Acumen Leadership Notebook #4

Tell the right story to the right people

• Are you telling a story about your goal that resonates with the people who are ready to hear it? 
• Tell your story four ways, all true, all based on different worldview, for different audiences. 

In the video lecture preceding this assignment Seth mentions something about "being naked..." I got lost at naked, but boy is that how I feel now. It is one thing to tell stories, another to tell stories you heard from other people, but to tell people a story about yourself and your goals? I sure feel a bit under dressed. I even cheated and read these questions prior to the lecture and I'm still at a loss, but here goes. 

To the people who pay the bills (Boss, investors, mom and dad): In the venture that you are helping finance I want to be successful on my terms. That doesn't mean I don't want to make a profit, nor does it mean I want to charge the customers an exorbitant rate so I can pay people to care for the three beach houses I see once a year. This venture needs to be one based on trust, relationships, and an understanding that we will not compromise our culture in order to get ahead or to make more money. To you I will define success as being able to pay the bills, pay the employees, and have enough left over to make sure that you are compensated for your trust and investment in me. Our riches will be defined by our experiences and our memories, not strictly by your ROI. 

To the staff: First and foremost I can't believe you are here reading and listening to me. I've always wanted to be the boss and now that I am I fear I lack the patience, grace, and wisdom that you need to succeed. As I told the people who pay the bills above our success will be defined by our relationships with our clients and the trust that we develop with them. There is no better differentiator or "value add" than customer service that exceeds expectations. If you stick with me we will work and learn together through the peaks and valleys and when we emerge from the other side we will have stories to tell, memories to hold on to, and someday wages that allow you open the mailbox (or email) without fear of the next bill. I want to stop thinking about money, and I want to provide the same for you. Additionally I'm learning that putting the customers first might be the wrong move... I will work to put you first in hopes (and expectations) that if you are happy you will treat the clients as you have been treated. 

To my family: Thank you. I had a wild dream and found the right people to help me get started, as well as a work force crazy enough to go along with me. I couldn't do this without you. I told the people who pay the bills and my co-workers that this will succeed on relationships and trust in one another... which happens to be something we've been working on at home. I know that this might be scary for you, or that my schedule may change, but I feel called to do this and I promise to see your dance recitals, soccer games, and gymnastics performances. I'll even be sure to set aside time to speak to the principal about why you had to visit him/her... again. (I hope my kids read this in 10 years) Thank you, I love you. 

To the customer: Thank you. This venture would not succeed or even have a need if it weren't for you. With my staff and family I talk about relationships and trust. Both take time to build and both are easily lost. I ask that you trust us as we get off the ground and continue to do our best to serve you. Throughout the course of our work together I will listen, I will remember things, I will probably Google you (I won't be creepy) because I want to know who you are and how you work best. I want you to see that we are an organization who puts you first. We are here to serve and to "win" with you. I want you to be proud of the work we do together and when some one asks "do you know any one who ______" our name is the first (and only) response you have. 

I feel like there were a few soap boxes here... I'll get down now. Thanks for reading. 

Notebook #3

What does it mean to do the right thing even when there's a popular shortcut? 
From a strict business perspective isn't the obvious answer differentiation? If you are the one company doing things the "right" way even when a popular shortcut exists then by nature you stand out in a crowd. You are choosing to do something that no one else is doing and therefore you stand to gain attention. Of course I suppose I should opine that doing the right thing for the sake of getting the attention isn't the right thing at all... it is simply gaming the system to "win" which might work in the short term, but what are the long term consequences of selling your soul for the short game? 

My daughter is taking piano lessons and one day I heard her practicing a portion of scale as fast as she could. I suggested that perhaps she slow it down and practice each note one at a time until she plays the grouping flawlessly. She disagreed. Instead she continued to hit the keys as fast as she could until she made a sound that looked like what was written in the music. For this short term performance she wins. Long term though she loses. What happens when the next scale comes up? What happens when she needs to run her fingers up and down the keys in a quick but controlled manner? She won't be able to because she didn't stop and do things the right way (practice slowly, learn the fundamentals) so she will not have the tools to cope with the change. If instead she practice the scale slowly, learned the mechanics, the notes, the progressions, and really trained her hands to play things correctly instead of just good enough, she'd be much further ahead than she is now. Thankfully she's young and has plenty of time to learn this lesson. Others thought might not be so lucky.

