Business Toolkit – Page 22 – thoughtLEADERS, LLC: Leadership Training for the Real World

What Is Your Natural Leadership Style?

June 12, 2024/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Career, Communications, Leadership /by Trevor Jones

Learn how to become a more authentic leader by using maxims to define your natural leadership style.

Authenticity is about being who you are. As you begin leading your people, you need to first understand and articulate a natural style that is most comfortable for you. If you’re showing up, putting on the mask every day, and acting in a manner that’s inconsistent with what you believe or what’s most comfortable for you, you’re actually going to set off alarms for the members of your team. They’ll see that inconsistency. They may not be sure about what’s not consistent, but it will make them uncomfortable. The better you can articulate your own natural style of leadership, the better off you’re going to be.

For me, one of my maxims around my natural leadership style is, “Kick up, kiss down.” Kicking up is about telling the higher-ups, “Hey, you guys made a mistake and I need to protect my team.” Kissing down is about praising the team when they deserve it. I learned this maxim from a great leader that I worked for at one point. Ryan was a really wonderful guy, and he was also a very calm kind of guy. You’d go in and he was very soothing. Well, one day I went to his office for a meeting. Ryan was on the phone and he was yelling. He was raging mad. I had never seen him like this. He was yelling somebody’s name and I only knew one person with this name. Ryan got so red, saying, “Oh, this is a dumb decision. I can’t believe you did this. You know what, my meeting’s here. I need to go and you need to fix this.” And he hung up. I asked him, “Who were you talking to?” He said the individual’s name, and this individual was a very senior executive at the company. He saw that I was a little bit confused that he was talking to this executive this way. Ryan said, “You know what? Kick up, kiss down. That’s my job.” I said, “What do you mean?” He said, “My responsibility is to kick up. When they make a mistake upstairs that negatively affects the team, as your leader, I have a responsibility to protect you and your team. And kiss down. That’s about praising people when they deserve it.” I said, “You know what? That’s really cool. I wanna be a leader just like Ryan. I wanna kick up and kiss down.”

Fast-forward a few months and Ryan made a dumb decision one day. I stormed in his office and I kinda went off a little bit on him. At the end of the conversation, he said, “You know what, you’re right. I made a bad decision. I’m gonna change it.” On my way out of his office, I looked at him and I said, “Kick up, right?” He said, “I can’t believe I taught you that.” This maxim that I’ve put into practice reminds me that my responsibility to take care of my team. It’s a style that works for me and it’s very comfortable. The members of my team now understand that’s Mike’s style. If he’s my leader, that’s what I can expect from him. It goes on to build that bond of trust between me and the members of my team.

As you think about your natural leadership style, think about how you prefer to behave. How are you most comfortable? Imagine if someone new joined your team and asked, “What can I expect of you?” How would you explain your leadership style to them? Imagine they say, “I don’t understand. Can you give me an example?” What would that example be? What’s that story that really crystallizes, “This is how I operate as a leader?” Within that story is where your maxim resides. Your maxim should be a trigger that reminds you of a story that exemplifies the leadership style that is most comfortable for you and sets the expectation with the members of your team for how you’re going to behave.

Again, as you define a leadership style that works, find something that’s emotionally resonant for you. Find something you’re really proud of or something you believe in very fiercely. This articulation needs to show up in the maxim and drive you to the type of behavior that will be consistent with the leadership style you like to live.

Want to learn more about developing your leadership philosophy? How about taking an entire course on it? Go directly to the course and start learning how to develop your leadership philosophy. The entire course is available at LinkedIn Learning. Enjoy!

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The Misinformation Trap: How Not To Derail Your Decisions

June 10, 2024/0 Comments/in Books, Business Toolkit, Career, Communications, Guest Blogger, Leadership, Social Media /by Trevor Jones

By understanding the conditions that trigger misinformation and practicing counter strategies, you not only safeguard your decision outcomes but build more responsible organizations and society.

Today’s guest post is by Nuala Walsh, author of TUNE IN: How To Make Smarter Decisions In A Noisy World.

It’s tempting to share compelling theories about people, companies or products – even in the absence of evidence or validation. Though everyone knows that spreading information hampers careers, reputations and businesses, people can’t resist doing it.

