they believe they already have transformed and now everyone else needs to catch up. 

Still, if the goal is to build a better culture, then transformation is a two way street. And the first step is being open to personal transformation. This is a choice that take courage, fortitude, and commitment. It is not an overnight process. 

One element of this choice is to stop trying to change other people and their ways of thinking before having done our own personal, internal work. Instead, we need to be open to changing our ideas and most important our perspective. Not that everything needs to be abandoned in our life and work as part of this process, but certain ideas and perspectives need to be routinely re-evaluated to make sure we are not missing critical information or telling ourselves a story, for lack of a better term, that is not true or accurate. As executive coach, author and founder of The Restoration Project, Lindsay Leahy in her book, Take It All Apart: How to Live, Lead, and Work with Intention (River Grove Books, 2024), writes: “Discovering and then releasing what no longer serves us is a critical part of our personal evolution as a human and a leader that we typically avoid or skip. We like to jump straight to dreaming and doing more, likely because letting go can be painful. When we succumb to the temptation of skipping this part or moving through it too quickly, we find ourselves unsettled, frustrated, anxious, and eventually back at the base of the mountain, having taken the wrong path . . . again.”

This in-depth work of personal transformation requires us to do three things. First, we need time and space for reflection. Second, we need quality resources like the aforementioned book to help us to create new insights. Third, we need people who will support us in this work. They can be allies, confidents, executive coaches, or mentors. These are the people who will be present as we think out loud, reflect deeply, and move through the normal, and sometimes painful steps of personal transformation. 

When these three elements are present, transformation can begin. And, in time, building a better culture will also take place. As Tod Bolsinger reminds us, “Leaders are formed in leading. Leadership formation is a hard and humbling, repetitive process of personal transformation.” This week, I encourage you to do the hard, humbling, and repetitive work of personal transformation. It will make a difference in your life at work and at home. 

Geery Howe, M.A. Executive Coach in Leadership, Strategic Planning, and Organizational Change