To put it succinctly, I think doing the right things regardless of shortcuts available means you are instilling a sense of pride, tradition, and resilience that will not be cast aside at the first sign of change. Doing it the right way means never needing to question why you did it in the first place.  

Consider the journey that you and your team are on. Do the ends justify the means? Which means? What's right and where do you draw the line? Does everyone in your culture draw the line in the same place?

I struggle with this because at the moment the only team I have is my family. I have co-workers, friends, and other groups I'm a part of. However I have yet to cultivate a team that is willing to follow me. (That has to be a blog post sometime right?) For the sake of discussion, and as a believer in God, the line needs to be drawn in the sand when things start to contradict what I've been taught from the Bible. In over-arching and simplistic terms this is mostly the golden rule - do on to others as you would have them do to you. Be honest, lead and work with integrity, be polite and courteous, and if I may be so bold as to add one of my own, tell a stinking joke once in a while. Any culture without laughter isn't a culture I want to be a part of. 

As individuals I don't think everyone has to have the same line in the sand. As a team though it is absolutely necessary that each individual conforms to the culture of the business and is able to discern what is right and wrong in the context of the team. This falls on the shoulder of the leader to lead by example and to make the expectations painfully clear. I don't want a team full of facsimiles of one another, individuality is good, but as a business a common culture and set of values is imperative. 

What sort of control are you willing to give up to get closer to your goal? 

None. I'm a control freak and this is counter intuitive. If I had to give up something, and let's face it I'm going to have to, I would be willing to give up everything. On one condition. I used to hate boundaries, now I love them. Not because boundaries are rules that I get to govern or dictate, but because without boundaries there is no creativity, there is no discovery, there is nothing new. I'm sure at least half a dozen times in the last year I've been angry enough at someone because they challenged me (how dare my boss challenge ME) on an opinion or a piece of work that I did. After pouting like a child and thinking about how ridiculous people were being I came up with a solution. All the boss did was give me boundaries within which to work and the boundaries provided the answer. 

That might be a tangent, but take a team of smart individuals, give them a common goal and a set of clearly defined expectations and boundaries within the context of the company culture and I'm sure the group would make any product I came up with look like garbage. 

My gut reaction again is I'd give up nothing, but I like winning and I'd like to think that I'm maturing to the point where I can give up control, within the context of a healthy culture, to get the goal. 

Notebook #2

Prompt: What about your leadership journey might not work? Does describing the chasm in front of you make it more likely that you'll fall in? 

Simple answers. Everything and yes. Everything might not work and describing the chasm can only guarantee that I am likely to fall into it. I vividly remember mountain biking in the woods (we don't have mountains in Michigan) and crossing a narrow bridge thinking to myself "don't hug the edge, don't hug the edge" so what do I do? Hug the edge so close I heard a gasp from the rider behind me. Thankfully I didn't fall in, but I went exactly where I told myself not to go. 

Or is it that simple? 

Of course everything could fail and chances are even if you planned out your worst case scenario you might encounter more failure that your pessimistic self had planned on. Isn't that leadership? Perhaps the concept of going from point A to point B totally pain free isn't a mark of good leadership, but instead great planning and low risk taking. 