Yet what we hear is rarely all there is. The problem is that uncontrolled sharing fuels a perpetual cycle of misinformation and becomes a type of fake news that distorts reality and promotes poor decision-making – yours or others.

Why do smart people cling to false truths? And why does misinformation spread so easily?

How does misinformation start?

You might entertain far-fetched ideas from colleagues or customers – after all, you’re open minded. But you may be at risk of accepting inaccurate sources of misinformation. In my book, Tune In: How to Make Smarter Decisions in a Noisy World, I argue that we tune out the voice of common sense in exchange for comfort or convenience precisely when we should tune in. Ten misjudgement traps explain why. It’s not surprising in today’s data-saturated age where news spreads like wildfire and social media algorithms shape our perceived truth. Understanding the associated reasons behind unintended misinformation helps us avoid decision damage.

Misinformation persists even with information abundance – or perhaps, because of it. The mind consistently filters messages, deciding what to accept or discard. When this process is disrupted, half-truths penetrate our consciousness. This vulnerability to unfounded rumour or speculation depends on information availability, organisational silos, and our context.

Information Overload: Most of us are bombarded with constant emails, notifications, warnings or adverts, making it hard to distinguish fact from fiction and decode conflicting narratives. Popular narratives thrive on what people hear or don’t hear, amplified by the information superhighway. That’s when organizational, political, social or religious theories find fertile ground. The result is misguided judgement.

Organizational Silos: Echo chambers lead to closed networks where individuals reinforce each other’s beliefs and dismiss dissenting views. People become entrenched in their favourite opinions, resistant to any form of contradiction. Misinformation predictably proliferates and siloed decision-making becomes skewed by information that lacks both empirical support and critical scrutiny.

Contextual Understanding. The busy executive usually accepts what they’re told by peers and team members because it’s easier – even if it’s not necessarily true. Of course, misinterpretation or mishearing is not intentional but a function of the context in which we decide, like a journalist, surgeon, emergency operator or firefighter. Understanding the environment in which a decision is made can often trigger a warning sign that greater attention is needed.

The impulse to share gossip is rooted in the idea that we’re part of a select club and privy to hidden truths. Feeling superior concretises the urge even more. When we subscribe to a certain workplace reality, we’re less likely to engage in constructive dialogue or seek common ground. We tune out and lose perspective. The result is under performance, low morale and polarised teams.

What can you do to curtail misinformation?

As a behavioural scientist with three decades in business, research suggests it’s possible to temper temptation and guard against misinformation by adopting several simple actions:

Firstly, tune in to the right voices. What did you not hear? As fake news proliferates, critical thinking is more important than ever. By questioning sources, evaluating evidence and considering alternative perspectives, we inoculate against risk of error. Make challenge part of the daily fabric. Take time to decode sources, fact-check, and recognize bias.

Secondly, build deliberate empathy. Fostering dialogue can bridge divides and rebuild trust. Ultimately, the leadership challenge is not merely about debunking falsehoods; it’s about empowering teams to think for themselves. Herding followers are also victims of compelling stories. Empathize with why employees, customers and investors fall into power-based or risk-based misjudgement traps.

Thirdly, temper overconfidence. What you hear is rarely all there is. Do you challenge enough or use counterfactuals when debating or disagreeing with others? In a noisy world, we’re more motivated to mishear than ever. We think we’re right – it’s the ego trap. Science suggests that misinformation thrives on what people think they hear. Slow down long enough to tune into contrarian voices for better decision-making.

By understanding the conditions that trigger misinformation and practicing counter strategies, you not only safeguard your decision outcomes but build more responsible organizations and society. It’s time to reinterpret what you hear. It’s time to tune in.

Nuala Walsh, author of TUNE IN: How To Make Smarter Decisions In A Noisy World, is a Non-executive Director, behavioral scientist, and award-winning marketeer with three decades in investment management. Her roles included CMO of Standard Life Aberdeen, and senior positions at Blackrock, Merrill Lynch, and PA Consulting Group. Today, as MindEquity CEO, she advises Fortune 500 leaders globally, among others. Holding multiple first-class Masters’ Degrees, she is a visiting speaker at the Harvard Kennedy School, INSEAD, and the London School of Economics.

