The Power Of The Chair

When visiting with senior executives, we often talk about the “power of the chair.” Many recognize, using a line from the Spider Man movie, that “with great power comes great responsibility.” They know they need to use this power in a very thoughtful manner.

However, recently the discussion about the power of the chair has turned to the burden of confidentiality that comes with being a senior leader. Routinely, senior  leaders know more about what is going on than they can say. Furthermore, they often can not visit about it with any one at work. As these issues surface, e.g. the potential impact of a reorganization, leaders often sit in a room and know who is being coached out, who is being coached up, and who will loose their job due to the reorganization. They recognize that as a leader these choices need to be made. They also know they are not easy.

Recently, many executives have come to realize that having the power of the chair means that they can not choose popularity over accountability or harmony over productive conflict. These two key concepts from Patrick Lencioni’s book,  The Five Temptations of a CEO: A Leadership Fable are critical to their success. They realize that the solution to the burden of confidentially and the wise use of power is to build a very healthy senior team, to find allies and confidents who can listen in a respectful manner, and to always think about the impact of their actions as leaders before moving forward.

At the same time, if we seek personal excellence in our work as leaders, we must continue to rekindle our passion for the work we do. Twice in my life, I have hit the proverbial wall and asked the question, “Is this it?” Once right after leaving my first job as a teacher, I returned to the trades. Over a lunch discussion with co-workers who told stories about the crazy things they did when they were drunk, I asked myself, “Is this it?” 

Once in my 40’s when my business was in a boom period and I was flying and teaching all over the place, I realized that I was never home. I also discovered that when I was home I was mentally still at work. Then, I realized that when I die, all my clients will come to my funeral. They will say nice things about my work, but I wondered what my wife and children would actually say. At times like that, I paused and asked myself, “Is this it?”

Then, in my 50’s this question changed as I changed. Rather than asking “is this it?”, I came to the realization that “this could be it.” I could keep doing this between now and when I retire. It would not be too bad. It was manageable and good enough, just more of the same. 

But with this realization, I kept thinking of Jim Collin’s book, Good to Great where he states, “Good is the enemy of great.” The pathway to leading from the place of personal excellence requires all of us to not accept “just good enough.” We have to reclaim our desire for greatness, passion and wanting to make a difference. We have to not settle into ruts of mediocrity and just roll with the issues. We need to realize that we are the program and the programmer. If we need to upgrade the program, we also need to upgrade the programmer.

One pathway to this level of work is to develop or expand our “circles of trust,”  a Parker Palmer term. With the burden of confidentiality, we need to surround ourselves with others who recognize that leading solo can yield anxiety and fear. We need people in our lives who know how to support without judgement. We also need to build more personal and professional relationships with people who comprehend that discernment happens best through dialogue and reflection. 

Next, we need to proactively build this level of trusting and supportive community so that the front of the house, our work, and the back of the house, our personal lives, are the same house. And if we have this already in place, then we need to proactively maintain it. Too many leaders are now watching their circles of trust decline through neglect.

Remember: people, boards and organizations all want great leadership. We, as those leaders, must lead with good hearts and a clear mind if it is going to happen.

Geery Howe, M.A. Consultant, Executive Coach, Trainer in Leadership, Strategic Planning and Organizational Change Morning Star Associates 319 - 643 - 2257

The Dark Side of Problem Solving

Most leaders do not want to talk about it, and most young leaders get caught in it. But all will admit privately that there is a dark side to problem solving. From my perspective, the best resource on this subject is the following book: Lencioni, Patrick. The Five Temptations of a CEO: A Leadership Fable, Jossey-Bass, 1998. Right now, it should be required reading for many people in management and leadership positions who are struggling with problem solving.

Lencioni points out that there are five temptations:

- Choosing status over results.

- Choosing popularity over accountability.

- Choosing certainty over clarity.

- Choosing harmony over productive conflict.

- Choosing invulnerability over trust.

I call these the dark sides of problem solving. Over the years, I have witnessed numerous people in leadership positions choose status, popularity, certainty, harmony, and invulnerability when solving problems. Not once have I seen this go well for the person, the proposed solution, or the organization. Choosing these temptations have short and long term implications and none of them are helpful or productive.  