I think the biggest fear for me is the fear of failing. As a husband and father of three I need to succeed and for me success is doing well at my job so I can keep the lights on and afford a meal out once in a while. I see stepping out as a leader in the framework of going solo, or starting up with a small team of coworkers and that scares me. Not only to be responsible for my family, but for the team as well. The thing is, I don't think leadership needs to happen on such a high level. Leadership could probably be something as simple as staring a push and getting people to realize that using refillable water bottles is better for the planet. Sure it isn't big, sure big beverage will come after you because you aren't tossing their empty bottles in the recycle bin or trash, but it is a difference that anyone can make and no one needs permission to start. If we are honest with each other I'd guess that a high percentage of people have a great idea or movement they want to lead, but they are too scared to take the first step. I'm there myself. Perhaps I will fail. Perhaps I'll lead and whoever is with me will fall off a cliff like a bunch of lemmings. Zig Ziglar has a line in his motivational speeches that goes something like "Failure is an event, not a person. Yesterday really did end last night." It is so easy to look at what could or did go wrong and put a face to that failure. Stop it. Perfection is a myth, and failure is most definitely a certainty, but failure only lasts as long as you let it. 

Now that I've laid out my ideas on what could fail will I fall victim to it and tumble down the chasm? If I do I hope it is one heck of a ride, but I don't think I will. I think that laying out what could fail is a great place to start and to establish that this chasm is the boundary. Some people like to think in the box, some like to think out of the box, or you could call it constraint. I think constraints are good, I doubt any fantastic creativity wasn't fueled by constraints that first seemed suffocating. I abhor it when a boss or co-worker says something like "Well, can't you just______?" NO OF COURSE I can't other wise I would have... but I didn't... because I didn't think of the problem in the terms of my boss who asked the question... and then it hits me. The solution or the answer or the thing to do next that I couldn't think of because I hadn't taken the time to appropriately define the chasm I was standing on the edge of. Chasms help us draw up the first steps in our leadership march. How do we get from A to B. Do we go around the chasm? Through it? Over it? Under it? Hey what if we filled it!? Defining failure (the chasm) gives us the space to be creative. We just have to take it. 

Maybe I should get a t-shirt "Chasms are our friends"... 

Notebook #1

Prompt: What is Leadership?

nstead of pointing to a leader, outline a moment when someone you respect engaged in leadership. I was competing in an adventure race with my brother in law and we were in the part of the race that required compass skills. I believe I can manage my directions quite fine on my own, but he was more than competent at using a map, a compass, and finding out where we needed to go. It was a subtle thing but his confidence showed he was choosing to lead and get us to the points we needed to reach so we could complete the task. It is quite possible I could have done it on my own, but certainly not with the speed and efficiency of my brother in law. 

Next, describe a moment when you chose to lead. How is it different from the rest of the time, when you are merely managing? Reflecting on my own leadership is difficult, mostly because I despise thinking or speaking about myself in anything but a pejorative manner. Within the last year I led a change in the way we do some business at work. I'm not sure it is working out for the better, but at the same time I think that is because I'm waiting to be told to lead, or that I have permission to lead, and instead I need to choose to lead and step up. There are hurdles in the way of leading a change and sometimes it is simply more comfortable to lean against them than to climb over... or under. 

o you agree that leadership is a choice? Is leadership a choice? Yes. Leadership is stepping out against what is easy or comfortable and doing something different, hopefully with at least a few supporting facts in place. I think sometimes leadership can be thrust upon someone, but ultimately an individual then has to choose whether or not they will answer that call of leadership. 

Leadership is about making change. A change that might not wor. If you do the work alone, you're an artist. If you get other people to do it with you, you're a leader. Going forward, then, what is the change you're trying to make? I don't know that I have a certain change I'd like to lead at the moment. I'd love to see more people care about the work that they do instead of simply showing up to check a box and collect a pay check. Caring for customers is so easy and so overlooked and it drives me nuts. Forward is hard too, I'd like to lead forward but moving takes effort, time, and money all of which are scarce. Perhaps a bigger thing on my heart right now is less hate and more discussion. It is too easy to be victim to media or knee-jerk opinions. People I respect, and those I don't, are all subject to making quick and harsh judgments (as am I) when a little patience would go immeasurably far. Arguments seem so binary that there is no common ground on which to build an understanding. I think I'd like to lead people to listen.