For more information, please visit nualagwalsh.com

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How do you deal with bureaucratic red tape that slows you down?

June 6, 2024/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Career, Leadership, Poll /by Trevor Jones

Our reader poll today asks: How do you deal with bureaucratic red tape that slows you down?

I respect the process and work through it. The process exists for a reason 17.19%
I try working through the process but escalate the issue if I’m struggling 61.72%
I try the process, but as soon as I hit a roadblock, I work outside the process 17.19%
I don’t even bother with the process. I work around it to get things done 3.90%

Are your processes slowing your organization down? While 17% of your people report respecting and working through processes, others will escalate issues or work around the process entirely when they hit roadblocks. Processes matter but make sure the ones you have balance the tradeoffs of compliance, safety, and rigor with the need to get things done. If your people are working around your bureaucracy and process anyway, the process isn’t having the desired effect. Sit down with your team and understand the roadblocks they’re facing. Review your processes to see which steps can be changed to make things more efficient. There needs to be a balance of process and operational effectiveness for the two to live in harmony.

– Mike Figliuolo at thoughtLEADERS, LLC

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Accepting Your Team’s Failures

June 5, 2024/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Career, Communications, Leadership /by Trevor Jones

The way you react to failure has a big impact on your team’s future performance and culture. Make sure you handle failures constructively.

As much as we like to celebrate success, there are going to be failures. They’re not fun and they can derail a team if you don’t handle the failure well. When there is failure, the first thing to remember is to avoid blame. Turn it into a learning opportunity. This is not about the individual. This is not personal. This is about behaviors and about choices we made that didn’t work out well. Find the opportunity to turn those into lessons learned. Think through how future actions can be taken that will help you avoid these failures the next time around.

Here are some principles for dealing with failure:

Fail as a team

First, fail as a team. Deconstruct the failure and understand what the root causes were. Identify all the places where the team could’ve improved. Maybe it was a process failure or a failure to provide information from one team member to another. Try to never make it about the individual. Instead, look at the processes that the team is following and where those broke down.

Praise risk-takers

Next, even when there’s failure, praise people for taking a risk. We’re always making risk/reward trade-offs and if you’re not encouraging people to take risks, you’re going to get a risk-averse culture where people are paralyzed and won’t make decisions. If they’re not making decisions, you’re not going to get that upside. So when you talk about failure, help people appreciate the risks the team took. Discuss what the team thought the odds of the risk were and what the final result was. If the risk didn’t work out, review what the actual odds were. Ask, “Next time around, how do we do this better?”

Your job as a leader, in terms of success and failure, is making sure that you celebrate successes and all forms of success every opportunity you get. Do so in a way that’s going to be targeted to the individual you’re trying to reward. When there’s failure, avoid making it about the individual. Instead, focus on, “What are the things that we, as a team, did wrong and what can we do differently the next time?” Taking this healthy approach and balance between success and failure will continue to build momentum for your team and keep team members engaged and excited.

Want to learn more about building high performing teams? How about taking an entire course on it? Go directly to the course and start learning how to build high performing teams. The entire course is available at LinkedIn Learning. Enjoy!

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Best Practices for Cultivating Company Culture and Employee Engagement

June 3, 2024/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Career, Guest Blogger, Leadership, Strategy /by Trevor Jones

A culture of inclusion makes employees feel valued. When employees feel like they belong, they are more likely to be engaged and motivated, resulting in higher productivity and lower turnover rates.

Today’s guest post is by Tiffani Martinez, Human Resource Director — Otter Public Relations

Gallup describes engaged employees as “involved in, enthusiastic about, and committed to their work and workplace,” but the reality is that over one-third of US employees are casually or actively looking for new work. This collective lack of engagement costs US employers $2.9 million every day, equating to roughly $1.1 billion each year.

Strong company culture and engagement start at the top, with leaders setting the tone and demonstrating the behaviors they want to see throughout their organization. Reports from Gallup have traced 70% of the factors influencing employee engagement directly to management.