The difficulty for many leaders is that they have to do something that most of them do not want to do, namely have the courage to help their organization face reality and then deal with it. As Ron Heiftz noted in an interview back in June 1999 in Fast Company magazine, “Leaders of the future need to have the stomach for conflict and uncertainty -- among their people and within themselves.” The challenge is that they need to keep people in a “productive discomfort zone” while guiding them through the problem solving process. This requires the leader to unprotect the organization from the difficulties before it and to help the organization determine what is and is not essential to being successful moving forward. While this is not easy, it is clearly a vital part of being a leader.

This week I encourage you to be more mindful of the dark side of problem solving and to make smarter and more effective choices as you move through the work of problem solving. 

Geery Howe, M.A. Consultant, Executive Coach, Trainer in Leadership, Strategic Planning and Organizational Change Morning Star Associates 319 - 643 - 2257

Building and Maintaining Healthy Work Relationships

Recently, I have been in a lot of meeting where the subject of resistance has surfaced. Too many times, I have to point out that the people who are resisting change often care about the organization and that resistance is simply a normal form of communication and feedback. The hard part about these conversations is that I often have to end up asking a difficult, and unnerving for some, but still important question: What is a healthy work relationship for someone in a leadership or management position? Most answers revolve around creating role clarity and making sure all involved are clear about expectations, goals and priorities. These are good answers but I like to go deeper than this when exploring this question.

First, Patrick Lencioni, in a book called The Five Temptations of a CEO: A Leadership Fable, Jossey-Bass, 1998, wrote that there are a series of temptations for those in leadership positions:

- Temptation #1: Choosing status over results

- Temptation #2: Choosing popularity over accountability

- Temptation #3: Choosing certainty over clarity

- Temptation #4: Choosing harmony over productive conflict

- Temptation #5: Choosing invulnerability over trust

Right now, I see more and more young leaders and even some more experienced and older leaders getting sucked into work relationships based on status, popularity and certainty.  I do not fault the young leaders and hope they can read more and receive better coaching over time to correct these missteps in judgement and perspective, but I am disturbed when older and more experienced leaders do not role model a healthier and more grounded understanding of leadership relationships.

There are days now when I wish I could greet each person who is new to the world of supervision and hand them a copy of the above book. I would then say, “please read this in the next 24 hours and then we will start your one to one coaching sessions.” Maybe then we can start off on the right foot.

Next, I would review the core concepts in the book, Crucial Conversations: Tools For Talking When Stakes Are High, McGraw-Hill, 2002, by Kerry Patterson, Kerry, Joseph Grenny, and Ron McMillan. As they point out, crucial conversations are normal to the work world and happen when opinions vary, stakes are high, and emotions run strong.  “When two or more of us enter crucial conversations, by definition we don’t share the same pool,” i.e. the pool of shared meaning which is a measure of a group’s IQ, and is the birthplace of synergy. 

First, the authors say to “start with heart” and work on yourself. “Remember that the only person you can directly control is yourself.” Next, “focus on what you really want.” As they explain, when you find yourself moving toward silence or anger, stop and pay attention to your motives. Ask yourself: What does my behavior tell me about what my motives are? Then clarify what you really want. Ask yourself: What do I want for myself? For others? For the relationship? And finally ask: How would I behave if this were what I really wanted?

They continue this line of thinking by refusing the “Sucker’s Choice,” i.e. that you must choose between peace and honesty, between winning and losing, and so on. Instead, they share with us the following term, CRIB. It stands for:

- Commit to seek mutual purpose.

- Recognize the purpose behind the strategy.

- Invent a mutual purpose.

- Brainstorm new strategies.

If more leaders were to commit to a CRIB perspective, we would have healthier work relationships. As David Cottrell in his book, Monday Morning Leadership: 8 Mentoring Sessions You Can’t Afford to Miss, reminds us: “Your job is not to lower the bottom by adjusting and accommodating the falling stars. You should be raising the top by recognizing and rewarding superstar behaviors.” It is time for all people to be super stars by avoiding the temptations of a leader and to commit to mutual purpose.

Geery Howe, M.A. Consultant, Executive Coach, Trainer in Leadership, Strategic Planning and Organizational Change Morning Star Associates 319 - 643 - 2257