26 Jun
PeopleTek Coaching Leadership

Calm, Cool, and Collect

How do stressful situations impact you? If you’re under fire at work, do others “feel” it and avoid interactions with you?

Self control is important. The ability to manage our feelings instead of allowing our feelings to manage us is beneficial for everyone, especially so for leaders.

Having the ability to feel and then respond with purpose, while remaining composed, is what we strive for daily and during difficult situations. If a person lets us down and we are angry, we need to have the skill to respond appropriately rather than blowing up or raising our voice.

Leadership is a matter of having people look at you and gain confidence, seeing how you react. If you’re in control, they’re in control.
–Tom Landry

We suggest becoming very aware of our emotions, and what triggers them, so we are better positioned to remain in control. This means becoming familiar with an entire spectrum of feelings including happiness, anger, sadness, loneliness, rejection, pride, shame, peace, etc.

And it means knowing how to diffuse the emotions that will not serve us well.

The more control and awareness we have, the better the leader we can be, now, and in the future. An example may be when someone did something we didn’t expect and we overreacted. Some of us may even yell or scream at our antagonist, which more likely than not puts us in disfavor with those that witnessed it.

Once composure is “lost,” the damage is done and may not be recovered from (even when composure is restored). We all have hot buttons and we all know individuals that seem to have a “gift” to light those buttons up. To excel in leadership we need to be in control of our emotions at all times. (It’s certainly easier when times are calm and steady but may challenge us in difficult and turbulent/crisis situations).

Common Circumstances That Lend Themselves to Control Issues

  • Surprises
  • Unexpected change
  • Incorrect/incomplete information
  • Missed deliverables
  • Insubordination
  • Deadlines, date changes
  • Lack of commitment, buy-in or urgency
  • Lack of team effort or no accountability

We first must understand our feelings and the response, (perhaps an unhealthy one), that desperately wants out. Instead, we can calmly think about a response that would help us deal with the problem at hand. This may require postponing a response which is fine (rarely do we HAVE to have an immediate response).

It can be challenging to remain cool, calm, and collect, but as a Chinese proverb says: Forego your anger for a moment and save yourself a hundred days of trouble.

It takes effort, but it’s worth it! What do you do to maintain your composure?

Here’s a Wealth of Information

Each week we’ll partner with QwikCoach and provide the ability for you to reinforce or expand your knowledge of a prior topic.

Last week’s tip focused on Conflict.

Go to QwikTips to read more! There are two different versions–one for visitors and one for licensed QwikCoach users.

Help turn your leadership knowledge into leadership action!

23 Jun
PeopleTek Coaching Leadership

Conflict – Address, Avoid, or Leverage

When you hear the word “conflict,” do you view this as “trouble” or do you think in terms that it could be a simple disagreement or difference of opinion? Do you ever find it to be motivational?

Consider a brain-storming session where everyone is heard and ideas freely bounce around and get further defined. This is a great example of how differences can be inspirational and lend themselves to creativity and growth.

For good ideas and true innovation, you need human interaction, conflict, argument, debate.
–Margaret Heffernan (author, entrepreneur, CEO)

Having said this, conflict must still be appropriately managed, otherwise problems arise, ill feelings surface, morale diminishes, and productivity suffers.

The 5 Modes of Conflict

Kenneth Thomas and Ralph Kilman identified 5 modes of conflict. Some styles sound like they may be “better” than others, but in reality there is no right or wrong style; all five modes are useful when used in the appropriate situation.

The 5 styles, and their best usage are:

  1. Competing is most effective when quick, decisive action is required and for important issues that may be unpopular or are vital to the organization. Examples include discipline, cost cutting, legal requirements, and enforcing company rules and policies.
  2. Accommodating mode is useful when preserving harmony is essential, for allowing others to learn from their mistakes (where the risk is minimal), when you realize you can learn from others and that their position is likely a better solution, or that the issue is much more important to the other person than it is to you.
  3. Avoiding is useful when there are more pressing issues, when others are addressing the situation and don’t require your intervention, when gathering more information is more important than having an immediate response, when you have no chance of satisfying your own concerns, and to let people cool down and reduce tension, and then readdress the concern at a later time.
  4. Collaborating is useful when there are important issues on both sides which can not be compromised, must be integrated into a solution, and when there is a need to work through hard feelings that are impacting interpersonal relationships.
  5. Compromising is useful when there are time constraints and solutions must be obtained quickly, when your issue is moderately important, when two opponents of equal power are strongly committed to differing goals but must reach a solution (ex. labor contracts), and as a back-up when collaboration or competition fails.

Effective leaders understand the value of all conflict styles. They readily adapt to the style most appropriate for the situation, and they intervene only when necessary.

Remember, without conflict there is no leadership!

How well do you manage conflict? Do you have a tendency to use one style more than others? Could the use of another style provide better results?

Here’s a Wealth of Information

Each week we’ll partner with QwikCoach and provide the ability for you to reinforce or expand your knowledge of a prior topic.

Last week’s tip focused on Listening.

Go to QwikTips to read more! There are two different versions–one for visitors and one for licensed QwikCoach users.

Help turn your leadership knowledge into leadership action!

09 Jun
PeopleTek Coaching Decision Making

Wake Up to Live Your Dream

In order to live your dream, you have to wake up!

Most people are sleep-walking through life, never becoming aware of why they are here and what they are supposed to do.

Wake up to your dream! Don’t just accept life as it has been given to you. Jump out of your comfort zone. Act decisively to create a life you love and will give you a sense of fulfillment.

Wake up! Drink deeply from the cup of knowledge, wisdom, silence and spirituality. Connect to the alarm clock of life and wake up to your dream! You have something special.

You have greatness within you!

–Les Brown