Establishing a culture that values open communication, feedback, empowerment, and inclusion fosters an engaged staff. Lay the foundation, and you build a team of committed employees who go above and beyond to help your company achieve success.

The importance of open communication in company culture

Open communication is the cornerstone of a healthy and vibrant culture. It creates a workplace environment where employees feel valued and informed.

When leaders and managers openly share information about company goals, strategies, and challenges, employees can better understand the bigger picture and become more invested in their work. In doing so, they gain a sense of trust and align their efforts towards the company’s objectives.

Likewise, when your employees freely share information, ideas, and feedback, they foster an environment conducive to innovation and problem-solving. This collaboration helps break down silos and enhances cooperation within and across teams.

Change is inevitable, but a culture of open communication enables you to promptly disseminate information related to new strategies, processes, or organizational structures. As you provide clear communication and regular updates about the reasons behind the change, you help employees understand and adapt to the shifting circumstances. Open communication channels also provide opportunities for your employees to voice concerns and contribute valuable insights, ensuring a smoother transition.

Employee feedback drives improvement

When you allow your employees to provide feedback, you show that their opinions matter. This leads to increased engagement and motivation, as staff feels connected to the company’s vision and empowered to make a difference.

Valuing employee feedback not only creates a more engaged and motivated workforce but also uncovers valuable insights that can help you address critical areas of opportunity. This, in turn, leads to better processes, products, and a stronger working environment overall.

Since your employees work on the front lines every day, they have a unique perspective on how things operate. Their feedback is crucial to understanding the problems that prevent your organization from reaching its full potential.

Your staff is often the first to notice inefficiencies, bottlenecks, or problems with company culture. Employee surveys, focus groups, and suggestion programs can identify these critical issues and develop plans to address them. Analyzing and acting on feedback can allow you to improve processes, build a better working environment, and increase employee satisfaction.

Employee empowerment creates an inclusive community

One key element in a positive company culture is employee empowerment, which can often be achieved by regularly acknowledging their contributions through verbal praise, incentives, employee-of-the-month programs, or even performance-based bonuses. When you make your employees feel recognized and valued, they also feel engaged and motivated.

Empowered employees feel that their work is meaningful and that they have opportunities to grow and develop professionally. Invest in training programs, mentorship opportunities, and career advancement paths to invest in your staff’s long-term success.

Empowering employees means giving them the necessary authority and tools to perform their jobs effectively on a day-to-day basis. When you empower your employees with resources and autonomy, you will see that they feel a sense of ownership and accountability in their work because they become motivated to take initiative, make decisions, and solve problems without fear of repercussions.

Organic growth springs from a culture of inclusion

A truly inclusive culture goes beyond diversity. Strive to create a workplace environment where everyone feels valued, respected, and empowered to contribute their unique perspectives and ideas. Remember, inclusion is about building a workplace that encourages collaboration, empathy, and mutual respect, regardless of background or identity.

A culture of inclusion drives organic growth. When people from diverse backgrounds come together, their various experiences and perspectives lead to more creative and innovative solutions because they feel more comfortable sharing their ideas. With these diverse perspectives, inclusive teams also lead to more well-rounded decision-making. The inclusion of diverse voices reduces the risk of groupthink, enabling teams to consider a broader range of options and make more informed choices.

Most importantly, a culture of inclusion makes employees feel valued. When employees feel like they belong, they are more likely to be engaged and motivated, resulting in higher productivity and lower turnover rates.

When you embody the values you espouse and consistently act in line with your company’s culture as a leader, it sends a powerful message. A culture built on open communication, feedback, employee empowerment, and inclusion fosters engagement. Each day, you will see how positive company culture leads to happier and more motivated employees, but over time, you will also see how it impacts the overall success and growth of your organization.

Tiffani Martinez is a native Floridian. She graduated Magna Cum Laude from Keiser University with a BA in Business Management and a focus in Human Resource Management. Tiffani excels at putting the “human” back into “Human Resources.” She comes from a non-profit and Property and Casualty insurance background with focused knowledge of the needs of Florida residents. Her tenure in non-profit led her to manage one of the top 100 largest churches in the nation with more than 2,000 members. Her passion is in conflict management where she strives to take in all perspectives, ensuring all parties are respected and heard with fairness and empathy.

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When members of your team have conflict with each other, how do you handle it?

May 30, 2024/1 Comment/in Business Toolkit, Career, Leadership, Poll /by Trevor Jones

Our reader poll today asks: When members of your team have conflict with each other, how do you handle it?

I ignore it and hope they figure it out 6.40%
I tell them to go resolve it 14.16%
I offer to mediate if they’d like me to 49.32%
I jump in and actively mediate 27.39%
I reassign their work so they don’t have to interact 2.73%

Mediating conflict. Most of you (80%) either offer to mediate conflict between team members if they want you to (49%) while another 27% of you jump in to mediate without asking. If you’re one of those who jumps in, recognize you’re depriving them of a skill-building opportunity. The better they learn to mediate conflict on their own, the less of it you’ll deal with and the less of it you’ll have. Try taking a step back and pause before jumping in. Perhaps offer “it seems like there’s some conflict between you two. If you’d like my help in resolving it, let me know and I’m happy to engage.” Leave it up to them to see if they can resolve it on their own or if they want assistance. While having conflict on a team isn’t fun, having a team that can’t resolve it on their own is an even bigger headache.

– Mike Figliuolo at thoughtLEADERS, LLC

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How to Celebrate Your Team Members’ Successes

May 29, 2024/0 Comments/in Balanced Lifestyle, Business Toolkit, Career, Communications, Leadership, Strategy /by Trevor Jones

Improve your team’s culture by celebrating your team members’ successes. Be careful, though…one person’s reward is another person’s punishment.

Success and failure are part of running a team day to day. You need to recognize and promote wins because it’s going to build momentum for the team and make them feel like they’re accomplishing great things.

There are a lot of great ways to acknowledge success. You can give people bonuses, provide them visibility opportunities, do some public recognition, give people increased responsibilities, and even promotions. All of these are very effective ways to celebrate the success of your team members. But remember…just because you think something is valuable doesn’t mean the team member will. You need to understand what personally motivates them and then reward them accordingly. If you’re not thoughtful about it, something you think of as a reward is going to be horrible from that person’s perspective.

For example, if you have somebody on your team who is very introverted and you decide that you’re going to take their success and celebrate it by putting that person on stage in front of a large audience, that introvert might really hate that situation and they’ll feel very uncomfortable. Even though you thought you were rewarding them and celebrating their success, you’ve turned it into a bad experience.

Or, for example, you have somebody who’s very happy in their current role. They like their level of responsibilities because it allows them to have a proper work-life balance. Let’s say you decide they’re doing a great job and you want to celebrate that success by giving them a promotion with more responsibilities. Now they’re pulling their hair out and they’re very stressed out and unhappy because they really enjoyed their old role. This promotion isn’t a good way to celebrate their success. It’s actually a punishment.

So as you’re thinking about celebrating success for your people, put yourself in their shoes and ask, “What would this individual really value?” Be sure that you communicate that success to the rest of the team. It helps build momentum and creates a culture of winning among those team members. People will feel proud to be associated with their teammates who are doing such great things.

Want to learn more about building high performing teams? How about taking an entire course on it? Go directly to the course and start learning how to build high performing teams. The entire course is available at LinkedIn Learning. Enjoy!

Did you enjoy this post? If so, I highly encourage you to take about 30 seconds to become a regular subscriber to this blog. It’s free, fun, practical, and only a few emails a week (I promise!). SIGN UP HERE to get the thoughtLEADERS blog conveniently delivered right to your inbox!

I Am the Storm: Learning How to be a Better Leader

May 27, 2024/0 Comments/in Books, Business Toolkit, Career, Guest Blogger, Innovation, Leadership, Strategy /by Trevor Jones

Psychological strength is key for any leader. Courage to face the storm is a skill that develops with experience.

Today’s guest post is by Oleg Konovalov, author of The Fisherman’s Path to Leadership: 224 Lessons from the Wisdom of Nature.

We are all perfect for today and we are comfortable in it. Yet, how strong we are for tomorrow’s challenges defines our leadership capacity. Thus, leaders must grow all the time to lead a vision that is greater than we are and greater than any organization.

You nurture and develop this competence through five critical elements – the courage to think differently and boldly; constant learning, as you must learn all the time to be able to give people more and manage more complicated tasks; growing your inner excellence as leading is not physical work but psychological; be confident and credible, which is about how you deliver promises to others as without credibility your vision wouldn’t have this magnitude; creating the knowledge bank or ensure a consistent engagement and contribution of all involved in terms of growing your vision strong.

A leader must be good at making him- or herself greater – this allows him or her to think and act in a greater way.

In simple words: I must be a storm myself that is stronger than forthcoming challenges.

Becoming the Storm

I spent some time on the Scottish fishing trawlers in the North Atlantic. We all know about seasickness. In fact, only a few people don’t have it. This is normal for all humans, to a greater or lesser extent, regardless if you are a beginner or an experienced seafarer. The only difference is that the experienced know how to adapt faster.

When we witness such incredible instability during a storm, our body and mind read conflicting signals which leads to reactions causing muscles to contract and nausea. Psychologically, if you are afraid that you will get seasick, you will feel sick. Therefore, take it easy, and keep doing your job.

First, I felt sick when facing a force-five storm. Soon, I adapted to a force-seven storm and felt okay. Then I faced something truly fierce and violent – a force-eleven storm. The small, 38-meter-long trawler fighting against 10-16-meter-high waves that could crush everything. My stomach was somewhere in my throat, my brain begged for a few seconds of stability and calmness, and my body wasn’t mine. I don’t remember feeling it somehow.

The distance from my cabin to the engine room, which usually was traversed in seconds, took about twenty minutes of clinging to every wall, handrail, and whatever I was able to get my hands on.

No one and nothing can help in such a 36-hour survival test. We were days away from the nearest safe harbor. The faces of all my crewmates were of a dollar-green color.

In these situations, everyone turns to God. Yet, before long, I realized something – I enjoyed the storms. After the force-eleven, I loved standing on the deck feeling like I was surfing. I realized that by growing through the storms I become the storm myself.

The main challenge is psychological. Growth is associated with enhanced psychological ability. You are either a leader who stands firm and does what must be done regardless of circumstances or you give up and let others fail.

Success is a port you can only reach through the storm. This rough passage demands two key elements – the ability to grow beyond our own fears and limitations and the ability to change and adapt to fast-changing realities. This is an absolutely essential ability to become a true leader.

Lessons learned:

The leader is responsible for leading people into the future. She defines a vision that is much greater than herself and the organization. No one can lead something so huge without the ability to grow and change.

If a leader fails to conduct his or her duty, the team will fail.

Change will be painful. The growth is rewarded.

No storm lasts forever.

Psychological strength is key for any leader.

If you can challenge yourself, you can withstand any storm.

Courage to face the storm is a skill that develops with experience. It doesn’t make you fearless but makes you experienced.

Dr. Oleg Konovalov is a global thought leader, author, business educator, consultant, and C-suite coach. Oleg is named among the top eight global experts in leadership and shortlisted for the Distinguished Award in Leadership by Thinkers50 and has been named one of the Global 100 Inspirational Leaders 2022, along with Bill Gates, Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and Oprah Winfrey. Having been named ‘the da Vinci of Visionary Leadership’ by many leading authorities of our time, Oleg is considered #1 in the world in the field of vision and visionary leadership. He is the author of The Fisherman’s Path to Leadership, The Vision Code, Leaderology, and other books.

For more information visit www.olegkonovalov.com.

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How much stress do you experience related to your personal finances?

May 23, 2024/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Career, Leadership, Poll /by Trevor Jones

Our reader poll today asks: How much stress do you experience related to your personal finances?

None. I have absolutely no worries 17.73%
Some. Occasionally there are financial concerns 55.96%
A lot. Financial issues regularly stress me out 16.34%
Constantly. It’s an ever-present source of stress 9.97%

How financially stressed are your people? 25% of you expressed having significant amounts of stress related to your personal finances. More likely than not, you make more money than the members of your team. If that many of you are facing financial challenges, how do you think your lower-paid team members are doing? If they’re doing great work, be sure they’re getting paid appropriately for it. Fight for raises they deserve. Give them spot bonuses. Create promotion opportunities. Put them in touch with financial resources like counselors you may have available to your associates. If you can remove some of their financial stress, they’ll be healthier, happier, and loyal. Take care of the things that are on their mind so they can focus on more important things like their work, their families, and their health.

– Mike Figliuolo at thoughtLEADERS, LLC

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Providing Feedback to Your Team

May 22, 2024/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Career, Communications, Leadership /by Trevor Jones

Some leaders are uncomfortable providing feedback to their team members. Follow this feedback model to make giving feedback easier.

If we want people to improve, we have to give them feedback. Giving feedback can be really difficult because we feel like we might hurt someone’s feelings. We tend to shy away from uncomfortable conversations. We don’t want to tell somebody who we really like and respect that they’re falling short in some regard. So we avoid feedback, but that’s a huge mistake—especially as the leader of a high performing team. I’d like to offer an example of a feedback model that can remove the emotion from these conversations and help people focus on improving performance versus getting defensive. The model goes like this: Read more

Why Leaders Solve the Wrong Problems

May 20, 2024/0 Comments/in Books, Business Toolkit, Career, Guest Blogger, Innovation, Leadership, Strategy /by Trevor Jones

We have been taught to find answers to problems, not to question the problem itself.

Today’s guest post is by Roger L. Firestien, Ph.D., author of SOLVE THE REAL PROBLEM: Because What You Think Is The Problem Is Usually Not The Problem.

Based on my experience working with thousands of people and hundreds of organizations, when it comes to solving problems, 99% of the time what we think is the problem is actually not the problem. It’s a symptom of the problem, what the boss thinks is the problem, or a knee jerk reaction to the problem.

Why?

Because we have been taught that when we face problems, our first impression of what we think is our problem… really is the problem. We have good reasons for this. Our educational systems set the problems up for us.

What is 3+3?

What is the capital of Spain?

Madrid.

We have been taught to find answers to problems, not to question the problem itself.

Today’s problems are not textbook formulas. They are complex, ambiguous, non-routine, difficult and potentially dangerous. Yet, we still use the same strategies we learned in elementary school to solve these problems.

Harvard Business Review recently reported the results of a survey of top-level executives on problem diagnosis. The findings were stunning – with 85% of these leaders, from both the public and private sectors, responding their organizations were just bad at diagnosing their problems. 87% said their companies were experiencing significant costs because of this weakness.

Why? Managers are typically responsible for output. Results. Efficiency. Bottom lines. Managers tend to switch quickly into solution mode when they see a problem.

The solution?

Problem redefinition – exploring and identifying the challenge you’re facing before trying to solve it.

How do you redefine problems?

Questions. But not just any questions – creative questions.

The language used to describe a problem is going to determine whether you create a good, lousy, or creative question. It also dictates the kinds of solutions you generate.

For example, “We don’t have enough money.”

Good or bad statement?

Answer: Bad.

When you hear that statement, your brain says, “OK, we don’t have any money.”

“Decision made. Move on. Don’t bother looking.”

“How might we raise the money for this project?”

“How might we reduce the cost of this project?”

Good and creative questions.

Questions framed this way provoke your mind to search for solutions. They tell your brain, “Let’s go find answers. And because we are using the word ‘might,’ these can be any answers. We haven’t made any decisions yet. Look for options.”

So, the first step to becoming better at solving the right problem is to use creative questions.

In my book, Solve the Real Problem, I interviewed people from business, education, agriculture, manufacturing and I posed one question.

“Can you tell me a story when you discovered that a problem you were trying to solve was not the problem at all?

I found their answers settled into four primary approaches or mindsets. A mindset is a particular way of thinking, a way of thinking that can actually help you solve the problems you are facing.

The four problem-solving mindsets were:

Challenge your assumptions

Get an outside perspective

See the big picture

Look for all of the details

Here is a story that illustrates the mindsets, challenges your assumptions, and looks for all the details.

My Tailbone Hurts

12-year-old John is experiencing severe tailbone pain.

The pain is so bad that his parents take him to the local children’s hospital. As the secretary at the hospital’s orthopedic department is checking John in, she asks, “What are you here for?”

John replies, “I have pain in my tailbone.”

Because the general model of orthopedic treatment is getting an x-ray before a patient sees the orthopedist, an x-ray of the sacrum, coccyx, and tailbone are ordered.

As the orthopedist enters the room with the x-rays he begins, “Well, I have reviewed your x-rays and I don’t see anything wrong with your tailbone. Since your x-rays are normal, I’m going to order a CT scan of that area.”

Just like the x-rays, these scans appeared normal. So, the doctor ordered a bone scan of the area.

The result: The scans all came back normal.

The orthopedist’s response: “I don’t know what is wrong.”

John next visits Dr. Michael Geraci, a specialist in this area.

During a first visit with Dr. Geraci, patients draw on a “pain diagram,” an outline of the body where they indicate where they are experiencing symptoms.

As Dr. Geraci began to take John’s history he reviewed the pain drawing. “I notice in your pain drawing that you didn’t draw it in your tailbone. Why don’t you stand up and just point to where you are experiencing the pain?”

John stood up and pointed to a place in his back a few inches above his beltline. A place five inches above the tailbone.Dr. Geraci quickly realized that young John misunderstood the terminology of his anatomy. After conducting an MRI of the lumbar spine, the results showed that John had a herniated disc which was the cause of his “tailbone” pain.

John responded well to physical therapy. After a few weeks, he was completely pain-free.

Lessons Learned

Challenge your assumptions. John’s orthopedist never challenged the assumptions he made when he looked at the first x-ray. He made his decisions based on one frame of reference – that a 12-year-old boy knew where his tailbone was.

Look for all the details. The doctor failed to look for all the details in John’s case, because he did not question him thoroughly in the initial examination.

It doesn’t take long to find the real problem, in fact, in controlled research studies when subjects took only 5 minutes to redefine a problem, they produced more original and higher quality solutions than those subjects who went right to work and did not spend time redefining the problem.

So, the next time you are faced with a tough problem.

Pause.

Don’t accept your first impression as the real problem.

Ask creative questions.

Take a few minutes to generate 10+ creative questions

Choose the creative questions(s) that best define your problem

Only then generate ideas to solve your problem.

Dr. Roger Firestien, author of SOLVE THE REAL PROBLEM: Because What You Think Is The Problem Is Usually Not The Problem, has presented programs on innovation to over 600 organizations around the world including: fortune 500 corporations, government agencies, universities, associations, hospitals and religious institutions. He is President of Innovation Resources, Inc., Associate Professor Emeritus at the Center for Applied Imagination at Buffalo State University, a founding member of the Buffalo Society for Creativity in Medical Education and guest lectures at the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences at the University at Buffalo, NY. For more information visit www.RogerFirestien.com

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Have you ever been involved in a company acquisition (either being bought or buying another company)?

May 16, 2024/1 Comment/in Business Toolkit, Career, Leadership, Poll /by Trevor Jones

Our reader poll today asks: Have you ever been involved in a company acquisition (either being bought or buying another company)?

Yes, and it went great 12.25%
Yes, and it went okay 43.54%
Yes, and it went terrible 20.75%
Nope, never happened to me 23.46%

Mergers can work, but they take work. It’s good to see that 55% of you have had decent (or better) experiences with mergers and acquisitions. And in this case, that’s 73% of you who have been through an acquisition when excluding those who haven’t had to deal with this particular challenge. Acquisitions can create a lot of turmoil and they require a significant amount of effort to make them work. This includes substantial integration preparation well in advance of the deal being completed. As a leader, the most important thing you can do during an acquisition is communicate with your team. Do not commit to being transparent because that’s not a promise you’ll be able to keep. Much of the work of an acquisition needs to remain confidential until specific points in time. Instead, commit to being candid and sharing what you know as soon as you’re able to share it. The more you can alleviate people’s fears during the acquisition process, the more they can focus on their work of making the acquisition a success.

– Mike Figliuolo at thoughtLEADERS, LLC

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